Essay Available:
Pages:
4 pages/≈1100 words
Sources:
3
Style:
MLA
Subject:
Literature & Language
Type:
Essay
Language:
English (U.S.)
Document:
MS Word
Date:
Total cost:
$ 14.4
Topic:
Being Human despite Cultural Differences
Essay Instructions:
Please use the question to answer for the essay
Pls, highlight the (Hook & Thesis)
Essay for Fiction
\\\"Who\\\'s Irish\\\" by Gish Jen
- Explain the theme of the short story you have chosen to analyze. Include in your analysis support for your theme by including a discussion of how characters, narrator point of view, setting, plot, symbolism, or irony helped the author convey his or her theme. You can choose just one literary element of the story, such as characters, to support the theme, or you can choose more than one. It's your choice. You must use specific support from the story you choose as a primary source, and you are required to use at least two secondary sources to support your analysis. Be sure to summarize, briefly, the story in the introduction paragraph, which could be your hook essentially.
Focusing on Plot
1. The beginning –what is the first thing that happens in the story, and in what time period and setting?
2. The middle - What happens next, and next, and after that? Be as specific as you can.
3. Suspense - What does the author do to create it?
4. Conflict? Crisis? Climax? – What is the conflict? Where in the plot is the crisis? What is the climax of the plot and its consequences?
5. Denouement- What is the unknotting of the plot?
6. The ending = What happens as the author brings the story to its close? Is everything or are at least some things resolved and settled? Or not?
Focusing on Point of View
7. In what point of view is the story narrated? First? Third?
8. If the narrator is in the first person point of view, is the narrator reliable?
9. If the narrator is in the third person point of view, is it omniscient? How so? Neutral? Editorial? Selective?
10. How does point of view in this story affect the telling of it?
Focusing on Characters
1. Who is the protagonist?
2. Who is the antagonist?
3. What action does each character do?
4. What dialogue goes on? What do they say to each other?
5. What is the appearance of the characters?
6. What do we learn about how the character thinks or feels?
7. Does the setting shape the characters?
8. Does the author show or tell about the characters?
9. What connections can you make between the characters in one story to another?
Focusing on Setting
11. What is the setting when the story beings?
12. Does the action remain in this setting throughout or does the author move from one setting to another? Are they similar or different from each other?
13. What does the author show us in action or tell us in description of the setting?
14. How much detail about the setting does the author give us?
15. Does the setting become symbolic throughout the story?
16. How is the main character affected or shaped by the setting?
Essay Sample Content Preview:
Name
Professor
Subject
April 2013
Being Human despite Cultural Differences
"Who`s Irish" deals with the clash of cultures between eastern and western standards and the conflict that it introduces to the characters. The main theme of the story is that despite the differences we are all the same—we are all human beings... Regardless of culture, beliefs and perspective, we are all human beings who have the same biological needs, emotional longings and we all need to love and be loved. Dori Kelsey states that when we are talking about culture, things that are most commonly thought of are the outward manifestations of a system of values, assumptions, and deeply rooted beliefs which are conveyed by the particular customs, food, arts and patterns of behavior by a specific country. A social group is what defines culture being that they as a whole faces and reacts to the challenges of life. Culture is then learned by experience by those who are taught the learned customs through the experience of others passed by the older to the younger (Kelsey, Culture as a Barrier to Communication).
The story, "Who`s Irish" by Gish Jen is a story about a Chinese grandmother and the clashing of two different cultures melded together by marriage of different races. It revolves around the view point of the Chinese grandma as she discusses issues such as lack of communication, cultural misunderstanding, age gaps, and gaps in family relationships. She has to take care of her granddaughter as the parents are always busy with their own stuff. The grandmother is very strict and rigid with her own culture and she compares her culture to that of the western culture especially the Irish family whom her daughter is related by marriage with John. John is the son-in-law of the grandmother, and the grandmother sees him as a lowly or flawed white or westerner because he doesn`t have a job even though he is a white man. The grandmother, even though she doesn`t like the sons, admires the mother of John because of her persevering and positive behavior in life. The grandmother, being Chinese, is hard in guiding her granddaughter. She would always impose the Chinese culture on her granddaughter. Her granddaughter as she describes her is wild and willful. Things come into crisis when the granddaughter shows the gap between their cultures when she disobeyed her grandmother and made her feel of the distance between them in terms of communication, culture, age and behavior. That is when they are spotted by the grand daughter`s parents who then saw the grandmother`s handling of their child. Because of that event, major changes were integrated into their lives mainly the putting of distance between the grandma and grandchild, and the living together of the Chinese grandmother and the Irish grandmother whom she admired.
The story begins with the introduction of the characters of the story by the grandmother. It is revealed that she is a proud Chinese mother who had proud Chinese culture integrated into her very core. She speaks of herself as fierce for she is feared by many including her husband and hardworking for she always works with full determination. She then talks about her daughter who is also fierce because she is a bank vice president and quite ambitious. Then she talks about the Shea family, a family consisting of four sons, all without jobs, and their mother, hardworking and persevering (Jen 80). Here, the difference of cultures is emphasized giving the reader the needed information to idealize the conflict of the story.
In the middle of the sto...
Professor
Subject
April 2013
Being Human despite Cultural Differences
"Who`s Irish" deals with the clash of cultures between eastern and western standards and the conflict that it introduces to the characters. The main theme of the story is that despite the differences we are all the same—we are all human beings... Regardless of culture, beliefs and perspective, we are all human beings who have the same biological needs, emotional longings and we all need to love and be loved. Dori Kelsey states that when we are talking about culture, things that are most commonly thought of are the outward manifestations of a system of values, assumptions, and deeply rooted beliefs which are conveyed by the particular customs, food, arts and patterns of behavior by a specific country. A social group is what defines culture being that they as a whole faces and reacts to the challenges of life. Culture is then learned by experience by those who are taught the learned customs through the experience of others passed by the older to the younger (Kelsey, Culture as a Barrier to Communication).
The story, "Who`s Irish" by Gish Jen is a story about a Chinese grandmother and the clashing of two different cultures melded together by marriage of different races. It revolves around the view point of the Chinese grandma as she discusses issues such as lack of communication, cultural misunderstanding, age gaps, and gaps in family relationships. She has to take care of her granddaughter as the parents are always busy with their own stuff. The grandmother is very strict and rigid with her own culture and she compares her culture to that of the western culture especially the Irish family whom her daughter is related by marriage with John. John is the son-in-law of the grandmother, and the grandmother sees him as a lowly or flawed white or westerner because he doesn`t have a job even though he is a white man. The grandmother, even though she doesn`t like the sons, admires the mother of John because of her persevering and positive behavior in life. The grandmother, being Chinese, is hard in guiding her granddaughter. She would always impose the Chinese culture on her granddaughter. Her granddaughter as she describes her is wild and willful. Things come into crisis when the granddaughter shows the gap between their cultures when she disobeyed her grandmother and made her feel of the distance between them in terms of communication, culture, age and behavior. That is when they are spotted by the grand daughter`s parents who then saw the grandmother`s handling of their child. Because of that event, major changes were integrated into their lives mainly the putting of distance between the grandma and grandchild, and the living together of the Chinese grandmother and the Irish grandmother whom she admired.
The story begins with the introduction of the characters of the story by the grandmother. It is revealed that she is a proud Chinese mother who had proud Chinese culture integrated into her very core. She speaks of herself as fierce for she is feared by many including her husband and hardworking for she always works with full determination. She then talks about her daughter who is also fierce because she is a bank vice president and quite ambitious. Then she talks about the Shea family, a family consisting of four sons, all without jobs, and their mother, hardworking and persevering (Jen 80). Here, the difference of cultures is emphasized giving the reader the needed information to idealize the conflict of the story.
In the middle of the sto...
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