Jamaica Kincaid The Lessons

In Toni Cade Bambara’s “The Lesson”, readers read through the perspective of a young black girl named Sylvia. She, along with her cousin and a few friends, are taken on educational field trips with an educated African American woman named Ms. Moore. Sylvia believes she just wants to prevent them from having any fun and finds Ms. Moore to be odd person because she makes it clear that she wants an involvement in their lives. It is an involvement that is seen as a total nuisance. Yet as their teacher, she tries to give them an education that is hard for them to achieve due to their families’ financial status and how the color of their skin affects their position in the world.

Thesis : In her story “ The Lesson” Toni Cade Bambara emphasizes social differences are caused by the economic differences of the world. These social differences and economic kids go through are connected together. Sylvia and Sugar differ especially when it comes to being able to deal with the reality of things not the way they envisioned it. Sylvia is not able to come to grips with the reality of what she saw.

It is fair to argue that dissecting one’s own ignorance is not an easy task to accomplish without a great capacity for self-analysis. In her essay “In History”, Jamaica Kincaid appears to criticize herself by exposing her ignorance and vulnerability to her readers. Why would she want to be criticized in this way? Is she challenging her readers by openly inviting them to judge her—yet also hinting at the fact that they should observe their own limitations? Indeed, this is precisely what Kincaid does, and she chooses the perfect theme through which to explore~ the flaws of her thought-process: history.

In the short story “Growing” by Helena Maria Viramontes, the author focuses on the forces that separate women from being themselves and rights to live their own lives. In the story, the father forces the youngest sister in the family, Lucia, to chaperone her older sister, Naomi. The reason he compels Lucia to chaperone her sister is to report Naomi’s every action, behavior and conversation to him. Despite Naomi wonders why her father refused to trust her and put someone to spy on her, the only reply from her father is “TU ERES MUJER” (36). Naomi was being punished just because her gender identity.

In the short story “Blackness” by Jamaica Kincaid, the narrator’s consciousness develops through a process of realization that she does not have to choose between the culture imposed on her and her authentic heritage. First, the narrator explains the metaphor “blackness” for the colonization her country that fills her own being and eventually becomes one with it. Unaware of her own nature, in isolation she is “all purpose and industry… as if [she] were the single survivor of a species” (472). Describing the annihilation of her culture, the narrator shows how “blackness” replaced her own culture with the ideology of the colonizers.

Lesson Learned Toni Cade Bambara creates a character that is way too smart to ignore what is happening around her in the real world. Throughout the story story, she learns that there is a difference between the rich and the poor, and even though it isn’t fair is not fair, it is very real. By the end, Sylvia, a rebellious, “terrorize the West Indian kids and take their hair ribbons and their money” (625) kind of girl with terrible people skills, living in a typical African American neighborhood finds she experiences a huge attitude adjustment in regards to her outlook on not just money, but life in Bambara’s The Lesson.

GIRL by Jamacia Kincaid essay by Eric Richard and Kaden Chen 1: The short story GIRL by Jamacia Kincaid expresses the tone in its title by representing how any woman can be overwhelmed and commanded by others around her. 2: This is mirrored in the tone of the mother figure, which is also very demeaning and heartless to her daughter. 3: Throughout the story, the main character is lectured about how to be a perfect girl in society, including setting tables, dressing right, interacting with men, and other mannerisms. 4: The mother tells the girl all the information about being a woman in one sentence while not allowing her to respond, and when the girl does, the mother just brushes her off.

Mother of Education Some children are not as fortunate to be given wonderful lives like their peers. Furthermore, the mother and father of every little boy and little girl do not always set the best examples. In “The Lesson”, Miss Moore seeks to educate the children of the neighborhood. She takes them to a store in town, trying to help them better understand the issues with income inequality. Confidence, intelligence, and passion-- these are all qualities that Miss Moore, a motherly figure, exhibits while impacting the children 's education.

The symbols present in “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara, depict the economic and social injustices faced by specific members of society, specifically the children in the story. The characters in the story are being mentored by Miss Moore, a woman from their block who has taken up the role of taking them out on weekly outings. The story touches on the situation of the children that are stuck in living in almost poverty. “The Lesson” focuses on the socioeconomic disparities between the different racial groups and how. Bambara uses several techniques such as irony, othering, and second person point of view to make the story meaningful and demonstrate the characteristics of the characters.

In her thought provoking essay “In History,” author Jamaica Kincaid explores the idea of naming things in a historical context through various anecdotes. Kincaid makes a purposeful choice to tell her story non chronologically, beginning with the tale of Columbus, putting her own reflection on plant nomenclature in the middle, and ending with an overview of Carl Linnaeus, the inventor of the plant naming system. This choice gives Kincaid the opportunity to fully vet out each point that she makes, an opportunity she wouldn’t have gotten had she written her essay in chronological order. Throughout each anecdote that Kincaid tells, the theme of names and giving things names is central. Kincaid argues that by giving something a name, one unrightfully takes ownership of it and erases its history.

The story Girl is very well written by the mother showing

Social inequalities between black and white people are no longer as distinct as they were a few decades ago. Nevertheless, many people still have a lot of prejudices against African-Americans. The unfairness of socioeconomic status can be seen in our daily lives yet it is something that we push to the back of our minds. By showing these social inequalities through the use of language, Toni Cade Bambara 's short story "The Lesson" raises awareness for the African-American pursuit of cultural identity and emancipation. The reader gains an insight into the world of a black working class girl, named Sylvia, who narrates the story in African American vernacular English (AAVE).

As it has been said before, this is a feminist rewriting of the classical version of Cinderella written by Perrault or the Grimm brothers that consists of three short stories: “The Mutilated Girls”, “The Burned Child” and “Travelling Clothes”. The first one, “The Mutilated Girls” follows more or less the classical plot since Carter says that if she had changed it, she would have had to “provide a past for all these people, equip them with three dimensions ... they would have to learn to think and everything would change” (Carter 1993: 113). In this story she pays more attention to paternity and maternity.

A wise woman once said, "The more a daughter knows about her mother 's life, the stronger the daughter" (http://www.wiseoldsayings.com/mother-and-daughter-quotes/). As any girl raised by their mother can attest, the relationship between a mother and her daughter is a learning experience. As young girls, you look up to you mother as your greatest role model and follow in their steps closely. In Jamaica Kincaid 's short story "Girl", a mother uses one single sentence in order to give her daughter motherly advice. Her advice is intended to help her daughter, but also to scold her at the same time.

The time when this story took place was a time when women were viewed as second class citizens. Mothers had traditional roles, which usually left them in the house, while men also had their roles, outside of the