Preview

Assimilate the New Culture

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
558 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Assimilate the New Culture
The Smolinski family in Bread Givers was a typical immigrant family who faced struggles during the assimilation process. By looking at Sara and her father¡¯s perspectives that there is a gap of cultural differences and generational differences separated between them, where most immigrants¡¯ family faces. As a child of immigrant Sara was bound by her native culture, but she unlike her other sisters took the courage and effort by abandoning her own culture to assimilate the dominant American culture. She also have sacrificed her family separation, her youth and experiencing hardship in order to pursuit her dream.
Sara and her father¡¯s argument about cultural and generational differences are similarly to most immigrants¡¯ family. Reb Smolinski, Sara¡¯s father considered as a conservative, religious and stubborn personality represented the old culture. Whereas the daughter, Sara a person of individualism, radical, and the desire of self-identity, which symbolized Americanism. As the story were happened a hundred years ago which were completely different than the world we live today. Reb Smolinski thinks men are the heads of family that women have to be at men¡¯s command. He breaks up her daughters and their lovers by using his own intelligence to matching to the men that his daughters actually do not like. He also does not accept the mistakes that he did; such as the even of the diamond dealer Moe Mirsky turn out as a fraud that he is actually a salesperson in a diamon store and the purchase of the grocery store also because of his own mistake. The modern ideology Sara had that she can not stand of her father¡¯s behavior because she does not want her destiny had the same result as her other three sisters.
Finally, Sara took the courage and effort by deserting her own culture to assimilate the new culture. Sara knows the only way for her to assimilate the American culture is to leave her cautious father and went to college to become a teacher, which is her

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Julia Alvarez “arrived in the United States at a time in history that was not very welcoming to people who were different.” Alvarez was stereotyped and hurt because of her ethnic background. Her tone emphasized the depressing nature of the situation and the disappointment of losing everything and the treatment receive in the USA. Her tone of depression and disappointment emphasizes the pain she experienced because of the judgment in America. As her essay comes to a close her tone shifts to hopeful and relaxed. Alvarez is accepted into America “through the wide doors of its literature.” Her introduction to literature allowed her to begin to feel accepted into society. Since Alvarez is accepted into society because of her assimilation through literature she becomes hopeful for her new prospect and relaxed to finally be understood. Overall, the tone shift from depressed and disappointed to hopeful and relaxed is significant because it emphasizes the central idea of mistreatment occurring within a new society and leads to acceptance with assimilation.…

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    In How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents, Julia Alvarez discusses the four girls’transition from the Dominican Republic to America. The Garcia’s are an immigrant family who must find a balance between their identity as Dominicans and their new identities as Americans. Yolanda, the sister on whom the story primarily focuses, must find a balance between the strict and old fashioned culture she comes from and the new, innovative and radical culture she is now learning to embrace. Immigration challenges Yolanda and her sisters to create a bi-cultural identity—a task at which they ultimately fail. They embark on a search to find themselves, feeling torn between two distinctly different and opposing…

    • 1767 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    In the book “Bread Givers” by Anzia Yezierska a young girl from poland grows up in america. Set in the 1920s conditions for immigrants living in the United States were tough, not to mention living in the lower East side of Manhattan, New York. Reb Smolinsky the father of Sara in this book really tries on impressing his beliefs onto his children for he is very set on his traditional ways. This becomes a very prominent underlying to the story as Sara grows throughout the book moving from her fathers beliefs to her own. This clash between the “old way” of doing things and her new american life style Sara breaks free from this conflict in finding her own identity in this new world. By doing so Sara really connect and Identifies with three main factors in her life independence, education and hard work. With these three basic elements in Sara’s life she really transitions into her own being and self identity.…

    • 1197 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Bread Givers

    • 1012 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Bread Givers, by Anzia Yezierska, is a novel about Sara Smolinsky, and her struggle remaining in the old world traditions or heading to the ever-changing new world. The novel has multiple themes, however, the main theme, of Anzia Yezierska’s writing, is the old world versus the new world.…

    • 1012 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Identity In Bread Givers

    • 1966 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Bread Givers is a novel written by a Jewish lady Yezierska Anzia in 1925, the novel covers a number of aspects. The set up is in the old Manhattan in the United States of America, in the 1920s. The author is believed to have migrated from Poland to United States of America in the year 1890. The novel talks about a poor Jewish immigrant named Reb Smolinsky, who has four daughters namely, Bessie, Mashah, Faniah, and Sara. Sara goes against the beliefs of her father by adopting divergent views. This paper seeks to explore how identities are shaped by cultural and societal influence within the context of equality and inequality.…

    • 1966 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The text emphasizes the hardships that immigrants often have to endure when going into a new country in the search of a better life or the American dream as many call it. The text potentially symbolizes America’s people as well as its culture because America has and is still today very diverse due to the wide variety of races, religions, and cultures that immigrants introduce when they come here. America can be seen as a melting pot because the different nationalities, cultures, and ethnicities of immigrants eventually “melt” together to create a common culture although several immigrants choose to retain their culture no matter what. The majority if not all immigrants leave behind everything they know and love to try and get a better life in a new country where there are more opportunities. America has always been a popular choice for immigrants as it has a plentiful of resources to offer such as employment, freedom of religion, and better education programs. Immigrants often choose to leave their home country because they have a family to sustain and their home country is simply not adequate for their necessities. In My Ántonia Willa Cather really focuses on the struggles that immigrants face upon arriving to their new country. People often think it is easy for immigrants to simply leave and go into other countries but Willa proves that it is quite the opposite. Immigrants do not immediately get a better life upon arriving to a new country which is depressing but it is the truth. Immigrants still have to face new problems that come with the change of countries. The problems that immigrants face in the new countries can sometimes be worse than the problems they faced at home which can be really discouraging. Willa Cather portrays the hardships that many immigrants struggle through the story of the Shimerdas, “tony was barefooted, and she shivered in her cotton dress and was…

    • 1088 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Analysis of Barefoot Heart

    • 1879 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Hart draws a childhood picture of endurance, inconsistency, and wants on many levels as well as the struggle to escape and the compulsion to remain in her migrant society. Elva had to struggle with living in the different societies as her family travelled each year to Minnesota from Texas so the adults and older children could work in the beet fields as manual laborers. Elva also didn’t have the sense of belonging or the security of her siblings of belonging to that community of the other families working together in the fields. Her father (Apa) did require that his family return early each year to Pearsall, Texas so his children could receive a proper education. He was very adamant about all of his kids graduating from school. In her own family, she had a sense of isolation since she was the youngest child and was unable to work the fields; she could only stay on the sidelines and watch. The first summer, Elva and her sister were separated from their family and had to live in a place supervised by nuns. The following summers while on the side of the fields watching for Apa’s signal to bring them water, she passed most of her time in virtual solitude. Elva remembers her birthday being celebrated only once during her…

    • 1879 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    The graphic novel American Born Chinese (2006), by Gene Luen Yang, is a very modern and influential piece of work that can be compared to the short indie film Two Lies (1990), directed and written by Pamela Tom, which had preceded the novel by 16 years. These two different forms of work, both utilizing their ability to teach the audience, are used as powerful venues for the topic of identity crisis among the Asian people in a majority European American world. In the film, we have Mei and her family who are all having some trouble adjusting to their lives in Southern California but more specifically we have Mei and her trouble to understand her mother 's cause and intent for having undergone double eye-lid surgery. In ABC, we have our protagonist, Jin, who is having trouble fitting into his new school in San Francisco since he is one of the very few Asian admitted to the school. Another time line in the novel is the story of the monkey king who does anything to get rid of the fact that he is a monkey in order to fit into society. The third is the story of Danny, a European American who has trouble and often becomes embarrassed with his hyperbolic Chinese cousin, Chin-Kee. This character is first introduced by saying "Harro Amellica!" while Jin 's father, carrying giant Chinese take out container says "I 'll put your luggage into your room, Chin-Kee" (48). All three of these time line show our characters having some sort of shame or embarrassment to the fact that their own image or background is different from those around them.…

    • 2458 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Laura, a Mexican immigrant and student in Rose’s remedial English class, has a completely different frame of reference than California born UCLA students she finds herself in class with. She remembers in detail how her father made a meager living as a “food vendor” in Tijuana. The types of food, the smells and the other items he sold are cannot be forgotten by Laura. She emigrated, with her parents, to the United States at the age of six (Rose 1). These memories keep her connected to Mexico.…

    • 1076 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    What are the differences between “cultural assimilation” stance and the “cultural pluralist” stance as defined by Ting-Toomey and Chung? Which stance do you subscribe in consideration of immigrant issues? Why?…

    • 370 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Jurgis And Onas Summary

    • 593 Words
    • 3 Pages

    This is a story of a Lithuanian immigrant name Jurgis Rudkus who came to America with his new bride Ona and their families. Like all immigrants who come to America hoping to like the America dream he moves his family to America to work in a meatpacking company in Chicago. This story tells of the hardships of Jurgis and his family, they encounter a lot of difficulties Starvation and poverty, hard and unsafe working conditions, crooked businessman who took their money, and corrupt politicians who made laws to allow the things that Jurgis went through to happen. And because of all the hardships he and his family go through opened his eyes and accepts the new political and economic revolution of socialism.…

    • 593 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    On a crisp night in Boston, all seemed well as Diane enjoyed a nice meal with her family, and the next day, her mom, dad, and brother were stolen by US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, and she was stranded. The book In the Country We Love: My Family Divided, tells us the life story of Diane Guerrero, a Colombian girl who was born in the United States, unlike her parents and brother who were both born in Colombia. The author tells a heartbreaking story of a girl’s resilience in frightening situations, like isolation and poverty. Diane’s home life was turned upside down, but despite the countless number of nightmarish situations, Diane strived and pursued her dreams with no aid…

    • 757 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Furthermore, it was impossible for Sara to escape poverty under her fathers roof. Sara’s father, Reb Smolinsky, became her main obstacle. While Sara lived with her father she was forced to live under poor conditions. Every penny her father earned would be sent away to charities across the world. Although donating money was for the right reasons, Sara’s father failed to realize that his own family was struggling in poverty. In reality, they barely had enough food to eat each night. On top of that, Sara and her sisters struggled to find jobs. In addition, Sara had to watch as her father wasted his money due to his lack of wisdom in American business. Reb, Sara’s father, purchased a store that did not have supplies nor could help them earn a…

    • 194 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Cultural Invasion

    • 485 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The invasion of any nation to destroy the enemy‘s internal structure and values is called the cultural invasion. These invasions are usually planned and cause many problems according to their intensities. Pakistani culture is also facing many trials and tribulations due to the cultural invasion by India. We are losing our legendary values and ethics. The Indian cultural is prevailing like the darkness. Our younger generation is showing more tendencies towards it and our Pakistani culture is seen rarely among them. We can use our media, educational institutes and seminars to promote our culture.…

    • 485 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    This research study also attempted to examine this component in a “heterogeneous community” where tribal families live along with other social groups. And it is observed that where tribal concentration is of reasonable size, they stay together in a hamlet within the geographical boundary of the revenue village. In this way they maintain their tribal identity and keep their culture intact among themselves. But tribal social assimilation is restricted in nature leaving a few situations like common village festival and life cycle events. The study also observed that apart from independent identity, there is a community sentiment and we feeling among all the community members in relation to common…

    • 2393 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Good Essays