Langston Hughes No Name Woman

Everyone has an Identity, including a dog who has a home or a stray cat who has a history in the neighborhood. Identity is something that represents you and your life and how people will look at you and know you. Identity is something you create while you grow up throughout your life. You can create one and change it however you like. In three essays of the name of No Name Woman by Maxine Hong Kingston, I just wanna be Average by Mike Rose and Salvation by Langston Hughes. In these essays they all found an Identity by going their own routes they think is best for them and while following that route they create their own Identity.

In the essay No Name Woman by Maxine Hong Kingston, she grew up in a very strict Chinese household who
are take their culture very serious thinking that any sexual passion could lead to adultery or incest and therefore threatened the social order. If the family member breaks that rule they will be shunned by the family, a disgrace and try to forget they were part of the family. So they're Identity was to be a pure woman to wait till they married and be impregnated by the husband and to only serve for the husband pretty much. Kingston was under this rule, and while hearing the story of her aunt she questions if she really wants to have that identity.

In No Name, Woman Kingston mother tells her a story of her aunt who was impregnated by another man, villagers destroying everything of her home including the livestock. Upon everything the next day they found her lifeless body inside of the well with her child. After the story, she told her Kingston mother made it seemed as if the aunt cheated on her husband. She told this story as a warning telling her “ ...Now that you have started to menstruate, what happened to her could happen to you. Don't humiliate us. You wouldn't like to be forgotten as if you were never born” (Kingston 229).

Because Kingston cannot ask about her aunt, she invents her own fantasies about why her aunt gave in to her forbidden dreams. She thinks of her aunt as a shy woman who was raped by a man. She denies the idea that her aunt was a loose woman who sought the attention of other men. She saw her aunt as a rebel who stepped out of the Chinese society and tradition role. Kingston saw that tradition a way to keep the village in place and for all to relate to something. She sees her aunt as a woman who gives into a dangerous sexual passion and is shunned out by her village, this is linked to the struggle with Kingston herself, who is trying to make sense of the old custom Chinese tradition that she only knows from her mother. Kingston began to think about her Identity how she does not fit the custom Chinese but having a sort of rebellious type of Identity. Kingston is trying to find her Identity but she knows it is not with the custom Chinese.

In the essay Salvation by Langston Hughes, it talks about how Hughes family is very into church and how they love the christ.
In the essay, Hughes believed in Jesus because his aunt always talks about him and so he thinks proudly that he will see him. When all the “little lambs” went to the front one by one they were seeing Jesus being “cleansed” from their sins “...and he held out his arms to all us young sinners there on the mourner's bench. And the little girls cried. And some of them jumped up and went to Jesus right away. But most of us just sat there”(Hughes 183). But as he waited for his turn he never felt or saw Jesus to him. He saw as one of the “little lambs” named Westley lied and even cursed in the church, he decided to stand up making everyone believes he has seen Jesus. Hughes felt very guilty lying to everyone that he has seen Jesus, but he was also very upset that Jesus did not come to him “...but my aunt heard me, she woke up and told my uncle I was crying because the Holy Ghost came into my life, and I had seen Jesus. But I was really crying because I couldn’t bear to tell her that I lied…”(Hughes
184).

Hughes Identity, in the beginning, was him being a boy who loved Jesus and was waiting to see him and waiting fo the minute that he will see Jesus in person. He was a believer like everyone in the church. But after he realized that he did not see Jesus everything crumbled down and he is now a non-believer because he did not come to him when he expected him “...I hadn’t seen Jesus, and that now I didn't believe there was a Jesus anymore since he didn't come to help me (Hughes 184).

In the essay Just Walk On By by Brent Staples, Staples explains how throughout his life others have discriminated against him because he is a tall, black man who works as a journalist in a predominantly white field.
He explains, how he first realized how much his appearance frightened others, particularly a white woman when he used to take late night walks as a graduate student. While he understands that he lives in a culture that is increasingly violent and dangerous, he begins o feel very frustrated that black men, are still judge and misjudge based on their appearance “To her, the youngish black man—a broad six feet two inches with a beard and billowing hair, both hands shoved into the pockets of a bulky military jacket—seemed menacingly close. After a few more quick glimpses, she picked up her pace and was soon running in earnest. Within seconds she disappeared into a cross street. “ (Staples
394).

Brent Identity is more like “I have to be someone who safe for them to know I’m safe” so he has to play many identities even though he is a good guy himself. His Identity is a kind man who won't hurt a fly, he allows others to see him for who he really is: a cultured and sensitive man than that black man who looks suspicious might be a burglar or a rapist.

Out of all the essays I have read, they all have to do something with an identity. They all talk about themselves and they struggle to stay themselves and show others they are who they are. Of course the different of all the essays I have read they all have different stories and different methods of handling they're Identity and they're own lives. They were all searching for themselves and acceptance from others. Some do not care if others do not but others do. They did find they're true selves and ended up writing an extremely good essay while at it. They tell us they're lives and how they found themselves. To have an identity you have to do it yourselves and choose the right path that will decide who you are. That's what an Identity is, something that explains you.

In the three essays No name woman by Maxine Hong Kingston who talks about her aunt life becoming nonexistent but having fantasies on how she really thinks her aunt was relating to her since she did not know what was her Identity. Then there was Salvation by Langston Hughes, whose Identity went from being a believer to a non-believer. Lastly, there was Just Walk On By by Brent Staples a young black man whose Identity is being stripped to being something he is not, even when he is a truly kind man. All of these authors Identity came along to them through their lives. Kingston relates with her aunt, Hughes became a non-believer due to pretty much stripped from his fantasies, and Staples because people just threw it at him. Their essay explains why they have an identity.