Reflective Statement

Naomi H.
Period: 5
Reflective statement: From Sleep Unbound
How was your understanding of cultural and contextual considerations of the work developed through the interactive oral? In other words, what did you learn that didn’t know before?

In the novel From Sleep Unbound by Andree Chedid, there is a major cultural difference from American culture. Through the interactive oral and reading the novel, I learned that one of the main differences is the role of women. In the novel, which is set in twentieth century Egypt, women were inferior to men. Until they got married, some girls went to school, like the main character Samya. Others awaited marriage. The marriages were usually arranged and the girls would be young at the time of their marriage. In these marriages, women were expected to obey their husband by having male children. Normally, the men these young women married had wealth so they would have servants to do the housework. Also during this time, if you were not married before your teen years were over you would be looked down upon. The interactive oral helped me to further understand the difference of cultures. I was able to compare many situations from the novel to the world today. For example, in the United Sates women are given more freedom. We are allowed to make our own decisions and are not forced to marry men we do not love. In other countries, however, the role of women has not changed since the time of the novel. Women are still seen as the inferior sex. They are still facing arranged marriages and expected to have male children. They are not allowed to voice their opinions or think for themselves. I also learned that sometimes trying to fight against a certain situation will not always have positive results. For example, Samya deciding to kill her husband was an act of rebellion. Through the novel we see her being mistreated by her husband Boutros. She felt alone and that she had nothing to live for because she was not happy with her situation. With this act, her fate was then sealed because death would be the punishment for a woman, being lower class, to kill a man that is superior. This was all occurring in a male dominated society meaning that the people who would decide her fate would rule in favor of punishing her. Overall, the interactive oral helped me to use the novel as a way to not only understand another culture but to think about what is going on globally today.