Final Paper: “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down” By: Anne Fadiman Meghan Maloney 26 April 2013 To understand the struggles that the Hmong people face living in America it is important to understand where they come from and what they have gone through. The majority of the Hmong people originate from the mountainous country of Laos. The mountains created isolation from the neighboring cultures and cultivated a clan identity. They were part of a society where everyone worked together
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novel‚ Never Fall Down‚ a group by the name of the Khmer Rouge invades Cambodia and takes all of their people. They have all of the power at the time‚ and force the people to work against their will. This turned out to be one of most devastating periods in history. Others may claim that power brings
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The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down - Summary and Reading Log Chapter 1 - Birth Chapter 1 goes through the traditional birthing methods and traditions of the Hmong people. One of the most significant traditions is burying the placenta. The placenta has to be strategically buried in a specific spot under the homes dirt floor or when the person dies its soul has to travel back to the placenta. This chapter also introduces the characters Nao Kao and Foua Lee. Nao is husband and father of 13
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The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down Being culturally competent is essential in caring for the lives of others. As a nurse you will be caring for individuals and families who may or may not have the same beliefs and values and yourself. Despite the differences the nurse must be able to ask the appropriate questions‚ seek out tools that are going to help the client and family understand the importance of their care‚ and feel comfortable when
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Never Fall Down Summary Arn Chorn-Pond‚ the protagonist of the novel‚ Never Fall Down‚ is a typical 11-year-old boy growing up in Battambang‚ a rice-harvesting village in western Cambodia. The residents of Battambang are vivacious‚ and the entire village is prospering. However‚ when the Khmer Rouge‚ a radical Communist regime‚ seize power in April of 1975‚ Arn’s unpretentious life changes dramatically. Suddenly‚ his once playful‚ carefree lifestyle is filled with tribulations and tragedies
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Arn Chorn-Pond Arn Chorn-Pond is the main character in “Never Fall Down”. The book is from the real story of Arn Chorn-Pond‚ and its written by Patricia McCormick. It’s about a poor boy that lives in Cambodia. He experienced wars‚ Khmer Rouge and the extreme things you have to do to survive. Arn survived through his smartness‚ kindness and sometimes coldness. Arn survives mainly due him being smart all the time. Firstly‚ under the Khmer Rouge Arn joined the band that plays music to drown the sounds
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Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down Journal #2 In The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down‚ by Anne Fadiman‚ Lia Lee is a very sickly child‚ and is now unfortunately a “vegetable.” Much to the hospitals chagrin‚ they in fact are the reason why Lia is in a comatose state. The Lee’s argued with the doctors throughout Lia’s entire 4 years of medical strife with epilepsy about the medication and the way they were treating Lia. Fadiman juxtaposes the differences of the Hmong way of healing people:
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December 11‚ 2012 Section 1: Who is the one to delineate fault for a miscommunication and misunderstanding between two cultures? In Anne Fadiman’s novel‚ The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down‚ she begins the novel as an attempt to allocate responsibility for the mistreatment and exacerbation of Lia Lee’s epilepsy. The tension between the Hmong and United States medical culture exemplified the strain in America between a foreign culture dependent on rituals and society’s norm. As the novel progress
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Praise for The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down “Fadiman describes with extraordinary skill the colliding worlds of Western medicine and Hmong culture.” —The New Yorker “This fine book recounts a poignant tragedy…It has no heroes or villains‚ but it has an abundance of innocent suffering‚ and it most certainly does have a moral…[A] sad‚ excellent book.” —Melvin Konner‚ The New York Times Book Review “An intriguing‚ spirit-lifting‚ extraordinary exploration of two cultures in uneasy
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ailment. According to Fadiman (1997)‚ “…the noise of the door had been so profoundly frightening that her soul had fled her body and become lost. They recognized the resulting symptoms as qaug dab peg‚ which means ‘the spirit catches you and you fall down’”(p.20). To the Lee family‚ Lia’s condition was as revered as it was frightening. While a person with qaug dab peg was traditionally held in high esteem in the Hmong culture‚ it was also terrifying enough that the Lee’s rushed Lia to the emergency
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