“When i was growing up” by Nellie Wong Essay

July 29, 2017 Cultural

1. title- When I was turning up ( verse form ) 2. Composer- Nellie Wong3. Year- 19974. What does this text high spot about the construct of individuality? This verse form is about the narrator’s ain assimilation into the dominant white civilization. and a demand to go something she in fact isn’t. It shows how society can act upon your individuality. because the storyteller wishes to be white as it is the dominant civilization and has ‘privileges’ with it. It shows how experiences and interactions with others and society can act upon your individuality. In this verse form. the storyteller lives in a society where she struggles to happen her ain voice and tantrum in a cultural bulk. The character in this verse form could hold represented society at the clip. a shallow society persistent on expressions. clamber coloring material and beauty and non focused on the interior beauty of adult females.

5. What is the connexion that you can do with this text and your prescribed text? ’When I was turning up’ and ‘Preludes’ by T. S Eliot portion a similar connexion in footings of individuality. The impact of society on the person in ‘When I Was Turning up’ is similar to how society caused the people in Preludes to lose their individuality. In ‘Preludes’ . forms of imagination appear throughout. particularly in the first portion. where people’s lives are controlled by what goes on in the universe around them. The images of decay and decomposition ‘burnt out ends’ . ‘grimy scraps’ . ‘withered leaves’ . ‘broken blinds’ expose a universe that is falling apart. Due to the humdrum and emptiness of their lives in a decaying universe. there is no individuality ; there is no life in the verse form. In this universe there is a loss of personal individuality and force per unit area for everyone to be the same and taking the same dull life.

Similarly. in ‘when I was turning up’ the narrator’s life is controlled by what is go oning around her. In the verse form. when Nellie was turning up. she was surrounded by thoughts forced upon her by society that it was better to be just. better to be white and non yellow ‘I began to have on fanciful picket skin’ . These thoughts transformed her into possessing a position of her that denied her the ability to appreciate her ain individuality as an Asiatic individual with xanthous tegument ‘I felt ashamed of some xanthous men’ . Due to her milieus. it forces her to presume another individuality that is non her ain in order to belong in a ‘model’ civilization. Society pressures her to go white. something that she isn’t. ‘when I read magazines. I saw films. light-haired film stars. white…desirable woman’ .

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6. What techniques does the composer usage to convey his/her thoughts about individuality? The techniques used in this verse form include rhetorical inquiries. imagination. and repeat. The metaphor in the image ‘ Chinatown as a ghetto for xanthous people’ was used to demo how their was a deficiency of freedom for the Asiatic immigrants. they struggled to suit into the cultural bulk. The repeat of the lines ‘when I was turning up’ at the start of each stanza. displays a mark of adulthood by adverting the yesteryear with the usage of the word ‘when’ . This remembrance of the yesteryear revealed how the talker had progressed or developed.

In this verse form. individuality of the dominant civilization is besides seemed to be linked with cleanliness ‘no affair hw much I bathed. I could non alter my skin’ . It shows how the poet wishes to alter who she is. due to the force per unit area of desiring to go white. but no affair how difficult she tried she couldn’t.

The verse form had a negative tone throughout ; there was ne’er a positive image. For illustration ‘”When I was turning up. I read magazines and saw films. light-haired film stars. white tegument. sensuous lips. a desirable adult females. I began to have on fanciful picket tegument. ” And ‘I felt ashamed of xanthous work forces. their little castanetss. their frail bodies… . ’ These images show how that she was ashamed of herself and had no assurance because she was dark. Due to the influence of the dominant civilization and their sterotyping. she felt like she needed to alter her individuality in order to belong. By get the better ofing these racial stereotypes. she is able to hammer an individuality of her ain piece life in a universe where her civilization is looked down on.

But in the terminal of the verse form. there is a rhetorical inquiry ‘I know now that one time I longed to be white. How many more ways? you ask. Haven’t I told you plenty? It is through this that she eventually accepts her ain individuality as a Chinese American and finds her ain topographic point in the universe.

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