Bharati Mukherjee Two Ways To Live In America Analysis

But yet, this is not the case for most immigrants in the United States. When immigrants come over to the U.S. they carry over new traditions that can be side-eyed by American citizens. An immigrant may have an accent or practice religion not common here and will stick out of what is considered normal in America. In the day, immigrants can “wrap their babies in the American flag, feed them mashed hot dogs and apple pie” to fit in and avoid conflict with patriotic citizens. At night they can “whisper in Spanish or Polish when the babies sleep” (Mora, 132) to hang on to what little pieces they have left of their original selves. This shame of having to hide who a person is stems from harassment received with an immigrants’ so called “freedom”. Pressure created to fit in causes most people to completely change who they are, like in the short story Two Kings by Amy Tan. Jing-mei’s mother belief is “you could be anything you wanted to be in America”. (Tan, 133) Jing-mei’s mother heavily believed this and through the story saw famous or talented Americans and tried to turn her daughter into what she saw. It wasn’t enough for the mother to have a simple daughter, so she took every opportunity she had to mold her daughter into a American prodigy that she saw on the

I have lived in two different worlds. The duality of the immigrant experience is a battle that every first-generation child has to wage. As I conquered my language barrier, a whole new world full of traditions and customs opened up. Seeking acceptance from my peers, it was hard not to adopt their culture and ignore my own in the process. However, abandonment was not an option in a family with a strong cultural identity. While there was nothing wrong with either culture, finding middle ground proved to be an ongoing journey.

Every year we see family emigrate to other countries, and they face many challenges. The stories “Sweet, Sour, and Resentful”, by Firoozeh Dumas, and from “Fish Cheeks”, by Amy Tan, share similar cultures and really interesting stories. Also, both families from the essay share several challenges that they are face when they move to the United States of America. The two families share many similarities; however, they differ in to keeping their culture, showing openness, and teaching a lesson from their culture to others.

People’s view of the world is based upon their personal experiences and not their culture. “Mira and I differ, however, in the ways in which we hope to interact with the country that we have chosen to live in.” (Two Ways To Belong In America by Bharati Mukherjee) The fact that even though Mira and Bharati were raised the same and they still had different beliefs and life paths to follow proves that culture doesn’t always affect future beliefs. The way you were raised doesn’t affect your cultural identity, views and future as much as experiences you go through. Two people could be raised the same, but end up different based on their experiences throughout their lives.

Immigration is deeply rooted in the American culture, yet it is still an issue that has the country divided. Marcelo and Carola Suarez-Orozco, in their essay, “How Immigrants Became ‘Other’” explore the topic of immigration. They argue that Americans view many immigrants as criminals entering America with the hopes of stealing jobs and taking over, but that this viewpoint is not true. They claim that immigrants give up a lot to even have a chance to come into America and will take whatever they can get when they come. The Suarez-Orozco’s support their argument using authority figures to gain credibility as well as exemplification through immigrant stories. These strategies work on the rhetorical appeals ethos and pathos. Exemplification appeals to pathos by making the audience feel sympathy for the immigrants for what they give up, and authority figures appeal to ethos by giving credibility to an expert, by supporting the argument through strong facts. In this essay, I plan to explore how these rhetorical strategies act on their respective appeals, how this is used to strengthen the Suarez-Orozco’s argument to persuade their audience, as well as explore other sources that may support this claim.

Bharati and Mira both have been living in the U.S. for 35 years and America is changing the way Bharati views her Indian culture and the world. She feels like she can express herself and be herself, Mira still stays true to her Indian culture. Mira told Bharati “she hopes to go home to India when she retires” (Mukherjee 70) Mira married an Indian man they had to get their labor certifications her sister Bharati married a man outside her ethnic culture he was a Canadian man. Mira and Bharati look at America differently, Mira doesn’t feel like America is where she belongs she wants to go back home and Bharati is just being herself living her life she likes her American life. Although Bharati and Mira have the same ethnic background, Bharati on the other hand, doesn’t let her cultural ethnicity affect her views on the world around her, showing that ethnic background doesn’t necessarily have to change your views all the time. But most of the time, it will have an affect on your

Informative, contemplative, and different are three words to describe “How Immigrants Become ‘Other’” by Marcelo M. Suárez-Orozco and Carola Suárez-Orozco from Rereading America. “How Immigrants Become ‘Other’” talks about unauthorized immigration. More specifically, this source talks about the other side of the issue of unauthorized immigrants; the human face of it all. “How Immigrants Become ‘Other’” depicts the monster from one of Jeffrey Jerome Cohen’s thesis in the article, “Monster Culture (7 Theses).” The monster seen in the source “How Immigrants Become ‘Other’” is the one that Cohen talks about in his fourth thesis, “The Monster Dwells at the Gates of Difference.” Cohen’s fourth thesis talks about the differences among groups of people in areas of race, gender, etc. and how those differences can create monsters in society. Unauthorized immigrants often get placed into a “different” or “unwanted” group and that causes them to face unfairness in society. “How Immigrants Become ‘Other’” correlates to Cohen’s thesis because unauthorized immigrants can be made into monsters due to differences in race and legal status. The group of unauthorized immigrants can become alienated in society, and the people themselves are sometimes referred to as “illegal aliens.” Ultimately, “How Immigrants Become ‘Other’” is more credible than Cohen 's “Monster Culture (7 Theses)” because the authors have more authority to write about the subject of their source and this source

One who lives an American lifestyle to one who lives a traditional Indian lifestyle. The purpose of the passage is basically stating that culture doesn't change us, we change ourselves. “In the passage” immigration separates the two sisters. Now while both are supposed to return to India. To marry the guys their father chosen. Mira feels a sense of betrayal. Mainly because they are living in the US, but Mira is living a traditional Indian lifestyle. While Bharati loves America and American traditions. The author states several times how the sisters were at odds with each other because of the fact that they are liking two different

In the essay “Two Ways to Belong in America,” from 50 essays, Bharati Mukherjee contrasts the different views of the United States from two Indian sisters. The author distinguishes her American lifestyle to her sister’s traditional Indian lifestyle. Both sisters grew up in Calcutta, India, moved to America in search of education and work. Bharati adjusts to the American society very quickly, where her sister Mira clings to her Indian traditions more strongly. Despite both sisters living in America, only Bharati is an American citizen, while her sister Mira is not. Bharati argues the two ways to belong in America are to transform yourself as an immigrant, or to be an exile.

Their essays approach the subject in two remarkably contrasting ways. Quindlen describes the past tensions that have arisen because of immigration and how they have been conquered in the face of tragedy and sorrow. Kennedy tells of how immigrants have altered America in many unfathomable way. He describes the impacts that immigration has had on our culture. Both essays tell of how immigration has enhanced our

In the novel, Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri, nine distinct stories are told that depict families or people of Indian descent who experience different situations and circumstances that affect their lives. Many themes arise throughout the stories, but one that is prevalent through two specific stories, Mrs.Sen’s and Interpreter of Maladies, is the idea of cultural assimilation. Mrs.Sen’s and Interpreter of Maladies both portray the idea of cultural assimilation, but in different ways. Mrs.Sen’s is an example of a woman who resisted cultural assimilation in order to preserve her Indian heritage, while Interpreter of Maladies is a story that depicts a family who have fallen victim to cultural assimilation, thus losing a sense of connection to their Indian roots and being conformed into American culture. Lahiri uses the recurring motif of physical objects and actions to illustrate the various effects cultural assimilation has on certain people. Ultimately, Lahiri suggests the idea that American culture plays an influential role in shaping one’s physical and cultural beliefs, but it is possible to avoid being assimilated through self-determination and resistance.

Immigration is a very broad topic, taking into consideration all of the emotional aspects it also provokes for the group of minorities that fall into this category in the United States. Although America is the home of a range of diversity, many still wish that their hopes of completing their “American dream” does not end soon. The Deferred Act for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) is shortly coming to a complete end. This privilege of having the act gives many the opportunity to be considered a citizen and have most of the benefits that this act offers. But there are still immigrants, like Jose Antonio Vargas, out there who “even though I think of myself as an American and consider America my country, my country doesn’t think of me as one of its own.”

Under the rubric of Commonwealth Literature, there is always a bewildering array of overlapping and intersecting experiences between ‘home’ and ‘abroad’. The ‘rootlessness’ which is central to an immigrant consciousness also connotes an underlying phenomenon of ‘give-and-take identity politics’ of a pre-defined identity along with the coterie of religious, cultural, racial, social values and norms thus become a site of hope, of a new beginning. All these issues come up in a unique fashion in One Amazing Thing by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni. This is unique from the perspective that unlike her other works where India is mostly viewed through the eyes of Indian natives, here in this novel there are some non- native characters who aspire to settle nowhere but in India with the hope of fulfilling their dreams which were otherwise lost in the materialistic soil of America.

Immigration is when people leave their original homelands for various reasons, carrying their distinct cultures, religious beliefs, and live permanently in the new land. In the book The Namesake, Lahiri uses the Ashima and Gogol’s experiences to suggest the dark sides of the immigration, which involves the lost sense of belonging, loss of identity, presensence of microaggression, and the generation gap between the first-generation immigrants and their children.

At the heart of a person‘s life lies the struggle to define his self, to make sense of who he is? Diaspora represents the settling as well as unsettling process. While redesigning the geopolitical boundaries, cultural patterns, it has also reshaped the identities of the immigrants with new challenges confronting the immigrant in negotiating his identity. Diaspora becomes a site where past is given a new meaning and is preserved out of intense nostalgia and longing. The novel The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid is significant in its treatment of the issues faced by immigrants in the diaspora. Mohsin Hamid has grounded his resistance narrative in the identity narrative and through the prism of identity offers a deep insight into the American society and its ideals. The novel exposes the ugly side of the American society with its fundamentalist institutions and dislodges the narratives of fundamentalism as a Muslim monopoly and inverts the myths and discourses on identity to produce a counter narrative.