The Universal Issue of Motherhood Dealt in Jamaica Kincaids Story - Essay Example

Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl” 2009 Thesis statement: The universal issue of motherhood dealt in Jamaica Kincaid’s story “Girl”. narrates about a mother’s seemingly old and obsolete warnings and advises (stemming out of her cultural mooring) to her young daughter about decent living is silently scorned by her modern mind showing the girl’s little empathy for her mother’s natural emotions—an attitude that needs changes given that in due course, she would be a mother some day having the same sort of worry. Outline 1. Mother-daughter relation: The mother consistently scolding her young daughter not to become a “slut” she finds her “so bent on becoming”. 2. The list of advises and warnings that apparently appears a verbal rant. 3. The real reasons of her worry a. Cultural : her background and heritage b. Eternal concern of a mother over her daughter’s future 3. The silent protest of the girl a. Cultural (she being a modern girl, it’s quite normal for her to find such advises outmoded) b. Respectful as she is towards her mother her defiance takes the form of keeping silence. 4. She should have empathy for her mother She should rather try to understand her mother’s worry about her than to ridicule as deep inside that old woman, there are anxieties, and concerns for her young daughter. The arguments “Girl” (first published in 1978), the 640-word short story (some refer it as a poem) written by Jamaica Kincaid, is basically a silent scorn of a young girl towards her mother’s long, sermonic sort of directions and warnings to behave as it should be, and not to act, as she finds it, like a “slut”. Of course, the mother is the main speaker, judging by the amount of her comments but it is obvious, that the daughter is the central character. Edith Milton, in her 1984 New York Times Book Review, article about Kincaid’s short story collection At the Bottom of the River (1983, n which the story is included), finds that for the mother’s the repetition of those abuses “define in a few paragraphs the expectations, the limitations, and the contents of an entire life” (cited from Bily, Criticism, answers.com). The story describes the life of a woman, especially of a developing country. Life here implies life of a woman, especially of a developing country. Kincaid was born in 1949 in St. John's, Antigua. Her becoming adult in Antigua under poverty, colonialism, and an unsure mother motivate her nervy, and at times contentious prose, much of which is closely related to these harsh tensions of her adolescence, in addition to the stiff control of a British colonial education system that worsened her sense of isolation(Kincaid, cla.umn.edu). At the Bottom of the River, her first book, a run of flowing "prose poems," focuses on the rising consciousness of a young girl in the Caribbean "Girl," perhaps the most important story here where she deals with themes of knowing one’s own culture and the "patriarchal politics of oppression" (Contemporary African American Novelists, 261263). The story Girl is also perceived as an study of mother-daughter relationships serving as a symbol between the dominant and the weak, the mature and the yet -to -mature— bullied by social dictates. Some critics regard the as a depiction of: rejection, anger, misery, and compliance. Some others see it as the young female protagonist’s attempt to gain freedom from her mother, her search for identity. Critics also maintain that the story highlight Kincaid's West Indian heritage. Mortality is also a major concern. Story wise, “Girl” consists only of a list of reproaches from mother to daughter, full of double-standards and scheming, at the end of the day (Major Themes, At the Bottom of the River). Yet there are some critics, who consider, that the story provides a series of images about the cultural practices and ethical values a Caribbean woman is conveying to her young daughter-- guidance that daughters incessantly hear from their mothers there, orders that a mother uses to stop the daughter from becoming “the slut that she is so bent on becoming” (Girl, turksheadreview.com). But these are, according to certain critics, more than simple orders; these are ways of assuring that her daughter has the means to live on as an adult. The fact that the mother patiently tries to educate her daughter the right ways for a decent woman to behave in their cultural milieu points how thick they are. It is true that here we find a rich African-Carribean cultural tradition is also conveyed from mother to daughter through instruction and guidance regarding food preparation-- elements of the mother’s lectures adds love to her cautions and criticisms. Making cuisine is depicted in recipe book style, easy detail, such as “cook pumpkin fritters in very hot sweet oil” and “soak salt fish over night before you cook it.” Other mentions to food such as “this is how to make bread pudding” and “this is how to make pepper pot” convey such a tempting tune of information to her daughter that it attains profound importance in terms of mother-daughter relationship in African-Carribean cultural heritage. In “Mothers and Daughters: Jamaica Kincaids’ Pre-Oedipal Narrative,” critic Roni Natov explains that, “Jamaica Kincaid’s fiction focuses on the importance of continuity and community as they are preserved and kept alive by mothers, through their stories and through their connection with their daughters” (cited from Brent, 2000). However, there are critics, who think, “Girl” shows the resentment and family opposition that the women suffer. According to them, the theme of Kincaid's Girl lies in the clash between mother and daughter. The mother advices her daughter to become a "proper" woman, like ""Wash the clothes on Monday and put them on the stone heap; wash the color clothes on Tuesday and put them on the clothesline to dry; don't walk barehead in the sun... "(Girl, turksheadreview.com). Her advice gets increasingly unyielding as the story progresses ending in the final line "you mean to say that after all you are really going to be the kind of woman who the baker won't let near the bread?" (Girl, turksheadreview.com). The daughter may not listen to her advice. Thus, Jamaica Kincaid shows the reader the generation gap, the older asking the newer to behave in a certain way. The author establishes this idea by using a series of long sentences to express both the feel of repressiveness and compliance, the long sentences signifying the authoritarian orders that she gives her daughter. The long sentences in stream of consciousness style express how tyrannical the mother's demands are. The dictates about housework and sewing show the tone of domination of the mother. The mother wants to regulate her daughter's life. She has many rather obsolete and unfair ideas about what a woman is to be. She orders her daughter and never lets her speak. We hear only twice in the story the daughter to question or speak against her, and she does so rather submissively. Kincaid’s sentence structure again shows the timidity of the girl whose personal reactions are represented only twice-- the first time when the girl butts in her mother with "but I don’t sing benna on Sundays at all and never in Sunday school"(Girl, turksheadreview.com). The mother, however, does not pay any attention to her protest and carries on her lecture. Jacqueline Austin views this relationship to be very cold. She indicates that the dialogue between the mother and daughter was almost "in a rhythm so strong it seemed to be hypnosis, aimed at magically chanting out bits of the subconscious" (as cited in Provost, Traditionally Better). ). The girl’s comment is true proof of her mother’s belief that her daughter be calm, listening to her lecture, no matter whether the girl knows the lessons by now. The dialogue is one-sided, like the relationship that is weighted (Provost, Traditionally Better). Yet if we listen to these advises carefully we can discover an worried and caring mother’s face hidden under those apparent heartless rants. The mother here is both the mythic and typical mother—mythic, as she emerges finally as the eternal concept of the all-too-cating mother and typical, as the mother cannot rise above the social taboo that a conventional mother always behaves with her daughter. However, we know that these two images with all their sharps contrasts are complimentary and merging—in the sense that one day the girl would also become a mother, would be engulfed by tradition and social dictates and would react on the same way like her. She would understand that this is the only possible way a usual mother can prepare her child to face a difficult world. Robert Maynard Hutchins, the great American educator once said, "the objective of education is to prepare the young to educate themselves throughout their lives." In “Girl”, we find that the mother educates her daughter with her beliefs and experiences that she's faced although t her life. Her approach of educating may be, a little bit, harsh, but the hidden messages are not. There are many things a young girl should learn during growing up and no teacher can be better than the than mother (Analysis of Girl, 123helpme.com). Works Cited Kincaid, Jamaica, girl, downloaded from http://www.turksheadreview.com/library/texts/kincaid-girl.html Bily, Cynthia, “Girl”, Criticism, http://www.answers.com/topic/girl-story-8 Kincaid, http://voices.cla.umn.edu/vg/Bios/entries/kincaid_jamaica.html Nelson, Emmanuel S, ed., Contemporary African American Novelists :A Bio-Bibliographical Critical Sourcebook, ed. by Greenwood Press ,1999 Major Themes, At the Bottom of the River, http://www.enotes.com/short-story-criticism/bottom-river-jamaica-kincaid Brent, Liz, Short Stories for Students, The Gale Group, 2000 Provost, Andrea, Traditionally Better, http://facultystaff.vwc.edu/~cbellamy/Dream%20Child/Kincaid-%20Provost.htm Analysis of Girl, http://www.123helpme.com/preview.asp?id=111023 Read More