Blog 9

Where we come from culturally has dramatic impacts on our view of the world around us. Our daily life is shaped around the norms of our own ethnic background and the teachings of ancestors. These teachings and cultural guidelines have aided the survival of our ancestors and are present for us to interpret and apply each and every day. The works of the three authors are centered on the theme of how culture shapes us. Bharati Mukherjee, Joy Harjo, and Mitsuye Yamada all present three different ethnic backgrounds and methods of telling their stories, yet allow the history of their people to greatly influence their viewpoint on the matters.

In “A Father”, Mr. Bhowmick is a man deeply influenced by his Indian roots. He wakes up early and prays to Kali-Mata everyday before breakfast and tries to live a life appeasing to the gods. He is extremely superstitious and is greatly affected by any possible circumstance or event that might be taken as an insult to his gods. But he was not always on edge. He lived a “lighthearted” and “almost fulfilled” life in India when he received a good job in Bombay. His wife, on the other hand, is much more Americanized. She pushed for him to obtain his visa and green card. It was her that nagged until he gave in to come to America, and continues to do so every day. She is an intelligent woman whose ambitions grew upon their arrival in the U.S. Every day their morning routine counteracts one another with him clinging to his roots while she wants to become more and more Americanized. Their daughter is a blend between the two of them. She is Indian in appearance but American in her attitude, profession, and thought processes. She is trying to find her place in society while mediating the turbulent marriage of her parents warring hearts. The story changes tone when the father learns that his daughter is pregnant. He reviews every possible scenario and weighs the two possible outcomes. Either she will disgrace her family name and keep the child or become a murderer and have the baby aborted. This proposes an interesting question. The ending of the story is twisted in that originally I thought that she would be the one making the decision leading to cultural shame based on a fling or one time sexual encounter but it turns out that she consciously made the decision to be artificially inseminated. With this she chose to outcast herself and it was too much for both parents to handle. While the father prevented his wife from harming the baby, he was not able to control his own emotions. He not only killed the unborn child, but also everything he worked his whole life for.

Joy Harjo’s poem explores this theme of culture from the opposite point of view. In “The Father”, the narrator was an immigrant who is felt a sense of “loneliness” in America. However, in this poem the narrator is a Native American who seems to be lost in a grandiose city filled with empty promise and a false sense of security. She is commenting that life in America has become focused on fame and fortune instead of searching out the beauty and wonder that gives life its true meaning. We have lost sight of what truly inspires people to do great things. In L.A., there are “strangers above me, below me, and all around me” (line 1). The author presents many cultural differences between American and Native American culture. One example involves the naming of L.A. the city of angels. These angels look nothing like the angels in “the songs of human voices on a summer night/ outside Okmulgee” (Lines 4-5). He says that in this city where only the stars have authority, “We must matter to somebody” (Line 10). Instead of selling out for these “stars”, the author proposes that we use everything that comes our way and our natural ability to find beauty and gold in our lives.