Blog Post 5 Girl Question 2 Kendra

In Girl, Jamaica Kincaid uses heavily loaded language to tell the story of a (shocker) girl that is being instructed how to become a good woman. The fact that the girl's mother is the one spouting off the harsh words is particularly shocking, though I'm not sure it was meant to be so literal. I believe that Kincaid uses the repetitive quote of "...slut you are so bent on becoming" to illustrate the girl's frustration at her mother for inundating her with all the "rules" necessary to become a lady, I don't believe that it is supposed to be a direct quote from the mother. 

To speak to another human being with such disregard for their feelings is awful, I'm not saying it doesn't happen but to allude that a mother would speak that way to her daughter is either a very large cultural gap or a vast exaggeration. Usually this kind of exchange is reserved for two teenage girls who have some kind of problem with each other, not for a mother and a daughter.

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As I mentioned in class, Kincaid has had an over note of bitterness to most of her essay's (stemming from what I believe is a general distaste of her upbringing in an English colony) so the acerbic words don't feel out of place at all in her writing. I usually try to keep my writing as neutral as possible, but in this case I feel put out. I suppose the essay "On Seeing England For The First Time" colored my view of her in a dark and rather unpleasant light. And I am sorry if anything I've said has insulted anyone.