Personal and Cultural Identity in Things Fall Apart and “I...

Thursday, January 17 Personal and Cultural Identity in Things Fall Apart and â€Å"I Lost My Talk† Identity can be explained as the state or fact of being a specific person or thing. [definition is good, but needs to be more specific] A specific person or thing can be defined by his/her personality, interests, family, community or culture. [connect your definition to the novel and poem—that’s why previous sentence was inserted] In both Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and in Rita Joe’s â€Å"I Lost My Talk†, Okonkwo and the persona, become confused about who they are and lose their respective identities. [Notice I insert the topics of your three body paragraphs here] Okonkwo and the persona have a certain degree of power that†¦show more content†¦The persona describes how she lost the power to speak her own language: â€Å"The talk you took away†. In the poem the persona describes how she can talk â€Å"Two ways† but that her own language is â€Å"snatched . . . away† and that she must â€Å"speak like yo u / . . . think like you† because â€Å"[y]our way is more powerful† (â€Å"I Lost My Talk†, Rita Joe). In the poem, â€Å"I Lost My Talk†, the persona feels powerless because she feels that she has lost her language and thus her identity. In both Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and Rita Joe’s â€Å"I Lost My Talk† a person who has power loses it quickly. [People who lose power may lose their personal identity-connect to works more smoothly—instead TRY:] Okwonko in Things Fall Apart and the persona in â€Å"I Lost My Talk† are people who lose their power and then lose their personal identity. When Okonkwo flees to Mbanta, he loses his personal identity because he loses his power. When Okonkwo is in Mbanta serving his time, the missionaries known as white men try to convert the people of Umuofia to follow their religion. [Evidence—how does this relate to his personal identity—you don’t really explai n] When Okonkwo returns, things have changed in Umuofia. The people of Umuofia call for a meeting in the marketplace [to discuss †¦..] and at the meeting the missionaries came to say the powerful white man â€Å"ordered th[e] meeting to stop† (Achebe 204). Okonkwo is angered by [what? Be more specific] and kills the missionary. [EitherShow MoreRelatedLanguage Is More Violent Than War?1426 Words   |  6 Pagesâ€Å"Who is to say that robbing people of its language is less violent than war?† Ray Gwyn Smith. I’ve always had this struggle with my identity because I am Mexican and American. I grew up speaking Spanish and English, and was always being policed on what language I was allowed to speak. If I was with my parents they only wanted me to speak in Spanish and when I was at school I was actually forced to only speak English. 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