Sui Sin Far “In the Land of the Free”: questions 2, 6

1.       Compare the experience of being oppressed in " In the Land of the Free" and " The School Days of an Indian Girl"

 

"The memory of oppressed people is one thing that cannot be taken away"

                                                                                                               Howard Zinn

If we take a look in a Merriam- Webster dictionary, word "oppression" defines as an "unjust or cruel exercise of authority or power".  Throughout the human history a lot of people, especially ethnical minorities were subjects to oppression, examples of that we can find in many books. Both novels of Sui Sin Far's "In the Land of the Free" and Zitkala-Sa's "The School Days of an Indian Girl" are based on the stories of oppressed minorities. "In the Land of the Free" tell us about a Chinese immigrant's family who came to America looking for a better life. However their little son was taken away from them, because he did not have a pass to enter the country.  In" The School Days of Indian Girl" a little Indian girl was forced to leave her family in order to be educated, was forced to study "alien" language and give up on "mother culture".

Both stories are cases of oppression against different minority, who cannot fully enjoy the rights of the majority.  In both examples the hearts of oppressed ones were full with anger, unfairness and despair. Memory was the only thing that left.

 

2.   What do you learn about Chinese culture from the Sui Sin Far's story " In the Land of the Free"

It is universally acknowledged, that in order to understand the core of any text or story you should be familiar with the subject a story is based on.  Sui Sin Far's story "In the Land of the Free" is full of the details that give comprehension of what Chinese culture is. In the novel we can find a lot of examples of Chinese household decoration:  flowers on the windowsill, carved ivories, fans, silks; Chinese cuisine: steamed rice in bowls, fragrant chicken. All of those details make us understand the story better.