Sherman Alexie, Amy Tan and Maya Angelou wrote narratives about their struggles dealing with their differences from white Americans. Alexie, a Native American living on a reservation, speaks of the problems he had while attending an off-reservation all-white school. Amy Tan tells a story of an embarrassing Chinese dinner that distinguishes her differences from the traditional American culture. Maya Angelou, an African American, narrates a moment in her life when she finally felt superior to the Caucasian race. Although all three narratives bear some similarities, the differences between their writings are pronounced. The most recognizable difference between the three narratives is their structure. Alexie uses an episodic story-telling structure in Indian Education. He separates each “episode” in Victor’s life
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By doing so, he purposely creates an effect that breaks up the events and does not allow the story to flow. He wants the reader to focus on each story individually. Amy Tan and Maya Angelou both use a traditional paragraph structure in Fish Cheeks and Champion of the World, but they avoid transition sentences to get their point across and effect the reader furthermore. Each author comes from a different culture; therefore, they are different from each other and the American culture. Amy Tan was the daughter of immigrants who fled from China in the late 1940’s (Tan 116). On Christmas Eve, her mother cooked a traditional Chinese dinner that consisted of “appalling mounds of raw food: A slimy rock cod with bulging eyes that pleaded not to be thrown into a pan of hot oil. Tofu, which looked like stacked wedges or rubbery white sponges. A bowl of soaking dried fungus back to life… and a plate of squid” (Tan 117). She was worried that the American boy would think her family was shabby and disgusting because they lacked proper American manners. Amy
By doing so, he purposely creates an effect that breaks up the events and does not allow the story to flow. He wants the reader to focus on each story individually. Amy Tan and Maya Angelou both use a traditional paragraph structure in Fish Cheeks and Champion of the World, but they avoid transition sentences to get their point across and effect the reader furthermore. Each author comes from a different culture; therefore, they are different from each other and the American culture. Amy Tan was the daughter of immigrants who fled from China in the late 1940’s (Tan 116). On Christmas Eve, her mother cooked a traditional Chinese dinner that consisted of “appalling mounds of raw food: A slimy rock cod with bulging eyes that pleaded not to be thrown into a pan of hot oil. Tofu, which looked like stacked wedges or rubbery white sponges. A bowl of soaking dried fungus back to life… and a plate of squid” (Tan 117). She was worried that the American boy would think her family was shabby and disgusting because they lacked proper American manners. Amy