Peter The Civilized Boy Analysis

In a lifetime people will have many codes or rules that they will morph over time. They might honor them or they may abandon them as time goes by. Peter is a young boy who grows up in South Carolina during the time of segregation. His world gets turned upside down when he abandons his code of being a wealthy civilized boy who dislikes people with darker skin tone to immersing himself in the aboriginal culture, becoming what he knows as being “uncivilized”, and starting to be more hands on.
Peter abandons his code when he is friendly to the bushboy and wants to learn the aboriginals language. Peter, Mary, and the Bushboy have just awoken from a long restless night. The day before they had covered 15 miles and the two siblings were especially tired. The three ate a bustard that had cooked all night in the fire and then proceeded to clean up the ashes. They are walking when Peter, …show more content…
Peter and the aboriginal boy have found a pool full of fish. To catch the fish they throw rocks into the water, causing the fish to paralyze and float to the top of the pool. The fish were very slippery and could not be carried by hand. They thought and thought until it came to them. “There were so many fish and they were so slippery, that when the boys wanted to take them back to the campsite they couldn’t carry them. Not until Peter took off his shorts. Then, in these- they wrapped the yarrawa up, and carried them back in triumph. When the children had eaten-three fish apiece- Peter refused to put on his shorts”(pg. 32). This shows Peter abandoning his code of being civilized and of thinking of darker skinned people as less. He is beginning to not care if he is thought of as a civilized boy, even by his sister. He did not take his shorts of just for survival but also because he wanted to. He also did this to be more like the aboriginal boy he admired through the whole