Looking For Alibrandi
Teenagers have to deal with many social issues everyday. These include, parental expectations, conformity and individualism, as well as prejudice and discrimination. Melina Marchetta’s award winning novel Looking for Alibrandi explores many topical themes such as these three.
To start of with, teenagers can be and are often being put under unnecessary stress due to their parents expecting them to do more than they either can or want to do. The character of John Barton experiences these idealistic expectations from his father. “One of my sons will one day lead this country back into the path of glory and I feel it can easily be John. (page 45)” John’s father says this every year on John’s birthday. John then confides to Josie “I’ve always had to be the best because its been expected of me. Do you think they voted me school captain because they wanted me? Get Real. They knew I was going to be school captain when I was in year 7 because every other Barton has been one.” The expectation of him becoming the prime minster or even just becoming the school captain, is clearly too much for him and dismisses his, Life as “sh*t. (page 46)” John eventually gives in to all this pressure and takes the ultimate way out, by ending his own life. Most teenagers could easily relate to this topic, as undue parental …show more content…
In the novel the is a group of people called the “beautiful people.”(page 80) The beautiful people are the group the follow all the current trends, “If long hair is in, they’ve got it. If one gets her hair cropped, so do the others.”(page 80) This is an example of today’s society conforming to the social standards. This sheep like behaviour can lead to problems later in life, such as making decisions on their own, earning money as being beautiful generally won’t get you a
Teenagers have to deal with many social issues everyday. These include, parental expectations, conformity and individualism, as well as prejudice and discrimination. Melina Marchetta’s award winning novel Looking for Alibrandi explores many topical themes such as these three.
To start of with, teenagers can be and are often being put under unnecessary stress due to their parents expecting them to do more than they either can or want to do. The character of John Barton experiences these idealistic expectations from his father. “One of my sons will one day lead this country back into the path of glory and I feel it can easily be John. (page 45)” John’s father says this every year on John’s birthday. John then confides to Josie “I’ve always had to be the best because its been expected of me. Do you think they voted me school captain because they wanted me? Get Real. They knew I was going to be school captain when I was in year 7 because every other Barton has been one.” The expectation of him becoming the prime minster or even just becoming the school captain, is clearly too much for him and dismisses his, Life as “sh*t. (page 46)” John eventually gives in to all this pressure and takes the ultimate way out, by ending his own life. Most teenagers could easily relate to this topic, as undue parental …show more content…
In the novel the is a group of people called the “beautiful people.”(page 80) The beautiful people are the group the follow all the current trends, “If long hair is in, they’ve got it. If one gets her hair cropped, so do the others.”(page 80) This is an example of today’s society conforming to the social standards. This sheep like behaviour can lead to problems later in life, such as making decisions on their own, earning money as being beautiful generally won’t get you a