Family Influence
Langston Hughes (shares an incident in his teens which has left him disappointed him quite a bit. His aunt has planned to take him to the church for the big revival. She is quite excited about the event as she keeps talking about it for days before it happens. Hughes is really happy because he believes that he will have a great experience at the Church. Hughes's aunt has lifted his spirits by telling him that after being revived he will be able to see the light and welcome Jesus into his life. Hughes goes to the revival with high expectations and waits to be enlightened. He feels bad that hordes of other people have managed to see the light and see Jesus while he hasn't had a chance so far. Hughes can't understand why he can't see Jesus when other people have seen him and saved themselves from sin. It's a further blow for him when the only other boy sitting next to him jumps up and decides to be "saved" as he is feeling tired and cant wait to leave. Hughes puts up the charade of being saved only because his aunt and the congregation is worried that he is not responding. He is devastated that he can't see Jesus and has lost his faith in him. "I had deceived everybody in the church, I hadn't seen Jesus, and that now I didn't be
There are incidents which make a person loose faith in something and can scar them from life. Hughes and Dillard's arguments are not that effective because they do not do talk much about family influence. She has learnt a lot of valuable lessons about life and its values through her liberal mother. However Cofer's family does not have any stories to share about their culture which they have to follow in every case. Cofer was expected to follow her culture as it was not dead despite the fact that they were in the United States. She talks about her trips to countries overseas where people have stereotyped views of Latin women and think of them fit for roles as housewives or sex objects. "Without bitterness and for as long as she lived she bore a vision of deicide. It has been difficult for her to cope with two different cultures but then she managed it with the help of her parents. Momaday's grandmother made a big effort to make sure that her culture did not die and passed on her rich legacy of stories to her grandson. However her mother has taught her a lot without interfering too much in her daughter's life by talking sparingly and allowing her daughter to find her own way. Dillard's mother was a strong influence in her life but then she often let her daughters choose their own way. "When we children were young she mothered us tenderly and dependently, as we got older she resumed her career of anarchism" (Dillard, Ann. In this way his aunt did play a role in being an influence in his life but it's not a strong enough reason to loose faith in something. This can be compared with the case of Judith Ortiz Cofer's story for following her Puerto Rican heritage which she was a part of. "Growing up in a large urban center in New Jersey during the 1960s , I suffered from what I think of as "Cultural Schizophrenia".
Common topics in this essay:
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Church Hughes's,
Anne Dillard,
Puerto Rican,
Ortiz Cofer's,
American Indian,
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Indian Kiowa,
Langston Hughes,
Navare Scott,
judith ortiz,
kiowa tribe,
family influence,
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talk family influence,
legacy stories,
culture alive,
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can't jesus,
judith ortiz cofer's,
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Acceptance Essays
