Two Ways to Belong in America

Mira

Bharati

Both

Sisters who are enraged about the immigration limitations

• Retained Indian heritage
• Married within her culture
• Narrow minded, reserved
• Wants to go back to India after retirement
• Dresses in traditional saris

• Threw away Indian heritage to fit in as an American
• Married outside of her culture
• Open minded
• Adventurous
• Dresses in regular blue jeans and t-shirts

Structure Through Vocabulary and Sentences Types (Continued)

• "Only the fluency of her English and the anger, rather than fear, born of confidence from her education, differentiate her from the seamstresses, the domestics, the technicians, the shop owners, the millions of hard-working but effectively silenced documented immigrants as well as their less fortunate "illegal" brothers and sisters." (Mukherjee 232)

• Mukherjee elongates her sentence by adding traits and characteristics of her sister before introducing the verb.

Tone (Continued)

Tone

• Example: "... we probably pitied one another. She, for the lack of structure in my life, the erasure of Indianness, the absence of an unvarying daily core..." (Mukherjee 231)

• Mukherjee exemplifies sympathy and pity in this passage as both sisters feel bad for the others outlook on life.

Structure Through Vocabulary and Sentence Types

• Mukherjee often uses simple sentences but extends the meaning by adding prepositional and appositive phrases to create a periodic structure.

• Mukherjee sets tones of sympathy and bitterness. She intertwines such tones to convey her mixed feelings towards her sister as well as the immigration policies.

Purpose

Two Ways to Belong in America

Purpose (Continued)

• Mukherjee exemplified the hardships of these limitations by comparing her struggles of the immigration policies to her sister's.
• The comparative aspect of the essay aimed to reach the hearts of those who sought to regain those rights.

Bharati Mukherjee

• At the time of the essay's publication, Congress limited government benefits to local immigrants."Two Ways to Belong in America" was written in a plea against the deterioration of immigration rights.

Presented by Lillian Redmann, Mia Suratt, and Safrin Bakth

Purpose (Continued)

Example of the comparative aspects:

• "I felt then the same sense of betrayal that Mira feels now. I will never forget the pain of that sudden turning, and the casual racist outbursts the Green Paper elicited." (Mukherjee 232)
• Through this passage, the readers are able to relate to her pain as many are or have immigrants in their family.

Literary Devices

Parallel Structure

• Mukherjee depicts several instances of parallel structure to emphasize her disbelief in the betrayal from the government.

• "...who have stayed rooted in one job, one city, one house,one ancestral culture, one cuisine, for the entirety of their productive years. " (Mukherjee 232)

Bharati Mukherjee

Background (Continued)

• She sympathizes with her sister's passion to hold on to old traditions and cultures.

• Studied at the University of Iowa
• Married Canadian Harvard student, Clark Blaise
• Taught English at multiple colleges before settling at the University of California, Berkeley
• Other pieces written by Bharati Mukherjee include Jasmine (1989), Wife (1975), and Miss New India (2011).

Structure of the Essay (Continued)

Date of Birth: July 27, 1940

Place of Birth: Calcutta, India

Background:

• In 1947, Bharati Mukherjee moved to England
• At the age of 21, she moved to the United States where she earned her Ph.D in English & Comparative Literature.

Structure of the Essay

Narrative Aspects:

• Mukherjee voices her thoughts against the immigration policies through the story of her and her sister's lifestyle.
• She introduced her story in third person before transitioning into a first person perspective.
• Her piece was written in past tense.

"Two Ways to live in America" is a comparative piece as well as a narrative.

Comparative Aspects:

• She compares herself with her sister, Mira, stating differences in clothing style, cultural contrast, dialect, and opinion on the immigration policies in America.

Perception (Continued)

The author chose to describe her sister in a way that one may depict as rude, but she ended up sympathizing with her sister. She showed sympathy by stating that her sister wanted to retain her culture instead of transforming it into a new one in response to Congress.

Structure Through Vocabulary and Sentences Types (Continued)

Structure Through Vocabulary and Sentences Types

(Continued)

• However, the author applies vocabulary such as "divergence" and "expatriate" to express her thoughts on her sister's lifestyle.

Perception

At first glance, Bharati Mukherjee portrayed herself as a sister who despised Mira Mukherjee's lifestyle and narrow mind. But after analyzing the piece, the readers will quickly find that the two sisters share a strong bond and hatred towards Congress's hostile decisions towards their people.

• Mukherjee embodies her sister's emotion towards the immigration subject by utilizing terms such as "manipulated" and "discarded".

Literary Devices

Similes

• "In one family, from two sisters alike as peas in a pod, there could not be a wider divergence of immigrant experience." (Mukherjee 232)

• The author uses this simile to define the similarity between her and her sister. This cliche depicts that they came from the same origin, but experienced varying treatment from the immigration policies.

Literary Devices

Similes

• "To my ears, it sounded like the description of a long-enduring, comfortable yet loveless marriage, without risk or recklessness." (Mukherjee 232)

• The comparison between the new policy and a loveless marriage depicts how the two unlike subjects create a barrier from freedom.

Syntax (Continued)

Syntax (Continued)

• Mukherjee's shortest sentence contained 5 words.
• Mukherjee's longest sentence included 55 words.
• Her average number of words per sentence consists of 18 words.

Imagery Explanation

• The first quote helps the reader visualize the type of clothing the two sisters were accustomed to while the second evokes Mukherjee's clothing as she gradually became westernized.

Literary Devices

Imagery

• "We dressed alike in saaris..."(Mukherjee 231)

• "...I was opting for fluidity, self-invention, blue jeans, and t-shirts..."(Mukherjee 230)

Syntax

Syntax (Continued)

• " I've obeyed all the rules, I've paid my taxes, I love my work, I love my students, I love the friends I've made." (Mukherjee 231)

• The quote above portrays a compound sentence with multiple commas. As many people only know compounds with FANBOYS, commas with independent sentences result in a compound sentence.

Many of Mukherjee's sentences appeared prolonged and complicated, but they were often masked with appositives, parallel structures, etc. They are usually simple or compound sentences.

Two Ways to Belong in America

Lillian Reddmann

Mia Suratt

Safrin Bakth