The selected text on Jamaica Kincaid’s Girl is underlies as a major literary work that effectively uses literary elements to express reflection of the society. For example, the text elaborately exhibits the concept of conflict through the individual characters in the text as a reflection of society in understanding conflict as a conflict. The autobiographical text, Girl, tends to express a general view of the mother-daughter relationship that further points to the aspects of the various roles of the society, community and the family in the development of one’s behaviour and identity that Jamaica uses to address the concept of conflict as a literary concern in the text, Girl.
The text develops conflicts through the character, mother, who attempts to prescribe sets of behavioural expectations of the Girl that she argues are ideal for females in society. She instils such behavioural expectations that she wishes to conform and obey such conduct. Therefore, the text reflects the larger society, especially those that tend to constrain their children’s identity based on a prescribed set of behaviours, mostly for females as opposed to males. Hence, such societal and parental expectations of society, mostly on the female members, further address the theme of conflict that asserts social pressure on the female members of the society whose conduct and social shape behaviour. Ironically, their female counterparts, such as mothers, say, “try to walk like a lady and not like the slut you are so bent on becoming” (Jamaica Kincaid and Okeanos Press 17). Therefore, Kincaid uses her background and cultural ways of life to emphasise how various social and cultural beliefs and behaviours are transmitted across generations. In effect, such expectations present conflicts linked to the social problems between the mother and daughter. The concern arises on the significance of familial relationships in shaping one’s behaviour in general. For example, some of the key arising issues of conflict include; sex discrimination, the effect of social pressure and gender stereotypes that relate to personal development as she tells her, “this is how to love a man; and if this doesn’t work there are other ways, and if they don’t feel too bad about giving up” (Jamaica Kincaid and Okeanos Press 26). For example, in reflecting on the text, the exhibited argument between the characters, mother and daughter, points at the development of the conflict in the text through the mother as being overbearing, social stereotypes, norms and biases a being against women, the mother’s pessimism on her daughter and the family as insistently extending social issues that continuously develop conflict based on behavioural concerns that further exhibit conflict in the text.
Girl, the character’s mother, is exhibited in the text as a major agent of conflict and representative of the larger female population in society. They are seen as both controlling and overbearing, as exhibited in Kincaid’s autobiographical text. The story majorly points to what the mother expects of the Girl. For instance, she teaches the daughter to wash clothes in a given way and to cook pumpkin fritters in very hot sweet oil, among other restrictions in terms of behaviour as the mother tells her, “always eat your food in such a way that it won’t turn someone else’s stomach” (Jamaica Kincaid and Okeanos Press 32). The mother’s desire to control every form of her daughter’s life that extends to how she should develop relationships, do her chores, and conduct herself in the outside world are conflict issues in the text. Thus, the text mainly reflects the issues of mother-daughter relationships that strongly question the nature of parenting styles used on children, whereby society gives parents a lot of power over their children in dominating their growth. For example, the text majorly expresses issues regarding the mother’s instructions, rules, perspectives, ideas and thoughts intended for the Girl. It is not surprising that in the entire text, the daughter responds twice to her mother (Jamaica Kincaid and Okeanos Press 35). It, therefore, points out that the conflict between the Girl and the daughter is strongly rooted in the societal concerns that the Girl’s thoughts and desires are never essential to the mother as addressed.
In conclusion, it is presented that Kincaid has explicitly developed conflict as a concern in the “Girl” with parenting as a symbol of discrimination, biasness and stereotypes in the society that the Girl has no voice for herself. Thus, the text reflects the larger society where social conflicts conflict with the needs and desires of children, that they are torn between fulfilling their desires or the societal and parental needs expressed in the text.
Works Cited
Jamaica Kincaid, and Okeanos Press. Girl. San Francisco Examiner, 1991, pp. 12–39.
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