"Coming of Age in America: A Multicultural Anthology" by Mary Frosch Book Review
Abstract
Mary Frosch’s book “Coming of Age in America: A Multicultural Anthology” is a collection of stories from writers belonging to different ethnicity. The central theme of the book is multicultural experience of young people.
This book is a good example of multicultural literature. Reading of such books can tell us about feelings and worries of people belonging to different cultures, people who try to find themselves in a new world for them after they moved to another country. This book can be used as for personal reading, so for literature lessons. It is important for people and especially for children to read multicultural literature because it not only develops their vocabulary but also enriches their knowledge about different cultures in the world and broadens their minds.
"Coming of Age in America: A Multicultural Anthology" by Mary Frosch Book Review
Mary Frosch’s book “Coming of Age in America: A Multicultural Anthology” is a collection of stories from writers belonging to different ethnicity. The central theme of this book that connects all stories is multicultural experience of young people. The book tells us different life stories of different people, but everyone will be able to find a topic that is familiar or close to him.
Nowadays, multicultural diversity is a part of our everyday life. There still exist too many stereotypes and prejudices against other cultures that we should fight with to live in an equal society. Mary Frosch’s book is well structured and is easy for reading, it is divided into four parts: Fitting In, Family Matters, Affairs of the Heart, Crisis. In 20 stories that make up the book we can found the answers for many questions: is it hard or easy for a foreigner to learn English; how families deal with a new atmosphere they live in, do they help and support each other, how native citizens meet people of other cultures and etc.
In a story “How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents” written by Julia Alvarez, the author reveals the problem of literacy and adaptation to a new society. This story can teach us to be strong and believe in ourselves, everything can be reached by hard work. It also can teach us to respect people of other cultures, because everyone who learns foreign language can face the problem of literacy.
The main theme of Gish Jen’s story “What Means Switch” is first love, but also it shows us the problem of cultural identity. On the example of two foreigners who live in the USA, we can see different attitude to their culture. One, a Chinese girl Mona is trying to be more American, because she thinks it will make her life easier, and another, a Japanese boy Sherman is pride of his culture and his heritage. The Gish Jen’s story …
