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Alex Geisler-The poem being past tense allows the reader to see how the narrator to set a curtain mood in the poem.This can be done with figurative language such as "I let myself lie back in the deep waters,my arms out like Jesus'on His cross,and instead of sinking down as I'd always done, magically,that night,I could stay up,"

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Isabella Marsh- To add on to the symbol of the beach and swimming, I think the speaker continuously included the symbolic metaphor to add a sense of happiness to her story. When someone thinks of a beach, the usual feeling associated with it is happiness. The speaker is trying to show that many people may associate immigration with a positive feeling because foreign people get to come to a free country and start their life over. As we can see in the poem, immigration is not always positive.

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Alex Geisler - The narrator shows the main struggle of immigrants of them trying to understand the "new world" they have arrived.Immigrants wonder if they are not fitting in the new country.This is show in Exile"And when we backed away, we saw our reflections superimposed,big-eyed,dressed too formally with all due respect as visitors to this country."This is a good example because the title Exile shows how they feel exiled from there cultures and home.

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I agree with AP on the fact that it was tougher for them to leave the D.R because it occurred so quickly and it was very shocking to them so this meant they were unprepared to move both physically and mentally.

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Ayden Freed - The idea of how immigrants needing to leave is seen in the poem with the connotation of the words such as "a hurried bag, allowing  one toy piece,"

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Brett Kot- This hope can sometimes be realized. In my outside source, the text states, "immigrants have been founders of companies such as Google, Intel, PayPal, eBay, and Yahoo! In fact, skilled immigrants account for over half of Silicon Valley start-ups and over half of patents, even though they make up less than 15% of the population." This emphasizes that immagrants should strive for a better future because sometimes amazing things such as what is listed above can happen when you strive for what you want to achieve.

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I agree with Leah because the audience being able to picture the deep end of the pool is an easy way to show the fear and danger she was facing and can easily be understood by the reader.

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I agree with eliza because we see that people have been exiled in the past, but the article she found shows that this is still happening nowadays around the world.

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I agree with how it seems like they don't belong. They are forced to leave and it has the depressing mood and even when they do get to America they continue with the mood by comparing themselves to the American family.. They get over the initial wonder of America and start to compare themselves and realizing that they don't belong

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Going off gary, being that young many small things can be stressful but having to leave everything at home and not fully understand why or where your going somewhere can be very tough on kids. The speakers parents tried to protect them from worrying which was very important in the transition process so the adjustment wasnt as bad.

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Mikie crowe- i agree with what eliza said about the mexico article. since the poem takes place in a different time period the central theme of both pieces is the same about how immigrants should be treated kinder. This puts the theme more into context today by making it be relevent across different times.

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I agree with Jacob- on line 17 the narrator admits that they know something is wrong. He has a good point on the narrator not knowing how to swim, as water, swimming, the beach, are all common themes and symbols in this poem. Since she doesn't know how to swim, the author reveals that she is going into the unknown. The deep end of a pool may seem endless to a child, full of the unknown. Also, on line 34 she notes that she "had already swum ahead and guessed," revealing that she has an idea that something bad is going to happen. Since she mentioned that she "swam" ahead it can be inferred that she is maturing as was discussed in group 2 when she went through the stress and struggles of being an immigrant. Additionally, "dark, deserted" airport could symbolize the deep end. The narrator is unaware of what's to come.

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Gary shows a good point when addressing the title. The word exile has more of a negative connotation, and its shown throughout the poem. Julia's family didn't choose to leave their own country. They basically had no choice but to leave and that can make adapting in the new country harder for some people -caroline b

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One of my outside sources says that many immigrants have "immigrants guilt" due to all of the hardships they go through. They also go through depression due to leaving their home, like Eliza just said about how it is very hard for immigrants to go through exile

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Julia Alvarez emphasizes to the reader that it is very difficult for immigrants moving to new areas because of the new challenges they must deal with. These challenges may even require these people to completely change who they are as a person to adapt to the new lifestyle that they are faced with. This poem makes it easier for the reader to understand how difficult transitions are if they've never experienced a change like this personally.

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Brett Kot- I agree with Gary's opinion because in that picture we can see mostly darkness but a small glimpse of light. Alvarez's message is that everyone should strive for a better future. We can see that small glimmer of light represent the hope that Alvarez wants us to have and act on.

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In my outside source (entitled "Forced to Leave Home"), a few other people groups that have to leave forcefully (exiled [forces leaving of a country] you could say) are noted including Zimbabwean refugees in South Africa, Burmese refugees in Thailand, Colombian refugees in Ecuador. It says "refugees leave their country because they have no other choice and fear for their own life or safety or that of their family." This is why the speaker and her family had to leave her country, and this is not that uncommon in current times.

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Mikie Crowe- i agree with what Jacob said about how she realized something was off if not knowing exactly what. I feel this creates a darker tone due to the dramatic irony of how we know what is in store for her but she doesnt. I found an article about how children react to bad situations and since the family didnt tell her what exactly they were doing they were trying to shield her. The article said children of a young age will react in a more dramatic and flambouent way than other people will do. I feel this shows the kindness of the family and indirectly characterizes them. This makes us connect to them and connect to there hardships. Going with the theme of being kind to immigrants, this part helps us want to be kind to them due to the positive characterization.

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Gavin Kanish- I do think there is a positive shift but i think it is forced positivity. If you look at the 3rd to last stanza it says "We stood awhile, marveling at America, both of us trying hard to feel luckier than we felt..." With this quote i think that even though there was a positive shift, that that positivity is being placed there artificially. Which shows the even though they are excited for there new life but there is still hesitation about it and that they still miss there old home.

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Mark Danna- I agree with Madison on the fact that exile is being forced to leave and the family feels like they are being exiled to America as in they do not want to go to this foreign land they want to stay at their home in Ciudad Trujillo

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The experiences of the family in this poem help us see the true meaning of the title "Exile" because we see that even though they may not have wanted to leave the DR, they were forced to leave and forget their past.  Also, we see how quickly life and culture change can happen. We see it occur overnight in this poem.

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Eliza is right. Its hard for immigrants to adjust and leave their homes. In a source I have, the text says, "Swimming is the perfect metaphor for the hastily departed immigrants who dive into an idealized America to discover, with some surprise, their own vulnerability ans a keen sense of loss." -Olivia N

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Ayden Freed - I agree with what Eliza says about this danger of immigration and how its often romanticized and i think thats why the title is exile has the much more negative tone of being taken away from your country vs moving to a new and better place.

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Going off of jacob, by referencing the deep end of the pool it shows how she could sense danger, but had nothing other than some of her real life experiences to compare it to. When immigrating it really is like swimming in the deep end for the first time because everything was so new for the reader and frightening at the beginning. They really had to be able to "swim" in a way through the US to keep themselves from losing who they were.

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I agree with what Eliza said about the point of the poem being to not romanticize exile/immigration because you can see that she never says anything about being truly happy. The speaker does say about how she is "eager", but also says "afraid, not yet sure of the outcome", so it is clear that the experience is scary as a whole.

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I agree with Jacob on the fact that Julia had the idea that she was going to lose something, but she just didnt know the extent of what it was going to be. As used on line 9 which says "on the way to the beach." This is italicized because Julia knows that this isnt just a simple trip to the beach- caroline b

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I found this image

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Isabella Marsh- I agree with Rachel because you can see a change in character. When the speaker begins talking about her family's situation, she is unsure of what was really going on and she uses words like 'floating', "instead of sinking", "magically", etc to show that she is just going to go with the flow and do what she has to. But as she continues the story, you can see that she has began to understand what is happening to her family, and she starts to realize that there are negative things that will come along with their journey. The speaker says, "I had already swum ahead and guessed some loss much larger than I understood, more danger than the deep end of the pool." This shows her realization that her experience may not be as easy as she thought.

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Rachel has a point. Because the ocean is what she is most comfortable with, she uses it constantly throughout the story to try and make sense of everything for herself. -Olivia N

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I agree with Shannon about the references to the water and the beach and also think the beach was almost a safe place for the family because they said they passed the family beach house which they must have visited alot.

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I agree with Jared because he gave the example of the differences in culture. I feel Julia Alvarez states these differences to also represent the major changes that her and her father have to adapt to in the new city environment rather than back home in the Dominican Republic. Also this shows that the mood of the story has shifted from saddening to hopeful with the new opportunities that her and her father have in the U.S.

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Ayden Freed - I agree with what Jarred said about the importance of the characterization in this poem and i found an outside source of a "authors craft" organization web article and it says how crucial it is to keep the reader interested. These can help develop the context of the story such the description of the father on line 53 and this is crucial to the meaning of the poem that involves the shift when they go to new york and how them fitting in and getting use to this "luckier life" is harder than expected

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I agree with what Rachel said because as early as line 17, the poem states "Something was off, I knew". Later on, the speaker says that she guessed that there was something beyond a surprise going on, "more danger than the deep end of the pool".

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I agree with Caroline because the speaker has to go through many changes after her immigration to the United States. She is not accustomed to the more modern lifestyle of people in the United States.

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Shannon makes a great point. In one of my sources, "Exile: Literary Analysis", it says, "The speaker seems a little odd in a way because she does not know what is fully happening; 'Worried whispers' (6) is an alliteration ans it also symbolizes the speaker's anxiety. Both her uncle and father do not tell the truth to the speaker, instead they 'sugarcoat' it." The speaker is not being told what is really going on, so she has to really guess and wonder what is going on. She's swimming with them, but only at the surface. -Olivia N

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Mikie Crowe- going off of what rachel said about the escalators and how speaker is amazed they arent like DR. I think this also conveys the theme i mentioned eariler on how immgrants dont feel like they are home. By contrasting USA and DR. This helps us understand how out of place they feel.

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I agree with Jared on them comparing the family to there own. It shows how they feel foreign and maybe that they are trying to fit in. She says that she gives respect to the people to show how she admires them and the culture of the new area.

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Mikie Crowe-   I agree with Jared when he said about comparing sterotypes of DR  man and USA man. I also feels there in a second theme in that showing how people let sterotypes define there character. Also in the article we read in class about self image ties back to this b/c the speaker is comparing her father with the USA man, revealing to us that immigrants to feel at home or self consious being in a foreign land showing us that they dont feel truly at home. The second theme being that to help others feel they are at home. Not as present as the main theme but still there.

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Going along with what Mark and Caroline said about the speaker feeling foreign, one of my outside sources, an article called "To Be The Child Of An Immigrant" says how there is not only a language barrier, but also a barrier of life. This refers to things like technology. This can be seen in the poem where the speaker needs his/her father to explain what escalators, elevators, etc. are. The article also talks about the innocence that immigrant children have, not knowing what is going on.

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Going off of what Shannon said, the speaker lets herself float, but earlier in the poem he uncle says, "What a good time she'll have learning to swim." The speaker doesn't actually know how to swim, but somehow she can figure out how to "swim" above everything bothering her.

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I agree with Jared because he mentioned how the speaker compares its father to the person in the Macy's. This shows that the speaker is part of a different culture and is not exactly used to the new place they live.

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Morgan Pichi- I agree with Shannon and Rachel about the water when it says she was floating instead of sinking helps us to know that there is a change, but it was taken as a step forward instead of a step backwards.  Rachel also said that the floating also shows the main character's innocence, as if not knowing where she was going and what would happen next.

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I agree with Rachel with the point that she was floating and not really feeling or understanding what was going on and being only a child at the time.

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Could the idea of her suddenly being able to float on the water show that she suddenly and quickly matured because she must grow up

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Brett Kot- While we are talking about a change in the poem's shift, I see that occur after line 60 because before that line, they she talks about the past and her experience but after line 60, we can wee her start to look to the future as we see her discuss the "red and blue boats" and her eagerness to look towards the future.

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Mikie Crowe-

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Going off of what julianna and Aden said, there is a shift of the tone closer toward the end of the poem from positive to negative. However, we can still see a negative tone when Julia is comparing herself to the almost ideal american family -caroline

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Madison Lucas- I agree with Isabella because the story is a narrative and I also think that the story being a narrative lets you see the feeling and thoughts that her and her family had while fleeing the country, and also the side conversations between her dad and her uncles as well as her and her mom.

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I agree with what Mikie said because, the audience has a better understanding of the poem because it is a narrative instead of a poem with a symbolic meaning. Poems that are symbolic are tougher to understand. Though there are still symbols present in this poem.

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I agree with Mikie about connecting easier with stories over poems because it helps to keep the reader interested while also getting a good descriptive view of how the speaker feels and their emotions towards the situation.

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I agree that conflict gives the audience a connection to the speaker, even if we have never had to leave our home country in the same way that the speaker did, we still understand how conflict feels. The use of the idea of "swimming" makes the audience (like what was just said) feel a connection to the speaker, though they [the audience] have never met her.

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Caroline Bachowski-

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I actually disagree with what Olivia said earlier. The audience gets the parts of a narrative, but its almost like snapshots into this story. You don't learn very much about the characters, setting, plot and conflict and this leaves the reader asking questions and wanting to know more about the full story.

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The amount of figurative language in a narrative poem can be used to convey the speaker's feelings to the audience. For example, on line 22 Alvarez wrote "I let myself lie back in the deep waters, / my arms out like Jesus' on His cross..." This conveys an idea of floating through the events and not really feeling what is happening. It feels surreal and dreamlike

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Morgan Pichi- I agree with Ayden on the second point of view and how it made the reader feel sympathetic. Julianna said how it connects the idea of how the children didn't know where they were going, but the parents knew where they were heading. The reader then feels sympathy for the children because they didn't know they were being forced to leave their country, but we, as a reader, knew this.