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Reading "New York Women" in Reader Response Lens

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Reading "New York Women" in Reader Response Lens

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Reader response lens means reading a text for personal meaning and relevance. Some questions readers can ask while using this lens might be “in what ways is the text familiar to my life”? “How did the text affect me”? Or “How has the text increased my interest in the subject matter”? These questions are relevant to having a better understanding of this critical lens. Reader response lens is also finding scenes or parts of the book where it relates to your life and experiences.

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"Mother-Daughter relationships: The entire short story is based on Suzette reflecting on her mother's personality and actions throughout an entire afternoon. As her tone slightly changes along the short story, we see traces of admiration when she thinks of her mother teaching herself how to read when she was only a child (151), and at the same time we see straightforward embarrassment when her mother stops and wonders whether she should buy her daughter an African print dress (149) - the embarrassment that most daughters feel as they grow up and the woman they once idolized now seems smaller and a little more ridiculous: "My mother, who talks to herself when she peels the skin off poultry" (148). The relationship between both is complex, like most mother-daughter relationships. They both want what is best for the other, often not taking into consideration what it is that the other wants."

Donaldson, Lucy. “Themes, Motifs and Symbols.” NY Day Women, 2014, nydaywomen-krikkrak.weebly.com/themes-motifs-and-symbols.html.

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This story takes place in New York. This setting is different from most of the other locations mentioned in the book because those usually take place in Haiti. The narrator of this story is Suzette, a young American Haitian woman who is living in Brooklyn, New York. Suzette is on her one hour lunch break from work when she sees her mother in Manhattan. She is shocked by this because she thinks her mother has never been outside of Brooklyn. She has never even visited her daughters building office. Suzette also remembers her mother is afraid of taking the subway trains so she is now worried. Suzette follows her mom and finds her buying a can of soda and hot dogs. Suzette is shocked because hot dogs contain a lot of salt and remembers her mom saying “I cannot just swallow salt. Salt is heavier than a hundred bags of shame” (Danticat 149). Suzette is curious to know where her mother is going because she never leaves the house or even goes out to eat with people. Again, Suzette remembers her mom saying “If they want to eat with me let them come to my house, even if I boil water and give it to them” (Danticat 147).  As her mother is walking she sees a dress with African print styles all over it. Suzette thinks her mom is thinking of buying it for her. Suzette thinks if her mom buys this dress she will just give it to Goodwill which leads her to remembering her mother saying “Why should we give to Goodwill when there are so many people back home who need clothes? We save our clothes for the relatives in Haiti” (Danticat 149). As her mom reaches her destination Suzette realizes she is going to a park. At the park she meets with a woman dressed in workout clothes and a little boy. Suzette’s mother takes the little boy from her and the woman goes off to do her workouts. Suzette’s mother and the little boy sit comfortably together and she hands him the soda and hot dog realizing she is just babysitting this little boy. Now Suzette’s lunch break ends and she goes back to her job.

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As I read this story I found a bit of myself in Suzette and realized her mother is just like mine. My family and I migrated from Somalia to Minnesota when I was about 6. It was a lot easier for me to adjust to the new culture and environment unlike most of my family members who were older. When I was reading this story I was shocked to find so many similarities to some parts of the book to my own life. When I learned that I was connecting to this story on a more personal level, it made me want to keep reading and find more things Suzette and I have in common. There was a situation just like the scene between Suzette and her mother where she thinks her mother will buy her the African print dress and how she will just donate it to Goodwill later on. Some of the cultural clothing my mother buys for me I find myself to never wear them. I also feel bad saying “no I don’t want it” sometimes. So I take it and as time goes just get rid of it. I was shocked to read on to find Suzettes mother saying “Why should we give to Goodwill when there are so many people back home who need clothes? We save our clothes for the relatives in Haiti” (Danticat 149) because my mother says the exact same thing except our relatives are in Somalia. I think when people migrate to new countries it is easier for younger people to adjust to the new place rather than the older people. Parents want their kids to adjust to new places, but they also never want their kids to forget where they came from. They also want the new generation kids to know where they’re from and appreciate the difference in their own culture than the one they grew up in. There was a part of the book where Suzette said her mother may have moved to a new country, but her soul and heart never left Haiti. This is exactly how I think of my own mother. Everyday my mom talks to relatives back home, she tells us everything new that’s happening there, the good and bad. She rarely even goes out. When I tell my mother that I’m leaving to go out to eat she tells me to just bring people home and cook here. I find Suzette’s mother to be just like my own and that's why I chose to write about this book using the reader response lens. I felt that Suzette and I were living the same life.