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In the short story, Sea Urchin the main character (Chang-Rae Lee) discovers his emotional turmoil through his frustration that he does not know what he desires or needs in his life. “I do not know what's wrong. Or what might. I could, I'm bored. I might be craving a girl”. His internal disagreement is a manner in which he determines through the cultural effect necessary. He also highlights the way he felt towards girls and his curious attraction to strange things in the novel. His mother is a symbolic because she has American cultural preferences and influence, she attempts to discourage the protagonist from doing new things ("get something cooked") and his father, symbolizing South Korea's cultural effect, wants him to do new things to see who he really is by saying, "'you have to be careful, you could die " When he does something different, the plot reaches a strong climax of diverse feelings and responses, in which it show that they are saying, he is a  'self-satisfied creature' which symbolizes a solution to his internal dispute. Symbolically, consuming his sea urchin has given him the key to his inner struggle. It is his turning point and while the intermediary between his two cultural identities has not yet managed, it constitutes the first step in the right path in which he becomes another human.

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In the short story Boys and Girls By Alice Munro, the protagonist faces self conflict about Gender roles and her opinion of them. As the timeline of this story tells us it is in the 1800-1920s Canada given the time of taking place fighting the roles wasn’t common. During our protagonists childhood she could be found in the outside which is typical the mens area, through her childhood as she grows she learned ton love the outside. Around the age of 12 and up girls on the farm typical start helping in the house to cook and chores. The protagonist faces black lash by strangers and her mother about helping outside. Once she is a more mature age she releases a live farm animal. Once she released the animal she was forced into the female role of the house. Throughout the story we learn that the female role symbolizes fear and a sense of trapped. We also learn that the live farm animal symbolizes her trying to get freedom and results in the death of her soul. At the end she accepts her given role in society. the symbolizes a acceptation of gender roles and failure

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The story “Boys and Girls” by Alice Munro talks about the protagonist’s struggles with her gender roles and what is expected from her as a girl, this is mainly caused by her parents who throughout the story say small things which our protagonist overhears, and makes her question herself and her gender sort of creating an internal conflict. “I just get my back turned and she runs off. Its not like I had a girl in the family at all” just from this quote said by the mother (Antagonist) we can see that she feels that our protagonist is not doing what she is supposed too, whereas from our protagonists point of view she doesn’t know what she is doing wrong or even what her mother wants from her. “What did she mean about Laird? He was no help to anybody.” “Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you’ll have a real help.” These two quotes give us a look on what each character feels about her younger brother, the parents clearly see the young boy to grow up and stick with his gender roles as a boy/man, although our protagonist is focused on how he is acting now compared to the future and doesn’t see him changing at all, this shows their is 2 different looks over the brother/son, which confuses our protagonist even more. Throughout the story, we can see many different quotes being made by her parents which forces upon conflict with our protagonist within herself and what everyone else thinks about her. The conflict isn’t really our protagonist and her parents but more with her and her younger brother, and how he is viewed so much different from the people most important to her.

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Kura, written by Patricia Grace, battles with her internal conflict wether or not to tell someone of the horrors her sister is forced to face on a daily basis every time she goes to school.

“We never spoke of what had happened to Riripeti.” Kura’s refusal to tell anyone of what was happening to her cousin at school is symbolic of her need to be the one her cousin goes to for help. “On the way to and from school we’d tell her the right things to say.” Kura tries her hardest to be there for Riripeti but “she was given spankings” no matter how much Kura taught her. Even when it got to the point were Riripeti would get sick about thinking to school Kura still didn’t want to admit defeat. “She began vomiting each day as we came near to school.” The severity of abuse Riripeti faced was unspeakable for Kura to admit to  her aunt and uncle so Riripeti was “killed by school.”

The moment of Riripeti’s death is shows that Kura, even when Riripeti died, didn’t want to admit defeat that she inevitably killed her cousin. Pride was a huge factor in this story and it took years for Kura to verbally admit that she could have prevented her cousin’s death. Pride can kill.

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Throughout the short story “Boys and Girls” by Alice Munro, the protagonist goes through internal conflict when dealing with gender expectations and trying to disagree upon gender roles. The bedroom where she and her brother sleep comes into play as symbolism and a metaphor, where its appearance slowly changes in step with her mindset. The bedroom is first introduced when she and Laird were younger, and would be afraid of the dark. They had created rules for themselves to go by, such as “when the light was off no place was safe but the beds themselves”. As a child, the protagonist felt out of harm’s way in her room, and in the night “no place was safe” which symbolises at that part of the story that the outside world is unsafe. Her dreams were not based on real life, and had no limitations, as they “took place in a world that was recognizably mine, yet one that presented opportunities for courage, boldness, and self-sacrifice, as mine never did”. In the bedroom, in her dreams, she says she is in a world that is recognisably hers, and yet “presented opportunities” for things she imagined herself to be like.

There is no internal self-conflict yet, but that changes with the alterations of her dreams, when “even in these stories something different was happening”. The protagonist would no longer be the hero of her story, for instead of “rescuing” other people and saving them in her dreams, she would be the one being “rescued”. At this point her mind is has acknowledged what gender roles are, and her dreams are a reflection of it. Her dreams would be focused on her appearance or on who was rescuing her, rather than a real plot or action, which meant that the “the real excitement of the story was lost”. Her part of the bedroom adjusted to her mindset when she made her part of the room “fancy”, decorating the bed and dressing table. There is also symbolism of both a physical and mental divide, when the protagonist wanted to put a barricade in between her brother’s and her beds, “to keep my section separate from his”. This really outlines how different the siblings have grown to be, and the recurring theme of gender role that the protagonist tried and failed to escape from.

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In The Shadow of War, the starting point of the protagonist’s transition from a false sense of security to a more experienced view is marked by his struggles with identifying what is real and what is fictitious and spiritual, demonstrated by Okri through the use of atmosphere and symbolism. To the protagonist, Omovo, the village is a zone of safety where regularity is the source of predictability and therefore safety. The villagers “stumbled about their various tasks as if they were sleepwalking,” so adhered to their repeated ways that they are capable of them even while asleep. This also enhances the hypnagogic atmosphere in which the boundaries between legitimate and magical begin to blur. As “noises dimmed and lost their edges,” the notion that the two worlds in between which Omovo finds himself are beginning to combine and cross over into each other. The said ‘blurry’ and ‘sleepy’ atmosphere generates a sense of confusion within Omovo and therefore the reader as well, a key characteristic of the coming of age experience, as young individuals’ worlds are suddenly filled with aspects of adulthood that have before seemed otherworldly. The forest to which the witch is heading represents the spiritual realm which, assumably, in Omovo’s Nigerian culture is considered a fundament of the transition into adolescence. Among a witch whose feet never touch the ground, floating figures in a cave and a river of corpses, Omovo finds himself surrounded by beings that do not yet make sense to him. The ongoing lunar eclipse catalyzes his senses of bewilderment as his world suddenly goes dark in what he thought was the late afternoon. This surreal experience highlights and acts as a hyperbole of moments of utter confusion that are so common in coming of age worldwide. The two key settings in The Shadow of War are symbolic of Omovo’s childhood and the rapidly approaching adolescence, and the arising confusion with dreamlike atmosphere exaggerate common features of coming of age worldwide.

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(I know this is terrible so I'm really sorry mr andrew that you have to read this)

In Hanan al-Shaykh's "The Woman's Swimming Pool", the narrator uses the urban and progressive Beirut and her grandmother as metaphors for cultural identity as well as the everlasting societal battle between progressivism and traditionalism. In the story, we first note the modernism of the city from the quote "...Beirut came into view with it's lofty buildings... the bared arms of women, the girls hair" which further goes on to describe in detail the city and its inhabitants. This quote in particular contrasts with the attire of the narrator and her grandmother, who are wearing heavy clothing with sleeves, veils and head coverings, which we take to be an intentional contrast between the two cultures; the narrator in particular seems to note this difference almost in a jealous tone. We see that the narrator's grandmother is extremely traditional, through various quotes; at one point she states, "If any man were to see you, you'd be done for, and so would your mother and father..." telling us that despite the fact that they were in Beirut, a massive city far away, the grandmother was still overly concerned with image and appearance, especially due to the fact that they were woman, noting throughout several points that the sea was something that could only be enjoyed by men. This is a very sharp contrast that is seen throughout the story, which as the story progresses, intensifies and develops into a struggle symbolic of the dualistic and contrasting natures of progress and conservatism; at some points in the story, the narrator feels as if her grandmother is holding her back and preventing her from being free, and reaching the woman's swimming pool (which throughout the story, can be interpreted as the climax of progressivism, as a place where women can be freely enjoying leisurely activities is supposedly rare as noted in the grandmother's disbelief). Although eventually, the characters do find the woman's swimming pool, we finally see that it is the young narrator's religious and cultural customs that brought her back and prevented her from reaching her goal, as seen through two different viewpoints; when the receptionist and other passerbys looked at her strangely towards the end of the story ("there was contempt in the way she looked at me - was it my southern accent or my long sleeved dress?"), and when the grandmother "had prostrated herself in prayer," "blocking the road between me (narrator) and the sea". This is the moment in the story when the narrator feels that they are being held back and her traditional values alienate her, despite being in a modern society, and so she turns once again accepting her culture are her personal identity, knowing that she will be alienated (this is symbolised by her going back for her grandmother to help her up, her grandmother "put(ting) her weight on my hand"). Perhaps an example of structural irony, at the very beginning of the story we note that the narrator states "I see a Japanese man, the very first of the yellow races outside of the books," noting him to be exotic or rare, perhaps in a slightly racist way; yet she herself in time, is revealed to be the outsider in this story. We thus realise that in the story, the city is a location which symbolises progress and modernism, the woman's swimming pool perhaps being representative of the pinnacle of progressivism, whearas the grandmother is a metaphor for tradition (both in her old age and her beliefs), who as a static character, consistently does not alter her beliefs significantly throughout the story and holds her granddaughter, the narrator back, being used as a metaphor for the struggle between progress and tradition, as well as how it explores the theme of cultural identity, and how it can serve to alienate in a foreign place (whilst Beirut is in the same country as the character's place of origin, that only serves to prove the point as even those who are neighbours can still be alienated).

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The Story “Boys and Girls” by Alice Munro, conveys the terrible result and consequences of coming across identification through portraying it through the protagonist’s adventure of coming of age with the gender stereotypes.
"Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you'll have a real help."
This is symbolic of the gender stereotypes that the protagonist is suffering from her surroundings. Regardless of the protagonist's ability and will, it is sadly conveyed to the readers that the gender stereotype and role set from her childhood cannot be changed even in her coming of age.
"She's only a girl,"
With her father's words, she realizes she can no longer change the stereotypes around her, accepts the stereotypes and adapts to her role as a girl.
The protagonist’s role as a girl is more distinct and serious by having a contrary character, her younger brother, Henry. The consensus between the protagonist and young mare, Flora, helps to convey more emotionally to the readers about the feeling of alienation and discrimination that the protagonist suffers.

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P: The narrator in ‘Boys and Girls’ discovers that her internal conflict manifests itself through her rebellious behavior and desire to be herself.
The narrator’s rebellious behavior is a symbol of her internal conflict of being restricted by her gender role. This is portrayed when her grandmother continuously criticizes her about acting ‘un-lady like’, and she responds to this by intentionally going against what she is being told. This is depicted in her following assertion: “I continued to slam the doors and sit as awkwardly as possible, thinking that by such measures I kept myself free.” She remains in a state of denial and continues to do things which annoy her family, as a way to show them that she doesn’t want to change who she is. Another core example of this is when she selflessly opens the gate for Flora to run away; “Instead of shutting the gate, I opened it as wide as I could. I did not make any decision to do this, it was just what I did. Flora never slowed down; she galloped straight past me.” The horse is a symbol of freedom and who the protagonist desires to be. As the narrator could not run away herself, she allowed flora to be free.
The protagonist comes of age when she realizes her antics are not appropriate. Her transformation begins when she starts adding ‘girly’ features to her room and finally accepts that she is just a girl at the end of the story.

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Throughout Sea Urchin, Chang Rae Lee manifests different experiences in his home country through the protagonist’s adventure as he tries to achieve a new experience. Despite his craving to try something new throughout the story he is constantly disappointed as he is unable to find anything that will satisfy his curiousness for a new experience and moderately starts to give up as he fails. By using Imagery, alliteration and symbolism, Chang competently expresses his story and meaning behind it through the protagonist’s inner conflict, by doing so illustrates the human nature of curiousness and need for exploration.

Throughout Sea urchin the narrator illustrates his internal conflict as it manifests through his humanly curiosity to new experiences which later on focuses on unappealing food. ‘I sit, my mouth slick with anticipation and revulsion not yet knowing why.’ The curious feeling the narrator creates towards sea urchins symbolizes the internal conflict of the cultural culinary influences he has experienced. Later on, in the story this is drawn to attention by the parent’s reaction when the protagonist requested the sea urchin. When the protagonists mother says ‘Get something cooked’ due to her symbolizing the narrator’s American side of culture this shows how the narrator is getting pulled to his American culture and a battle between the two cultures begins as the father then says ‘You have to be careful. You could die.’ Which shows that even though the South Korean heritage is displayed as dangerous it the protagonist decides to go with the Korean side as it would satisfy his need for something new. Once the protagonist eats the sea urchin the conflict becomes intense but exciting as it’s what he been looking for the whole time. The protagonist releases allot of different reactions and feelings as he says ‘blind, self-satisfied creature’ and ‘it tastes alive’. Out of the whole story when the protagonist eats the sea urchin that’s when he starts coming of age and even if his two cultures still haven’t made up the sea urchin was the first step.

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In the short story, "In the Shadow of War" by  Ben Okri, Omovo struggles with internal conflict throughout the change in the unfamiliar environment and by visually witnessing violence and sensing the darkness. “The dead animals on the river were in fact the corpses of grown men”, Omovo later understands that he is visually changing his surroundings through his consciousness. The corpses of men represents the dead soldiers from the war, as also conveying suffered dead human beings. "The lights changed over the forest" The new element in the setting of the different lighting, changed the perspective for Omovo, as it lead for him to notice the corpses. This internal conflict gave a warning sign to Omovo also foreshadowing the danger that would happen next.

For Omovo to experience real life danger happeninning in front of his eyes changes him as he realizes the reality and understands in his coming of age.

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The protagonist/girl in the short story “Boys and Girls” by Alice Munro, finds herself in an external conflict with almost all her family about the difference in lifestyles between girls and boys. The narrator of the story is most likely trying to make the point that there is no superior gender or no gender who can do something better. “Girls don’t slam the door like that” or “girls keep their knees together when they sit down”, the choice of words and the gender talk in front of the protagonist(girl) is symbolic when talking about external conflicts between the two genders as well as the points of view from this sub-urban family when it comes to gender. The conflict of gender can further be exemplified by her reactions to hearing this which could be the reason she let the horse free. The girl (protagonist) had a strong connection with the new horse (flora), this connection created a strong bond between the girl and the horse, the girl felt close and similar to the horse, when she freed the horse, she could feel like she was being freed. The grandmother is symbolic in the way of creating the conflict by starting the conversation and adding on to points her mother, father or brother could’ve made. Henry Bailey and the father show some significance in adding onto the conflict, Henry states “Oh, that there Laird’s gonna show you, one of these days!” this fits perfectly into the category of men are superior to women. The father on the other hand finds out about the girl letting flora go and justifies it by “never mind, she’s only a girl” saying this made the protagonist want to speak up, however she did something they thought was wrong, she stayed quiet. Symbolically speaking, the protagonist spoke up at some points but not at others, her coming of age moment could be when she freed flora the horse, the disappointment that stopped her few steps of transformation in the coming-of-age process was that at the end of the story she gave up, even though she knew she had it coming, she gave up.

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Formative Paragraph:

The protagonist & narrator of Kura shows how Riripeti’s the internal conflict and her death affect the protagonist emotionally and sentimentally.

“Look after your little sister at school, help her, teach her what to do” Its symbolizes the pressure the family put and expect of the protagonist to care of her Retina. This show the coming of age of the protagonist, as an expectation that she must to prepare her retina to the unexpected world of school. What again, is symbolic of the coming of age. The teacher, Ms Wood, treatment to Riripeti and the rules all the they must follow in the school grounds.  The rules imposed at school “Afraid our bad language might come out” & “I knew my name was Kate in school” makes the readers to see the schools as a prison and that the teachers makes the natives kids to change the name to English and behave like British kids. “Who are you and where are your manners, coming in and sitting down as you thought you own the place?” The welcome treat the teacher had with Riripeti weaken her by treating her as she was a thing and not a person. This directly links to the emotional climax the protagonist suffer when Riripeti died because of the extress and stress the school had provoke her.

As a whole, the school is symbolic of a prison in which Riripeti suffers constantly and is trapped like in a labyrinth with no way to escape. This cause much conflict in the protagonist as she tries to cover is duty.

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In “Sea Urchins” the experience of visiting Korea highlights the narrator’s insecurity and disconnect from the country meant to be his home place especially in attempts to eat sea urchins “And I'm half gagging, though still chewing; it's as if I had another tongue in my mouth”. The indisputable fact that the character continues to eat sea urchins even if he's actively gagging from disgust reflects his internal conflict concerning his cultural identity. even if he can’t relate or fancy each side of Korea, he is still pushing himself to. He desires to assimilate and belong such a lot that he is virtually forcing himself to. Overall, eating sea urchins for the first time in this story reveals the ways of him attempting to come of age and realizes his cultural identity.

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‘Boys and Girls’ by Alice Munro is a short story that is an indirect commentary on gender roles in the early mid 20th century; in which a young girl, though inclined towards fieldwork, sports and other such masculine activities, is pressured to stay inside and help her mother in the kitchen by those around her, including her parents. The protagonist is told by her mother that "Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you'll have a real help". This sentence is symbolic of their internalised gender bias. A boy was seen as more capable than a girl to do field work whereas a girl was seen as more suitable to work in a kitchen. The protagonist’s parents live by this concept as there is a lack of awareness and they believe this to be right. Being an indirect commentary on gender roles, this story is meant to spread awareness about internalised traditional gender roles. It was meant to empower both young boys and girls, as well as inform and educate adults of the time. 

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The protagonist in Boys and Girl short story uncovers her external conflict that manifests as she attempts to rebel against social norms and codified structures of society.

One must decide for themselves whether to give in to those pressures and conform to society's projected image, or rather to resist and maintain their own desired self-image. Boys and Girls tells a story about girl with an external conflict between the role she wishes to fill and the role that her gender prescribes to her. “the world girl had formerly seemed to me innocent and unburdened like the word child: now it appeared there is no such thing” the girl develops a negative perception on the word “girl” as she identifies with her father, resenting housework and preferring the groundwork her father does. The secondary characters develop the theme by supporting one constant notion in which women are inferior and compliant. The prejudice is introduced to the narrator very early, when a businessman commends her for her physical labor, saying “I thought it was only a girl”. "Girls don’t slam doors like that”, “girls keep their knees together when they sit down”. The secondary characters words symbolize her developing external conflict, her identity worsens as she is confronted with what society expects from her and who she wants to be. It is not long before her wall is torn down, and she succumbs to the voice of others.

At the end of the story the narrator begins to take interest in traditionally girly things such as lace and ruffles. She starts thinking about boys and her emotions become more dislocated as she goes through puberty. Her final stance on her position in the world is conveyed to the reader when her father remarks “never mind, she's only a girl” to which she agrees.

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Through Sea Urchin, author Chang-rae Lee displays the difficulties of inner conflict using symbolism and the idea of adapting to unfamiliar cultures, this is seen in the quote "My mother is telling my father he's crazy, that I'll get sick from food poisoning, but he nods to the woman, and she picks up a half and cuts out the soft flesh’. The protagonist is torn between South Korean culture, which is symbolizes through his fathers encouragement to try something new, and American culture, represented through the mother who shows his hesitancy in accepting an unfamiliar part of the culture, he lost after moving away.
To conclude, symbolically stepping in for the challenge in trying the Sea Urchin show casing the moment of truth, the moment where the protagonist begins his transformation into a new chapter of his life

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In "In the Shadow of War" Ben Okri uses foreshadowing combined with confusion and also detailed plot points to create a fantasy-like story that portrays how not everything is what it "seems" or in this particular short story "looks" to the young protagonist.

The story starts off introducing 3 soldiers who have arrived at the main protagonists village: a boy named Omovo, Omovo notices through the window a shady women has been going across the village. The author quickly shifts from these brief details and then cuts into a diaologue between Omovo and his father so that the reader might disregard the previous details that might foreshadow what might come later. They hear from the radio that there will be a eclipse today and Omovo asks "What is an eclipse?" his father then proceeds to say "That's when the world goes dark and strange things happen" as soon as he says this it is understood that something fantasy realted will happen later in the story. As his father leaves Omovo spots the 3 soldiers talking with kids in the village and giving them money, he proceeds to go over to check it out. Turns out the soldiers have been giving money to the kids to spy on the strange women who they believe is a spy. They tell Omovo to spy on her which he initially refuses but then he sees the women leave the village so he decides to follow her into the forest. He then sees the women enter a cave and it seems as if she is giving food to refugees hidden in the cave with dead animals on the side. Suddenly the three soldiers appear and Omovo's view of what is in his sight is drastically changed. He finds out that dead animals are actually dead people that look to have been strangled. As the soldiers try to ask what has happened the women turns into a monster that looks as if it is going to attack the soldiers. Omovo gets scared and runs but trips and falls on a rock rendering him unconscience. As he wakes up he is in his house with his father and the three soldiers who his father says saved him. This entire second half of the short story is very confusing as the author changes Omovo's perception of the strange women and the soldiers many times but even then uses many imagery details to show how what Omovo is seeing might be a reality. Also throughout the many perception changes the author shows that not everything is what it might look like, specifically about the instance of the strange women. The author uses the foreshadowing of the eclipse to tie in a perplexing yet confusing plot changes through detailed twists and turns while riding in the fantasy roller coaster that he

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In the story “Boys and Girls” we get to see a various amount of interactions between the time that the story was placed and the characters. This is shown most during the ending of the story around Flora’s death.

Boys and Girls starts off with a society started issue, with inequality of different genders from growing up in completely different environments set with different expectations. The male gender was focused off of heavy work, strength and more control over emotions while on the female side we see less control over emotions and having them take over. This had cause parts like Flora escaping the gate around the end. Some evidence would be "Anyway it was her fault Flora got away." "What?" my father said. "She could of shut the gate and she didn't. She just open’ it up and Flora ran out." This was implying that the brother was shifting the blame from the difficulty onto his older sister for her valuing the life of the horse. This would then end up in the argument as found during the story, we see a disconnection from the brother and the sister throughout from her befriending him to the argument on the table.

Throughout the story we see glimpses of the mother’s opinions from males being the more workful gender in this time here is an example: I wheeled the tank up to the barn, where it was kept, and I heard my mother saying, "Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you'll have a real help." This shows us that the societal impact has affected middle aged people that had grown up with the inequality to start spreading it around. This would end up being an unbreakable cycle of parenthood telling their certain gendered children what they can and cant do. The main protagonist in this story transforms and adapts to the situation allowing her to share her thoughts through physical movements and verbal speech towards her parents as we get to see throughout the story.

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Kura by ‘Patricia Grace’ is a story surrounding regularized racism toward Polynesians the protagonist finds herself faced with internal conflict from her own culture and the culture that is forced upon her from the British colonies. “You have to listen, you have to obey. We know that you’re very clever and we know you’ll learn.” The reader is able to witness how Kate’s traumatic memories as a toddler as the she has grown up and taught to do whatever her grandmother asked her to do which causes her to fight with herself internally. Therefore, she faces many challenged as the protagonist which vary from cultural scenario wherein the children live to the private demanding situations. Kate herself faces internal conflict when given the obligation of looking after her little cousin, Riripeti, which is resented in the exposition of the chapter “That morning before I went to get Riripeti my mother said ‘Look after your little sister at school, hep her, teacher her what to do’” As Kate imagines how different and nice it would be to go through school with her, it is obvious that she faces dilemmas within herself and doubts her actions which causes her internal conflict to be exposed when her cousin Riripeti is faced with abuse by the teacher. “Who are you and where are your manners, coming in and sitting down as though you own the place?”. This explores the violence and anxiety that Kate must face in a society to be accepted. Figuratively when Kate returns to school after three months post the death of Riripeti is the protagonists identifies the initial coming of age moment, however, when Kate goes back to school, she then is faced with additional conflicts which aid her coming of age transition. 

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Sea Urchin

P - The arising internal conflict within the protagonist of Sea Urchin is noticed upon his sudden interest towards an unknown food to his pallet. Such introduction to the unknown food paired with internal conflict on the identity of his culture is a great combination a coming of age experience for Lee in Sea Urchin

E/A - “I point to a bin and say that’s what I want”. Lee’s decision in trying the Sea Urchin holds symbolic significance of a choice fueled by internal conflict between his cultural identity of two different cultures. the presence of internal conflict is built up across the story through his experience of Korea, but a supple part of the internal conflict is built through his parents who symbolize as polar opposites of cultures. The mother -rather the antagonist- symbolizes the American counterpart of Lee as she prefers for him to “get something fried” and stay within a civil path by not eating raw food. On the other hand, the father represents the Korean counterpart of lee as the fondness of eating raw food make feel like “it’s the old days” and emphasizing the dangerous aspect of eating raw food, “one of the suction cup can get stuck in your throat. You could die”. This specific emphasis possess a metaphorical connotation on the danger or risk Lee is willing to take in order to become closer one side of himself. “What does it taste like? I don’t know”, a confused reaction was the result of tasting the sea urchin, followed with clashing reactions of disgusted yet intrigued as he is “half gagging, though still chewing”. The display of these conflicting emotions is further emphasized metaphorically as if he “had another tongue” in his mouth. After this experience, he then caught food poisoning, but he does returns again to the bar and ordered the sea urchin, sitting with his “mouth slick with anticipation and revulsion, not yet knowing why”. The courage and curiosity within him wanting to try it again is symbolic of his Korean counterpart slightly winning in grasping to Lee, but hesitation due to American counterpart is still present.

L - The symbolic significance of the Sea Urchin is quite important as a catalyst to his coming of age experience in the story. However, it’s rather the driving force for Lee’s will in pursuing to reconnect to his Korean culture, but reconciliation hasn’t be fulfilled as the influence of his American counterpart is still conflicting Lee internally.

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The story “The women’s swimming pool” written by Hanan al-Shaykh illustrates how the protagonist renounced her dream because of her grandmother’s inflexible religious principles. The girl and her grandmother live in a village in South, weaving the tobacco plants. The protagonist is “exasperated at being in the tent”, “growing thirsty and dreaming, with the sea ever in [her] mind.” The exasperation of being in the tent is symbolically indicating that she is exhausted by the suppression she suffers and the sea indicating her dream and ideal life she dreams of. After the protagonist heard about the women’s swimming pool in Beirut from her friend Sumaya, she persuades her grandmother and starts her journey getting closer to reach her dream. She finds the swimming pool, but she also faces her reality while looking at her grandmother praying “on the pavement at the door of the swimming pool.” She has to overcome her grandmother to achieve her dream, her will, to go into the women’s swimming pool, but even though her grandmother “was destroying what lay in [her bag], blocking the road between [her] and the sea”, she goes back to her life which she showed exasperation because it was her grandmother. This symbolizes that there is a great steady obstacle, formed by its beliefs and “[fear] they wouldn’t go to heaven” because of not leading her granddaughter in religiously correct path, laying in between her and her dream.

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Kura is a story about institutionalized racism towards Polynesians in New Zealand that uses a contrast of respect and responsibility with danger to show the internal conflict that the main character goes through while seeing the abuse her cousin goes through. “You have to listen, you have to obey. We know that you’re very clever and we know you’ll learn. That’s what our school is for, for you to learn, for our children to learn. You’re very lucky to have a school and to be allowed to go to school.” The grandmother’s words stay with “Kate” throughout the whole story, causing her to clash with herself, due to the protagonist being raised to do whatever is asked of her in order to be well mannered, and  to stay safe. This adds to her internal conflict of what is right and wrong, since she was taught that behaving well is what kept her safe, but Riripeti wasn’t safe even though she was well behaved. “She told me she wanted to go back to her mother and father and kept urging me to ask our grandmother if she could go home, but I wouldn’t. I wasn’t old enough to ask our grandmother a thing like that”. The protagonist doesn’t feel like asking anyone for help is the right thing to do, due to the amount of trust and responsibility that was placed upon her. She feels that her grandmother placing Riripeti’s care on her is extremely important, and that asking for help would be disappointing her, and wasting her time. This leads her to the conclusion that Riripeti’s death was her fault: “She was my charge, my little sister, my work that I’d been given to do, mine to look after. What an evil girl I was to let her die.” “Kate” mourns Riripeti by seeing herself as the cause of her death, due to being responsible for her. “Kate’s” overcoming moment doesn’t necessarily happen in the story, but it takes place when the story is told years later, due to it being the moment when the story is told for what it is, holding not herself but the teacher accountable.

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The short story Kura, portrays the harsh reality of not only finding but losing self -identity.Throughout the story, we learn of the ruthless behavior given towards the Maori, as seen with Riripeti. They were stripped of their true identity with Kura knew her "name was Katie at school." They were unable to speak their language in public without discrimination as seen when the headmaster reminded Mr.William "I don't allow any of that language in my school or in these school grounds." Having your name and language stripped from you is more than enough to lose a fraction of your identity. Kura describes how "in those days no one would take a Maori bag to the town or shop" further detailing the need to have to hide their Maori identity for safety. Despite this, Kura describes the change as "it wasn't like these days when you can see these baskets everywhere. We can see uses of symbolism here with the bags possibly representing   fighting society. In summary, through analysing we can understand the sorrow and pain Kura had faced as she watched someone so dear to her, Riripeti, lose themselves before her eyes.She faced the struggle of fighting society and coming of age.

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Chang-rae Lee, the author of the story, Sea Urchin uses foreign or unappealing food to the reader and boy in the story as an attraction to this almost 15 year old.

‘Ive always liked food, but now I’m bent on trying everything.’  The name of the story, ‘Sea Urchin’ gives a hint on what the boy tries eating in the story.  We also now know that he likes to try every different type of food.  The Korean cultural influence in his life also may have led him to this as typically in more Asian countries or parts of the world, they tend to eat more live sea creatures and animals / typically they eat very different types of meals than say what British people would eat.  The mother wanting them to get something cooked instead of raw is a symbol of the American culture that they would be used to.  The father wants something live representing more of the Korean culture.  The internal conflict of both the boy and father are that they are attracted to the live food which is where something catches the boys eye; sea urchin.  They end up getting the sea urchin and from the way the text is written, the boy didn’t know if he liked or disliked it.  He threw up that night, but then when he was feeling better, a week later he went back for more.  Going back for more shows that the boy was interested and wanted to try it again.  This once again shows the internal conflict of the boys dual nationality of American and Korean where he begins to find Korean food at least interesting or addictive.

When the boy goes back for more sea urchin, I believe that this shows the boys coming of age moment and his 2 different cultural identities coming together.  I believe this is the coming of age moment because he realizes that he wanted to try the sea urchin again, which is more Asian cultured food, and is visiting for the first time in 12 years from America which he has grown up with American culture.

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In the story “the woman’s swimming pool”, the narrator is faced with mental dilemmas as she tries to get to fulfill her desired dream, but her grandmother, and other conflicts life has thrown at the narrator through her journey, makes her feel as if she is sinking. The author uses symbolism to contrast the religious beliefs and heritage between the narrators home town and the big city of Beirut.

“I felt sorry for her, her knees that knelt on the cruelly hard pavement, and for the tattooed hands that laid on the dirt. I felt how far removed we were from these passersby, from this city, this sea. I approached her, and she again put her weight on my hand”. The quote presents a contradiction between the two locations, Beirut, and the narrators home town which is located in the country side of Lebanon. Although they might be close, they are two very different places with different beliefs, and cultures. This quote can identify this through symbolism as the narrator describes the tattooed hands, and the way she knelt down onto the ground to pray. The passerby stares at the grandmother as it is not something he is used to seeing in this city, but it normal for the grandmother. The way she kneels down can symbolize the grandmothers religious beliefs, contradicting to the passerby who symbolises a new generation of society. This can clearly display a contrast between the grandmother who still follows the ancient beliefs, and the new generation beliefs, who originate from two different places.

As the narrator sees the symbolized contrast she finally understands that her grandmother does not belong in this place, but possibly a future for her self growing in this new way of culture when she will be independent.

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In the book ‘Boys and Girls’ written by Alice Munro, the protagonist develops internal conflict as she subconsciously succumbs to female stereotypes imposed by the antagonist.

“And then I can use her more in the house.” This is symbolic of the traditional way the antagonist, her mother, was raised, reinforcing her belief that females are supposed to maintain the house. The protagonist hearing this statement is symbolic of the moment she begins to question her sense of self, thus her designated position in the family. This is indicated further when the antagonist speaks on her mother’s constant plotting, “She was plotting now to get me to stay in the house more, although she knew I hated it” Knowing quite clearly that she does not want to conform her identity as her mother wishes, painting her in an antagonistic light, considering a mother should never force a child into something she does not want to be. Yet here, “It did not occur to me that she could be lonely”, this quote Is symbolic of the way the protagonist’s idealistic mindset assumes her mother has a very good reason for her actions. Further emphasizing the depth of her internal conflict, as she struggles to decide whether to give into the antagonists stereotypes, that may seem genuine or become as she desires. Although her father is representative of the side of herself that accepts the way she is, “I did not expect my father to pay any attention to what she said” similarly to how she wishes she didn’t have to listen to the antagonist’s reminders each day that she must stay in the house. As we enter the subplot, the protagonist’s internal conflict comes to a dynamic climax, “instead of shutting the gate, I opened it as wide as I could.” At this very moment letting Flora go embodies the way the antagonist wishes she could be, rather than reality where she is just a girl, "She's only a girl," he said.” Clearly pointing out the moment where the side of her that accepts who she is, embodied in her father, has now too, turned against her.

Symbolically, the moment where both her parents agree that she is just a girl marks he protagonist’s shift from an idealistic mindset, to reality, where she feels destined to succumb to female stereotypes. Her two conflicting natures have not been reconciled, instead she gives in.

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The protagonist of ‘The Women's Swimming Pool’ narrates her desire to reach a sense of independence and self expression yet is drawn back and guilt tripped by her familial beliefs and harmful gender stereotypes symbolised by her Grandmother the antagonist presence.

“If any man were to see you, you’d be done for, and so would your mother and father and your grandfather, the religious scholar- and id be done for more than anyone because its I who agreed to this and helped you”, the grandmother ridicules her dream to reach the sea which symbolises her freedom and a more progressive lifestyle as they are on their journey to cosmopolitan Beirut, the grandmother symbolises the grim reality of oppressive religious beliefs and effectively guilts her into believing her actions of participating in a progressive yet ‘scandalous’ lifestyle would shame the families reputation prioritizing familiar beliefs of what is the right way for the young girl to behave over the protagonist individual beliefs as if its her duty to protect her deceased relatives. The grandmother also references specifically if it was a man that saw the state of her that her family would harm therefore eluding that the protagonist's actions as a female may be judged and condemned only by a man as she is lesser than him, a common theme seen in oppressive cultural beliefs. At the closing scene the author depicts how the protagonist felt alien in such as progressive setting compared to the rural lands “I felt how far removed we were from these passers-by, from this street, this city, this sea. I approached her, and she again put her weight on my hand”. The main character reaches a deafening low as she is convinced that due to her cultural background being so behind on self expression and social norms compared to cosmopolitan Beirut she will never reach the ‘sea’ and is meant to live the dreadful life back at the Tobacco farm. Now contrasting against the start once she realizes her community believes are engraved in her effectively estranging herself from the environment she returns to her Grandmother rather than run away as she has nothing left but the oppressive life she knows. Symbolically the protagonists revolving dynamic with her grandmother represents her relationship with oppressive cultural and religious beliefs, the author portrays the young girls journey to the ‘sea’ a point of freedom in a coming of age story yet to the end through her emotional transformation she reaches a depressing epiphany during the climax that such a destiny is not for her due to her background holding her back leading the audience unsure of her future.

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In Sea Urchin, the narrator goes through a traumatic coming of age experience when he has a taste of his lost heritage provoked by his internal conflict.

‘And I’m half gagging, though still chewing.’ The protagonist has a strong desire to the sea urchins, a traditional Korean food, which is driven by his internal conflict of wanting to reconnect with his Korean culture after being exposed to American culture ever since he was a toddler. His parents are symbolic of both sides of his cultures; his mother being completely indulged in American culture tries to prevent the narrator from tasting the exotic food as she is now used to fried and cooked American food, she says, ‘Get something fried. Get something cooked.’ His father on the other hand is still excited about revisiting his heritage but warns the protagonist by saying ‘You could die,’ symbolically suggesting that the experience of reconnecting with his Korean culture can be overwhelming. Finally as the protagonist has a taste, he has an epiphany that starts dismantling his internal conflict. Realizing that the sea urchin tastes like ‘something alive at the underaged bottom of the sea.’ he still forces himself to eat it as he is determined and ready to find his Korean identity again.

After completing this big step forward into his coming of age experience, the narrator is still not fully awakened but he still continues to symbolically taste his Korean heritage to further understand his true identity.

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Within the story “Boys and Girls” written by Alice Munro, the reader is able to identify a variety of themes all of which link back to societies perspective of gender roles. The protagonist within the story discovers her internal conflict is the gender roles provided to men and women, the protagonist doesn’t take into account the seriousness of the gender roles until she herself matures and gains an understanding as to what she herself can and can’t do. The author displays both the protagonist frustrations of being forced to follow the gender role and the protagonist coming of age through a variety of imagery, symbolism, conflict alongside some stylistic and narrative techniques used within the text of the story.

“I had told Laird, as soon as he was old enough to understand such things, that bats and skeletons lived over there; whenever a man escaped from county jail, twenty miles away, I imagined that he had somehow let himself in the window and was hiding behind linoleum. But we had rules to keep us safe. When the light was on, we were safe as long as we did not step off the square of worn carpet which defined our bedroom-space; when the light was off no place was safe but the beds themselves. I had to turn out the light kneeling on the end of my bed, and stretching as far as I could to reach the cord.” The word imagination confirms that the tale is of the protagonist imagination although this whole tale itself is symbolic and connects to the theme of coming of age because children are known to have a wild imagination. The light being seen as protection is also symbolic as people are usually scared of the dark because of their lack of knowledge of their surrounding and this causes people mainly children to imagine creatures and ghouls and the light allows them to become more aware and calms their brain which prevents them from imagining all these creatures and ghouls. “I no longer felt safe” is what she felt that winter, with the word girl becoming more relevant. “A girl was not, as

I had supposed, simply what I was; it was what I had to become”

The girl has come to the terrifying realisation that being who she was now was not enough.”  The protagonist awareness as to how she wasn’t following the gender roles society view women and how instead of being accepted into society she’d be expected to reform and change who she is entirely to fit the gender role of women. The feeling of uneasiness because of the word girl was used to symbolise the protagonist journey of discovering her own identity as well as the protagonist maturity throughout the story whether it was her thinking or her feelings on the words of her mother more within the story after she’s told by her grandma.

“My grandmother came to stay with us for a few weeks and I heard other things. ‘Girls don’t slam doors like that’. ‘Girls keep their knees together when they sit’. And worse still when I asked some questions, ”That’s none of  girls’ business. I continued to slam  the doors and sit as awkwardly as possible, thinking that by such measures I kept myself free.” Just like the protagonist mother, the grandmothers constant nagging of what a girl should do and shouldn’t is an internal conflict towards the protagonist life as the grandmother constantly reminding the protagonist of these gender roles she’s going to need to follow within her life as well as her social value, the grandmother whilst saying helps the protagonist mature as the protagonist hearing this from someone other than her mother starts to think more about her life within the future and feels caged. The protagonist also goes on to think about what the term girl truly means and what it takes or what societal value and purpose does a girl need to follow. “And then I can use her more in the house," I heard my mother say. She had a dead-quiet regretful way of talking about me that always made me uneasy. "I just get my back turned and she runs off. It's not like I had a girl in the family at all.” The mother is the main antagonist throughout the story and she symbolises societies view on girls at the time and makes it clear that she has no desire for the protagonist to be different from girls from previous generations of girls and doesn’t provide any desire throughout the whole story of the protagonist staying like herself. The mother frustrates the protagonist as she not only reminds the protagonist what she’s expected to do but also how she’s supposed to think and act although the protagonist ignored what her mother was saying all these comments the mother of the protagonist made can be seen as the development for the protagonist growth in maturity as the protagonist focuses on the words of her mother more within the story after she’s told by her grandma.

Symbolically the protagonist tale that she tells to her little brother can be viewed as a sign as to the protagonist journey of discovering her identity although it also represents the character development of her mindset and her innocence as she displays both a childlike mindset when telling the tale and viewing the light and the bed covers as safety but later on within the story the protagonist focuses more on the term girl and all the significance behind it. The internal conflict successfully symbolised how women are generally seen within society and provides how much of an impact societies view on gender roles have on people’s life, the protagonist struggle of battling against how she’s being viewed by everyone represents the struggle of women when trying to express themselves as women are expected to behave, act and talk within a certain way depending on where they’re from and this can decide their value.

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Throughout the story The Women’s Swimming Pool, the protagonist deals with external conflict with the antagonist, which would be her grandmother. “I’m thirsty. I go out… I see greenish blue water… Before being able to savor its relative coldness, I hear my name and see my grandmother standing in her black dress.” The author of the story uses the ocean as a symbol of the narrator’s desire of freedom. And contrasting to that, her grandmother symbolizes the traditional religious beliefs of her country that result in gender restrictions. There are clear differences of desires between the two characters, for example, “I still had to wear that dress… I had resisted her and refused to wear my stocking.” The narrator faces conflict with her grandmother as a result of their generational difference. By refusing to wear her stocking, the protagonist rebels against the old religious customs that her grandmother believes she has to follow. On top of those, the grandmother also wants the narrator to believe superstitions of her generation, like “the sea puts a spell on people.” The external conflict between the protagonist and antagonist of the story is symbolized through their ideological differences that come from a result of their wide age gap.

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The narrator of ‘Girls and Boys’ finds her internal conflict from her identity as she encounters the restrictive nature of gender expectations in society and her family by proving her capabilities in contrast with her younger brother and female family traditions.

“Lately I had been trying to make my part of the room fancy, spreading the bed with old lace curtains” the protagonist is clearly having an identity crisis and is unsure of the gender roles she is supposed to fulfill as a woman. Making her room “Fancy” is symbolism of starting to fit more into the role of a girl that her family and society accepts. “I planned to put up some kind of barricade between my bed and Laird’s, to keep my section separate from his”. This is symbolic to the gender restrictions and differences that separates boys and girls, further more this creates visual imagery to show that the protagonist is separating herself from Laird as she becoming more of a girl. In the short story ‘Boys and girls’ the protagonist’s grandmother came to visit them which further developed the protagonists inner conflict about her gender by scolding the protagonist for not being a “proper girl” by making sexist comments such as “Girls don’t slam doors like that” “Girls keep their knees together when they sit down” “That’s none of a girl’s business”, it is evident that the Mother has been trapped into these gender rules created by society because her grandmother is just the same. They both expect the protagonist to follow these traditional rules but she decides to continue acting like herself as she feels more free. This made the protagonist question her gender and identity even more, this caused her to be insecure about herself, the actions she takes and her thoughts about life and her future path as a woman.

Symbolically, the coming of age journey that the protagonist goes through allows her to explore her feminine side and relate to the female roles she is expected to take as a woman from society and her family. This journey allows her to explore and discover her identity and differentiate her lifestyle from her brother’s.

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Kura, an excerpt from Patricia Grace’s “Baby-No-Eyes”, is a story about institutionalized racism and discrimination towards the Polynesian racial identity in a predominantly white New Zeland, who’s emotions it provokes can’t be described in words. It perfectly details how society can strip any individual of their identity simply because the majority doesn’t agree with it. At the beginning of the story when Riripeti is being talked to by the teacher but doesn’t understand due to the language barrier, the narrator says-“She didn’t understand and sat there smiling, swinging her shoulders, swinging her eyes-to me, then back again to the teacher”. The narrator portrays to us how innocent and lively Riripeti is, always smiling and excited for her school experience. Throughout the beginning of the story, she remains this way, regardless of the physical, verbal and psychological harassment she receives from her teacher daily. She fights to keep her identity for so long, until she’s inevitably broken down by society and when she refuses to go to school altogether, the narrator says- “It was true that she couldn’t go to school. Her spirit was out of her, gone roaming ``''I’d seen a dying dog look like that, which made me think it might be true what the teacher said, that my teina was changing into an animal”. When society and the entire world around you tells you what you are, it can become a challenge for you yourself to even know, and that’s what happened to Riripeti, to an extreme extent. This harrowing story shows how identity is something that we all fight for, sometimes against society itself, a great example being institutionalized racism and the downfall of a cheerful Polynesian girl who’s only sin was being herself.

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The author Alice Munro in Boys and Girls explorers the protagonist’s coming in age through her growing awareness of traditional gender roles that her mother, father and society were steeped in. ‘Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you'll have a real help.’ The mother makes her daughter feel invaluable and insults her ability to help her father with the farm work, this emphasizes the protagonists mother perspective of women as weak and unhelpful in the field/farm. This is symbolic and reflects the influence of prevalent gender stereotypes in the mind 19th century. The protagonist faces an internal conflict with her identity because her mother addresses her presence in the farm as ‘unhelpful’ just because she is a girl, the word ‘girl’ has become warped, now an insult and meaning someone ‘incapable’. ‘I can use her in the house’ said by her mother, emphasizes symbolism; girls are considered a symbol of washing dishing, making food, cleaning the house and serving the men. These symbolic stereotypes massively impacted the protagonist’s coming in age and identity. Through symbolism, setting, and conflict the author explores the girl discovering herself as she faces the grim reality and overwhelming desire for freedom.

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The internal conflict of the protagonist in Kura, is conceived throughout her climatic experiences at school, from which she had no control over. "She didn't know what she had been told to do." The unconventional surroundings that the protagonist found herself in, emphasized her vulnerability to the traumatic experiences she would face at the hand of the teacher that motivated the creation of her internal conflict. These events cause the physical and mental deterioration of the protagonist as the journey to school became increasingly difficult each morning with "her footsteps getting slower and slower" which symbolizes the accumulation of her internal conflict pulling her down. Soon she is consumed by the adverse circumstances and is "Killed by school. Dead of fear" during the technical climax of the story. The death of the protagonist symbolically relates to the coming of age transition of the narrator and the other Maori children after experiencing the climatic event, which leads to the exposure of the conflicting circumstances of the protagonist.

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The protagonist in Boys and Girls stumbles upon the conflict of the story when she realizes the harsh and cruel reality of gender stereotypes as she longs to work outside instead in the kitchen with her mother but cannot as a result of her parents’ gender stereotyping.

“In this he was quite different than my mother, who, if she was feeling quite cheerful, would tell me all sorts of things-the name of dogs she had when she was a little girl, the names of boys she had gone out with later on when she has grown up, and what certain dresses of hers had looked like- she could not imagine what had become of them now.” The mother acts as an influence to all what the protagonist did not stand for. The protagonist enjoys working outside with her father, while her mother acts as a barrier to try and stop her. She does this by talking to her about “feminine” topics.  Later on in the story, the rising action of the story takes place. The protagonist is working with her father, when a salesman arrives and her father introduces her as his new “hired hand.” The protagonist is pleased by this statement because she feels like she finally found her place and her father appreciates her hard work. But, then the salesman’s comments saying “I thought it was only a girl.” The salesman’s comment creates a sense of uneasiness and it comes as destruction to the protagonist’s five minutes of happiness. However, even with everyone around the protagonist acting as barriers to what she truly wants in life, she still fights through it and never gave up. “As soon as I was done I ran out of the house, trying to get out of earshot before my mother thought of what she wanted me to do next.” This statement is highly symbolic as it represents how the protagonist loathed the work she would do. She despised the house work and would take any chance to escape the torture her mother would put her through as she longed to work outside. “What did she mean about Laird? He was no help to anybody.” The protagonist’s parents praised Laird for completing the basic necessities. While the protagonist works all day in the kitchen completing the hardest chores, Laird plays outside living his life. Yet, the parents praise Laird only based on his gender. They disregard all of the protagonist’s hard work solely based on the fact she is a girl. This is a representation of gender stereotyping. “It’s not like I had a girl in the family at all.” Here the mother admits the purpose of the protagonist is to complete house chores. She objectifies the protagonist, not treating her as her own daughter but a thing that completes chores. She ignores the protagonist’s feelings and emotions and only cares about herself. This reveals the mother’s selfish and unsympathetic nature.

Marking the resolution of the story, the protagonist recognizes she will never amount to anything in her parents’ eyes due to gender roles. After tears form in her eyes, the father brushes it off saying she’s only a girl. This marks her realization she will always be just a girl to her parents. She never protested what her father said and accepts the fact that she will never be destined to live her the way she likes unlike Laird who will be praised on the simplest of achievements.

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The protagonist finds his internal conflict manifests itself through his confusion of not knowing what he wants, or what he needs in his life. "I dont know whats wrong. Or maybe I do. Im bored. Maybe Im craving a girl." Him not knowing what he wants, is symbolic of his internal conflict in a way judging by the possible cultural influences he has. This is further emphasized by him going on to talk about the way he feels about girls, and his strange attraction to unusual things throughout the story. His mother is symbolic because she has american cultural interests and influence, trying to not let the protagonist try new things ("get something cooked") and his father, symbolizing the South Korean cultural influence in him wants him to try new things and to figure out who he truly is, by saying 'you have to be careful, you could die' intending that there is a chance the protagonist could die trying something new. As he is trying something new, the story reaches a powerful climax of different emotions and reactions, in which he feels like a 'blind, self-satisfied creature' and noting that the sea urchin tastes alive. When he says 'self satisfied creature' this could symbolize that he might have found a solution to his internal conflict. Symbollically, him eating the sea urchin gave him the solution to his internal conflict and is his coming of age moment, and although he still hasnt managed the inbetween of his two cultural identities, it marks the first step in the right direction to become a different person

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In Boys and Girls, the protagonists conflict with her mother is rooted in the stereotypes she is expected to conform to. The protagonist’s mother is insistent on her daughter spending more time working inside the house and kitchen, a location symbolizing the more feminine stereotype in the story. This symbolism of the location is enforced as the mother describes, “its not like I had a girl in the family at all,” in reaction to her daughters refusal to help with indoor work. Working indoors is inherently seen as the feminine, and thus correct, job to do, taking the status of ‘being a girl’ away from the protagonist as she doesn’t take part in it. Instead, the mother tells the father to ‘wait until Laird gets a little bigger, then you’ll have a real help,’ implying that the brother was more suited for the outdoor work than the protagonist. The outdoors is then the location that symbolizes more masculine work, hence the mother shunning her daughter away from it. To the protagonist, work in the house is not her ideal, as she tends to describe it in a negative manner; how she ‘hated the hot dark kitchen in the summer,’ and ‘ as soon as I was done I ran out of the house…before my mother thought of what she wanted me to do next.’ However, when describing work outdoors, the protagonist’s language is much more neutral; she describes working in the field and among the foxes much more positively then she does working in the kitchen. Thus, the protagonist can be seen favoring the ‘masculine’ world more than she does the ‘feminine’, rejecting the stereotypes placed on her. Her mother on the other hand favors the following of these stereotypes, hence her reasoning for urging her daughter to work more with her in the kitchen. It is clear then that this difference in interest between the mother and the protagonist, based off of preferences and adherence to stereotypes, is the root of conflict between the two. 

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Omovo’s perception of the world around him is symbolic of his innocence and exposure to the external conflict in his country.

Omovo begins as an innocent child, not understanding the true dangers of the world and war, in an effort to preserve his youthful innocence, his father tells him “turn off the radio. It’s bad for a child to listen to news of war”. Omovo’s innocent ignorance is further symbolized by his initial perception of the veiled woman as a supernatural being “They say she had no shadow. They had said her feet never touched the ground”. The perception that a veiled woman must be a supernatural being symbolises Omovo’s innocence as he is believing unrealistic rumors instead of considering the darker truth of the woman’s identity/purpose, which is that she is involved in the war, and according to the soldiers “She is a spy. She helps our enemies”. Omovo’s coming of age happens when he witnesses the killing of the woman, and his perception of the things around him rapidly changes as his innocence is lost. As he follows the soldiers and the woman to the place she will eventually be killed, his young, imaginative, and innocent mind substitutes dead bodies with more innocent things, “When he looked at the canoes again they had changed into the shapes of swollen dead animals”. Omovo loses his innocence as he witnesses the woman being beaten and interrogated he has an epiphany that war and violence are actually real and pose potential danger towards him, he finally perceives his surroundings for the dark truth and realizes what he thought were canoes or animal carcasses are actually human corpses “Omovo saw that the dead animals were in fact the corpses of grown men”. This premature realization that war and death are real and not just stories he hears on the radio causes Omovo to panic and run.

Omovo’s perception of his surroundings symbolically portray his coming of age journey from innocent ignorance to understanding the darkness of the real world. He was prematurely pulled into realizing the hard truth that war and violence exist, the exposure to the external conflict of the war causing him to lose his innocence at far to young of an age.

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In Sea urchin, the narrator uses symbolism, in order to convey how the narrator has difficulties settling in South Korea as he is used to the environment from USA. From the quote: “And in the heat, everything smells of ferment and rot and rakness”, we can understand that the temperature is significantly different and therefore, he finds South Korea hot. Of course, as something that is associated with hotness is rot and rakness, the author using these adjectives to describe how the places smell due to the heat. From this quote, it is evident that the narrator has difficulties settling in South Korea, since the temperature as well as surroundings are significantly different and that therefore bothers him.

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Throughout the story “Boys and Girls” by Alice Munro the protagonists develops internal conflict on who she is meant to be as a result of the stereotypical world around her. The steps of internal conflict rose very early in the story as it built up to the demise of the characters personality and confidence. “”Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you'll have a real help.”” said by the protagonists mother was the first strike of internal conflict. The protagonist did not know this was how the people around her let alone her mother felt. “I felt my mother had no business down here” the protagonist starts to feel anger and confusion since she never thought she wasn’t capable of doing farm work like the males. Munro uses dialogue to set the stereotypical idea into the protagonist and readers minds. “What did she mean about Laird? He was no help to anybody.” it is clear fom the anger she was showing towards Laird that she was in conflict with herself. The anger is symbolic to the part of her that feels this could be true, her first time experiencing a situation that made her feel incapable of doing something she loved. “Instead of shutting the gate, I opened it as wide as I could.” As the protagonist was meant to shut the gate she opened it setting “Flora” the female horse free. Flora was symbolic to the authors own personality, because she was technically a female however she was tougher that Mack the male horse. Letting Flora escape was the internal conflict affecting her actions, this was the little hope she had that she acted on. We can see the protagonist is unsure of her actions and is confused on why she did them, just as coming of age is confusing for many. “"She's only a girl," he said.” This statement said about the protagonist was the final strike of self doubt in her mind, as she realised she was only a girl in the world, not capable of being strong or doing what she really wanted to, she was then forced to mature into a real world view that she will never be able to defy the gender roles in her society. “I didn't protest that, even in my heart. Maybe it was true.” This was the last phase of the protagonists coming of age where she accepted the reality of her world knowing she had finally come of age where she must follow her duties. Finally the protagonists coming of age took place in steps. With each crucial moment she was facing internal conflict as a final result of acceptance into this stereotypical world that she now had to live in.

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The Womans Swimming Pool - English formative paragraph

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In the story "In the shadows of war” the author, Ben Okri, tries to convey a message to the audience to not judge an individual by their actions and looks. There were many key points in the text which lead to this. The narrator used words such as “strange” to describe the mysterious lady wearing black, the audience still had no idea of who the woman is, but the soldiers did tell Omovo that she helps the enemies who are in a war with Omovo’s country. Towards the end of the story, Omovo realizes that what the soldiers told him about the lady wasn’t true, the lady was being attacked by the soldiers in the forest, a soldier pushed her and she “fell on her face and lay still”. Omovo then saw the corpses of grown men alongside the river right before the soldiers were about to pull the trigger to shoot the woman, Omovo then heard the shot and as soon as he did, “a violent beating of wings” above him had scared him from his hiding place, this lead the soldiers to follow him, that is when Omovo had woke up in his house and saw his dad talking to the 3 soldiers in the balcony. We can see here, that the moment before the woman was shot, Omovo realized from the dead bodies alongside the river that the woman was not an enemy and in fact, she was just a normal citizen in Omovo’s village. The context behind this piece of text is that Omovo knew that the soldiers were lying to Omovo about what the woman does, although he did believe them at the start before he saw the corpses of dead men. After Omovo had woken up, he pointed at the three soldiers with fear, his dad then stated that they brought him back from the forest and that he should thank them, in this part, the audience and Omovo himself in the story, were confused between the reality and Omovo’s dream, since when his dad had told him that they brought him back from the forest, it links back to his dream when he was in the forest.

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The protagonist in ‘Boys and Girls’ is a victim to the society’s unwritten gender-imposed rules which causes an internal conflict in the protagonist’s innocent mind. Moreover, the protagonist is exposed to the harsh realities and societal expectations in the world which causes a gradual demolishment of an immature mind and the growth of a mature mind. Through symbolism and pathetic fallacy, the author explains the journey of the protagonist while she deals with the orthodox.

In the exposition of the story the author introduces the young mind of the protagonist to the readers. The narrator says that “But we had rules to keep us safe. When the light was on, we were safe as long as we did not step off the square of worn carpet which defined our bedroom-space;”. This scene is symbolic while considering the fact that the carpet in the bedroom symbolizes her innocent mind and lack of experience while the area outside the carper symbolizes maturity and experiencing reality. Eventually, the external world lead by the gender orthodox would pull her out of the immature mindset. On the other hand, the narrator uses pathetic fallacy to describe the second floor in the house. She says that “but these things, reminders of the warm, safe, brightly lit downstairs world, seemed lost and diminished, floating on the stale cold air upstairs”.  The protagonist assigns traits to the floors of the house to describe her feeling when she entered the particular part of the house. The downstairs was ‘safe and brightly lit’ because it symbolizes the idealistic world where she was protected by her parents while the upstairs “seemed lost and diminished’ because she was all by herself at night surrounded by her dreadful thoughts about the supernatural that encouraged a sense of fear in her mind. Ironically, her parents would be responsible for diminishing her immature mind by imposing the unwritten gender discrimination rules. In the resolution, the father says that “She's only a girl” while the protagonist says that “I didn't protest that, even in my heart. Maybe it was true.” The protagonist accepts the oppressive nature of the society. She puts an end to the internal conflict by accepting the fact that she is a girl, and the society would never accept her aspirations. The dreams that the young yet innocent mind viewed was demolished in a second. She had viewed the death of a horse but more importantly the gender orthodox pulled her away from the world of idealism into the cruel realistic world.

The author explores the internal conflict based on the aspirations of the protagonist and the expectations of the society. With the help of symbolism and pathetic fallacy, the author describes the journey of the protagonist from a world of idealism to a world of realism.

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The story "Women's Swimming Pool" delivers the solution the protagonist reached for her external conflict where she was suppressed by gender role compelled by her family and the journey she walked toward the sea and swimming pool.

"She wants to go to the sea, to the women's swimming pool" and “I came forward and asked her, Is the women’s swimming pool here? She nodded her head,”
The protagonist dreams the sea or women's swimming pool as a utopia where she can break out from old custom confined her from freedom.
The sea symbolizes the freedom protagonist wanted or resistance to female injustice she suffers as external conflict.
The conflicts and solution of the protagonist were rendered through her dialogue with grandmother- the symbol of gender role- and Al Taweela- an emblem of fairness.
Grandmother avoids her grandchild-protagonist- from making friends or touching the sea surface. She worries her granddaughter getting out of her control as it was forbidden in her culture and heritage and is represented in the quote: "Don’t you know that the sea puts a spell on people". On the other hand, Al Taweela encourages the protagonist to visit women's swimming pool and kindly introduce a male who will escort the protagonist to the place.
Unlike grandmother, Al Taweela has open-eyes and values coexistence of male and female in equal position-“And why not? Right now Ali Mousa, our neighbour, will be coming and he’ll take you, he’s got a car”
At the beginning of the story, the protagonist only dreamed about the sea but did not execute any plans to full fill it. In page 3 of the story-"My distress increased I was no longer able to stop it turning into tears that flowed"- the protagonist expresses her anxiety towards her current situation where she cannot physically change anything but to imagine. However, in the end, the protagonist actively executes her plan of visiting Al Taweela for advice and even courage her grandmother to join her at the women's swimming pool-“Come along, Grandma, get up and let’s go.”
The external conflict protagonist suffered disappears and the protagonist feels juxtaposing idea where her grandmother's dress once looked prestige now looks shabby creating a bright atmosphere for the protagonist.

The protagonist entering the women's swimming pool is the turning point where the protagonist meets the coming of age and turning false world view to true world view as she breaks female injustice and gender duty.
Indeed, her grandmother did not completely accept the protagonist's behaviour as she continues to prey inside the swimming pool, which indicates the conflicts are not entirely solved yet.

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The internal conflicts that happen within our protagonist are seen as problems only she is aware of happening but we must also see what these conflicts are that cause so much strife to her emotionally and her little sister Riripeti. This is seen during the time when Riripeti was introduced to school for the first time and our protagonist had said 'the teacher had jolted her head and gave her a smacking on the legs' and 'she was too good to lie' we can tell that Riripeti's kindness and unreadiness to school are the reasons as to why she goes through smacking's and reprimanded at school and with the fact that later Riripeti had died because of fear of school; we also see her pain as it is written 'we all cried embracing each other' during when she was with her cousins during break after her class was sent outside. As seen by the evidence, our protagonist had to see the continuous abuse towards Riripeti and the fact that school was scarier than anywhere else she had been and when she saw that Riripeti had died because of the constant abuse, terror, and fear of Ms. and Mr. Wood we can tell these where the causes resulting in Riripeti's death which filled our protagonist with even more angst and sadness since Riripeti was her little sister and to see her get hurt continuously was really painful towards our protagonist despite not getting any injuries.

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The narrator in "The Women's Swimming Pool" finds her internal conflict through her eccentric contentment towards the sea.
The passage prescribes the unusual attraction composed of the sea through the narrator's symbolic instinct that binds her internal conflict between the immoral disadvantages in her life. The quote "I felt how far removed we were from these passersby, from this street, this city, this sea" further emphasizes the distinction between the narrator's ambition and her present identity through her Grandmother's conduct towards the journey. The grandmother tries to drive the narrator to neglect her aspiration of the sea by encouraging that it was "that devil Sumayya who put it in her head" instantly recognising the grandmother's symbolic past of living in Lebanon that cultural stereotypes were given to dismay women through many activities such as going to any type of swimming pool. The narrator then gets pulled by Maryam al-Taweela, who being a close friend, as the symbolic attribute of her mom trying to let her grandmother reconsider the thought saying "and why not" let her go to the swimming pool. This enforces the contrast between her and the protagonist's grandmother. Maryam being the protagonist's admirer on letting her take her to the swimming pool. However, the protagonist symbolically gets agitated by not knowing how to reach the swimming pool when spotting it and addresses that her "dreams had come to an end" aggressively dismantling what she had wanted to become to finally drift away from her grandmother. As the protagonist realises where the entry to the swimming pool is, she soon needed to bring her grandmother. The resolution ultimately syncs in the culmination seeing that "she was praying", her grandmother was praying. The internal conflict of the protagonist uprises as she "walked off in another direction" and "stopped looking at her". Until the moment of epiphany, where she realizes what she brought her grandmother into. The protagonist knows how "far removed" they were, but still approached her grandmother to "put her weight" on her hand.
Ultimately, the protagonist finding and viewing the sea was a symbolic action of reaching her 'coming of age' moment, but her not being able to successfully touch it influenced the blockage from her grandmother through the prayer making the protagonist unaware, casually stopping her transformation in disarray and essentially halting her dream.

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In Boys and Girls, the author finds the conclusion of her internal conflict through the release of the unruly horse. "I opened it as wide as I could. I did not make any decision to do this; it was just what I did”. The protagonist feels a connection to the horse as they are both seen as wild and irrational but are judged by society for their actions. The protagonists confusion at her actions is symbolic of the beginning of the resolution to her internal conflict of trying to escape society’s pressures for her. By characterising the horse as a parallel to the protagonist, the author shows that the releasing of the horse is representative of the protagonist releasing her freedom of self expression. This acceptance is further exemplified when Laird, the foil to the protagonist, joins the hunt for the horse while the protagonist stays home -"Laird called to them, "Let me go too, let me go too!" and Henry stopped the truck and they took him in.”. The brother joining them on their hunt for the animal symbolises Laird finally growing into his role alongside his father that used to be his sisters. Hunting is often seen as a coming of age ritual in many cultures, so while the protagonist has come gone through the resolution of her internal conflict, so has her brother, finally stepping into his role on the farm while the protagonist stays home with her mother. The tension between the protagonist and her brother comes to a close as she realises that she cannot take what was rightfully his, she cannot take his gender role.

Symbolically, releasing Flora represents the resolution to the protagonists internal conflict as she finally accepts her fate, though she has not undergone the complete psychological transition between the two worlds, it indicates the first step in her coming of age.

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Sarah AlMansoori 10B- PEAL Paragraph: How does conflict impact the protagonist in ‘In the Shadow of War”

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Sarah AlMansoori 10B- PEAL Paragraph: How does conflict impact the protagonist in ‘In the Shadow of War”

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In the short story “In the Shadow of War”,  the author uses external political conflict to symbolize and emphasize Omovo’s coming of age journey. Omovo’s journey in graduating from idealism to realism, and his struggles with maturity, are manifested in his reactions to conflict. The protagonist, Omovo, as he lives amidst a war. In the beginning of the story, he defies his father and listens to radio news regarding the war, this represents how he is gaining maturity and sees himself as an individual capable of comprehending the magnitude of violent and realistic situations such as war. This contrasts with his reaction to conflict being near him. When he witnessed the murder of the veiled lady he was easily scared and put himself in danger by reacting audibly. This shows that even though he views himself as matured, he is still incapable of handling dangerous situations in real life. His reaction to the veiled lady’s murder also represented his fading idealistic views. When he returns home and sees the soldiers in his house, he attempts to explain to his father that they are bad as they committed an act of violence, he speaks out because his idealism leads him to believe that evil people should be shunned or punished. His father silencing him by taking him to bed represents how realistically, not every bad person is punished, and right and wrong are not always clear. Therefore, the murder of the veiled lady is Omovo’s coming of age experience, not only does it show his struggle with maturity, but the following interaction with the soldiers represents his transition from idealism to realism.

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Formative PEAL paragraph - Boys and Girls.

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Formative PEAL paragraph - Boys and Girls.

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The protagonist in ‘Boys and Girls’ is portrayed to fall victim to perplexity through a manoeuvre of symbolism, pathetic fallacy and conflict, caused by the unassailable customary of society as she gradually shifts from an innocent, curious psyche to a mature teenager, accepting the orthodox. An expanding exposure to realistic expectations is carried out throughout the story symbolically portrayed by the nature of the girl’s parents. “It was an odd thing to see my mother down at the barn.” Ironically, the protagonist, a female in the society of a time that carved its denizens along with ethics based on a former gender orthodox, opposed the role she is meant to render in dissension. Additionally, the protagonist would have a relatively optimistic perception of the role her father portrayed, to which she responds by confessing - “I worked willingly under his eyes, and with a feeling of pride.” The two, mother and father, are juxtaposed by the author in the eyes of the protagonist, inducing moods of confusion about choosing a path or even there being a possibility for her to be able to choose in the first place. The values running down the girl’s family are made repetitively reminiscent of, to her, through highlighting a desirable feminine persona in the form of passing remarks such as “Girls don’t slam doors like that” and “Girls keep their knees together when they sit down” by her grandmother, thereby impaling pressure of the society’s unwritten rules on the delicate innocence of the girl. The author makes use of pathetic fallacy when showcasing the transitive phase of the protagonist - “Lately I had been trying to make my part of the room fancy.” The room’s desired ‘fanciness’ symbolizes the expected female etiquette, specifically - enchantingness. “‘She’s only a girl, he said.’ I didn’t protest that, even in my heart. Maybe it was true.” The hesitancy she encounters when identifying her individuality is symbolic of the impact that societal and familial values have on her, which go on to outweigh her own, unique temperament, therefore coming down to the sentimental climax. Eventually, this embarks upon a primary yet shrouded complication of transitive behaviour where the protagonist’s approach to oppressive nature switches from dissension to acceptance - representing her altered interests in accordance to an idealistic world view to a realistic world view, respectively.