Full-Swing

Full-Swing Full-Swing There is a stereotype against the 1950s. Women stayed at home, worked in the kitchen, and raised children. Men provided for their families by working for eight hours everyday, and coming home to a prepared dinner. Children were the result of how their mothers molded them, and were segregated according to subject. Boys were involved in sciences, while girls were involved in arts; boys played backyard football and baseball, while girls played hopscotch and tea party with their dolls. Everyone went to church on Sunday mornings, and religion was often the determining factor for which school the children attended. In the beginning of An American Childhood, there is a feeling of entrapment. The speaker describes how she lazily wanders the house, noticing all of the routine events occurring. However, once she “wandered outside,” there was an overwhelming emotion of freedom, along with an elusion to what will come, as she grows up (411). This freedom was given to her “as soon as [she] could say [her] telephone number” (414). The concept of segregation by religion is a part of her freedom, but also a part of her entrapment. boys, activities, while, home, art, often, lessons, freedom, detective, 415, women, stereotype, speaker, school, religion, played, music, men, involved, girls, children, catholic, attended, 414, work, tough, took, take, subject, studied, society, segregation, professions, profession, piano, part, parents, out, one, neighborhood, microscope, medicine, longed, involvement, however, herself, hall, going, future, forensic