Bigger Question

Okay so here's my biggest question when it comes to America and his situation found in the text:  What do we do as a society to take care of boys/girls in his position?  What do we do to make sure the wrong people are brought to justice (i.e. if Mr. Browning had been jailed instead of killed in a fire), and the right people are being taken care of properly and receiving the help and guidance that they need.

The public has created programs at hospitals and other institutions for therapy and care of children, and I know there are obviously steps in place for children without a real home (foster care, adoption, group homes), but is all that enough for kids who fall through the cracks in the system?

America is the prime example of these children who have nowhere to go and no one to turn to.  What institutions can be modified to really accommodate and get these kids the help they need before they spiral out of control from the isolation, lack of parents, exposure to drugs/alcohol/street life, etc??

This is the main argument I have drawn out of the text and hope to explore it in greater detail in the future.

Central Conflict

America's central conflict within himself is if he was born as a bad person, destined to be bad for the rest of his life, or if he chose to be bad and therefore cannot change who he is now, or if he is able to make the important changes necessary to be a good person in society.  He doesn't know whether to let his circumstances reflect on who he is, or if he has the strength to be his own better version of self. 

This is often a current theme within Young Adult novels -- Identity and what defines it.  However I see this present within the text through America's reflections of "being bad" - he often attempts to justify why he acts bad or if he is bad at all.  When looking back on his childhood, he clearly pinpoints when he was told to act in this way, and then reflects on what it meant to go through his experiences (in special ed, etc) and if that meant he was already bad or just troubled.

This is an idea we all entertain at some point - what defines us and our actions and if that makes us morally sound people or not.  Surely everyone has made foolish decisions to some degree, but what is important is what we learn from them and what we take away from the experience.

This image reminds me strongly of America's emotional reaction to the fountain where he meets Brooklyn in the middle of the night.  Maybe I'm just missing snow at the moment but I think it displays America's feelings of isolation and the attachment he finds within his relationship with Brooklyn -- even though it brings up the negative source of his mother and her abandoning him over and over again... there is still a sense of connection and love and power between the boys.

Passages to look further into

The following are passages that interested me:

America gets lost easy. . . America is not worth the trouble of finding. (page 29)

It's not so heavy anymore, and I remember leaving places and going places and getting places.  There was the bus from Mrs. Harper's with the lady and then the taxi with the lady to an office.  There was my mother and me on a train underground and then walking to a building with an elevator that took us high to Brooklyn's apartment.  There was the sofa bed and the green towel and War and dead Kyle.  There was me and Brooklyn and Lyle in an ambulance to a hospital and a wheelchair in a hospital with a nurse wheeling me away from Brooklyn and Lyle to a place where they poked me and stuck needles in me and another wheelchair to a place where they put me in a bed and gave me soup.  Then there was leaving the hospital with a whole different lady in a car to a building and a different, different lady in the building walking me through halls and steps and doors and then another car with a man to the place where the grandmother didn't get mad if you peed your bed, and then my bed here and my own feet walking me to Mike's room. (page 53)

I'm bad.  I can't help it.  It's just what I am.  Bad. (page 64)

I cut and I scrape and I chop, and in my head, I go, It's not bad.  I am not all bad.  I.  Am.  Not.  Bad. 
      You have to get away somehow.  You can choose the fountain at five o'clock in the fucking A.M.  You have to find where it's going to be peaceful.  You have to find where it's going to be safe.  Maybe you don't get to stay too long and then you have to choose someplace else all over again.  But you always have to choose. (page 203)

It's a different kind of school.  Everybody in it's seen a lot of shit.  It's like one big school for special ed.  Only I know better now.  It's not for if you're stupid and bad.  It's more for if you've seen a lot of shit, and you did some bad things.  Some of the younger ones, they don't know that yet.  You can tell by the way they walk around.  All big and in your face like they'd rather turn up dead than be some kind of pussy.  They're real young, those ones. (page 209)

Will elaborate on this more later, Happy Thanksgiving to all!!

Re-reading progress

So after reading so quickly through the book the first time, and then dealing with a family crisis, it took me awhile to get back on track with re-reading this text.  However, as I sat down to begin again, I first reviewed my first post and Anna's comment about the concept of "relating" to a work even without experiencing similar circumstances. 
Well funny enough, because of aforementioned family issues, my brother ended up hospitalized for several days and spending time with him within those confines actually gave me a very clear perspective on America's environment.  Therefore, little did I know that if I had waited a couple weeks, I would be able to very much relate in a literal spectrum.
This afternoon my mother and I picked my brother up at the airport from college for Thanksgiving break and he is doing great, so I know he has mentally persevered through his experience in the hospital, where he had to deal with talking to several different doctors and therapists.  We endured a couple uncomfortable family conversations with a social worker/therapist to clarify how my brother was doing and the state of our entire family's emotions.  This reminded me greatly of America's talks with Dr. B and the motivation to talk or stay silent on issues that hold highly important emotional stakes.
Many of the patients at the hospital were not fortunate like my brother and remained at the hospital for a long term time period.  They become trapped in the system just like America, for whatever their reasons may be.  Some gain clarity in the experience, others go nuts and lose all hope.  It's an extremely high-tension environment at all times.

On a different note, I recently viewed the film It's Kind of a Funny Story, which takes place in the Pysch Ward of a hospital, where the young protagonist checks himself in, in order to gain support to battle his own demons in his adolescence.  I saw a lot of similar behavior in that movie as well, about how people function in these isolated environments with a high-stress level to handle. 

Intertextualizing!  Inferencing! Crazyyyy.

Speed Reading

I intended on taking my time with America by E.R. Frank and stopping to write posts about it as I went.. but then I made a common mistake of my own; I took the book with me on the subway.  My commute to work is about 40 minutes and I like to become deeply absorbed into whatever I am reading, so I tend to speed through my literature.  Therefore I ended up finishing America within four days, and doing a lot of open crying on the 6 train.  My belief is that I sped through to the end way too quickly and therefore experienced a strong visceral reaction instead of understanding each underlying intellectual moment and idea.  I am going to try to read through the book again with a different perspective so I can pinpoint which sections moved me the most, beyond the several quotes that will end up here.  I will post some of the quotes that stood out to me at first as well, and my reaction to them.  Alright, sounds like a plan.

Also overall, I loved the book and it stirred a lot of emotion within me even though my own life does not relate to most of the concepts addressed within the text.