Preview

Inside Out And Back Again By Thanhha Lai

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
347 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Inside Out And Back Again By Thanhha Lai
Last year, nearly 85,000 refugees entered the United States. Many are young and still have to go to school. Successful adaptation is influenced by factors including age at arrival, previous traumatic events, family background, response to society, and individual resiliency. The main character, Ha, from Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai, dealt with numerous difficulties when adjusting to her new school in Alabama. Refugees often battle with not being accepted by peers when arriving to their new school until they meet and become friends with new people.
When a foreigner is adjusting to a new school, they often feel like they don’t fit in. For example, in the book, Inside Out and Back Again, “I eat candy in toilet.” Ha doesn’t really know

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The book, Last Man Out by Mike Lupica, is a very unique book and I would recommend it to anyone who loves sports, especially football, to read it. The setting of this book is in present-day Boston. The main character is Tommy Gallagher, a 12 year-old boy who loves to play football. The rising action of this book would be that Tommy’s father died because of a fire at a house that he was called to. Because of this Tommy’s sister, Emily, stopped playing the sport she was so good at. Tommy tried to persuade her to keep playing. Tommy kept playing football and kept making…

    • 641 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The poem “Where There’s a Wall” by Joy Kogawa describes the historical event of internment or concentration camps using a wall as a metaphor. The author does not outright identify and describe this unfortunate historical event but readers can use the imagery and symbols along with their historical knowledge to be able to determine that the author could be writing about a person in an internment or concentration camp. The poem is universal in the fact that it may not be interpreted in a historical way by one that does not have as much knowledge about history. These type of readers may interpret it as the wall being an obstacle in the way of a goal. This aspect of the poem makes it very interesting because it can be interpreted in many unique ways to different readers.…

    • 598 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Thanhha Lai’s novel, Inside Out and Back Again, is an example of a young refugee, Ha, who’s country suffered a war, forcing its citizens to flee. Like many other men, women, and children around the world, Ha left her home to escape the grip of the war, and the challenges that would be faced there, ultimately becoming a refugee. While leaving her homeland and moving overseas to America, she faced challenges that many other refugees suffer, and had to work her way through them. Thanhha Lai’s novel showed how Ha’s life, like the lives of other refugees, turned inside out.…

    • 145 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Stiff By Mary Roach

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The tone of something merely depends on the type of audience you are addressing. I wrote two letters to two people explaining whether or not I would donate my body to science after reading the book Stiff written by Mary Roach, that went into depth about cadavers. My first letter, Letter 1, was directed towards the author herself, Mary Roach, someone who I have never met or know. Naturally, my tone towards her would be formal and respectful. My other letter, Letter 2, was written to my best friend, April, who I am extremely comfortable so the tone would be more laid back.…

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Interlopers By Saki

    • 416 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In the short story, “The Interlopers,” by Saki, Ulrich Von Gradwitz and Georg Znaeym have a feud over a strip of forest land. As they confront each other and are faced with a difficult situation they set aside their differences and become friends. Throughout the story, we have twists, suspense, and tragedy that will take this story to a whole new level. As they were holding their guns at each other and fighting a tree comes down and pinned them to the ground.…

    • 416 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Have you ever visited a different country and felt like a complete alien? Well, how would you feel if you were to move there, forever? The novel, Home of the Brave, by Katherine Applegate is the story of how a young refugee from war-torn Sudan learns to adjust to a new life in America with the help of friends and family. Katherine Applegate’s use of figurative language, first person point of view, and free verse poetry is the most effective way to reveal the story of a refugee adapting to life in America.…

    • 737 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The lives of refugees are turned inside out when they faced discrimination and getting bullied. In the poem “ Inside Out and Back Again ” Ha says “ A pink boy with white hair on his head and white eyebrow and white eyelashes pulls my arm hair. Laughter. It's true my arm hair grows so long and black.”(pg. 187/188) This demonstrates that Ha’s life is turned inside out when she got bullied by her long black arm hair, because she is getting bullied just because she looks different from the rest of her peers. Even though the bullies didn’t know Ha very well, they still bullied her and they take pleasure out of bullying Ha. Lots of refugees faced this problem of discrimination and discrimination causes them to have no self-esteem. In the article “ Refugee Children In Canada: Searching for Identity ” discusses that both refugees and immigrant children may encounter society discrimination and racism, and both have to accomplish the central task of childhood and adolescence. This shows that refugee lives are turned inside out when they faced discrimination and racism because of how they look and their culture like how Ha was bullied by her looks. People judge refugees by their…

    • 589 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The book, Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates shows the necessary thoughts in order to succeed in the world in general. Coates writes the essay in the form of an essay as a whole. He is writing the essay to his fifteen-year-old son, Samori. Coates explains his life story of how he grew up in the ghetto of Baltimore to now becoming a writer within his life. Coates has several different statements that reflect his life as a whole; however, there are several different ideas that better the read be more involved in their lives.…

    • 312 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A refugee can be anyone who has to leave their home due to destruction in their country. When they move far from their homes they have to look for a safe place to live . Leaving to find a new home makes them feel as if their lives are turning “inside out”. The novel Inside out and Back Again Thanhha Lai the author speaks about Ha and her family living in a war. Ha is a 10 year old Vietnamese girl who comes from a single parent and a traditional background.…

    • 645 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Anyone who flees their home country due to war or persecution is referred as a refugee. In Inside Out and Back Again, we are introduced to the narrator, Ha. Ha is a refugee who fled her country, Vietnam, because of political warfare. In the novel, she explains her experiences being in the middle of the war feeling confused and sad at most times, not knowing what’s going on. This causes her brother needing to explain everything to her.…

    • 597 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Inside Out And Back Again

    • 727 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Many refugees face hardships when they flee their country for safety. They often do not get the respect that they deserve. Many people do not realize all the consequences refugees face since they fled and how their lives have been turned inside out. The novel Inside Out & Back Again written by Thanhha Lai is about a girl named Ha and how her family flees during the Vietnam War. Throughout the novel their lives had been turned inside out and they returned back by end of the novel. Inside Out & Back Again definitely is an appropriate title for the novel for so many different reasons.…

    • 727 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the novel “Inside Out and Back Again” by Thanha Lai, the universal refugee experience is expressed through the title, and Ha’s individual experience of fleeing and finding home. This essay will show the hardships of turning inside out and how hard it is coming back again. In “Inside Out and Back Again” an independent, determined girl named Ha flees her home in Vietnam because of war and poverty. Ha and her family flee to Alabama to start a better life. In Alabama, Ha faces challenges such as bullying, and racism that make her stronger to come back again.…

    • 748 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    A long time ago the difference between perception and reality was defined as the act of understanding in contrast to the act of being real. Reality could be tricky; most of us including myself depending on scenarios of our lives tend to give in to ideas which are not applicable to reality as a whole. The best example of this is written in the short story “All Over” by Guy de Maupassant. In which his main character Lormerin is very self conscious and narcissistic also Lise de Vance, a former old love plays a big role in hurting Lormerin ego and opening his eyes by showing him, his real self. Many would say that when reality knocks it could be harsh and confusing. In the next couple of paragraphs I want to show how my understanding of reality can be applied to the short story previously mentioned. Every day life brings so many unexpected moments of which we dream of but never really happen, this is where we draw the line for reality and perception of a perfect to be situation. Reality is in the eyes of the beholder and no one can really change that, all of us are born dreamers. When things get out of hand and reality hits, this is where people suffer. Why do we suffer? We suffer because we give too much or expect too much and not everyone has the same ideals when returning the favor. Also, some events might be trifling to some but extremely important to others.…

    • 1777 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    One universal challenge that Ha and other refugees struggle with is being ridiculed and judged because they are not of the same religion as everyone else in the new country. Therefore, they are bullied / harassed because of it. “I hate everyone!!!! A lion’s paw rips up my throat, still I scream, I hate everyone!!!!” (Lai 209) Ha, from Inside Out and Back Again, feels she does not belong. She is so upset about this, that she is outside of her home, screaming, “I hate everyone!!!!” “Sometimes I wish I’d stayed at war rather than being here without friends” (Brice) The quote is self explanatory, really. She wishes she stayed back home in the war sometimes, because she deals with discrimination and harassment at school, and feels it would be better…

    • 458 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Skylight Room by O

    • 660 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The first character we meet is the landlady who is a bit snobbish. She has a number of rooms available to let. The largest rooms (and the most expensive) bring her great satisfaction. Ascending the stairs brings us to smaller and cheaper rooms. The smallest room is an embarrassment to the landlady. She has the housekeeper show this room.…

    • 660 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays