“A Private Experience” is a short story written by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Essentially, it’s about the clash between the Hausa and Igbo. Two women of opposite cultures meet in an abandoned store in the middle of a riot and discuss their differences and bond with one another. The title came from the plot, where Chika and the unnamed Hausa woman were in the store together where it was quoted “It is like the woman’s tears, a private experience, and she wishes that she could leave the store. Or that she, too, could pray, could believe in a god.”

I decided to choose an obvious symbol being the scarf as I felt as if it was super important to mention. However, I also included the ring which was a much more reflection-required symbol. I made sure to use images that clearly state the symbol as both were objects. For the setting, I mentioned the location, time, and specific events to clearly demonstrate exactly what was going on. My mind map heavily depended on quotes to give evidence and explain even more what I was saying. I found drawings of the author online, so I edited them a bit and used them in some pages like the characterization slide to keep them more connected to the story. I couldn’t really find pictures of the actual riot that happened in the theme I wanted for my mind map’s consistency, but I was able to find other pictures of other riots and events and I feel like they blend in well. For the plot slide, I tried to give a description in a way you’d see if you were to google it just since the format makes it look a lot more professional and right to the point, and easy to read. Literary criticism-wise, I wasn’t too sure what would work best, but I decided to use the bibliographical approach so that I could explain the similarities between the author and Chika and her inspirations as they could be connected to the book’s writing. I said the point of view was third person limited as it was showing Chika’s thoughts to a certain extent and how she was also the only character whose thoughts were shown to the reader. The conflict was the easy part to analyze from this short story. Since it was a riot caused by the clash of two ethnicities/religions, I went with society vs society or person vs society.

Throughout the whole mind map, my goal was to demonstrate my understanding using key pieces from the story. I felt I had to include some obvious things like the scarf and its symbolism just due to the fact of how important it was to the story and the two women’s bond. I also made sure to use a bit more in-depth things like bibliographical criticism reasoning as that was the point of the project. I feel like it was put together in a reasonable manner. The one thing I was unsure of was the theme of the presentation. I wasn’t sure whether I should use a more energetic template given by the website, or if I use a very simple basic solid color theme. I came up with the idea to have almost a comic-like theme just since it was basic but creative. It also wasn’t really a theme that doesn’t fit at all with the story like my original design of some super energetic black and green template. I made sure the final project conveys the message that, when it really comes down to it, we’re all the same deep down. We have our differences, whether it be race, religion, sexuality, etc. However, really, we are all just human beings living on the same planet, there is no reason for there to be pre assumptions based on appearance and affiliation. It’s always possible to get along with one another no matter how different you may be.