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Angelina Sharma
Ms. Tate
English 11
October 4, 2021
Short story summary understanding| A Private Experience By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
To display my knowledge and appreciation of the short story “A private experience,” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, I have included some symbols that I believe represented ideas surrounding the story on more of a deeper level. The motive of this short story was to give incite of how two completely different characters from completely different parts of the world can unite and grow a relationship. Chimamanda described this through a religious conflict, noting that despite the existence of social group values and cultural stereotypes, we end up often like each other. To display my expertise of the elements on this piece, I was determined to pick symbols that require a person to reflect on consideration on what those symbols ought to be for the element. To represent characterization, I selected an image of two cultured woman unified hands as a representation of the bond among the Hausa Muslim woman and Chika. Chika and the Hausa Muslim woman had very different religions and lifestyles. Despite their religion, wealth, and race, they were able to bond on a personal level, and Chika was able to change her assumptions in the beginning and how she viewed Hausa Muslims. A great symbol that shaped my understanding of this story was the meaningful scarf of the Hausa woman. Within the story we know that the scarf is a religious and sacred piece of the Hausa Muslim woman, but beyond the text I have come to realize that the scarf represented further into the two character’s relationship. The scarf shown me the perceptions of a Hausa woman almost being like a mother to Chika, and how she takes care of her when she is ill. Right before Chika had left the store, the Hausa Muslim woman warned her not to go, and that the riot was very dangerous, so when Chika had returned, she was badly injured. the Hausa Muslim woman didn’t refuse nor hesitate in offering help to Chika. To me this event was shown as a returned favor by the Hausa Muslim women to Chika because of how Chika had aided the woman with her nipple trouble. Hence, my decision in using the scarf as a symbolic piece for the topic of symbolism and thought to incorporate the quote from the Hausa woman when she is caring for and wrapping Chika’s injury. As for the setting, I decided to use an image of a store to show the place of which Chika and the woman were lucky to get to safety and soon discover things that make their bond stronger by finding out their similarity’s. The setting of the story took place in this store for the most part, I wanted to include the quote that shares how the Hausa Muslim woman guided Chika to the store when she was running towards the dangers of the riot. This gave me incite of a whole new side to the Hausa Muslim woman’s personality, this just created the beginning of the bond. For the conflict, I used an image of a bible with a cross on it to express the two different religions. I included my understanding of why I believe this type of conflict. I believe Chimamanda chose a religious conflict because of the real-life issues against these two religions. This conflict stood out me there are many stereotypes out there stating how and why these two religions don’t like each other, but they are lies and single stories made up by outside viewers. Chimamanda has shown that stereotype is wrong. I chose the bible because these two religions use the bible for reasoning from their culture, they share some different qualities in cultural, but at the end of the day are still people who are ardent about their religion, with caring hearts. While enjoying this short story I was able to understand the more symbols and quotes that were not added to the mind map, a symbolic element that I noticed was the green wrapper. in the story the Hausa Muslim woman was wearing this wrapper and later puts it onto the floor. This could potentially signify the Hausa woman’s feeling of solidarity. a deeper level of understanding and something that caught my eye while reading this story were these two quotes “The woman’s crying is private, as though she is carrying out a necessary ritual that involves no one else.”, and “She knows the woman is on her knees, facing Mecca, but she does not look. It is like the woman’s tears, a private experience…” these two quotes lead the readers in understanding of the name for the shot story, discover that the title of the story is represented by Chika the main character. as we know Chika is Igbo Christian and the Hausa Muslim woman is Muslim, in the story there was a part where Chika had no other choice then spending the night with the Hausa woman because of all the riot and dangers happening outside, this is then where we find out that Chika was crying in private. this will be nearing the end of my paragraph and I would like to acknowledge the author of this short story, not only in “A private experience” was she able to incorporate her roots, and experiences but she displays hidden meaning. she is not afraid to speak her mind, say her piece, and make change in the world by creating these inciteful short stories. I am honored to be able to read books like these that further help me understand the world a bit better.