The readings from this blog post are The Rose That Grew From Concrete and The Scholarship Jacket
Theme
Themes in stories and in society change by what is going on in the world and what inspirations they take from the world to write or experience. Not all themes are surpassed throughout time. If we take a look into passages or readings that were written a long time ago there is a possibility that a theme in the story can be related to someone’s life or story. Looking at the poem “The Rose That Grew From Concrete” by Tupac Shakur and the story “The Scholarship Jacket” by Marta Salinas. We can see how recognition is an important thing to people.
Recognition is the way someone can validate their success or knowledge. For most people it is important to be recognized for what they’ve done. But, recognition isn’t always done in an honest manner.
Different Stories
In the story by Marta Salinas we are told the story of when a student is asked to pay for a scholarship jacket when usually the only condition is that you’ve had the best grades for 8 years. The girl isn’t fortunate and isn’t given the money to pay for the deserved jacket. Later on she is told she doesn’t need to pay for the jacket and receives it. Sure it seems like something simple but this is just a summary. I would suggest you read the story in order to understand more. There are many themes to this story. Some of them are that hard work pays off and that recognition shouldn’t be paid for.
In the poem “The Rose That Grew From Concrete” the author talks about how someone can become something great even if people don’t believe in them. In the poem he uses the comparison to a flower and how it is really pretty even with it’s imperfections. The main theme in the poem is that greatness can be where there is no recognition.
In my own life I can say that recognition is something important. It is a way that I can reassure that what I’m doing is paying off and that I should keep getting better. One of the things that many schools do just like mine is recognize students. Having good grades is something that most schools think is important for students to be rewarded for. I think that an award can be a symbol of students’ achievements.
Similarities:
In the story “The Scholarship Jacket” on the last sentence in the second paragraph it says “This one the scholarship jacket, was our only chance.” In the story it tells us how she comes from a family that isn’t affluent but still live in a comfortable matter. The girl believes that she has earned that jacket and later in the story is sad about how all her achievements might not be recognized when she over hears how own of the staff believes she isn’t worthy of the jacket due to her being Mexican.
The poem “ The Rose That Grew From Concrete” the author decides to say that “Long live the rose from concrete when no one else even cared!” (last two lines of the poem). This is utilized to explain that even when people don’t believe in you or no one supports you there can still be greatness out of what you do. Sometimes when people don’t believe in you it can be the best motivation. Even though there was no recognition towards the “rose” growing it was still able to do it.
All these different experiences relate to how recognition is important. In “The Scholarship Jacket” we can see how it was important for Marta to receive the jacket because she had earned it by being top of her class for eight years. In “The Rose That Grew From Concrete” we can see how the author decided to talk about how even without motivation it is important to recognize those who do what others were afraid to believe was possible. In the real world and in my own life I can say that recognition is important to me to feel achieved by what I’ve done. To our society whether it was in 1986, 1999 or right now the importance of recognition or the act of receiving something to represent achievements is a present theme in readings and in our life’s.
Regina 