Plot - Red Scarf Girl

The exposition is described with the setting, situation/climate, and characters. The setting in this book is Shanghai, China. The scenes mostly take place at her house, her neighborhood, and her school. There is one change in setting throughout the whole story. This is when Ji-Li has to go to the rice harvest in the countryside. The situation/climate in this book is the Cultural Revolution. The whole story is about the Cultural Revolution and how the main character struggled through this. The main character and narrator in this story is Ji-Li Jiang, and most of it is about her family members: her grandmother, parents, siblings. Some of her 'friends' are included as an important feature in this book. Three main events that happen during the story is when 1) Ji-Li enters Xin-Zha Junior High School. 2) The Red Guards invade Ji-Li's house in passing for the first time and take their belongings that may be involved in the fourolds. 3) Identification of Ji-Li's family's problem of a different political background. The protagonist (Ji-Li Jiang) v.s. the antagonist (brainwashing of the Cultural Revolution) leads to the conflict. The climax has two parts: external conflict and internal conflict. The climax of the external conflict is when the Red Guards invade Ji-Li's house the second time in search of the letter. The climax of the internal conflict is when Ji-Li goes to the police department to change her name and to break her identity from her family background, but actually ends up not making that decision and refusing. The start of the falling action is when Ji-Li's family ends up looked down on, and Ji-Li ends up worrying about each member of her family, and blaming herself that she hadn't hid the letter well enough. Concludingly, her mom is classified as a landlord's wife and is humiliated even more so. The resolution is when the Cultural Revolution ends, Chairman Mao loses power, and Ji-Li realizes that her family was the most vital and significant detail during the time of the Cultural Revolution and her life. Though the ending of the book isn't a "happily ever after," the real "happily ever after" ending of the story takes place after the Cultural Revolution ends in Ji-Li Jiang's life.

Theme - Red Scarf Girl

In the story of the "Red Scarf Girl," the title indicates that Ji-Li was a girl who followed Chairman Mao because she was brainwashed. The red scarf signifies the communist party in China and how it got hold of her life. The red scarf is tied to Ji-Li and she is to it. This shows suffocation because of her family background. She is stifled in her own thoughts. Ji-Li Jiang later realizes that her family was really important: more than anything else. She was the kind of girl who thought her life was perfect, and was prideful. However, she later realizes that becoming a Red Guard and being a follower of Chairman Mao was meaningless. An important statement made in the story is: "Heaven and earth are great, but greater still is the kindness of the Communist Party; father and mother are dear, but dearer still is Chairman Mao." pg. 1. This quote is actually written and acknowledged by Ji-Li, but later in the last chapter and the epilogue, it reveals to the audience that Ji-Li was actually writing the whole story against this quote. In this book, the theme is directly stated in page 263. The theme is very long, so this is the theme in our own words that my literary circle came up with: Ji-Li Jiang's "Red Scarf Girl" about the Cultural Revolution, the theme reveals that in whatever circumstances, we should always have the courage to show compassion to our values. Also, another theme related to the previous one is this: We should always know and keep to our values, no matter the situation and whatever the cost may be. I think that this book reveals a precious theme in which everyone should know about.

Setting - Red Scarf Girl

In the setting of "Red Scarf Girl," the main character is Jiang Ji-Li. She is around 11~13 years old when the Cultural Revolution takes place in 1966. She lives in China, Shanghai, and she is part of a pretty well-off family, so they live in a relatively pleasant neighborhood. She attends a public school close to her home : Xin Er Primary. This setting is the main setting in this book. The only time that the setting changes place is when Ji Li has to go to the countryside to work for Chairman Mao. This is the time of her life which she has to go through so much physical suffering. This book is based on the setting of the Cultural Revolution. Without a setting for this book, I wouldn't be reading it.

Characterization - Red Scarf Girl

"Red Scarf Girl" tells the story of a girl called Jiang Ji-Li and basically, she lives a perfect life in Shanghai. . In the beginning, she is a girl who is very bright, smart, respected by her classmates, has a loving and caring family, and her family is a pretty wealthy family, too. She practically lives an almost perfect life. She has everything she wants. Her physical characteristics in this story seems like she is an attractive girl - her picture on the cover looks like it. Her character seems very personal, independent, and generous. Although she is born from a wealthy family, she doesn't seem so spoilt. I think that this is because of her parents' discipline. Her personality seems very cheerful and bright. However, there are some parts of the story in which she brags and she is very selfconcious about herself. She is the top student in her class, she has all the love and respect from her classmates. She can get almost anything she wants. She even gets picked to join the Central Liberation Army Arts Academy. She is able to excel and is always expected to succeed. Her future seems ideal. And she never doubted what she was told: "Heaven and earth are great, but greater is the kindness of the Communist Party; father and mother are dear, but dearer still is Chairman Mao." Chairman Mao is her hero. She vowed to herself she would do anything for him. At least, she kept that vow until the Cultural Revolution began in 1966.

"Secret"

Deep down inside, everyone has secrets. It's either a sin that you haven't told anyone, or it's just some secret that you have that you don't want anyone to know about. Well, this is a story about me when I was in Home-School Co-op in Mongolia. Basically, this place was a building and there were around 40 students here, most of them MKs in Mongolia, and they were being schooled by their parents or a private teacher. Anyway, there was this one girl that wasn't the best of my friends. Her name was Helen. Actually, I didn't like her at all. During this time, I had some bad habits that I had which I shouldn't have had. One day, I wanted to play a prank on someone, and the first person that came to my mind was Helen. Perfect, I thought. I got a sheet of paper and wrote some nasty things in it with nasty words. I signed the note with another name. I know I shouldn't have done this, and I seriously regret it. Anyway, I took the piece of paper and put it on her desk, so that she would be able to see it right when she sat down. Well, the next day, the principal of the school called everyone to a meeting. This did not happen often at all. The next thing I knew was that he was announcing to everyone that Helen had gotten a note with some bad content in it. My first thought to this was "Helen is such a tattle tale" but the second thought that came to my mind was "Gosh. I did that." My face got a little hot, but still, I stayed calm. I stayed quiet. In fact, I stayed quiet with this secret for a long, long time. No one knew about this, and I felt extremely ashamed. However, now I don't feel bad about it. I know that I have been forgiven.

My story of COURAGE

COURAGE. COURAGE. COURAGE?
Two years ago..there was a girl. Her name was Caroline Lee. She was shy, unconfident, self-concious. Until..There was a moment of her 13 years of life that changed her. She raised her hand in class. Sounds strange? Well. Not many people might believe this, but she used to be REALLY quiet. She didn't talk at the dinner table with her family very much, she wasn't involved in class discussions. She was a seriously different person. Some of the time she tried to fake courage. Actually, a lot of the times she still fakes courage. Some may have thought that she was some sort of really brave person that did things no one else would do. But deep down inside, she was scared. So scared she would hide behind herself. Still..everyone has fears, right? But you know what? None of you people were probably as cowardly as she was. Anyway, two years ago, she came to a school called TCIS. Before all this, she was a homeschooled student almost her whole life. Being a new student, she was SO scared. In classes, she would sit in a corner and be silent. But gradually, after seeing how things worked in a real school classroom, she started to listen to teachers, and paying some attention. However, still, she didn't, or couldn't, answer any of the questions that teachers asked. In one of her classes, there was one certain student. This student inspired her. This student seemed to have a great personality. This student was funny. This student was so friendly. This student seemed so happy. This student had courage. One day, a teacher asked a question. No one else knew the answer apart from Caroline. She finally got the courage to speak up in class. She raised her hand. After doing this, it seemed like a tiny burden rolled off her back. But it still felt so good. As you can imagine, this girl changed. She changed into a girl that had so much more courage. And that girl is me.
Today, I heard that my grandmother has cancer. Currently, she's in the hospital. My mom had to fly from China to see her. When I heard this, I had some mixed feelings. I felt deprived, bitter, angry, heartbroken. I couldn't believe this happened to my grandmother. In other words, I wanted to blame it on God. Why did He let this happen to her? Why couldn't it have been someone else's grandmother? But I wasn't going to cry about this. I felt anger and hatred. I thought to myself, why be such a coward and cry about this?? This isn't your fault. Have some bravery. Have some courage. Save your tears for worse things. I had these thoughts for a while, when I just suddenly broke out in tears. My heart felt so full of things. It needed to be emptied out. As I cried, I asked Him to forgive me. And I knew He did. And what I realized was that though someone that I love has to go through so much pain, God has a reason behind all this. It could be that He wants to take her away. But I don't think that's the reason. I think He wants to get her attention. What I want to get across with this is that sometimes courage doesn't mean not to cry. It doesn't mean that you should stop your tears. But what it could mean is that when you really need to cry, the best thing to do is cry.