Leila's marriage

Per Cathy T:

In lecture, Professor Schaub posed a question regarding the recent marriage of Leila and Mason. Leila is hesitant to tell her mother about quickly getting married in New York City instead of not having a formal ceremony with friends and family. Why do you think Leila doesn't tell her mother about her marriage? Is she afraid of how her mother would have responded? Is it possible that Leila is trying to move away from her Chinese culture and live in the modern American culture?

Time and Chinatown

Ng uses time to tell the story differently than the novels that we've read so far in Professor Schaub's class. The novel starts off in the present and goes back in the past in an orderly fashion, much like how we would evaluate our past because of difficult events or situations. This is very different than how time was used in novels we've read such as The Sound and the Fury and In Our Time. Do you think that the way time is used in this novel is efficient at getting across Ng's story?

Also, Ng writes about Chinatown and how tourists come to see the bright lights and colors. Have you ever been to Chinatown and how does her representation of it change your views about it? What were your opinions towards Chinatown before reading about why it is the way it is today and the hardships the Chinese have faced?

Ona and Abel

Ona is a part of the Western world in a way that Abel was not. In fact, on page 26, Ona talks about how depressing it can be to go into Chinatown and see the "hard life." Chinatown can be comparable to Abel's village. However, though Ona's environment is different from Abel's, they seem to be facing the same tensions between generation and identity. I think that Ona will become a "hybrid," like Professor Schaub talked about in lecture, a combination of both identites, like Abel. Do you disagree or agree with this? This could also be related to Raisin in the Sun with the generation gap.

Bone and History

In the same way that Momaday incorporates Native American tradition and history into House Made of Dawn, how does Ng incorporate Chinese tradition and history into Bone?