Red+Scarf+Girl

 RED SCARF GIRL By: Maddie, Eli, and Jessica


 * Eli:**

Setting of book and description of what is going on-

This book takes pace in Shanghai, and follows the life of the author, Ji- Li Jiang, as the Cultural Revolution is occurring. The Cultural Revolution was an event very similar to the Russian Revolution, and it took place from 1966-1978. Ji-Li Jiang was part of a "black family", which meant that she had a very disgraceful past. Her grandfather was a landlord, which at that time was the worst thing that you could be, because you had lots of power. Also, landlords were considered to completely persecute their workers. Ji-Li's father was also convicted of being a capitalist. In China at that time, if a member in your family was a landlord or in the five black categories you were also considered to be a xenophile as well. You could break from your family and become a child of Chairman Mao, but that would mean cutting off all communication with your family members. In this book, Ji-Li is faced with the decision to either stay with her family and support her sick mother and worried grandmother while their father is in jail or break off all connections with her family and have more success in communist China.

In the book, there was something called the Four Olds. In China, Chairman Mao was promoting the idea that you have to destroy the four olds and make China more modern. Traditions were broken, and all of the fancy things that belonged to people were confiscated by the Red Guards or destroyed by the families before the Red Guards could take them. The Four Olds were replaced by the Four News, which were very proletariat items. For example, in the book, Ji Li's grandmother had received many beautiful wedding gifts, such as dresses, and they had to make rags out of them to make it seem like they didn't have any fancy belongings. If the Red Guards caught you with bourgeois accessories, they were confiscated immediately, and it made your family look really bad. In the book, there were countless "examples" of these kinds of things occuring, and sometimes they would beat the victims of these searches.




 * Jessica:**

Ji-Li:
 * **Smart** ("In the corner behind me the breeze rustled the papers hanging from the Students' Garden, a beautifully decorated piece of cardboard that displayed exemplary work. One of them was my latest perfect math test" (page 3)
 * **Sympathetic** (She feels bad for her family, and for the people being hurt by the Red Guards, but she also feels bad for the peasants that were abused and worked to death by the landlords.)
 * **Friendly** (She is nice to those around her, and tries not to hurt people's feelings.)
 * **Shy** (She has only a couple of friends because of her backround and because she is shy.)
 * **Thoughtful** (She is always conscience of other's feelings and is very nice to her friends when difficult things are going on like when her best friend's grandmother died she was there for her.)
 * **A loyal communist** (She never wants to disappoint Chairman Mao or the Red Guards. Eversince she was little she has wanted to be a Red Guard or even be in the liberation army.)
 * **A loyal member of her family** (When her father is put in jail and her mother becomes sick she takes care of her family and tries to help them get through. She lives with her father, mother, little sister, little brother, and grandmother)

This book is mainly about the feelings of the people in China during the Cultural Revolution, and that is why the characters in this book are so important. I think what made this book interesting was that you didn't know who you felt sorry for. Whether you felt bad for the peasants who got harassed by the landlords, or the children revolting against their teachers, or the Red Guards stereotyping anyone that was a child or related to a landlord. The main conflict of the plot is the cultural revolution and how Ji-Li and her family is treated because of their political background, and how her grandfather was a landlord, which everyone thought of as very mean, and that their families would be as exploiting as they were. Ji-Li just wants to live a normal life, and be praised for her hard work, not her background. Chairman Mao, the leader of China during this time, appoints thousands of teenagers to be Red Guards, which are supposed to help China and keep out the four-olds, which are old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits. Then there were the Red Successors, or the kids that would become Red Guards. Ji-Li doesn't get appointed because of her background, and then these students harass her. Then, things start to get worse when kids turn against their own parents. Also, they write Da-zi-bao's, which are propaganda posters that say bad things about people. Some kids write a da-zi-bao about Ji-Li. Also, Red Guards would come to some houses and search them for four-olds. Then, things get worse, when they detain Ji-Li's dad for something they blamed on him, and they won't let him out of working until he confesses. This book is all about the struggles of the cultural revolution, and what they have to face.

Important Quotes: This quote is near the end of the book, and it shows how upset and desperate people are, even Ji-Li. This is after people had come and searched their house, and got a letter that Ji-Li had tried to hide. The letter was talking about the situation in the theater, and if the Theater people found it, her dad and family could get in huge trouble. The quote says; "My body was an empty shell, too devastated to feel anything but exhaustion. I could not fight anymore. As I trembled down the stairs with grandma, a thought came to me for the first time in my life. Should I continue to live at all?" (p. 259) I thought this showed that some people, even kids like Ji-Li, were contemplating suicide. Even a grandma of Ji-Li's friend jumped out the window and killed herself. This paragraph is really stunning and important, and it really gives you a look into the lives of these people.


 * Maddie:**

Our book, The Red Scarf Girl, is a lot like Animal Farm. Both books are about communism, and as we went on in the book we noticed similar events that happened during the Cultural Revolution in China that also happened during the Russian Revolution in Russia. We noticed that in Animal Farm Napoleon addressed the animals as comrade. In the book a lot of the communist leaders, red successors, and liberation officers called the people comrades too. We also noticed that in both books there was a confession scene because during the Cultural Revolution the Red Guards and the Red Successors were always asking people they thought were going against the Four Olds to confess what they had done. If they didn't confess they would be detained and some people felt pressured to confess even to something they didn't do. Another thing we noticed was that they made propaganda to convince people that Chairman Mao was the best leader and the most powerful, sympathetic one in China. There was one piece of propaganda in particular that reminded me of Russia that was written on a blackboard in a classroom that said "Down with Imperialism! Down with Revisionism! Down with the new Tsars!" In Animal Farm Mr. Jones represented the Tsar. Later on, we realized that the Cultural Revolution was made after the Russian Revolution, maybe inspired by the Russian Revolution.

Our Group's symbol is the Red Scarf because in our book the Red Scarf represented being loyal to communism and Chairman Mao. In our book the main character, Ji-Li was loyal to communism and she believed she was a child of Chairman Mao. It showed others that saw her in it that even though she was part of a black, landlord, capitalist family she could still break from her and become a child of Chairman Mao, and even a Red Successor. She could break off all connections with her family and rid China of the Four Olds and promote a more modern, American China. This is a picture of a teacher in China putting a red scarf on one of his students in 2006.

__**Our Game**__: Split up into two teams and answer the questions. Whoever gets the most right answers wins the game.

1. Who was the leader of China at this time? a.) There was no leader because everyone was equal b.) Kim Jong Il c.) Chairman Mao d.) Tsar Nicholas II

2. What was the name of the revolution going on in China where the communists rebelled against the capitalists, and wealthy? a.) The Chinese Revolution b.) The Communist Revolution c.) There was no revolution d.) The Cultural Revolution

3. How long did the revolution of China take place? a.) 1966-1978 b.) 1955-2000 c.) 1947-2011 d.)1958-1969

4. What are you called if you are from a capitalist, wealthy or landlord family? a.) There is no name for it. b.) A Capitalist family c.) A "black family" d.) A Four Olds family

5.) What genre (type) of book is Red Scarf Girl? (Our book follows the life of the author.) a.) historical fiction b.) realistic fiction c.) an autobiogrophy d.) a memoir

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