Girl (1987)

A short story by Jamaica Kincaid

About the author
Born Elaine Potter Richardson in 1949 in Antigua, in the British West Indies,
but changed her name when she started writing because her family disliked
her career choice
She came to New York at age seventeen, taking a job as a nanny for a rich
family and met New Yorker columnist George S. Trow, who eventually
helped her publish in the magazine
Much of Kincaids work deals with ramifications of Antiguas history as a
colony of Great Britain.
The short story Girl, like many of Kincaids books, deals with the
experience of being young and female in a poor country. Kincaids
complicated relationship with her mother comes out in the mother-daughter
dynamic in the story. She describes her mother as a literate woman who
struggled against her poor circumstances, eventually feeling bitterness
toward her children because of all her problems.
Historical Context
The British controlled Antigua from 1632 until 1967
By 1967, the island had become self-governing, but it did not achieve
independence within the British Commonwealth until 1981.
The British imported many Africans to Antigua during the early colonial
years to labor as slaves in the sugarcane fields. Despite independence,
many of the descendants of these slaves still live in poverty there.
Kincaid visited her homeland in 1985, four years after independence. The
rampant poverty shocked her so much that she felt compelled to write
about it.
Summary
Girl consists of a single sentence of advice a mother imparts to her
daughter, only twice interrupted by the girl to ask a question or defend herself.
The mother dispenses much practical and helpful advice that will help her
daughter keep a house of her own some day. She tells her daughter how to do such
household chores as laundry, sewing, ironing, cooking, setting the table, sweeping,
and washing. The mother also tells the girl how to do other things shell need to
know about, including how to make herbal medicines and catch a fish. These words
of wisdom suggest that the women live in a poor, rural setting, where passing on
such advice is essential for daily living.
Alongside practical advice, the mother also instructs her daughter on how to live a
fulfilling life. She offers sympathy, such as when she talks about the relationships
her daughter will one day have with men, warning that men and women sometimes
bully each other. She also says that there are many kinds of relationships and
some never work out. The mother also tells the girl how to behave in different
situations, including how to talk with people she doesnt like.
Often, however, the mothers advice seems caustic and castigating, out of
fear that her daughter is already well on her way to becoming a slut. She tells the
girl, for example, not to squat while playing marbles, not to sing any Antiguan folk
songs in Sunday school, and to always walk like a lady. The girl periodically interjects
to protest her innocence.
Characters
The Mother
The mother of a preadolescent daughter, and the main speaker in the story.
The mother dispenses a long string of advice to her daughter to teach her
how to properly run a household and live respectably. The mother

intermittently scolds the girl between her words of wisdom because she
fears her daughter will adopt a life or promiscuity. At the same time,
however, the mere fact that she takes the time to impart her knowledge
suggests a deeper caring for the girl.
Strict, bossy, controlling, but also caring
Flat character
Characterization: characters action/ thoughts/ words
Analysis: The mother sees herself as the only person who can save her
daughter from living a life of disrespect and promiscuity. She believes the
girl has already started down this path because of the way she walks, sits,
and sings benna (Antiguan folksongs) during Sunday school, and she
imparts her domestic knowledge to keep the girl respectable. In some
ways, the mother is wise: not only does she know how to cook, clean, and
keep a household, but she also has a keen sense of social etiquette and
decorum, knowing how to act around different types of people. For her,
domestic knowledge and knowing how to interact with people bring
happiness along with respect from family and the larger community. Her
instructions suggest that community plays a large role in Antiguans lives
and that social standing within the community bears a great deal of weight.
Yet at the same time, there is bitterness in the mothers voice, and she
takes her anger and frustration out on her daughter. She seems to think
that none of her wisdom will make any difference and that the girl is
already destined for a life of ill repute. She even repeatedly hints that the
girl wants to live promiscuously and be a slut. Her fears for the girl
actually belie deeper fears of the precarious state of womanhood in
traditional Antiguan society. Despite the mothers caustic remarks and
accusations, the fact that she knows how to make abortion-inducing elixirs
implies that she has had some illicit relations with men or at least
understands that such encounters sometimes occur.

The Daughter
The preadolescent daughter who listens to her mothers speech. The
daughter says little, speaking only to defend herself against her mothers
accusations that she will one day become a slut. The girls protestations
suggest resentment, but Kincaid does not provide her true thoughts or
feelings.
Flat character
Characterization: characters action/ thoughts/ words; other characters
description (mother)
Analysis: Even though the girl says very little in the story, the fact that
readers perceive the mothers words through her ears makes her the silent
narrator and protagonist. The daughter narrates Girl as if recalling the
memory of her mother from a distant future place. Girl is not a word-forword transcript of an actual conversation between the mother and daughter
but a compilation of advice the daughter remembers her mother saying.
She remembers, for example, how her mother constantly accused her of
promiscuity and impropriety, an accusation that has apparently haunted
her through the years. The inclusion of such remarks in the story illustrates
how deeply they affected her while growing up and just how powerful a
mothers influence and opinions can be on her children.
Themes
1) The danger of female sexuality
Even though the daughter doesnt seem to have yet reached
adolescence, the mother worries that her current behavior, if continued, will
lead to a life of promiscuity. The mother believes that a womans reputation
or respectability determines the quality of her life in the community.

Sexuality, therefore, must be carefully guarded and even concealed to

maintain a respectable front. Consequently, the mother links many
tangential objects and tasks to the taboo topic of sexuality, such as
squeezing bread before buying it, and much of her advice centers on how
to uphold respectability. She scolds her daughter for the way she walks, the
way she plays marbles, and how she relates to other people. The mothers
constant emphasis on this theme shows how much she wants her daughter
to realize that she is not a boy and that she needs to act in a way that will
win her respect from the community.
2)

The transformative power of domesticity

The mother believes that domestic knowledge will not only save
her daughter from a life of promiscuity and ruin but will also empower her
as the head of her household and a productive member of the community.
She basically believes that there are only two types of women: the
respectable kind and the sluts. Undoubtedly for many Antiguan women,
domestic knowledge leads to productivity, which in turn wins respect from
family and society. Household work therefore brings power and even
prestige to women in addition to keeping them busy and away from
temptation. Readers recognize the reverence the mother has for the power
of domesticity because of the numerous specific instructions she gives her
daughter, such as how to cook pumpkin fritters, sweep, grow okra, buy
bread, and wash clothes. For her, domesticity brings respectability; sewing
up a dress hem thus becomes more than an act of maintenance because it
saves a womans sexual reputation within the community.

Symbolism
Benna
Antiguan folksongs, or benna, symbolize sexuality, a subject the mother
fears her daughter already knows too much about. Historically, native Antiguans
sang benna to secretly spread scandalous rumors and gossip under the
uncomprehending British peoples noses. Singing benna in Sunday school, therefore,
represents not only disobedience but also sinful, forbidden knowledge that cant be
discussed openly in public, let alone in church. Even though the daughter may not
consciously equate benna with sexuality as her mother does, her protestations
nevertheless suggest she knows full well bennas seductive power, mystique, and
forbidden qualities. In fact, the girls adamant, almost desperate denials may even
hint that she actually has sung benna in Sunday school with her friends, an
indication of her blossoming interest in boys as well as a sign of an increasing
exasperation with her mothers advice and intrusions into her personal life.
Point of View: Second POV
Conflict

man vs. society: society or social classes influences on role of women or the
status of femininity
man vs. himself: daughter struggles to adjust to the expectations of her
mother (interrupts her mother with questions, defensive tone)
man vs. man: mother seems to be berating her daughter that she is
becoming a slut

Structure
nonconventional arrangement: no introduction, rising action, climax
THE ENDING: Girl does not seem to heed her mothers advice, fears that
what if she cannot live up to the expectations of society and ends up (or
may be already becoming?) promiscuous
Kincaids use of semicolons to separate the mothers advice and commands
creates a prose poem that vividly captures the daughters conflicting
feelings for her mother. (A prose poem is one that lacks rhyme, lines, and
the traditional form of poetry as well as the narrative structure of
conventional fiction.) The layers of advice and commands spoken in one
long, unending breath create a smothering sense of duty and even
oppression that stifles real, two-way communication.
The daughter uses the few opportunities she has to speak to protest her
mothers belief that shell grow older to become a slut, suggesting that
the daughter has already begun to resent her mother. At the same time,
however, Kincaid uses the run-on sentence structure almost as a list to
display the mothers domestic accomplishments to highlight her wisdom
and power.
The Ending Explained
Always squeeze bread to make sure its fresh; but what if the baker wont let me
feel the bread?; you mean to say that after all you are really going to be the kind of
woman who the baker wont let near the bread?
In this final line of the story, the mother interprets the bakers potential
refusal to allow the daughter to touch the bread as a sign that the daughter has
become a social outcast, undoubtedly a slut. Kincaid uses the words feel and
squeeze to turn the act of buying bread into a metaphor for sexuality, and the
bakers refusal is therefore a sexual rebuke. In response to her daughters innocent
question, the mother seems to explode in anger at her, as if one impertinent
question demonstrates the futility of advising a stubborn and undisciplined girl bent
on becoming a slut. The daughters question and lack of an answer from the mother
also highlight the inability of the mother and daughter to communicate on any level,
much less a meaningful one. The mothers final words also make her seem unfair,
unsympathetic, and almost cruel. Readers suspect that it wont be long before the
young daughter grows to resent her mother and her implications of her promiscuity,
if she doesnt already.