The Rise And Fall Of The American Teenager (54 - 108)

Summary
         In the next following chapters, I read about how teenagers had some family values and I also read about their independence. Before, in different places back then people used to honor family values more often. They used to do whatever they could to help suppose their families. Teenagers also did for their country and themselves. At young ages as of 12 boys were fighting in the war . Some teenagers had to leave their homes and go out in becoming an apprentice which meant that they were entering a stranger's home to do work for them and be able to learn not only in education but, kind of like a new life. They did this to sort of honor their parents. As an apprentice they had to do whatever the master wanted them to. When I read about these young people getting independence, they talked about the Lowell mills factories and then and there a made a connection to what I had previously learned in history class earlier this year. The factories were the first time women got the chance to work and many of these women where teenage girls. Them being able to work in factories helped their families out where they finally got the chance to do something else out of their homes.

Quote: " the beginning of their teens was the first moment that they fully understood the meaning of their situation",( Hines 98).

Reaction:
 Though Thomas Hines was referring to the slaves when he said this when I first thought about this it clicked in my head how true this was. It reminded me of the idea of " coming of age moments" and how young children when they grow up slowly face the reality of the what the world is like.The reason as to why I believe being a teenager is such a difficult part of life is supply because it's when a child finally gets to see what is really going on and is having a hard time to taking it in. Though Thomas says that the idea of being a "teen" was made up by society, I still think that this part of life is a difficult step into a human - being becoming an adult .

The Rise And Fall Of The American Teenager (1-54)

Summary

    So far from what I read in The Rise And Fall Of The American Teenager by Thomas Hine , the author is trying to explain and find out himself as to why teenagers are the way they are and go through what they go through. In the chapters I read, Thomas describes adolescence first as something that everyone has to go through and can not be changed as a part of growing up. However, later he describes it using some of the very different ways certain societies practice a time where teenager or a child reaches social or physical maturity that allows them to be ready for the world they would have to face as an adult. However, Thomas also says that the idea of a "teenager" was made up by society. At the beginning Thomas also describes teenagers as being such a mystery as to what they think and do because of their crazy behaviors. As when he talks about teenagers getting pregnant and killing their new born and also how he talks about kids being in gangs and killing others. From what I've read so far Thomas is giving different reasons in explanations as to what a teenager is , why they act the way they do and what causes it. What I found interesting was how Thomas uses other coming of age books though fiction, to help describe teenagers, one of the books being Catcher In The Rye which was my second Roar book.

Quote: "The teenager is a symbol of American's aspirations, the repository of hopes, the one who will realize the American dream. And inevitably, the teenager is a disappointment, whose combination of adult capacities and juvenile irresponsibility sows personal heartbreak and social chaos." ( Hines 8)

Reaction: When I was reading this quote in the introduction of this book, i stopped and realize how true I believed this was. Society as a whole has to views on teenagers one as a positive and the other as a negative. Our society has such high hopes for teenagers in becoming the future however, at the same time they view them negatively as sometimes expecting them to do nothing but, wrong doing.