Final Blog

Do Americans have a different mentality on the world compared to the rest of the world’s population? Is it a good thing that most Americans like the idea of globalization? Globalization, either way one looks at it, is happening and will continue to happen. There are of course many different opinions on it from people old and young, good or bad. Globalization, in my view, is a good thing. It allows countries to work together and unites the world more. It allows for cheaper products as well as giving jobs to people in third-world countries. Of course not everyone will agree with this so the question is posed, how do we move from either love it or leave it?

In Bharati Mukherjee’s novel Jasmine, Jasmine is faced with many challenges throughout her life. After all of the tragedies in her life, Jasmine starts to forget her past and move on in her life and live it for herself and not be confined by her culture’s customs. She ends up moving to the United States where she eventually has a good life and lives her life for herself. Although she had a horrible and terrifying first day in America, it changed her life for the better. Living the American dream is why so many immigrants want and come to the United States.

It is the land of opportunities and if someone works hard enough his or her dreams can come true. Jasmine at first believes that you either you love being who you are or you leave and abandon who you are. Jasmine tried to “distance [her] self from everything Indian, everything Jyoti-like” (Mukherjee 145). Jasmine does abandon her culture and ways, but it made her who she transformed into at the end of the novel.

Jasmine is the classic example of someone who takes advantage of globalization. She is allowed to live a better life, after she realizes that her husband was right in coming to the United States. 

In Kazuo Ishiguro’s An Artist of the Floating World, the main character and narrator, Ono, is torn between two worlds in his life. He wants to remember his good life that he had before the Second World War, but later realizes that his actions weren’t the best. Ono doesn’t want to forget his past, and rightfully so since he was so patriotic to Japan before the war. Ono comes to a point in his life where he must face the facts of his previous actions and realize he is an old timer. Once Ono realizes he is making these mistakes, he starts to understand that his efforts were “ultimately harmful to our nation” (Ishiguro 123). Ono helps the reader understand that even though one thinks they are acting in good faith, they could possibly be making things worse. Ono knows he caused the “untold suffering of our own people” (Ishiguro 123), and he is finally man enough to realize what he had thought to be right, was actually wrong.

Ono and Jasmine help make the point that there are always more than two ways to look at things. One does not have to love it or leave it. There is always a third option. Globalization is a good thing and a bad thing. There are many different aspects that people can argue for and against it. But either way one leans towards, the fact is that there is only one life, one planet, and we have to find a way to compromise in order to help preserve personal and cultural identities as well as help conserve the only planet we have.