Relationships between Parents and Children - Essay Example

?Parent-Child Relationships in Literature and Film Teenage angst is a huge theme in both literature and film. It is a topic often explored because itis so relatable to the masses. Everyone has gone through a point in which their relationship with their parent or guardian is strained as the result of hormones and personality changes that occur during their teenage years. The characters that are created as a result of these experiences may bring us back to a time in our lives that we can laugh at as we get older. To teenagers, it can give them someone to identify with. While they are doing this, they are seeking out answers to their own life questions and trying to figure out who they are. The characters of Holden Caulfield in J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, the many characters in John Hughes’ The Breakfast Club, and Kat and Bianca Startford in Gil Junger’s 10 Things I Hate About You all struggle to maintain relationships with their parents while discovering their own identities, yielding different results in each situation. From the beginning of The Catcher in the Rye, it is evident that Holden Caulfield’s relationship with his parents isn’t quite what it is supposed to be. Holden discusses how he has been kicked out of school and yet, his parents are entirely unaware of it. He also expresses that he has no desire to come home. Right there, it was evident that Caulfield had a disconnect from his parents. Part of this disconnect may have been related to the fact that Caulfield was sent away to boarding school for so much of his life. Not only did he go to boarding schools, but he went to multiple boarding schools due to failing out of one after the other. It is clear that he is a deeply emotionally disturbed individual throughout the novel, and yet his parents are insignificant figures in his life, as seen in the novel. Mr. and Mrs. Caulfield were not entirely to blame for this, of course. The family had gone through a great deal of emotional turmoil outside of Holden’s personal circumstances. Outside of the novel’s action, Holden’s older brother Allie, who serves as the family’s “golden child”, passed away from leukemia. Of course, this had an effect on Holden, his parents, and the relationship between them. As parents who are in mourning, their other children may not be on the forefront of their minds, as unfortunate as it may be. The consumption of their attention by the death of their child does not mean that they love their other children any less. Rather, they are preoccupied by the situation at hand. Consequently, the remaining children may feel as though they have been forgotten or are unimportant. In Holden’s case, he feels as though he’s living in the shadow of his deceased brother. Studies show that “Most children are resilient when bereaved, and their adaptation is facilitated by positive and authoritative parenting,” (Dowdney). Unfortunately for Holden, his bereavement process has not been facilitated. Rather, he has been in boarding school, where he has no choice but to sort things out for themselves. Coupling this with general teenage angst, it is extremely difficult for Holden to establish his own place in the world, let alone establish a healthy relationship with his parents. Each character in John Hughes’ The Breakfast Club has an intricate relationship with their respective parents. Their difference in social status also further the complexity of these relationships, as well as their behavior as a result of these relationships. In this film, the parent-child relationship is explored in a way in which we see how it effects the individual’s search for them true selves. In John Bender’s case, he adopts his tough guy persona as a way to mask the feelings he has over being physically abused by his father. Studies have shown that “Adolescents are at risk of academic failure, school drop-out, delinquency, and substance abuse. Some investigators have suggested that a history of family violence or abuse is the most significant difference between delinquent and non delinquent youth,” (Volpe). This is similar to the behavior exhibited by Bender throughout the film. Claire Standish, who is portrayed as the rich, uppity princess, has everything she’s ever wanted from the material point of view. That said, she feels like her parents try to buy her these things to compensate for the fact that they don’t spend any quality time with her. It has been found that “…children brought up in this way tend to be poor in relationships. They do not know how to value things like friendships. Such a child is poor indeed, in spite of being financially rich,” (Charnly). Andrew Clark is the athlete of the bunch. His relationship with his father has him living a lifestyle he is unhappy with. Mr. Clark is interested in seeing his son become a renowned wrestler, while he feels like living as your typical jock is unfulfilling and superficial. Parental pressure is very risky, because “When parental pressure becomes too great, young athletes may experience headaches, muscle pains, stomach aches, sleep disturbances, fatigue, or depression,” (Allowing Youth Sports to be Child's Play). While Andrew doesn’t hit this point, he does break under pressure and injures another, which is equally dangerous. Brian Johnson is the group geek. He is pressured by his parents to be perfect, anything less being seen as unacceptable. On the other hand, to his peers, he is boring and nerdy. In trying to balance, he snaps. Lastly, we have Allison Reynolds, who is seen as the outcast. Her parental relationship isn’t discussed much, but it is clear she is deeply disturbed, which can be attributed to a possible lack of connection. What’s most interesting about these relationships is how they compare to the relationships between adolescents and their parents today. According to Millennial Marketing, “A Nickelodeon study revealed 76% of parents of 2-21 year-olds say they feel extremely close to their child today, while only 25% of grandparents reported that they felt close to their own child,” (Phillips). Gil Junger’s 10 Things I Hate About You is a modern adaptation of William Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. The dealing with child-parent relationships in the film, being adapted from Shakespeare’s texts, allows one to see how the conflicts that occur in parent-child relationships during adolescence have spanned over time and have become almost universal. In the film, Walter Stratford is a single father raising his two daughters, Kat and Bianca. The two girls were sisters who were close in age, but two had polar opposite personalities. Bianca, the younger sister, was more of the approval seeking, popular sweetheart. Kat was the older, cynical feminist sister, who didn’t believe or have faith in much. She finds her younger sisters constant perky, optimistic view on life to be annoying and unrealistic. With the two girls in the same high school, Kat wishes her sister wasn’t so pathetic by her standards while Bianca wishes her sister could be more “normal.” Both girls clash with their father over his traditional, conservative parenting ways. The film seems to attribute some of Kat’s cynicism to the fact that she was more affected by her mother abandoning the family than her sister, because she was older at the time. She wants to go away to college, which her father greatly objects to. She reasons that he’s punishing her for her mother leaving, when in reality it’s likely a more basic situation, such as the desire to keep his daughter a little girl. In Bianca’s case, she begs and pleads to be allowed to date, which Walter objects to because he fears she’ll get pregnant by some guy and ruin her life. Bianca feels she’s being babied when in reality he’s trying to protect his naive daughter from realities she isn’t quite prepared for. The resolution of both conflicts by the end of the film allow for a successful relationship between each girl and their father, as well as the development of positive identities. One of the most interesting things to note about these two films as well as the novel is the universality of the themes and sentiments communicated within them. They have all stood the test of time in their own ways. Salinger wrote The Catcher in the Rye in 1951. Today, readers still keep Holden Caulfield alive and relevant in popular culture. The members of The Breakfast Club were first introduced by Hughes in 1985. Today, the film has become a cult classic which is still as appreciated as it was 26 years ago. Likewise, Shakespeare’s ideas in The Taming of the Shrew have lived on over 400 years to be reintroduced in 10 Things I Hate About You. Through the telling and retelling of these stories, it’s easy to see that the conflict in parent-child relationships during adolescence is going nowhere. Learning how to successfully resolve these conflicts by learning from life, literature, and film is a possibility, however. By implementing all the knowledge handed down to us from previous generation, these conflicts can be positively resolved and a positive identity can be achieved by the adolescents journeying toward adulthood. Works Cited "Allowing Youth Sports to be Child's Play." Nationwide Children's Hospital. . Charnly, Ken. "Are Wealthy Children Happier Than Poor Children?" ArticleSnatch. . Dowdney, Linda. "Children bereaved by parent or sibling death." Psychiatry 7.6 (2008): 270-275. Phillips, Carol. What "The Breakfast Club" Can Teach Us About Millenials. 4 August 2010. 21 April 2011 . Volpe, Joseph S. "Effects of Domestic Violence: An Overview." American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress (1996). Read More