36 pages • 1 hour read
Nalo HopkinsonBrown Girl in the Ring
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1998A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Essay Topics
How does the setting of Toronto’s city center and its surrounding suburbs illustrate the growing class factions after the Riots? How does the depiction of the communities living within the city center challenge perceptions of financial and cultural poverty?
Ti-Jeanne often finds herself torn between different figures in her life who have ulterior designs for her. Name three directions in which she is torn. Which of these paths does she follow at the novel’s end? Why?
What role does African and Caribbean spiritual and healing traditions play in a novel set in an impoverished Toronto city center? How do these traditions speak to their historical origins as well as their ability to transform the future of this city?
Rudy’s violence extends not just to the women in his family but also to the most vulnerable members of society. How does the figure of Rudy come to represent a critique of a larger system of violence such as historical or patriarchal harm?
What distinguishes spiritual father figures such as Papa Osain and the Prince of Cemetery from Rudy? Why is it important that the novel makes these distinctions?
What is the significance behind the figure of the duppy in the novel? Why is the duppy an appropriate creature to illustrate cycles of generational violence?
What does the shift in Ti-Jeanne’s attitude towards Tony by the novel’s end suggest about her personal growth? What do her final feelings towards Tony suggest about how to deal with men in the aftermath of their intimate violence?
How does Baby’s transformation signal the culmination of Ti-Jeanne’s lessons throughout the novel? What can the reader infer about the future of Ti-Jeanne’s family through the young mother’s decision to give Baby a name in the novel’s end?
In the end of the novel, Mami’s heart transforms Premier Uttley’s outlook on her campaign and politics. How does this physical embodiment relate to earlier instance of spiritual possession of the body in the novel? What is the significance behind this transformation?
