Sparkle Vs. Girl

           After several hours of researching I was finally able to connect one of the stories to a form of media.  Certain scenes from the movie “Sparkle” featuring Whitney Houston and Jordin Sparks depict the mother’s advice to the daughter in “Girl”, by Jamaica Kincaid.  In the movie “Sparkle”, an authoritarian mother name Emma (Whitney Houston) has three daughters by the name of Sister (Carmen Ejogo), Delores (Tika Sumpter), and Sparkle (Jordin Spark). The storyline of the movie is supposed to resemble that of the 1960’s. Emma is extremely protective and strict with her daughters, especially Sparkle. She as a certain guideline that they must follow since they all live under her roof. They are not allowed to watch television pass a certain time, they had to attend bible study, go to church, dress proper like respectable young ladies, not allowed to go out pass a certain time, and behave properly in public. The most absolute rule that the mother forbid all the girls to do is singing unless it is with the church choir. Emma was extremely displease when she discovered that her daughters were in a singing group that perform in clubs and work for the entertainment industry. Due to the vulgar and crude reputation of the entertainment industry and Emma’s personal experiences, she did not want her daughters to be involved in it. This caused Emma to believe that her daughters were not innocent and seek to correct them, but the method backfired and at the end Sparkle defended her reason for wanting to be a singer and followed her own path.

        “Girl” is similar to “Sparkle” in the sense of a mother’s expectation for her daughter(s), and the multiple advices that the mother provide to the daughter in order to follow social norms and be considered a respectable woman. In “Girl”, the mother suspected that the daughter is not following her words of wisdom and scorned the daughter by continuously repeating “like the slut you are so bent on becoming”. This is presented in “Sparkle “also, Emma thought her children were impure and basically pushed them away. She did not even attend any of their performances until the end when she went to Sparkle’s first solo performance. Finally, in “On Girl”, the speaker’s decision to create her own path instead of following the advice of the mother is related to Sparkle’s decision to pursue a career in the entertainment industry despite her mother’s protest and corrosive judgments.

http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/photos/stylus//2258059-jordin-sparks-sparkle-617-409.jpg

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/17/movies/movie-review-sparkle-with-whitney-houston-and-jordin-sparks.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k49K3b4vuwE (The Trailer)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAVCKbAETg8 (Shows the mother's strictness)