"Dead on Arrival"

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses and analyzes the short story, "Dead on Arrival" by Linh Dinh. Specifically, the paper explains what interesting items relate to Asian-American literalities in the story. The paper explains that Dinh's writing style is quite unique, with each snippet of information in the story somehow relating to his own life, but also the life he believes Americans on the other side of the world live. These literalities add depth to the story, but also relate to the cross-culture of Asian- Americans, indicating how they are torn between the ways of their ancestors and the ways of modern America.

From the Paper:

"This short story, really simply a set of small vignettes and thoughts placed together illustrate much about the culture of the Vietnamese people. It also illustrates how difficult it can be to assimilate culturally into the melting pot known as America. While Americans do not see anything odd about their culture or way of life, to strangers, everything can be intimidating and odd. For example, Dinh writes, "When people say 'I'm buying a house,' what do they mean by that? I mean, what store is big enough to hold a bunch of houses? Or even just one house? And how are you going to take a house home with you after you bought it?" ("Dead" 110). This example is amusing, but it points out just how different our cultures are, and how things that seem quite simple and straight forward to us, might seem far different to someone from another country."

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• Term Paper # 149410 : "Too Cool for the Room"

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