Essay Questions

Explain racial segregation in the novel The Sun Is Also a Star.

The novel contains characters of different races such as Natasha who is black and Daniel who is Asian. The racial segregation is described by Natasha as, ' America's really not a melting pot. It's more like one of those divided metal plates with separate sections for starch, meat and veggies. ' She uses the metaphor to illustrate how different and unwelcoming the people of different races were towards each other.

In the novel, when Daniel takes Natasha to his father's store, his brother Charlie assumes that Natasha is a thief. His father tells her to use a relaxer on her hair so that she can tone down the afro and his father generally disapproves of them being together.

Analyze the lives of immigrants as illustrated in the novel.

Daniel's parents are immigrants to The United States from Korea. They had come to America looking for greener pastures because they were very poor in their country. Once they got to America, they opened a black hair care shop which was doing well since the Koreans were firmly rooted into hair business. They had high hopes for their two sons Charlie and Daniel to excel academically so that they can have better lives.

On the other hand, Natasha's family who were undocumented immigrants from Jamaica to America were having a hard time. Samuel who was Natasha's father had thought that he would move to America and advance his acting career. Unfortunately, this did not happen.