How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
One Saturday, when the garden was fullest, I stood up a minute to straighten my back. And what did I see? With a few exceptions, the blacks on one side, the whites on another, the Central Americans and Asians toward the back. The garden was a copy of the neighborhood. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. (6.5)
When Sam looks at the garden, he sees one thing: segregation. People have separated into their own parts of the garden and aren't working across ethnic differences. Normally, Sam is an optimistic dude. But here, he doesn't sound too cheery. Why don't you think Sam is surprised by the segregation in the garden? Is he more pessimistic than we thought?
Quote #5
The only faces looking back were the drunks that hang out under her place. […] They liked to call me "field slave" and "share-cropper." Ask how Massa's crops is doing. I could have banged their heads together and shut 'em up, but I didn't. (9.6)
While Curtis is working on his tomato plants, a bunch of rude drunks across the street start mocking him. When they call Curtis names like "field slave," they're reminding Curtis about a dark part of American history, when African Americans were slaves. Curtis does a good job of not getting too angry about all this cruel name-calling, but in Shmoop's book, it's 100% unacceptable.
Quote #6
If you're Mexican, the Cubans and Puerto Ricans hate you because they think you snuck in illegally and they didn't. (11.1)
Maricela has some pretty serious thoughts about race. For starters, she feels like other people make assumptions about how she came to live in Cleveland because she's Mexican. And Maricela makes the whole thing even more complicated because she's making some assumptions of her own, right? What do you think of all these assumptions? And does Maricela get to escape stereotypes by the end of her story?