An Analysis of Joyce Carol Oates' Short story 'Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?'

Seminar paper from the year 2014 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 3,0, University of Würzburg (Universität), course: The American Short Story in the 20th Century, language: English, abstract: This paper deals with Joyce Carol Oates's short story 'Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?'. Therefore, the following will be subdivided into two main parts. The first one is going to be an introductory one, in which every tool and term that is to be used will be spelled out and explained. The first chapter is going to deal with the features of a short story. It is to be pointed out, what makes a short story a real Short-story and which features can be found in general. In the second chapter, there is going to be an introduction to the literary postmodernism. Thus, an explanation of features characterizing the postmodernism as such is going to follow. The third chapter is going to be an introduction to the story of initiation, in which its main elements and ideas are going to be presented and explained. In the fourth and last chapter in this section, an approach on Genette's theories on narrative perspectives, as well as a suitable explanation for each one can be found. The second part of the main section is going to consist of an analysis of 'Where are you going, where have you been?' in terms of every above named aspect, as well as the approach of classifying the short story as a story of (female) initiation.