Was Connie In Joyce Carol Oates Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?

She sees the boys who give her attention as subjugations who “dissolve into a single face that was not even a face but an idea” (Oates 675). But soon enough her dreams and music materialize into the shape of Arnold Friend. Arnold Friend is described as a muscular, older, and mysterious character. He seems to be a work of her imagination as he is ultimately an idea she created that would fit into her perfect fantasy world. Connie is defenseless to Arnold Friend’s manipulations mainly because she has no visible identity of her own.

Human trafficking in Houston is growing at a high rate year after year. The persons that is being trafficked around is telling a lie stating a better life and more money, but that isn’t the case. Women get tricked into being a sex slave and this leads to mental and physical abuse, as well as health infections all because of promises for a better life for her family. Due to this Houston has become a number two place for human trafficking. Houston is a hot spot for traffickers to find their next victim to add to the list of women they have taken away from home and force them to work.

When questioned about rape, especially most women, they might think or even picture a stranger coming out of a dark place to assault someone. But in reality there’s more to it. According to the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, “About half of all people who are raped know the person who attacked them. This is known as date rape — forced sex that can happen not only on a date, but also somewhere like a party with someone the victim may know, like, or even be interested in.” Furthermore, social critic and feminist, Camille Paglia, has been discussing this persisting issue about date rape with a personal stance that many women may disagree with.

Connie uses her attitude and appearance to attract boys. But she is not aware of the reality of the society in which she lives. Connie is living in a fantasy world, but when she gets trapped by Arnold Friend she is put into a scary reality. There

He tries to seduce and persuade her to go with him for a ride similar to how the Devil lured Eve with a shiny and mysterious apple. Oates displays evidence of biblical allusions regarding Arnold Friend’s appearance and persona in the story by depicting his physical characteristics, his supernatural knowledge, and his demeanor as an image of evil. Connie wants to be desired for her sexuality and Arnold possesses this by his tone throughout the story. His appearance comes

Throughout the story, there are many instances: the illogical time and settings, the similarity between Arnold and Connie and the unrealistic events show that the meeting between Connie and Arnold Friend is a dream. The dream is also a preparation for Connie before she steps onto the stage of being an adult. Connie’s dream begins when she refuses to go to her aunt’s house for barbecue party. She stays home, and under the warmness of the sun, she begins her day dreaming about love and the boy she has met the night before. In the beginning, the author writes “Connie sat with her eyes closed in the sun…”

This interpretation of the story explains how Connie simply fell prey to the common theme of men acting as predators in society. Therefore, Connie had no say in her fate, so she just decided to go quietly with him. However, this theory completely disregards the psychological disorders that Connie has. Connie did not go quietly with Arnold because he was a dominating male. Instead, Connie left due to her numerous unconscious mental problems.

Another reason why Connie why wants to be independent from her mother is because she does not want to be like her. “Her mother went scuffling around the house in old bathroom slippers…”( paragraph 11). Connie’s mother is an image of the future Connie doesn't want -the life of a domestic housewife. Lastly, you can see that Connie has a love-hate relationship with her other, with whom she identifies, but at the same time she has to distance herself from her mother in order to establish her independence; “Sometimes, over coffee, they were almost friends, but something would come up – some vexation that was like a fly buzzing suddenly around their heads – and their faces went hard with contempt.” ( Paragraph

Carol Joyce Oates’ “Where Are You Going Where Have You Been?” presents how falling into temptation leads to giving up control and innocence. Though her mother is unapproving of her actions, Connie spends her time seeking attention from male strangers. Home alone, Connie is approached by a compelling creature who convinces her to leave her life and join him on his unknown journey. Through disapproving her family, having multiple appearances, listening to music, and her desperation to receive attention from boys, Connie gives up control of herself losing the purity of adolescents and contributing to her detrimental fate. It is imperative that one should not be controlled because of a desire to impress others.

Instead of realizing the danger that she was in, Connie was focused on what Arnold Friend was wearing and how attractive he was. Connie’s obsession with finding her own sexuality overpowered her gut feeling of danger. In an analysis of “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”, Barbara Wiedemann discusses how the antagonist Arnold Friend is based upon serial killer Charles Schmid, who murdered several young girls during the 1960s. In the analysis, Wiedemann

Teenage girl’s desires to be beautiful and desired, feminism, and adolescent sexuality are a few of the issues Connie, along with others, faced during this time period (and some can argue today). Connie was responsible for her actions (obviously) but it only partially to blame for what happened to her. If she had never left her friend to go sit in some random guy’s car, maybe Arnold Friend would’ve never seen her, or had taken a liking to her. I’m not stating that what happened with Arnold Friend was her fault, he’s the pedophile that should’ve known better and not threatened her, but it could have been prevented if she had never ditched her

Through the duration of their “conversation”, Arnold was able to make her completely give up her free will to him. Connie gives up everything she had ever owned to him, even her “pounding heart [is] nothing that [is Connie’s]” after Arnold takes control of her. (Oates 11). Willingly doing whatever someone says regardless of consequence is enough to classify someone as a victim on its own. But not only was Connie doing whatever Arnold said, she was even giving herself to him.

One out of every six women has been sexually assaulted either completed (14.8%) or attempted (2.8%) in her entire lifetime. Imagine of the those women was a 15 year old girl attending high school, who had a lot to offer, but was periodically silenced, while battling a mental illness in a fictional novel called Speak. The novel speak and the articles we read outside of class have a lot in common including sexual assault stereotypes, sexual violence statistics, and mental illness. Next, I will compare the character Melinda with the four articles. During the book speak, the main character Melinda can be described as a “perfect victim”.

Oates’s biography explained her fiction writing as a mixture violence and sexual obsession. The writing style definitely fits the plot point of this story with both of her literary ingredients being present in not only Arnold Friend but in Connie as well. The Protagonist Connie is presented in a very self-centered way. She is obsessed with her looks and often fantasizes about all the boys she meets.

The first example of the emotional effect rape has on a person is Maya’s relationship with herself. Throughout the novel Maya struggled with finding her identity and feeling displaced and insecure. While some of this was caused by a lack of parental love or by a culture that praised white beauty, a majority of it is caused by her rape. After Maya was raped, she was suddenly both a woman and a child, yet she felt like neither. She didn’t know where she belonged because she had experienced a very mature moment at such a young age.