Found Artifact #7: Quote"One thing that children of divorce have to deal with, particularly if the divorce occurs early in their lives, is the entry and exit of adults other than their biological parents into their lives...They develop emotional attachments with people who sometimes disappear from their lives." Found Artifact #8: TED Talk
Original Artifact #4: Interview #2
*Interview held with high-school student. Why do you think the divorce rate is so high? I think it starts when they’re just kids in “young love.” They’re expected by society to have boyfriends or girlfriends. They give so much of themselves into the relationships their whole lives. Then, when they get married, there is nothing to look forward to. They have already been so romantically involved with other people that the only difference now is that there is a legal paper which binds their love. Also, when kids date, they often go through breakups. In school, some kids date so many people and go through so many break-ups over little fights. Then, when they get married and have a fight, their initial thought is to breakup with them through a divorce, as it is what they have been doing their whole life. One reason the divorce rate is so high is because people get too close with people that they are not married too, both emotionally and physically. I bet that if you were to survey a divorced person they would tell you that they have had multiple relationships with many people before marrying a specific person. In their initial relationships, the couples are young and had not quite developed a sense of maturity to understand the idea of marriage and how it is supposed to be a sacred and permanent bond. In the end, I think the biggest reason that the divorce rate has become so high is because there was no foundation for the relationship and the marriage to be founded upon. This foundation that many of the longer marriages have that divorced people don’t is religion. Religion plays such a crucial role in presenting this idea that marriage is sacred and not to be squandered with by a bunch of random people. If you were to ask older, married people how their relationships began I would suspect you would find a significant difference to how much they allowed their relationship to go before getting married. And by this I mean both the physical and emotional aspects of love and a relationship. Think about it: sex was originally supposed to be the ultimate act of love, the closest one can be with another person. But now, sex has become a staple to this economy. Society makes sex seem like an appropriate and dispensable product that people are now willing to do “purchase” well before their marriage. I mean come on there’s a show called “16 and Pregnant.” The reason the divorce rate is so high boils down to the idea of sex and love and how people no longer value the sacred meaning of marriage, but focus only on the legal definition. |
Found Artifact #9: PhotographOriginal Artifact #1: Visual Analysis
This image powerfully illustrates the pressures that children of divorced parents are often faced with. The black and white color scheme serves to show the “dulling effect” that divorce can have on an individual. The parents pulling on the child symbolizes the difficult position that children of divorced parents are put through. One parent may try to convince the child to testify against the other parent in court. Frequently, they are put in the almost impossible position of choosing which of the parents they want to live with, as each parent tries to win them over. The blurred middle section of this picture serves to signify this constant battle that these children face. With so many huge decisions to make and so little time to make them, their lives often appear blurred. Grown adults have trouble handling these circumstances, so imagine the burden of this process on small children. The tearing of the child shown in the picture shows that the effects of a divorce have permanent effects, affecting kids even till adulthood. Found Artifact #10: Letter
View the letter, which is addressed from a single mom (Abby M. King) to her kids, at: http://www.scarymommy.com/an-open-apology-to-my-kids/ Original Artifact #10: Textual Analysis
In this letter, Abby King writes an open letter to her two children, apologizing for her divorce. She uses heavy repetition with the phrase “I’m sorry,” intending to show her children how sorry she feels about making the go through a divorce. She mentions the tough, emotional pressures that the divorce had on her kids, saying it “broke [their] world apart.” She then further talks about the physical impacts that the divorce brought, including the endless trips the kids would have to make from one parent's house to the others. This is an aspect often ignored by many parents. She further sympathizes with her child, saying how she is “most sorry that she is not a child of divorce.” This acknowledges the fact to the children that their mom does not know what they are going through and adds to how sorry she is. But perhaps the most powerful part of the letter is when King apologizes for the fact that the children cannot see both of their parents at the same time, saying how her kids can go to bed with tears in their eyes on their 10th birthday knowing that only in another 365 days will they get to eat dinner with their whole family again. To this, she replies saying that “sorry” is too small a word for their pains. She ends by saying that her kids’ lives will be uphill from here, that all other roads will run smoother. Through this, she is hoping to end on a cheerful note, trying to show her kids that their life will eventually get better. At the very end, she stands by what she did considering the other alternates. This is intended to show her kids that though they were hurt a lot by the divorce, she had their well-being in her mind when she filed for the divorce. Found Artifact #3: Article
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This article is also available at:
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/fcs/pdfs/fcs471.pdf |