Cultural Placement Every Culture varies from place to place depending on where you are in the world. It can change as much as a different culture from house to house. If a person is in a place for a certain amount of time, their identity can start to be formed from the different traditions and tendencies of that area. This will also affect the way people form relationships with others. Throughout this semester, searching for different ways to show this effect of location became pretty clear. This was represented through the book Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, and the article From Marseille to Mecca by Yahya Laayouni. Depending on the location of certain people, different cultures are developed and traditionalized within people’s lives. Each of these examples show a different area and era of time. This is important because no matter the time or place, culture is different and is represented in its own way. The era in which Frankenstein was placed, was very interesting. This was the era of becoming slightly more modernized, however, people didn’t want change even though it was needed. The culture here in Europe during the early 1800’s was seriously harsh and way different than what we see today. “I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet”(Shelley 56) This quote shows a good description of what their location was like when the Frankenstein was created.Shelley also uses words such as “cell”and “workshop of filthy creation”. These simple words can change the entire atmosphere that Frankenstein was around when created.The along with just atmosphere, the brain that Frankenstein had reciever, was already traditionalized to certain things. So, when he awoke, he had no idea where he was or how to act. Therefore, he was threatening and mistreated because of the culture of the people in their town. They attacked and tried to find him in order to keep their peace and culture.    Also, in Frankenstein, the identity of Victor is also altered by the surrounding and expected culture. People in the town think that he is crazy because he is going against the ways that they live by and is trying to be like God. This idea of secularism is becoming more and more common. Back then, people who were very secular were sentenced to death, simply because the traditions and culture were so ingrained that people didn’t want to stride away from it. Another example being in Things Fall Apart. They adopted son from a different culture was sentenced to die and the adopted father, okonkwo, was the one who had killed him. The culture they lived in, made the father go  against every grain in his body and kill his son. “Dazed with fear, Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him down. He was afraid of being thought weak” (Achebe 61). This simply shows that the culture and Okonkwo’s role in the culture made him “cut down” his son. “Okonkwo did not taste any food f.

1. Cultural Placement
Every Culture varies from place to place depending on
where you are in the world. It can change as much as a different
culture from house to house. If a person is in a place for a
certain amount of time, their identity can start to be formed
from the different traditions and tendencies of that area. This
will also affect the way people form relationships with others.
Throughout this semester, searching for different ways to show
this effect of location became pretty clear. This was represented
through the book Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Things Fall
Apart by Chinua Achebe, and the article From Marseille to
Mecca by Yahya Laayouni. Depending on the location of certain
people, different cultures are developed and traditionalized
within people’s lives. Each of these examples show a different
area and era of time. This is important because no matter the
time or place, culture is different and is represented in its own
way.
The era in which Frankenstein was placed, was very
interesting. This was the era of becoming slightly more
modernized, however, people didn’t want change even though it
was needed. The culture here in Europe during the early 1800’s
was seriously harsh and way different than what we see today.
“I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might
infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my
feet”(Shelley 56) This quote shows a good description of what
their location was like when the Frankenstein was
created.Shelley also uses words such as “cell”and “workshop of
filthy creation”. These simple words can change the entire
atmosphere that Frankenstein was around when created.The
along with just atmosphere, the brain that Frankenstein had
reciever, was already traditionalized to certain things. So, when
he awoke, he had no idea where he was or how to act.
Therefore, he was threatening and mistreated because of the
culture of the people in their town. They attacked and tried to

2. find him in order to keep their peace and culture.
Also, in Frankenstein, the identity of Victor is also altered
by the surrounding and expected culture. People in the town
think that he is crazy because he is going against the ways that
they live by and is trying to be like God. This idea of
secularism is becoming more and more common. Back then,
people who were very secular were sentenced to death, simply
because the traditions and culture were so ingrained that people
didn’t want to stride away from it. Another example being in
Things Fall Apart. They adopted son from a different culture
was sentenced to die and the adopted father, okonkwo, was the
one who had killed him. The culture they lived in, made the
father go against every grain in his body and kill his son.
“Dazed with fear, Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him
down. He was afraid of being thought weak” (Achebe 61). This
simply shows that the culture and Okonkwo’s role in the culture
made him “cut down” his son. “Okonkwo did not taste any food
for two days after the death of Ikemefuna”(Achebe 63). This is
at the beginning of a chapter and explaining how it truly affects
people. Even though Okonkwo
loved his adopted son very much and thought of him as his own,
his reputation was more important than saving the life of one
that he loved. This has many moral dilemmas involved in it and
it difficult to think that this actually happened. Then, just in
this old era of time in Africa, the culture was crazy. The amount
of death and things that people today would think of as insane is
unbelievable. So, the way these people in Things Fall Apart
were raised and traditionalized, made them the way they were
and how they acted
towards each other no matter the relationship.
The authors for every example, were all from different
cultures. The interesting thing being that they all wrote from
either personal experiences or traditions. For example, From
Marseille to Mecca, the author described how the creator of the
film had based his logic off of his own personal experience.
Even in the thesis, Laayouni talks about this. “ I argue that

3. personal experiences are not isolated reflections of the self and
that each individual experience carries within itself traces of
other “selves” whose recognition is quintessential to selfhood”
(Laayouni, 1). Then, Chinua Achebe, is from an african tribe
that had practiced the things described in Things Fall Apart.
This is important in writing these pieces because of the fact that
if someone has experienced something in a certain area of
culture, then their accuracy will be perfect. If someone outside
of Africa were to write about the tribes in Africa, there would
be many stated facts and less personal detail. But, having
someone who lived through it write about it, it will become
completely personal and meaningful rather than stating facts.
An argument made by Layouni is that the French background
becomes a big issue in the tradition and belief of the new
generation that was born in France. “The challenge that the
Beur’s citizenship presents to French society is that their
cultural and religious backgrounds clash with the French secular
notion of citizenship”(Laayouni 7). He then goes on to say that
since the father and son have to be together all of the time, they
are forced to then look at the differences between them and
accept them for who they are. “Accordingly, the Beurs, though
they share culture, religion and ethnicity with immigrants, are
different from them in the sense that their Frenchness is not
acquired but internationalized”(Laayouni 7). This is explaining
also how the fact that even though the Beurs were brought up in
France, they still share the same culture that they derived from
their parents. So, the father and son were able to get a long
somewhat because of the simple understanding of how each
other believed what they believed. This all is basing the fact
that the location of their birth and culture affects the way they
believe in it and how they act upon it.
Along with her imagination, Mary Shelley, the author of
Frankenstein, had a major fascination with the hideous. This is
obvious while reading the novel because of how horrific it can
be. Her task which sparked this whole idea was to simply write
a ghost story “ We will each write a ghost story.” (Shelley 167).

4. For days, Shelley was incapable of creating a story because she
had no idea what to write. “ I was asked each morning, and
each morning I was forced to reply with a mortifying negative.”
(Shelley 167). The only time she had any ideas, were in the
night when she was sleeping. She had thought that the other
stories were a waste and may have been well written, but not a
good enough ghost story to win. Shelley began to think that if
something were to frighten her, they would frighten others. “ O!
If I could only contrive one which would frighten my reader as I
myself had been frightened that night!” (Shelley 168). This idea
was one of the best she had because after that she had created
this amazing story. She even cheered in excitement that she had
thought of a story. “ I found it!” (Shelley 169). She had such a
fascination that not only had she thought of a story, but the fact
that it would be in fact horrific. The personal part of how she
came up with the idea being that it was what scares her, makes
the story more real and readable.
Along with these are the different ages of the cultures. They
different times in which they were created, created a huge factor
in how they acted upon them. Times when Things Fall Apart is
set in, was a very harsh and different culture than what we
would think today. The amount of death and different events
that took place are quite shocking to people in today’s world.
When Okonkwo had to kill his adopted son, most people would
think that is insane for people in the modern day cultures. Then,
From Marseille to Mecca, once the father had arrived to Mecca,
he ended up dying from being trampled. And this cause of death
is very common there. Some fact had said that thousands die
from being trampled. All of this for part of their culture and
tradition. For the son however, he was raised in a slightly
different culture, so to him that wasn’t very important and
would probably not make the walk in Mecca. So, basically, the
age of these cultures date back quite far and can seem crucial to
one’s identity or identity formation.
Overall, the location of the culture and people can make a major
impact on their identity formation and begin to define who they

5. are. Factors to this can include the age of the culture, where
they people are, personal experiences, and many others. Also,
depending on where the culture was created and then where it
has spread, variations can be formed and traditions can be
altered. Identity formation is majory impacted by all factors of
cultural placement and should always be slightly looked at when
dealing with someone's identity, especially because they are all
different.
WORKS CITED
Ojaide, Tanure. "Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart in World
Literature." Indigeneity, Globalization, and African Literature.
Palgrave Macmillan U.S., 2015
Laayouni, Yahya (2016) “From Marseille to Mecca:
Reconciling the Secular and the Religious in Le grand voyage
(The Big Trip) (2004),” Journal of Religion & Film: Vol. 20:
Iss. 2, Article 41.
Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, and J. Hunter Paul. Frankenstein.
2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton, 1996. Print. Norton Critical.