One Crazy Summer Prejudice Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #4

The same stewardess who let the large white woman gawk at us and press money into Fern's hand wasn't so quick to hand us over to the woman I said was our mother. (3.30)

At every turn, Delphine points out the prejudice she faces. It's not that the flight attendant says anything racist; it's that she's skeptical about Cecile because of the way she looks. Delphine notices when other people use prejudice to make snap judgments but isn't so quick to notice when she's guilty of the same exact thing.

Quote #5

Vonetta and Fern eyed the wooden sticks and formulated ideas about turning them into hairpins, play-fight swords, and pickup sticks. (6.18)

Who knew you could do so many things with chopsticks? The girls aren't used to seeing—let alone eating with—chopsticks, so they think up their own fun games to play with them instead. Their mouths practically hit the floor when Cecile actually uses the chopsticks for (gasp) eating.

Quote #6

She had picked out three girls who looked alike enough to be sisters, each one as thick as my sisters and I were lanky. They wore white boots and daisy dresses with flared sleeves. They might as well have been going to a go-go, not to a free breakfast. (10.2)

While this initially seems like harmless childhood judgment, there's something insidious about Delphine's readiness to judge this girls. She forms an unfavorable impression based on these girls' appearance alone. It's not until pages later that she even learns their names (a.k.a. starts to get to know them for who they are as people).