“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” by Joyce Carol Oates

The Summer Reading Assignment: After carefully reading and annotating the story, please complete all of the guided reading questions. Be sure to apt and specific text references to support your answers.

1. Oates dedicated the story to Bob Dylan? Use the Internet to research Dylan, his music, and America in the 1960s. Summarize some of the most interesting details you discover in a short paragraph. 2. How is Connie characterized in the opening paragraphs of the story? Please use at least three details from the text to support your answer.

Characterization: The way an author helps the reader to learn about the characters.

Direct characterization - The author directly states the character’s traits.

Indirect characterization – The author reveals the traits of a character through methods that require the reader to draw conclusions about the character (i.e. dialogue, a character’s actions, a character’s thoughts, and what characters say about him or her).

3. How is Connie different from her older sister June?

4. What is Oates revealing about Connie when she writes, “Everything about her had two sides …one for home and one for when she was away from home” (1)?

5. For Connie and her teenage friends why does going to the restaurant “shaped like a big bottle” feel like entering a “sacred building?” (2).

6. Based on the language Oates uses to describe them, what is are your initial impressions of Eddie and the boy with the “shaggy black hair?” (2). Use specific words and phrases from the text to support your answer.

7. Why does Connie want to stay home instead of going to the barbeque with her family? What are some of the things she does and thinks about while she is home alone? How would you describe the mood of the text at this point in the story?

Mood: The emotional atmosphere in a literary work (how the work makes the reader feel).

8. What is Connie’s initial reaction to the arrival of the “gold jalopy” and the two boys from the restaurant?

9. Read carefully the paragraph that begins, “Can’tcha read it…” (4). What inferences can be made about Arnold Friend and his attitude toward Connie based on the language and the details in this paragraph?

Inference: A reasonable conclusion based on the information presented. 10. What does Connie initially find appealing about Arnold Friend? Why does her attitude change when he says, “Connie, you ain’t telling the truth…” (5)?

11. Why does Connie ask Arnold Friend, “Hey, how old are you?” (6). How does he react to Connie’s question?

12. How does Oates description of Arnold Friend in this section of the text – “He grinned to reassure her and lines appeared at the corners of his mouth…” (6) – add to your understanding of his character? What details suggest that Arnold Friend might not be an ordinary teenage boy?

13. At what point in the story does Connie realize that she is in danger? Please support your answer with evidence from the text.

14. How does Oates use diction and dialogue on pages eight and nine to add tension to the story and help readers understand that something terrible is going to happen? Use at least three examples from the text to support your answer.

Tension: A mood that is created by an author to engage the reader in an anxious anticipation of the outcome of a story line or an interesting character. Authors use suspense and tension to hold the reader’s interest throughout the plot developments.

15. Near the end of the story Oates writes, “She felt her pounding heart. Her hand seemed to enclose it. She thought for the first time in her life that it was nothing that was hers, that belonged to her, but juts a pounding, living thing inside this body that wasn’t really hers either” (11). Explain the significance of this moment; what kind of an epiphany might Connie be experiencing?

Epiphany: A moment in which a character experiences a sudden realization that leads to a new perspective and/or clarifies a problem or situation.

16. Why do you think Oates ends the story without specifically revealing what happens to Connie?

17. What are three possible symbols in the story? Please make sure you explain what you believe each symbol represents.

Symbolism: The use of any object, person, place, or action that has meaning in itself while standing for something larger than itself, such as a quality, attitude, belief, or value.

18. What is one thematic idea that Oates may be trying to convey in this story? Please use at least 3 specific text references to justify your interpretation.

Theme: A declarative statement that reveals universal meaning by addressing questions such as, "What does literature suggest about the human experience? What does literature suggest about human nature? What does literature suggest about the human condition? What does literature suggest about people in general?"