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Rachel Ruggieri
Sipin
Exploring the Second Story

The Danger of a Single Story by Adichie and the song Second Chance by Shinedown
they the theme of peoples single stories. The Danger of a Single Story portrays that you cant
judge people based off of one story. There is much more to people than one story. In the song
Second Chance, it is about teenagers running away from home to create their second story
because they cant stay stuck in just one story. Together they both explains that there cant be
only one story to a person; there are multiple stories to a person which makes them who they are.
Adichie talks about how a single story leaves only one impression to the reader. When
people are given only one story, thats what they are going to base their thoughts and opinions
on. Adichie said, What this demonstrates, I think, is how impressionable and vulnerable we are
in the face of the story (Adichie). She is describing the true danger of the single story, which
is not having the full understanding of people, good or bad. As a part of Adichies childhood she
experience her houses boy, Fide, familys fist story. Since her first impression of the family was
poverty. After knowing that knowledge she had expected nothing else from the family.
So I felt enormous pity for Fide's family.Then one Saturday we
went to his village to visit, and his mother showed us a beautifully
patterned basket made of dyed raffia that his brother had made. I
was startled. It had not occurred to me that anybody in his family
could actually make something. All I had heard about them was
how poor they were, so that it had become impossible for me to see
them as anything else but poor. Their poverty was my single story
of them (Adichie).

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The danger of Fides single story was that his family is poor and nothing is expected from them.
Adichie explains how she got Fides familys first story and that was her only understanding of
them. After seeing the beautiful basket, it was hard for Adichie to accept the fact that Fides
family could make something so treasurable in a poor family. From Adichies experience, The
consequence of the single story is [that]: It robs people of their dignity. It makes our recognition
of equal humanity difficult (Adichie). The single story will stick in the readers head and is hard
to remove, even with counteracting proof.
The song Second Chance is about a teenager breaking free from their single story that
their parents trapped them in. Living in their single story they are doing repetitive things every
day and doing what is expected of them. Which is expressed in a few lines in the song I just saw
Halleys Comet/ She waved/ Said why are you always running in place?/ Even the man in the
moon disappeared (Shinedown). After living in that one story for their whole life, the teenager
runs away from home. In the chorus the teenager is singing Tell my mother/tell my father/ Ive
done the best I can/To make them realize/This is my life/I hope they understand/Im not angry,
Im just saying/Sometimes goodbye is a second chance (Shinedown). According from the
chorus, the teenager has been restricted into a single story and is running away to give him a
chance to make his own story that represents him. The second chance in the song in the lyrics
is symbolizing the second story that the teenager is going to pursue.
The single story has the ability not just to tell the story of another person, but to make
it the definite story of that person (Adichie). That is why the teenager in Second Chance is
trying to change their story to be their own, not their parents. Adichies speech talks about the
impacts of having a single story while the song Second Chance is about a teenager making
their own story by leave the first one that was set up by their parents. In todays world, society

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views songs as way to express emotions. Thats why popular songs have deeper meanings in it
and other people can relate to the singers problem. Adichie believes that The single story
creates stereotypes and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are
incomplete. They make one story become your only story (Adichie). Which is why the teenager
in Second Chance runs away from home. Having a single story only tells a little part of a
persons life. In order to understand the person fully is to create multiple stories.