93 pages • 3 hours read
Margaret Peterson HaddixUprising
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2007A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Essay Topics
Uprising describes New York as a city filled with different immigrants, cultures, and languages. The novel follows the stories of Bella—who immigrates to escape famine, disease, and send money to her Italian family—and Yetta—who immigrates for refuge from a violent genocide in Russia. Today, immigrants still move to the United States for similar reasons and face many of the tensions, prejudices, and struggles described by Haddix. How have conditions in the United States changed for immigrants since 1911? How have they remained the same?
Class stratification is a major theme in Uprising, and Haddix illustrates dramatic lifestyle differences between Jane’s wealthy family and the immigrant shirtwaist workers. Nevertheless, Jane comes to realize that women face many similar struggles across class boundaries, that both she and Yetta feel “caged” (120). How is the experience of gender roles influenced by class in Uprising? Are there any aspects of gendered oppression that seem to transcend class?
The women in Uprising frequently encounter rules, protocol, and expected behaviors in social situations, such as the list given to Jane at The Triangle strike. How do these rules function in the novel? What do they illustrate for the reader?
How are the images of fire and fire escapes used over the course of the novel? What message (or messages) does Haddix convey with these images?
During The Triangle strike, Rahel suggests that the union’s efforts are largely financed by upper-class activists and socialites. Though grateful for their contributions, Yetta notes that she is tired of interacting with these wealthy individuals. Why are these interactions with affluent activists so draining for Yetta? How do power and privilege influence the course of the strike?
Though Bella, Yetta, and Jane all come from very different backgrounds, all three girls grow to feel increasingly distanced from their families. What are some of the ways they become distanced, and what do these ways tell us about each woman’s development?
Communication, dialect, and language barriers are frequently examined in Uprising. What do you feel the author is trying to tell us with these discussions of language?
Romance and daydreams carry both positive and negative connotations in Uprising. What do these conflicting undertones suggest about the role of dreams?
In light of Rahel’s cautionary words—“This one girl—she might have been you or me. One minute, she was just standing there…[t]he next minute…gone in a flash” (241), Yetta’s death is arguably an instance of dramatic irony. What is Rahel trying to tell her sister with this story? How do you interpret Yetta’s death in the context of her political struggle?
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