Clothing In John Updike's A & P

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We have all at one point or another in our lives made a comment or had a thought about why a person would wear certain types of clothing in public. John Updike’s story “A&P” introduces a young man of nineteen; of which, his name is Sammy from his point of view the story is told. Sammy is a checkout clerk in a grocery store called the A&P located in a small town approximately five miles from the ocean. The A&P is located in a conservative portion of the town shared with a church, banks and other respectable businesses. Sammy goes into detail about the dress of three young women being compared to the A&P’s normal clientele. Throughout many of our travels we all have viewed someone wearing cloths we deemed inappropriate for their age, immediate surroundings and showing of individuality but in reality did we consider our own morality or the morality of individuals that surrounded us. No…show more content…
Sammy’s description of Lengel the store manager as a much older person leads us to notice the generational difference between them. Sammy’s choice of words describing the young women compared to the store manager’s statement “We want you decently dressed when you come in here” as he confronts the girls identifies our ideas of decent are relative to our generation. When Sammy decided to quit his job at the A&P. He was representing what all of us have the right to do by standing up for our beliefs. Sammy felt strongly that Lengel was unjust in the way the girls were confronted but made a decision in hast whether right or wrong but one of his own choosing. So, when we see a young man wearing his pants in a way to have his boxers visualized should we consider the affects by the choice of the individual or the individual’s affects on us before we pass

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