Metacognition: Kite Runner Essay

As I worked on my Kite Runner essay, I had difficulty choosing a claim statement for the thesis. I tried to think of both contrasting sides of the argument and tried to reconcile both ideas by...

My original thesis was as follow: Although Amir’s birthplace is Afghanistan, he exhibits less touristic qualities in America than in his native land; therefore, it can be speculated that Amir is, in fact, more American than Afghani.

Then I began to debate whether or not I believed my thesis was true. I explored several perspectives of the claim and realized that the problem was the choice between quantitative or qualitative. Some actions/traits of a tourist include sightseeing, being ignorant to hardships of the native, being wealthy, and being treated well. I realized that out of majority, Amir is more of a tourist in Afghanistan; however, I knew that Hosseini wanted the readers to realize that Amir was actually more culturally Afghani. I knew I could write a more concrete essay about why Amir is more American, but it wouldn't be as meaningful or as important to the main plot of the story as Amir realizing his tie to Afghanistan. By viewing the pro's and con's of contrasting ideas, I found that the idea was not that he was more of one culture than the other, but that Amir needed to reunite his two ways of life to reach redemption. In class we talked of how Amir divided into many fragments, and once he reached redemption he would be whole again; this relates perfectly to the idea of piecing together both cultures to reach redemption and be one again.

This way of thinking is very effective because it allows one to compare contrasting ideas, which seems confusing, but is actually helpful. When seeing similarites between opposing ideas, I recognized that both thoughts worked as one to reach the end goal. By reconciling the idea that Amir was both American and Afghani I was able to create a more fascinating thesis. (This is referred to as a dialectic - conversation about contrasting things)