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1. What does the first section of the book speak about?

The first section of the book is about childhood and youth. The selections featured in this section are about survival, trying to "pass for white," and class structure. This section showed how the authors of the selected pieces have learned to live with the contradictions that society established for them.

2. In the poem "When I was Growing Up," what was life like for Nellie Wong?

In the poem "When I Was Growing Up," Nellie Wong spoke about the desire to be white as she was growing up. Wong, poetically, spoke to the fact that others told her how "dark" she was. She, bombarded by media putting whiteness on a pedestal, imagined that her skin was white. Therefore, her entire life revolved around a desire to be something that she never could be.

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