Leviza Murtazayeva

English 1121- Prof. Scanlan

Research Prospectus

  A short story I chose is titled “Assimilation” by E.L. Doctorow. This story caught my interest mostly because of its clear and up-front information and storytelling. It is a story that shares the life of regular people who may be dealing with legal reasons. Sometimes, in some areas, the story “Assimilation” hits home because I have read the news before about people doing this for a better life. Assimilation is an idea that one is taking in and fully understanding information or ideas that have been proposed by a different area, that can happen in relocation such as moving to a different country. This story was chosen to be my favorite because the story is very familiar to many stories I like to read and that I have read before. The theme and the style of this book have caught my attention since there is dialogue and it helps a reader feel all the emotions the author is expressing through the narrator. 

      This story begins with a description of a man who may be Hispanic that works in a restaurant as a dishwashing person. The man’s name is Ramon he was a legal citizen and he had a college education, meanwhile, his Russian boss is an immigrant. Ramon later finds himself being promoted as a busboy. Eventually, the boss asks Ramon if he could marry his Russian relative Jelena so that she can stay legally in the states. Later when Ramon finally goes to Europe to meet his future wife. He finally gets married to her and she is now legal. And she treats him like dirt, she believes that she has no reason to be kind to him. Bad situations happened around them with the help of the Russian family, the couple spent more time, and Ramon learned more about him. Despite her initial attitude, their affection and love for each other grew and they did not want later divorce as they were planning before.

        Ramon is a struggling college student, who works as a dishwashing man, and is one day offered a promotion that changes his life. Ramon seems like a naive and gullible person, he decides to dive into the arranged marriage to make some money in the result. Russian Boss, Borislav, is a very strict and commanding person, he risks a lot of what he has to set up this marriage with his employee. Jelena is very apathetic even though she was the one who needed the legalization to be successfully done.

       The ethics that Ramon seems to follow are mostly normative, such as Utilitarianism and virtue, since he does have his moral about his education and his legalization, even though he is Hispanic and not so wealthy. For the second main character, Borislav mostly follows global ethics, which means that he just follows the morals that are made up for everyone. Jelena has overlapping of normative and feminist ethics. You can make that conclusion when she acts with an attitude towards Ramon, who didn’t do anything. Meanwhile, later giving up the emotions and fall for him truly.