Caroline's Page
Kate Culkin's "The Family Car"
Kate Culkin’s work, “The Family Car” illustrates the sense of freedom a woman feels with her first car. Culkin looks at her own experience as well as her grandmother’s experience with the automobile. The story begins as Culkin describes the empowerment she feels behind the wheel of her car. She discusses how it frees her and givers her confidence. Through this new-found confidence she is able to face the world and experience it . Culkin then describes her grandmother’s experience with the automobile. Her grandmother loved her car and loved the sense of autonomy it gave her. However, when she got married she got rid of it and took the role society bestowed upon her. Culkin’s grandmother admires her granddaughter’s freedom through her car and urges her never to succumb to the same circumstances she did.
