In the short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been,” Joyce Carol Oats uses characterization including methods such as symbolism and allusions to develop her characters, and thus establish her theme of the cross roads Connie faces in her transition from the innocence of her adolescence to the impurity of adulthood facilitated by the antagonist, Arnold Friend.
From the beginning of the story, the reader sees Connie has a strong desire to make her early transition into adulthood. Although she in only 15, she acts like an adult as “everything about her had two sides to it, one for home, and one for anywhere that was not home” (Oats, pg 510). She frequently tests her limits by making her parents believe she was with her friend shopping or seeing a movie, however “sometimes they went across the highway, ducking fast across the busy road, to a drive-in restaurant where older kids hung out” (Oats, pg 510). There she met boys and eventually went out to their cars with......

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Title: Where Are You Going Where Have You Been
Approximate Word Count: 1011
Approximate Pages: 5 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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