Educated Questions and Answers
Educated
What literary devices and elements does Tara Westover use in Educated?
The literary devices that Tara Westover uses in her memoir Educated include repetition, imagery, and dialogue. To emphasize notable points and perhaps to supply her prose with a bit of rhythm,...
Educated
By chapter 22 of Educated, Westover writes that her life was often “narrated for me by others. Their voices were...
In Educated, Tara's realization that she has a voice of her own signifies her mental and emotional emancipation from her family. Throughout much of the narrative, she's told by her parents and the...
Educated
What is the purpose of Educated: A Memoir?
There are several purposes of Educated: A Memoir. One key purpose, as other educators have noted, is to stress the importance of obtaining a conventional structured education, as Tara, the...
Educated
When describing the mountains in Educated, Tara often uses the a literary device called "personification," which...
By personifying the mountains—especially the Princess—Tara adds a layer of literary symbolism to her memoir. The Princess is a real, tangible element of Tara's physical landscape, but by leveraging...
Educated
Educated starts with an epigraph from Virginia Woolf: "the past is beautiful because one never realizes an emotion at...
Virginia Woolf was an English author born in 1882. She was one of the first writers to use the narrative technique known as stream of consciousness. Woolf is quoted often in today's world. One of...
Educated
We are introduced early in the book to the standoff at Ruby Ridge, a 1992 gunfight between FBI agents and United...
The deadly stand-off between the Weaver family and the authorities had a profound impact on the Westovers. For one thing, the deaths of Randy Weaver's wife and son during the stand-off further...
Educated
What was the relationship between Tara and her mother?
Tara admired her mother, Faye, while she was growing up, even when her mother was refusing to protect her from her cruel brother. Once Tara moved away from the family and worked to get an...
Educated
On the first page of Educated, we are introduced to the mountain in rural Idaho where the Westover family lives,...
This extract from the Prologue immediately immerses the reader into the world of the Westover family. And, as the above lines make clear, it's a very small world indeed—a world created by Tara's...
Educated
By chapter 12, "Fish Eyes," we are introduced to Shawn's abuse of Westover and the other women in his life, which...
Despite the close bond between brother and sister, Shawn starts acting abusively towards Tara, both physically and mentally. A prime example comes in chapter 12 of Educated, "Fish Eyes". One night,...
Educated
In Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover, what is Westover's central argument, focus, or main idea?
This is by no means a definitive answer, but I would argue that the central idea of Educated is the power of the human spirit to overcome the greatest adversity. Just look at all the struggles that...
Educated
Westover's memoir revolves around the conflict between her desire to be educated and her loyalties toward her family....
The reason why education is incompatible with Tara’s family is the fact that her family is extremely religious. As radical Mormons and isolationists, the Westover family do not believe in any kind...
Educated
Westover's family suffers several car accidents. Explain some of those car accidents, describing how and why they...
Educated is a memoir written by Tara Westover. In this memoir, Westover describes her childhood growing up in a rural town in Idaho with her family. Her parents, Gene (her father) and Faye (her...
Educated
What are the obstacles Tara has to overcome to receive a formal education?
The obstacles that Tara Westover was forced to overcome to receive an education were numerous, but none were so oppressive and challenging as her incredibly unusual family. Living in an...
Educated
Why does Tara persist in returning to Buck's Peak despite her troubled relationship with her parents and Shawn...
One could read Educated as a classic “coming-to-be” story of a young girl who emancipates herself from the stifling traditions and parochialism of her home town by pursuing higher education, but...
Educated
While Tara's relationship with her parents deteriorates gradually, the moment of no return comes when she confronts...
There are several instances throughout the memoir where we see Tara’s internal struggle between her devotion to her family and wanting to discover who she is. When Shawn initially returns to the...
Educated
By part 2 of “Educated,” Westover has decided she wants to get an education, has found a way to take the ACT, and has...
Educated is a memoir that was written by Tara Westover. The story covers the struggles she went through to get her college degree after growing up in a survivalist Mormon family. Westover starts...
Educated
What are the turning points in Tara's journey towards thinking independently and asserting herself?
One important event was her brother Tyler’s break from the family over the idea of higher education. Tyler decided to go to college, an idea that their parents sternly opposed. Tara had not...
Educated
In chapter 5, Westover's brother Tyler announces that he is going to college, something none of her other sibling...
Early in Westover's memoir, we learn that her father is very anti-establishment and wants his family to live "off the grid" -- so much so that the children don't even have birth certificates....
Educated
How did the events of the Ruby Ridge Standoff in 1992 affect Tara's family and their worldview?
Tara Westover is the youngest child of a Mormon fundamentalist named Val Westover (who is given the pseudonym "Gene" in her memoir, Educated). Gene Westover and his wife were paranoid survivalists...
Educated
What is important about Tara never having heard about the holocaust in Educated?
Tara's father, Gene, is a crazed conspiracy theorist and ultra-right-wing survivalist who homeschools his children as he believes that if they attend public schools, they'll be brainwashed by the...
Educated
What happens to Gene in the mountain?
Gene is Tara's father; when she is in college, he suffers from a bad accident while working in the mountain. Due to Gene's constant recklessness and carelessness, he starts a fire while in the...
Educated
In the book Educated, the Westover Family deals with a number of accidents, which include two separate car accidents,...
In both cases, the lines blur between accident and neglect primarily because of the parents' response. After the car accident, Tara's father refuses to take her mother to the hospital. Professional...
Educated
How do vulnerability and isolation affect a person’s life, according to Educated?
As is so poignantly demonstrated in Westover’s memoir, vulnerability and isolation can cause unhealthy relationships and force people to face remarkable demons in the pursuit of happiness and...
Educated
Westover's family suffers several accidents. Explain some of those accidents; describe how and why they happened.
Educated is a memoir by Tara Westover. It was first published in 2018 and describes the life of Tara Westover and her family. Tara grows up in a very religious Mormon family in rural Idaho but...
Educated
Explain the significance of the episode in chapter 5 of Educated, where "grandma over-in-town" introduces Tara to the...
The hand-washing episode illustrates a few important things about Tara and her father, Gene. For Tara, it demonstrates just how isolated she is from the outside world. The issue isn't just that she...
Educated
What did Aunt Debbie do?
Aunt Debbie, the sister of Tara's mother Faye, plays an important part in supporting her nieces and nephews. This is despite the fact that Faye has pretty much been ignoring her ever since she...
Educated
In Educated, Tara talks about how a person’s actions and inactions add up to shape the course of their lives, but her...
On any given day, a person will be involved in countless situations over which they have no control. These include natural phenomena or “acts of God,” such as hurricanes or tornados, as well as...
Educated
In her author's note, Westover cautions that this memoir is not about Mormonism or "any form of religious belief" and...
Certain doctrines and faiths have developed codes of conduct for their followers. These codes or rules often set believers away from nonbelievers and help members adhere to a common set of norms....
Educated
What are some quotes involving critical thinking in Educated?
I began to experience the most powerful advantage of money: the ability to think of things besides money. Now that Tara has a good job and a place of her own, she can think of other things...
Educated
What did homeschooling look like in Tara Westover's household in Educated?
Homeschooling in the Westover household is based on religion. To be more precise, it's based on the variant of Mormon fundamentalism practiced by her parents. Above all, this means that Tara and...
Educated
While Tara's relationship with her parents deteriorates gradually, the point of no return comes when she confronts...
For Tara's parents, it's easier to live in ignorance and to pretend that their son isn't abusive. For Tara, however, the fear of someone else being hurt—or forcing her sister to stand alone when...
Educated
Identify some of the important turning points in Educated where Tara Westover receives crucial help of any kind.
In Educated, Tara Westover relates her journey from childhood in a dysfunctional isolationist family, with a domineering father who saw education as the work of Satan, to studying for a PhD at...
Educated
How would one analyze the following passage from Educated by Tara Westover? Dad was waiting for me when I came...
This passage occurs in Chapter 19, as Tara returns home for the summer after her liberating year at Brigham Young University. Tara wants to earn money working where she has been hired, at a local...
Educated
Educated tries to answer two questions: What is an education, and what is its value? How does Westover answer this...
Tara Westover shows the reader that self-actualization and identity development are both distinguished from and tightly intertwined with formal education. In her view, both are equally necessary;...
Educated
How did pep talk and good advice help Tara Westover in her journey in Educated?
Tara Westover, the author of Educated, not only received no moral or financial support from her parents in pursuing her education but was actively discouraged and sabotaged by them, particularly...
Educated
What is a summary of Educated: A Memoir?
Educated is a memoir written by Tara Westover. It is a true story of finding one's identity and purpose, even though this journey can sometimes include loss. In the memoir, Westover describes her...
Educated
What are the themes of Educated: A Memoir?
One of the themes of this remarkable book is the way we often retreat into fantasy and delusion to mitigate the harshness of the real world. Tara's father is completely at odds with that world. His...
Educated
Who are the central characters in Educated: A Memoir?
As Westover's story is a memoir, the characters are real people from her life. The predominant characters are members of her large, fundamentalist Mormon family, of which she is one of seven...
Educated
"I scanned down to the composite score. Twenty-eight. I checked it again. I checked my name. There was no mistake....
Part of Tara Westover's memoir Educated is concerned with her efforts to gain admission to a college or university. In the quoted passage from chapter 16, Tara is relaying the information that she...
Educated
At Cambridge, Westover receives indisputable confirmation that she is a talented writer. Why does she find this so...
An underlying theme of Educated deals with how experiences outside of family life have a transformative effect on Westover. Throughout the novel, Westover struggles to define her own ambition and...
Educated
Given the most impactful experiences described in her memoir, what does Tara think it means to be educated?
Tara Westover's memoir complicates our idea of what it means to be educated. As a young girl, she was "homeschooled," but she reveals that her parents really did not insist upon learning from...