Abstract:
This thesis focuses on simply going beyond a text and instead analyzing and researching
the cultural and historical prevalence occurring during the text’s timeline. This process examines
how a text moves around time and space and correlates how this movement is illustrated by
geographical locations, cultural practices, and the specific time period. It pushes the idea of
movement beyond the text itself. Through this research, two memoirs will not only be measured
through the historical critic lens but the geographical lens as well. The Glass Castle written by
Jeannette Walls, detailing events in the 1960s and 1970s, provides insight on the unconventional
upbringing of Jeannette and her three siblings under the hands of their dysfunctional parents. The
timeline, geography, and history will be examined throughout the memoir. Along with The Glass
Castle, Tara Westover’s memoir Educated, detailing events taking place in the 1990s and early
2000s, will be examined in the same aforementioned context. These two memoirs in correlation
with their timeline, historical prevalence, and geographical locations will offer in-depth and new
insight into these women, their families, and the memoirs themselves.
