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Displacement, Home, and Belonging
Themes and Colors
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Boy at the Back of the Class, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
When Alexa, the novel’s protagonist and narrator, meets her mysterious new classmate named Ahmet, she’s immediately curious about him. She’s eager to get to know him and learn what it means that Ahmet is a “refugee kid.” She asks her mother about refugees and Syria, Ahmet’s home country, so she can understand Ahmet better. Alexa also drafts a list of questions she wants to ask Ahmet, including “What sports do you like best?” and “Do you like it here or do you miss your old house more?” She hopes she can become friends with Ahmet by learning more about him. Importantly, Alexa doesn’t make assumptions about Ahmet or judge him before she knows him. Instead, she approaches him with an earnest, innocent desire to learn new things. Alexa’s open-mindedness leads her to accept Ahmet as he is and embrace her new friendship with him.
In contrast to Alexa, many other people—mostly adults—exhibit prejudice against Ahmet because he’s a Syrian refugee. In other words, they have pre-existing biases about refugees, so they presume negative things about Ahmet specifically and refugees in general. For instance, one of Alexa’s friends, Josie, says her dad warned her that Ahmet might be “dangerous,” simply because he’s a refugee from Syria. That is, instead of getting to know Ahmet as a person, some people reject him straightaway based on harmful stereotypes. However, it’s clear throughout the novel that these prejudices against Ahmet and other refugees are hurtful and inaccurate—Ahmet is an innocent kid just like any of his classmates, not a “criminal.” Through Alexa’s easy acceptance of Ahmet, The Boy at the Back of the Class shows how being open-minded, asking questions, and trying to make connections with people who are different ultimately helps everyone. Being curious helps dispel prejudice and harmful preconceived notions, creating a more welcoming environment for everyone.
Related Themes from Other Texts
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Curiosity, Open-Mindedness, and Acceptance ThemeTracker
The ThemeTracker below shows where, and to what degree, the theme of Curiosity, Open-Mindedness, and Acceptance appears in each chapter of The Boy at the Back of the Class. Click or tap on any chapter to read its Summary & Analysis.
How often theme appears:
chapter length:
Chapter
Chapter 1
1
Chapter 2
2
Chapter 3
3
Chapter 4
4
Chapter 5
5
Chapter 6
6
Chapter 7
7
Chapter 8
8
Chapter 9
9
Chapter 10
10
Chapter 11
11
Chapter 12
12
Chapter 13
13
Chapter 14
14
Chapter 15
15
Chapter 16
16
Chapter 17
17
Chapter 18
18
Chapter 19
19
Chapter 20
20
Chapter 21
21
Chapter 22
22
Chapter 23
23
Chapter 24
24
Chapter 25
25
Chapter 26
26
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Curiosity, Open-Mindedness, and Acceptance Quotes in The Boy at the Back of the Class
Below you will find the important quotes in The Boy at the Back of the Class related to the theme of Curiosity, Open-Mindedness, and Acceptance.
Chapter 1 Quotes
I made a secret promise to myself right then and there that I would be friends with the new boy […] And I would ask Josie and Tom and Michael if they would be his friends too.
After all, having four new friends would be much better than having none. Especially for a boy who looked as scared and as sad as the one now sitting at the back of our class.
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Chapter 2 Quotes
“Maybe he’s deaf?” someone whispered.
“Maybe he can’t speak English?” muttered someone else.
“There’s definitely something wrong with him!” whispered everyone.
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Chapter 4 Quotes
“Hmph!” said Mrs. Grimsby. “Trouble, the whole lot of ’em! Wouldn’t trust one as far as I could throw ’em. Just you wait and see—it’s our kids who will suffer, just because these ones are coming over to do whatever they like…”
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Chapter 5 Quotes
It’s one of the things I love most about Mum. She always tries to answer my questions no matter how tired she is or how hard my questions are […] And Dad used to say that the more questions you ask, the smarter you’ll be.
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Chapter 6 Quotes
“But my dad said Refugee Kids are dangerous and that they lie and steal things,” said Josie, looking confused. “He told me to stay away from the new boy and not to talk to him, because he was probably a criminal!”
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Chapter 21 Quotes
[I wondered] how anyone could hate someone who was running away from bullies and bombs. Mr. Greggs had clearly never met someone like Ahmet before, because if he had, he could never have been so horrible about anyone who had to become a refugee.
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Chapter 24 Quotes
Maybe it didn’t matter if really horrible people like Mr. Fry or Mr. Greggs didn’t like Ahmet. Maybe they didn’t even deserve to know him. But people like Josie’s mum and dad did, because they weren’t horrible at all. They had just been nervous about making a new friend.
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Chapter 25 Quotes
Wherever we went, Tom and Michael and Josie and Ahmet and I were waved at and smiled at and patted on the head and given thumbs-up by lots of people we didn’t know. People at the bus stop and on the street would run up to us and say things like “God bless you!” and “We’re all behind you, Ahmet!” and “I just signed the petition! Parliament’s gonna listen to us! You’ll see!”
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