Racism Still Exists
Saturday, August 31, 2013
Unprepared
Jerald Walker is a credible author who has been published many times, won awards, been a professor, and co-founded a literary journal called The Bridge. Walker is an African American who grew up in Chicago and was once robbed. He believes deeply in equality. In Unprepared, Walker tries to show everyone, especially whites, that both black and whites commit horrendous crimes and that they are all equal. His purpose is accomplished by using in media res, satire, logos, and analogies. In the story, Walker ends up getting offered a ride to work by a stranger after he forgets his umbrella earlier in the morning. It was revealed through a flashback that Walker had been robbed before so was wary of accepting the ride, but he did. The stranger made Walker uncomfortable by showing his attraction toward him, but Walker felt that his body was safe. At the same time in Atlanta, there had been a series of murders that spanned two years, from 1979-1981, in which Walker watched the trial. The trial angered the black community, including Walker, because the convicted was black. Walker wrote, “Sure, we had some rotten apples amount us, your garden variety of thugs, burglars, prostitutes, gangbangers, and dope dealers. We even had middle-age men in cars who’d solicit sex from teenaged boys, but the torturing and execution of people for sport or at the behest of inner voices, that pathological shit, was the strict domain of white folks” (215-216). Walker satirizes both blacks and whites to prove that whites are just as bad as blacks. He even gives examples of white murderers who were clearly psychotic. After hearing of a murder case involving a crazy black man, Walker wrote, “This was just a man-as vile and deranged as any white counterpart who had preceded him or who would follow. And he, like Wayne Williams, and like Gein, Bundy, Mugett, and the others, belonged to us all” (217). He uses logic to prove that both races are equal and that blacks are not the stereotype they are painted after he gets out of the car safely.
Rude am I in My Speech
Besides being an English professor at Yale University, Caryl Phillips is a credible author because he has written numerous essays, novels, and screenplays and has won many awards. Phillips’ family are immigrants, and being a second-generation immigrant, Phillips has managed to assimilate himself into the English culture much better than his father. In Rude am I in My Speech, Phillips describes a personal narrative of when he met his father for lunch after not having seen him for a few years. This lunch has caused Phillips to evaluate the lives of first-generation migrants and how they differentiate from those of the second generation. As a result, his purpose has become to encourage people of the second generation to record information about the lives of the first generation. That way, heritages will not be lost and there will be a better understanding of past struggles as well as better communication between the generations. He accomplishes his purpose mainly by using Othello from Shakespeare’s Othello in an analogy with first-generation migrants to logically explain how important it is for people to conform to their societies. Othello was an outsider who believed that he was above the rules and ways of the culture around him. Since he got away with things that others of the society could not, such as having a secret marriage, he thought he was accepted into society. Therefore, he did not realize until it was too late that he was not assimilated. Phillips’ father however, did try to fit into society. Phillips’ wrote, “My father is no Othello. He may have polished up a few words and phrases here and there, and done a little studying of the dictionary, but to this day he remains admirably rude in speech” (144). While trying to fit into society, Phillips’ father tried to also keep a sense of identity by going to clubs and behaving like himself at home. As a second-generation migrant, Phillips’ did not understand his father’s ways and would get frustrated. However, he later understood that he could incorporate more of his father’s views into his own mindset.
Othello and First-Generation Immigrants are Black Sheep
What Really Happened
Madge McKeithen is a credible author due to being a teacher turned writer who has been published in many different literary outlets. In What Really Happened, McKeithen tries to teach readers how to get the closure and acceptance that they need in order to move on with their lives after tragedy has struck. She accomplishes this by writing in the mindset of a woman who is in great emotional turmoil. Twelve years previously, a woman was murdered by her husband, and her kids were sent to live with the wife’s mother. The husband was sent to jail for life and without parole. Twelve years later, a friend of the woman has not gotten over what has happened and does not comprehend why such a situation had to occur. Therefore, she goes to visit her friend’s murderer in jail in order to get closure for both herself and for her friend. McKeithen wrote, “Hear You are there for her . . . to see, ask, hear . . . because she isn’t” (139). The in media res approach allows the readers to guess the circumstances as to why the protagonist is visiting a prison and emphasize with her pain as the details, as well as her nostalgia, come into focus. The woman is so lost and confused that she calls other friends who knew the deceased one in order to recall memories, looks at old pictures, learns about her friend’s kids, and even calls the mother of her dead friend. After visiting the husband in jail, the woman does not get her catharsis. Even though she gets the husband answers her questions, she still does not have a full understanding of why it had to happen because his logic does not make sense to her. However, she finally gets her closure after meeting one of the sons of her friend at a wedding and hearing from him how he has lived a happy life. It is there that she hears from her deceased friend to“love life” (140). Finally, she gets her closure and is able to move on.
Another Man Who Killed His Wife Without Remorse
Pearl, Upwards
Patricia Smith, a credible writer who is a renowned poet and who has been nominated for many awards, teaches the main character of Pearl, Upward, Annie, that she should not have taken her old life for granted, that she cannot always run away when she does not like the view of her life, and that she must face the consequences of her choices. Annie Pearl Connor, mother of the storyteller, was a Delta girl from Alabama who was always “running wide, running on purpose, running toward something” (Smith 183) when she was a child. She had a nice life in Alabama but it was not enough; she wanted to live the American dream in Chicago, the foil of Alabama. While residing in Chicago, Annie loses the tenacious young girl she once was and becomes a scorned woman filled with regret. Instead of living the dream, she lives a nightmare. Smith wrote, “She crafts a life that is dimmer than she’d hoped, in a tenement flat with walls pressing hard and fat roaches, sluggish with Raid, dropping into her food, writing on the mattress of her Murphy bed” (181). Chicago’s rejection of Annie causes the reader to both pity and be a little happy that she is getting her just desserts because of the irony of the situation. To “claim her place in the north” (Smith 183), Annie tries to find love and have a baby. She was “driven by that American dream of birthing a colorless colored child with no memories whatsoever of the Delta” (Smith 183) in order to prove to herself that she made the right decision to leave Alabama behind. However, as her lover offers her no promise of a future or support for her child, Annie is left alone in Chicago with a new responsibility that she cannot run away from. It is then that Annie learns the intended lesson of the author and fulfills the bildungsroman purpose. Smith’s target audience, people who run away from their problems and/or those who have left their past behind them but are regretting their actions, have learned their lesson(s) as well.
The Equivalent of Annie's Dreams
Monday, August 26, 2013
A Personal Essay by a Personal Essay
Founded by Dave Eggers, McSweeney’s publishes a website entitled McSweeney’s Internet Tendency where authors submit pieces of humorous literature; one of whom is Christy Vannoy. On this site, she has published 18 articles, including A Personal Essay by a Personal Essay. In the essay, Vannoy is an applicant to get her life story inside of a national magazine where the winner is the person with the saddest life. As she listens to the other contestants trying to sell themselves to the judges, she reflects back on her own life and adds insight to her adversaries’ lives while trying to prove that life is not as bad as it seems. For example, Vannoy wrote, “It wasn’t as if they’d landed in state care, like I had, and been delivered straight into the wandering hands of recently paroled foster parents. Being gay is about as tragic as a stray cuticle, and I wasn’t born a Jehovah’s Witness yesterday” (210-211). It is shown that Vannoy uses ethos and logos perfectly; she makes the reader believe her logic by portraying herself to be more knowledgeable about how hard life can be in comparison to the others. Her satirization of the other contestants helps convey and accomplish her didactic purpose by making said purpose easy to interpret and repeatedly shown. Vannoy essentially reinforces the age old adage of making lemonade when given lemons. She does so by writing, “But the thing about life is that you simply cannot settle for melancholy, even when it’s true. You are not a tragedy, you are a personal essay. You must rise above and you must do it in the last paragraph with basic grammar and easily recognized words” (212). She is saying that people must fight to overcome the difficult times in their lives in order to live happier ones. Her point can be interpreted through examples, proving that Vannoy has accomplished her purpose. As a result of Vannoy writing about overcoming adversity and comparing problems, the essay is mainly intended for those who are depressed about their lives and the problems they face.
Lemons Into Lemonade
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