Native Son Theme Analysis Essay Example for Free

Native Son Theme Analysis Essay In his novel, Native Son, Richard Wright reveals his major theme of the Black population in America in the 1930’s. In the opening scene of the novel, Wright introduces his condemning message towards the ugliness of American racism and the social oppression of Blacks in his time. The opening scene of Native Son functions by foreshadowing future events that occur throughout the novel involving major symbols that are introduced in the scene to represent other elements in the novel. The scene also establishes an atmosphere of hopelessness and despair as it presents the Thomas apartment setting and its contrasting image of the Dalton mansion. The function of the scene is established by three major elements which is the alarm clock, the rat-catching, and the apartment setting. The first element that is introduced is the ambiguous alarm clock. The alarm clock that awakens Bigger Thomas and his family at the opening of the novel is a major symbol that Wright uses to attack American racism. The loud ring the alarm clock gives off serves as a wake-up call Wright wants his audience to hear. Wright uses the alarm to represent his assertive message to the American public of the destructive effects of racism and oppression American society has accepted. His call for change is like a prophetic warning such as Elisha gives, in Biblical context, demanding the need for social change before it is too late for the nation of ancient Israel. Similar to Elisha’s warning, Wright predicts revolutionary violence and social upheaval if racism and oppression is not stopped in American society. Another function of the alarm clock is its foreshadowing of Bigger’s symbolic awakening in the course of the novel. The clock in the opening scene represents Bigger as a powder keg, both of which are waiting to go off at any moment. Bigger’s climactic point of his explosive act of killing Mary serves the same function as the alarm given off from the clock whereas both wake and opens the eyes of those who hear it or see it. The alarm clock symbolizes Bigger’s new realization that he should not feel guilty for the killing of Mary because of the living conditions White society forced him to live into, which made him into what he is. Another important element in the opening scene that Wright uses to attack racism and oppression is the rat-catching. In the commencement of the novel, Bigger discovers a huge black rat and his mother and sister jump in hysteria. Bigger then corners the rat, and as the rat attacks back, he strikes it with a skillet; then smashes it superfluously until it became a bloody pulp and showed it to Vera. The rat-catching scene is significant because it foreshadows Bigger being tracked down and caught in the course of the novel. In the scene, Wright portrays the black rat as Bigger Thomas. Wright makes them resemble like each other because of their color and their unwanted presence. Like rats, the Black population are viewed as vermin and unwanted pests by White society. With this perspective, the public oppresses and controls the Black population to prevent them from getting near towards Whites in American society. Both Vera and Mother Thomas’ hysteria towards the rat resembles White society’s hysteria toward Bigger’s murder and assumed rape of a White woman. Vera and Mother Thomas’ reaction towards the huge black rat is that of disgust and fear of what it may do. In comparison, when the public found the truth behind the killing of Mary, they panicked and feared of what a Black murderer and rapist is capable of doing. Wright uses this episode to reveal the intense hate the racist American society has towards the Black population. He also uses it to call attention to the excessive paranoia the public exhibits which is a link to the intensity and depth of American racism. Another foreshadowing in the novel would be the representation of Bigger’s capture through Bigger’s cornering of the rat. In the beginning of the novel, Bigger blocks the exit of the rat such as how the police block the exit on Bigger later on in the novel. The foreshadowing extends also at how the rat attacks viciously at Bigger’s pant leg such as how Bigger shoots back at his capturers to prevent being caught. These aggressive scenes between survival and fear points out the result and effects of American society’s strong racist views as Wright describes the capturers drive to capture what seems dangerous and fearsome to them. The last and final foreshadowing in the opening scene would be Bigger’s superfluous bashing of the rat and his act of showing the bloody rat to Vera. The scene is used to portray Bigger’s excessive beating at the time of capture and Buckley’s exhibition of Bigger’s capture and death. The excessive beating of both the rat and Bigger relate the abuser’s need for their thirst witnessing pain being inflicted upon their subject. They are also similar because their unnecessary abuse is a signal of the intense hate the abuser had towards them. Also, the exhibition of Bigger by Buckley presents the similar racist connotations as the beating does. In the novel, Buckley holds Bigger as a political advantage, stressing a racist message to Blacks to show them what happens to the unwanted Blacks when they break the law in Richard Wright’s time which consists of strict and racist laws. One last important element of the opening scene is the setting of the dilapidated Thomas apartment. One function of this apartment setting is to set the atmosphere for the novel as a whole. The run-down and squalid apartment gives a sense of hopelessness and despair. The gloomy aspect of the setting describes the victimization of the Thomas family done by the society in which they are living in. Another function of the apartment setting is that it is a microcosm for how Blacks live throughout the city of Chicago. The apartment is a small, congested room fixed with a kitchen and no walls to separate the men from the women. The inappropriateness of their apartment is exemplified when both Buddy and Bigger have to turn their heads away while Mother Thomas and Vera dress. These unacceptable living conditions are created by an oppressive society and creates an unstable Black society which produces people such as Bigger who turn out to be exactly what White society believes they are like. The apartment setting is also part of a geographical contrast with the Dalton mansion. The apartment shows the unfair distribution of wealth as the Dalton mansion exhibits aristocratic characteristics with its multiple rooms and white columned porch; while the Thomas apartment has a mere single room, which occupies an entire family, and consists of a rat infestation. The contrast helps enforce the sense of the inequality and injustice while it also presents a divided Black and White society made possible by a racist country. Altogether, the opening scene functions to attack American society and its oppressive standpoint towards Blacks in Richard Wrights time. Wright establishes the scene’s function by using these three major elements: the alarm clock, the rat-catching, and the apartment setting. Richard Wright central theme of change is produced by the opening scene to correspond with the rest of the novel as it stresses the warning of a possible revolution and social upheaval if conditions do not change in American society.

The Power of Heart of Darkness and A Passage to India Essays -- Compar

The Power of Heart of Darkness and A Passage to India      Ã‚  Ã‚   John A. McClure writes in Kipling and Conrad that "as the twentieth century opened, the artists and intellectuals of the age increasingly came to believe that imperial rule, if inevitable in the short run, was an inglorious enterprise that deformed both those who ruled and those who submitted" (153). Joseph Conrad and E. M. Forster were among these artists and each expressed their misgivings about the "inglorious enterprise" and its "deforming" effects in Heart of Darkness and A Passage to India respectively. I will attempt to analyze some of these effects among a range of British characters in both novels in terms of the connections between ideologically motivated cultural assumptions, personal attitudes and behavior, and psychological crisis.    Vladimir Lenin describes imperialism in his work Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism as the "product of highly developed industrial capitalism. It consists in the striving of every industrial capitalist nation to bring under its control or to annex larger and larger areas of...territory, irrespective of what nations inhabit those regions" (155). When the industrial nation allows its citizens to settle in the conquered territory the area is then a colony and the settlers are colonizers whereas the people native to the area are the colonized. The fundamental motive of imperialism and colonialism is economic: profits are large because investment in the conquered area is nil and native labor is cheap, and this situation is maintained by depriving the colonized peoples of political and economic rights. However, as James Kavanagh points out in his essay "Ideology," such a "social situation e... ...ish Empire, everone is affected, everyone is guilty and no one can afford the luxury of an unexamined life.       Bibliography Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. New York: Signet Classic, 1983. Forster, E. M. A Passage to India. New York: Harcourt, Brace, & World, Inc., 1952. Kavanagh, James T. "Ideology." Critical Terms for Literary Study. Eds. Frank Lentricchia and Thomas McLaughlin. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990. Kiernan, V. G. The Lords of Human Kind. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1969. McClure, John A. Kipling and Conrad. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Meltzer, Francoise. "Unconscious." Critical Terms for Literary Study. Eds. Frank Lentricchia and Thomas McLaughlin. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990. Memmi, Albert. The Colonizer and the Colonized. New York: The Orion Press, Inc., 1965.   

The Importance of Media

Media has become almost as necessary as food and clothing in the twenty-first century. The meritorious role that a media plays in regenerating the society is undeniable. Various media are prevailing. Media has the duty to inform, educate and entertain human being. News channels and some newspapers are mouthpieces of some social issues, which help us to estimate the realities of lives. They also put their lives in danger during natural disasters and wars just to apprise people of the situation. Information and awareness are spread in the society partly because of the media.The media has shaped and completed people’s lives in this century. Media’s primary task is to inform people, which is related to the form of the government. For example, in a democratic society, one should be aware of the circumstance that is going on around the world. A modern society cannot work without the media, which acts as an agent between public and state. Information as a main task of media so unds basic; however, it is not as simple as it sounds. Information is always balancing between subjectivity and objectivity. On the one hand, media has to warn about all events and keep information neutral.On the other hand, media should also be a podium for groups and organizations that are not predominant. Lastly, media should regulate and criticize not only political parties but also society. Concerning these functions, a variety of media is essential for the correspondence of the world. The role of media in education is evident today by the numbers of computer labs, television sets and libraries that have become part of curriculum in schools. Media comes in different forms and each affects the way students interpret and learn information.Media has brought globalization; as a result, students from different universities and countries are associated through manageable internet connection. As technology become less expensive over the last couple of decades, media has found its way into homes and businesses throughout the world for means such as gathering information, communication, distance learning, etc. Most students do not know what life was like without media because schools are preparing students for efficacious participation in a technological society. Entertainment has a forceful influence on people.This influence of the entertainment industry has grown excessively over the past decades due to the advancement of technology. Entertainment is mostly available through the media which includes: the television, magazines, newspaper, radio, and internet. The influence of entertainment on young generation affects the way they behave, dress, and talk because the current generation depends on entertainment as a form of communication and information. People, therefore, turn to entertainment for daily activities. The media are the place where most people get the latest facts and news on remarkable concerns.The entertainment industry has affected the upcoming gene ration views and expression of culture. Mass media have tremendous effects on our daily life, whether one wants it or not. The media affects people’s perspective not only through television, but also through newspaper and magazines. Consequently, information about the world and the current century come to mind from diverse destiny of media. They can even be turned to benefit by provoking the understanding and articulation of what one believes. Media is among the wonders of the twenty-first century as it interprets coordinated reports repeatedly to millions of audiences.

Essay about Women in Buddhism - 1100 Words

Women in Buddhism The role of women in religion, especially Eastern religions, is a strange one. Western religions are fairly straightforward about a womens place. For example, most Western religions (excluding the Roman Catholic Church) allow women in leadership roles within the religious community. Judaism allows women rabbis, most Christian religions allow women ministers, and even Islam, which does not allow women mullah, have had many influential female sufis throughout Islamic history. Women have had similar roles in Eastern religion. However, the big difference in Eastern religion is in the philosophical or scriptural attitude towards women versus the actual, everyday role of women.†¦show more content†¦Hinduism is so entwined in Indian culture, as I have shown, that most other cultures have a difficult time assimilating Hinduism into their own society. Even when Hinduism is assimilated into a culture, such as Hindu movements in the United States, women are sure to find discrimination in not only the traditional gurus and swamis who are teaching them, but sexist commentaries deeply ingrained in religious texts. Buddhism suffers from the opposite extreme. The Buddha originally banned women from monastic practice but later reversed his decision, allowing them to practice in separate quarters. Buddhist scriptures say very little about women, treating them as equals. In one scripture, the Visuddhi Magga, a monk asked: Reverend Sir, have you seen a woman pass this way? And the elder said: Was it a woman, or a man That passed this way? I cannot tell. But this I know, a set of bones Is travelling upon this road. (Visuddhi Magga, Ch1. FROM: Coomaraswamy.) Although this verse attempts to show the equality of women on the spiritual path, there was, and is, still sexual stereotypes similar to that found in the Bhagavad Gita. 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