The Awakening Symbolism Essay - 1756 Words

Kate Chopin uses powerful and significant symbolism in The Awakening to depict the feminist ideas involving women s longing for sexual and personal emancipation through the development of the main character, Edna Pontellier, as she recognizes the extent of her passion and ultimately the disappointment after the realization of her inevitable limitations in life. Symbolism is used to tell the story of Edna s journey toward self-discovery and the pursuit of her desires and freedom while defying Victorian society s expectations and her limited domestic female role of wife and mother. Some of these symbols include art, music, and houses. These images are also used to portray the different women of the Victorian era. Birds and water appear to†¦show more content†¦These personal struggles are emphasized with Chopin s use of symbolism and imagery. Chopin uses third person point of view, omniscient narrator to report the feelings and actions of Edna Pontellier. The narrator is anonymous but many critics believe that the narrator seems to align with Chopin s own convictions especially since Chopin began to write in the years in which she was trying to come to terms with her individuality, making her acquaintance with the wholly convincing self that was no longer defined by her husband (Boren, 160). Chopin clearly demonstrates her own support of the character rebelling against the conventions of Victorian society. Although the narrator is mainly objective, it also appears at times that the narrator has sympathy for Edna and support for her female struggle. This is especially evident in chapter six of the narrative, when Chopin is describing the beginning of things that represent Edna s first steps toward self-discovery by stating that a certain light was beginning to dawn dimly within her, --the light which, showing the way, fo rbids it (Perkins, 550). Chopin continues by stating that, In short, Mrs. Pontellier was beginning to realize her position in the universe as a human being, and toShow MoreRelated Symbolism in Kate Chopins The Awakening Essay1467 Words   |  6 PagesSymbolism in Kate Chopins The Awakening Chopins The Awakening is full of symbolism.   Rather than hit the reader on the head with blunt literalism, Chopin uses symbols to relay subtle ideas.   Within each narrative segment, Chopin provides a symbol that the reader must fully understand in order to appreciate the novel as a whole.   I will attempt to dissect some of the major symbols and give possible explanations as to their importance within the text.   Art itself is a symbol of both freedomRead MoreEssay on symbolaw Use of Symbols and Symbolism in The Awakening1292 Words   |  6 PagesUse of Symbolism in Chopins The Awakening The Awakening is a novel full of symbolism; within each narrative segment there is often a central and powerful symbol that serves to add meaning to the text and to underline some subtle point Chopin is making. Understanding the meaning of these symbols is vital to a full appreciation of the story. This essay lists some of the major symbols with explanations of their importance. Art becomes a symbol of both freedom and failure. It is through theRead MoreEssay on Use of Symbolism in Chopin’s The Awakening740 Words   |  3 PagesUse of Symbolism in Chopin’s The Awakening --Passage from Chapter X, pgs. 49-50 â€Å"But that night she was like the little tottering, stumbling, clutching child, who all of a sudden realizes its powers, and walks for the first time alone, boldly and with over-confidence. She could have shouted for joy. She did shout for joy, as with a sweeping stroke or two she lifted her body to the surface of the water. A feeling of exultation overtook her, as if some power of significant import had been givenRead MoreReconciling Edna s Suicide And The Criticism Surrounding861 Words   |  4 PagesReconciling Edna’s Suicide and the Criticism Surrounding† by Mary Bird. The first essay I read was titled â€Å"Reconciling Edna’s Suicide and the Criticism Surrounding† by Mary Bird. In this essay she reveals two point of views about Edna’s death. Bird presents two thesis statements. The first thesis is â€Å"†¦awakening is one of mental clarity, and her suicide is a triumphant act. By committing suicide Edna is finally freeing herself from social constraints and possession.† The second thesis is â€Å"Edna’s awakingRead More Jonathan Edwards the Great Preacher Essay1604 Words   |  7 Pagesthe era, he spearheaded the Great Awakening. â€Å"This was a time when the intense fervor of the first Puritans had subsided somewhat† (Heyrmen 1) due to a resurgence of religious zeal (Stein 1) in colonists through faith rather than predestination. Jonathan Edwards however sought to arouse the religious intensity of the colonists (Edwards 1) through his preaching. But how and why was Edwards so successful? What inf luenced him? How did he use diction and symbolism to persuade his listener, and whatRead More The Importance of the Sea in The Awakening Essay830 Words   |  4 Pagesof the Sea in The Awakening      Ã‚   Throughout her novel, The Awakening, Kate Chopin uses symbolism and imagery to portray the main characters emergence into a state of spiritual awareness. The image that appears the most throughout the novel is that of the sea. â€Å"Chopin uses the sea to symbolize freedom, freedom from others and freedom to be ones self† (Martin 58). The protagonist, Edna Pontellier, wants that freedom, and with images of the sea, Chopin shows Ednas awakening desire to be freeRead MoreThe Awakening By Kate Chopin1563 Words   |  7 Pages The Awakening by Kate Chopin The title of Kate Chopin’s novella is significant and full of enriched symbols that reflect Edna’s Awakening. Edna is waking up her understanding of herself as an individual. Not as a mother nor a wife, but who she is as a woman and a sexual being. Throughout the novel, there are a few distinct types of awakenings; from her awakening to herself as an artist, realizing that she can have her own opinion over what kind of music she liked, and the most important, Edna realizedRead MoreThe Awakening, by Kate Chopin1222 Words   |  5 PagesThe Awakening is a story based around a woman, Edna Pontieller, during the nineteenth century that has decided that she is not like all the additional women in her life because she questions her life ambitions and dreams and realizes that she does not fit into the usual role of a wife and mother. The Awakening begins on Grand Isle, an island off the coast of Louisiana and then to the state of Louisiana and then the story ends on Grand Is le. This story focuses on metaphors, symbolism, differenceRead More Comparing the Symbology and Imagery in T. S. Eliot’s Poetry Essay1481 Words   |  6 Pages In the poems â€Å"The Love Song by J. Alfred Prufrock,† written in 1910, published in 1915, and â€Å"Rhapsody on a Windy Night,† written in 1917, both of which were written by poet and literary-critic T. S. Eliot, the symbolism and imagery of the women represented in mythological means, the locations and landscapes that both protagonists wander through or plan on going to, and the nature that is used in both poems are very similar, yet uniquely different. â€Å"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock† is aboutRead MoreEveryday Use by Alice Walker: A Look at Symbolism and Family Values879 Words   |  4 Pageshappen to anyone. Walker uses the symbolic two quilts to represent the true respects to sentimental value and preservation of family heritage. Nancy Tuten was quoted saying, â€Å"Commen taries on Alice Walkers Everyday Use typically center on Mamas awakening to one daughters superficiality and to the others deep-seated understanding of heritage†(Tuten). Because, the quilts had been made by the grandmother’s hands, the work that went into the quilts is the reason for importance of saving or preserving

Analysis Of Shane Koyczan And Many Artists - 1160 Words

â€Å"To this day† is a spoken word poem and video illustration by Shane Koyczan and many artists. It was created in 2013 with the purpose of effectively spreading the convincing message that bullying is a real and serious thing that is too often dismissed as normal and not acted upon as the serious thing it is. 2013 was shortly after the new large push against bullying which is likely one large reason as to the creation and popularity of this work. However even with the anti-bullying movement it would not have become popular if it was not in itself an effective piece at conveying its own point against bullying and contributing to the cause. Koyczan made his piece so successful by successfully using ethos and pathos to make hard hitting grounded points to his purpose. He also used small amounts of logos but it was not a majorly effective part of his piece. Ethos is the way the writer creates a persona that allows the audience to see them as trustworthy, relatable, knowledgeabl e, and as someone with authority. Then uses these to convince an audience of their point. This is use of ethos effectively done in the creation of koyczan’s poem â€Å"to this day†. He shows his reliability and knowledge to the viewer by showing them that he has personal experience with the main topic. He tells the story of his pain when he was bullied and how simple name calling left lasting effects on him personally. This not only lets the viewer see that he has a reliable viewpoint, it shows that he has

Understanding Native American History Free Essays

American history is filled with glorious accomplishments that Americans love to point out when saying how great a country this is. Certainly, America is a great country, and as countries go, it has probably done enough now to forever remain as one of the great countries ever to exist on the planet. Perhaps it will someday go down in history beside Ancient Rome, Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece and other great civilizations of the past that have made their mark on human history, but along with its greatness, America has enough faults and shame to give pause for thought. We will write a custom essay sample on Understanding Native American History or any similar topic only for you Order Now In a country of immigrants, America has historically mistreated its immigrants, especially the Chinese, the Japanese and today the Chicanos. Despite their efforts to get away from religious persecution, the pilgrims were not so eager to avoid religiously persecuting others and forcing their religion upon everyone. Everyone is keenly aware of how America enslaved the blacks and then held them down as second class citizens or less after slavery was more or less begrudgingly abolished. Black Americans were not properly treated in American until the 1970s and even today blacks suffer from the vestiges of past slavery. Yet, with all of the two-sided treatment and mistreatment of so many cultures that have today merged within the amalgamated American culture, with all of the irony and tragedy of those mergers, perhaps none is any more tragic than that of the American Indian.   With all the Native Americans who lived in this country when Europeans arrived, today there are only an estimated 2.75 million remaining.   They are probably the only ethnic group whose numbers in America have fallen since the arrival of Europeans. While the number of Native Americans in the country when Europeans arrived is speculative, it is estimated that there were between 60 and 100 million Natives here when Europeans arrived and that by 1650, the Native population had already decreased by 90 percent due largely to the introduction of European diseases into the Native populations. (MacCleery, 2004) While Black Americans have more or less assimilated into American society despite the mistreatment they suffered, nothing could be further from the truth for Native Americans.   Blacks can be found in large numbers all over the country with few exceptions other than the northwest where there are still areas where people have never seen blacks or rarely do, yet one would be hard pressed to find a Native American in the US away from the reservation. When encountered, they would usually be mistaken for something other than a Native American and always, always they will be speaking a foreign language, usually English, Spanish or both. Forced to abandon their native language, many young Indians today cannot speak their native language and others won’t speak it expect to other Natives, and while blacks can occasionally be heard asking for â€Å"reparations† for the wrongs that were committed against them during slavery (those who were wronged are dead) such that their ancestors (those now alive) get to reap the benefits for the suffering of their ancestors, nobody is available to speak up for the Native American who still suffers today in ways that blacks and other ethnic groups do not. Certainly, blacks no longer have their native tongue, but it was not forced out of them in the same way and there was no effort to Americanize blacks.   To the contrary, blacks were maintained separate while the effort towards natives was more like the extermination of the Jews in Nazi Germany.   Whites on the Plains sometimes killed Indians just because they were Indian somewhat like the extermination of the aborigines in Tasmania who were actually, literally hunted down to extinction! Between 1803 and 1833 the Aboriginal population of Tasmania went from 5,000 to around 300 and by early in the 20th century they became virtually extinct, their original languages lost.   Native Americans were intentionally subjected to a similar fate and today their languages are also being lost, this despite the fact that the language of the Navajo code talkers took part in every assault the U.S. assault in the Pacific war against the Japanese from 1942 until 1945. The very languages which helped to save America were not allowed to be spoken among the Natives!   What right do blacks and others have for reparations for what their ancestors suffered when Native Americans are still living basically on reservations in the 21st Century and get virtually nothing? There is no doubt that the survival of the first Europeans to America was due in large part to the ability of the native peoples already here to survive and thrive in this country—in their own land. Even today, each year we celebrate Thanksgiving because we realize that the new visitors to this country owed their survival and existence to the knowledge and ingenuity of the native peoples who were already here. Yet, most Americans today fail to realize the true diversity of the native peoples who already existed here when Europeans arrived. It is estimated that humans lived in North America up to 12,000 years ago and perhaps as much as 40,000 years ago certainly calling into question Bible stories of Adam and Eve a mere 6,000 years in the past. When Europeans arrived, the Native Americans were a vast diversity of cultures, nations and religions that ranged from one coast to the other, people living together in harmony with their environment and with their fellow Native Americans at times, living very much out of harmony with their fellow Native Americans at others.   As was true in Europe, all was not always calm and peaceful co-existence between the various a sundry â€Å"races† and tribes of the Native countries. Native nations differed in terms of their religious beliefs, cultural habits, dietary habits, migratory habits, religions and more, sometimes bringing them at odds with one another, especially in terms of competition for food and perhaps at times for living space. The American mistreatment of the Native peoples they found here began even before the Revolutionary war.   The very natives who saved the lives of the first colonists and pilgrims were treated like second class citizens or not as citizens at all.   By the time of the Revolutionary War, Native Americans had already felt the encroachment of the white Europeans on native lands.   When over two-hundred Iroquois, Shawnees, Cherokees, Creeks and others visited St. Louis in 1784, they were already feeling displaced. One said, â€Å"The Americans, a great ambitious and numerous than the English, put us out of our lands, forming therein great settlements, extending themselves like a plague of locusts in the territories of the Ohio River which we inhibit.† (Galloway, p. 158)   In May 1830, the Indian Removal Act was passed in Congress. It authorized the president to negotiate treaties to remove all Indian tribes living east of the Mississippi. This led to surveyors, squatters and a campaign of harassment against Natives such as the Cherokee. While the Cherokee Nation brought a suit against the Act, Chief Justice John Marshall declared that the court had no jurisdiction over the case since Cherokees were not U.S. citizens or an independent nation. (Garrison, pp. 1-12)   This is certainly a sad state of affairs for the Native peoples of American, one for which there has never been a true champion and which has great significance for the way in which Native Americans still live today. Early in the 20th Century, Joseph Dixon wrote an aptly named book entitled The Vanishing Race that detailed many of the struggles and travails of the Native American. With all of the struggles and travails of the Native American, it was not until December 8, 1911 that President Taft signed a bill passed by Congress granting a United States Reservation and the erection of a National Indian Memorial (Dixon, p. xx). Dixon speaks of an â€Å"Expedition of Citizenship to all tribes of American Indians†, an effort to extend friendship to all Indians and to have them unite so as â€Å"to raise the same flag and sign the same pledge of loyalty and receive at the hands of his representative an American Flag†¦that they might call their own.† (Dixon, p. xxii), but while at the time, this might have been viewed as a sign of advancement by white America, it was no more than further evidence of the forced assimilation and continued mistreatment of the Native Americans who were being robbed of their land, their customs, their language, their religion and forced to assimilate into and assume the American culture strange to them and certainly not their own. For example, Calloway speaks of how the far ranging Comanche bands came together as a nation in the 1870s after they were confined to a reservation. (pp. 339-40)   These nomadic people became a â€Å"Nation† more or less because they were forced to do so. In the 1870s and continuing through the 20th Century, native Americans in defense of their homeland who had once suffered military attacks (and still did in the 1870s and beyond) from invading Europeans suffered a different king of attack, the efforts to Americanize the Natives, an effort to reform the native â€Å"savages† as they were called by forcing them into the European ways of life.   Indians were relocated, forced to wear European attire, to cut their hair and to speak the European languages. Christian missionaries played a large role in this effort as the missionaries simultaneously tried to convert the â€Å"savages† to Christianity and to Christ.   As reformer Helen Hunt Jackson put it in her 1881 book, A Century of Dishonor, those who believed that the United States should extend their blessings to the Natives could see that what was happening was just the opposite. Natives were being â€Å"(shot)†¦down in the snow.† (p. 335) It was a concerted effort to remake the Natives by transforming them into the image of white America and it was met with resistance by the natives. Natives, many of whom migrated with their food supply, the weather and the seasons, were forced to adapt to and adopt strange, European ways. While Europeans claimed a kinship to the land, that kinship was very different from that of many natives. The idea of owning land seemed strange to the natives, and being tied to a specific region to till the soil as farmers was not the native idea of kinship to the land. As Europeans pushed West in their quest for â€Å"Manifest Destiny,† they progressively displaced the natives by killing their food supplies, searching for yellow iron (gold), stealing the Natives’ horses and more. Chief Joseph said, â€Å"For a short time, we lived quietly. But this could not last†¦The white men told lies for each other. They drove off a great number of our cattle†¦ We had no friend who would plead our cause before the law councils.†   What Chief Joseph saw happening was common all across the new continent—new to Europeans.   After the Civil war, the efforts at Manifest Destiny continued and increased. â€Å"Winning the West† was a national goal that led European settlers to move into native lands in greatly increasing numbers. So, the native peoples were being robbed, displaced, involuntarily acculturated, tied to the land in ways that were very un-native, and more. While Europeans forced natives into one compromise after another, the growing sentiment among the invading Europeans was that Indians should be treated as wards of the government rather than as independent nations. (Galloway, p. 271) Today Indian tribes enjoy the unique political status as sovereign nations within the United States, a status they already enjoyed before the arrival of Europeans. They have managed to regain what they lost at the hands of the Europeans, but only after paying a terrible price and being nearly exterminated and what they have today is only a shadow of what they had in the past. Certainly, Americans are essentially oblivious to the plight of the Native Americans.   There has never been a successful spokesman for them, no eloquent Martin Luther King and Cesar Chavez for the American Natives.   Those who existed in the 19th century were quickly killed, imprisoned or ignored as were the few whites who stood up to champion the cause of the Natives, among them former President Herbert Hoover. Therefore, today, while many Americans are at least vaguely familiar with the plight, suffering, indignity suffered and torture of the African slave, few Americans know the true story of the Native Americans and their suffering, suffering that continues even to the present time.   We need a better understanding of what they have suffered in the past and what they continue to suffer even in the present, how they were dispossessed from their lands, moved elsewhere and basically ignored even to the present. Finding a reasonable way to compensate them will not be easy.   Indeed, compensation is probably impossible.   Who can compensate the Tasmanian peoples now that they have been exterminated?   Likewise, who can compensate the Native Americans not that they have been dispossessed and nearly wiped out?   Their story is one that is seldom told even today and is generally distorted when told.   Can we as Americans continue to live with this situation?   Perhaps we can, but should be?   I believe that the answer to that question is, â€Å"No!† References Dixon, Joseph Kossuth.   The Vanishing Race. The Last Great Indian Council.   Philadelphia, PA: National American Indian Memorial Association Press, 1925. Galloway, Colin.   First Peoples: A Documentary Survey of American Indian History. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s Press, 2004. Garrison, Tim Alan.   The Legal Ideology of Removal:   The Southern Judiciary and the Sovereignty of Native American Nations.   University of Georgia Press, Athens, GA, 2002, pp. 1-12. Jackson, Helen Hunt.   A Century of Dishonor: A Sketch of the United States Government’s Dealings With Some of the Indian Tribes.   New York, NY:   Harper Brothers, 1885. MacCleery, Doug.   The Role of American Indians in Shaping The North American Landscape, Forest History Society, 2 November, 2004, 12 June, 2007. How to cite Understanding Native American History, Essay examples

Carrying Capacity free essay sample

The carrying capacity is the size of a population that can live indefinitely using the resources available where that population lives 2. For example, consider an island onto which is dropped a colony of rabbits. As long as there is an adequate supply of food and water, the rabbits will not only survive but they will reproduce and the colony will get larger. 3. The rabbit population can continue to grow as long as food and water are adequate. However, if at some point, there are more rabbits that there is food to feed them, then the rabbit population will start to decline pic] [pic] Biotic Potential 4. Biotic potential  is the maximum  reproductive  capacity of a  population   if resources are unlimited. Full expression of the biotic potential of an organism is restricted by environmental resistance , any condition that inhibits the increase in number of the population. 5. It is generally only reached when environmental conditions are very favorable. We will write a custom essay sample on Carrying Capacity or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page A species reaching its biotic potential would exhibit exponential  population growth and be said to have a high  fertility, that is, how many offspring are produced per mother Environmental Resistance 6. The effect of physical and biological factors in preventing a species from reproducing at its maximum rate. factors  in an  environment  such as predators,   competition,  climate, and  food availability, that keep its various populations  from reaching their maximum  growth  potential [pic] Exponential Growth 7. Rapid Growth of organisms multiplying in each generation 8. If a population has a constant birth rate through time and is never limited by food or disease, it has what is known as exponential growth. With exponential growth the birth rate alone controls how fast (or slow) the population grows.