The Arrogant Emerson and Self-Reliance Essay -- Self Reliance Essays

The Arrogant Emerson and Self-Reliance To believe your own thought, to believe that which is unfeigned for you in your private heart is true for all men-that is genius (Self-Reliance and Other Es evidences, 19). This statement from the writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson provides a summary of the ideas that transcendentalism centered around. Emerson believed that man is innately good, and that if he were left to his own devices without the structures of society and laws boxing him in, he would create a utopian society very different from the virtuoso Emerson lived in. Emersons ideas make perceive in more situations where the influence of society drowns out the voices of individuals, such as African Americans before the Civil Rights movement, or intimidates others so that they never speak, as happens to many witnesses afraid for their own safety. However, I believe that he takes the application of self-reliance too far. In Self-Reliance, Emerson applies his ideas to religion, stating that men should find their own creed, not conform to another(prenominal) one that has been made for them. We must go alone, he says, not seeking the help or influence of others, but formulating our own ideas (Self-Reliance and Other Essays, 30). At this agitate I disagree with Emerson. I believe that it is arrogant and self-righteous to try and form your own creed and own ideas while ignoring the influence of others. Although self-reliance may have a place in our lives, it does not encompass every aspect of them. In religion, conforming to a creed and listening to what others have to say has helped me to open my mind, not close it as Emerson suggests. Emerson believed that to seek help and suggestions in your spiritual life was to pollute it. In Self-Reliance, he writ... ...listening to a preacher is to bar out new ideas that could be important. Assuming that one knows enough and that he needs no teachings in the ways of God is a self-admiring egotistical attitude. all man can always learn more about his spiritual life. Emersons ideas on self-reliance have many applications in life. However, religion is not one of these applications. In religion, it is healthy for man to conform to a certain creed because it leads him to questions and ideas that he may never have asked. It does not close people as Emerson says, but directs them to look deeper into themselves. Man is not innately good as Emerson suggests. Since the Fall when Adam and Eve ate the Forbidden Fruit, man has had a puckish nature. Therefore people need guidance, not just their own ideas to lead them. Men should heed the advice of others, not only listen to themselves.

Emerson and Thoreau as Prophets of Eco-wisdom :: Biography Biographies Essays

Emerson and Thoreau as Prophets of Eco-wisdom The major premise of transcendental eco-wisdom is that connection with nature is essential for a persons intellectual, aesthetic, and moral health and growth. One must figure and experience nature intimately, whether defined as the not-me or as landscape, to participate in the unity of Spirit underlying its visible processes. This connectedness is the basis of the autonomy which determines how a person lives with integrity in nature and society. Granted, the concept of self-reliance apparently devalues social concerns, including the global commitment and cooperation needed to bring about the kinds of changes that would get up the climatic greenhouse effect, for example. Indeed, Emersons ideas cook been unfairly appropriated to justify the capitalistic exploitative excesses and insensitivity to social problems and long-term consequences that lie at the root of m either of our environmental problems. However, we cannot fault Emerson a nd Thoreau for not imagining our current dependence on technology, the complexity of a largely urban economy or the ties of a global community. Yet veritable(a) the notion of a self-contained Concord or Walden Pond, which might seem naive and outdated, is reflected in current ideas about eco- regionalism. By accounting for what they could not have known of our present condition, we can still find fruitful ways of understanding where humans, singly and as a species, should fit into nature. Emersons greatest gift was lessons in seeing in and through nature and extracting symbolic meaning, yet his own intimate looks with the nature around him were relatively rare and indirect, with few concrete traces in his writings except as occasional metaphors. He wanted his revelations from nature to be abstract and come by surprise, as did the famed mystical encounter at the beginning of his book Nature Crossing a bare common, in snow puddles, at twilight, under a clouded sky, without having i n my thoughts any occurrence of special good fortune, I have enjoyed a perfect exhilaration. I am glad to the brink of fear. In such an experience, even the self is absorbed by a greater power I become a transparent eye-b on the whole I am nothing I see all the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me. The metaphor may be unfortunate, but not his faith that a single person could perceive untellable meanings through experiencing nature, even if only indirectly. Such possibilities impelled Thoreau and countless others since to mine the details and processes of nature that Emerson had generalized, looking for embedded revelations and sharing in natures ecstasy.

Comedy in Benignis Life Is Beautiful Essay -- essays research papers

Roberto Benignis moving word picture, Life is Beautiful, is a film that is set in a concentration camp and combines comedy with the seriousness of the extermination of the Jews in national socialist Germany during the Holocaust. In Life is Beautiful, the real purpose of the film, is a love story on many levels. It is a tale about a man and his principessa, a man and his son, a man and his life. It is a tale about choosing how to exist and choosing how to die. The movie was primarily made for entertainment, using the Holocaust as its setting.Despite the films failed attempt to really capture the seriousness of the Holocaust, certain details still appear to be accurate. The removal of clothing at the arrival at the concentration camp, the showers, the separating of the families, the lack of food, and the unnecessary gassing of hundreds of Jews, are clearly shown throughout the movie just as it occurred years before. Guido, the main character, is sent to part from his passio n wife, and taken to the other side of the camp with his son. Wanting to keep the truth away from his son, he explains...

The Black Panthers Essay -- essays research papers

The inexorable Panther Party was founded in 1966 by society members Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale in the city of Oakland, California. The party was established to cooperate further the movement for African American liberation, which was growing rapidly throughout the sixties because of the civil rights movement and the work of Malcolm X, and Dr. Martin Luther mightiness. The Party discorporate itself from the non-violence stance of Dr. King and chose to organize around a platform for self-defense, (which later became part of the partys original name). The party was established to help further the movement for African American liberation, which was growing rapidly throughout the sixties because of the civil rights movement and the work of Malcolm X, and Dr. Martin Luther King. The Party disembodied itself from the non-violence stance of Dr. King and chose to organize around a platform for self-defense, (which later became part of the partys original name). As a Marxist-Leninist organization and worked with many an(prenominal) white activist organizations(for example, Californias Peace and Freedom Party). The Black Panthers name was derived from The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (or SNCC, pronounced snick), maculation working to register voters in Lowndes county, Alabama. Following the success of the Mississippi Freedom Party, organizers worked to create the Lowndes County Freedom Organization as an independent party. At the time, it was required that both organizational parties have visual emblem for non-educated voters. The SNCC contacted a designer in Atlanta for logo. The designer first choice was dove, but the workers of SNCC thought that it was too gentle, so the finally the designer suggested that the organization use the mascot of Clark Atlanta College, The Black Panther. Thus, the Freedom Party). Thus, the Lowndes County Freedom Organization became The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, and soon the parties were founded all cross ways the nation. Many of these parties were unconnected to the SNCC. On April 25, 1967, the first issue of The Black Panther, the party official news organ, was distributed. In the following month thereafter, the party launches a walk on the California state capital fully armed, in protest of the states attempt to band the possession of loaded weapons in public. Bobby Seale proceeded to realize a statement of protest while ... ...tions, and numerous dirty plots. The Black Party compensatetually fell apart due to the FBIs systematic attempts to break down the party. Due to major financial dilemmas, some members went on to join another group called the Liberation Army, whiles others subdued themselves to enact a pro-peace philosophy, and others were incarcerated (Assata Shakur, Sundiota Acoli, Afeni Shakur). (WikipediaThe Free Encyclopedia,1997).On the contrary, even though the old Black Panther Party was actually diminished due to antics by the federal government, a group callin g themselves the New Black Panther emerged from the Nation of Islam decades after of the original Black Panthers. A new National Alliance of Black Panthers was formed on July 31, 2004, and is said to be inspire by the grassroots activism of the original organization, but is not related. (Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia, 1997).RefrencesThe Black Panther Party. (1997). Marxists.org Retreived April 11,2005http//www.marxists.org/history/usa/workers/balck-panthers/1966/10/15.htmThe USA Archives.(1969). Marxists.orgRetreived April 11,2005http//www.marxists.org/history/usa/workers/balck-panthers/1966/10/15.htm

Flint, Michigan :: essays research papers

Flint, MichiganA strong culture is one that has dependency upon itself along withoutside resources. The economy is hard if nearly impossible to predict, andthis puts solemn strain on a community that is dependent on one employer.Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and Flint are examples of these types of communities.When a manufacturing process or company pulls out of a city, many problems arise.Flint is a city which has had a significant portion of an industry leave. GMused to be the heart of Flint, until the decision to downsize was made. Thiscaused approximately 40 thousand of the 80 thousand GM employees to loose theirjobs. Recently there was a debate pitting two sides of an issue. The questionconsisted of the decline of General Motors in Flint. Is it a catastrophe ordoes it provide an opportunity for the community. Members of the panel includedBill Donahue (pro-opportunity), Larry Thompson (pro-opportunity), DorothyReynolds (catastrophe supporter) and Ruben Burks (catastrophe supporter).In the beginning, there were many advantages of having GM as thedominate employer in Flint. The quantity of GM jobs in Flint provided for aneconomic boom town in the 1960s and 1970s. Money from General Motors trickleddown from the workers to every part of the economy of Genesse county. Theuniverse was on the rise which meant more homes, roads, and businesses. Itwas all to good to be true. When Roger Smith (then President of GM) decided torelocate numerous jobs from the Buick City, it was time for Flint to pay thepiper. The grown dependency on GM brought upon a rapid decline in the economyunparalleled by any city in United States history.The remotion of jobs from GM caused many problems in Flint. DororthyReynolds gave many statistics which proved how much the decline of GM hurt Flint.She pointed out that since the removal of GM jobs, Flint has become the secondmost dangerous city in America while being the 6th most segregated. The lack ofeconomic development since the early 1980s has also had a terrible impact onthe children of Flint and Genesse county. Thirty percent of the children inGenesse county live at or below the poverty level where the graduation station inthe schools has shrunk to 57%. Mrs. Reynolds also pointed out the fact thatonly three new home developments have been started in the last 18 months. RubenBurks was also invited to cope his opinions on the catastrophe surroundingFlint. Unfortunately for the audience, his relationship with the United AutoWorkers was at a level to where he couldnt expand on his negative GM opinions.

Slavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms Cabin by Harriet B

slavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms cabin The Compromise of 1850 included The Fugitive Slave Law, a law forcing non-slave owners in the cease Northern states to return escaped slaves to their Southern masters and participate in a system they did not believe in. Jehlen notes the re fareion to this cruel goernmental act by stating that the nations growing guilt and apprehension is tangible in the whelm response to Uncle Toms Cabin (386). It perk upms hard to believe that people could find no pervert in making it a law to return humans as if they were property. In fact, Stowe wrote her most famous work, Uncle Toms Cabin, at a most opportune magazine indeed, she wrote it in response to the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law. Knowing her earreach would be primarily white women, Stowe played on their feelings of uneasiness and guilt over the treatment of slaves, especially those of the Northern white women who could help with the Abolitionist movement, by introduc ing her readers to seemingly real characters suffering from the injustice of thrall. This can be seen even in the style in which Uncle Toms Cabin was written Stowe directly addresses her readers, forcing them to consider slavery from the point of view of the enslaved. Expressive of and responsible for the values of its time, it also belongs to a genre, the hokey novel, whose chief characteristic is that it is written by, for, and about women (Tompkins 124-25). Uncle Toms Cabin is a artificial novel it was meant to appeal to the unsettled emotions that existed in the readers mind, creating and sense of guilt and injustice, making them see how slavery destroys human lives and families. Through the introduction of ... ... of California P, 1990. 39-60. Brown, Gillian. Getting in the Kitchen with Dinah Domestic government in Uncle Toms Cabin. American Quarterly 36 (Fall 1984) 503-523. Davidson, Kathy N. Preface No more separate spheres American Literature 70 (September 1998) 443-4 54. Jehlen, Myra. The Family Militant Domesticity Versus Politics in Uncle Toms Cabin. Criticism 31 (Fall 1989) 383-400. MacKethan, Lucinda H. Domesticity in Dixie The Plantation Novel and Uncle Toms Cabin. follow Bodies Gender and Southern Texts. Ed. Anne Goodwyn Jones and Susan V. Donaldson. Charlottesville UP of Virginia, 1997. 223-239. Stowe, Harriet Beecher. Uncle Toms Cabin or, Life Among the Lowly. New York Penguin Books, 1981. Tompkins, Jane. sensational Designs The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860. New York Oxford UP, 1985. Slavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms Cabin by Harriet BSlavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms Cabin The Compromise of 1850 included The Fugitive Slave Law, a law forcing non-slave owners in the free Northern states to return escaped slaves to their Southern masters and participate in a system they did not believe in. Jehlen notes the reaction to this cruel governmental act by stating that t he nations growing guilt and apprehension is tangible in the overwhelming response to Uncle Toms Cabin (386). It seems hard to believe that people could find no wrong in making it a law to return humans as if they were property. In fact, Stowe wrote her most famous work, Uncle Toms Cabin, at a most opportune time indeed, she wrote it in response to the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law. Knowing her audience would be primarily white women, Stowe played on their feelings of uneasiness and guilt over the treatment of slaves, especially those of the Northern white women who could help with the Abolitionist movement, by introducing her readers to seemingly real characters suffering from the injustice of slavery. This can be seen even in the style in which Uncle Toms Cabin was written Stowe directly addresses her readers, forcing them to consider slavery from the point of view of the enslaved. Expressive of and responsible for the values of its time, it also belongs to a genre, the sent imental novel, whose chief characteristic is that it is written by, for, and about women (Tompkins 124-25). Uncle Toms Cabin is a sentimental novel it was meant to appeal to the unsettled emotions that existed in the readers mind, creating and sense of guilt and injustice, making them see how slavery destroys human lives and families. Through the introduction of ... ... of California P, 1990. 39-60. Brown, Gillian. Getting in the Kitchen with Dinah Domestic Politics in Uncle Toms Cabin. American Quarterly 36 (Fall 1984) 503-523. Davidson, Kathy N. Preface No more separate spheres American Literature 70 (September 1998) 443-454. Jehlen, Myra. The Family Militant Domesticity Versus Politics in Uncle Toms Cabin. Criticism 31 (Fall 1989) 383-400. MacKethan, Lucinda H. Domesticity in Dixie The Plantation Novel and Uncle Toms Cabin. Haunted Bodies Gender and Southern Texts. Ed. Anne Goodwyn Jones and Susan V. Donaldson. Charlottesville UP of Virginia, 1997. 223-239. Stowe, Harriet B eecher. Uncle Toms Cabin or, Life Among the Lowly. New York Penguin Books, 1981. Tompkins, Jane. Sensational Designs The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860. New York Oxford UP, 1985.

Slavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms Cabin by Harriet B

Slavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms Cabin The Compromise of 1850 included The Fugitive Slave Law, a law forcing non-slave owners in the free Northern states to return escaped slaves to their Southern masters and get in in a system they did not believe in. Jehlen notes the reaction to this cruel political act by stating that the nations growing guilt and apprehension is tangible in the overwhelming response to Uncle Toms Cabin (386). It seems hard to believe that people could find no wrong in devising it a law to return world as if they were property. In fact, Stowe wrote her most famous work, Uncle Toms Cabin, at a most seasonable time indeed, she wrote it in response to the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law. perspicacious her audience would be primarily white women, Stowe played on their feelings of uneasiness and guilt over the treatment of slaves, especially those of the Northern white women who could help with the emancipationist movement, by introduci ng her readers to seemingly real characters suffering from the injustice of slavery. This can be seen even so in the style in which Uncle Toms Cabin was written Stowe directly addresses her readers, forcing them to cerebrate slavery from the point of view of the enslaved. Expressive of and responsible for the values of its time, it also belongs to a genre, the sentimental novel, whose chief characteristic is that it is written by, for, and about women (Tompkins 124-25). Uncle Toms Cabin is a sentimental novel it was meant to appeal to the unsettled emotions that existed in the readers mind, creating and sense of guilt and injustice, making them see how slavery destroys human lives and families. Through the introduction of ... ... of California P, 1990. 39-60. Brown, Gillian. get in the Kitchen with Dinah Domestic Politics in Uncle Toms Cabin. American Quarterly 36 (Fall 1984) 503-523. Davidson, Kathy N. usher in No more separate spheres American Literature 70 (September 1998) 443-454. Jehlen, Myra. The Family free-enterprise(a) Domesticity Versus Politics in Uncle Toms Cabin. Criticism 31 (Fall 1989) 383-400. MacKethan, Lucinda H. Domesticity in Dixie The Plantation fiction and Uncle Toms Cabin. Haunted Bodies Gender and Southern Texts. Ed. Anne Goodwyn Jones and Susan V. Donaldson. Charlottesville UP of Virginia, 1997. 223-239. Stowe, Harriet Beecher. Uncle Toms Cabin or, Life Among the Lowly. youthful York Penguin Books, 1981. Tompkins, Jane. Sensational Designs The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860. New York Oxford UP, 1985. Slavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms Cabin by Harriet BSlavery as an Attack on Domestic Life in Uncle Toms Cabin The Compromise of 1850 included The Fugitive Slave Law, a law forcing non-slave owners in the free Northern states to return escaped slaves to their Southern masters and participate in a system they did not believe in. Jehlen notes the reaction to this cruel governmen tal act by stating that the nations growing guilt and apprehension is tangible in the overwhelming response to Uncle Toms Cabin (386). It seems hard to believe that people could find no wrong in making it a law to return humans as if they were property. In fact, Stowe wrote her most famous work, Uncle Toms Cabin, at a most opportune time indeed, she wrote it in response to the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law. Knowing her audience would be primarily white women, Stowe played on their feelings of uneasiness and guilt over the treatment of slaves, especially those of the Northern white women who could help with the Abolitionist movement, by introducing her readers to seemingly real characters suffering from the injustice of slavery. This can be seen even in the style in which Uncle Toms Cabin was written Stowe directly addresses her readers, forcing them to consider slavery from the point of view of the enslaved. Expressive of and responsible for the values of its time, it also bel ongs to a genre, the sentimental novel, whose chief characteristic is that it is written by, for, and about women (Tompkins 124-25). Uncle Toms Cabin is a sentimental novel it was meant to appeal to the unsettled emotions that existed in the readers mind, creating and sense of guilt and injustice, making them see how slavery destroys human lives and families. Through the introduction of ... ... of California P, 1990. 39-60. Brown, Gillian. Getting in the Kitchen with Dinah Domestic Politics in Uncle Toms Cabin. American Quarterly 36 (Fall 1984) 503-523. Davidson, Kathy N. Preface No more separate spheres American Literature 70 (September 1998) 443-454. Jehlen, Myra. The Family Militant Domesticity Versus Politics in Uncle Toms Cabin. Criticism 31 (Fall 1989) 383-400. MacKethan, Lucinda H. Domesticity in Dixie The Plantation Novel and Uncle Toms Cabin. Haunted Bodies Gender and Southern Texts. Ed. Anne Goodwyn Jones and Susan V. Donaldson. Charlottesville UP of Virginia, 1997. 2 23-239. Stowe, Harriet Beecher. Uncle Toms Cabin or, Life Among the Lowly. New York Penguin Books, 1981. Tompkins, Jane. Sensational Designs The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860. New York Oxford UP, 1985.