My Eulogy Essay - 903 Words

My brother is not just someone I share blood with but someone I can rely on and look up to. Patrick, my seventeen-year-old brother, has been by my side since I was a little baby. The earliest memories I have are of Patrick and I running around in our backyard laughing and playing. As he grew older, I began to look up to him. He was everything I aspired to be: intelligent, passionate, and athletic. Patrick always seemed to know what he wanted in life, and I admired how he chased down his goals. There were points in my life when I was extremely unmotivated, one time being when I was seven years old. Insecure and unsure, I did not believe in myself from a remarkably young age, and Patrick was there for me when no one else was. He made me†¦show more content†¦Patrick had said the high pitched screeches were too much for his ears to handle. â€Å"I could be an artist.† â€Å"You can’t even draw in the lines of a coloring book.† â€Å"That’s not true.† â€Å"You know it is,† he argued, â€Å"but don’t be discouraged. If you really want to be a musician or an artist, you can be. You can do anything you want if you work hard enough.† In hindsight, I should have listened to his advice, but changing a stubborn seven year old’s mind is as tough as nails. Finally, summer came to an end. The days were shorter, the temperatures cooler, and school consumed most of my time. I watched the crisp, dead leaves flutter to the ground along with my dreams. I had completely given up and not even Patrick could cheer me up. â€Å"What about volleyball?† Patrick asked one day after school, â€Å"We never gave that a shot.† â€Å"There’s no point in even trying,† I answered. â€Å"Come on, maybe you’ll like it.† â€Å"Fine,† I snapped. Little did I know that this conversation would change my childhood. Volleyball would become an outlet for my problems, a source of excitement, and a way to make new, lifelong friends in the years that followed. But for seven year old me, volleyball was just another box to check off. My mom signed me up for a volleyball camp along with my neighbor and best friend, Ava. Surprisingly, we both had a great time at the camp. It felt like a blindfold had been lifted from my eyes, and I couldShow MoreRelatedMy Eulogy Essay2027 Words   |  9 PagesSunday school that morning (I was too shy). My family was taking up the full row of chairs. I was sitting in-between my mother and father, as I always did. As I was watching the pastor do his impassioned speeches, and share stories from family vacations. He always does this, I thought. My mind was wandering. Salty tears started to downpour; as if I were a cloud letting go of the rain during a storm. My face was a warm, beat red, and my palms were shaky. My mother pulled me out of the gym-like sanctuaryRead MoreMy Eulogy Essay1130 Words   |  5 PagesMy symbol that represents everything I want to be; is my grandmother Lena Knox. Who is the beginning of the Knox bloodline, and she is also a very strong willed determined indiv idual. The three key points that I will touch on that makes her my symbol, are her adventurous courageous and powerful states of mind. When I was 8 years old we took our first family vacation that I can remember. Our family left Hot Springs, Arkansas headed back to Oakland, California. We drove through Texas, NewRead MoreMy Eulogy Essay1065 Words   |  5 Pages We’ll start at school. That is where it all began. In class, we were making Christmas angel ornaments for our family. I was the only one, in my class of thirty that had divorced parents and decided to make one for each of my parents. I still remember that angel. That angel with messy glue marks, a crooked smile drawn with a black marker. My dad would still hang it on the tree after everything that had happened, saying every year â€Å"I remember when you gave this to me†, with a smile on his faceRead MoreMy Eulogy Essay1984 Words   |  8 PagesRecently, an extraordinary person offered me the perfect muse to energize my stagnant existence, and therefore, its paramount I have a chat with my mother, Whitney West. Immediately upo n arriving at Whispering Breeze, her country estate, I’m escorted out to the veranda by Franà §ois, her butler and since my mother sat alone, she requested I join her for lunch. While we enjoyed the repast, Lady Josà ©phine and Sir Bonaparte, my mother’s, two Doberman pincers, entertained us with an aggressive game ofRead MoreEulogy for My Father Essay2078 Words   |  9 PagesMy father died a week ago today. He had a profound impact on the life I live today and on the person I became. The relationship between a son and a father can often be quite complicated. Not so, for me. I was blessed to have a rather simple, yet powerful and loving, relationship with my dad. And because I believe that at Fast Company we have created a community of friends, not mere readers with little connection to our magazine, I want to share the eulogy I delivered at his funeral on Saturday. Read MoreEulogy For My Friend Essay5974 Words   |  24 Pagesyet again to speak with this remarkab le gentlemwoman this year! RH: I m so glad we finally get to catch up, Barbara.   BN:   Oh, Ruth, thank you for reaching out again this year. I know you ve been busy, and it s been a busy summer for us too. My mom has actually been taking some classes at church and really challenging herself. She wanted to make sure to tell you hi, and let you know she s doing that. I m very proud of her.   That is just great. I think as we get older we wake up and discoverRead MoreEulogy Essay About My Best Friend701 Words   |  3 Pageshave told you a million times, but thank you. For honestly just being my best friend. You have seen sides of me that most people haven’t. You have shown me that how many friends you have, really doesnt matter. If you have one true friend, you are set. And you have been that one best friend for me. I have watched as you and I have grown so much closer over this past year and I really do believe that if I hadn’t of had you in my life, I wouldn’t be where I am now. I know that we have talked about thisRead MoreAnalysis Of Christopher Columbus And Charles Lindbergh804 Words   |  4 PagesAcademy, I have wrote numerous essays, with generally positive results. Several of the essays exceeded expectations, while others reached expectations to a modest extent, but all of the essays were supported by the writing skills that I had learned that year, regardless of my strengths or weaknesses with these skills. These techniques vary extensively, from comparing and contrasting ideas in a text to editing and revising essays for quality results, which is proven in my writing portfolio. TheRead MoreReflection About Myself955 Words   |  4 PagesSemester I have written six essays, and all of them were a little different. All of them had a different purpose in writing and required a different skill too. There are things that I did both good and bad in writing all of these essays. The first essay that I had to write for this class was a Self-Assessment essay, about my writing career and how the four basics have been involved in my life. This was a more personal essay about myself, while I have also had to write some essays about a feeling that IRead MoreWhat Is Love Essay796 Words   |  4 PagesRanging from â€Å"I love Coach purses†, to actually telling a person â€Å"I love you† is now a common thing. Throughout this essay I’ll be taking a philosophical approach to help give a better understanding of what love is according to the speakers in the Symposium, and which conception of love I believe is most compelling. In the Symposium, each speaker decides to compose his own eulogy of Love. It all starts on page 9 with Eryximachus stating, â€Å"It’s terrible that people have given serious attention to

The Suffering of Native Americans in Native Son (1940) by...

Native Son (1940) by Richard Wright is by far the most captivating and practical novel I have read this semester. The novel does an exceptional job at illustrating the suffering of African Americans in the United States of America. Wright through his brilliant and graphic writing acknowledges the racial barriers that prevent the advancement of Blacks. Through his depiction of the novel’s protagonist Bigger Thomas, Wright indicates the frustration and chaos that might occur due to the isolation and defamation of people of color. He deliberately shows his readers the Black man’s struggle and the social oppression he faces in the country that claims to guarantee its citizens: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Bigger, who fights†¦show more content†¦The powerlessness of African Americans is displayed throughout the text and plays a vital role in Bigger’s monstrous transformation. For instance, Wright explains that Bigger â€Å"hated his fami ly because he knew that they were suffering and that he was powerless to help them. . .He knew that the moment he allowed what his life meant to enter fully into his consciousness, he would either kill himself or someone else† (25). Bigger’s inability to provide for his family creates feelings of hate. He hates his family because they are a constant reminder of his race and the social injustices being a Black man in America subjects him to. He attempts to suppress the reality of his suffering because he knows that acknowledging it would unleash â€Å"a Negro murderer, a black murderer†¦.an element which he reckoned with as ‘them† (89). Interestingly, Wright allows Bigger to become the â€Å"black murderer† Bigger fears will manifest. As a result, Bigger becomes a tragic product of his environment. Through Bigger’s transformation, Wright illustrates the negative effects racism has on its victims. Bigger initially predicts that  "something awful’s going to happen† (33) to him and later brutally murders a white woman. He decapitates Mary Dalton, and disposes of her body in a gruesome fashion. Mary made Bigger feel â€Å"his black skin by just standing there looking at him. . . He felt he had no physical existence at all right then; he was something heShow MoreRelated Contrasting Native Son and Their Eyes Were Watching God Essay4128 Words   |  17 Pages  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   This paper examines the drastic differences in literary themes and styles of Richard Wright and Zora Neale Hurston, two African--American writers from the early 1900s. The portrayals of African-American women by each author are contrasted based on specific examples from their two most prominent novels, Native Son by Wright, and Their Eyes Were Watching God by Hurston. With the intent to explain this divergence, the autobiographies of both authors (Black Boy and Dust Tracks on a Road) areRead MoreRichard Wrigh t2847 Words   |  12 Pagespoverty, the disruption of his family, and his faulty education allowed Richard Wright to grow into a novelist astonishingly different than other major American writers. Richard Wright was born on a Rucker plantation in Adams County, Mississippi. He was born on September 4, 1908 to Ella Wilson, a schoolteacher and Nathaniel Wright, a sharecropper. When Wright was about six years old, his father abandoned Ella and his two sons in a penniless condition to run off with another woman. This left Wright’sRead More A Marxist Reading of Native Son Essay4809 Words   |  20 PagesA Marxist Reading of Native Son In the Communist Manifesto Karl Marx states clearly that history is a series of class struggles over the means of production. Whoever controls the means of production also controls society and is able to force their set of ideas and beliefs onto the lower class. The present dominant class ideology is, as it has been since the writing of the United States Constitution, the ideology of the upper-class, Anglo-Saxon male. Obviously, when the framers spoke of equalityRead MoreRichard Wright s Native Son2377 Words   |  10 Pagesthe turn of the century, the time of Bigger Thomas, the roles of black men and women in America were heavily restricted compared to the white population. Black people were also still treated unequally and dealt with as ignorant fools. Richard Wright s novel, Native Son, embraces this knowledge and follows the reaction of one angry man as he manages the delights of his exploits and the consequences of his deeds. Challenging pressures and stereotypes, Bigger be lieves he understands the world and thatRead MoreNarrative Of The Life Of Frederick Douglass Essay1792 Words   |  8 PagesAfrican American Literature Midterm Exam 1. Define who Frederick Douglass was and provide a summary of his book, narrative of the life of Fredrick Douglass: an American slave 1845. Frederick Douglass was an African-American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. Frederick Douglass was the most important black American leader of the nineteenth century. He was born in February of the 1818 and died February 20, 1895. Douglass was a firm believer in the equality of all peoplesRead MoreAnalysis Of James Baldwin s Sonny Blues 1753 Words   |  8 Pagesthe word â€Å"darkness† appeared frequently throughout the reading. I think the significance of darkness of this particular situation of this book that Baldwin is trying to present is fear and suffering. It shows how the characters are in the state of panic and fear, of the situation they are in and all the sufferings they have to go through. Connecting the Baldwin to the novel, Harlem; where the story takes place is Baldwin’s hometown. He was born in 1924 and he worked as a Pentecostal preacher duringRead More Flight in Song of Solomon, Native Son, A Worn Path, Sad Sweet Story of Sugar Lips Shinehot, and Por5690 Words   |  23 PagesFlight in Song of Solomon, Native Son, A Worn Path, Sad Sweet Story of Sugar Lips Shinehot, and Portable Promised, and Land First Eagle Story Since the beginning of time all human beings have had a fascination with human flight. Watching a bird soar through the air, one cannot help but desire the same capabilities. Imagine the point of view of the bird that flies high above the trees, among the mountains, over the ocean, and high in the air, far away from the clamor of everyday life on the groundRead MoreLangston Hughes Research Paper25309 Words   |  102 Pagesto avoid segregation and racial injustice in the United States. As the manager of an electric company and owner of a ranch and mines, Jim expressed contempt for black Americans who continued to submit to segregation and live in poverty. Langston Hughes, 1933 (Library of Congress) Langston was not ashamed of being a black American. He had already written poems celebrating his heritage. He felt connected to the oppressed brown people of the world and hated his father for mistreating his MexicanRead MoreHistory5499 Words   |  22 PagesRenaissance’’ refers to the efï ¬â€šorescence of African-American cultural production that occurred in New York City in the 1920s and early 1930s. One sometimes sees Harlem Renaissance used interchangeably with ‘‘New Negro Renaissance,’’ a term that includes all African Americans, regardless of their location, who participated in this cultural revolution. Followers of the New Negro dicta, which emphasized blacks’ inclusion in and empowerment by American society, were undeniably spread throughout the nationRead MoreLiterary Criticism : The Free Encyclopedia 7351 Words   |  30 Pagesthe growing up or coming of age of a sensitive person who goes in search of answers to life s ques tions with the expectation that these will result from gaining experience of the world. The genre evolved from folklore tales of a dunce or youngest son going out in the world to seek his fortune. Usually in the beginning of the story there is an emotional loss which makes the protagonist leave on his journey. In a Bildungsroman, the goal is maturity, and the protagonist achieves it gradually and with

U of P / Eth 316 / Ethics Essay Free Essays

ETH 316 August 22, 2011 Ethics Essay Utilitarianism Utilitarianism ethics emphasize that action should be morally beneficial to a group. This course of ethics is often known as â€Å"the greatest good for the greatest number† or simply put, â€Å"the greater good† (Boylan, 2009). In other words, the consequence of any ethical action should be beneficial for all by mass appeal. We will write a custom essay sample on U of P / Eth 316 / Ethics Essay or any similar topic only for you Order Now This is a common underlying theme for ethics in capitalist economies and business as well as in democratic governments (Boylan, 2009). Virtue Theory Virtue theory, also known as virtue ethics, focuses more so on the character of a person rather than the rules and consequences of specific acts. What this essentially means is that the primary focus is whether or not the person acting ethically is a person who upholds high morals and virtues, in turn expressing â€Å"good character† (Garrett, 2005). Rules, intent, consequences and outcome are not necessarily irrelevant; however, the emphasis of virtue theory is primarily on a person’s character, their virtues, and their expression of good intentions (Garrett, 2005). Deontology Unlike virtue theory, deontology has a heavy emphasis on duty in action, in adherence to rules. The right action is important here, where upon completion, should bring about the greatest good for all involved. This is somewhat similar to utilitarianism, which does focus on the consequence of the greatest good. However, deontology does not lean on the consequence itself, but more so the principle behind committing the right action. (Boylan, 2009). In turn, the ethics behind deontology is about principle and following rules. Similarity Between Theories All three of these ethical practices have tangible similarities. The primary similarity is consequence of action. Even though consequence is not always the primary focus of the action, it is expected in all three theories that the consequence should have a beneficial result as an outcome of the action. Whether the action is based on principle, values or virtues, the end should justify the means. Difference Between Theories The best way to express the differences between virtue theory, utilitarianism and deontological ethics is to take a common scenario and analyze from these three different perspectives. A good example to use would be a person having car trouble and has pulled their car on the side of the road. They are in obvious need of help. In committing the action of helping the person, an individual is acting on a moral or ethical duty. An individual who practices virtue theory ethics would point out that by helping the person, doing so would be a charitable act and would express good character of the person assisting the one in need. One who practices utilitarianism would say that by helping the person, doing so would be good for both the person in need and the person helping. A deontologist would say that by helping, it would be so in accordance to a moral rule, such as karma, or what you do to others will come back to you. (Hursthouse, 2010). As the example shows, virtue theory focuses on a person’s moral ethics, and not on any specific outcome or rule. Utilitarianism has an emphasis on the greater good, focusing on a beneficial outcome for all persons involved, where the consequences of acting are beneficial to a community. Finally, deontology emphasizes duty as specific action being done in completion of following a specific moral code, rule or command. In a previous job position, I had an ethical dilemma that required making a fair decision for all parties involved. It involved a quality assurance process for outbound marketing in a call center. There was a Spanish speaking division where the manager wanted a special call monitoring process just for the Spanish speakers. I decided against the process for the simple fact that the Spanish speakers did not say anything different or offer anything different than the non-Spanish speakers. The reason I chose to do this was to make the quality assurance process fair for all the call agents. If I had done the opposite, the non-Spanish speakers would have sought similar treatment. I consider this to be a utilitarian action for my ethical dilemma. References: Boylan, M. 2009. Basic Ethics. 2nd Edition. Pp. 153, 171 Garrett, J. (2005, November 28). Virtue ethics. Retrieved fromhttp://www. wku. edu/~jan. garrett/ethics/virtthry. htm Hursthouse, Rosalind, â€Å"Virtue Ethics†, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter2010 Edition), Edward N. Zalta  (ed. ),http://plato. stanford. edu/archives/win2010/entries/ethics-virtue How to cite U of P / Eth 316 / Ethics Essay, Essays