How Do Our Relationships With Others Determine Who We Are? Socializing plays a huge role in people’s lives. Relationships are formed with family, classmates and teachers, colleagues, and strangers. These relationships have an impact on people’s lives as a whole. Because it is human instinct to be attracted to other people like us, influencing how we behave, perceive things, and think about ourselves determine who we are in our relationships with others. When we interact with other people, their behavior has a great effect on how we behave. The more time spent with others, the more likely a person is to act like them. In the short story The Lottery by Shirley Jackson, the people of the town participate in a traditional ritual because it …show more content…
When we spend time with someone, their beliefs and opinions rub off on us. The Wife’s Story by Ursula Le Guin displays this relationship between a wolf wife and her pack. The wolf wife discovers that her husband morphs into a human, and she is upset and shocked. However, she tries to fight him off, calling her pack to help her. The pack and the wife kill the husband. “I had to see him, my own dear love, turned into the hateful one.” (Le Guin 7) The wolf pack had the belief that humans were evil things, so the wife also adopted that belief. Finally, people we socialize with influence how we think about ourselves. Others can influence self- reflection either positively or negatively. In What, of This Goldfish Would You Wish? By Etgar Keret, A magical, talking goldfish grants three wishes to a man named Sergei, and it has granted two wishes so far. The only reason why Sergei has not used his third wish is because he did not want to be alone. A young interviewer comes along and asks Sergei if he had three wishes, what he would wish for. The interviewer nags Sergei and invites himself into Sergei’s home, which leads to Sergei killing him. The goldfish tries to persuade Sergei to use his third wish to resurrect the young man. He tells Sergei “You murdered someone- but you’re not a murderer.” (Keret 8). This changes Sergei’s mind and he uses his final wish. When others describe what they think we are, it changes our perception of ourselves,
“The less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it” (Twain). The Lottery begins during the summer. A small, seemingly normal, town is gathering to throw the annual “Lottery”. In the end, the townspeople—children included—gather around and stone the winner to death, simply because it was tradition. The story reveals how traditions can become outdated and ineffective. “I suppose, I hoped, by setting a particularly brutal ancient rite in the present and in my own village to shock the story's readers with a graphic dramatization of the pointless violence and general inhumanity in their own lives” (Jackson). As humans develop as a race, their practices should develop with them. Shirley Jackson develops the theme that blindly following traditions is dangerous in her short story “The Lottery” through the use of symbolism, foreshadowing, and irony.
Throughout the course of humanity, people have sought ways to promote a society where moral unification and motivation are present. It is essential for a community to coincide with such values; therefore, tradition and folklore are transcended though generations as customs which people follow mostly without question. In Shirley Jackson’s short story, The Lottery, such traditions are exploited through a futile box along with a brutal ritual which symbolizes the way a society might mindlessly abide by them and feel powerless to divert from such illogical acts. The storyline contains a constant tone which depicts normalcy to present normalcy itself as seen by the villagers, yet whispers eerie to the reader by setting up hints and indications of what is really occurring.
Human beings have been known to become strung up on following tradition. In the short story The Lottery by Shirley Jackson, the villagers demonstrate this fact. While following traditions has its benefits, doing what is customary can be hazardous.
In “The Lottery,” the town put so much importance on tradition. As the townspeople were getting ready, Mr. Summers said, “Guess we better get started, get this over with…” (Jackson 2). Even though the town is getting ready to do the lottery, the people do not like to do it. This is very odd because if people do not like to do something, people tend to stop doing the activity.
Tradition, defined as "the handing down of information, beliefs, and customs by word of mouth or by example from one generation to another without written instruction." ("Tradition") Tradition is a core trait of humanity, from the time before recorded history to present, humanity has followed traditions or customs that have been passed down from generation to generation. More often than not communities all over the world blindly follow these practices with little regard to who started them or why they were enacted in the first place. The community, in the short story "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson, is no different. The community members follow the tradition of the lottery without any consideration to its ramifications. Shirley Jackson's goal for writing "The Lottery" is to get the reader to question why certain things are done. She accomplishes this through her use of symbols, her description of the fear of change, and the portrayal of the dangers associated with blindly following tradition. The ignorance of tradition or lack of knowledge of it is brought to the reader's attention by Jackson's utilization of themes, depictions and symbols.
Everything may not be what it seems in Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery”. Within the story there are many reoccurring themes, ranging from the townspeople inability to establish bonds to the Jackson’s displaying how easily humans will engage in behavior that is otherwise frowned upon once given an excuse. The most prominent of these themes is the loyalty the townspeople hold towards various items and rituals in their lives. The townspeople hold the utmost loyalty towards their tradition of the lottery. The second most noticeable theme is the lack of ties within the community. At the beginning of the Lottery some of the fragile community ties are evident it becomes obvious how easily they are broken. The final and most important of themes is how readily and without reserve the town members participate in a murder they have reclassified as a sacrifice. These themes are the most important within the Lottery because all of them are alluded to on more than one occasion.
The relationship you have with others often has a direct effect on the basis of your very own personal identity. In the essay "On The Rainy River," the author Tim O'Brien tells about his experiences and how his relationship with a single person had effected his life so dramatically. It is hard for anyone to rely fully on their own personal experiences when there are so many other people out there with different experiences of their own. Sometimes it take the experiences and knowledge of others to help you learn and build from them to help form your own personal identity. In the essay, O'Brien speaks about his experiences with a man by the name of Elroy Berdahl, the owner of the fishing lodge that O'Brien stays at while on how journey to find himself. The experiences O'Brien has while there helps him to open his mind and realize what his true personal identity was. It gives you a sense than our own personal identities are built on the relationships we have with others. There are many influence out there such as our family and friends. Sometimes even groups of people such as others of our nationality and religion have a space in building our personal identities.
Tradition; it is the back bone of every culture and civilization. It is what keeps the beliefs, philosophies, and activities of societies alive, to be passed down from generation to generation. However not all traditions are practiced with pure intentions. Some activities become so routine, people don’t know a life outside of them. Societies become so accustomed to “tradition” that they will participate in pastimes without questioning the ethics or morals of the situation. Ultimately when tradition takes the place of a rationalizing mind the outcome can be incredibly dangerous. The role of tradition is an underlying theme in the short story The Lottery by Shirley Jackson, forcing readers to ask themselves “At what point do people set tradition aside and realize the thoughtlessness of their actions in their practices?”
In “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, tradition is seen as very high and something to be respected not to be messed with. Although, the lottery has been removed from other towns, the village where the story is set in still continues to participate in the lottery. It is almost as if the other towns realized the lack of humanity in the tradition. However, the village still continues with the lottery even though the majority of the ritual has been lost or changed. The oldest man in the village complains about how the lottery is not what it used to be. There are hidden messages in “The Lottery” that reflects today’s society that the author wants to make apparent and change, such as, the danger of blindly following without any knowledge, the randomness
Even through the times, traditions have remained a constant for the human race. They can be as gruesome as the Aztecs practicing human sacrifice to as simple as saying the pledge of allegiance every day. “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson is a chilling story about the reoccurrence of an abhorrent ritual that takes place on a sunny morning. The people of this village demonstrate fear over straying from conformity and thus have the ignorance that sprouts from never trying new things. Through this short story the author portrays this fear and ignorance the human race has through her casual narration, euphemistic dialogue and morbid events.
Everyone had influenced by their surrounding. Your personal identities and choices in life are based on the role of the relationship you have with others. This helps you to realize who you are and what you need in the life. The combination of all you learns come together to give you a clear idea of what your needs, values, and belief in this life. Finally, it is clear that the role of relationship play an important role in the framework of our personal identities.
"The Lottery," a short story written by Shirley Jackson, is a tale about a disturbing social practice. The setting takes place in a small village consisting of about three hundred denizens. On June twenty-seventh of every year, the members of this traditional community hold a village-wide lottery in which everyone is expected to participate. Throughout the story, the reader gets an odd feeling regarding the residents and their annual practice. Not until the end does he or she gets to know what the lottery is about. Thus, from the beginning of the story until almost the end, there is an overwhelming sense that something terrible is about to happen due to the Jackson's effective use of foreshadowing through the depiction of characters and setting. Effective foreshadowing builds anticipation for the climax and ultimately the main theme of the story - the pointless nature of humanity regarding tradition and cruelty.
Would you believe that there was once a village where everyone would partake in a terrible event, but think it was innocent because of how they blindly followed a tradition? The short story, “The Lottery,” by Shirley Jackson communicates this theme by showing how the villagers participate in a lottery every year. In life, there are people who follow tradition because they have to, or they are used to following without question. The author, Shirley Jackson, was born on December 14, 1916 in San Francisco, California. In 1937, Shirley Jackson attended Syracuse University where she began to write short stories.
...nizes the fish because, just like the fish, people fight daily battles to survive in life. This humanization of the fish enables the speaker to relate and respect him, and therefore, ultimately leads to his release.
The way a person behaves is a reflection of how and where they were raised. From birth, we are taught to behave a certain way and have certain family expectations that we must meet that will then play a key role in shaping our identity. But family is not the only factor that influences identity, friends and environment help shape our identity too. Family, friends and environment help shape our identity greatly from the beginning of life up till adulthood.