The Emancipation of Rita in Russell's Educating Rita Rita detests the inflexible attitudes of the working class people around her. She dislikes the conventions that prevented her from learning and thus gaining a better, freer life and a culture, too. Her husband is a good example for those attitudes because he doesn't want her to learn and doesn't understand why she wants to change because of intellectual reasons. For him, materialistic choices are most important. Rita finds these choices narrow. A better education could liberate her from conventional and help her to develop own potential. She is willing to change her whole personality. Rita intentionally meets Frank and tries to break away from the working class way of life. Frank however, cannot understand her working class origin, which can be seen as criticism because the educated, privileged class doesn't care for the less privileged, poor class. Before Rita manages to adapt to the 'new' culture, she becomes a "half-caste", neither belonging to the working nor to the middle class. At this point, she can only go forward hoping for better choices. She gradually becomes more self-confident and independent; speaks in an unnatural voice, imitates life-styles and adopts accepted opinions as well as a new culture. In order to escape from her working class background, Rita preferred literature to real life. Now literature is more important than her relationships to Frank. Being in despair, he had always been warning her not to forget the difference between real and imitation. Finally Rita understands that culture and education do not automatically bring happiness. She has just exchanged her culture, not being aware of loosing her original spontaneity and uniqueness. Now she is able to distinguish between acquired and personal wisdom. She has a choice and can decide what to do. To emancipate means setting someone free from social restrictions and the same applies to Rita. [304]
When he landed at Honolulu, Ball describes how he approached the "splendid view those high volcanic mountains that constitute all of the higher parts of all these Pacific Islands" (Traveler John Ball visits Hawaii in 1833). He describes the islands being 14 miles long on average and the height of the mountains being around 3,000 feet high. The climate of the tropical islands, unlike the contiguous states, was very high in temperature. When Ball landed, he met a Hollander who had been studying the climate the past four years before 1833. He mentioned that the lowest temperature in Hawaii 70 degrees and the highest being 85 degrees (Ball). Honolulu was the principal harbor visited on those islands which means that it was a stopping place or port for all vessels going to China (Ball). Studying Hawaii, Ball noticed a great deal of different cultures living on the islands.
Contrary to a common modern misconception, Lincoln did not believe that Negroes were equal to white men in regards to intellect or morals. In his fourth debate in Charleston, Illinois, he is direct...
Seeing Helen from the beginning,and the way she dresses, and the house she lived in, you would think she came from a wealthy family and has been raised to dress very elegant like, when in reality it’s the total opposite. Before Charles, Helen was raised in what you call a “ghetto” neighborhood. Her mother is a christian lady but her grandmother would not be scared to run over a human being. They have a two story frame home and associate with many people regardless of who they are and where they come from. You can assume Helen has a high school education seeing that she can read, write and spell. Helen has no work experience because she has been dependant on Charles. Because Charles pampered her with what she wanted, abused her and treated her with disrespect, she has changed her ways. Helen learns to work for what she wants, stand up for herself, keep her guard up even when not needed and not put up with any disrespect.
Abraham Lincoln’s original views on slavery were formed through the way he was raised and the American customs of the period. Throughout Lincoln’s influential years, slavery was a recognized and a legal institution in the United States of America. Even though Lincoln began his career by declaring that he was “anti-slavery,” he was not likely to agree to instant emancipation. However, although Lincoln did not begin as a radical anti-slavery Republican, he eventually issued his Emancipation Proclamation, which freed all slaves and in his last speech, even recommended extending voting to blacks. Although Lincoln’s feeling about blacks and slavery was quite constant over time, the evidence found between his debate with Stephen A. Douglas and his Gettysburg Address, proves that his political position and actions towards slavery have changed profoundly.
The passage portrays a power struggle in Laura’s upbringing and a young girl's attempt to establish her own identity. Laura is a caring and sensitive young person who struggles with her own and her family's perceptions of class difference. It is evident that Laura is self-consciousness regarding her own youth and inexperience with her encounter with the workmen, it brings a sense as that she has no or little control of the situation in the passage, soon loses her composure and the workmen become frustrated.
The story follows three girls- Jeanette, the oldest in the pack, Claudette, the narrator and middle child, and the youngest, Mirabella- as they go through the various stages of becoming civilized people. Each girl is an example of the different reactions to being placed in an unfamiliar environment and retrained. Jeanette adapts quickly, becoming the first in the pack to assimilate to the new way of life. She accepts her education and rejects her previous life with few relapses. Claudette understands the education being presented to her but resists adapting fully, her hatred turning into apathy as she quietly accepts her fate. Mirabella either does not comprehend her education, or fully ignores it, as she continually breaks the rules and boundaries set around her, eventually resulting in her removal from the school.
Freedom means to be able to do what one desires to do without being restricted from doing that action. In Kate Chopin’s book The Awakening, she displays how the protagonist, Edna, escapes from her relationship and society .She feels cornered by society and she is not satisfied with her relationship. Mr.Pontellier Edna’s husband does not treat her with respect, but as if she is a child. Edna is trying to get out of the relationship because she wants to be treated equally (Chopin). During the 1800s, oppression of women was beginning to happen more frequently with women not taking anymore of the unfair rights and actions toward women. Edna uses others distractions or hobbies to feel free away from everything else in her life. Throughout The Awakening, Edna’s obsession with water, playing music and just flat out leaving her family despite her children are her actions toward freedom. She finds these activities soothing and comfortable ,she is feel when she is around doing these things she can't be judged or told what to do. With her obsession with water it is a Her transcendalistic obsession with water and nature sooths her and releases the toxins from her life. With music being an interest of her, she plays it a lot throughout the book too, which is a symbol of something she does to escape from society. But all of these actions by Edna result in her suicide ,which is a way of freeing herself from everything that is constricting her in her life. Edna’s longing for freedom inspires many of her actions throughout The Awakening.
She strives to change classes, and although she is different from her working class peers, she still isn't ready to be accepted as middle class. She aims to reach her goal through an Open University course, yet naively thinks knowing what books to read and clothes to wear will allow her to immediately become accepted as part of her chosen social strata. Change is a major part of the play, affecting Rita in both positive and negative ways. It shows how the influence of education helps to bring about these changes, and how eventually Rita is able to overcome negative problems and settle on a happy balance. Rita is also molded by her tutor, Frank, and learns a great deal from him, whilst also teaching him in many ways.
When we first see Rita she is struggling to open Frank’s door, ‘…Come in, an’ it’ll go on forever… poor sod on the other side won’t be able to get in. And you won’t… get out,’ which symbolizes the fact that although he isn’t contented with his life he is unwilling and unsure about how to change it for the better. When she comes back for her second lesson she oils the door which represents her opening Frank’s eyes to the world around him. The fact the she always comes into Franks office and goes straight to the window, to look out at the proper students shows the audience what Rita wants to become; a proper student.
Helen’s early life was very much shaped by her loss and abandonment. The greatest loss Helen experienced was the death of her parents. As she was orphaned by the age of six, it left her with great grief, darkened childhood memories and bewilderment of where she truly belonged. She eventually found her position as a labourer in her uncle’s house. After working on her uncle’s farm for two years and being denied an opportunity for education, she faced the most significant abandonment in her life: being turned
Rita felt the need to conform to the way everyone around her lived their lives until she realised that there was a way out. The class antagonism that pressures Rita can be seen through language misunderstandings between Frank and Rita:
Sophie was now in a new country with a mother that was also new to her. She now most learn English and at the same time maintain a fluent Creole. But the most difficult thing is to get use to New York and her new surroundings because you no longer can be running around in the street and your parents are working day and night. There is no more freedom until you become an American (meaning more independent an liberal) in from of your mother eyes.
Eliza's never thought about becoming educated herself. Rita, on the contrary, wants to use education as a means of complete change, as the means by which people develop their potential. She succeeds in leaving her working class environment behind. Is education only liberating? As Rita adopts a new culture and becomes alienated, she might be regarded as limited, just like Frank, who has no understanding for people of a different class.
Rita eventually explains to Frank that she used to have the mentality that education was unimportant and useless and recently her views upon that have changed. This is why she decides to go to Frank in the first place. She wants to receive good scores on her final exams and Frank is supposed to help her better her essay writing skills. She is already the better student because of this. She already has a strong desire to learn and better herself and her exam scores.
... having overcome the limitations of her old world through education, and by recognizing the limitations of what she has acquired at the University, she finds herself in the same situation as Frank: in some sort of existential Australia where "everything is only just starting." She has choices to make, and it is her having grown beyond old forms of life that gives her the freedom to make these choices. This in the end is the essence of her education, and the essence of any liberal education as such: the knowledge-based ability to step back from all form of life, the capability to deliberate freely, and then to embark on a course of action that does not grow out of established patterns and unexamined impulses, but out of critical reflection and informed decisions. What Rita thanks Frank for at the end, and what has made him a "good teacher" during all her trials, is that he has helped her to get into this position: "You have given me a choice." Education, in other words, is liberation. It is the emancipation of a person from a state of being a mere extension of a given environment to an active agent who can choose who she or he will be: a potential creator of his or her own world.