It is common knowledge to assume mourning over someone’s death. Grieving over one’s loss as well as recalling fond memories of the individual who has passed are just some of the conventional ways to mourn. However, in today’s day in age this solemn act of mourning has become grossly exploited when it comes to mourning of public figures. In Diana Taylor’s essay, “False Identifications” she goes into in depth analysis on precisely this and what that, in turn, says about society overall. This essay will compare the public acts of mourning of Princess Diana and Farrah Fawcett; in addition to contrasting the different roles the media has played between the twelve-year difference of the deaths.
In the year 1997, the tragic death of Princess Diana was felt by nearly everyone as her groundbreaking life screeched to a halt. Princess Diana despite living in the public eye and in turmoil at home, she devoted herself to humanitarian work. Furthermore, she broke traditions within the royal family and forevermore left her legacy on England’s monarchy and the English people alike. Parades of the grandest caliber were held by the royal family were published on TV and splattered on newsstands; mourning was even felt over seas as a New York graffiti artist Chico painted murals to pay tribute to her life. Grief indeed was being displayed everywhere in different ways, Taylor suggests the media is the reason for such widespread acts.
An interesting statement made by her is “Funerals have long served to channel and control grief. But this televised funeral, with its insistence on participation, seemed to provoke the very emotions it was designed to channel” (236). It is peculiar to consider how grief because of being televised seemed to spread eve...
... middle of paper ...
...ents draw us closer and even more so if we are constantly reminded of our loss. That is a power to recognize and the media should learn to use it more cautiously, and at least try to make it for the greater good of humanity, not just to capitalize on a death temporarily. For as the death of these major people in society left an everlasting mark the media can too contribute to making a difference. If the media can harness their collective power and channel it into more humanitarian efforts, then there is hope for them yet.
Works Cited
"Farrah Fawcett." 2010. Biography.com. 21 Jan 2010, 09:38 http://www.biography.com/articles/Farrah-Fawcett-9542358
Barrios, Barclay. "False Identifications." Emerging A Reader. 'Comp'. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2009. Print.
McNamara, Mary. "Farrah Fawcett: a legacy bigger than her hair." Los Angeles Times 26 Jun 2009, Print.
Joan Didion’s reaction to when her husband passes away is characteristically American because of how she is unable to cope with her husband’s death. “[She] would still get up in the morning and send out the laundry. [She] would still plan a menu for Easter lunch. [She] woul...
Throughout this essay I will use the theories surrounding power, spectacle and memory to analysis and explain the controversy surrounding Jimmy Savile, with the child/sexual abuse crimes that have come to light since his passing. I have chosen to use this example, as not only does it show the three elements in action but also shows the spectacle falling apart leading to the failure of the other elements. To do this I will explore power by focusing on celebrity culture and how he manipulated that, leading to exploring the spectacle he created by his charity work, which served as a smoke screen. Memory will be explored by contrasting the views and opinions of people before and after these crimes had come to light, how he manipulated people’s memory of him compared to people seeing through it after the spectacle had been broken and the downfall of his power which came after his death.
The characters in Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones are faced with the difficult task of overcoming the loss of Susie, their daughter and sister. Jack, Abigail, Buckley, and Lindsey each deal with the loss differently. However, it is Susie who has the most difficulty accepting the loss of her own life. Several psychologists separate the grieving process into two main categories: intuitive and instrumental grievers. Intuitive grievers communicate their emotional distress and “experience, express, and adapt to grief on a very affective level” (Doka, par. 27). Instrumental grievers focus their attention towards an activity, whether it is into work or into a hobby, usually relating to the loss (Doka par. 28). Although each character deals with their grief differently, there is one common denominator: the reaction of one affects all.
I keep my journal hidden; the script, the drawings, the color, the weight of the paper, contents I hope never to be experienced by another. My journal is intensely personal, temporal and exposed. When opening the leather bound formality of Alice Williamson's journal a framework of meaning is presupposed by the reader's own feelings concerning the medium. Reading someone else's diary can be, and is for myself, an voyeuristic invasion of space. The act of reading makes the private and personal into public. Yet, for Alice Williamson and many other female journalists of the Civil War period, the journal was creating a public memory of the hardship that would be sustained when read by others. The knowledge of the outside reader reading of your life was as important as the exercise of recording for one's self; creating a sense of sentimentality connecting people through emotions. (Arnold)
...her and the more modern case of Brian Walski demonstrates the importance of ethics in the mass media. With the public dependent on photographers for images that will give an accurate and true representation of the facts, in some cases even leading to such important decisions as giving relief aid, waging war, or determining votes in an election, it is vitally important that journalistic images be true and unaltered likenesses of real persons and events. Even apparently innocent misrepresentations, designed to create a better image or better prove a point, can have serious consequences for the photographer, the subjects of the image, and the public. It is a reminder of the importance of honesty in all professions.
...for ratings and start trying to help the viewers that are watching your programming? How can the media bring better lives to the people affected by the events that they cover, instead of just showing their story and moving on? Will the media follow the families of the 370 tragedy as they did those in the Boston Marathon bombing? Will viewers 10 | P a g e
Earl Spencer remained a very reliable and credible source because he knew Diana very well. Some examples of logos shown in this article remained that Diana had eating disorders, and that the last time that Earl had seen Diana was for her birthday on July 1st in London. To explain the pathos, Earl Spencer tells about the sadness of Diana’s death and says how wonderful of a person she acted as, “People who never actually met her, feel that they too, lost someone close to them.” Anyone who has ever read this eulogy could feel the great amount of emotion that the brother had expressed for Diana. This article missed the mark because the author gets off of subject and talks more about the feelings of him and the people rather than about
...opped, choking with sobs, and, overcome by emotion, flung herself face downward on the bed, sobbing in the quilt” (223). The emotion of him were shown throughout the “Dead” and brought the individuals in society closer together through the dark times.
dealt with and the individual moves on. Susan Philips and Lisa Carver explored this grieving
Grief in media rarely goes in depth and is often rush often with little consideration to how it impacts people 's everyday lives. This may be a reflection of how grief is viewed in our society. Collectively people are uncomfortable with death and talking about it publicly. We rather acknowledged it as little as possible. The movie “My girl” takes on the unique plotline of grief and loss. The movie, taking place in a funeral home, touches on both tangible and symbolic loss. These losses are represented in numerous instances throughout the movie within the character development of the main cast.
During the early seventeenth century, poets were able to mourn the loss of a child publicly by writing elegies, or poems to lament the deceased. Katherine Philips and Ben Jonson were two poets who wrote the popular poems “On the Death of My Dearest Child, Hector Philips”, “On My First Son”, and “On My First Daughter” respectively. Although Philips and Jonson’s elegies contain obvious similarities, the differences between “On the Death of My Dearest Child” and “On My First Son” specifically are pronounced. The emotions displayed in the elegies are very distinct when considering the sex of the poet. The grief shown by a mother and father is a major theme when comparing the approach of mourning in the two elegies.
When Eveline’s mother died, she was immensely impacted. She saw how her mother acted and was treated by society. James Joyce writes, “She would not be treated as her mother had
Mourning could be applied to any couple pending separation, John Donne wrote his poem for his
Prince Earl Spencer, in his eulogy towards Diana, he expresses his feeling towards Diana's death. He speaks of this in order to honor Diana's life, and the impact she had on the world. He builds this by using ethos, pathos, and tone, in order to present to the audience that Diana was seen as an inspiration to everyone.
Katherine Philips is desperately trying to renew her faith in life, but she is struggling to do so because of the death of her son. She is attempting to justify the loss of her child as a form of consolation, while keeping somewhat emotionally detached to the later death of her stepson in “In Memory of F.P.” The differing phrases, words, and language contrast the two elegies and emphasize the loss and pain in “Epitaph” while diminishing the pain in “Memory of FP.”