Freedom, Patriarchy, and Racial Oppression
The French philosopher Jean-Paul Sarte is known to have established existentialism in France after the liberation of Paris in 1944. Existentialism is the philosophy that states that the values people choose influences the choices they make and how they interpret the meanings of their decisions. When existentialism was introduced in the United States, it challenged Americans to access their ethical standards from a different perspective.
America is associated with being "The land of the free". However, the American society has set standards on women's roles and racial castes and until these oppressions are eliminated the entire society will never have freedom. What is freedom? Freedom, as defined by Krisnamurti, is a state of mind in which there is no fear or compulsion, no urge to be secure. In the American society there is a need for security and there is fear. People conform to society's ideas to feel secure and fear being different, fear thinking on their own to set their own standards and choose their own values. Sartre's existentialist view of freedom is that it preexists value choices. Because people do not freely choose and follow their values, society creates ideals that control their views in life. These ideals are supposed to maintain order in society by showing everyone their place, but these ideals displace what society should stand for and prevent people from freedom. Should people follow societybs norm or become existentialists and think on their own?
Society has set limits on gender roles with ideals such as male privilege and patriarchy. Patriarchy is the political structure to control womenbs thoughts on their sexuality, laboring, and place in society so...
... middle of paper ...
... the exact abilities that they have and that those views and values weakening society. They could choose new values that would allow equal opportunity for all people and a better society would be able to come into existence. Minorities could use an existentialist perspective to improve their standards of themselves.
The American ideals on patriarchy, male privilege, and race will continue to oppress the entire society from freedom until these views can be changed as people realize what freedom really is. People must first free themselves from society's views by realizing that they have a negative affect on everyone. They must freely choose their own values. When people in society assess their ethical standards from a new perspective and become existentialist, freedom will preexist value choices and people will choose values with the equality of everyone in mind.
Intro with Thesis: A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is a novel by Alexander Solzhenitsyn that documents totalitarian communism through the eyes of an ordinary prisoner in a Soviet labor camp. This story describes the protagonist, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, as he freezes and starves with the other prisoners, trying to survive the remainder of his ten-year sentence. In this story, Solzhenitsyn uses the struggles in the camp as a way to represent the defaults of the Soviet Union under Stalin’s regime. By doing this, Solzhenitsyn uses authoritative oppression in his labour camps to demonstrate the corrupt nature of the Soviet system.
One day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is not a book about a superhuman. It is not a story about someone who is weaker and more desperate than everyone else. It is not a tale of greatness, nor is it about extraordinary faults. Instead, Aleksander Solzhenitsyn chose to center his story around Ivan denisovich Shukhov, an average, unnoticeable Russian prisoner.
Who could possibly be able to imagine the utter hopelessness and misery that a soviet prisoner experienced during Stalinism. Thousands of innocent men were taken from their families, homes, and lives, stripped of their dignity and banished to the harsh labor camps where they were to spend the rest of the days scraping out an existence and living day to day. This is exactly what Alexander Solzhenitsyn tries to express in his masterpiece work One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. Solzhenitsyn gives the reader a glimpse into the life of every man who ever experienced this hardship and shares the small acts of thriving humanity that are sparingly, but unendingly passed through their dreary lives and offer a bit of comfort to help them get through a single hour, a day, or even just a meal time. Solzhenitsyn uses One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich to portray the endurance of humanity through out terrible hardships and shows the strength of the human spirit.
Solzhenitsyn believed that it was nearly impossible to have truly free thoughts under the prison camp conditions described in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, or in any situation where there is an authoritarian ruler. In a pris...
The novel, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, presents moral issues, and daily dehumanization of men living in a camp in Russia in 1951. Ivan Denisovich, the protagonist in the novel spoke out against Stalin, and was then put in a prison camp because of it. The novel presents a terrible situation in which Ivan must overcome daily circumstances, which only a person living in a prison camp would know how to survive. The tone and mood of the novel are able to work together to show the theme of the novel, that human self-respect is achieved as long as one is still holding onto it.
The article under review is Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in the DSM-5: Controversy, Change, and Conceptual Considerations by Anushka Pai, Alina M. Suris, and Carol S. North in Behavioral Sciences. Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a mental health problem that some people develop after experiencing or witnessing a life-threatening event, like combat, a natural disaster, a car accident, or sexual assault (U.S. Department VA, 2007). PTSD can happen to anyone and many factors can increase the possibility of developing PTSD that are not under the person’s own control. Symptoms of PTSD usually will start soon after the traumatic event but may not appear for months or years later. There are four types of symptoms of PTSD but may show in different
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder is defined by our book, Abnormal Psychology, as “an extreme response to a severe stressor, including increased anxiety, avoidance of stimuli associated with the trauma, and symptoms of increased arousal.” In the diagnosis of PTSD, a person must have experienced an serious trauma; including “actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violation.” In the DSM-5, symptoms for PTSD are grouped in four categories. First being intrusively reexperiencing the traumatic event. The person may have recurring memories of the event and may be intensely upset by reminders of the event. Secondly, avoidance of stimuli associated with the event, either internally or externally. Third, signs of mood and cognitive change after the trauma. This includes blaming the self or others for the event and feeling detached from others. The last category is symptoms of increased arousal and reactivity. The person may experience self-destructive behavior and sleep disturbance. The person must have 1 symptom from the first category, 1 from the second, at least 2 from the third, and at least 2 from the fourth. The symptoms began or worsened after the trauma(s) and continued for at least one
When Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich in 1962, he crossed political barriers in his explanation of the Siberian prison camp. Through his character Ivan Denisovich, Solzhenitsyn shows us a normal day in the camp. The book has no chapters, so it is like the reader is spending the day with Ivan. Through this day, he tells of the people, the life conditions, what things are to be done and what things are not to be done. One Day. . . takes us from the wake up call to lights out, with only meals and work between. Nevertheless, because this is only one day, it is hard to really know and understand the characters. Yet, Solzhenitsyn uses flashbacks to show the different sides to his character Ivan Denisovich.
Being a military member in the armed forces across all branches will have a positive and negative impact in both personal and professional areas of life. All military members take the oath of enlistment before they join it is a requirement before attending basic training. What most service members do not realize is that they are completely oblivious to the road that lies ahead of them. Most people join the military for a number a personal reason such as money, education, and a sense of stability. Others may join the military in hopes of being a part of something greater than themselves, they may see it as a chance to serve their country. No matter what drives one to join the armed forces it is safe to say that they will encounter both good
Military background and history has been in the world for a long time. It goes back as far as Assyrians, Spartans, Aztecs, Romans and Greek. The military purpose is mainly to protect our country and our rights and freedoms. It’s just a part of nature. No one came up with military it just happened and got stronger and stronger over the years. It first started with random people coming together protecting towns and homes and families, and eventually more and more people came together. The three main branches of the military are The Army, Navy, and Marine Corps. All three of these branches are the reason the U.S is how it is. These branches fight for our freedom, our rights, and our country!! (Robbie Hughes Interview)
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich focuses on totalitarian oppression and camp survival. The Gulag was a correct labor camp and settlement which almost entirely stripped the prisoners’ identity and dignity. The food rations were scarce among the prisoners, and the inadequate clothing and uninsulated housing were barbarous acts committed by this system. Various efforts to completely dehumanize the prisoners are articulated in this novel. While most of the prisoners were victims of dehumanization, Shukov and Alyosha were still able to preserve their identity, dignity, and humanity.
Existentialism is a term that was coined specifically by Jean-Paul Sartre in regards to his own life. Sartre had adopted the Atheistic approach to life and its meaning, and while he was not the first or only one to do so, was the first and only one to come up with a way to describe it. Under Existentialism, man lives without higher power or guidance and must rely solely on himself and what he is aiming to do in order to lead a fulfilling life. This can be anything. Critics of Sartre propose that, because such a vast array of options exists within the meaningfulness of life, this philosophy is obsolete and trivial in nature. This is not true, as it is seen in everyday examples – celebrities, namely – that a thirst
This is particularly palpable in the phenomenon of gender roles. “Oversimplified conceptions pertaining to our behavior as females or males,” gender roles boil down our gender and anatomical performance into categories of “boy” or “girl” (Basow 3). Patriarchy then builds systemic inequality off this simplistic binary foundation, attaching “male” to spheres of power and “female” to spheres of powerlessness. Gender roles are one of many patriarchal infrastructures that thrive off a concrete definition of gender and/or sex, and so modern feminism has found power in dismantling both constructions.
On the other hand, the military lifestyle carries much more responsibility than the civilian lifestyle. There is always the threat of heading into a combat zone and having to risk your life. You have to be on time to work, there are no "I got stuck in traffic" excuses. You must always be well-groomed, and live up to the working and presentation standards of your specific military branch. You never have the option of saying "no" or just quitting
The novel focuses on one man, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, as he tries to survive another day in the Soviet Union with dignity and compassion. The action takes place at a prison camp in Russia in the northeastern region called Ekibastuz. The location is pounded by snow, ice and winds of appalling and shocking force during winter and lasted for many weeks. The camp is very isolated as it consists double rows of barbed wire fencing around the entire area, making sure it is fully concealed and private, so that no prisoners can escape. The conditions of the camp are very harsh. It is a union where camp prisoners have to earn their food by working hard in their inadequate clothing during the extremely cold weather. Living conditions are almost unbearable; heavy mattresses do not include sheets, as an alternative it is stuffed with sawdust, prisoners only eat two hundred grams of bread per meal and guards would force prisoners to remove their clothing for body searches at temperatures of forty below zero. The building walls are covered in dull and monotonous white paint and it was untidy and unpleasant. “It’s constant chaos, constant crowds and constant confusion” shows that ceilings are most likely coated with frost and men at the tables are packed as tight and it was always crowded. Rats would diddle around the food store, because of the incredibly unhygienic and filthy environment the camp is and it was so insanitary that some men would die from horrible diseases. “Men trying to barge their way through with full trays” suggests that the living conditions are very harsh indeed and mealtimes would be chaotic, as every famished men would be rushing to receive food. However, not only did the place cause the prisoners to suffer and lose their...