The Things They Carried Discurse Essay Example for Free

The Things They Carried Discurse Essay â€Å"The Things They Carried† displays men in the heart of war trying maintain some sort of semblance of their normal lives.   The main character of the story, First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, spends a good deal of his time thinking about his love interest back at home.   In fact, the story opens by saying that he â€Å"carried letters from a girl named Martha†¦They were not love letters, but Lieutenant Cross was hoping, so he kept them folded in plastic at the bottom of his rucksack† (PAGE #). Immediately the reader is thrust into this world of war, and what is important to the men who live it.   There are countless different clichà ©s/sayings regarding how one can tell a lot about a man by X or Y (by the way he dresses, by the way he treats his mother, etc.); in this story, we can tell everything at the heart of a man by what he carries with him trekking through the jungles of Vietnam. Jimmy Cross is a dreamer; he spends his time fantasizing about building a life with a woman who hasn’t really expressed the same kind of interest in him, and who maintains a great deal of emotional distance from him.   But it is this idea of a â€Å"normal† life, a life in which he can focus on marriage and children and just life, a life he hopes to return to after the war.   The thought of Martha, as well as her letters, acts as a beacon of normalcy for him, and it is what he feels he must cling to for his own survival. Jimmy ultimately ends up shunning his own need of maintaining some sort of focus on life outside of the war because he feels his own incessant daydreaming was the cause of another soldier’s death; in a great symbolic gesture, he burns her letters and her pictures, turning his back on any hope he clung to of a normal life and vowing to be the solider he failed to be: â€Å"Henceforth, when he thought about Martha, it would only be to think that she belonged elsewhere.   He would shut down the daydreams.    This was not Mount Sebastian, it was another world†¦a place where men died because of carelessness and gross stupidity†¦He was not determined to perform his duties firmly and without negligence† (PAGE #).   Jimmy is so shaken by the experience of witnessing one of his men’s death that it forces him to become a different person—in a sense, to adapt, and to become hard and cold.   As much as his daydreaming was for his own survival before, his hardened personality after the death of Ted Lavender is as well. The use of Ted Lavender’s name and story is the dominant theme throughout the story.   O’Brien uses Lavender’s tragic demise as a constant reminder of the horrors of war.   Throughout the whole story, in the middle of what might seem to be a casual description of various items being â€Å"humped† by the men, O’Brien drops Lavender’s name attached to a reminder of how he was shot.   This occurs towards the beginning, when the narrator is describing the different things the men carried: â€Å"Ted Lavender, who was scared, carried tranquilizers until he was shot in the head outside the village of Than Khe in mid-April† (PAGE #). His name is brought up repeatedly throughout with this same kind of cryptic reminder of his death.   When referring to how everyone had to carry a poncho, it is noted that it â€Å"weighed almost two pounds, but it was worth every ounce.   In April, for instance, when Ted Lavender was shot, they used his poncho to wrap him up†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (PAGE #). This name-dropping of Ted Lavender throughout the story is an effective tool that O’Brien utilizes the emphasize the point that this man died.   The deeper-lying message behind the use of Lavender’s demise as a running metaphor is that people die in war; it is terrifying; these men are children (with the Lieutenant being a mere 22 years old) and they’re scared and they want to go home, and these things they carry they keep because it makes them feel safe and reminds them a little of home. There is emphasis in the story about how their constant marching and their humping of endless items from village to village seemed pointless to them—as pointless as Ted Lavender’s life ending.   â€Å"By daylight they took sniper fire, at night they were mortared, but it was not battle, it was just the endless march, village to village, without purpose, nothing won or lost†¦They had no sense of strategy or mission.   They searched villages without knowing what to look for†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (PAGE #). These men, who have to hump a great many number of items (of both the personal and the protective nature) from one place to the next to the next, are being shipped off to war without a clear sense of what it is they’re doing there and are sacrificing their lives without really understanding what their lives are being sacrificed for.    They do what they are told because they are told to do it, and because they are too afraid not to: â€Å"Men killed, and died, because they were embarrassed not to.   It was what had brought them to the war in the first place, nothing positive, no dreams of glory or honor, just to avoid the blush of dishonor.   They died so as not to die of embarrassment† (PAGE #).   These young men were dying for little other reason that they knew of besides that they felt that they had to. O’Brien’s message throughout this story is clear: war is terrifying.   O’Brien uses the lists of what they had to carry with them to illustrate the heavy burden each of them had to hump around everywhere they went, with the underlying theme that the things they carried physically were nothing in comparison to the things they each carried around with them emotionally.    All of them were scared for their lives; all of them wanted to go home.   Much of their personal belongings were things that would remind them of home, that would possibly allow them to escape for brief moments (like Jimmy Cross did with Martha’s letters) and fantasize about the lives they could and did have outside of this war, reminding them that there is still another world outside of Vietnam.   Many of the men carried with them the hope of a safe return; many more carried with them the fear that there wouldn’t be one for them. O’Brien is very careful to allow these characters’ lives (and one death) speak for themselves.   He uses their example of their experience in war to speak for a greater number of young men across the country who had been shipped off to Vietnam to die without understanding why.   Part of O’Brien’s message is that these experiences—the hopes, the fears, the daily terror and the struggle to combat it—are universal, and can universally be applied to anyone who has been through war.   The bottom line is that war is hell, it is terrifying, and no amount of pride or glory can change that, and whether or not the war was being fought for the â€Å"right† reasons (a big debate during the Vietnam conflict) couldn’t change that either. O’Brien is largely concerned with the pointlessness of all of it, and he succeeds in making his point effectively by using these very poignant lists of things the men carried and for what reasons to hammer his point home.   He is able to do so without being preachy or pedantic; the story is so simple that the message becomes just as simple.   Whether or not you support war, you cannot deny that the men fighting it are forced to live through things that the rest of us would rather not know about.   We would rather remain in our self-deluded bubble in which we understand war only as far as its being for freedom, for honor, for the greater good†¦we would rather be spared the knowledge of the blood loss and the body counts.   Not to mention the terror.   We would rather not hear the story of the Ted Lavenders, but O’Brien insists that we have to. Works Cited O’Brien, Tim.   â€Å"The Things They Carried.†Ã‚   (1986) [NAME OF ANTHOLOGY.] Ed. [NAME OF EDITOR(S) OF ANTHOLOGY.]   (DATE OF ANTHOLOGY’S PUBLICATION.)

Portrayal of Man in Dostoevskys The Brothers Karamazov Essay example -

Portrayal of Man in The Brothers Karamazov  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚      Debauchery, dueling, infidelity, orgies, and even monastery life are all used to help Fyodor Dostoevesky define his characters in The Brothers Karamazov. At the beginning of the novel, the reader becomes filled with contempt for a few members of the Karamazov family, yet filled with admiration for others. The legitimate members of the Karamasov family each represent a separate aspect of human character, which is applicable to society. In some ways the characters resemble separate factions and cliques of society that most often argue, but together can be productive. This is shown not by direct implication, but rather the reader discovers the fact on their own by becoming infuriated at the stupidity of the Karamazov men. This anger leads to the realization that in many ways, they themselves are in some ways similar to them.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Fyodor Pavlovich Karamasov is the patriarch of the family. A shrewd businessman, Fyodor is very self-centered and cares more for himself than anyone else. He is a brilliant man for making deals and increasing his wealth, but manages to be oblivious of manners and societal rules. A tendency to act is an enormous fault in him, and he leaves an impression of having no deeply personal feelings, only overzealous acting to fit his "role" at any given time. When Fyodor's first wife dies Dostoevesky explains, "What seemed to gratify and flatter him most was to play the ridiculous part of the injured husband and to parade his woes with embellishments"(4). Because he has little, if any personal feelings, this enables him be indifferent towards others' emotions. Happiness is the only cause worth pursuing to Fyodor, and he will cross anyone to achieve it. Wh... ...e in their own ways. When searching for separate goals, and conflicting with each other, they can accomplish very little. The more inner-conflict within the family, the more problems they seem to find themselves in. These men, representing different aspects of society and humankind, have problems that they cannot solve on their own. If the Karamazov's were to work together towards a common goal, much could become accomplished, just as society could solve many conflicts through teamwork and cooperation. The characters in the novel The Brothers Karamazov show the reader that most societal conflicts are unnecessary and could easily be remedied through understanding and patience. WORKS CITED Dostoevesky, Fyodor Mikhailovich. The Brothers Karamazov. The Constance   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Garnett Translation revised by Ralph E. Matlaw. New York: W. W. Norton   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  & Company Inc., 1976

Erythrocyte sedimentation rate

Instructions: Read the information below. Do not simply answer the questions!! You will hand in your work on a separate piece of paper. Please put your information in paragraph form. Include any information you have found which helped you to answer your questions. The better Job you do of explaining your results, the more points you will receive. Best wishes and remember to cite all resources! A 34-year-old male from India presents with slowly progressive discovered skin attaches and nodules accompanied by a strange deformity of the nose.The patient has a history of nasal stuffiness and some nasal discharge which is slightly bloody; he also reports loss of libido. A physical examination reveals the following: leonine faces; loss of eyebrows and eyelashes; nodules on the sclera; a depressed nasal bridge; adipose fat deposits in the breast; testicular atrophy; many symmetrical, flat, discovered areas on the skin without defined borders; numerous nodules & broad, raised areas on the ski n; partial loss of pinprick and temperature sensation; no noticed changes; symmetrically enlarged lunar and common personal nerves.A blood work-up was ordered and the CB showed mild anemia. The erythrocyte sedimentation rate was slightly elevated. Swabs were taken from the skin patches and they revealed numerous acid-fast bacilli on modified ZEN staining. 1. What disease does this patient have? (be specific! ) 2. What Is the causative organism? 3. What are some of the complications seen associated with this disease? 4. What Is the mode of transmission of this disease? 5. What Is the recommended treatment for this disease?

Black Lives Matter Mission - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 1 Words: 397 Downloads: 4 Date added: 2019/04/02 Category Society Essay Level High school Tags: Black Lives Matter Essay Did you like this example? What comes to mind when you hear the Black Lives Matter movement? There are many different assumptions and conceptions on what the Black Lives Matter movement is, and the purpose of the organization. Knowing the history and the facts and comparing it to the Civil Rights movement may change your viewpoint on both movements. Although both movements strongly impacted the African American society to improve equality and to diminish police brutality, racial hatred, and prejudices. The Black Lives Matter movement was established in 2013, this movement was orchestrated by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi. The movement shortly began after the death of Trayvon Martin a 17 year old who was stereotyped and murdered by neighborhood watch member George Zimmerman, because he was wearing a black hoodie, and carrying a bag of skittles through a dark winter night (#Black). Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Black Lives Matter Mission" essay for you Create order The Black Lives Matter movement aroused even the more when Mike Brown a young 18 year old African American male who was fatally shot on August 9, 2014 by police officer Darren Wilson who shot a total of twelve rounds, with six of them hitting Brown. Brown allegedly was shot trying to run away from Officer Wilson, after a previous tuggle that occurred a few moments prior to his death between him and officer Wilson. Officer Wilson allegedly felt that his life was endangered by the unarmed teen, and killed the young man diminishing his life and innocence as a young adult. This tragedy led to the burnings of business and turmoil that Ferguson Missouri (#Black). The Black Lives Matter movement is geared more towards ending police brutality towards African Americans mainly towards African American males. In the society that we live in today African American males are a the lead target by police, either it being the color of their skin, the saggy pants, or even the way that they dress or look. Statistics has shown that 62.7% of unarmed African Americans are killed by cops each year (Lopez). To end police brutality and to put a stop to racial injustice, the organization Blexit was formed.Blexit, a movement and organization that debuted in July, of 2016. Blexit was strategically organized by kanye West and Candice Owens. Both West and Owens organized this movement to push towards black independence and equality. Blexit aims for civil disobedience, economic boycotting, and to put more investments into black own businesses.