Thursday, November 28, 2019

Catcher In The Rye Holden And His Phony Family The Protagonist, Holden

Catcher in the Rye Holden and His "Phony" Family The protagonist, Holden Caulfield, interacts with many people throughout J.D. Salinger's novel The Catcher in the Rye, but probably none have as much impact on him as certain members of his immediate family. The ways Holden acts around or reacts to the various members of his family give the reader a direct view of Holden's philosophy surrounding each member. How do Holden's different opinions of his family compare and do his views constitute enough merit to be deemed truth? Holden makes reference to the word "phony" forty-four separate times throughout the novel (Corbett 68-73). Each time he seems to be referring to the subject of this metaphor as -- someone who discriminates against others, is a hypocrite about something, or has manifestations of conformity (Corbett 71). Throughout The Catcher in the Rye, Holden describes and interacts with various members of his family. The way he talks about or to each gives you some idea of whether he thinks they are "phony" or normal. A few of his accounts make it more obvious than others to discover how he classifies each family member. From the very first page of the novel, Holden begins to refer to his parents as distant and generalizes both his father and mother frequently throughout his chronicle. One example is: "?my parents would have about two hemorrhages apiece if I told anything personal about them. They're quite touchy about anything like that, especially my father. They're nice and all ? I'm not saying that ? but they're also touchy as hell" (Salinger 1). Holden's father is a lawyer and therefore he considers him "phony" because he views his father's occupation unswervingly as a parallel of his father's personality. For example, when Holden is talking to Phoebe about what he wants to be when he grows up, he cannot answer her question and proceeds to give her his opinion about their father's occupation.. ?Lawyers are all right, I guess ? but it doe sn't appeal to me,' I said. ?I mean they're all right if they go around saving innocent guys' lives all the time, and like that, but you don't do that kind of stuff if you're a lawyer. All you do is make a lot of dough and play golf and play bridge and buy cars and drink Martinis and look like a hot-shot. How would you know you weren't being a phony? The trouble is, you wouldn't' (Salinger 172). When Holden describes his mom, he always seems to do so with a sense of compassion yet also with a jeering tone. Holden makes his mom sound predictable and insincere. These phony qualities are shown in two different examples when Holden is hiding in the closet of D.B.'s room as his mom walks in to tuck in Phoebe: ?Hello!' I heard old Phoebe say. ?I couldn't sleep. Did you have a good time?' ?Marvelous,' my mother said, but you could tell she didn't mean it. She doesn't enjoy herself much when she goes out. ?'Good night. Go to sleep now. I have a splitting headache,' my mother said. She gets headaches quite frequently. She really does (Salinger 177-178). The first two examples are excellent illustrations of how Holden classifies people as phonies. However, when it comes to Holden's older brother, D.B., more analysis is needed to derive Holden's true feelings about his brother. Holden seems to respect his older brother somewhat but cannot tolerate the imposed false image brought on by D.B.'s career choice as a screen-play writer. For example, this sense of respect is shown when D.B. takes Holden and Phoebe to see Hamlet: "He treated us to lunch first, and then he took us. He'd already seen it, and the way he talked about it at lunch, I was anxious as hell to see it, too" (Salinger 117). Holden feels that all movies and shows are false, absurdly exaggerated portrayals of reality and subsequently because his brother takes part in these perversions of realism, he is a "phony." He's in Hollywood. That's isn't too far from this crumby place, and he comes over and visits me practically every week end?He's got a lot of dough, now. He

Sunday, November 24, 2019

Progressive Era

Progressive Era The Progressive Era was a period of drastic reform in the United States. The 17th Amendment of 1913 reformed the direct election of Senators by putting the power of the vote in the hands of the people. The 18th Amendment of 1919 placed the prohibition of liquor because of the social and political temperance movements advocating this government regulation. The 19th Amendment of 1920 finally granted women's suffrage by giving women the right to vote in government elections. All three of these amendments reformed problems that Progressives called for after the nationwide depression from 1893 to 1897.The 17th Amendment of 1913 took power of electing the senators of a state from the state legislature and placed it in the hands of the people of state. Many city and state governments were controlled by dishonest business executives and politicians who tried to block economic reforms and with a direct primary election, the command of elections would be in complete control of the citizens.Sup ernatural Fairy Tales: The Progressive Rock EraThe progressive movement was initiated by liberals in both political parties, the fight for government reform can be traced back to Liberal Republicans(An Oxymoron, Mr. Jetel?) during the Grant administration and Mugwumps. Citizens were enraged, with big businesses' growing influence in all branches of government and sought ways to purify it.Big Business was also a target of progressivism. During this time presidents like Roosevelt and William Howard Taft tried to regulate and control big business. Many well educated people of the time, as well as moderately prosperous businessmen and members of other professions(middle class) felt threatened by the increasing power of big business and the tycoons. These people were also disturbed by the Big business' influence in politics, making a mockery of the democratic system. Then with the failure of the interstate commerce act and the Sherman act, made big business look unstoppable. As the...

Thursday, November 21, 2019

News Media Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

News Media Analysis - Essay Example The audience was also involved with their input made through a live chat on the anchor’s Twitter page (foxnews.com). From the onset, the presentation was all inclusive with the guest granted equal chances to express their opinions on the Democrat – Republican divide. The target audience were adult voting Americans with guests discussing issues related to the upcoming US presidential elections. Being a morning show, the stories were too political with very minimal informative material. My opinion of a morning show is that it should get comprehensively informative with highlights of major news at the start of the bulletin and later focus on core topic of discussion. This was not the case with politics being the sole top of discussion. With several other issues touching and of significance to the audience totally ignored. With regards to the political ‘target audience’, the newscast did half justice. Evaluation into what would woo the Latino and women voters w as well disused with the guests providing comprehensive insights into the task ahead for the presidential candidates if they were to win these two constituencies. Sue Kelly who was representing the voice of the Republican Party and women voters provided a comprehensive statistical breakdown of the performance of women in congress over the years in relation to the GOP and the Democratic Party which was of only of intersect to find out, but also left viewers more informed. Chuck on the other hand made contributions that provided viewers with a chance to take a journey through the mind of a Latino voter and as it turned out, immigration was a major determinant of the voting patterns of the Hispanics. The broad cast was particularly very long with the political discussion lasting over 30 minutes which is not proper for a morning show that should always provide very brief and informative insights into the day’s main events and leave the viewers with the urge for more. That was not the case in this broadcast. The provision of viewers input through a live chat was of particular significance as it provided the all inclusiveness required in a political debate. There were five commercials and these were very appropriate as they all targeted an adult audience. Commercials on fitness were particularly relevant given the time of broadcast. The commercials were on fitness equipments, breakfast food products, cars and travel with one advert on a transatlantic airline. These commercials served the intended purpose of reaching the target audience since viewers of the show are adults who make purchase decisions on what their families have for breakfast, their fitness issues, travel options and the brand of car to purchase. The commercials were however few given the duration of the broadcast. There should have been numerous ads during the political discussion to break the monotony of argument that went on. The informality of the set was equally unappealing; the anchor con versed quite informally with very inappropriate interruptions that were mostly personal as the debate went on at some point telling one of the guests, Mr. Chuck about where and how young she was in 19988 when the later made reference to the year to provide historical information on the past administrations’