Alice Walker's Beauty: When The Other Dance Is The Self

The societal expectations for beauty are an ingrained concept amongst the minds of almost every individual, who in turn project these standards on each other and their own children. Throughout her adolescence, Walker seeks for validation of her beauty through others. “When I rise to give my speech I do so on a great wave of love and pride and expectation.” (Walker 2). Walker was seeking a reaction from her audience as she read her Easter speech to her church; a reaction of approval and admiration, which then confirmed her “cuteness”. The emotional toil brought upon by the accident caused Walker to go into a dark place of unacceptance of herself. She did poorly in school, was bullied in school, and kept her head down for several years of her life because of the shame she felt from the appearance of her eye. “I tell it I hate and despise it. I do not pray for sight. I pray for beauty.” (Walker 5). At twelve years-old, Walker talks about the eye that has gone blind and development of her self-unacceptance can be seen here. The lack of concern she had about the function of her eye, but rather the aesthetics, shows how dependent Walker was on in achieving societal standards.

In Alice Walker's "Beauty: When the Other Dancer Is the Self”, her view of beauty changes through different stages of her life. In her childhood Walker has a misunderstanding of beauty. She is concerned with superficial signs of beauty and fails to appreciate her inner beauty. A tragic mishap as a young child leaves her right eye blind and deformed. She enters a period of depression her life, living her life in shame and disappointment because she believes her beauty to be lost. Even getting surgery as an adult doesn’t help defeat her demons. She continues to struggle until she finds her inner beauty through her daughter’s love. As a child, Alice Walker got her definition of beauty from her family, in her teens she turned to her peers to define beauty, her perception finally changed again in adulthood when she discovered an inner beauty.

In the essay, “Beauty: When the Other Dance is the Self “, Alice Walker describes how her identity is affected when a traumatic accident occurs that mangled her eye and took her eye sight. One been confidence in her looks she felt exalted by those around her. After her accident occurred she struggled with accepting her new appearance and the consequences that came along with it. Walker became insecure which cause she to feel disregarded, and misunderstood. After years of pain, she got her “glob” removed which helped her gain her self-confidence but still felt overlooked and unnoticed by the people around her. Walker’s journey is proof that accidents can cause changes that you must accept. Although she felt overlooked by adults in her life, she finally embraced her scar, “imperfection”, when a child saw the real beauty in her eye.

My paper literary artist Alice walker and visual artist Van Goth are best artist in the world, they have many similar things and different things, they are come from different century, different country, they have different family background, they have different work and life. People have different views on them. They both well know and both have a lot of fans in the world. Compared their difference and similar, life and work. We could links the two lives and their work together.

Alice Walker is a very well-known and well respected author, she worked as a teacher, social worker, and lecturer, and took part in the 1960s Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi. Alice Walker’s life greatly impacted her monumental writing style, many of her stories have a young female character who is learning and maturing through different experiences such as the concept of death. Taking part in the Civil Rights Movement shows her bravery and that she will fight for what is right under all costs. This shows in her writing because her protagonists and usually very brave and strong through difficult times. Two famous short stories of Alice Walker are “The Flowers” and “To Hell with Dying”, although these stories have developed different

A form of adversity is in Alice Walker’s essay, “Beauty: When the Other Dancer Is the Self”, it shows how a person’s perception of everything is always greatly influenced by their past experiences. Walker uses various elements throughout her writing to show her outlook towards her appearance. Walker uses the incident that happened in her childhood to show that a persons mindset can be changed by a experience and how her attitudes changes from a sassy, conceited kid to a matured and powerful women who finally sees beauty in her life. Alice Walker’s essay is a great example of a person whose fear of adversity allowed themselves to be worn down by it. She begins the story with a cocky outlook on life where she knows she is beautiful. “I’m the prettiest!” (Alice Walker), as a young child she would use her

There a multiple things that can make an effective narrative essay, this can include interesting and consistent dialogue, attention to details, particularly sensory details, and the story in which the author decided to write about. These are all things that help Alice Walker’s Beauty: When the Other Dancer is the Self become an effective narrative essay. As with anything though, there are things that could have been improved such as the amount of things she attempted to talk about and how long it took to explain the point of the paper.

Cultural Identity Essay Directions: Using your knowledge on writing MLA formatted essays, write the cultural identity synthesis essay below. One source once stated, “Children begin to develop a sense of identity as individuals and as members of groups from their earliest interactions with others” (Trumbull and Pacheco 9). People should examine their own culture in order to better understand how it affects their identity and perceptions. In order to understand one’s cultural identity, he or she needs to understand what the term means. According to one source, cultural identity can be defined as “[t]he system of understanding characteristics of that individual’s society, or of some subgroup within that society.

Growing in a safe environment and thinking the world is under your control when you are young can make you confident and express yourself. This comfort zone is not forever, and when something that was not expected occurs, it brings the ideal world down and can change your daily life. Going from the happiest stage of life to a drastic and dramatic tragedy can change someone’s views about how confident he or she is. Not being able to accept how different you are now because something that changed in the outside can intimidate the talented, smart person on the inside. Realizing and analyzing other people’s imperfections makes you see how you are not the only one who has something that you do not want other people to see or criticize. Analyzing the story in “Beauty: When the Other Dancer is the Self” by Alice Walker, her character explores how the theme of the story develops from the beginning, middle, and the end of the story.

Despite Alice’s home and complexion, the narrator notices more than just her bad side. Alice is seen as “real” and has “beauty.” Her beauty, mentioned three times, was not strictly physical, but also internal. This internal beauty is shown when the narrator says “beauty of her soul” yet the narrator still sees her as a “beautiful-bad woman.” Alice’s laughter is also mentioned multiple times and included in her beauty. The narrator showed admiration for Alice’s kindness by including when Alice attended to her oldest son who needed a wheelchair. The story says Alice “stayed with him for hours giving him her love, filling him with laughter.” These actions were what the narrator was fond of in Alice. Although when the narrator grew up, these feelings

One way in which Dee gets in a conflict with her family, it’s when she toll her Mama that she changed her name to Wangero. Momma never expected her daughter to change her name after all generations, even knowing that her new name was Wangero she always called her Dee. Most of their discussions where, because Dee was lady with a different lifestyle that Maggie and Mama had. The basic conflict was the personality that Dee had, she seems like a arrogant daughter that don’t appreciate what her mother do for her. Most of the time, Dee said things that make Maggie and Mama felt bad of what they were.

“Beauty: when the dancer is the self” the story of Alice Walker and a devastating time of her life. The family life of Mrs. Walker and how things are ran in the household tend to play a part of the truth of the “accident”. The real truth behind the accident and how Alice’s life begins to change. The way Alice copes with the accident is not good for her or her family. However, there is more than just the ugliness of her eye that bugs her.

A look at some of the women in Walker's earlier works, who, like Celie, are victims of sexual and communal abuse, and who are sometimes victims of their own minds, reveals that Celie is not substantially different from them and that the culmination may be the reaffirmation of many old stereotypes rather than the assertion of a new identity.

Each writer has their own individual and distinct writing style which is unique to their own work. Most authors use distinctive methods to connect with their readers on a personal level. Although many authors do not succeed in fully being able to capture the attention of the typical reader, one famous author is known for her abilities to strengthen the bonds between her work and her reader. Her name is Alice Walker. She has won many awards for her unique and effective writing methods which have captured the attention of millions of readers worldwide. Walker is a novelist, poet, and even an activist. She is an influential person as she has mastered many fields of literature. Nonetheless, she has experienced many adventures throughout her life

An unknown author from thethingswesay.com once said, “Beauty is the opposite of perfection--it’s about confidence, charisma and character.” For many people, women especially, this concept seems unrealistic. In the autobiography “Beauty: When the dancer is the self” by Alice Walker, she identifies with this perception of life and applies it to the societal views of beauty. Through her autobiography, she sets the stage by explaining her childhood, beginning with her sassy and independent nature as a two and a half-year-old. Proceeding several years later, she describes her pain from being shot in the eye by her brother and the cover-up that altered their relationship. Next came the feelings of diffidence and timidity from the accident, that led to her physical and mental decline. Finally, the acceptance of past events, followed by, the ability to see “the world in her eye” (Walker 40) enables Walker to value herself and spread the message of self-acceptance. Using the pain felt from that shot, both mental and physical, she is able to define a new chapter in her life and become an award-winning novelist. By writing to a broad audience, she is able to make a greater impact as she delves into the process of taking pain and despair and transforming it into self-celebration. In Walker’s essay, she addresses this reoccurring theme by employing structural preferences, logical appeals and the use of imagery to cultivate a powerful message of personal growth.