Daniel Alarcón's The Contestant

In the novel, “Lady Q: The Rise and Fall of a Latin Queen” Reymundo Sanchez, talks about a woman’s perspective of her rough childhood experiences and how it led up to her being affiliated in one of the most notorious gangs in America, the Latin Kings. Sonia Rodriguez, was born into a low social economic class with very minimal opportunities. Not to mention, her household was not an ordinary house hold. In fact, it was a household filled with violence, drugs, no sense of love from her family members and abusive with no expectations of prosperity. Sonia was five years old when she was already having doubts about whether her mother loved her. At such a tender age, this little girl is having these thoughts about her mother not loving her demonstrates she would receive little or no love from her family. In fact, Sonia turned to receiving good academics to attempt and please her mom for love in return. This eventually fails, leading to her never getting that love from not just her mom, but the family. Sonia was viewed more as a scapegoat to the house hold then a family member. She was excessively punished for no reason with no trust from none of her family members. If something was occurring in the family for instance, her sister going out late or money missing she would the one to blame and severely punished, “She swore she hadn’t stolen from either Juan or her mother and continued to maintain her innocence even through the beatings she received whenever there was missing money”

During this time, instead of giving up their cause, they held steadfast and kept their voices heard. They believed in their cause with so much passion, that they would not surrender to the cruel tortures of the SIM, Trujillo’s secret police. In fact, they tried convincing other prisoners to want to overthrow Trujillo by secretly taking newspaper clippings of his wrongdoings and having them in their hair. Had they given up in prison, their cause and motivation for other revolutionaries would have died right there. However, they stayed persistent and resilient to continue fighting against Trujillo’s regime. Imagine if they had not stayed true to their cause. Trujillo may not have been overthrown! His despotic and inhumane ways of treating his country and people may have never ended. People who would say anything opposing him would be instantly put to death. There would be no freedom of speech. The very basic rights and freedoms people live and long for would be taken away from them. By sacrificing their time with their families, friends, and children, the Mirabal sisters ensured that the entire nation’s future generations would live with peace and

Hernandez’s trait of courage is represented by her feeling fear yet choosing to act, her following her heart, and her standing up for what she believes in. By trying to expose murderers, Hernandez was often on hit list and was often threatened by many people. Even though she was fearful she still choose to fight for what she believed was right. Hernandez had a passion for helping others, and even though she was tempted to give up she followed her heart and continued to help others. Hernandez felt strongly about speaking for the rights of victims during the war. She believed that the victims were treated unfairly and should be

This book is not for the sensitive reader. In this book, Ronson takes one into the victims lives and shows the effects of brutal shaming. For example, Ronson tells the story of a woman by the name of Justine Sacco, who posted a racist tweet. Within a short period of time, Justine had been completely obliterated on Twitter. Justine lost her job, and self-worth due to her public shaming.

Perhaps one of the most remarkable facets about the woman described herein is her ambition. As afore-mentioned, Eva Perón was born in poverty. In fact, the village in which she was born was in the Argentinian grasslands, with very little homeliness to offer, at least for Evita. This was because she was born as an illegitimate child, and suffered from a sense of shame as a result of this fact. Because of the sense of illegitimacy that Eva says surrounded her childhood, as a teenager, she left Los Toldos for Buenos Aires, and found success in radio and film acting in the country's capital. In a matter of years, Eva established herself in

He introduces the story of JonBenet Ramsey who had been murdered as a result of competing in pageants and becoming the eye of the media. “JonBenet Ramsey, who would have turned 21 had she not been brutally murdered, remains the most famous pageant girl in the world. All one has to do is say her name and the images come flooding back—not those from photos of her home in Boulder, CO, where she was found in the basement on December 26, 1996, but those of the 6-year-old pixie strutting across pageant stages, looking like a baby Marilyn Monroe with makeup more suited to a woman several times her age” (Hollandsworth 2). The appeal to fear fallacy accompanies as we see different occasions where Hollandsworth is trying to warn the parents by showing them all the negative effects pageant life can have on young girls. “After JonBenet's death, a few journalists went so far as to suggest that her tricked-up pageant look was the reason for her murder” (Hollandsworth 4). Guilt comes frequently to ensure that readers have remorse in supporting the child pageantry in any way. “The message these little girls take away is that natural beauty isn't enough — that their self-esteem and sense of self-worth only comes from being the most attractive girl in the room, not from being smart or resourceful or tough or creative” (Hollandsworth 3). An

In Annie Dillard’s narrative, “The Deer at Providencia,” she reveals her awareness of and confusion regarding suffering by paralleling human and animal anguish and dignity . On a trip to Ecuador with a North American group in the village of Providencia , Dillard witnesses the suffering of a small deer. Her lack of reaction to the suffering deer stuns the travelers; however, in America Dillard conditions her awareness of suffering daily by previously daily encountering an article about a burn victim in America (M.S. 4) Posting the article on her mirror, Dillard strengthens her realistic perception regarding suffering and divulges her confusion regarding the randomness, inevitability, and the threat of agony for all beings . (M.S. 8) Recounting these experiences, Dillard employs word choice, tone, and parallelism to acknowledge her deliberate awareness of and confusion about the cruelty of suffering.

What if I told you that before you could even speak you would already have a reputation, would you believe it? Noel Sturgeon, a professor of environmental studies at Washington State University, fights against such injustices. In her 2009 novel Environmentalism in Popular Culture: Gender, Sexuality, Race, and the Politics of the Natural, she utilizes rhetorical devices to expose the corruption of popular advertising. The genre of this text gears towards her field of expertise, classification using symbolic aspects of the environment. The time period that the text was written is significant because it was the year that Obama was inaugurated, the the murder of Dr. George Tiller, domestic abusive relationship of Chris Brown and Rihanna, and Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation to the US Supreme court. These events demonstrate the opposite relationship of stepping out of boundaries and confronting social injustices, but the death and beating in particular show the rejection of homosexuality and women's rights. We are constantly moving back and forth on the equality spectrum, and from a very young age we were fed subliminal messages of our certain roles in society. Colonization, exploration, primitivism, racism, homophobia and sexism are presented to us through popular advertising thus her audience is the entire nation. She uses our definition of what it means to be “natural” and by doing so, people are given a reputation based on their race, gender or sexuality.

The documentary's narrative through-line is Jennifer S Newsom herself, who begins with her telling her story in a calm, semi-sad voice. Born out of anxiety, worry and stress about the world she was bringing her little girl into, the film begins with Newsom telling of her past struggles in life caused by body-shaming, assault, and eating disorders. Newsom uses her pregnancy as the jumping off point for inquiry into the system. Already, the documentary grabs the attention of mothers or mothers-to-be or anyone for that matter. Her story offers some comfort and relief to viewers who may or may not have gone through what

Twenty years after the passing of Selena ,the people of Corpus Christi, Texas speak of her as if she's still alive today, but remember her as if she passed just yesterday. While life has changed in Corpus Christi since Selena was killed on March 31, 1995, it also feels as if it's stopped .In every corner of Corpus Christi’s Hi-Ho Restaurant one of Selena’s favorite hometown restaurants, she’s there. The walls are covered with her signature smile, traced with red lipstick. The one exception is a painting which hangs in middle of the main dining area. The media responded to this surge of grief in unprecedented ways. People magazine not only released a special southwest edition with Selena's death as the cover story, but it also followed up with a tribute issue, only the third such publication in the magazine's history, and continued to reach out to Latino readers with People en Español. During Saldivar's trial, TV Guide published a bilingual edition for the first time in its history, with English and Spanish versions of an article about el juicio de

The author uses pathos to appeal to the audience’s sense of open-mindedness about women who make national news. O’Connor tries to get the reader to realize how being human can cause people to overlook certain stories and make them seem unimportant. In her essay she states, “We don’t pay as much attention to someone missing from a community we don’t know or are not familiar with” (661). This quotation symbolizes how sometimes people can be overlooked in today’s news. The issue about who makes national news can appeal to more than just a sense of open-mindedness, it can also appeal to your sense of sympathy. When news reporters get their stories, no one is for sure how long the story can stay lingering amongst people. Earl Hutchinson, a political analyst, states, “When you raise the issue people say, “This is a tragedy and we should do more,” Hutchinson said. “But it only lasts a hot minute.

History is our past, and all over the world students are learning about all the history around the world. The United States has gone through a lot of history, with the colonies, fighting for independence, and making a new working government and founding a new country. The founding fathers have been a big factor in the rebuilding of America. George Washington has played a big role in the rebuild of America. He was considered one of the key founding fathers, also he had a temper. George Washington made a substantial impact on the growth of America, his contributes are still talked about today. George Washington is one of the more well-known founding fathers, he is one of the biggest names around the world. He help America develop a new government that still exists today. George Washington was born in Virginia in 1732, and he loved the lands he was born in. He was born into a wealthy family, and we would always explore his home lands. George was a patriot and would do anything for his country, he was a great leader because of his determination, and he was a smart man. His father passed away when he was 11 years old. This might have helped him go through school quicker because it is believed that he help his mother with the plantation. He had to take the responsibility of that, and the man role in the family. Most people at that time were taught in private schools or they had tutors at home, but it has been known that he was finished with school by the age of fifteen. The young

“Deportation at Breakfast” by Larry Fondation demonstrates a game that test moral values and represent characters that possess deceiving qualities.

Lynn Nottage’s Pulitzer Prize winning play Ruined takes place at Mama Nadi’s brothel in the Congo where a civil war is being waged and coltan is the new gold being mined from the earth. Mama Nadi reluctantly takes Sophie and Salima into her establishment to work alongside Josephine as entertainment for miners and soldiers. Before coming to Mama Nadi’s, Sophie, Josephine, Salima all experienced rape. The word rape is so common in our society that it has lost its intensity and heinousness to a person who has not experienced it. Rape is a general term to describe what the women experienced but it does not give any hint to the struggle that comes after the event. For example, what it does to a person’s mind, the lasting scars on someone’s body, and how it can change a person’s personality. Many critics assume that rape is the tragedy in the play, but Nottage’s use of the word “ruined” emphasizes that the real tragedy is the consequences of those soldier’s actions on these women 's lives and how it affected their interactions with society.

Chaucer admired and made use of the medieval "courtly love" romance tradition, although he did not fully "buy into it." The "courtly love" code is based on the woman as the center of attention. The medieval knight suffers greatly for his love, who is often someone else's wife. He will do anything to protect and honor her, remaining faithful at all costs. Adultery and secrecy characterize these relationships. The knight views a woman and experiences true love. The knight fears that he will never be accepted by his love; therefore, she is worshiped at a distance.