Gorilla, My Love By Toni Cade Bambara

The Gorilla beringei beringei or mountain gorilla, was first discovered on October 17th 1902, by a German officer named Captain Robert von Beringe (Berggorilla and Direkthilfe, 2002). Mountain gorillas play a large role in it’s particular ecosystem through consumption the gorillas control and maintain vegetation that is vital for a healthy environment not only for the primate but also other species that live in the environment as well. Since the discovery of the mountain gorilla much fascination has been drawn toward the species. However, the gentle creature’s population has had a sharp decline from Rwanda’s belief in sumu, poaching, human disease, and unregulated tourism. In efforts to revive the species population from extinction, persistent activism through worldly foundations are helping protect the mountain gorilla species.

After about 10 minutes, he is abruptly bothered by the youngster who is running on his knuckles towards the male and runs back up the hill as if he is taunting him. The youngster does it about 3 mores times within the next 7 minutes and perches upon the hill in the same position as the silverback, except he is bended at the knees in squat position. In my second visit, I return to the gorilla exhibit for about 10 minutes to see a female unknown if related to the previous observation in submission. She is found crouched to the floor with her elbows on the ground and hands extended out and her butt perched up. Her hind legs are also bent and position to help support her butt. Three minutes upon observation, a silverback male comes running on his knuckles from another part of the exhibit and mounts the female. He positions himself on his knuckles to provide him support and continues with the sexual intercourse, in which I conclude my observations.

What do you think the author meant by ‘With Gorilla Gone, Will There Be Hope for Man?’ quote at the end of the story? (Comprehension)

Hazel is a fiery little girl. She is strong-willed and openly opinionated, and believes that “when you got

Hazel has a strong identity in the story, she has much self-confidence and is not afraid of letting everyone know that she is the best, “Now some people like to act like things come easy to them, won’t let on that they practice. Not me. I’ll high-prance down 34th street like a rodeo pony to keep my knees strong even if it does get my mother uptight.” p. 1 ll. 29-31. Thus her strong and proud personality, she still loves and protects Raymond and is not afraid of showing this either. At the end of the story Hazel’s view on other people changes, when she sees Raymond running parallel with her at the May Day race in his own unique style. She realizes that everyone is not just who she sees them to be, that there are more to people than you can

Thus, I was able to observe some similarities among these species. The way the female chimp used tools, and her fingers to grab food, how she used to be on her feet, freeing her hands, groom her child, educate her offspring, sleep with him while snuggling, use a lot of face emotions to convey a message to an individual; she smiled at her baby, laughed when playing, and tickling him, remind me of human. She also has a flat pink face, hands’ palm, and feet sole as humans do. Furthermore, the gorilla was also really human when he protected his eyes from the intense sunrays, following the movement of the sun, and sat in the shade, mated with a female, scratched his head, and bottom, and put his finger in his nose. I think that these humans’ pattern appeared for similar reasons as in the Primates. For instance, when the gorilla scratches his bottom, it is because the area is itchy, and he wants to remove what is indisposing him. In addition, the mother chimp educates her kid to transmit knowledge throughout generation, which is the same for humans, who go to school.

Although, Hazel is courageous enough to “...hide the money…” (Bambara 450) from the “…big boys…” (Bambara 450) that take their money, she has fear as any other child would have. Ultimately the age of the narrator helps establish this sense of betrayal to the reader. Hazel sits in the “navigator seat” because she is afraid of “…sittin in the back with the pecans.” (Bambara 449)In fact, she says that “…if you scary like me, you sleep with the lights on…” (Bambara 449) because like most kids being in the dark scares them. This helps elevate the thought that the narrator is a young age because it shows child-like behavior.

Scout is considered an unknowing kid by many people until she models her father’s behavior and advice he gives her. “You never really understand a

Gorilla, My Love," by Toni Bambara, demonstrates how adults often undermine children and do not take them seriously due to the adults automatic assumption that because they are younger, they are also uneducated; therefore unable to be on the adults level of maturity and intelligence. One way that "Gorilla, My Love" shows how adults undermine children is when the wrong movie played in the theater. Hazel was with her friend Big Brood and Baby Jason and they start booing once a different movie played than what was expected and the guy

The gorilla, fighting after the manner of its kind, struck terrific blows with its open hand, and tore the flesh at the boy’s throat and chest with its mighty tusks.” – Burroughs, p. 42

It was a surprising finding to see that most of the participants in the study were not able to recognize the gorilla or person change. These experiments provide valuable insight on the way we perceive our environments that may challenge our intuitive thinking. The brain is receiving a lot of different stimuli simultaneously and it is worth understanding how it processes this stimuli and which stimuli gets more attention than others. When people are focusing on a task they prioritize the task at hand which is why the people who were focused on the ball or filling out the papers failed to noticed changes in the environment. Like the video suggested it is important to learn what are the differences between people who recognized the gorilla/change

Dian helped us connect even more to the foreign primates by focusing on the different habits of mother, baby, and adolescent gorillas. Giving each gorilla a name, Fossey helped us almost humanize the animals through her vivid descriptions of their personality and behavior. She showed us that gorilla mothers protect, care for, and discipline their infants. Gorilla babies develop much the same ways humans do; acquiring skills as they age. Adolescents can be just as curious as they are mischievous. Fossey's work helps replace the image of the gorilla as a ferocious animal into one that is kind, gentle, and more human-like that we had never known.

The short story collection, The Thing around Your Neck, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, contains twelve short stories about Nigerian characters in either Africa or America. In the collection, it is integrating to see the struggles of the Nigerian characters that straddle two worlds. It is also easy to see individuals act to control their own life, whether it is a woman or a man in the story. The protagonist of each story has the choice to choose whether they will accept, decline, or change the situation of their lives. Through the collection, Adichie emphasizes the importance of the power of individuals based on how they deal with the situation. Through this collection, Adichie attempts to go beyond stereotypes of Nigerians and tells real stories about fictional characters that could possibly exist and the real dilemmas they deal with. According to Ted Talk, Adichie explains how writers like Chinua Achebe and Camara Laye were the cause of her metal shift in her perception of literature. She realized that people like her, who had the characteristics just like her could exist in literature, and so began to write the things she recognized. Also, a critic like John Madera explains in openlettersmonthly.com, Adichie writes, “stories of women living between worlds, struggling with identity, with mapping, navigating, and trespassing boundaries.” The main argument of this paper is that Adichie uses the protagonists to use their power to control their own lives in situations that are

Hazel Grace is a seventeen-year-old girl with cancer. Her mom recommends her to join a cancer support group because she feels she is depressed. Hazel reluctantly joins the support group that is held in the basement of a church. She ends up meeting a handsome boy names Augustus Waters. She learns he has lost his leg due to a form of cancer and he is currently in remission. She learns that Augustus is there to support his friend Isaac that has lost his eye and now has to have the other eye removed. Once the meeting ended Augustus walks up to Hazel and complements her on how she looks like Natalie Portman. Augustus invites Hazel over for a movie and she accepts. That night of the movie they discuss their cancer and she reveals she has thyroid

For my second essay I’ll be talking about the movie that I watched Planet of the Apes. In this movie human are made as slaves and the Apes control them. For this essay I’ll be specifically talking about a Ape in the movie that stood out to me the most. Which would be “Koba”. He was an altered bonobo with enormous hatred for humans. He had years of abuse and neglect. Due to all the abuse that he had gone through from the humans, he was left with a scar over his left blind eye.