Humor By Mairs Summary

In her essay “On Being a Cripple”, Nancy Mairs presents her audience with an honest inside view of her life and perspective as a cripple, a word she openly uses to define herself. She brings her world to us by discussing a wide variety of things including language, family, and humor, and how these all relate to her life. Through various stories and insights, she allows her readers to gain an understanding and acceptance of people with disabilities. She examines the public’s view of the disabled, as well as the views they have of themselves, and compares them to her own. She makes it clear that she is not to be defined solely by her disability. In discussing honestly her views, as well as

Mairs uses a high quality choice in words throughout the essay to describe her condition and herself as a person. In the passage she states that people “wince at the word cripple because they can't handle it .She also states that the other words that people would use to describe her don’t correspond to her condition. In the passage she quotes George Orwell’s thesis which states “the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.” She agrees

In “On Being a Cripple”, Nancy Mairs, an American poet and essayist, describes her personal battle with multiple sclerosis, a degenerative disease of the central nervous system with no known cure. She begins with a personal account of falling into a toilet because she loses control over several motions. Mairs prefers to be called a cripple rather than a disabled or handicapped person, although she acknowledges that this is not the same as others’ preference. She explains her journey from being a young, active child, to losing control of her body and developing a blurred spot in one eye in her late twenties. As her body continues to break down, Mairs tries to stay involved by participating in activities like bridge and

Someone who is crippled often receives pity and sympathy from others, but do cripples always want this? In this passage entitled “On Being a Cripple,” Nancy Mairs uses interesting word choice, repetition, and a sarcastic tone to touch upon a subject that most mature non-crippled Americans are not entirely comfortable with; using the so widely feared word “cripple” instead of the common “handicapped” or “disabled” to be polite or politically correct. Elaborating to a society, so infatuated with being politically correct, that using a word considered derogatory to most may be necessary according to exact definition is Mairs’s purpose in writing this passage.

In Nancy Mairs ' "On Being a Cripple," she deliberates the relationship between the English Language, American Society, and her struggle with multiple sclerosis (MS). Mairs criticizes people for wincing at the word "cripple," and using terms like “differently abled,” because they lack reality and accuracy. She equivalents society’s inability to accept crippledness with death, war, sex, sweat, and wrinkles. Through the usage of ethos, pathos, logos and other rhetorical devices, she effectively tells her story and proves that there is power in words, from which she could come to terms with a new fact of her identity, and to accept the incurability of her disease.

In her essay, Mairs describes how society uses different terms to describe people’s appearance such as disabled, handicapped, and cripple. She claims that society’s poor use of language and meaning has resulted in the way society thinks on the terms disabled, handicapped, and cripple. An example of this is when Mairs uses the word cripple as she claims that people wince at the word when they hear it. She says the word makes her appear as a tough customer as she is want to been seen as someone who can face the harsh reality of her condition. Mairs argues “Society is no readier to accept crippledness than to accept death, war, sex, sweat, or wrinkles”(Mairs p.241) which states that society isn’t willing to acknowledge people with disabilities as they are put at a disadvantage. She also states that society doesn’t want to acknowledge the fact that a disability could potentially be worse than death as she uses her own experience to show her audience that the evil of humanity is not only death. She claims that society doesn’t take the issues of disabilities seriously as they treat those with disabilities differently rather than acknowledging them for who they are.

Mairs starts the essay by telling us about the incident where she became unbalanced and fell in the restroom, which led to her writing the essay. She admits to us how she fully accepts her disease and is not ashamed of it. She says, “ I am a cripple. I choose this word to name me.” From this, we can see that she wants people to identify

In Nancy Mairs short story, “On Being a Cripple”, she reflects on her life handling her disability of Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and how it has changed different aspects of her existence. She defines herself as a cripple despite the negative connotations the word may have. Over the past ten years, Mairs has had her MS slowly progress as her body deteriorates. She sees her life as fairly average, but seemingly small tasks have become difficult to her and has required help from her family. Despite their support, Mairs still fears that people's kindness is out of pity. The stigma around physical disfigurement and being crippled causes added suffering to her life. Although the disease dictates much of her existence,

If you saw a person in the mall in a wheelchair, would you judge them? Or would you look at them like they are a normal human-being? People who have a disability whether they are physically disabled, mentally disabled, or learning disabled, are still themselves. Nancy Mairs was forty-three year old woman with multiple sclerosis. She wrote an essay, “Disability”, that explained her views of her physical disability.

In the essays “On Being a Cripple”, written by Nancy Mairs, and “Living Under Circe’s Spell”, written by Matthew Soyster, both authors strive to communicate to the reader what it is like to live with MS. Although both writers have a similar purpose, they both use exceptionally different methods of communicating their experiences with MS. Overall, Mairs’ essay proved to be more effective than Soyster’s, because of her varied use of rhetorical devices that all work together to create an effective argument. On the other hand, Soyster’s essay was less effective because he only relied on pathos to convince the readers of his argument.

She takes a comical approach when examining the idea of the word “cripple” when giving her experiences throughout the paper. In the very first paragraph of the essay Mairs says, “… landing fully clothed on the toilet seat with my legs splayed in front of me: the old beetle-on-it’s-back routine” (page 1). Society has put a negative connotation behind the word “cripple.” It largely comes off as an offense towards someone with a physical incapability, however Mairs has embraced the word because it is “straightforward and precise” (Mairs page 1). She outcasts herself from the rest of society in that she finds other words: “disabled”, handicapped”, and especially “differently abled” slightly offensive because they take away from her humanity. In other words, these works make her feel like she is not accepted like the rest of the fully, physically functioning people in society because people feel that they must baby those who are handicapped as though they are not able to do any simple task.

When the tough gets going, the going gets tough. This quote describes Nancy Mairs and her strength. Mairs has been through trials and tribulations which has shaped the way she perceives herself and why she describes herself as a “cripple.” This essay will be explaining her reasonings for calling herself a “cripple”, using rhetorical features she uses in her essay.

Nancy Mairs in her passage introduces the American society while including her life struggle with multiple sclerosis. Mairs demonstrates confidence of the condition with which she lives in and her calling herself a “cripple”. Her tolerance of this cruel reality guides her essay through a series of arguments as she utilizes pathos and others to communicate her opinion and feelings.

Cripple Nancy Mairs, a woman with multiple sclerosis wrote Cripple to express the feelings she has towards people labeling her, and how she can only be the one to label herself as a “cripple”. In the passage, she claims that even though she --or anyone-- is crippled, they are still the same person. Nancy Mairs presents herself as a brave woman by expressing the confidence she has in herself, having a direct frank tone, and going through every obstacle in her path. The confidence she has conveys that as long as she’s content and happy, other’s opinions do not matter. Creating this brave face to achieve one’s happiness without looking back.

Nancy Mairs, author of this passage, who has multiple sclerosis talks about herself and her decisions on why she calls herself a “cripple.” While she does this, she also criticizes words like “handicapped” and “disabled.” She tells a small story and her views on certain things while also explaining the reasoning behind calling herself a “cripple.” Mairs conveys why she is a cripple in her mind through her tone, word choice, and passage structure. Mairs your in this passage is calm at first but as she gets more into a sensitive topic, for her, she begins to be much more upset.