Is A Sanctuary Really A Secret Place? Essay

Through traumatic events many people lose their sanity. Some people are born insane, while others are driven to their breaking point by life experiences. In the memoir “Night” insanity is a major theme, through various characters like Mrs. Shockter and Moishe the beedle. In “Night” insanity is experienced through horrific events and continues to make itself present throughout the book.

In the short story,“The Sanctuary of School,” by Lyndd Barry, the author uses characterization, the building of one’s personality and feelings, to create a central idea. The central idea that is supported in this short story is that home is not a place, it’s a feeling of love and safety. The writer of the story,“The Sanctuary of School,” proves the central idea that home is not a physical place but a feeling hope and protection, through characterization.

The Citadel symbolizes the enduring nature of traditional gender roles. It has fought long and hard to maintain an air of strictness, military refinement and manliness. However the traditional views enforced by the Citadel and its interaction within the context of the outside world has created what Susan Faludi, author of “The Naked Citadel”, refers to as an “atmosphere of cruelty”. Throughout her essay Faludi uses primary witnesses and factual evidence to expose the violent injustices done to “knobs”, freshman cadets, by their senior counterparts at The Citadel. In his essay, “The Power of Context”, Malcolm Gladwell, argues that violence results as a response to social context and thus can be completely avoided or treated. Based on Gladwell 's theory of The Power of Context, the senior cadets are not directly culpable for their violent behavior; their actions do not create the “atmosphere of cruelty” rather the atmosphere defines them. The “atmosphere of cruelty” itself, is defined by social cues derived from historical context which prompt the cadets to dominate. The walls surrounding, The Citadel also perpetuate violence by separating the cadets from normal social conventions and boundaries. However because the “atmosphere of cruelty”, is not a problem caused by some innate or psychological instability on the part of the cadets, it can easily be treated by adjusting little things in the environment such as eliminating the use of derogatory language and presenting the

In Twenty-Something Women and the Paradox of Sexual Freedom by Leslie Bell we follow the stories of three women contradicting the environments they were raised in, as an act of rebellion and individuality. These three women are distraught and confused about their identities and individuality due to conflicting obligations between traditional family values and their own desires. The environment each woman was brought up in was a catalyst in producing a “reactive decision.” As a result, their reactive choices lead to a greater sense of self and individuality. These three women display how their inner convictions are revealed and explored, as a result of the faith and beliefs that surrounded them. The oppressive expectations of their environments

At some point in their life, every person has been told to “walk in somebody else’s shoes” because they need to be aware of the struggles that other people face, but it is often tough for people to understand things outside of the scope of their own practical knowledge. In her memoir, Lucky, Alice Sebold suffers from this same problem. Throughout the course of her narrative, Sebold thinks of her experience as something that is accessible to be understood by outsiders; in addition to this, Sebold paints her reactions and experiences as a model that she can apply to other victims of sexual assault. Even though Sebold’s story is one of strength in the face of horrible occurrences, her lack of acknowledgement in regards the ways in which other people’s consciousness and coping mechanisms differ from her own makes it far more difficult to sympathize with her than it should be considering the content of her memoir. Evidence of her closed world understanding can be seen from the beginning of the memoir, when she reports her sexual assault to the police (Sebold, 3), later in the narrative, when other people react to her experiences and related feelings (Sebold 146), and finally, and perhaps most significantly, when her close friend Lila undergoes a sexual assault (Sebold 220).

It is easy to get caught up in one’s own world when life picks up the pace and everything seems hectic; along the way decisions are made unconsciously to let go of people who were once held dear. It is easy to be torn between what appears to be important and what is trivial. Amidst the mess that is life, various things contend for one’s attention, and what really matters might not be so clear. In “The Last Rung on the Ladder” the guilt that consumes the narrator over his sister’s suicide becomes an essential part of his identity even as he tries to adjust to her loss. In “Sanctuary” Jim Hammer is in the very first stages of realizing he is guilty of his friend’s death, and the responsibility has not yet taken its toll on him. The history and experiences of one’s identity affect the way an individual reacts to guilt, if one has never understood the impact that relationships have upon past and present selves then it is difficult to fully digest the impact of his/her actions.

This story speaks of a young teenage woman who, amid the civil rights’ movement and sexual revolution of the 1960s, is rebelling against the conservative morals and values of the 1950s and exploring her individuality and sexuality with a sense of egotism and inexperience that eventually gets her into harm’s way. Looking back, the Civil Rights movement may have been the most emotionally charged movement of the 1960s (Anderson). No other movement in United States history defines a change in culture better than the movement of the 1960s. Issues such as women’s rights, war, civil rights and the sexual revolution greatly influenced the American youth. Conservative family morals and values that predominated the 1950s were beginning to be questioned. Oates

Personally, “The Sanctuary of School” offers the strongest conflict. Namely, the conflict of Man v. Society, because troubled children like Lynda Barry contend with those who think before and after school programs are unimportant.

Complexity is what makes life exciting and fascinating; it is also, however, what makes life challenging and stressful. When difficult situations occur, people tend to avoid them as much as possible. In the essay “The Naked Citadel,” author Susan Faludi explores the underlying problems with sexuality, which are unknown to the general public, at The Citadel, an all-male military academy in Charleston, South Carolina. Shannon Faulkner, a female who applied to, and was granted admission to the academy, challenged the masculine mindset of the academy. Faulkner managed to gain admission by not marking her gender on the application, which led to a controversial court case. In “Selections from Losing Matt Shepard,” author and Laramie, Wyoming

“After a traumatic experience, the human system of self preservation seems to go into permanent alert, as if the danger might return at any moment” (Judith Lewis Herman). The psychoanalyst Lewis Herman describes how encountering agonizing pain causes individuals to become more cautious as a result. The psychoanalytic lens is based on Freudian theories and asserts that “ people’s behavior is affected by their unconscious:...the notion that human beings are motivated, even driven, by desire, fears, needs, and conflicts of which they are unaware…” (Tyson 14-15) High schools a place where tragedy are brought upon people, but their voices aren’t heard. Melinda, a high school freshman, is the protagonist in Laurie Halse Anderson’s book, Speak.

Being born into the age of speed, people are taught from a very young age to put their problems behind, to not think about them, and to just move on. The notion of always looking forward and never taking enough time to recover from a crisis is bound to result in suppressed emotions, which might eventually turn into personality disorders and unhealed wounds. In different pieces of literature, both Bell Hooks and Rachel Naomi Remen discussed how a person’s adulthood can turn into living hell once they are trapped in memories they never forgot. While Hooks told the story of the harmful childhood that gave her many emotional scars, Remen wrote about a lady whose childhood turned her into a cruel person she was not supposed to be. In both essays,

The Naked Citadel, written by Susan Faludi, chronicles the life of cadets in an all white male school- until Shannon Faulkner, a daring woman, disrupts The Citadel’s prestigious tradition: no females allowed. Although, according to Faludi, Shannon was anything but the feminist poster girl: “She prefers to call herself “an individualist” and seems almost indifferent to feminist affairs-” (198). Despite Faulkner’s disregard to the feminist revolution, she did manage to be the first women to challenge the stereotypes that restrained people of color and women in society. Faludi, however, further exposed The Citadel beyond their gender boundary; she detailed the severe bullying that shaped

Susan Griffin, a feminist writer and finalist for the Pulitzer Price in non-fiction, explores the concept of forgetting in her chapter “Our Secret”. Unlike Foer, Griffin (1992) doesn’t seem to be too much a fan of remembering, describing memory to be like “a long, half-lit tunnel, a tunnel where one is likely to encounter phantoms of a self, long concealed, no longer nourished with the force of consciousness, existing in a tortured state between life and death” (p. 258). In fact, Griffin might argue that there are several benefits to forgetting, and that the collective memories of a traumatic past should not be remembered or preserved. Failure to retrieve memories may not always be a bad thing, in fact, unwanted memories – of childhood trauma, emotional rejection, or any of life’s inevitable disappointments - have the ability to torment and mentally exhaust a person. Throughout her essay, Griffin explores the hidden shame and pains that several characters carry, herself included, and the consequences they bring. She writes of one woman’s memories of the cold war, who, as a young child, witnessed “shoes in great piles. Bones. Women’s hair, clothes, stains, a terrible odor”, all of which left her sobbing and screaming in fear (Griffin, 1992, p. 233). Another gruesome account Griffin (1992) writes of, is as

Repression of memories is a psychological concept that has haunted modern psychology for years. Repression of memories also known as “rememory” defined by the mind pushing away traumatic or shocking experiences into a dark corner of a person’s unconscious. As this idea developed and began to be studied more thoroughly, slavery became an institution in which researchers saw promise in drawing conclusions about the dangers of repressing memories. In Toni Morrison’s novel, Beloved, the character narratives of Paul D and Sethe exemplify the dangers of repressing memories. Both disconnect from and push away unwanted emotional traumas or experiences from their past. However, this effort doesn’t pay off and their repression of memories is not successful. Through the use of symbols such as Paul D’s tobacco tin and Sethe’s scars and lost child, Morrison demonstrates how repression of the past isn’t effective and how it always comes back to haunt a person who doesn’t correctly cope with their trauma. Paul D and Sethe live unfulfilled lives as a result of repressed memories.

Although a light read, her experience is heart-breaking as she is abused at home, institutionalized, and instead of being treated for her depression, doctor’s attempt to “feminize” her with eye shadow and lipstick. She is the type of advocate that makes noise in a silence because she tells a tale that would otherwise be unknown.