Still Alice Story About Identity

In the School of Athens there is a large group of people which are many famous mathematicians and philosophers and they are all pictured in a very large room. With all these philosophers and mathematicians and scientists it is shown that they are all sharing ideas and thoughts. This show humanism during this time because it is some of the greatest minds associated with humanism. Philosophers study philosophy which is the study of reality and real things. The mathematicians and scientists also only deal with stuff that is on Earth. None of the people pictured deal with anything not on Earth and they are all sharing information with each other. This shows humanism because all these people are totally against the Church’s beliefs and they believe that man is greater than the study of the spiritual

Although humanism has several different meanings, especially for those who consider themselves humanists, this definition in my opinion best explains humanism as it is applied in our class. In a journal entry written by Robert L Sinsheimer, titled “Humanism and Science”, he explains that humanists are concerned with

The theme of the book is related to the early onset Alzheimer’s disease and how the main character, Alice Howland’s quality of life or in other words her lifestyle is affected due to the disease she is diagnosed with (Genova, 2009). The novel sheds light on the lives of those

Alice’s story about her’s and her family’s struggle reaches to me because the disease takes away someone you love slowly. This book shows Alice losing parts of herself gradually until she is unrecognizable. However, Alice is still a person and should still be treated as one. The message this book sends across to its audience that, although taken by Alzheimer’s, Alice has emotions too and that part is not taken away from her.

Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a story of a young girl’s journey down the rabbit hole into a fantasy world where there seems to be no logic. Throughout Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Alice experiences a variety of bizarre physical changes, causing her to realize she is not only trying to figure out Wonderland but also trying to determine her own identity. After Alice arrives in Wonderland the narrator states, “For this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people” (Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland 12). This quotation is the first instance that shows Alice is unsure of her identity. The changes in size that take place when she eats or drinks are the physical signs of her loss of identity.

Alzheimer's disease is a familiar sight to me. I had a sad experience during my work as a nurse in my country Colombia and Spain with Alzheimer disease patients. Day by day I came to know each patient’s story because every day they were living the moment without remember the last minute. This is also what happened to Lisa Genova’s novel Still Alice. The protagonists is a 50 year old woman, a very well organized, efficient, highly-educated, and smart Harvard professor, wife of a successful man, and the mother of three grown children, who has diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. People have learned about the progression of Alice’s disease through her reactions, so feeling what she feels- a

Alice faced severe challenges throughout the movie. However, she was a college professor, who was well-known and very intelligent. Alice had a wonderful husband with 3 beautiful children, 2 girls and one son. Alice family was the most important thing to her as a wife and mother. Alice was always on the go as a professor and wife. Alice loss her mother and sister in a car wreck a year ago on January 19th and her father passed away due to being an alcoholic. In the beginning of the movie Alice well aware of her surrounds and competent to her priorities. Alice was a peaceful, sweet, and humble young lady, who had a lot of respect for individuals. As time went by, Alice became fearful of the episodes she were experiencing. However, she felt it had to do with menopause. With that being said, she never took it seriously of the traumatic episodes that she came in contact with on a daily basis. Thoroughly, Alice begin to realize as time went by that her episodes begin to get worse and she start experiencing hallucinations. Alice experienced many different events of losing memory. Alice enjoyed exercising every morning. One particular morning, Alice went out to do her daily exercise, while do so Alice breath got heavier and heavier to obtain. Alice stop to caught her breath, in the process of trying to caught her breath, everything around her was spinning. Alice forgot where she was at that moment and had to give herself time to come back to reality. She became fearful and realized

“Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a slowly progressive disease of the brain that is characterized by impairment of memory and eventually by disturbances in reasoning, planning, language, and perception.” (Howard Crystal) In Health 1000 we were asked to read the book Still Alice. I have never dealt with or have done any study on Alzheimer’s disease before reading this book. After finishing this book it has really opened my eyes to how bad of a disease and how it cripples the mind. I never imagined the effect of this disease on a patient and the patient family. This book is about a upper middle aged lady named Alice who is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, and how she and her family learn how to deal with disease. One of the things this book

Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland creates a warped reality, causing each character’s identity to become confused. An exception to this confusion of identity is the Cheshire Cat, who shows an uncanny awareness of his own madness, giving him considerable control over his presence and allowing him to occasionally leave only a grin behind. Alice, contrarily, is strewn all over as she loses herself in Wonderland. In Wonderland, all are “mad,” but to Alice this is preposterous, even as she fails to explain who she is – both to herself and to others. Carroll’s juxtaposition of the Cheshire Cat and Alice in their first meeting scene exaggerates Alice’s insecure identity and its development throughout her adventures in Wonderland.

A man is only a man as long as he deems himself to be as such. In the novels, Me Before You and Still Alice the authors, Jojo Moyes and Lisa Genova suggest that hopelessness is inescapable when a person is stripped of what they consider to be the core essence of themselves. Will Traynor, the male protagonist in Me Before You is an adventurous young man who found his identity though the joy of physical thrills yet he completely lost his mobility due to a motorcycle accident which shattered his idea of himself. By contrast, for an academic like Alice Howland, the protagonist in Still Alice, her identity is her intelligent mind which is gradually fading due to the fact that she has developed a case of early onset Alzheimer's disease. Both individuals

I saw Still Alice this week. I wanted to see the Glen Campbell movie (which I will watch later) but opted for this one first. What a stirring movie! Watching the progression of her decline, and realizing that she KNEW that she was affected, was very sad. It was heartening to see the support that her family gave her, even while dealing with their own issues. The fact that she was proactive on the front end, in obtaining the diagnostic testing helped her family be better able to understand what was happening and to support her. I love the fact that she and her daughter were able to have a better relationship, and that her daughter was truly able to see her mom, even when her mom had trouble seeing her earlier.

4, pp. 69 ff.), "Humanism recognizes the value and dignity of man and makes him the measure of all things or somehow takes human nature, its limits, or its interests as its theme."

The individual’s role in society dramatically changed following the introduction of humanism. The idea that was depicted is still heavily important today and still holds strong within society. Humanism brought forward the thought that everyone is important and the concept of individuality. Humanism created the notion that instead of being part of a whole, everyone is unique. Before this introduction, most just thought about their actions and what consequences it had in the afterlife; Whether that be going to heaven or hell. Following the emergence of humanism, people started to think more about the present, encouraging education in humanity, the study of literature and enhancement of art – all this expanded an individual’s outlook on life and in turn allowed for the development of personal success.

The emotion evoking 2014, film titled Still Alice featured the many challenges a family residing in New York City faced following the matriarch’s, Alice Howland, diagnosis of a rare form of familial Alzheimer’s disease. The film opened with Alice and her Husband, John, celebrating Alice’s fiftieth birthday along with two of their three grown children, Anna and Tom, as well as their son-in-law, Anna’s husband, Charlie. The couple’s third child, Lydia, was not present at the birthday dinner, as she was aspiring to be an actress and resided in California. Within minutes of the opening scene Alice’s mild cognitive impairments became apparent through her marked confusion while communicating with Anna and Charlie. As the film progressed, Alice herself, a renowned doctor of linguistics and college professor, quickly became cognizant of her own declining cognitive ability as she struggled with mundane tasks, such as imparting a lecture at the University of California Los Angeles. The subsequent concerning episode, where Alice became disoriented and fearful in due course while out for a run on the campus where she had taught for years and was therefore familiar with it’s geography, ultimately encouraged her to seek care from a neurologist.

Encarta Dictionary says that Humanism is a system of thought that centers on human beings and their values, capacities and worth. Encarta also goes on the say that, in philosophy, humanism is an attitude that emphasizes the dignity and worth of an individual. A basic premise of humanism is that people are rational beings who possess within themselves the capacity for truth and goodness. I see myself as a being a humanist through everyday life. I always try to see the good in a person when he/she makes me angry or sad, and say I to myself that maybe that person has had a bad day and living life is difficult at the moment. Socrates was even an early humanist of sorts. He can be quoted as saying, "to know the good is to do the