Wilson's 'Trueblood': Reflective Essay

Kevin Davis’ essay Does Coming to College Mean Becoming Someone New? uses his personal story as well as research to highlight the changes new college students must make in order to grow into successful students. Davis explains that students must choose to grow in order for their college careers to be truly successful. Davis’ use of kairos as well as logical, ethical and emotional appeals organizes his essay into an effective one. The writer structures his essay in an exceptional way that leads the reader to analyze his uses of kairos, logos, ethos, and pathos.

Throughout the essay, Charles Murray stresses the idea that college is the wonderland of finding oneself and to find the career that one would want to follow for the rest of their lives. “College is seen as the open sesame to a good job and a desirable way for adolescents to transition to adulthood. Neither reason is as persuasive as it first appears.” Murray, C (2008) Practically spoken, this is not normally the case. College is a fair amount of work, much more work than one would normally acquire through any course of a high school or secondary school setting. In no way saying that the average student cannot meet the requirement and achieve success over the amounted work, it would also be ridiculous to expect every graduate to pursue going into higher education with the expansion of work that will be given.

In the essay, Two Years Are Better Than Four, the author, Liz Addison, gives her opinion on the importance of community college. The main point that she is trying to convey to her audience is that going to a community college is not harming the essential college experience. For some individuals, such as herself, the two-year college experience is exactly what they need to further their education. Community college is an affordable place that can “foster dreams (Addison)”. Throughout the reading, Addison makes compelling statements to prove the point which she is trying to make.

The author, who put himself as narrator, describes how he walks through the halls of the university and approaches the upper school and its playground, and he seems to get so emotionally attached that he cannot take another turn. “I turned right so as not to

College is an opportunity to truly discover who you are. Often enough, you hear people saying “You should really major in this field, I think you would really enjoy this career.” or, “Do you think you really want to study that? Have you thought about what you will be doing ten years from now?” filling your mind with self doubt, uncertainty, and the anxiousness of not knowing what you want to do with the rest of your life. Mark Edmundson wrote an article titled, Who Are You and What Are You Doing Here?, published in Oxford American addressing college students and their families how the most important thing college students should focus on is personal growth. When students take their courses seriously their engagement can help finding out who they really are and which future career will lead not necessarily to great financial success, but to a career and life that is very satisfying. Edmundson wants to inspire his audience and have them take what he is saying seriously. Edmundson uses satirical informal language and hypothetical situations to effectively persuade college students to focus on their personal growth in order to create a life and career that is deeply fulfilling.

The author was inspired to write this essay because he experienced college the same way all freshmen will experience college. He went through the same exact struggles that they are bound to go through at some point in it, so he was motivated to help them survive school and stick with it no matter how tough it gets. He consistently emphasizes how magnificent the rewards are if one finishes all of college.

Some wonder whether or not college is worth the time and money. Two essays, “Plan B. Skip College” by Jacques Steinberg, and “Is College Worth the Money?” by Stephen G. Emerson, both discuss this topic and bring different views and insights. Although Steinberg and Emerson both write on the same topic, they use different writing strategies and styles. Both essays have varying styles, arguments, use of metaphors, and utilization of other sources in their essays.

“I am an invisible man… I am a man of substance… I am an invisible man…” (Ellison 3). This quote resembles the fact that the narrator is trying to find his true self, but he is constantly getting put down by white Americans. “His blackness produces a number of fixed, stereotypical images in the minds of white Americans. Society has a uniform vision of all African Americans, failing to embrace them as individuals” (Szmanko 1). The narrator describes himself as “... invisible… simply because people refuse to see [him]” (Ellison 3). The narrator is lost and has not yet found who he genuinely is. The narrator knows that being invisible to the society is not a desired position to be in; although, he uses this to work around his obstacles. “Although Ellison notices positive sides of invisibility, he leaves no doubt that the ultimate objective of African Americans is to triumph over their invisibility, not acquiesce to it” (Szmanko 1). For example, he lives underground and steals electricity from a company that knows is being stolen from, yet, can no track who is stealing from them. The narrator expresses himself by saying “ Now, aware of my invisibility, I live rent-free in a building rented strictly to whites, in a section of the basement that was shut off and forgotten during the nineteenth century…” (Ellison 5-6). “The Invisible Man discovers that invisibility opens a hatch to tricksterism” (Szmanko

After reading the last paragraph on page 258, I realized the right kind of motivation from society around us can change the way we think and act. Even though choosing where to go to college was my decision many factors did influence my choices. One influence would be that society pushes us to go on to college after high school. Also, colleges try to motivate you to attend their school by offering you money. So when thinking of why I chose to attend college after reading Chapter 8, I realized it was my decision to attend University of Hartford based on my preferences in a college. But it was not an autonomous decision, in some way society played a role in my

In his default setting, the graduate focuses on his thoughts and only pays attention to himself. Wallace, for example, describes the habit in a quote: “Probably the most dangerous thing about an academic education—at least in my own case—is that it enables my tendency to over-intellectualize stuff, to get lost in abstract argument inside my head, instead of simply paying attention to what is going on right in front of me, paying attention to what is going on inside me” (4). Failing to acknowledge his surroundings, the graduate unrealistically expects the world to prioritize his desires. He, in fact, only pays attention when the world doesn’t live up to his expectation. Wallace, for example, describes the college graduate’s perception of the people in front of him in the check-out line: “And look at how repulsive most of them are, and how stupid and cow-like and dead-eyed and nonhuman they seem in the checkout line, or at how annoying and rude it is that people are talking loudly on cell phones in the middle of the line” (6).

Other characters relentlessly stereotype and typecast the Invisible Man, yet he maintains vestiges of power until the end of the novel, when he breaks free of others’ preconceived notions. In college, where he has the supposed privilege of learning and giving tours to trustees, he easily falls into the role of the compliant second-class citizen. Only an insane veteran at the Golden Day can see his complete lack of identity, saying, “He’s invisible, a walking personification of the Negative, the most perfect achievement of your dreams, sir! The mechanical man” (Ellison 94)! After college, he gains a type of power by working for the Liberty Paint Company and overcoming Dr. Bledsoe’s attempts to sabotage his life, but he once more becomes a mere stereotype in the factory hospital. The doctors view him as an experiment, not a person. They argue about radical operations to test on him, debating if they should castrate him and calling the Invisible Man’s psychological state “Absolutely of no importance” (Ellison 236)! He then believes that he has found true power in his speeches with the Brotherhood, but once again, the Invisible Man is a mere pawn in someone else’s game. Brother Jack uses him to further his own status in the Brotherhood, causing the Invisible Man to realize, “He doesn’t see me. He doesn’t even see me” (Ellison 475). All of the Invisible Man’s attempts to gain some semblance of

The first literary piece that will be discussed is Dr. Roush’s “College Should be an Adventure”. This was written by the president of Centre College. He says many intelligent things about what he has learned about college from his own experiences. How does this article relate to the human condition? In the

In Ellison’s Invisible Man, the character himself is fully aware of his societal invisibility as a black man, manipulating it to his own advantage. In stating, “it is sometimes advantageous to be unseen, although it is most often rather wearing on the nerves,” the reader becomes aware of the character’s cognizance regarding the supposedly debilitating construct of “blackness” (Ellison 3). However, the societally perceived “inferior” nature of this construct is manipulated in the work as a means of rebellion, proving that one’s “blackness” does not have to be equated with submission. Furthermore, the alleged trait of complacency with this supposed debilitation is presented as a method of masking the true “vital aliveness” the invisible man feels in his rebellion (Ellison 7).

Ralph Ellison titled his novel Invisible Man He chose this title to state a point he was making about an African American man’s life throughout the early years of America. The title uses those two words to describe the main character in an extremely strong way. He refers to the main character as “the invisible man” because people see him as whom they want him to be, not who he really is. Ellison’s definition of invisibility in his novel was a form of racial prejudice.

These individual skill sets played a vital role in the Invisible Man’s ability to acquire a sense of his own identity. Without these skill sets, he was just a lifeless body floating throughout life. Burying his real self and identity to play the roles that the college and brotherhood compelled him to play, the Invisible Man was depicted as invisible. The Invisible Man recognized his invisibility soon after leaving college, but did not grasp what exactly it meant to be invisible, “Without light I am not invisible, but formless as well; and to be unaware of one’s form is to live a death. I myself, after existing some twenty years, did not become alive until I discovered my invisibility”(6). He noted that being unaware of one's self-was as if he was already dead. Gregory Ellison II, an author, wrote a book entitled "Cut Dead But Still Alive: Caring for African-American Young Men” stated that oftentimes African American young men feel invisible and feel as though they are cut dead. Cut dead was a 19th-century term meaning to be snubbed completely or deliberately ignored. Gregory Ellison II also mentioned that African American men who do feel invisible are in many instances not given the opportunity to be seen otherwise. The Invisible Man was one of the men that Gregory Ellison II was talking about because he had been constrained by the institutions he had been a part of. These institutions did not allow him to be himself or be seen as an individual. After reflecting on where he