Premium Essay

Personal Narrative: My Experiences Of An Outsider

Submitted By
Words 813
Pages 4
Looking In
An outsider is someone who does not fit into a certain group, feels uncomfortable, or does not feel they belong. Someone could feel different in their own mind, and people around them may not know it. One might become excluded for many reasons such as race, religion, gender, or wealth status. You may be born unlike another group and in that case you may not be able to change that about yourself. There are times when you may not be able to change something, but you can come up with strategies and ways others will not think of you as an outsider. My experience is having Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). I was born with it and the deficit has made me the person I am today. I have learned tricks, strategies, and ways to cope with my ADD, but overall it makes me different from the rest of my peers. …show more content…
For example, when I am in a class like math, it can be challenging to listen to a long discussion. I am focused initially, but then my brain decides it wants to think about what I am doing after school or over the weekend. Like a boat in the ocean near other boats, the wind just blows me in another direction. I realize I am alone, but it is too late. I have missed a lot of my Math lecture. When I start focusing again, I realize I have missed the next process. It makes me feel depressed when I have to ask the teacher how to do something, even though they just explained it. Being different is normal to me in my own mind, but not an easy thing. I do take medication to help me focus, which helps a lot, but I still have trouble with the same things I would if I were not on my medication. It is just downscaled in its

Similar Documents

Free Essay

The Butcher Boy - Alienation

...of the extract, taking account of narrative methods, show how effective you think McCabe is in presenting the outsider Francie Brady’s alienation and separation from society. In ‘The Butcher Boy’ Patrick McCabe transforms, according to John O’Mahony, “the microcosm of the small town, a neglected and disparaged corner of Irish experience into an arena for burlesque humour and biting satire.” “McCabe is a true original,” says critic and novelist John Banville. “Like Roddy Doyle writing about life in working-class Dublin suburbs, McCabe has used the stuff the rest of us didn’t bother with and made a peculiar kind of rough poetry out of it. He catches that particular kind of bizarre, insane world of Irish country life in the 50’s and 60’s. People like O’Faolain and Frank O’Connor wrote about it in lyrical mode, McGahern wrote about it in tragic mode, but McCabe writes about it in a kind of anti- black comedy that is absolutely unique.” Such aspects of McCabe’s unique style are vividly captured within the given extract from the novel, where McCabe’s unique hybrid bog-gothic style is clearly evident. The theme of Francie Brady’s alienation and separation from society is a dominant concept that develops and intensifies throughout the novel. Alienation refers to the sense of being separated and isolated from others, of not belonging, and in the specified extract McCabe successfully develops the reader’s understanding of Francie as an outsider in a society neither accepts nor understands...

Words: 1300 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

The Concept of the Outsider in Literature

...The Concept of the Outsider Literature often persecutes the most vulnerable, a person who lacks support and therefore power within society. Described by Terry Eagleton for The Guardian as the “literary mainstream”; these characters are often referred to as the Outsider due to their exclusion from the community in which the text is set. The characters who are referred to as Outsiders can be portrayed in different ways; their initial exclusion from society can ultimately lead to a narrative of their acquisition of power throughout the text but similarly, can portray a story of their maintenance of the minimal power they have over the course of the text’s plot. However, this is not to argue that some Outsiders presented within literature do not have power over the course of the development of the text so, as a consequence, remain excluded from the society. In this case, the text would then be considered an exposition of the character’s experience from their position in society rather than the author’s attempt of trying to integrate their character into society through their work. Furthermore, the author themselves may be considered an Outsider through their own status in society; they command their readers to be Outsiders themselves within the novel. As well as to read and observe the narrative in order to emulate the same feeling within themselves, within the reader or to have a specific impact on the issues surrounding humanity at the time. The contrast in the ways in which...

Words: 7231 - Pages: 29

Premium Essay

The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao Summary

...Dear Bardes (aka the best teacher ever), Throughout my memoir, I reflect upon the meaning of a home to me, and how it’s definition to me changed over time. I also try to use innocence and ignorance highlight the misunderstandings of the real world through the mind and eyes of a child. My narrative includes stories of immigration from Israel, the struggles to fit in, and accepting myself for being one of a kind. This belongs to Unit 4 in particular because it easily relates to the idea of immigration, and transition, and feeling left out of the crowd, which is what Oscar felt and experiences in The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. I also tried to use humor to spice up my memoir with statements such as “And if your mother [...] case red rain boots.” which as silly as it may...

Words: 865 - Pages: 4

Free Essay

As I Lay Dying

...distinction of facts and truth within the nature of the mind is of a Southern decaying family’s attempt to bring their mother home for burial. Faulkner narrates each character’s singular point of view to show the result of the multitude of subjective interpretations as each character deals with their emotions engendered by the events. The reader is unsure as to which imitated perspective is objective towards the truth. Faulkner’s narration of imitating events from a different stand point develops an arguing conflict of what is thought to be an established nature of mind. As I Lay Dying is a conflict of the conceptual idea of truth. It can be interpreted that the conflict of the narrative is a conflict of our beings – whether or not there is such a thing as unprejudiced truth. Within the beginning narratives, the characters reveal their corruptions that will obscure their interpretations: including adultery, pregnancy, abortion, hatred, and insanity. Using multiple views promotes the isolation each family member’s internal conflicts in relation to their response to their mother’s death, relationships, and own seemingly selfish concerns. The reader begins to see the instability of their isolation when the Faulkner establishes no character to provide objectivity. The extremities in the elusiveness of the truth can be followed through the issues associated with each character and how the novel’s multiple perspectives interpret their issues, obscuring the line of accuracy. For instance...

Words: 1469 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Corruption and Polotics

...chapters, I have discussed the polemics of the regional novel during the course of its evolution as a special category. An attempt was made there to trace their development in the British, Indian, and Telugu literary traditions. The British regional novel is a different phenomenon from that of the regional novel in India. Yet, there have been some important continuities in the genre. Preoccupations with landscape as also with identity conflicts have continued as distinctive components of the regional novel. As the introduction discusses, such developments are partly products of the socioeconomic milieu of the writers. In this concluding section, I return to that assertion and draw together some observations, discussions and arguments to offer my views on what might actually have gone into the making of the regional novel. Firstly, I review the major queries regarding the nature of the "region" and the "regional novel" that have cropped up during the course of the thesis and consider how they might be explained. "There is no universally accepted definition of the region," observes Norton Ginsberg, (qtd. in Cohn 101) The study comes out with the hypothesis that the "region" cannot be given one particular identity and definition. When we come across labels like Regional College of Education, Regional Engineering College, etc, we are bound to associate the region with something local and inferior as opposed to the National and the superior. The renaming of institutes like Regional...

Words: 4398 - Pages: 18

Free Essay

Sexual Harassment at Work Place

...Sexual Harassment in the Workplace EXPERIENCES OF WOMEN IN THE HEALTH SECTOR Paramita Chaudhuri Health and Population Innovation Fellowship Programme Working Paper, No. 1 This report is the result of a project entitled “Understanding Sexual Harassment in the Health Sector,” undertaken as part of the Health and Population Innovation Fellowship (HPIF) awarded to the author in 2004. The HPIF programme is administered by the Population Council, New Delhi and is a continuation of the MacArthur Foundation’s Fund for Leadership Development (FLD) fellowship programme that continued over the period 1995 to 2004. The Council is grateful to the MacArthur Foundation for its support to this programme. The HPIF programme aims to support mid-career individuals who have innovative ideas, leadership potential, and the capacity to help shape policy and public debate in the field of population, reproductive health and rights in general, with a focus on two priority themes – maternal mortality and morbidity, and the sexual and reproductive health and rights of young people. Since the transfer of the programme to the Population Council through 2006, a total of 17 individuals have been supported under the HPIF programme. For additional copies of this report, please contact: Paramita Chaudhuri Senior Programme Officer Sanhita 89B Raja Basanto Roy Road Kolkata 700 029 Email: sanhita@cal.vsnl.net.in Phone: 033-24227965 Population Council Zone 5A, Ground Floor India Habitat Centre, Lodi Road...

Words: 12061 - Pages: 49

Premium Essay

Justice Studies

...Michael F. “They Wished They Were Honest” The Knapp Commission and New York City Police Corruption Publication: June 2012 by: Columbia University Press In the course of his narrative, Armstrong illuminates police investigative strategy; governmental and departmental political maneuvering; ethical and philosophical issues in law enforcement; the efficacy of the police's anticorruption efforts; the effectiveness of the training of police officers; the psychological and emotional pressures that lead to corruption; and the effects of police criminality on individuals and society. Hunt, Jennifer and Peter K. Manning. “Symbolic Interaction” 14.1 (1991): 51-70-Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction Lies are relative to a moral context, and what an audience will accept. Police learn to lie and to carefully distinguish normal (or acceptable) lies from unacceptable lies, suggesting that lies are a part of a negotiated occupational order. This study reports and analyzes two kinds of troublesome lies: case lies, recognized stories an officer utilizes in a courtroom or on paper to facilitate the conviction of a suspect, and cover stories, lies an officer tells in court, to supervisors, and on the job with the aim of providing a verbal shield or mitigation in the event of discipline. Moskos. Peter. “Cop in the Hood: My Year Policing Baltimore's Eastern District” Publication: August 2009 by Princeton University Press When Harvard-trained sociologist Peter Moskos left the classroom to...

Words: 811 - Pages: 4

Free Essay

Mnasd

...Specimen Papers and Mark Schemes for English Literature For first AS Examination in 2009 For first A2 Examination in 2010 Subject Code: 5110 Contents Specimen Papers Assessment Unit AS 2 Assessment Unit A2 1 Resource Booklet Assessment Unit A2 2 1 3 9 15 25 Mark Schemes Assessment Unit AS 2 Assessment Unit A2 1 Assessment Unit A2 2 29 31 61 95 Subject Code QAN QAN 5110 500/2493/0 500/2421/8 A CCEA Publication © 2007 Further copies of this publication may be downloaded from www.ccea.org.uk Specimen Papers 1 2 ADVANCED SUBSIDIARY (AS) General Certificate of Education 2009 English Literature Assessment Unit AS 2 assessing The Study of Poetry Written after 1800 and the Study of Prose 1800-1945 SPECIMEN PAPER TIME 2 hours INSTRUCTIONS TO CANDIDATES Write your Centre number and Candidate Number on the Answer Booklet provided. Answer two questions. Answer one question from Section A and one question from Section B. Section A is open book. INFORMATION FOR CANDIDATES The total mark for this paper is 120. All questions carry equal marks, ie 60 marks for each question. Quality of written communication will be assessed in all questions. 3 Section A: The Study of Poetry Written after 1800 Answer one question on your chosen pairing of poets. Heaney: Opened Ground Montague: New Selected Poems 1 John Montague and Seamus Heaney both write about the Irish past. Compare and contrast the two poets’...

Words: 25332 - Pages: 102

Premium Essay

Comparison Essay

...view and this tends to be easier for the reader to understand the relationship between characters. Lee Maracle’s “Sojourner’s Truth” is another text that uses the third person narrative to commentate the events in the story. Readers are able to more easily receive the details about the relationship between characters from the narrator. The following paper gives consideration to some examples from Warrior’s “Compatriots” and Maracle’s “Sojourner’s Truth” of the third person point of view is utilised in differing ways. In “Sojourner’s Truth”, Maracle chooses to use first person and third person point of view to create a frame narration. The author starts the story with the first person point of view, and as the story going along, she brings up the idea of using third person to identify the relations between characters. The first sentence of the story states the way of narration being used by the author, it says “From inside my box, an ugly thought occurs to me” (Maracle 297). This proves that the story is being told from the perspective “I” with words like “me” and “my”. On the other hand, the use of first person point of view allows the story to have a more personal, subjective, and even intimate tone of voice. Readers can notice that the narrator of the story is dead by his own description “inside my box” (297), also “ugly thought” (297) can be considered as a foreshadowing to what the narrator is trying to refer to his relationships with other characters. While in “Compatriots”...

Words: 1400 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Koyaanisqatsi Paper

...1) I believe that although there is no dialogue or actors in this film, there is still a discernable narrative that guides the film. The first shots in the film are entirely of naturally occurring landscapes and phenomenon that occur on Earth. Although no dialogue is ever spoken, the music combined with the scenic nature shots create a sort of “build up” to the next element introduced to the film, humans. The narrative throughout Koyaanisqatsi, seems to be a reflection of the increasing impact that sentient life has on a planet. It is interesting, however, to observe which footage Reggio used to depict this mounting involvement of humans and technology into the plot. At first, I thought Reggio was attempting to make a statement about the harmful impact of environmental pollution caused by man. However, as the film progressed, the footage of technology and man seemed to play an indifferent role towards nature. The footage of factories and vivid time-lapse shots of city skylines at night are not portrayed in a negative light but instead in more of a chaotic one. In my interpretation, this chaos of the human impact on nature and the growing complexity of technology are depicted because that is simply how life has become for modern humans. Life is chaotic and the addition of increasingly intelligent beings trying to make order out of chaos will ultimately be futile. In other words, the very attempt at creating order out of chaos is chaotic in and of itself. The footage of nature...

Words: 3458 - Pages: 14

Free Essay

Church on the Edge

...Ministry and Contextualization II | | Dr. D. Kortright DavisProfessorEvaluation of My Church Experience | Jacqueline D. Rooths 2/23/2012 Jacqueline D. Rooths 2/23/2012 I have attended five churches in my life. Born and baptized in the old Israel Baptist Church. During the height of the Civil Rights movement, my family transferred membership to the Church of the Redeemer Presbyterian church in Washington DC; we relocated to Long Island in my senior year of high school and we joined Memorial Presbyterian church. As an adult, I joined Hemingway African Methodist Episcopal (A.M.E.) church and for the past 24 years, I have been a member of Union Bethel A.M.E church. I stood on the fringes of the first four churches, observing from a far, but by virtue of age and experience I have been intimately involved in the bowels of Union Bethel A.M.E. church. Each church denomination has their body of governance. The Baptist denominations follow congregational church governance in which each individual congregation is governed autonomously, free from the direct control of any other body. The Presbyterian Church has a democratic form of city and church government called "presbyterian," meaning "governed by elders." The Presbyterian Church is a connectional church, functioning on several levels, the first level being the local church. Local churches...

Words: 1652 - Pages: 7

Free Essay

Tempered Radical

...CROSSROADS When I read the first draft of this manuscript it provided a genuine "aha" experience. I felt that "tempered radicalism" was a concept that had been waiting to be invented. Meyerson and Scully, in my view, have grasped an important idea and have written about it in a careful and an illuminating way. It's one of those papers, I suspect, that some people will react to by thinking: "I wish I had written that!" Further, I can see others I know well in the field as fitting the description of the tempered radical, at least in some circumstances and at different times. The reviewers, while suggesting changes, as reviewers do, were also very taken with the paper. It is intellectually interesting, and evocative. It provides us with a perspective on organizational issues that is typically glossed. It opens an arena for organizational analysis that is missed in most theoretical frameworks. Tempered radicals, Meyerson and Scully argue, are individuals who identify with and are committed to their organizations and also to a cause, community or ideology that is fundamentally different from, and possibly at odds with, the dominant culture of their organization. Their radicalism stimulates them to challenge the status quo. Their temperedness reflects the way they have been toughened by challenges, angered by what they see as injustices or ineffectiveness, and inclined to seek moderation in their interactions with members closer to the centre of organizational values and orientations...

Words: 12768 - Pages: 52

Free Essay

Religious Conversion

...RAMBO Theories of Conversion: Understanding and Interpreting Religious Change The author explores the nature of theory and provides an overview of resources for the study of conversion to Islam. Theory is valuable in so far as it illuminates different aspects of a phenomenon. Various theoretical approaches include some dimensions and exclude others. Scholars of conversion must be aware of theoretical issues and systematically utilize theoretical options with sophistication. Such an approach will expand understanding of conversion and also enhance comparative studies of conversion. Theoretical orientations considered in this paper include: globalization, post-colonial, feminist, cross-cultural, religious/spiritual, intellectualist, narrative, identity, ritual, psychoanalytic, archetypal, attribution, attachment, process/stage, and Islamization theory. L’auteur analyse et offre un panorama des théories disponibles pour réaliser une étude des...

Words: 5949 - Pages: 24

Free Essay

Madness as Religious Experience - Allen Ginsberg

...Madness as Religious Experience: The Case of Allen Ginsberg Author(s): Martin Wasserman Reviewed work(s): Source: Journal of Religion and Health, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Summer, 1982), pp. 145-151 Published by: Springer Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27505671 . Accessed: 14/06/2012 10:29 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. Springer is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Journal of Religion and Health. http://www.jstor.org Journal of Religion and Health, Vol. 21, No. 2, Summer 1982 Madness Experience: Ginsberg as Religious The Case of Allen MARTIN WASSERMAN to be a religious Various writers have considered madness On the basis ABSTRACT: experience. in the area with literature and conversations it is argued that of the psychiatric patients, as a four-stage as a religious can be viewed The four madness process. experience developmental are: 1) The state hurt-and-be-hurt of being, self-induced 2) The stages experience, psychedelic 3) The clarify psychotic...

Words: 3501 - Pages: 15

Premium Essay

Wife by Bharathi Mukherjee

...University of Tennessee, Knoxville Trace: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Masters Theses Graduate School 5-2010 Bharati Mukherjee and the American Immigrant: Reimaging the Nation in a Global Context Leah Rang University of Tennessee - Knoxville, lrang@utk.edu Recommended Citation Rang, Leah, "Bharati Mukherjee and the American Immigrant: Reimaging the Nation in a Global Context. " Master's Thesis, University of Tennessee, 2010. http://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_gradthes/655 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at Trace: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Masters Theses by an authorized administrator of Trace: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact trace@utk.edu. To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a thesis written by Leah Rang entitled "Bharati Mukherjee and the American Immigrant: Reimaging the Nation in a Global Context." I have examined the final electronic copy of this thesis for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, with a major in English. Urmila Seshagiri, Major Professor We have read this thesis and recommend its acceptance: Lisi Schoenbach, Bill Hardwig Accepted for the Council: Carolyn R. Hodges Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official student records.) To the Graduate Council:...

Words: 30269 - Pages: 122