The Daly Post

     Our discussion in class this past week about humor and satire had me wondering - how is humor defined? The dictionary would say that it is the quality of being amusing or comic, but why is it that if something is defined by “amusing or comic” that not everyone laughs?  When being introduced to the idea of satire within literature, we were shown a series of videos that demonstrated humor in a certain way. Some clips, such as the princess bride, displayed an underlying, somewhat ridiculous humor. The expressions, the nonsense ideas, and the tone created by the characters is what ultimately made the clip humorous to some. It was nondirect and took the idea of humor to more of a discrete level. Other clips, such as the SNL clip about sarcasm, presented a very upright, straight-forward type of humor. As an audience member, you can tell that the skit was meant to be outwardly humorous.      Throughout these variations of scenes and skits, (this may so...

          Hubris, along with the idea of ignorance, are themes often presented in a multitude of mythological works, such as ‘Oedipus Rex’. The excessive pride and overwhelming amount of confidence that characters inherit may ultimately lead to their downfall. Oedipus, in particular, heavily possessed the common, stereotypical tragic flaw of ignorance. Ignorance is defined by the idea that one may be uneducated or unaware of information that they are expected to know. Oedipus carried a large amount of ignorance, which was only emphasized by his overloading sense of pride to save the village of Thebes. Therefore, the idea of hubris and its ties to the well-known tragic flaw of ignorance is what carries Oedipus into his downfall and defeat as an individual, thus being defined as a tragic character.      ‘Oedipus Rex’, the play itself, displays how a character’s tragic flaw can ultimately be the downfall of their persona. At the beginning, Oedi...

The first chapter of “The Round House” was different than any other first chapter I have read. Right away the audience is introduced to the fact that the mother figure in the novel is a victim of rape. Joe, the main character, and his father are shown to heavily rely on her as they both express the idea of how she would’ve returned by that point to start dinner.  “Women don’t realize how much store men set on the regularity of their habits. We absorb their comings and goings into our bodies, their rhythms into our bones. Our pulse is set to theirs, and as always on a weekend afternoon we were waiting for my mother to start ticking away on the evening” (Erdrich 3). The two ideas highly contradict themselves which displays the irony behind women’s rights in society. The mother is shown as the backbone and is described as a figure of unity and power within her family but the idea is later diminished by the images of her body which I believe acts as one of the main conflicts within th...

Scene involving Mama and Walter discussing the importance of money: Walter : Standing in the kitchen with a rundown, boiling look. Mama... you just don't understand. I'm not quite sure what you don't understand, but whatever it is you just simply don't get. Everyday, I wake up and all I do in this life of mine is serve other people. These people that I work for live in big, fancy houses and wear nothing but smiles upon their faces. Tell me, what do I get? Nothing. "Money is life" (Hansberry 74) Mama, can't you see? Money is what makes you happy. Money is what makes you successful. God, I don't think I could emphasize the statement even more; "Money is life[!]" (Hansberry 74). It's not like I'm asking for pink elephants or a flying Pegasus. I'm asking for a life -- full of happiness and love. No wonder I went off and spent all that money to be put into the liquor store. It was my only chance to re-route my life, your life, all of...

Why did Hansberry choose to add Mama to his story? Although Mama can come across as a "dream-crusher", she acts as a symbol of progress for her children throughout the play.  Beneatha and Walter, Mama's children, can be easily identified as characters who tend to fall behind present day culture . Beneatha, who is studying to be a doctor, falls into these stereotypes once Walter has spent her college money. Without the money, she lost faith in humanity and felt as if she could no longer do anything to help people. In comparison to Beneatha, Walter has this dream of owning a liquor store as he believes that the profit would be beneficial to himself and his family. Once his money was gone, he wouldn't do anything but drink all day. Just like Beneatha, he had lost hope in his dream.  Both characters looked at money as the pathway to success. Once that path was gone, the characters both lost their ambition. They have both assimilated to society as they refer to the...

It's shocking to me when I hear that "not much has changed" (Wilkinson) in regards to the segregation in our surrounding communities. Coming from such a racially diverse, well-rounded area makes it hard to believe that only 25 minutes away people don't live with the same range of culture that we do here in Troy. We've only ever been exposed to a multitude of races and cultures in our schools and neighborhoods that we hardly pay attention to what's happening a few cities away.  Take yourself back to when you and your family went on vacation. Often times, you meet either other travelers or tour guides and the question of "where are you visiting from" maneuvers its way into the conversation. When you follow up the question with "Detroit", the answer commonly shocks the average person, but why?  Detroit is known for being one of the most "segregated areas in the nation" (Wilkinson). It mainly consists of African-Americans whi...

After calling Gatsby "gorgeous" (Fitzgerald 2) in the first chapter of the book, "The Great Gatsby", Nick's sexuality was immediately questioned by not only myself, but by many others. The queer lens, or perspective, offers insight for the reader in regards to how  Nick himself may be portraying a queer role without the knowledge of it. Him being the narrator of the novel, we as an audience see  his queer-like opinions, descriptions, and interpretations of situations and people which ultimately sets a very "sexually ambiguous" (Tyson 342) tone to the novel.  Nick is often seen describing females in a very masculine way, and males in a very feminine way which can suggest his sexual insecurities, yet true interpretations of the characters. Gatsby is always  described by Nick as if he were a female figure. He talks about him as if he only owned "gorgeous pink suits" (Fitzgerald 162) and "shirts with stripes in coral and apple green ...