Psychoanalysis as a Form of Literary Criticism

Psychoanalysis as a Form of Literary Criticism Psychoanalysis is a set of psychological theories that was founded by the Austrian physician Sigmund Freud in his work Interpretation of Dreams (1900). By bringing up models for the human psyche such as tripartite model (considering human mind as being consisted of an Ego, Superego and Id), proposing different stages of human development (including oral, anal and phallic stage) and also mentioning Oedipus , Electra and Castration complexes, which were a great contribution towards Psychoanalysis and Psychoanalytic criticism . Oedipus Complex: the unresolved desire of a child for sexual gratification through the parent of the opposite sex, especially the desire of a son for his mother. This involves, first, identification with and, later, hatred for the parent of the same sex, who is considered by the child as a rival. Castration Complex: What prevents the male child from continuing to have incestuous desires for his mother is the fear of being castrated by his father as punishment for his desires. This approach then continued by psychologists such as Carl.G.Jung and Jaques Lacan. Lacan tries to analyze the hows and whys of human action. In this regard language has a significant role, psychoanalysis declares that language shapes the individuals emotions and experiences and as Lacan believed Language shapes and ultimately structures our unconscious and conscious minds while also shaping our self-identity. (Bressler, I34) Because psychoanalysis is concerned with the amorphous human stuff, before it is influenced by culture, language and history, its concern lies in the very intersection of pre-history and history. Pre-history is recognized with qualities such as indivisibility, non-integration, plentitude and oneness while history is related through difference, subjectivity and separation. In other words, the main concern of psychoanalysis is the continual tension between differentiation and non-differentiation. As Lacan believed, human beings go through different stages in order to be able to differentiate themselves as a separate entity in order to reach the sense of individuation. These stages are imaginary order, mirror stage and symbolic order. When the infant is in the first phase, the imaginary order, he imagines himself as united with his mother and cannot see the boundaries, but then in the mirror stage he begins to know that he is separated from his mother and the external world; although, this is just an allusion because he cannot move his body or eat whatever he desires. In the third phase, the symbolic order, the baby considers himself as separated and begins to learn language and this is where language gradually molds his identity. Intro John Fords Tis Pity shes a Whore encourages us to identify with its central characters complete identification with the pre-Oedipal, only for that sympathy to turn belatedly to disgust. The play dramatizes an incestuous relationship between Giovanni and his sister Annabella which leads to pregnancy and ends in disaster and death. Set in Parma, Italy, the story takes place against a background of lust, vengeance and greed that serves as a critique of contemporary culture and morality. Giovanni was warned about the seriousness of his sin by the Friar, but as Giovanni describes it is out of his control. After Annabella decides to end her relation and marry her suitor Soranzo, Giovanni falls in distress. Soranzo plans to catch Giovanni and Anabella in the process of love-making so he leads the situation so that they end up in his own bedroom, and have them murdered. Giovanni talks to Anabella and after realizing their impossible situation he kills her and exits and later on enters Soranz os party with Annabellas heart on his sword and after a battle kills Soranzo and dies himself from his wounds. Analysis Giovanni the central protagonist is a pre-Oedipal narcissist, he returns subjectivity to a pre-Oedipal state which literally consumes the other part of a self and makes two completely separate things into one self-same entity. Incest is a case within the pre-Oedipal stage. It breaks the laws of the post-Oedipal sexual and linguistic difference, in this case confusing the names of brother and sister with the name of lover. Giovanni rejects God as the creator of the world and gives himself the right to refashion and restate laws as a result of his pre-Oedipal desire. Giovanni emphasizing on the oneness he believes with his sister which was the womb where the both were born of seeks reunion and conjoining, looking towards his sister as an object, an object of love and devotion which eases the feeling of division within him. Love symbolically castrates Giovanni and the castration leads him to exile from his identity and masculine self, leading him to a state of a pre-genital, pre-linguis tic non-differentiation.  Ãƒâ€šÃ‚   Giovanni also seeks another kind of unity which is the unity between sign, language and reality and he believes his words are directly from his emotions. Imitating words of poetic lovers; however, this language further separates and alienates him from the object of love which is Annabella for example when he is reading a sonnet for Anabella repeatedly interrupts him, these interruptions indicate Annabellas refusal to see herself in Giovannis inscriptions and results in violence. Unable to cope with losing his Annabella to Soranzo and his refusal of reality he kills and removes Anabellas heart from her body and enters the final scene with the heart on his dagger. Giovannis violent response to the trauma of exile (exile from Anabellas heart, life womb and bed) is to destroy in order to retain everything that is to be separated from him. His pre-Oedipal narcissistic fantasy is based upon the utter eradication or absorption by others leading hi m to create an iconic approach in the final scene obliterating all competing realities. Intro In Ben Jonsons Bartholomew Fair, an ensemble of various London characters attends the yearly fair in Smithfield commemorating the martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew. First performed in 1614, particularly the theme that when social order is turned upside down or absent, predators emerge to construct a new order based on cheating other characters. At the fair, the characters argue, steal, fight, and cheat while consuming roast pig, ale, gingerbread in a swirl of gluttony, profanity, and sex. Three authority figures, Humphrey Wasp, Justice Adam Overdo, and the Puritan Rabbi Zeal-of-the-Land Busy, seek to control other characters, but they cannot control their own appetites. When the three authority figures accede to their own appetites and gorge themselves, the audience and the characters realize that the fair has its own social order. Analysis For the purpose of the psychoanalytic interpretation of Bartholmew Fair, author will be read as Oedipal father/father-figure; audience as fathers wayward children conscripted by the father at the beginning of the play to the principle of solitary, and the fair as the occasional pleasure, sensual release and enjoyments forbidden by the father as audience are expected to keep their distance from the fair, preventing their fall into the pre-Oedipal world of the fair. The Carnival is the pre-modern equivalent of Freuds polymorphously perverse pre-Oedipal child whose bodily drives have not yet been regulated. The bizarre game played by several of the characters of vapours which involves contradicting one another for the sake of contradiction depicts the discharge of undirected bodily energies and the pig-woman Ursula who is the body of the fair psychoanalytical perspectives of the infantile desire towards the mothers body. Quarlous one of the spectators finds Ursula as a swamp that a man can sink within. Based on the Oedipus complex perspective, Ursula is that womb like state which can draw a man back to the non-differentiation state, while the aim of Ursula is to make money out of the fairs visitors, a capitalist simulation of the blissful state of pre-Oedipal indivisibility. Cokes represent an unregulated infant who bothers his guardian because he is attracted to each and every capital object within the fair. Bartholmew Fair is a questioning of e xternal authority and its externally imposed laws of difference and an embrace, which falls under the fantasies of pre-Oedipal state. Conclusion Psychoanalysis plays an important role in literary criticism, the approach to analyze a characters whats and hows of action without an aesthetic concern and to find a reason for their thoughts can be beneficial to the way readers interpret a literary work, and for authors to create distinguished characters based upon their concern. The Oedipus complex and the personality disorders were enlightened through   Giovannis Violence and death in Tis pity shes a Whore, which were a result of the intolerance of separation from his object of love; in addition, Cokes infantile desires in Bartholomew Fair is a shining example of rejecting adult-separateness.

Comparing the way two poets, John Claire and Ted Hughes, write about :: English Literature

Comparing the way two poets, John Claire and Ted Hughes, write about the theme of nature and the season of summer. Through out my essay, in which is to follow, I will be comparing the way two poets, John Claire and Ted Hughes, write about the theme of nature and the season of summer. The two poems that I am to study are Work And Play written by Ted Hughes and Summer Images written by John Claire in the 1800's. In both the poems the poets are talking directly to us (the reader). Although both poems are about summer and nature they are coming at us from very different points of view. In Work and Play Ted Hughes Talks directly to us about how nature in terms of the swallow deals with summer 'the swallow of summer she toils all the summer' and how nature in terms of human beings deal with summer 'But the holiday people were laid out like wounded flat as in ovens roasting and basting'. He makes the comparison between the beauty of the swallow and ugliness of the humans throughout the poem. When thinking of summer one can't help but get a rosy picture in ones mind, the beach, the sun, and the fun!! But Hughes paints a more realistic picture for us. He shows us the down side and instantly wipes away the mental picture and shows us its not all fun. Through out the poem he also points out how we are destroying our surroundings giving it a very green, environmental feel to it. He pacifically concentrates on cars, petrol and pollution 'Serpent of cars that crawl through the dust' 'in hailing petroleum'. As you can clearly tell Ted Hughes is constantly contrasting the humans (nature at its worst) with the swallow (nature at its best). John Clair's poem comes across from a different angle. He concentrates on everything that is right with nature; through out his poem we get a very romanticised view of summer, and in every stanza he describes nature to its full beauty 'much beauty intervenes', 'turn up the silver lining to the sun'. Every word that John Clair uses in his poem he manages to romanticise in some way, for example 'the jetty snail creeps from the mossy thorn' John Claire softeners the word thorn by adding a soft word in front of it, in this case the word was mossy. In the time that Claire was writing this poems was seeing nature through rose coloured glasses, but he was also summing up what people of his time thought of nature.

The Psychology of Dreams

Why we dream: an analysis of contemporary research and theory on the function of dreaming Krista L. Hulm Essay Topic Why do we dream? Discuss with reference to psychological theories and research. Abstract Within classical psychoanalytic psychology, Freud’s (1900) conception of dreams is the most prominent dream theory among modern Western culture (Fosshage, 1983). Freud theorised that dreams serve a dual, compromise function. He suggested that unconscious, instinctual drive energy pushes for discharge, moving toward the expression of a consciously unacceptable impulse. The reduction in conscious restraints characteristic of sleep allows a symbolic, disguised dream expression of the repressed wish. The overt (manifest) content of the dream represents a compromise between the instinctual forces (latent content) striving for expression, on one hand, and the repressive forces of consciousness on the other (Freud, 1900). Freud assumed that the energy pushing for action would awaken the sleeper if not for the dream which, through symbolic discharge, allows a return to sleep. Therefore the dream is seen as serving the biological function of preserving sleep, with the psychological function of discharging an unacceptable wish that might otherwise burst destructively into waking life (Dallet, 1973). Various aspects of Freud’s dream theory have undergone review from the point of view of contemporary dream research (Breger, 1967; Foulkes, 1964). It is generally agreed that with respect to dream function in particular, the sleep preservation view is invalid and the underlying model on which the wish-fulfilment theory rests requires extensive revision. A study on REM sleep deprivation and its effects on depression found that when dream sleep was experimentally repressed in depressed patients, they were found to be more outgoing, energetic, more likely to engage with others and generally less unhappy (Cartwright, 1993). This may be due to dreams of depressed people having the characteristic of being more self-blaming. These findings contradict with Freud’s theory: if dreams are a safe expression of infantile wishes, why does this function fail to help the depressed? Despite the many problems inherent in Freud’s theoretical formulation of dream function, his far-reaching work has provided a basis for many of the contemporary theories discussed below. Contemporary research on dreams using brain-imaging studies contradict the view that content emerges from random signals (Morewedge & Norton, 2009). The hippocampus, which is critical to the acquisition of some types of memories, and the amygdala, which is important for emotional memories, are both seen to be active during REM sleep in brain-imaging studies (Nielson & Strenstrom, 2005). This understanding of the physiological aspects of dreams supports the idea that one of the functions of sleep itself is to draw together recent experiences with one’s goals, problems and desires (Paller & Voss, 2004). Fossage’s (2007) organisational model of dreams stemmed from such understandings. The model proposes that the core process and function of dreaming is to organise data. More specifically, dream mentation, like waking mentation, develops, maintains, and restores psychological organisation and regulates affect in keeping with shifting motivational priorities. Research shows that babies spend 50% of their sleep time in REM sleep, adults 25% and older people 15% (Breger, 1977). From the idea that REM sleep quantitatively decreases throughout the lifespan, a number of theorists (Breger, 1967; Reiser, 1990) suggest that dreaming fosters structuralisation of the nervous system through the establishment of neural memory networks or maps and babies spend more time in REM in order to establish maps and corresponding categories of organisation. This suggestion supports the organisational model of dreaming. Furthermore, the organisational model of dreaming includes a revision of psychoanalytic theory to explain the content of dreams concluding, in short, that dreams more directly reveal – through affects metaphors and themes – the dreamer’s immediate concerns (Fosshage, 2007). References Bulkeley, K. (1993). Dreaming is play. Psychoanalytic Psychology 10(4), 501-514. Retrieved September 8, 2009, from PsychARTICLES database. Cartwright, R. (2000). How and why the brain makes dreams: A report card on current research on dreaming. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 23, pp. 914-916. Fosshage, J. L. (1983). The psychological function of dreams: A revised psychoanalytic perspective. Psychoanalysis and Contemporary Thought, 6, 641-669. Fosshage, J. L. (2007). The organizing functions of dreaming: Pivotal issues in understanding and working with dreams. International forum of psychoanalysis, 16, 4, 213-221. Retrieved 14 August 2009, from Academic Search Premier database. Freud, S. (1900). The interpretation of dreams. Revonsuo, A. (2000). The reinterpretation of dreams: An evolutionary hypothesis of the function of dreaming. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 23, pp. 877-901.

Teens Pregnancy Between Ages 15-19 Essays

Teens Pregnancy Between Ages 15-19 Essays Teens Pregnancy Between Ages 15-19 Essay Teens Pregnancy Between Ages 15-19 Essay Essay Topic: Teens Nakeda Denise Ford Imagine an average group of teenage girls still in high school that have always done everything together. They make straight A’s in school and belong to a wealthy family, and soon they decide to come up with a pack. The pack is for every one of them to become pregnant by their boyfriend or a random guy. Planning the pregnancy pack, the girls are unaware of the consequences that their actions may bring them. Now picture a young female around the age of sixteen who feels very unwanted and unloved by society and even her own parents. Feeling abandoned and alone, she decides to become pregnant to fulfill the need of love. The next young women seems to have fallen in love with her new boyfriend believing he is the answer to her problems, but he seems to be pushing away from her and starts to pursue other females. Feeling as if she has no control over the situation, she decides to become pregnant believing that a child will bring them closer together. Only she succeeds at bringing them farther apart. What do these three cases have in common? What may lead these young girls to become pregnant, and why does pregnancy seem to be the solution to their problem? There are many answers to these questions. The following examples will explain what kind of situation and what state of mind influences these girls to become pregnant. One reason could be that teens see others female pregnant or to keep their relationship stable. Another reason teenager gets pregnant because of loneliness. There are also other contributors of teen pregnancy. Teenagers today are having sex at a young age thinking that they are responsible and able to take care of a baby. Teen pregnancy can also result because of a lack of sex education and birth control in schools. Young females of this generation do not think of the consequences before they go out and engage in something that can seriously affect their future. To better present the ideas within this paper, it is necessary to give a definition of teen pregnancy. In 2006 the total number of live births per 1,000 women aged 15-17 was 22. and for women around the age 18 and 19 the number was 73. 0, both instances the first increase since 1991(Kendall 495). Teen pregnancy rates are becoming higher every year. Although many teens decide to become pregnant for the several reasons, they fail to think about other aspects related to their pregnancy, but rather focus on the one reason for them choosing to become pregnant. Teenagers who are becoming pregnant have a higher risk of running into social aspects and economic issues. According to Kendall, teenage pregnancies are a popular topic in the media and political disclosures, and the United States has the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the Western industrialized world (Kendall 495). Young women today gain the attention from the community by becoming pregnant. Many times, this attention is exactly what they need. In today’s society, becoming pregnant is like a cycle. Everyone is trying or planning to do it. Teenagers sometimes get pregnant because they see other females pregnant. According to Miller, some girls may see their friends having babies and then decided to get pregnant themselves just to get the same attention they have witnessed given to others (Miller 17). When young women begin to feel like this, they may be experiencing low-esteem and the lack of family involvement. Interviewing a friend she stated, â€Å" If her parents acted like a parents she would not have to be in the situation she’s in now. † If parents today take the time out to pay more attention to their children, they would not need to turn to their peers or to others in the community for attention. If teens have someone to give them advice about pregnancy and explain to them all factors associated with making the decision to become pregnant, such as putting education first, then maybe not decide differently. Many teenage girls see themselves as having nothing to strive for like graduating from high school because they have few role models to follow, their teachers give them little encouragement about their abilities, and friends are becoming pregnant. Parenting looks like the best thing going, any girls think, because babies provide an immediate source of unconditional love, Parrot said. Teens in foster care are more likely to get pregnant than teens that are at home with their parents. In fact, teen girls in foster care are two and a half times more likely than those not in the system to experience a pregnancy by age 19 (Blick 16). This may happen because of the family related issues. They see what other teens in foster care are doing and seek to do the same to gain attention as well. Again, no one is there to give them advice. Young adults may experience struggles in their relationship and may be able to sense when their spouse wants out. Thinking that becoming pregnant will somehow savage their relationship, most females find the need to get pregnant to mend a broken or unstable relationship, their young and undeveloped minds seem unable to comprehend the dangers involved in teenage pregnancy. Some teenagers try to become pregnant to keep their relationship stable. Even if their boyfriend decides to stay with the for child shake, the problems will still be there, and will only resurface later on. When becoming pregnant the female will have to deal with the stress and other things that come along with the pregnancy and the relationship may end. Teenager also become pregnant because they know the father will be there for her and the baby. In most article they explain to there readers about how fathers neglect there children but there are some fathers out there who are willing to take care what there. Maybe that is why teens get pregnant to try to find the same kind of treatments. In some cases, older teenagers who have decided to get married may decide to get pregnant to start a family early (Miller 15). Most young women believe in getting married at a young age before getting pregnant because of their religion. These cases are very rare because almost 71 percent of females are unmarried or live with their baby fathers (Miller 16). Adolescent’s females have a weak mind especially when it comes to men. Young women seem to get pregnant to support their financial need for her and her male partner by becoming pregnant. Young women become pregnant, not because the value children, but because of the amount of benefits they receive (Stewart 1). By been place on welfare young women think becoming pregnant will be their solution to their problem. Fertile welfare receipts is actually lower than the fertility rate among women not on welfare (Stewart 1). It is best for welfare program to invest in each home and help young teens get a job. Young teenager believe in getting pregnant by older men. They fill that an older man can take care of them and fulfill their financial needs by supporting them and the baby. Been with an older man they believe that the relationship may work. This information may and may not be true because some men bail out on women after they become pregnant. Some men are unable to take care of her and the baby. Abusive relationship can also cause a female to become pregnant. According to Miller twenty –six percent of girls reported their partners were actively tiring to get them pregnant by manipulating condom use, sabotaging birth control and making explicit statements about wanting them pregnant (Miller1). An abusive relationship can affect the female in many ways causing her to be afraid her partner and listening to his commands. Think of forced sex as an aspect of abusive relationships, but this takes that abuse a step further to reproductive control of a young womans body (Miller 1). † When teenager seem be in an abusive relationship she tends to be scared of her partner and have know one to turn to. When young women seem to say their partner want a baby instead of them mostly there involved in a abusive relationship. The biggest issue teens face is been lonely. Many teenagers today do not have a father figure which causes them to become pregnancy because of the Piaget, J. The Moral Judgement Of The Child. New York: The Free Press, 1965.

Understanding the Difference Between Race and Ethnicity

Understanding the Difference Between Race and Ethnicity Its common to see the terms race and ethnicity used interchangeably, but, generally speaking, the meanings are distinct. Race is usually seen as biological, referring to the physical characteristics of a person, while ethnicity is viewed as a social science construct that describes a persons cultural identity. Ethnicity can be displayed or hidden, depending on individual preferences, while racial identities are always on display, to a greater or lesser degree. What Is Race? The term race refers to distinct populations within a larger species. Racial characteristics are physical and can range from skin, eye, and hair color to facial structure. Members of different races usually have relatively minor differences in such morphology- a branch of biology dealing with the form and structure of animals and plants- and in genetics. All humans belong to the same species (Homo sapiens) and sub-species (Homo sapiens sapiens), but small genetic variations trigger varying physical appearances. Though humans often are subdivided into races, the actual morphological variations dont indicate major differences in DNA. The DNA of two humans chosen at random generally varies by less than 0.1%. Because racial genetic differences arent strong, some scientists describe all humans as belonging to a single race: the human race. What Is Ethnicity? Ethnicity is the term used for the culture of people in a given geographic region or of people who descended from natives of that region. It includes their language, nationality, heritage, religion, dress, and customs. An Indian-American woman might display her ethnicity by wearing a sari, bindi, and henna hand art, or she could conceal it by wearing Western garb. Being a member of an ethnic group involves following some or all of those cultural practices. Members of an ethnicity tend to identify with each other based on these shared traits. Examples of ethnicity include being labeled as Irish, Jewish, or Cambodian, regardless of race. Ethnicity is considered an anthropological term because it is based on learned behaviors, not biological factors. Many people have mixed cultural backgrounds and can share in more than one ethnicity. Race vs. Ethnicity Race and ethnicity can overlap. For example, a Japanese-American would probably consider herself a member of the Japanese or Asian race, but, if she doesnt engage in any practices or customs of her ancestors, she might not identify with the ethnicity, instead considering herself an American. Another way to look at the difference is to consider people who share the same ethnicity. Two people might identify their ethnicity as American, yet one is black and the other white. A person born of Asian descent growing up in Britain might identify racially as Asian and ethnically as British. When Italian, Irish, and Eastern European immigrants began arriving in the United States, they werent considered part of the white race. This widely accepted view led to restrictions of immigration policies and on the entrance of â€Å"non-white† immigrants. Around the start of the 20th century, people from various regions were considered to be members of sub-categories of the white race, such as â€Å"Alpine† and â€Å"Mediterranean† races. These categories passed out of existence, and people from these groups began to be accepted into the wider â€Å"white† race, though some retained distinction as ethnic groups. The idea of an ethnic group can also be broadened or narrowed. While Italian-Americans are thought of as an ethnic group in the United States, some Italians identify more with their regional origins than their national ones. Rather than view themselves as Italians, they consider themselves Sicilian. Nigerians who recently moved to the U.S. might identify more with their specific group from within Nigeria- Igbo, Yoruba, or Fulani, for example- than their nationality. They might have completely different customs from African-Americans who descended from former slaves and whose families have been in the U.S. for generations. Some researchers believe that the concepts of both race and ethnicity have been socially constructed because their definitions change over time, based on public opinion. The belief that race is due to genetic differences and biological morphologies gave way to racism, the idea of superiority and inferiority based on race, they charge. Persecution based on ethnicity, however, also has been common. Race Trumps Ethnicity New York University sociology professor Dalton Conley spoke to PBS about the difference between race and ethnicity for the program â€Å"Race: The Power of an Illusion†: â€Å"The fundamental difference is that race is socially imposed and hierarchical. There is an inequality built into the system. Furthermore, you have no control over your race; it’s how you’re perceived by others.† Conley, like other sociologists, argues that ethnicity is more fluid and crosses racial lines: â€Å"I have a friend who was born in Korea to Korean parents, but as an infant, she was adopted by an Italian family in Italy. Ethnically, she feels Italian: She eats Italian food, she speaks Italian, she knows Italian history and culture. She knows nothing about Korean history and culture. But when she comes to the United States, she’s treated racially as Asian.† Key Takeaways Differences between race and ethnicity: Race is biological, while ethnicity is cultural.Ethnicity can be displayed or hidden, while race generally cannot be.Ethnicity can be adopted, ignored, or broadened, while racial characteristics cannot.Ethnicity has subcategories, while races no longer do.Both have been used to subjugate or persecute people.Some sociologists believe that racial divisions are based more on sociological concepts than biological principles. Sources: https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/what-is-the-difference-between-race-and-ethnicity.html https://www.diffen.com/difference/Ethnicity_vs_Race https://www.livescience.com/33903-difference-race-ethnicity.html

Polarizers Lab Report Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Polarizers - Lab Report Example With reference to the two major classes of polarizers, a number of applications are drawn from their characteristic behavior (Dipak, 143). Linear polarizers as a class of polarizers are made up of two sub-categories including absorptive and beam-splitting. The major difference between beam-splitting and absorptive polarizers is that the former splits an incident beam into two beams of varying polarization while the latter splits unpolarized beam into two oppositely polarized states. An example of a linear polarizer is the wire-grind polarizer which is considered one among the simplest under the linear category of polarizers.  An instance ofthe  absorptive polarizer is the tourmaline crystal. However, this crystal is not used applicably as a polarizer as it appears colored (David, 13). In practical applications, polarizers  function under Malu’s Law which states that  when  a  perfect polarizer is positioned in a beam of polarized light is affected  by the initial intensity of the beam and the angle between the beam’s primary polarization path/direction and polarizer’s axis. Circular polarizers find more industrial use in that they are used in as filters in photography. In addition, circular polarizers are also employed in the 3D-glass lenses where determination of whether an image is supposed to be visible to the right or the left eye (Mark,

Economics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 23

Economics - Essay Example Brooks argues that this migration to what he terms â€Å"sprinkler cities† is a part of the American character. While taking a tongue-in-cheek look at the peculiar nature of these new exurbanites (massive outdoor grills, SUVs and shopping at mega-box stores) he focuses more sincerely on his observations about what really motivates this group of people to live in sprinkler cities. Brooks concludes that it is a combination of factors that are uniquely American. He says that the belief that greener pastures are always to be found in another place is a part of American mythology. This desire for movement is coupled with the desire to be surrounded with people that are similar to them. The belief in technological solutions to modern problems, the desire for relaxed camaraderie and providing a traditional childhood for their children drive them to create new spaces that fit their ideal. Katz feels that the real cause of the outward expansion of population from city centers isn’t caused by something inherent in American culture. He identifies a lack of cooperation between governmental entities as the real root cause of the problem. He argues that misguided land use policies and funding for transportation systems that encourages exurban growth create the atmosphere needed for the expansive growth. He shows that as households move away from urban centers and older suburbs, what they leave behind is broken neighborhoods and crumbling social and physical infrastructure. I agree most with the article written by Katz because his focused on sound economic principles. Actually, Brooks alluded to these principles but did not identify them as a real part of the problem. Brooks speaks of the underused six-land highways, the in-ground sprinkling systems and the availability of enough treated water to have lush grass even in the most arid climate. He identifies these trappings as necessary for the new exurbanite to create their own little