Ralph Waldo Emerson Essay Example for Free

Ralph Waldo Emerson Essay Ralph Waldo Emerson was born into a pre-determined life. His father was a minister, so he was already set to become a minister. However, Emerson didn’t believe in organized religion. This was the reason that he became a transcendentalist and wrote his essay â€Å"Self Reliance†. In 1817, Emerson attended Harvard College where he first began to formulate his ideas that were portrayed in his most famous essay. In his essay, Emerson uses two main strategies to persuade his readers. These strategies were anecdotal stories and reasons supported by evidence. Throughout his essay, Emerson uses anecdotes as his main strategy for persuasion. For example, he tells an anecdote about when he was a child. When he was a child, he expressed his true beliefs to a close adult. When asked how he knows that his beliefs aren’t from the devil, Emerson responds by saying, â€Å"They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am the Devil’s child, I will live then from the Devil. † In this response he is saying even if his beliefs are from the Devil, it doesn’t matter. This is what he believes in and nothing can change that. This idea was Emerson’s main virtue that he lived by and wanted others to live by: trust thyself. Emerson’s anecdotes prove to be a very effective way to persuade his readers to believe in his ideas. The anecdotes in this essay are so effective because the reader is able to connect with him, and place themselves in his shoes. The anecdotes are also effective because they are a portal into Emerson’s life. Instead of just listing facts and statistics, Emerson chooses to tell stories about his life. This allows his readers to connect with him on a personal level and the readers develop a stronger emotional connection with Emerson. Another strategy that Emerson uses is reasons supported by evidence. This strategy is also effective because it gives the reader a reason why they should trust themselves, and then supports the reason with evidence to show why the reason is true. For example, he says that if people don’t trust themselves, then they will feel guilty and ashamed. This is the reason Emerson gives of why people need to trust themselves, and then he supports the reason with evidence by saying that it is a waste of time to want what thers want and â€Å"envy is ignorance; imitation is suicide†. He also says that to be truly happy, a man must accept himself for better and for worse. This evidence supports the reason that people should be happy with themselves the way they are. Emerson’s strategy of reasons supported by evidence is very effective because it gives the reader concrete evidence. The evidence supports the reason, and the reason supports the overall claim. The reasons and evidence are logical appeals which appeal to the reader’s good sense; this also makes the strategy effective. It is hard to argue when Emerson gives many concrete reasons to support his claim and then backs it up with even more evidence. Although Emerson’s essay â€Å"Self Reliance† has many good strategies and qualities, it also has some weaknesses. The essay is aimed at a small audience, educated white males. If he were to open the essay up to a broader audience, he would be able to spread his idea more effectively. For example if women were also targeted in the essay, then Emerson’s ideas would be spread to almost twice as many people. Another weakness in the essay is the overall claim. He says that people should trust themselves. This claim has no qualifiers; therefore Emerson is saying that people should trust themselves, always. This is not always true. Yet another weakness in the essay is that Emerson uses mostly anecdotal evidence. Although the anecdotes prove to be effective, the evidence inside of them is not all that concrete. The claims he makes in these anecdotes are not as strong as they could be if he had more of a variety of strategies to support his claims. Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essay â€Å"Self Reliance† tells its readers to trust themselves. He says that every heart vibrates to this iron string. Emerson uses many strategies in his essay; however the two main strategies are anecdotes and reasons supported by evidence. Both of these strategies prove to be very effective on the reader. The anecdotes allow the reader to connect with Emerson, and have strong emotional appeals on the reader. While the reasons supported by evidence apply the reader’s logic and give concrete examples that support his claim. â€Å"Self-Reliance† is a well written essay that persuades its readers to listen and trust themselves.

How Does a Writer Engage a Reader? :: Teaching Writing

How Does a Writer Engage a Reader? It's still snowing. The wind is so strong; it is hard to stay upright. I'm lost in a blizzard. Ahead of me, I see a faint glow. Is it a lamp in my house? I tell myself, "Keep moving toward the light." Left, right, left, right, up, down, I keep walking. I'm so cold. I press on, but the light remains just out of range. Left, right, left, right, up, down. The light grows brighter. Now it dims. I suddenly realize that I'm walking in circles. Where do I go with this paper? How do I get beyond the theme? Why is this assignment so difficult for me to grasp? Intellectually I understand the assignment, at least the right side of my brain does. The left side of my brain seems to be disengaged. Every time I feel like I've nearly got "it,""it" vanishes, eluding me once more. I never realized how difficult it was to break the writing habits learned throughout life. "Themewriting" may not be good writing, but I fear it is the only kind of writing I've ever done. I believe that "theme writing" may still have value and that "themewriting" is undesirable because it fails to engage the reader and to communicate anything of substance. How does a writer communicate and engage a reader? Is it by using a lot of details? The author of The Innocent Nihilist used a lot of details. Those details didn't help me understand it any better. I still am confused about what he was trying to communicate to me. Did Lee really dislike his dog? Was he happy when the dog was killed? Or, was Lee just happy that he wasn't the one hit by the car. The author caught my attention initially by his use of dialogue, much as Mike's attention was held by Lee's story. A lot of details were present, but they didn't help me any with this story. Another paper, Martin Luther King, also used details. It told me where Martin Luther King was educated and what some of his religious convictions were, but it failed to reveal the whole man. It didn't develop his character or reveal his passions. The paper had some details, but it fell short of my expectations. It's still snowing. It's been snowing since noon. The wind is howling; it must be at least 30 m.p.h.

Punctuation Essay

Punctuation is one of the most important aspects of written English, yet it is one taken the most lightly. And it changes meaning, gives a pause to the reader,and changes the tone of the voice when speaking. In all of the essays authors surprised me.They showed me what punctuations actually is, whats te importance of punctuations. as for example â€Å"Don’t stop† and â€Å"Don’t, stop† do both of them are same? No, just a comma changed full meaning. This is how the essays impressed me. â€Å"The comma is a flashing yellow light that asks us only to slow down† this line has been taken from the essay â€Å"In Priase of the Humble Comma† paragraph no.2 line no.5, this is the line which gives all the description about Comma. Like this in every essays they described each punctuations in this way, which I was hoping to. This essays has changed my view of how to see puntuations. Before I didn’t cared that much about punctuations, but now I got a clear information about punctuations.And I came to know that to convey a correct message and write a good piece of English I must use punctuations. â€Å"The relationship with my father in Winnipeg has became more personal than it had been with the alternating saturday father-son telephone call.Because of its brief nature every single character is an enormous significance.† this lines has been taken from the essay â€Å"The Impotance of Email Punctuation: A Cautionary Tale† paragraph no.2 line no.9, this lines makes me understand that punctuations played a great role to make their son-father relation stronger which serves to an emotional investment. These essays made me felt ’emotionally invested’ because it can grow a stronger relation between two person which is really a important thing in this society and these essays made me understand impotance of punctuation too.

The Problems of Aging on Elderly - 1197 Words

AGEING Introduction Ageing refers to change with respect to time. In human beings ageing refers to physical and mental changes with respect to time. As the time passes a person grows old and his physical body becomes weak but his mentality has increased due to experiences.In scientific language senescenceis the term used for aging process. It is measured by the person’s date of birth which comes once in a year. The process of ageing is so interesting because it starts by your birth when you open your eyes for the first time in this world and then stops by your death. Ageing is a very important part of life and daily round about 100,000 people die worldwide due to ageing related problems or diseases. Types There are many types of ageing such as biological ageing (ageing in which biological changes take place within the body), social ageing (how should people react when they grow old), universal ageing (that all people share), probabilistic ageing (changes that may occur to some but not to others it also include diseases) etc.[1][Wikipedia] Symptoms When we talk about signs of ageing, different kinds of signs are being shown by ageing at different developmental stages. Just like during childhood due to aging process child is growing and bones are becoming strong and cells are dividing rapidly and body is developing and organs are becoming mature. But when you are fully mature (after 30) your body starts reverse process. Body starts becoming weak and bones also become weakShow MoreRelatedThe Biology Of Aging And Aging942 Words   |  4 PagesChapter 6, Youth and Aging, analyzes how age is percieved throughtout society as a whole. 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