Selfhood

I agree with the idea of selfhood presented in " Beauty: When The Other Dancer Is The Self" by Alice Walker. The way selfhood is shown throughout the essay all ties together from her childhood up until she was an adult. Alice Walker framed a very particular idea of selfhood in her essay “Beauty: When the Other Dancer is the Self” when she talks about her prettiness at the beginning of the essay until one day her world turn to what seemed upside down. In the midst of playing with her siblings, Walker’s ends up getting hit in her right eye which resulted with her having a “hideous cataract” as she believes. Now, her perspective of selfhood changes and she believes that she isn’t the “prettiest” girl that she once use to be because of an “accident” that happened to her. She later grows up and starts a family on her own. When Walker is putting her little girl down for a nap, she fears that she’s will be hated and rejected by her own blood, but something about the way her daughter’s eyes way looking at her made her realize that her eyes was a world on it own. At this point, Walker realize that the selfhood she once rejected still had beauty within it. The idea of selfhood presented in this essay teaches us to still love ourselves even with our flaws.  

Selfhood

I agree with the author Alice Walker's idea of selfhood in Beauty: When the Other Dance is the Self, and how she perception of herself changes throughout the story. Walker was always considered the "Pretty" girl and was idolized in her community until a traumatic event happens to her at just a young age of 8. Her 2 older brothers ruin her Beauty by shooting her with a BB gun and she loses sight in one eye and becomes inverted and shy. Walker loses a part of herself when she loses a part of her eye, Confidence. As a young girl, she thinks that she is ugly now and different because of the white scar in her eye but really she is just as beautiful. It takes her a long time to see that but eventually one of her older brothers takes her to a doctor and she becomes "Beautiful" again. She rises to the top of her class in high school and becomes popular again becoming her old self. She will eventually get married and have an adorable baby girl who grows up one day to find the white scar in Walker's eye but instead of rejecting her difference she embraces it. Walker realizes in that moment that it's ok to be different and not to be the ideal "Beautiful" person she used to be before the accident. I value Walker's idea of selfhood in this story because it tells the reader it is ok to be different because your just as beautiful.

I agree with the idea of selfhood presented in " Beauty: When The Other Dancer Is The Self". Throughout the essay, we were shown how Walker based her selfhood on beauty. Her perception of her own beauty however, changed when she was struck in the eye by a BB gun giving her eye a scar. From then on she viewed herself as unattractive and became quite and shy about her appearance as well as her personality. Although she gained some confidence when she had surgery to fix her eye she still felt insecure until the end of the essay where she realized through her daughter that she did not have to let her drawbacks define who she was rather she should accept and enjoy  the lady the she had become through her experiences. Personally, I couldn't agree more that the idea of our selfhood relies too much on how we think of ourselves based on what other people think of us. In the essay, when Walker describes the joy and relief of when her own daughter accepts her for who she is, she has finally realized and overcome her own self doubt about herself. It shouldn't matter what other people think about us, their beliefs about us are invalid and the only thing that should matter is how we see ourselves and how we learn to accept who we are which is what Walker did at that very moment. We as people need to learn form Walker's experience that we do not need to rely on others for approval, but rather we should trust and love ourselves for who we really are.

Alice Walker

In Alice Walker’s essay, Beauty When the Other Dancer is the Self, she presents the ideas of selfhood having to be with how you love yourself and the people that you allow in. I agree with her ideas of selfhood because I am a firm believer that you are happy judging by who you allow in your life as well as the value that you hold for yourself. She begins with focusing on her early childhood where she was always adored by the locals for being adorable and cute. Her brothers, who she hung out with on a daily basis because of her tomboy tendencies, were one day playing outside with their pellet guns while she played with her bow and arrow. As Walker was outside playing, she felt a pellet penetrate her eye from one of her brothers’ guns. Walker recalls that day as the day that her beauty was lost. Walker stated that,” it was great fun being cute. But then one day, it ended.” Walker isolated herself from the world because she completely believed that she was hideous and disfigured. As time went on, her eye developed white scar tissue that resulted in her using six years to hide her face from the world. Years later she had surgery to remove her cataract and allowed herself to rejoin society and date. She met a man who later became her husband. He reassured her of her beauty and what she has to offer the world. When she became a mother, her daughter had asked her “mommy, where did you get that world in your eye,” which ignited the first within Walker to show the world what she has to offer regardless if she is disfigured .From that point forward, because she had enabled people to come back into her life, she was able to finally love herself after the “accident”.

Alice Walker

I totally agree with Alice Walker’s selfhood. The way she distinct herself from her other siblings as being “the prettiest,” allows her father to dictate who’s going to the fair. This makes her feel like she is special between the bunch and the fact that her father chose her to go along with him and Miss Mey. The fair being described as a place where joy is being fulfilling, more like a wonderland. At this point, after being at the fair Alice starts to share her memories of the night. At this point she becomes annoying and it’s not good repeating things because people tend to get irritated and that’s how her siblings felt. Alice doesn’t know that because she’s aroused by her experiences. Alice is reciting a speech and she is in front of an audience who seems to be amused by her. She doesn’t care about what’s going on just focused about her speech cause at this point she feels important delivering such a sweet speech. Growing up, she gets a lot of attention based on her looks. Alice can’t believe what has happened to her eye, which is struck painfully by her brother’s BB gun. It leaves her looking uncoordinated and her eye becomes shut closed. Due to the accident, it gives Alice the chance to discover how people keep staring at her in an eccentric way. She doesn’t feel the same because she feel like she is some sort of monster due to her “disfigurement.”  This really brings her self-esteem down because she is used to being beautiful. She is not herself because it creates a scar and makes her feel lonely. It’s in fact a tragic because when people ask what happened, she gets uncomfortable and shuts down. She begins to get that feeling of what happened on that night. That day made her feel like she was unwanted and beautiful and there are people who shuts down when something different changes to them. They feel like they can never become that beautiful person they once were. People are very emotional and that’s the way Alice is thinking. Until her brother brings her to a hospital and helps with her “eye” problem. She is excited once again because she doesn’t have to worry about people staring at her in a horrific way, making her feel like what she once was, BEAUTIFUL. Ironically, she leaves high school with high honors and other memorable awards. Later on she realizes that she has to embrace her new image even if others have their opinions. That’s what we all do when we feel insecure about ourselves sometimes. Shutting ourselves down and feel threatened by others, but you have to learn how to embrace the new changes and just be happy for everything. That’s what Alice eventually learns at the end of the novella. Not everyone can be beautiful at all times but it’s how you carry yourself in your image and the way you live your life not being in fear of the next persons voice.

I agree with the idea of selfhood that Walker presents only at the end of “Beauty: When the other dancer is self”, because as we read the essay we are taken through the journey of Walker’s life and find where her selfhood lies throughout this journey.

The ideas that Alice Walker presents in the beginning of story, are based off the fact she placed her selfhood in the way she believed world viewed her, and in how she looked and acted after the accident involving her being shot in the eye with bb gun by her brother. Throughout the novel she would explain how the accident affected her and then repeatedly stated, “you did not change, they said”, which proves that she viewed herself differently then she had prior to this. As the novel goes on we are shown how Walker is greatly affected, she becomes an introverted person and her life seems to revolve around the negative affects that accident has had on her. After the surgery to fix her eye, Walker regains some of her confidence and is able to live a life that she seems to feel more proud of. When Walker begins telling us about her baby daughter we realize even though she has overcome so much she is still living with some insecurity. Walker is insecure that her baby might be “cruel about physical differences” as most children unknowingly are, but is amazed to hear her daughter say “Mommy, there’s a world in your eye.” In this moment Walker says the pain left her, it seems she had accepted herself for who she was: she had come to love her differences and realized where her true selfhood lies.

Not in what others think, not in her “shortcomings,” but in her ability to love herself for who she is. She realized that although she is different, her past didn’t have to affect her selfhood.

For the most part, it is natural instinct to place our selfhood in the way we are viewed, or what is “wrong” with us, but the idea that Walker presents about being content with life, is something that hopefully we can all attain, hopefully one day we are able to find positive selfhood just as Walker has.

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I agree with Alice Walker’s ideas regarding selfhood, Appearance is a big part of our Self-esteem, because it gives us assurance and confidence to which of these incorporate into our personalities even at an early age. In her essay she talks about several scenarios in which being pretty got her what she wanted, but as human beings we’re exposed to situations where our selfhood is put into risk rather it’s an accident that changes us physically to any type of life scenario that affects us mentally. When Alice Walker goes blind it changes her whole perception on how she views life, as though it where a whole different person. She feels as though she lost her personality, so much that she repeatedly questions herself and accepts the fact that she has changed. She goes from a little girl who praised her appearance to a woman who faces rejection which leads her to have a negative destructive perception of herself. Her despise towards her scar leads her to the point that she prayed at night for her beauty rather than her eyesight. We can easily distinguish the importance of her selfhood with, the fact that she chooses image over the possibility of gaining sight back. The moment she goes through surgery she describes how good she felt and how she regained her self-esteem. I believe Walker shared this experience to prove that sometimes society’s interpretation of “beauty” can change the perception we carry within ourselves and it can affect us negatively trying to live up to the expectations of those around us to avoid criticism and “fit in”. We fail to realize that beauty is not on the outside but within ourselves. The fact that Walker is able to find peace with her scar demonstrates her true discovery of self-worthiness and self-acceptance to who she is, and how by nature we are all flawed it’s just that we need to find our inner self to make peace with are flaws and be happy.

Alice Walker on Selfhood

I agree with Alice Walker’s view of selfhood. Everyone grows up with a unique appearance in addition to how they feel about it, and along with that it becomes very easy to point out flaws within oneself. Some people more than others actually pay attention to their own flaws and critique themselves heavily when in reality no one tries to look through them so deeply. There are also people who pay attention more to others’ flaws than their own. Walker experienced this as a child; they bullied her so much she moved back to her hometown. She explains her favorite brother and his wife helped her having understood her “feelings of shame and ugliness.” They took her to a hospital to get her cataracts removed. After the surgery she says to feel as if she were a different person. They still insisted that she hadn’t changed. When the accident first happened she didn’t understand why people would act as if nothing had changed. She noticed things going on around her and noticed the differences. She was not the same and no one had the guts to tell her. She remained the same girl bright and vibrant girl trapped in a body that was physically affected and that hurt her personality in many ways. Once the surgery was done she was able to go back to who she had been, and even growing up post-surgery she had made peace with the “accident” but still thought about the little “world” she had inside her eye, as her daughter had said years later. I feel people can be either of the two. Either you are very careless of what others think so much it helps you in a good way, or you can be so self-critical you trick yourself into thinking others think about you the same way.

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Denerick Patterson





                  I agree with Alice Walker's essay about selfhood  , people do care about what other people say and it sometimes kills people self-esteem and makes people go into depression. For example , when Alice Walker says , " I abuse my eye. I rant and rave at it , in front of the mirror." From this example it shows that Alice is upset with her eye , she doesn't like the recognition it getting from other people. She feels like other people are treating her different and she's not confident in herself anymore because she has that on her eye but when she got it removed it changed her whole attitude. For example when she says, " her brother took her to a doctor and had it removed and she turned into the girl raises her hand now and won the boyfriend of her dreams." From this example it shows that just from taking the wound from off her eye it made her feel like a different person.
                 I feel like a lot of people don't have thick skin and when somebody says something about their flaw they kind of get emotional. Then that's leads to a lot of depression or even worse people committing suicide. We should all use the golden rule " do unto others that you would like them to do to you." If this was used more a lot of incidents that be happening wouldn't happen. But a lot of people wont agree with that and continue to bully and not caring about other people feelings so, we have to let go of what other people say and stop letting them get to us. Or if somebody says something about you and it kind of get to you always remember , " sticks and stones may break my bones but words wont hurt me" , the saying will help you get over there mean words.
                 

First Peron Plural

First Person Plural

I believe that I am made up of multitudes- a plural. “Some scholars argue that although the brain might contain neural subsystems or modules, it also contains a part that constitutes a person, a self: the chief executive of all the subsystems”. Our body may be one, but the mind surely does take charge of our subsystems. The brain “gives rise to selves that last over time, plan for the future and so on”. With that being said, I believe that me as an individual am made up of multitude because “within each brain, different selves are continually popping in and out of existence.” We may refer to these “selves” as our subconscious or the angel and devil on our shoulders, but really, it’s our two minds battling with each other. “They fight for control- bargaining with, deceiving, and plotting against one another.” The effects of our mind battling shows when it comes time for me to make a tough decisions. I am constantly fighting between doing right and doing wrong and with whatever decision I make at the end of the day, I know that It was I who came up with that decision along with the two hemispheres of the brain in my head and with these two hemispheres comes different personalities. So even if people want to deny being “made of multitudes”, sadly we are because with the different hemispheres in one body come with different  personalities.

First Person Plural: Multitudes or One Individual Consciousness?

I believe that I am composed of a single and individual consciousness. At the end of the day I still make my own choices with my one conscious. I do also agree with Paul Bloom, author of the First Person Plural article, in that we do have different desires and that in us we plot against each other. The examples he gives us are about the cake eater who wishes not see articles over obesity and the adults who remembers that every occasion is special so he/she can have at a least a drink. We tend to trick ourselves so that we can get what we ultimately want. In this article, Bloom mentioned a quote by a philosopher, Jerry Fodor, “If, in short, there is a community of computers living in my head, there had better be somebody who is in charge; and, by God, it had better be me.” Even though there are different ways our minds work because of past experiences or memories, we are still in charge. We are still one singular person who wish to pursue happiness in one way or another. We have different styles in a number of situations but we are just one self. I believe that when we beat ourselves up by calling ourselves “lazy bastards”, for example, is because we knew we could have done something different but instead we wanted to take the easy way out. In our minds we know the other options are there but we continue to battle within our minds on what to decide. Some may call it over-thinking. It is not that we have different selves, it is that we think about things quite too much. We learn from our decisions and we also decide what we want to carry with us from them. That is why I believe I have a single, individual conscious because I ultimately come down to a decision from my own one persona.

A multitude of selves

Paul Bloom says in his article First Person Plural, "The idea is that instead, within each brain, different selves are continually popping in and out of existence. They have different desires, and they fight for control—bargaining with, deceiving, and plotting against one another." He argues that instead of one singular self thinking in your head, there are actual multiple selves fighting each other in your head, almost like a civil war within yourself. I agree with his statement, because when faced with decisions, an answer to my question or problem is not immediately made. When sitting down, I have to contemplate the good repercussions and the bad repercussions of an argument. Sometimes the side with the bad repercussions win due to my other selves arguing against the good such as fear and stubbornness. This can be related to the movie Inside Out. Although a children's animation, it holds a great likeness to what Bloom is saying in his article. Each personality that we have, whether it's kindness, selfishness, fear, generosity, all play against each other at every moment of the day. All those different selves make us into the person we think, or know, we are. For instance, in the mornings, my reasonable and knowledgeable side tells me that I know the best thing for me is to wake up early and make a healthy, hearty breakfast consisting of eggs, bacon, fruit, and an English muffin, but the lazy and tired side of me tells me, "Hey, it'll be so much easier to just make a bowl of Cocoa Puffs, plus they're more delicious." I reason with myself that I can work out and work it off, but in reality I know I won't. Yet, I still eat the Cocoa Puffs. These are all of my selves fighting against each other. They're all talking at once to make up one cognitive decision, but due to the difference of all of them, decisions differ. Therefore, that allows one to grow into their personality, or who they are. So, yes I believe in Paul Bloom's idea of a multitude of selves living in one individual's brain.

First Person Plural

I believe that our minds are composed of a single and individual consciousness. Everyone is their own person and in the end makes their own decisions and choices. No one else is inside your head other then yourself. However, I do think that we have all different types personalities and want different things at different times and they vary depending on the situation. A great example to show our different personalities is when Bloom talks about not making the coffee before he goes to sleep. He says “When I get up and there’s no coffee ready, I curse the lazy bastard who shirked his duties the night before.” It would be hard to say that he was just a different person the night before when he decided to blow off making the coffee. He was still one person, himself. His personality at the time was just “lazy” because he was probably tired and just wanted to go to sleep at the time. The next morning he wakes up and is no longer tired anymore and wants his coffee but there is none because he himself chose to not make it the night before. He had two choices and he himself chose one of them.  Although Bloom does have a solid argument about how we have “multitudes” , I believe that we all have different personalities and want different things and that it is our own single consciousness that decides in the end which and what we choose.