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Religious themes in grapes of wrath
Symbolism in grapes of wrath
Symbolism in grapes of wrath
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John Steinbeck passionately describes a time of unfair poverty, unity, and the human spirit in the classic, The Grapes of Wrath. The novel tells of real, diverse characters who experience growth through turmoil and hardship. Jim Casy- a personal favorite character- is an ex-preacher that meets up with a former worshiper, Tom Joad. Casy continues a relationship with Tom and the rest of the Joads as they embark on a journey to California in the hopes of prosperity and possibly excess. Casy represents how the many situations in life impact the ever-changing souls of human- beings and the search within to discover one's true identity and beliefs. Casy, however, was much more complex than the average individual. His unpredjudiced, unified, Christ-like existence twists and turns with every mental and extraneous disaccord.
Jim Casy is an interesting, complicated man. He can be seen as a modern day Christ figure, except without the tending manifest belief in the Christian faith. The initials of his name, J.C., are the same as Jesus Christ. Just as Jesus was exalted by many for what he stood for was supposed to be , Casy was hailed and respected by many for simply being a preacher. Casy and Jesus both saw a common goodness in the average man and saw every person as holy. Both Christ and Casy faced struggles between their ideals versus the real world. (Despite Casy's honesty, goodness, and loyalty to all men, he would not earn a meal or warm place to stay. Although Jesus had many followers, still others opposed his preaching until the very end. ) These prophets attempted to disengage man from the cares of the world and create a high spiritualism that stemmed joy from misery. (All the migrants found pleasures along their trips and kept their hope and spirit throughout the journey. Thanks to Jesus, the saddest, dullest existence has had its glimpse of heaven.) Casy once remarked, "I gotta see them folks that's gone out on the road. I gotta feelin' I got to see them. They gonna need help no preachin' can give 'em. Hope of heaven when their lives ain't lived? Holy Sperit when their own sperit is downcast an' sad?" Casy wished to reach out to others in spite of his own troubles. He wanted to give them sprit, hope and rejuvenate their souls. Jesus too felt that need and can be considered "the great consoler of life." The Life of Jesus by Ernest Renan ...
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...ist-like, harmonious, unprovincial, somewhat realistic charcter who has seen the challenges of organization, authority, his own faith, reception from others, and his own ever- changing personality. This man can be looked at as a martyr, ethical, sacred individual, and yet ironically "Okie", hobo, or virtue-less bum. However The Grapes of Wrath and Jim Casy are undisputed symbols of hope, dreams, spirit and the oneness of all humanity. To me personally, Jim Casy is a role-model to any one who aspires to think original thoughts. I find his defiance of organized religion thought-provoking and inspiring. His ideas of nature are prophetic and his selfless love of people beautiful. Jim Casy's essence of understanding, dreams, love, hope and belief in an almighty holiness can be summed up in one quote, "An' Almighty God never raised no wages. These here folks want to live decent and bring up their kids decent. An' when they're old they wanta set in the door an' watch the downing sun. An' when they're young they wanta dance an' sing an' lay together. They wanta eat an' get drunk and work. An' that's it- they wanta jus' fling their goddamn muscles aroun' an' get tired."
Operation Ranch Hand lasted from about 1962 to 1971, and used various herbicide mixtures, such as Agent Blue, Agent White, Agent Purple, and Agent Pink to overthrow its prey, the communist North Vietnamese. However, the most legendary herbicide used was called Agent Orange.
The military forces sprayed over 19 million gallons of herbicides and it was over 4.5 billion acres of land in Vietnam. The Agent Orange was the chemical dioxin that was most commonly used and was the most effective herbicide. This chemical was used “to remove unwanted plant life and leaves which otherwise provided cover for enemy forces
Yet another similarity between Jim Casey and Jesus Christ can be seen when Casey decides to venture off and join a union group in order to prevent strike wages from falling even farther. This represents the event of Jesus Christ and his faithful disciples, traveling with him in an effort to spread their beliefs throughout the people as a whole. In addition, there were many people who wanted to follow Christ and his quest, yet they declined due to fear of persecution, just as the migrant workers feared an upset of government retaliation against trouble-makers or "reds".
...fortunately, when a person is given that much power and control over a large group of people their decisions as well as reasoning can become altered. In the case of Jim Jones his power lead to an enflamed ego, which led to a greed, not only of loyalty but of money. Money then lead to drug use, and in the end, drug use led to insanity. Those who are gifted with the ability to influence others have a huge responsibility. They must recognize what they have as a gift and not abuse what God has given them. Jim Jones is a person who had this gift as well as good intentions, yet he could not balance and keep in perspective that what he was doing was to benefit the world, not to benefit himself.
Race has no biological meaning. There is only one human race; there are no subspecies, no single defining characteristic, traits, or even gene, separates one “race” from another. Instead of being a biological concept, race is a social construct, and a relatively modern one at that. It was created to give light-skinned Europeans an advantage by making the white race superior and all others inferior. Throughout its history, the concept of race has served this purpose well.
Race, in the common understanding, draws upon differences not only of skin color and physical attributes but also of language, nationality, and religion. Race categories are often used as ethnic intensifiers, with the aim of justifying the exploitation of one group by another. Race is an idea that has become so fixed in American society that there is no room for open-mindedness when challenging the idea of racial categories. Over the years there has been a drastic change with the way the term "race" is used by scientists. Essentially, there is a major difference between the biological and sociological views of race.
Tom Joad experiences many struggles in The Grapes of Wrath. Due to his struggles, he undergoes an immense change that causes him from being unconcerned and impassive to being contemplative and expressive. The journey with Casy and his family affects how he achieves success to become a true, strong character. With his responsibility of taking care of the family, he carries great burden and doubtful decisions of leading them to California. Throughout the journey, he faces trials and sufferings that lead him to have an inner conflict with himself in order for his family to have the golden opportunity to live prosperously in the scarce but hopeful land. His moments of feeling helplessness and vulnerability in the position of a deterred migrant,
began using pathos at the beginning of his speech when he introduced his claim, “This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice.” (King 275) With the use of repetition he was able to deliver a strong feeling about what he was speaking about within that moment. “But one hundred years later, the Negro is still not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is... One hundred years later, the Negro lives... One hundred years later, the Negro is still anguished...” (King 275) Emotions about this subject can be brought out more after one has heard or read the same words several times over, it makes the audience begin to think about what he is truly meaning and realize how important the matters are. King also appeals to the emotions when he refers to the blacks as Negros, “Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, which has come back marked “insufficient funds.”’ (King 276) One does have to take into consideration that blacks were not called anything else besides Negro; looking at society today that term is rarely used when referring to someone of color. A sentiment of happiness and hope was instigated by King throughout the speech and this inspired the people to continue to move forward in spite of the pain and sorrow that they have been
The book consists of three parts. The first part has five chapters of which focuses on explaining what the key questions are and why we find them difficult to answer. The second part has nine chapters explaining in detail what N.T. Wright considers Jesus’ public career and the approach he had in first century Palestine. The third part of the book, the last chapter, challenges readers to wrestle with the questions of Jesus’ life and ministry.
It was deemed “Agent Orange” due to the orange ring found on its packaging. Agent Orange was government regulated, with its production controlled solely by the United States. The product was standardized and limited to production by only several companies. From 1954 through 1975, the Monsanto Company was one of nine wartime Agent Orange manufacturers ("Monsanto 's Agent Orange: The Persistent Ghost From The Vietnam War"). Other herbicides existed as well, such as Blue, Pink, Green, White, and Purple. However, Agent Orange was found to be most effective, and therefore 60% of the “Agents” used in Vietnam were Orange. It is estimated that 11.4 million gallons of Agent Orange were used during the war. Cargo planes dumped most; the rest was sprayed on the ground by trucks or by hand. Agent Orange is fairly simple; it is just a 50/50 mixture of two different herbicides. These two components are: 2, 4-D and 2,4,5-T. These chemicals only remain potent for a few days or weeks before breaking down, though not all of the substance ever broke down. Dioxide is the byproduct of mixing these two chemicals. Dioxide’s half-life is much longer than any of the other components,
Broadly speaking, race is seen or is assumed to be a biologically driven set of boundaries that group and categorize people according to phenotypical similarities (e.g. skin color) (Pinderhughes, 1989; Root, 1998). The categorical classification of race can be traced back to the 16th century Linnaen system of human “races” where each race was believed to be of a distinct type or subspecies that included separate gene pools (Omi & Winant, 1994; Spickard, 1992; Smedley & Smedley, 2005). Race in the U.S. initially began as a general categorizing term, interchangeable with such terms as “type” or “species”. Over time, race began to morph into a term specifically referring to groups of people living in North America (i.e. European “Whites”, Native American “Indians”, and African “Negroes”). Race represented a new way to illustrate human difference as well as a way to socially structure society (Smedley & Smedley, 2005).
Agent Orange is a chemical defoliant introduced in agriculture in 1946 as an herbicide to aid farmers and was used accordingly throughout 1950, after which its production was switched solely for military uses under the Defense Production Act of 1950. Since then, even though ingredients were commercially available and accessible to the public, mass production became heavily regulated and only a handful of the US Chemical manufacturing companies were able to produce it. Agent Orange derives its name from the distinctive orange bands that were used by the military to mark Agent Orange storage containers in which it was transported, rather than from the color of the substance itself. British Military was the first to use Agent Orange in warfare in Malaya. Later, it was used by the US in the Republic of Vietnam from 1961 to 1971 during the Vietnam conflict. It was used as a defoliant and herbicide in Vietnam to deny the enemy use of jungle foliage, for cover and concealment, and to disrupt food production used to sustain the enemy force (Committee on Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans and Agent Orange Exposure. (2011). Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans and Agent Orange Exposure. The National Academies Press.).
People have different physical characteristics, for example skin, hair or eye color, tall or short stature, and other ways evolution has adapted humans to be able to live and thrive in different areas of the world. For hundreds of years race has been a factor in how people have categorized each other. Race is defined as “a group of persons related by a common descent or heredity, characterized by supposedly distinctive and universal characteristics” (“Race”). Race is part of what makes us unique as individuals, however it has not been scientifically identified in the physical make up of what is known as the human genome. There is no scientific proof that gives race the ability to be a social construct, yet it has been a large part of American history and society in history and still has a presence today. Race is a reality.
The Grapes of Wrath is a novel by John Steinbeck that exposes the desperate conditions under which the migratory farm families of America during the 1930's live under. The novel tells of one families migration west to California through the great economic depression of the 1930's. The Joad family had to abandon their home and their livelihoods. They had to uproot and set adrift because tractors were rapidly industrializing their farms. The bank took possession of their land because the owners could not pay off their loan. The novel shows how the Joad family deals with moving to California. How they survive the cruelty of the land owners that take advantage of them, their poverty and willingness to work.
THESIS: Scientists and other intellectuals recognize the modern concept of "race" as an artificial category that developed over the past five centuries due to encounters with non-European people. Even though people still attempt to organize humans into categories according to their race, these categories have been shown to have no scientific basis.