According to the statistics on peer pressure, “70% of teens who smoke say they started smoking because their friends smoke, or they felt pressured to try smoking.” But in other cases, peer pressure has helped friends overcome addictions and perhaps quit smoking. This essay will address the various consequences of conformity, pertaining to the Dead Poet’s society. First off, conformity can lead one to where they don’t want to be. Neil conformed to his parents’ will; they picked his school, chose his courses, and determined his future occupation. Yet, his parent’s choices went against Neil’s nature. Neil passionately wanted to pursue acting. His dreams and his father's visions didn’t line up. When Neil conformed to his parents’ hopes versus …show more content…
At first, the Latin teacher, Mr. McAllister taught his students from their desks. He did the textbook worksheets, and it was a very structured, boring class. Then Mr. Keating came along. Mr. Keating took his classes on walks outside to teach them different life lessons, having an interactive style class. Mr. McAllister saw how much more productive his class was, going outside and experiencing things instead of just hearing them. By the end of the book, we saw that Mr. McAllister took his class outside and talked to them incorporating nature into their academics. Mr. McAllister started out teaching as all the other teachers did, not because he thought this was the best way to teach, but because it was all he knew. Mr. Keating came along and taught him that different, is not bad. This encouraged him to think for himself and do what he thought would be beneficial for his students and their learning and not what others deemed was the appropriate way to teach. Another example of how conforming is easier was when Neil pressured Todd into joining the Dead Poet’s Society. Todd was a shy person and especially didn’t like reading in front of others. When Neil and his friends formed the Dead Poet’s Society, Neil urged him to join not letting him stay in the safety of the school, but encouraging him to be adventurous. Neil demanded Todd participate in the Dead Poet’s Society …show more content…
The boys recreated the Dead Poet’s Society that Mr. Keating participated in when he was younger. There they were able to say and do whatever they wanted. Girls were even invited, which they weren’t allowed to see at their all boy school. Here they were invincible; it was a place where anyone can share their feelings and talents without shame. When the boys started this club they didn’t think about what their parents or teachers would think. They had the freedom to do and act the way they pleased, without fear of being judged. If they had conformed with what was acceptable and not risked breaking school rules, they would never have felt the freedom of the Dead Poet’s Society. At the end of the movie when Neil committed suicide, the school wanted to find someone to condemn. The boys were pressured by both their parents and the threat of being expelled from school if they didn’t follow through. They were forced to sign papers that blamed the death of Neil on Mr. Keating, firing him from his job. The boys had no reason to do this they admired him as their teacher and what he stood for. They were forced to conform to what the school and their parents wanted. What they wanted and believed in was not important. Their freedom of choice was nothing to Mr. Nolan the headmaster. He just wanted what was best for him and the school, not the
Mr. Keating encourages Todd to speak up and voice his opinions. He makes Todd realize that the world will accept him because his thoughts and feelings are so deep and heartfelt. Charles Dalton receives just the spark he needs for action from Mr. Keating. He reforms a group called the Dead Poets Society.
Many people have heard the old phrase “if one jumped off a cliff, would you follow them?” that concerns conforming into society and following other people’s actions. In “Stargazer”, by Dara Weir, being a conformist is seen to be a negative way of life for one to pursue. Upon initially reading “Stargazer”, I was overwhelmed with the depth of the poem. I had a strong sense of the poem being about society, but I had it had taken a few readings to get a stronger background of the meaning. After doing so, I felt more positive emotions throughout the poem, as it thoroughly describes opportunity that an individual is given throughout their life. With this, though, conformity can be a factor that may affect the opportunities one receives. Although
Furthermore, sometimes the desire to be accepted is stronger than prevailing conventions. This makes an individual to do things to make him feel accepted in the society. Krakauer compares the people in Alaska and McCandless. He writes, “And I’m sure there are plenty of other Alaskans who had a lot in common with McCandless when they first got here, too, including many of his critics. Which maybe why they’re so hard on him. Maybe McCandless reminds them a little too much of their former selves” (Krakauer 221). In today’s society, an individual confirms itself to what a society wants and expect him or her to be.
Keating demonstrates to his students that books and poetry are necessary in life, but should not be relied upon completely. For example, Mr. Keating tells his students that, “ ‘We don 't read and write poetry because it 's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for’ ”. Similarly, Emerson believes that, “Moses, Plato, and Milton is, that they set at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men but what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages”. Poetry, books, tradition, bards, and sages are essential for people to have passion and knowledge in life, but it does not mean that they should live a life base on those ideas. At some point in life, people have to think for themselves. They should pursue what their heart wants them to because everyone has to think for themselves and find their own talents. This is the main idea Mr. Keating and Emerson are trying to explain. Thus, this is the concept that Mr. Keating is trying to pass
It is very common to see conformity among young people, especially when large groups of young people are constantly around each other. School is one example where conformity is rampant. For some reason people tend to gravitate towards what others are doing. In Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel, Never Let Me Go, the characters are no different from any other young person in that they tend to conform. Ishiguro shows this conformity to prove that conformity stems from the want to fit in and pure ignorance. At Hailsham, the students conform just to fit in with the rest of the students, but they also conform because they do not know any better.
The movie, Dead Poets Society truly captures the essence of the conformities that children are facing. The difference is letting the hourglass run out of time, or making the best of time, facing tough challenges along the way. Todd Anderson makes the best out of his time thanks to the teaching of Mr. Keating, his beloved English teacher. From a misunderstood adolescent to a courageous man, Todd shows his true colors and releases the inferior thoughts stirring up in his developing, young body. In the end, romanticism crushes idealism with power and envy, showing the eye-opening ways that a teacher can contribute to such a tightly wound academy such as Welton.
The teen boys in the Dead Poets Society have to deal with a lot of different things but one thing the boys have to deal with a lot of is coping with their intruding parents. One of the students has to deal with their parents always comparing him to his older brother. Apparently Todd Anderson’s older brother was quite a big deal a Welton Academy and made a big name for the family. Todd has to try and live up to the standards of his family, but also wants to be able to live the life he wants to live. Another student that deals with intruding parents is Neil Perry.
Who is to blame for the death of Neil Perry? Explore the idea that others, including his father, Mr Keating, and Welton Academy, expected too much from him. Mr Perry uses blackmail, pressure and authority to get his way over his son’s life and is otherwise to blame for Neil’s death. He sets Neil limits as to how he can live his life. When Mr Keating inspires Neil and the rest of the senior English class, it gives Neil the idea that he does have the power to stand up to his father.
The Dead Poets Society, a film that takes place in present-day England around 1959, narrates the story of a group of teenage boys who are inspired by their English teacher at a preparatory school to pursue their own passions and dreams rather than following the paths their parents already have planned out for them. Throughout the story, one character, Todd Anderson, presents himself as a respectful and loyal friend, in which I can relate to. However, Neil Perry differs from me the most because of the defiant actions he chooses to make. In Dead Poets Society, Todd is bashful, but he demonstrates his loyalty in the end.
Director Peter Weir, director of The Truman Show, presents the importance of individuality and speaking up in his movie Dead Poets Society, a fictional but realistic story that tells the story of a group of friends at the Wellington Academy prep school and their interactions with their new English teacher, John Keating (Robin Williams). Keating teaches the boys life lessons through some interesting teaching methods that end up changing his students’ approach to life’s challenging situations. Throughout watching Dead Poets Society, I found myself liking the movie more and more as it progressed.
“Dead Poet’s Society” is a film set in the late fifties at a prestigious school for boys called the Welton Academy. The story focuses on an unorthodox English teacher and his impact upon his students, especially a group of seven boys. The primary focus of this film, in my opinion, is the theme of coming of age. The film itself highlights many important and relevent issues that teenagers face in the process of trying to find out who they are as a person. The students are constantly pressured to conform by adults throughout most of the film. Although these adults are only trying to help the boys, it is important that they figure themselves out and develop their own way of thinking. When the boys realize this, they grow up themselves. The character of Todd is a fantastic example of this. Throughout most of the film, this shy boy is ultimately unwilling and reluctant to go against what he is told. When Neil commits suicide, he begins to see the world in a very different way and understands that sometimes questioning the decisions and regulations accepted by society is necessary.
So while he was teaching the class he asks them what “Carpe Diem” means and they didn’t know what it was so he was telling them that it means “To sees the day”, because at some point in life we are going to die and end up becoming worm food and he wanted the boys to have lived their life to the fullest. Neil seizes the day, he loves to do new things and coming up with ideas. He was the first to call Mr.Keating “O Captain! My Captain!” and he was the first to ask him what the Dead Poets Society was.
Dead Poet’s Society The movie Dead Poet’s Society talks about a group of boys named Neil Perry, Todd Anderson, Charlie Dalton, Knox Overstreet, Gerard Pitts, Steven Meeks and Richard Cameron who go to an all-boys prep school and restart the Dead Poet’s Society group. The beginning of the film starts when Todd Anderson is a new student at the school and his roommate is Neil Perry. Neil introduced all of his friends to Todd and made him feel welcomed to the school. The boys had grown an interest to their English class and to their English teacher named Mr. Keating.
The audience is positioned in Keating’s class to share the view of the students, and close ups shots of individual students show them listening but not with the boredom shown in other classes, but with enthusiasm and optimism. This use of camera angles also allows insight into the way Keating sees his pupils, positioning himself on a level of mutual respect. In the first lesson of Keating’s class he introduces the idea of freedom to think as an individual when he declares mathematically analysing a poem is “excrement”. Keating says this because he does not believe in constructing a poem using maths and teaching how to write it, because you can’t teach poetry, it comes from the heart. Following this, he encourages the students to rip the first chapter from their poetry books, an act symbolic of free thinking.
The students are simply pawns for the adults around them, means to an end. Most of the parental control and actual raising of a young boy has been turned over to Walton. Bulman describes the lack of parental involvement, and Dead Poets Society seems to align with most of his