Belief

A literary text often acts as a reflection of the society of the time in which it was written. The particular value systems or ideologies of the characters and character groups represented in the text inform the reader of those characters’ cultural identities. In Thea Astley’s it’s raining in mango, the author offers many representations of cultural identity. Through the story of the Laffey’s, Astley provides an alternative to the mainstream society’s representation of cultural identity and challenges traditional beliefs regarding Australia.

It’s raining in mango is set in Australia, and follows the story of the Laffey family from 1860 to 1980. The characters endure some of the major events in Australia’s history, such as the gold rush of the 1860s, the depression, both World Wars, and the horrific treatment of the Aboriginal population. From these events came the ‘Australian identity’; what mainstream society believed to be the traits and characteristics unique to the ‘typical’ Australian. From the First World War sprung the legend of the heroic ANZAC, and Australians were regarded as the resilient ‘battler’ with a strong sense of humour and laid-back attitude.

Camaraderie and mateship were highly valued. The patriarchal ideologies of the society meant that women were expected to be submissive, and function solely in the domestic sphere, while men were the providers and “bread-winners”. Aboriginals and other minority groups were marginalised or silenced. The value systems and ideologies that inform the representation of mainstream Australian society’s cultural identity are represented in Astley’s text by characters such as the diggers, who believe that the Aboriginal people are “not human” and the pub owner “who hated blacks, but loved their pay checks”.

Other characters who represent the patriarchal values of the society are the priests with whom Jessica Olive and Connie conflict with. However, the strongest representation of the values and ideologies of this society are reflected through the police, the figures of authority who find it “in order to blame a blackskin. The easy way out”. All these characters, along with the men looking for work during the Depression, reflect the values and ideologies of mainstream society, which inform representations of the cultural identity of Australians.

However, through the Laffey family and other character groups, Astley offers an alternative representation of cultural identity. The women in Astley’s text offer an alternative to the cultural identity of women in mainstream society. Unlike the women represented in the ideologies of this patriarchal society, the female characters in mango display strength and independence. Jessica Olive begins as the passive, submissive wife and mother idealised by mainstream society, however moves to challenge this notion after Cornelius leaves and she is left to become the “manageress extraordinaire”.

She shows strength, passion and determination when facing hardships, or challenges to her values from characters such as the boarder at her hotel, and Father Madigan. Connie also proves her independence and strength of character throughout the text. As a child in a convent, Connie has difficulty suppressing her sexuality “and for one silly week she flattened her gently erupting breasts with a broad ribbon band”, and then as an adult she goes on to become a strong, self-reliant single mother. Connie, like Jessica Olive, displays passion and determination when she conflicts with another priest, Father Rassini.

Mag is another character whose values and beliefs give an alternative to the mainstream notion of cultural identity. When she hides Nelly and her baby from the authorities, Mag displays courage and defiance, and the fact that she speaks for George, her husband, reflects power and strength of character. The prostitutes in the text also show very strong independence and courage, and their value systems and ideologies inform a representation of cultural identity that challenges the identity ascribed to prostitutes by mainstream society.

The value systems and beliefs of the female characters in this text create a very different representation of women’s cultural identity in Australia than that ascribed to women by the mainstream patriarchal society of the novel. They create a new cultural identity for women, that of the strong, independent woman. These women have a very strong connection to the land, and place family at the centre of their value system, as do most of the main characters in the text. The centralisation of family in the story of the Laffey’s is very important in the construction of an alternative cultural identity.

Unlike the characters that represent mainstream society, whose families are not mentioned, the Laffey’s have a strong, profound bond. They represent values and attitudes similar to those found in Aboriginal culture, those of respect for, and reliance on, the family. Connie recognises that “only the family as she knows it has cohesion, provides a core”. She understands the unbreakable bond between her family throughout the centuries, and the fact that they are inextricably linked to each other by the knowledge that they are Laffey’s.

The bond between Connie and Will reminds the reader of the importance of family in a time when many families were being ripped apart by the tragedy of the Second World War. For the main characters, the family home in Mango is their place of return, a place to come back to for sanctuary and security. This emphasis on strong family values informs the reader of a cultural identity that is very different to the one offered by mainstream society, in the text. Along with a strong family connection, the main characters also have a strong connection to the land.

While the settlers in the text saw the land as something to be battled with, the Laffey’s learnt to harmonise with the land, and see it as something to be protected. Reever represents the values of the Laffey family through his acting out as a conservationist, and Clytie and Harry’s struggle to save their farm during the Depression displays their concern for the land. It is this connection to the family and the land, similar to Aboriginal values, that sets the Laffey family’s representation of cultural identity apart from that of mainstream society.

The value system and ideologies of the Aboriginal characters, and other characters, inform the reader of the cultural identity of the Aboriginal people. The mainstream society of the text views Aborigines as savage, “no-hoper(s), river-tribe layabout(s)”. This view is clearly expressed throughout the text; by the diggers who callously slaughter the “blackskins”, the pub owner, the police, and especially by the gang in the bar who beat Billy and his family.

The Aboriginal population is marginalised by mainstream society. However, Astley, by privileging the point of view of some of the Aboriginal characters, and creating main characters who sympathise with, and share some beliefs and values with the Aboriginal people, has created a cultural identity that is different from that of mainstream’s society’s beliefs. Aboriginal culture places great emphasis on the unity of the family, and this value is evident in Astley’s text.

Nelly is willing to run, and risk being hunted down, to keep her child, and Billy’s first concern is his father when they are attacked in a bar. The very strong Aboriginal connection to the land is also evident in it’s raining in mango. The way the land is described by the Aboriginal characters is beautiful and serene, with it’s “hill(s), grey scrub against blue, the long grasses dry before the big rains”, and shows an understanding of the nature of the earth.

Bidiggi automatically reaches for the earth to comfort him when his tribe is slaughtered, hiding in the water grass and falling asleep under a paperbark. These Aboriginal notions of family, and their connection to the land, provide a representation of cultural identity. The attitudes of other characters also affect the representation of Aboriginal cultural identity in this text. The Laffey family, who are centralised in the text, sympathise with the plight of the Aboriginal people.

Cornelius is fired because he writes an article exposing the shocking treatment of Aboriginal people, the child George believes that Aborigines are just the same as white people, Mag and George protect Nelly and her baby, and Will tries to help Billy in the bar brawl. Because these characters are all centralised, and the reader is encouraged to agree with their values and attitudes, the reader is positioned to see the Aboriginal people as humanised, which provides an alternative representation of cultural identity to that offered by mainstream society.

Other character groups are also represented in it’s raining in mango, and their value systems and ideologies inform the reader of their cultural identity. These groups are the soldiers, the hippies, and the cult members. The myth of the resilient, laid-back Australian soldier is destroyed in Astley’s text, and replaced instead with the image of a shattered, broken man, plagued by what he has seen. Will’s experience of the war, and how he deals with it, are not the same as the romanticised identity created by main stream society.

Will is instead constantly disturbed by the horrific images of his experiences at the front, and though awarded for bravery, he throws the medal in the rubbish because he does not believe that he deserved it. Thus, through Will’s reaction to the war, Astley again offers an alternative to the cultural identity created by mainstream society. The hippies are represented as lazy, careless, and free. They believe in love, peace, and freedom, and regularly smoke marijuana.

The hippies don’t have real names, and they are constructed as drifters, travelling and moving whenever the mood seizes them. The values and ideologies of the hippies create their cultural identity, however their attitudes and actions are hypocritical, and position the reader to question the validity of the hippies’ cultural identity. The members of the cult are constructed as surreal, surrounded by a blue haze. The reader sees them through the point of view of Connie, and the odd characters are almost satirised.

Astley uses the cult to make another attack on institutionalised religion, suggesting that they are no better than the Father Madigans or Father Rassinis of the world, as they place their absolute faith in the intangible. Their inability to act in an emergency, such as when Connie saves the drowned man, highlights the ineffectiveness of their beliefs. The cult members’ representation of cultural identity is informed through their value systems and ideologies, and is used by Astley to comment on the ineffectiveness of having faith solely in the divine, and no faith in self.

In Thea Astley’s it’s raining in mango, the author has revealed several representations of cultural identity. She has revealed the cultural identities created by the mainstream society of the text, and then offered alternatives to these assumptions through the story of the Laffey family and other surrounding characters. The value systems and ideologies of these characters are what create the cultural identities for these groups.

Trumann life is built and controlled, and revolved around media without his knowledge. Trumann “perfect world” Is a direct metaphor for our lives. Our lives are warped by the media’s ideals similarly how the protagonist unknowingly lives in a life that is being controlled. In both circumstances, the media’s main objective seems to be evident; a subtle way to convey a message. The media depicted in the motion picture has a significantly high Influential role to our modern day society, which Is unavoidable.

This is strongly portrayed throughout, “the Truman show” solely based on three points which are commercialism, manipulation, and emotions created when engaged into media. Manipulation is a recurring theme in “the Truman show’ as the media creates unrealistic societal expectations for the viewers. These expectations are created to achieve the ideal life that is demonstrated in Trumann life, as each situation he encounters Is Immaculately set up. Shaven Is a prime example of how the film shows the audience what a perfect world Is pertaining to.

In the utopian world, everybody is content with his or her lives, but realistically it’s embellished. The society is manipulated in thinking to believe a flawless world exists and the way people live In media Is the way humanity should live as well. The film displays Trauma’s life In a nutshell, having an adequate Job and having a significant other, which are things, any typical male would request for. “The Truman Show” implemented an imaginary world to capture the viewer’s attention and to give of a positive vibe, further Influencing the viewers that media can help us attain the Ideal world _

In the scene, where Truman tells the teacher his dream occupation is to be an explorer, she blatantly lies to him down by telling him the whole world Is already been discovered and explored. Truman now believes he can never become an explorer, destroying all his ambitions and aspirations. The teacher manipulated Truman so he thinks that he can’t be what he wants so he doesn’t disrupt what the media wants. This is similar to how civilization Is manipulated as younger kids to believe that we can’t pursue what we truly desire such as being a female astronaut because it’s not supported by society.

Modern day society is heavily manipulated and influenced by external factors such as media and the powers of authority. Truman is not the only victim exposed to media, we all are as well. Ideals of our society are established by the messages of the media In turn to shape our expectations and attitude towards life Itself. The media often demonstrates how it plays an impact with our emotions whether it is an advertisement or television show. These emotions can either have a positive or a negative repercussion to our mood. Media Is so powerful; Its capable to take over an individual’s composure.

A prominent example would be when the bathtub man goes to the extent by incorporating a television in his bathroom so he can watch Truman would do such a peculiar thing for the purpose of watching a reality show. The bathtub striver to emulate Truman, fixating to every move he made, felt like he was Truman or wanted to be like him. At the same time as Truman was sleeping, he was too. During the thunderstorm, where Truman was desperately holding onto his life, the bathtub man pretended he was in enduring the thunderstorm and held on to the shower curtains as followed.

The media is able to toy with our emotions, which is apparent when Sylvia, Trauma’s first legitimate love knelt down in front of the television in desperation when watching “The Truman Show. ” This signifies that Sylvia had built up emotions and felt an intimate connection with the character. She was frantically hoping Truman realizes he is living in a constructed staged world. Sylvia felt infuriated and appalled that Christofis has the power to control one’s life, physically and mentally. Due to Christofis repugnant actions, Sylvia took initiative to notify the director of how unacceptable it is to confine a human in sense of morality.

By the behavior and emotions people generated by media indicates that media can easily influence peoples mental state. Since, Trauma’s life is broadcasted 2417 to an extensive audience, it’s only right to include commercialism, for profitable purposes. The labels and brands are explicitly shown as well advertised all through the movie whether it is Maroon holding his beer a or posters saying “Free Range Kaiser Chicken. ” By endorsing the products, it promotes and emphasizes positive connections with the brand.

Product placement is an advantageous tool to sell merchandise and is shown during the entire movie. One moment that highlighted this point is when Merely excessively describes how marvelous the cocoa is. Her method to endorse the cocoa wasn’t genuine however, when someone is constantly bombarding you with information of how great this product is, people will start to believe it’s true. Merely also talks about how fancy and functional this kitchen utensil is, because it’s peeler, dicer, and grater integrated into a single appliance.

Product placement can either be subtle or exaggerated nevertheless it’s objective is to leave the audience a long lasting impression, thus unconsciously leading them to purchase the product. Media is critical factor of how society is influenced because how media is perceived whether it’d be deception, endorsements, or feelings developed when looking at media. The “Truman Show’ is a fictional film created to educate the audience that everything on the media isn’t authentic or accurate. We should value our own beliefs and not the interpretation the media is portraying.

When one thinks of “new social movements” (NSM’s) it is fair to say that a number of images may spring into peoples’ minds. To some, Swampy chaining himself to a tree will automatically be imagined, for others, they may think of the anti-globalisation protests in Seattle or on the streets of London. The fact is that both of these ideas come under this broad title and it is for that reason that it can de difficult to define exactly what is meant by an NSM. This essay will attempt to address why NSM’s have come into existence, which sections of society choose to become involved and how these groups operate.

Having done this, the essay will then attempt to show why defining an NSM is problematic. It is fair to say that most people who choose to participate in NSM’s do so because they feel that conventional politics does not or has not dealt with the issues that they feel are important. It is, therefore, the aim of the NSM’s to highlight these issues and bring them to the attention of either the politicians or the general public in the hope that government policy will adopt a different strategy.

It has been said that “one repeated motif in the discussion of new social movements is the view that they are, in contrast to older movements, primarily social or cultural in nature and only secondary, if at all, political. ” (Scott, 1990:16). What Alan Scott is saying here is that the main ideas behind social movements are the attempts to change the way society exist as a whole and not necessarily the way people view their politics. Being part of a social movement is not just a way of thinking; it is a belief in a certain ideal that transcends all aspects of your life.

In this way, it can be said that NSM’s are expressive in their views as opposed to political parties, who are instrumental. An NSM is not necessarily motivated by achieving a pre-set goal but by the belief itself. This is one reason that can explain why members or ‘adherents’ of social movements are fully prepared to make self-sacrifices, such as imprisonment, for their cause. One important ramification of this is that the adherents to social movements are prepared to step outside the law to achieve their goals.

This creates a very serious dilemma for governments because if people are prepared to act illegally then the threat of legal action will not act as a deterrent. In other words, if people have a strong enough will then in the end, there is nothing to stop them. As Russell Dalton and Manfred Kuechler wrote “the new social movement approach claims that many NSM’s intentionally remain outside the institutionalized framework of government. ” (Dalton et al. , 1990:14). The NSM’s prefer to remain in this position to avoid being forced to compromise their goals.

What this suggests is that NSM’s actively promote criminal behaviour and rationalize it by saying that it is for a good cause. However, in a survey conducted by Alan Marsh in 1977, it was found that 55 per cent of the people questioned believed that “it is justified to break the law to protest about something you feel may be very unjust or harmful. ” (Byrne, 1997:4). Although these activities are illegal, the majority of people are prepared to act as such anyway.

This illustrates the complications that arise when one tries to define NSM’s. On the one hand, you could say that they choose to be troublemakers, committing crimes and illegal protests, but on the other hand, you see that in fact a substantial proportion of the population shares their views on the appropriate course of action. A major difficulty with trying to define NSM’s is to distinguish with what exactly we are dealing. What is meant by this is what sort or group of people or section of society do we class as a new social movement?

For example, we would class feminists and green activists as social movements but this also leads to difficulty in defining what an NSM actually is. In terms of ideology, feminists and green activists have little in common yet they would both fall into the category of NSM’s. A very extreme example of this is the Al’ Queida terrorist network and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND). These two groups could not be more different if they tried but to a certain extent they can both be classed as social movements.

On the one hand, you have the CND, an organisation at the heart of the Peace Movement, whose “supporters have employed tactics which extend from serious academic work on the probable effects of nuclear warfare, to mass demonstrations, and to a wide variety of non-violent direct action. ” (Byrne, 1997:11). On the other hand, you have the Al’ Queida terrorist network, the alliance responsible for the September 11th attack upon New York’s World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.

This group is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent people – the CND, however, call for an end to weapons of mass destruction. How then can you class the Al’ Queida terrorist network as a social movement? Its members are willing to step outside the conventional channels to achieve their goals. They are prepared to fight and die for their cause as long as by their death they have advanced towards their end goal – the destruction of the US.

The Al’ Queida is one extreme example of how an NSM can be described as irrational and unreasonable. Their adherents are not motivated by self-interest but by their unbreakable belief in the cause. They also seem to think that they are justified in breaking the law or ignoring any kind of conventional methods. Here we can see how defining a NSM can be made difficult. The spectrum when it comes to social movements is so diversified that it leads to problems in terms of what can and cannot be included.

It is difficult to comprehend that two such different groups can be classified under the same heading. The Al’ Queida terrorist network is, to a certain extent, an example of how NSM’s choose to exist in terms of their structure. The Al’ Queida exists with more recognizable members, such as Osama Bin Laden, but the fact remains that if he were to be captured or killed then that would have little effect on the remainder of the group. The adherents will still believe in their cause and they will still do all they can to realize their vision.

Of course, this is a very extreme example of a NSM and when we look at more mainstream groups the structure is less militant but the basic ideas remain the same. On a whole, NSM’s attempt to avoid the hierarchical approach of the conventional political parties and instead choose to opt for a more co-operative system. The CND is actually an example of how a structured organisation can exist within the informally organized Peace Movement. It is difficult to describe the structure of an NSM as even the word ‘structure’ suggests some kind of organisation.

Referring to NSM’s as groups also causes problems as this suggests that there would be some kind of hierarchy when in fact, as Brand et al. suggest “New social movement theorists maintain that these groups prefer a decentralized, open, and democratic structure that is more in tune with the participatory tendencies of their supporters. ” (Dalton et al. , 1990:13). It is clear that NSM’s choose to steer away from creating any formal structure as to avoid becoming the political parties that they are attempting to influence. The structure of NSM’s has strong links with their ideology.

NSM’s are inclined to believe more in a co-operative society where every person has his or her own personal space in which they have the right to exist and the right to choose how they wish to live their lives. This means that NSM’s have no leaders as such due to the adherents wish to maintain a sense of autonomy. To many adherents of social movements it is important for them as individuals to maintain their rights to exist as they see fitting. The idea of autonomy is of great importance when trying to discuss NSM’s and the fact that they demand various aspects of this autonomy adds weight to the arguments for difficulty with definition.

The first aspect is personal autonomy. The idea that adherents have the social ‘space’ to grow as individuals and develop their own views and ideas, as opposed to being limited by constraints placed upon them by society. An example of this sort of autonomy can be found when we look at the Women’s movement of the early seventies. Here women were not only fighting for their sex as a whole but for their own personal right to equality within the male dominated system. The Women’s movement is also a good example of the second aspect of autonomy: that of group autonomy.

Here we can consider the issue of abortion and the rights of women. This issue can be evaluated on both levels: personal and as a group. On a personal level, the efforts of the movement mean that the choice is there and whichever path is chosen is not dictated by anyone other than the parties involved. The women’s movement fought for the rights of all women to choose whether or not to have abortions so that no matter what background you come from or what religion you are, every woman has the right to choose.

The third aspect of autonomy is described as the ‘autonomy of struggle’, which is to say “the insistence that the movement and those it represents be allowed to fight their own corner without interference from other movements, and without subordinating their demands to other external priorities. ” (Scott, 1990:20). We now see that this issue of autonomy is very important to NSM’s. A social movement sees itself through its own rights and the rights of its adherents to live their lives in a certain fashion.

This leads on to the idea of a social movement helping people to define themselves in terms of their place in society. This is prime example of how adherents differ to members of conventional political parties. A Conservative does not really have to make any concessions upon his or her lifestyle in order to be a member of the Conservative party but being an environmentalist is about a change in how one acts in general. What this illustrates is the argument that NSM’s do not necessarily take action towards political reform but in fact towards social reform.

One of the main elements that makes defining NSM’s so difficult is who makes up the adherents of these movements. Over the last thirty years, there has been an increase in the so-called new politics but can this all being attributed to the uprising of the student movement or are the adherents far more diversified? As has already been mentioned, different people have different views on what they consider to be an NSM. Are we supposed to believe that all adherents are in fact longhaired, unwashed students who have nothing better to do with their time that form squatter camps and disrupt building work?

The classical approach to NSM’s suggests that most adherents turn to social movements due to relative deprivation. The idea that they are somehow incapable of participating in conventional politics so they choose NSM’s as an alternative. However, when classicalists looked at the type of people involved in the civil rights movement in the US during the fifties and sixties, they found that it was not only the alienated black population that was involved but also the white middle class. The theory of ‘resource mobilization’ was put forward as an alternative to the classical theory.

Here, the authors of the theory believed that participation in NSM’s was to do with resources. What ‘resources’ mean is the availability of finances, office space and other intangible assets such as time and education. It suggests that there has been an evolution of the middle class to include people such as teachers and lecturers who have created a class not through economic wealth but through their knowledge and intelligence. The typical adherent to NSM’s is far from the image of a tree-hugging extremist but is, in fact, a member of this new middle class, a technocrat.

What are the reasons behind this? That is a hard question to answer but Ronald Inglehart suggested the theory of ‘post-materialism’. “Inglehart argues that the post-war generation have been socialized into such higher order or ‘post-material’ values, and its this which motivates their support for social movements. ” (Byrne, 1997:55). Here, the argument is that the people who choose to become involved in NSM’s are those who feel that they have achieved all the material possessions that they can and are therefore, looking for some other kind of personal fulfillment.

This theory holds a number of flaws, for example, how can Inglehart be sure that people would choose to become involved in social movements instead of charity work in their quest for personal fulfillment? Another problem arises when you try to quantify the level of material wealth that constitutes satisfaction and at which point the person decides to give up the search for more money. However, the fact remains that it has become more apparent over the years that it is this new middle class that is the typical adherents to the NSM’s but it has not become clear why it is this group.

The fact is that these new social movements choose to exist outside the conventional channels of politics. They do not have the same structure as the mainstream political parties as they are not supposed to be as such. They are an ideology that is followed through choice and lead to more extreme measures than usual politics to the extent that adherents make a lifestyle decision. The difficulty in defining NSM’s comes from all aspects of their existence.

The title of a social movement covers such a diverse range of beliefs and ideas that any kind of set rules will ultimately fail as no statement can be truly all-inclusive. Neither would NSM’s want to be able to be defined as it goes against all the ideals for which they stand – the ideals of a hierarchy free alliance where the emphasis is on co-operation and not leadership. This statement itself causes problems, as it is a sweeping generalization of the group of social movements as a whole. The difficulties of defining new social movements appear because of the fact that no two movements or beliefs are exactly the same.

Text 23 is taken from ‘our day out’ by Willy Russel. In the text it describes of a school trip where a class of students are taken on a day out. Two of the main teachers in the text Mr Briggs and Mrs Kay have conflicting ideas on the purpose of the trip. They also believe differently about the education of the children and the reality of their situation. The children are less interested in learning and more interested in enjoying their day out much to the dislike of Mr Briggs.

Mr Briggs believes that even though the students are on a school trip they should still behave in an orderly fashion and that they should be learning at the same time as behaving themselves. Mr Briggs has much more stricter views and ideas on how a school trips should be conducted. Mrs Kay realises and is very aware that none of the children are interested in anything other than enjoying themselves and since the children are, in her words, ‘rejects since the day they came into the world’ so what is the point in trying to make them learn. When Mrs Kay makes these views clear, Mr Briggs is horrified even though he most likely knows its true. The main difference between Mr Briggs and Mrs Kay is that Mrs Kay has accepted the truth that these children haven’t learnt and aren’t going to start on there big day out.

Mrs Kay has much more realistic values and beliefs such as, it’s too late for teaching the children anything and they aren’t interested. In her opinion the children should at least enjoy there one day out they have although Mr Briggs thinks much more differently. She hides truths from the children so they are not disheartened such as when a girl asks her whether one day she could own a nice house she basically says you might do instead of being pessimistic like maybe Briggs might have been if asked a similar question.

The attitudes of Mrs Kay and Mr Briggs are hugely different. Mr Briggs is constantly ignoring the fact that the children don’t want to learn and in Mrs Kay’s opinion it’s too late for that now. In some ways Mr Briggs still believes that the children can be educated either that or he is just kidding himself. Throughout the text Mr Briggs is constantly trying to show his authority over everyone claiming “I was sent by the headmaster to supervise this trip”.

Mrs Kay has a different attitude towards the children. She knows that they are troublesome but claims its too late for the children and that no one will teach them because no-one knows what to do with them. She also mentions that what the children are good for, or would have been good for, she uses the term ‘factory fodder’ but mentions that the factories have closed down so what future do the children have.

Overall Mr Briggs and Mrs Kay have totally different opinions and beliefs about the children. Ideally Briggs would like to see the children behaving and trying to learn but as both Mr Briggs and Mrs Kay knows it wont happen. Whereas Mrs Kay is more realistic and is looking out for the children’s enjoyment instead of further making there lives a misery.

It refers to our need to be right. Sometimes, an individual does not know what is the correct behaviour for the particular circumstances. In these cases, the individual will look to and copy the behaviour of others (e. g. modeling). The behaviour of others provides information on what is the correct thing to do in this situation. There are three types of social influence – conformity – compliance – obedience conformity.

Conformity involves developing attitudes, opinions, and behaviors to match the attitudes of a specific group. Most people conform to the standard values, also called norms, of many groups without stress and often without even knowing that they are doing so. From an early age, a process of making children conform starts and continues persistently eg. Don’t speak to strangers. Conformity is neither good nor bad. Some degree of conformity is necessary for societies to function. For example, when you stop at a red light, you are conforming to the law and to the general agreement that for the good and safety of society, a red light means stop.

You stop, even though most of the time there is not a police officer on the scene to enforce the law. All people balance the need to conform and fit in with the need to express their individuality throughout their lives. Some research into birth order suggests that the oldest child in a family is more likely to conform, while later children are more likely to become non-conformists. However, these studies are open to different interpretations and, although interesting, should not be considered conclusively true. Young children tend to be the least aware of the group and society values and are the least influenced by the need to conform.

However, with more social interactions and more awareness of others, the need to conform grows. Pre-teens and teenagers face many issues related to conformity. They are pulled between the desire to be seen as individuals of unique value and the desire to belong to a group where they feel secure and accepted. The result is that often teens reject conforming to family or general society values, while conforming rigidly to the norms or values of their peer group. An example of this phenomenon is seen when young people join gangs. In joining the gang they are rejecting the community’s way of dressing and behaving.

Yet to belong to the gang, they must conform to the gang’s own style of dress, behavior, and speech. Conformity within a group entails members to change their attitudes, perceptions, opinions, behaviours and beliefs in order to match those of others within the group. In order to conform, the group member must attribute someone as having the legitimacy and credibility to lead or influence the group’s behaviour. Without this “leader”, conformity toward the group’s goals will be less prevalent. The ‘leader’ has the power to affect change in behaviour or belief towards a group’s standards as a result of the group’s members who follow him/her.

If key members of a group accept messages about how to change behaviour to reduce risky activities such as needle sharing, drinking and driving, and unsafe sexual behavior, other group members often follow their lead and change their behaviour also. Conformity is tied closely to the issue of peer pressure. Although people feel peer pressure their entire lives, young people who are seeking to define themselves are generally most influenced by the values and attitudes of their peers. Adolescents often encourage friends to do or try things that they themselves are doing in order to fit into to a group.

The encouragement can be positive (studying hard to get good grades) or negative (drinking beer after the football game). Deciding how much and which group’s values to conform to are one of the major stresses of adolescence. Trying to conform to the behaviors of a group that go against one’s own beliefs in order to be accepted creates a great deal of internal conflict and sometimes external conflict with family members and friends from an earlier time. Defining oneself as an individual and developing a constant value system forces young people to confront issues of conformity and non-conformity.

This is a major challenge of adolescence. Many studies of young people show that if a person’s friends engage in a behavior – everything from cigarette smoking to drinking alcohol to shoplifting to sexual activity – an adolescent is highly likely to conform to his or her friends’ behaviors and try these activities. The alternative is for the young person to seek different friends with values more in line with his own. Often, however, the desire to be part of a group and the fear of social isolation makes it more appealing to change behaviors than to seek other friends.

Attitudes toward conformity are of particular interest in community health, where conformity may influence the willingness of people to engage in activities such as illicit drug use or high-risk sexual activities, or prompt them to avoid drug rehabilitation programs. The tendency to conform to a group’s values is of interest to outreach workers because social networks may provide a link to reaching and influencing the behavior of a wide range of people involved in drug abuse and high-risk sexual activity.

If key members of a group accept messages about how to change behavior to reduce risky activities such as needle sharing, drinking and driving, and unsafe sexual behavior, other group members often follow their lead and change their behavior also. Although society tends to focus on teenagers’ needs to conform and follow fads, and many parents worry about how the desire to conform will influence the decisions their children must make, issues surrounding conformity continue into adult life.

They may be as trivial as choosing the proper clothes to wear to the office so as not to stand out or as serious as choosing whether to have one’s children vaccinated against diseases. Finding a rational balance between belonging and being an individual is a challenge for everyone. Many people who feel as if this area of their lives is out of balance benefit from seeking professional counseling to help them find a level of conformity that is more comfortable for them When Asch tested individuals alone they made fewer than 1% mistakes and when the same participants were in a group that made errors in judgments, they make more than 33% errors.

This indicates that: We make errors in judgments to fit in with the rest of the group – even when we know the judgment is incorrect. We rely on others for information about reality, about the validity of our feelings, decisions, behaviour etc. We conform because we are unsure of our judgement and not assertive enough. We conform because we need approval and validation. Compliance The concept of compliance is similar to conformity, yet it’s slightly different. For compliance to occur within groups, one must adapt his/her actions to another’s wishes or rules.

Requests for and acts of compliance occur in everyone’s lives. Simply asking someone to perform a task is a request for compliance. The most effective method to gain compliance is through rational persuasion and inspiration. Although this person is asking another to perform a task, he/she is not asking the person to agree or disagree with the task in question. The person requesting the performance of the task is not necessarily attempting to change the other’s beliefs, but simply needs or wants the task to be performed. This notion is what sets conformity and compliance apart.

The central aspect of conformity is that the person being influenced by the group change his/her attitudes and/or beliefs while the main point of compliance is the achievement of some specified task. Foot-in-the-door technique (FITD) is a compliance tactic that involves getting a person to agree to a large request by first setting them up by having that person agree to a modest request. Therefore FITD is a two step compliance technique in which an influencer prefaces the real request by first getting a person to comply with a much smaller request

Obedience is the act of following orders without question because they come from a legitimate authority. When someone orders another to perform some action, and the person complies Variables affecting obedience:

• the authority
• the victim
• the procedure

Milgram’s Experiment

The experiment involved two people one a confederate would play the part of a student trying to remember different words that they had heard the other person who was the subject played the role of a teacher and gave him the test. He was told to shock the “student” everytime he missed a word. Milgram thought that most people wouldn’t shock another human being and especially not all the way up to deadly levels of electricity. As the “teachers” were told to increase the dosage as they got more answers wrong, he found out that most people would shock their fellow man in this experiment and would be obedient to all the demands made by the instructor since he was the one in a position of authority.

Eve asked them what they usually do when going to different malls. The common answer that Eve heard is to hang out with their friends or sometimes with their family. They seldom buy unimportant things but Just to window shopping and there they already enjoy it.

Other’s eat at the KEF because they said that it’s more affordable and at the same time the quality is good. Other’s buy the things they need for their studies. They have common answers and there I figured out something that affects the Filipinos culture. Way back old days, mall is not yet well known buy a lot of people. Only those who are in the upper class are able to go and shop. But as the years pass by, malls are now available for all the class type of Filipinos. Upper, middle or lower class, they are now able to afford and go to malls.

As now, children with the age of 12 and upper are owe going out and have fun In the mall. Filipino families in the old times hangout, going to park or different beautiful views of nature, but now, a lot of families hangout, going to malls, watching movies or shopping. Now, malls are already part of lots of families. They use malls to bond their relationships with their loved ones. Experiencing the Joy Inside the mall Is a great thing, they offer something that everyone will love that Is why Filipinos come back and enjoy walking and sighting things Inside It.

A student has an Idea; a great, huge, expansive Idea. She wants to write about It, so she turns to the only way she knows how to write. The Five Paragraph Theme. In all of her years of school, she has been led to believe that it is the only good way to write an essay. In the process of writing her essay and forcing all of her ideas into three main topics, she loses a great deal of the important information she had previously planned to write about.

But that’s okay, she thinks, because at least her writing is well organized and written in an “acceptable” way, right? Wrong! All their lives, students have been manipulated into believing that five paragraphs in an essay is the only way to go. In reality however, according to Mrs.. Kimberly Wesley, an English teacher at Berkeley Preparatory School, Tampa, Florida, becoming complacent with only being able to write In one format “stunts the growth of human minds” (57). The FTP was meant to help students with their writing and organizational skills after they mastered the art of writing In Itself.

Instead, what’s been happening Is that teachers eve become satisfied with staying on the edge of the status quo, and have fallen back on using the simply structured “national phenomenon” FTP as their main teaching method to teach their students how to write efficiently. To create an easy grading system and keep organized order in the class so students think they know what they’re doing, they have forced the belief on the children that the FTP is the only way they will ever, and should ever write essays.

I myself remember on separate occasions in Junior high when I would receive less than satisfactory grades mainly cause I didn’t stick expressly to the FTP. With time, I conformed to the idea, as all of my classmates with me and before me had. Now, In high school, learning that It’s not the only way to write, and that it’s actually desired to write In a different format, comes as a challenge as well as a relief to me.

Along with so many others, I had unwittingly fallen prey to the complacence that came with the belief that I had learned all that my teachers wanted from me, and that besides more complicated topics, not much more would ever be expected of me. Changing the way I’ve been rating for years will not be impossible, but it will be an uphill road. If a teacher does not challenge a student, they will not ever reach their full potential.

When students believe they must stay strictly within their guidelines for their essays, they “carry seeds of critical thought that are never allowed to grow,” says Wesley (58). Instead they focus mainly on clearly summarizing the effects of whatever they were sent to write about, and not revealing much, or any opinion of their own, as it “didn’t fit within the neat prescribed formula of their thesis” (58). As a result, many essays that ad the potential for great Insight were cut and pruned until only the most basic bones remained.

In other words, Instead of using It to create an Interesting, more thought provoking essay, students channel all of their energy Into keeping wealth the confines of three neatly connected ideas. Rather than endlessly revolving in this dry, staring them right in the face. They don’t need to stick to five paragraphs. Especially when they have topics that are extremely complicated and must fit into, for example six to seven pages. The thought of using only three ideas and five paragraphs to write six to seven page paper seems absolutely ridiculous when one really ponders the notion.

What Wesley introduces is that while there must be an introduction, body, and conclusion, there is no set rule that says there must only be one paragraph for each the introduction and conclusion, and only three paragraphs that explain three ideas. As long as you have a clear introduction, body, and conclusion, you can use as many paragraphs and ideas as you like! Wesley calls this the “Rhetorical Process. ” A symbiotic relationship is when two organisms share or feed after another in order to main. Take for example, the relationship between feeder shrimp and sharks.

Feeder shrimp eat the organisms and plants that get caught in sharks’ gills. By them doing so, the shark is able to breathe efficiently, and the shrimp get nutrients that allow them to live and grow. The student and teacher have a similar symbiotic relationship. When the student works harder for the teacher, the teacher works harder for the student, and in doing so, they are both able to grow. The student responds to a teacher’s encouragement, and in return, the teacher responds to a student’s enthusiasm.

When that occurs, the student grows as an independent writer, and the teacher is allowed to accomplish their Job more fully. When teachers go beyond the minimum requirement and revoke the easy, cookie cutter way of teaching that turns out cookie cutter students to pass on to the next grade, but instead build on students strengths, work on strengthening their weaknesses, and teach each student according to their individual potential, they remove the boundaries on the students’ learning, and set them free.

One way of proposing this change in organizing ideas is o show students different styles of writing, from different time periods and from people of all ages and backgrounds, to show them that there really are many different ways to write. Wesley believes that when students are asked to “reflect on what format best enables them to voice their concerns and meets the needs of their audience” (60), they are encouraged to become communicators, which will help them immensely out in the real world. Coming from a student’s point of view, I agree wholeheartedly.