Places

In the short essay “”, Ian Frazier puts himself back to the place in time when he did activities just for the sake of doing them. As a kid, Frazier traveled to the woods behind his house without a real sense of purpose. His main goal for the day or afternoon was just to explore, whatever that word may mean to him. Frazier and his friends spent hours on end in the woods simply breaking thin ice sheets, “throwing rocks at a fresh mudflat to make craters, shooting frogs with slingshots, making forts, picking blackberries, digging in what we were briefly persuaded was an Indian burial mound” (53).

They weren’t doing anything important, but that was the point, to do something so insignificant but have it mean so much. Frazier explains that the activities he did as a kid “was a higher sort of unpurpose” (53), or in other words, marginal. I agree with Frazier about the important of marginality, because children in particular need to try out ideas for themselves and have some breathing room on their own. Marginal activities and places are important to kids, because they allow them to try out ideas or purposeless activities.

As an example, Annie Dillard wrote a short essay called “Hitting Pay Dirt” in which she talks about receiving a microscope as a Christmas present and going down to her basement to play with it endlessly. Dillard received a microscope from her parents because she had wanted one ever since she read “The Field Book of Ponds and Streams” (82). She was utterly convinced that everyone needed a microscope. At first, Dillard failed and could not use the microscope correctly because the slides she saw were a “bust. ” Eventually in late spring, Dillard succeeded and saw an amoeba.

Proud of her accomplishment, she rushed upstairs to tell her parents, but they seemed more interested in their coffee than excited (83). From that point on she understood that you do what you do for pure enjoyment and love for the activity itself and that no one really cares, but yourself. The microscope was her marginal activity and the basement was her marginal place where she could do whatever she wanted. Dillard ends her short essaying stating: “Anything was possible. The sky was the limit. ” (83). “Hitting Pay Dirt” and “In Praise of Margins” both have the similar idea of doing something for pure enjoyment.

Dillard considers her work in the basement “play” because she enjoys it, but she didn’t actually realize that she was learning. This is a prime example of a marginal activity because she only used it for her enjoyment without a sense of real purpose. No purpose is needed because marginal activities allow you to be yourself and do something that you like to do, not because there is an end goal. Marginal activities like Dillard’s microscope allow children to try out ideas that they otherwise may never have found. A safe haven or a place to escape reality can be important to children.

As a child, I lived in the typical two-story home in a typical suburbia neighborhood. I never really could keep much to myself or have ultimate freedom. My parents were typical over-protective parents who were scared that the world may danger and hurt their precious young boy. The only source of escape or get away I ever had was found in the play set in my back yard. It was just a little orange and blue play set that featured a slide and landing. Whenever I couldn’t be found, everyone knew that I was in my little play set in the back yard with my siblings and cousins.

My play set was my marginal place because that was where I could come up with crazy imaginations and as soon as I stepped in my thoughts ran free. The play set was a get away from over bearing parents, homework, or even vegetable filled dinners. In that back yard, we could be anyone we wanted to be, think of the craziest adventures, or even just sit and talk. The play set in the back yard didn’t consist of judgment or scrutiny; rather, it was filled with bliss and innocence. It was such an important part of my childhood and I honestly don’t know if I would be the same person I am today if my play set hadn’t exist.

Frazier’s woods are equivalent to my play set in the back yard. It was our get away from reality, the pure pleasure of doing nothing and something at the same time. My play set was my marginal activity and place because it allowed me to explore thoughts and try out the craziest of ideas. It is important as a child to have a get away where you can do anything you wanted because sometimes children are brought up to be perfect. Expectations can get to a child and a safe haven from that is all that is needed.

In the words of Ian Frazier “ The margin is where you can try out odd ideas that you might be afraid to admit to with people looking on” (54). Marginal places and activities are very important to children because it allows for breathing room. Not everything has to be purpose filled. Activities and places can be purposeless and just as satisfying as if it were purpose filled. Frazier took himself back to a time where everything was much simpler, and realized that marginal activities are very important. Marginal places and activities are important for everyone especially children.

Black Men in Public Spaces is a piece of autobiographical writing that deals with issues of racism and discrimination in the United States. In his short essay, Brent Staple relates a few of his nighttime experiences in the street, which revealed the way in which he was perceived by the others. As a member of the black community, Staples discovers that he is shunned by the strangers that he meets in the street and that women especially think of him as of a perilous individual.

Not being a violent man, Staples is confused and offended by the awe he inspires to the strangers that pass him by and soon learns to shun them himself in order to avoid the unpleasantness of an encounter. Thus, Black Men in Public Places is best suited for biographical criticism. The essay recounts a few of the experiences of the author during his encounters with strangers in the street. These experiences are related in such a way as to highlight the social issues at hand: racism in the form of prejudice and preconception.

The author has several encounters with white people during his night wanderings that reveal a disconcerting attitude on their part. The young black man is shunned by the white collectivity as a dangerous man. The setting of these occurrences is very important: the night and the public places reveal the space that the black community is allowed for in the current society. Despite the fact that they are free, black men are regarded with prejudice and lack of confidence by absolute strangers, without any explicit motive.

Thus, the author feels that his simple presence in the street, without any triggering gesture or attitude on his part, is likely to cause disturbance. He also realizes that the fact that he is considered dangerous by the others without other evidence than the fact that he is black can make his walks dangerous. To highlight his ideas, Brent Staples uses a few particular devices. Thus, first of all, the piece is more of an essay than an actual story. Nevertheless, the author shapes it by giving it a particular ending.

While he relates a few of his experiences as well as that of one of his black friends who is also a journalist as himself in the beginning, he ends by remarking that he himself soon adopted the same attitude as the white individuals had towards him. Thus, in order to avoid the unpleasantness of feeling the fear he inspires to the strangers he meets in the street, he begins to avoid anyone he sees himself and to keep his distance as much as possible.

He also relates that he decides to quicken his pace and overtake other people in the street so that they should not feel as if they were followed by him. These techniques that the author uses for avoidance are revelatory for the racial problem described here. Thus, the black men do not seem to be entitled to the “public space”, where they are looked upon with fear or distrust. Their mere presence is therefore avoided by strangers because of racial prejudice. The author creates an interesting effect at the beginning of the story as he uses semiotics and tropes in order to make his point.

Thus, swinging for a moment into the white perspective, he begins his story by declaring the first woman that ran away from him in the street “his first victim”: “My first victim was a woman-white, well dressed, probably in her early twenties. I came upon her late one evening on a deserted street in Hyde Park […]”(Barnet, Burto and Cain, 301). The word “victim” is a sign, emphasizing the way in which the white person perceived himself or herself in the presence of the black man.

Furthermore, Staples makes use of an interesting metaphor to describe the confusing and painful effect that this first experience had on his own perception. Using an auditory image, he highlights the fact that the reality of prejudice was discovered to him in the sound of the hurrying footsteps of the white woman who was trying to escape him without any apparent reason: “It was in the echo of that terrified woman’s footfalls that I first began to know the unwieldy inheritance I’d come into–the ability to alter public space in ugly ways.

”(Barnet, Burto and Cain, 301) It is through this echo of avoidance that he hears in the woman’s footsteps that Staples realizes that he is not regarded as a simple individual but as a part of the black community, and, as such, he finds himself the unwilling inheritor of detrimental behavior. In order to transmit his message on racial prejudice, Staples also uses a metaphor describing the actual distance that lies between black and white people: “That first encounter, and those that followed, signified that a vast, unnerving gulf lay between nighttime pedestrians–particularly women–and me.

” (Barnet, Burto and Cain, 301) Using the word “gulf” to portray this distance and the relationship between the black and the white, Staples evokes the painful consequences of prejudice, which creates this insurmountable distance between people. These observations, determine the author to take precautions himself and avoid encounters in the street as much as possible: “I now take precautions to make myself less threatening. I move about with care, particularly late in the evening. I give a wide berth to nervous people on subway platforms during the wee hours, particularly when I have exchanged business clothes for jeans.

” (Barnet, Burto and Cain, 302) The ending of the story is also very effective, as the author declares himself the inventor of a new strategic point designed to relax the relationships between the two racial opposites. Thus, upon his encounter with white people, the author begins warbling cheerful songs meant to ease the atmosphere and increase the confidence of the others: “Even steely New Yorkers hunching toward nighttime destinations seem to relax, and occasionally they even join in the tune. Virtually everybody seems to sense that a mugger wouldn’t be warbling bright, sunny selections from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.

” (Barnet, Burto and Cain, 302) Black Men in Public Places is therefore effective precisely because the writers chooses an autobiographical style to relate his experiences, thus providing with an introspective view of his experiences. The ending is particularly effective precisely because it depicts the unnecessary efforts the author takes in order to make his presence in the street less conspicuously menacing for the white people. Works Cited: Barnet, Sylvan, William Burto, and William E. Cain. Literature for Composition. New York: Pearson Longman Publishers, 2007

Passing Places and Transporting. They play I am analyzing Is Passing Places, by Stephen Greenhorn. It is a Scottish play from 1998 which Is set In Motherly. Alongside with this, I will also analyses the movie ‘Transporting’, a movie directed by Danny Bayle based on the novel ‘Transporting’ by Irvine Welsh. First I will focus on the mall characters In the several works and analyses their development throughout the play and the movie. Afterwards I will compare the play and film, and how they each depict Scotland. In the Scottish play Passing Places, the main characters are the two boys Alex and Brian.

Of those two characters, Alex is the one who develops most during the play. In the beginning he is aggressive, angry and tough, and has nothing but hate towards his home-town Motherly: ALEX: Look at this place. Nothing but shoe shops and burger bars. BRIAN: I’m starving. . It shows his feeling of disenchantment with his home-town, but also with his life. It feels Like he needs to leave Motherly, In order to discover what life really Is. HIS life Is full of emptiness, the only relationship he has Is with Brian.

Even his relationship with his mum Is poor: ALEX: No. Look. I Just need to go away for a while. Trust me. MUM: About as far as I could throw you. Throughout he changes in a better way. He learns to relax and discovers the better sides of Scotland. He has achieved some kind of tranquility, which perhaps is a result of his meeting with Mirror. Brian is Ale’s best friend. He is more clever than Alex, more sensible and more aware of the “other side” of Scotland. He has a big knowledge of Scotland and is not afraid to bombard Alex with facts during their ride through Scotland.

Just as Alex, he is also seeking something besides the walls of Motherly. He knows that there are better things, and uses the stolen surfboard as n excuse to run away from Motherly. On their trip, he meets people who are Just like him. At first It’s Loan, but later It’s particularly Frank the Shaper, who makes him realism that there are others like him. They have created a computer program, but also a whole way of life that gives Brian the satisfaction he has been searching for. Bran wants to do the same thing.

In the film ‘Transporting’, the main character is a young heroin addict living in Elite, called Mark Rent. He has a serious drug habit, and resort to shoplifting and petty theft due to his unemployment: RENT: Choose your future. Choose life… But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose something else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you’ve got heroin? 3 Mark actually goes to Aberdeen university before the narrative begin, but dropped out and really hit the drugs when his disabled brother dies In hospital.

As a person he Is very dreamy, troubled, sharp, and as a viewer you never know where you are with him – he never knows where he Is himself. He actually managed to get rid of his heroin addicted, moved to London to start a new life and doing business. But with his old friends. Therefore, he ends pop getting involved in a drug deal and sells 4 kilos of heroin. He then escapes with the money from his “friends”, which Just shows that he has changed into a better person and has decided to choose life, instead of living in the fast lane.

Both works describes the dark sides of Scotland in the beginning, only to end it up by giving the reader/viewer a good impression of Scotland. All three of them aren’t really proud of being Scottish when the narrative starts: Mark Rent: It’s Shiite being Scottish. We’re the lowest of the low! The scum of the bucking earth! 4 Mark expresses clearly that he isn’t proud of being Scottish. If you look at Alex and Brian, their way of talking and living can be seen as a result of the town they have been brought pop to. They are, to a certain point, unconcerned about everything.

It is clearly illustrated in scene 29: ALEX: I can’t. I can think it but I can’t say it. It’s Just It’s not part of my language, alright? 5 Alex can’t say the word beautiful because during his adolescence in Motherly, he hasn’t seen any signs of beauty. The director uses, especially Alex, to criticism the modern big cities. The brings up the contrast of beauty in the landscape and ugliness in the towns. ‘Transporting’ shows some of the same things, UT of course brings up the problem of the rising usage of drugs in Scotland, mainly in the larger cities.

In the film and play alike, the main characters go through a positive development. They go from being troubled and disturbed in the big cities of Scotland, to better human beings when they leave their home-towns. Both the feeling of being Scottish and the Scottish society are criticized. As a reader, you get the impression that the Scottish society is filled with improper practices and an ascending drug abuse. In order to discover the beauty of Scotland or to live life, you have to move to landscapes or even another country.