Nature vs. Nurture Essay Example for Free

Nature vs. Nurture Essay It is a matter of concern whether human behaviors and characteristics are determined by nature or nurture. If a person’s behavior is inherited directly from the genes of his/her parents or other biological factors, then it is the nature that determines his character. But if the environment that a person grew up in, affects his behavior, then it is the nurture that determines his/her character. It became a great matter of controversy among scientists, psychologists and sociologists. Previously, many people believed that human behavior was instinctive. It can neither be taught nor learned. But later some psychologists came to the conclusion that human behavior is learned throughout the lifetime which is not instinctive. I believe that it is the combination of both nature and nurture that determine one’s characteristics. Nature only or nurture only cannot be the determining factors for one’s behavior and characteristic. A person’s behavior is determined by the equal blend of nature and nurture. Brent Staples in his essay â€Å"Black Men and Pubic Space† proves that one’s character cannot always be determined by their race which is a biological factor or one’s upbringing and society. But both the nature and the nurture affect the way one behaves, â€Å"I grew up one of the good boys, had perhaps a half dozen fistfights. In retrospect, my shyness of combat has clear sources† (Staples 315). Although the society he lived in was not good, he became a good person. It might be because of his behavior inherited from his parents and the good manner he was taught by his parents. So both nature and nurture by his parents work here and the environment of bad people didn’t affect his behavior. However, he once says that â€Å"Women are particularly vulnerable to street violence, and young black males are drastically overrepresented among the perpetrators of that violence† (Staples315). This makes the reader little confuse whether he himself is b eing racist, but he is actually trying to explain that particularly African American males commit crimes more than others because of the environment they grew up in and the choice they made. This may not be because of particularly being a black man, but because of the culture he has adopted since his childhood. Here he somehow takes the side of nurture. Many black people are assumed to be criminals. People judge them just by their appearance and the impression black people have made in today’s world. But this does not always mean that every black people are criminals and it’s  their biological factor that makes them do crimes. We can take the example of Brent Staple. Even though he was an educated and good person, many people and especially white women fear of him. But he was neither an uneducated person nor a criminal. He was brought up in a good family and properly nurtured by his parents. Therefore, nurturing became the factor for his behavior. Similarly, there are examples given by another author Amy Cunningham in her essay, â€Å"Why Women Smile†. Although she focuses primarily on a smile, she tends to explain the actual cause of one’s behavior. She explains that a smile or particularly a women’s smile comes from both natural happiness as well as the hope of people living around them,  "The behavior seems to be an equal blend of nature and nurture† (Cunningham 190). She further explains that both a normal baby and a blind baby smiles, although it may take a little longer for the blind one. It means that the smiles are natural and should not be taught in all cases. However, there are situations where people and especially women are social pressurized to smile and show a good behavior even if they don’t want to, â€Å"Evidently, a woman’s happy, willing deference is something the world wants visibly demonstrated† (Cunningham 191). It is both natural as well as nurtured along with the situations. For example: It is more likely for a child to be a doctor in the future if his dad is a doctor too. Nature plays an important role here because the intelligence of the child is inherited from his father. But if the child is not given proper care of his education or if the parents encourage him to be something rather than doctor, he may choose other professions too. If the child is given proper care and if he is psychologically prepared that he should be a doctor in the future, nature and nurture plays equal role. There are many debates still going on whether human behavior is affected by nature or nurture. Many psychologists and scientists are still researching on whether it is one’s genes or the environment that affects one’s behavior. Yes, one’s genes affect their characteristics but the environment they are cultured in also affects the way they take actions. Since childhood, people are taught moral education at school and home. They learn how to talk, behave, act and respond. These all are nurture. If they are given good lessons, they will be able to be good in the future. But if one does not get proper guidance, he will turn out to be a morally bad person. These are the examples of human behavior affected by  nurture. When we think about nature, different personality of people develops according to the genetics tendencies. For example it is likely for a person to have the habit of being aggressive if his father or his mother or any of his biological family has the same habit. Also there are many styles of talking, eating or walking that are inherited by oneâ €™s parents or biological family. Paul Theroux somehow agrees the equality of nature and nurture. In his essay â€Å"Being a Man†, he explains how nature and nurture has affected a man to be like a man. According to him a girl since her childhood is encouraged to behave in a cute way but a boy is instructed to behave roughly or so called manly, â€Å"It begins with mother encouraging little girls to say (to other adults? â€Å"Do you like my new dress?† In a sense, little girls are traditionally urged to please adults with a kind of coquettishness, while boys are enjoined to behave like monkeys toward each other.† (Theroux177). This shows how a girl and a boy are nurtured differently which determines their characteristics. Healso takes the side of nature where some different behavior between men and women comes naturally, â€Å"Femininity- being lady-like-implies needing a man as witness and seducer: but masculinity celebrates the exclusive company of men† (Theroux177). We can know from th is that not only a nature of a girl or a boy separates each other from their behavior but also their parents or the environment or the nurturer encourage them to behave separately. Therefore, the behavior is determined by both nature and nurture. In conclusion, it can be stated that human behavior are both the result of nature and nurture. One can neither neglect the effect of biological factors one have on them nor disprove the behaviors that are affected by the environment one is living in. It is important for a person to have a good environment even if his biological parents are good in nature. Also, some characters are inherited from genes of one’s parents that might last forever although he is far from his parents. Therefore, both the nature as well as nurture has equal effect on determining human behavior. Work Cited Staples, Brent. Black Men and Public Space. The Norton Reader: An Anthology of Nonfiction. New York: W.W. Norton Company, 2012. Print Cunningham, Amy. Why Women Smile. The Norton Reader: An Anthology of Nonfiction. New York: W.W. Norton Company, 2012. Print Theroux, Paul. Being a Man. The Norton Reader: An Anthology of Nonfiction. New York: W.W. Norton Company, 2012. Print

Warnings Against Gender Stereotypes in Early Twentieth-Century American

Many early twentieth-century American writers used conflicts based on female stereotypes as a central theme in their works. For example, the titular character from Mary E. Wilkins Freeman's short story A New England Nun lives a life of domestic solitude, happily sewing and cleaning while separated from her husband to be for nearly fifteen years. Freeman's nun uses her domesticity as an excuse to avoid marrying her fiancà ©, though she leads him on for most of the story and only avoids marriage after learning of her betrothed's love for another woman. Similarly, the much mentioned but never revealed central character in Susan Glaspell's play Trifles seems to embrace domesticity to escape the misery brought on by her marriage, even managing to escape both the guilt and suspicion of her husband's murder through her and her fellow characters’ embrace of her passive, domestic, and harmless feminine archetype. By focusing on the conflict arising from female stereotypes, these two stories reveal the dangers of stereotyping women as passive, subordinate, and domesticated, both to the adopter and the adoptee. Mary E. Wilkins Freeman's A New England Nun reveals the hazards of female stereotypes to their adoptees through the actions of Louisa Ellis. At the time of the story, Louisa has been engaged to marry her fiancà © Joe Dagget for fifteen years, fourteen of which he has spent away from Louisa (Freeman 1623). Though Louisa admits that "fifteen years ago she had been in love with him," she feels apprehensive about their inevitable marriage after his return (Freeman 1623). Louisa's apprehension towards Joe builds throughout the story, but because her embrace of the female stereotype prevents her from expressing her true feelings and breaking... ... escape their undesirable predicaments. The ease at which the problems in both stories could be solved by abandoning presumptions of how women should behave suggests that Susan Glaspell and Mary E. Wilkins Freeman want people to follow their own desires rather than the conventions of gender roles. Furthermore, this moral continues to be true today; modern readers can still benefit from relinquishing their assumptions about how others should behave based on their gender, religion, or ethnicity. Works Cited Freeman, Mary E. Wilkins. A New England Nun. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Shorter Seventh Edition. Ed. Nina Baym. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2008. 1620-1627. Print. Glaspell, Susan. Trifles. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Shorter Seventh Edition. Ed. Nina Baym. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2008. 1968-1976. Print.

Lives of the Saints Essay

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Nino Ricci’s Lives of the Saints both demonstrate different visions of women. Comparing weak and indecisive women in Hamlet as to strong and independent women in Lives of the Saints. Ophelia in Hamlet is characterized many times as a weak women especially in the quote, â€Å"frailty thy name is woman.† She is completely dependent on her father and proves her dependence when she acts cruel to Hamlet. Which goes against her true feelings toward Hamlet. Afterwords Ophelia agrees to not see Hamlet anymore, â€Å" I shall obey my lord.† Which shows Polonious’s control over his daughter. Ophelia’s actions show that she will do anything to please her father, even making a personal sacrifice which she doesn’t agree with. Ophelia’s desire to please her father leads her to be used as a puppet in order for the King and Polonious to spy on Hamlet, Ophelia’s willingness to spy on a person she truly loves, shows her true nature toward her father. Even when Hamlet harasses Ophelia and tells her to go to a nunnery, Ophelia had the inability to defend herself. When her father passes on, Ophelia is left by herself, with no one to give her guidance. Instead of trying to move on with her life, she calls for her brother hoping he will have a plan for her, â€Å"My brother shall know of it and so I thank you for your good counsel.† Polonious’s was irreplaceable and finally Ophelia realizes this â€Å" I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died.†The significance of the violets are that they symbolize faithfulness and they all died because she felt useless without her father. Ophelia’s death is in result of her dependence and weakness of character.Overall, Ophelia goes mad because she has no position in society. Men have continuously ordered her around, used her, pulling her mind in every direction. She put her faith in one person and never made her own decisions. Similar to Ophelia is Gertrude. She is also characterized by the quote, â€Å"frailty thy name is woman.† Gertrude depends on her husband. Gertrude longing for the attention that she loses when her husband dies, quickly marries Claudius, her husbands brother. Shakespeare displays that women have no back bone and our weak. As if they could not live with out others, men especially. Nino Ricci demonstrates a whole different side of women, he shows that women are strong and independent. The character that illustrates these qualities is Cristina, she raised her child Vittorio alone. Unlike the women in Hamlet, Cristina didn’t need a man to help her raise her child or to get through life. When her son gets beat up at school, she doesn’t just ignore it. She takes physical action about the situation † I’ll make her pay for this, Vittorio, you’ll see, by the blood of Christ I’ll make her pay. The wiping at some tears in her own eyes, she took me suddenly by the hand and marched me out the door into the street. (107).† Cristina is defiantly not a pushover and stands up for what she believes in. She lives in a village where the women stay at home and the men work out in the field and everyone believed in strange superstitions. Cristina was against her village’s expectations and went against what everyone thought. Cristina is outspoken and self-assured. She has a feminist point of view and is vey confident in it, she says â€Å" He’s probably slept with every whore in America by now, but for me its a disgrace. (154)†. Cristina is explaining about her husband Mario but it is also a statement in general about men. Guys can go around going from girl to girl to girl and its not a problem. But if a women were to do the same thing, even if it was just with one guy its an absolute disgrace. This book was based in 1960 and the same sentence could apply to 2012. Also has significance to the text because she had an affair and the whole town found out, which then they treated her with disgu st. Cristina also states â€Å"Women have had their faces up their asses for too long, they let their men run around like goats and then they’re happy if they don’t come home and beat them! (154)† It is demeaning that women are seen as whores when they have affairs, especially when its said by other women. They’re oppressing their own gender when saying it. She finally decides to move away and says her final words to the village â€Å" You are the ones who are dead,not me, because not one of you knows what it means to be free and to make a choice, and I pray to God that he wipes this town and all its stupidities off the face of the earth! (184)† Most women wouldn’t have spoke there mind, especially a woman like Ophelia or Gertrude. Cristina constantly fought with her father and always disagreed â€Å"Long arguments were carried on daily between kitchen and bedroom, tension hovering around.(154).† She finally got fed up with living with her father and hearing his opinion she said â€Å" Then to hell with all of you! I’ll go to Rome, Naples, anywhere.† She had the courage and strength to leave her father and start a life somewhere else, mean while Ophelia couldn’t last a couple days with out her father and killed her self. Nino Ricci illustrates women to be outspoken, independent and powerful. In the end of each story both women characters die. The difference is the way they lived their life. Cristina at least lived her life, standing up for what she believe in and having her own opinion. As for Ophelia lived a lie, as she was a spineless imbecile always doing what others told her to do and had a pathetic death. Shakespeare and Nino Ricci may have very different vision on women but at the same time they are both very accurate views.

What Respect Is The Word Respect - 1113 Words

When talking about the word respect, numerous individuals have no clue what it implies. This word changes its meaning depending on who is inquired. Several people, even ones who comprehend what respect implies, still have no respect for anyone else. A two-way streak that everyone appears to overlook is respect. The word respect has a one-sided meaning to it, as an consequence of all the disrespect around the world. Respect has different opinions, gone through history, and help shape famous quotes. These days, numerous individuals have different implications for the word respect, however there is only one genuine meaning. The definition for the respect is as per the following, a feeling of deep admiration for someone or something elicited by their abilities, qualities, or achievements. Apperception, esteem, consideration, dignity, recognition, and honor are just a minority of the synonyms. So of course, criticism, dishonor, disrespect, neglect, disregard, and ignorance are just a minority of the antonyms. Indeed, even across the world, there are different definition for the word respect. Even throughout time this word has changed numerous times. This word has endless implications around the world and all throughout time. For instance, an elderly person might find it respectful for another person to help them cross the street while on the other hand they might consider it a sign of weakness. An example of how the word respect changes around the world, like in some areas ofShow M oreRelatedPersonal Essay : Self Espect And Self-Respect739 Words   |  3 PagesMerriam-Webster, self-respect is a proper respect for oneself as a human being. I do not call it self-respect when I constantly beat myself down with words. One must put themselves in a position of self-respect with self-acceptance, self-worth and self-conceit. Prior to this time in my life, I would continuously bully myself with malicious words. This hurtful content would come from my own self or others. I had a visual idea of what I wanted myself to be. At the time, self-respect did not look likeRead MorePersonal Statement On Self Respect1263 Words   |  6 PagesSelf-Respect When I think of the word â€Å"self-respect,† I think of understanding the importance of your own rights and sometimes looking out for your best interests before others. Of course, it is always great to put others before yourself at times; but when it comes down to it, you should never put yourself in a vulnerable position. When first hearing this word, I understood it as having pride and confidence in oneself. However since then I have learned that there’s much more to it. Digging deeperRead MoreRespect and Why the Marine Corps Has a Rank Structure. Essay1050 Words   |  5 PagesRespect and why the Marine Corps has a rank structure. 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So you should always be respectful to others so they will treat you the way you want to be treated. Read MoreSelf Respect Is A Very Powerful Term1099 Words   |  5 PagesNeel Bhagat ENG 111 September 09, 2015 Self-respect is a very powerful term. Self-respect is something that has to be earned; it has to be earned from you for yourself. Self-respect has to be learned by oneself, nobody is born with self-respect for himself or herself; it’s not an instinct. Many people take pride in their sense of self-respect. Self-respect is a vital part of ones existence. Self-respect is developed throughout a persons lifetime through many different experiences and encountersRead MoreRespect vs. Disrespect1242 Words   |  5 PagesRespect Vs Disrespect By Osita Onyebuchi Respect vs. Disrespect Have you ever met someone who was rude to you and didnt hold you with much regard? How did you feel? Did you feel angry? What do you think respect is? How is respect earned? Respect is an important way of being kind and good to other people. We live in a society that respect is earned not given. With respect there is also an opposite side of disrespect. The definition of respect is to consider worthy of high regard. There areRead MoreRespecting Elders1547 Words   |  7 Pagesalways respect my elders, if I didnt, Id get a slap on my face by my parents. As I grew up, I came to realize the true meaning of the phrase, respect your elders, and I agree fully with my mothers teachings. I not only respected my elders, but I respected everyone around me. When I had my children, I taught them the same way my parents taught me, on how to respect their elders, and why. I never had any problems teaching my children how to respect, not only their elders, but how to respect everyoneRead MoreRespect1532 Words   |  7 PagesRespect Being responsible for what you do will earn you the respect you deserve, also doing what is right and not running your mouth demonstrate a lot of respect, â€Å"Being brilliant is no great feat if you respect nothing†. (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe) Every military in this world has some sort of chain of command in which respect is the main premise behind the entire Idea of organization and with a chain of command. Respect is important in the design of the military system itself. You haveRead MoreRespecting Elders1559 Words   |  7 Pagesalways respect my elders, if I didnt, Id get a slap on my face by my parents. As I grew up, I came to realize the true meaning of the phrase, respect your elders, and I agree fully with my mothers teachings. I not only respected my elders, but I respected everyone around me. When I had my children, I taught them the same way my parents taught me, on how to respect their elders, and why. I never had any problems teaching my children how to respect, not only their elders, but how to respect everyoneRead MoreThe Rattler Character Analysis790 Words   |  4 Pageshis innate respect for life and nature. The author uses imagery to characterize the snake and emphasize the importance of its life. When the narrator first approaches the snake, he observes how the snake â€Å"held his ground in calm watchfulness; he was not even rattling yet, much less was he coiled; he was waiting for me to show my intentions.† This description uses specific details of the snake’s actions to illustrate how the snake reacts nonviolently. In fact, the snake waits to see what the narrator