Naked Citadel By Susan Faludi Summary

920 Words4 Pages

In her essay "Naked Citadel," Susan Faludi talks about the "whole man," that is, the stripping of the individuality of young boys in order to turn them into men through monstrous ways while devoting their lives to the citadel, completely going against the beliefs of Sacks. In his essay "The Mind 's Eye," Oliver Sacks talks about, and respects everyone 's individuality. Faludi 's essay gives a sense of how the people in citadel are supposed to comply with cultural expectations, whereas the evidence in Sacks ' essay seemingly defies cultural expectations. These two types of people self evidently do not complement each other, illustrating the two types of people created. Although in the end expectations aren 't always met, and by facing the …show more content…

The environment in which you live in plays a crucial role in the way you perceive the world. As Faludi mentions "The men bathe as a group; they walk to the shower down the open galleries, in full view of the courtyard below, and do so"(Faludi,75). The cadets are against the entrance of women in the Citadel because they feel they will break the long ongoing tradition of the Citadel. However, that is more due to the fact they are living with males in the Citadel, and they have been brainwashed into believing that women will deviate them from their main aim. Furthermore, Sacks states "Lusseyran began to construct and to use imaginery visual worl more like Torey 's. He came to identify himself as belonging to a special category, the 'visual ' blind"(Sacks,334). This further bolsters the case that surrounding affects your perception of things. Although, it is harder to adapt to the problems thrown in life, everyone is capable of adapting, just like how Lusseyran was successful in adapting to the reality of becoming blind. The cadets in the Citadel are seemingly to scared to break the long lying tradition of not allowing women to enter the Citadel, otherwise they all had women in their lives before entering that atmosphere surely. Nobody residing in the Citadel grew up without having their mother/sisters beside them, whom are women. Women deviating cadets from their main task is just a myth, and as proven by Sacks everyone has the ability to adapt no matter what the situation is, so surely the Citadels could adapt too with women in the

Open Document