Self-Harming or Self-Helping? Halloween night: children run around screaming for candy in different costumes and masks, pretending to be something they are not. Even though that day is only for 24 hours, many people hide themselves and their true identity longer than that. Throughout history in society and in different cultures, there have been masks. In ancient times, the Greek, Romans, Chinese, Indians, and Japanese used masks in a variety of different ways, one of them including theater. In tribal societies, masks assisted in witchcraft/sorcery and curing illness. Masks have a variety of purposes and uses in modern society; to fit in, to be accepted, religion purposes, ritual uses, to hide, and to protect others/yourself. Despite the fact …show more content…
When masking yourself, you can protect yourself and others. In the book Under A Painted Sky by Stacey Lee, the protagonists Samantha and Annamae have to change their identity and appearances into men to escape from trouble. In this case, it was essential that they wore a mask and hid their true identity. If the girls didn’t wear the mask, they could’ve got caught and been sentenced to jail or even death. In the clip “My Dad’s Story” by Metlife, the dad is is hiding his true emotions while changing his persona and lying to his daughter about their wealth. If the dad told his daughter the truth, she would be worried about him and not as happy. The dad just wanted her to focus on her life and have a better life than him. He was trying to help her and make her successful. Some may say this is bad because you’re not being candid with each other. It is better to mask yourself and protect others’ feelings so they don’t get hurt. Many short films and stories show that masks can be both beneficial and harmful. In some situations, wearing a mask can help your life and protect the ones you love. However, many times when wearing a mask can destroy your self identity and ruin trust with one another. Therefore, people should wear masks temporarily and know the right time to use them. Society struggles with the balance of this and when to reveal one’s true self. Most people today use masks to gain acceptance from one
Society is better when everyone has different appearances, life would be so boring, having masks takes away the ability to be unique and stand out, and these masks make people feel
In this world, an individual has two masks: the mask is the way the individual chooses to express and appear to family and close friends and the second mask is the way the individual expresses his or her self to the outside world. In some cases, people have many different masks for the different groups of people he or she interacts with. The masks people wear can hide and reveal aspects of them, in other words, one-mask reveals who the individual truly is and the other is who the individual wishes they were. In Joyce Carol Oates’ short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” Connie, the main character, wears two masks, which coincides with the contradictory themes of the story, fantasy versus reality.
The Other Side of the Sky It’s crazy how different cultures are when we all live on the same planet. It’s also crazy how similar cultures are when we live so far away from others. That is what makes our world and our people so diverse. In The Other Side of the Sky by Farah Ahmedi and Tamim Ansary there were many events that showed great amounts of cultural differences, and similarities.
It's about reading. People read all the time. They read for information, for escape, for entertainment, for instruction, for guidance. They read recipes and tweets and texts. They read newspapers, blogs, and Facebook replies.
Duality. The Unseen Side of Everything. Many people can agree with the fact that society can be a controlling, manipulative beast. It’s hand persistently reaches out and drags unsuspecting victims into depths known as conformity. Over time, many people develop masks of their own to hide from this beast and to be seen as a typical and average person.
Masks were popular among african art simply because in their culture art was intended for a daily use rather than to be aesthetically pleasing in one spot which was commonly seen in what is known as europe today. Typically, in african heritage, ceremonies would represent substantial transitions in a person's life and masks were a huge part of the ceremonial attire. These ceremonies included birth, puberty, marriage and death. A mask functioned as a tool to transform a person's identity and channel different spirits. The mask is essential because
People act differently when they are with certain people than when they are alone. Some will call this act a “mask.” This metaphor is used because people cover up who they truly are or what they really feel with their actions; similar to the way a mask covers up a person’s face. This idea of a mask is explored in Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poem, “We Wear the Mask” and readers can see examples of “masks” in Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. People often wear masks to hide something about themselves that they are not proud of or hide their emotions and fears they do not want others to know.
In We Wear the Mask, the author’s rhetorical purpose is to teach the reader why people hide behind their emotions. Dunbar states in the poem that “We wear the mask”, but what mask? What are ‘we’ hiding from? Dunbar explains that we (everyone) are hiding our feelings about one another. He is trying to make the reader realize what people are hiding from everyone else.
Hiding behind a mask Have you ever had a day when you are too embarrassed of yourself that you wanted to hide by wearing a mask? Masks are used in various ways, they can be used for a Halloween costume or a stage play. The astonishing thing is that those masks are visible to others. In the Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the characters such as Myrtle Wilson, Jay Gatsby, and Daisy Buchanan use masks that cannot be seen with the naked eye, they used them as a way to hide their flaws to others. Jay Gatsby is one of the major characters of the novel, Gatsby is a tremendously rich young guy living in a mansion located known as West Egg.
Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide was a very important documentary based of the book by Nicholas Kristof and his wife, Sheryl WuDunn. It talks about the gender-based violence that goes on across the world. Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl both work as journalists for The New York Times. Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide was filmed in 10 countries: (Afghanistan, Cambodia, Kenya, India, Liberia, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Somalia, the United States, and Vietnam) and follows Kristof, WuDunn, and celebrity activists America Ferrera, Diane Lane, Eva Mendes, Meg Ryan, Gabrielle Union, and Olivia Wilde on a journey to tell the stories of inspiring, courageous individuals. Across the globe oppression is being confronted, and solutions are being fashioned through health care, education,
The novel To Kill A Mockingbird exposes the reality behind the mask that people wear to protect themselves from ideas and thoughts that they have but don’t want to accept because they are scared to be vulnerable to society and possibly themselves. Throughout Harper Lee’s creation, though the mask is not directly shown or stated, it is implied in many situations. Maycomb county wears a mask that narrows their vision so they are unable to see other people’s side of things. The upper class white families in Maycomb are the most prone to this mask regarding to the fact everyone is below them, especially the black community.
Masks hide the truth and obscure the facts. They form a barrier between what is real and what is an illusion. Yet, during from the moment blacks were brought to this continent in chains, to the moment they were granted civil rights in the 1960’s, masks were a method of survival. Another way of life for African Americans was the practice of signifying. Signifying is mostly seen in the black literary tradition as a means for African Americans to take back power from the white through misinformation and deception.
After some deliberation, I’ve decided Fezzik had the best quote, “You be careful. People in masks cannot be trusted.” The very term, mask, means to hide from view or to conceal. In truth, most people use masks every day. Therefore, I surmise that most people cannot be trusted.
In the book the Lord of the Flies the masks that Jack’s group uses helps them overcome their fear of killing the pig by hiding their true feelings. When Jack volunteers himself as the leader of hunting he doesn’t realize that he would have to overcome new challenges. Masculinity “masks” and the clay masks they wear in the Lord of the Flies are basically just “things trying to look like something else” (Golding 63). Jack explains to his group of hunters that the masks they were going to wear are so they can look like something they are not or to hide what is keeping them from killing a pig. This shows that they are trying to push away their true selves and by looking like something else they can make a character of who they choose to be based on the reason they put the “mask” on.
However, when people finally listen to their own thoughts, they can find that the thought differ greatly to the majority. By thinking independent, people become aware of themselves, and their own emotions. Going through with a mask on is not truly living. It is important for people to understand realize how they really feel and if that is not how the majority for people are, then so be it. People, government, and the world in general will always be feeding its population lies.