Categorieën: Alle - responsibility - hierarchy - instability - survival

door David Sweenie 1 jaar geleden

101

what hierarchies exist in our own family

In the play "Fences" by August Wilson, the dynamics within the family are explored through the contrasting priorities of its members. Troy, as the head of the household, is burdened with the responsibility of meeting the essential needs of the family, such as repairing the roof, which symbolizes the stability and shelter he must provide.

what hierarchies exist in our own family

The motif I had traced was the fence

Floating topic

Summary

what hierarchies exist in our own family

Reading fences has changed the way I thought about my family hierarchy as there is only 2 people in my family hierarchy and the gap is closing soon, meanwhile there seems to be 4 people in fences hierarchy and they are all relatively in the same spot besides troy, before he had died. it made me think that the more people there is, the larger the power gap will be.

Fences By August Wilson

"ROSE: Troy, I want to talk to you.TROY: All ofa sudden, after all this time, you want to talk to me, huh? You ain't wanted to talk to me for months.You ain't wanted to talk to me last night. You ain'wanted no part of me then. What you wanna talk to me about now?ROSE: Tomorrow's Friday.TROY: I know what day tomorrow is. You think I don't know tomorrow's Friday? My whole life I ain't done nothing but look to see Friday coming and you got to tell me it's Friday.ROSE: I want to know if you're coming home."
specific words in the quote such as "my whole life I done nothing but look to see friday coming" convey feelings of desperation and sadness. as troy is mentioning how his entire life was just him living to see friday over and over and over again. Furthermore, this lets us see that troy only thinks about living to live, he does not have some ultimatum or goal that he wants to achieve, he just lives life to be there.

its important to understand these feelings at this point in the story as it shows troys breaking point and reveals so much about him that we had not known before. it takes away that competent and hardworking persona, reveals the facade and shows us how vulnerable troy really is, when he is at his weakest not even doing anything for his wife and kid besides providing for them, but ultimately being absent from both Rose and Cory's lives.

these feelings relate to a unit question as the way a hierarchy is formed in a family is the stability of the people in it, if the people at the top or bottom become unstable or unsure of themselves, at a certain point the hierarchy topples over and is completely reformed. we can see this as when troy had broken down and became absent, Cory had to take the responsibility of being the top of the family hierarchy and had to protect rose.

This is repeated in the 2 other quotes from the mindomo as we see time and time again that the top of the hierarchy starts with troy, and it just slowly decays from there.

While you thinking about a TV, I got to be think-ing about the roof . . . and whatever else go wrong around here. Now if you had two hundred dollars, what would you do fix the roof or buy a TV
the words "while you thinking about" and "I got to be thinking about" convey the feelings of necessity and comfort, as cory wants to have a tv but he does not really need it, meanwhile troy needs to have the roof fixed or he wont have a home to live in.

its important to understand this at this point in the play as the more the story goes on, the more worries troy has which leads to his eventual breakdown of cheating and the major turning point in the stroy.

these feelings relate to the unit question in the way that those on the bottom of the family hierarchy only have to worry about wants most times, while the top has to concern themselves with the needs of the family and how they will survive.

this is repeated throughout the mindomo as in the other 2 quotes it infers troys anger and instability with his tone, especially about how much he worries about the needs of the family, in the first quote it mentions "if i don't take it im gonna have to hear about it for the next six months" showing troys side of responsibility and control, but near the end of the story in the 3rd quote of the mindomo it shows troys breaking point where he says " I ain't done nothing but look to see Friday coming " showing how he had descended.

"Here you go, Rose. If you don't take it I'm gonna have to hear about it for the next six months.(He hands her the money.)ROSE: You can hand yours over here too, Troy.You see this, Bono. You see how they do me.BONO: Yeah, Lucille do me the same way."
specific words in the quote like "you see how they do me" convey the fact that this is a common occurence. this brings out the feelings of a hierarchy as we can see how the family is organised and run.

its important to at understand these feelings at this point in the play is it shapes how the family will react to the events of the story

these feelings relate to a unit question as hierarchies that exist in our families is the ones we make our selves, and furthermore, how these hierarchies affect the way we live

this is repeated in the mindomo twice, as the 3 quotes proceeding this show troys descent in the family hierarchy. Family hierarchy's are built by those who are in the family to show a clear representation of power within a household, when the power decreases, the pyramid is toppled.

Here explain how this quote brings out the feeling or idea in a different way than the other two quotes and HOW realizing this difference is important because it helps you answer the unit question in a slightly different way than the other two quots.