Conformity And Rebellion In Antigone And The Unknown Citizen

Conformity and Rebellion There are so many different plays, short stories, poems, and books. In the world today that resemble conformity and rebellion. For an example, some may believe that the authors W. H. Auden, John Updike, and Sophocles all did a fantastic job at showing these themes in their writing. W. H. Auden wrote a poem, “The Unknown Citizen,” this poem is about an unknown man who lacks identity, but is within the norms of the society. He listens to the rules and does not disobey them, because he does not want to lose his place of being a good person. Throughout the poem it is known that he does things for the greater good which makes him a happy person. John Updike wrote the short story, “A & P,” this short story is about a young

This play has two characters that represent these concepts of this. The two character are Antigone, and her sister Ismene. Antigone is known to be the rebellious one throughout the play and Ismene is known to be the conformist within the play. Antigone started to discuss with her sister about burring their brother, “and now you can prove what you are a true sister, or a traitor to your family”. then say says to her sister, “Ismene, I am going to bury him. Will you come?” (Sophocles, 727). Antigone was saying this because her brother just died and she wants her sister, Ismene to help burry him. She wants her sister there, so they can have a proper family burial for their brother, even though it is against the rules. Ismene replies with, “bury him! You just said the new law forbids it” (Sophocles, 727). This allows the reader to see that Ismene represents conformity by following the rules and feeling guilty when breaking them. She knows the circumstances for disobeying the laws and she does not want to be punished for something that her sister wants to do. Ismene is too scared to find out what could happen or not happen, but Antigone is not. Antigone states, “Creon is not strong enough to stand in my way” (Sophocles, 727). She is the type of person that will do anything she believes in, and if that is burring her brother because no one else will, well she will gladly stand up and do it herself. “Drama for

This does not only have to be in short stories, poems, or plays. These concepts are found within a person’s personality. Some may question how conformity reflects on a person’s normative, and The European Journal of Social Psychology said, “Conforming to the norms of the existing environment provide individuals with social approval and recognition, which allow them to feel good about their behavior and about themselves” (245). A person who typically feels good about themselves is someone who wants to help others. Meaning they represent a whole-hearted person this is wiling help society as much as they can these individuals do not represent anger often. The European Journal Of Social Psychology said, “even non-conformity to national cultural norms has been shown to negatively affect people’s wellbeing” (245). This is saying that a person that is rebellious is a person with a bad attitude and it will affect the people around them. For an example a person works at a store and they woke up in a bad mood and the bad mood carried on through the day each person that comes into contact with might also have a bad day because this one person’s attitude. Their mood can affect the people around them. This could make a huge effect on a person and how they do something next time. On the other hand, as people start to grow and generations are getting larger develop into the rebellious stages of life. For