Context In Faludi's The Naked Midnight

Any actions that an individuals or society makes stems from their respective beliefs and purposes. This holds true especially when examining a person’s immediate surroundings compared to past context. In Leslie Bell’s “Selections from Hard to Get: Twenty-Something Women and the Paradox of Sexual Freedom” society believes women should act a certain way in according to the “old edicts about sex and love” (Bell 26) but presently women are embracing their sexual freedom and attempting to separate themselves from these “old edicts”. Just as in Bell’s piece Susan Faludi’s “The Naked Citadel” follows a similar trend. The purpose of the Citadel is to essentially groom southern boys into respectable men. However, they are instead disciplined by the

Most prominently, Malcolm Gladwell’s “The Power of Context” is this dilemma of the power of immediate context displayed. In a tragic series of events Goetz, a disillusioned figure of justice, shoots 4 men on a subway one day. The reason being less so of his troubled background rather than a unkempt surrounding to encourage his troubled thoughts. What these scenarios all have in common is influence immediate surrounding can have a group or individual person. However, all actions and beliefs are held to the circumstances of their current happenings. Immediately harmful surrounding are the prevalent cause of actions or beliefs held rather than past contex. Essentially, the immediate context of a person’s situation is very important to the development of actions or beliefs.

The women Bell interviews both share a similar conflict which is the separation of their personal from their current lifestyle. Alicia, one the women Bell interviews, feels that she must work to stay

Shannon Faulkner’s unexpected arrival to the Citadel clearly dealt a heavy blow to the men’s sense of order. The complaints as to why she wouldn’t be able to attend became numerous and as she fought to enter to the school, the cadets only came up with more excuses. One of the excuses was “she would only be destroying a long and proud tradition” was the prevalent notion. (Faludi 79) The actual reason as to why the men reacted the way the did had less to do with the actual tradition than it did to only the idea of breaking that said tradition. No calamity would actually follow suit once Faulkner joined the ranks of cadets, but the order and gender roles the men of the Citadel has created for themselves would collapse. The symbol of the “Men Only” institution played heavily into the idea that the men should have absolute dominance over this specific territory. The only concept that these men failed to realize what that women had always been a part of their institution. Though they may not have been drilled in discipline following the same methods the me were forced to follow, but women made up a larger majority of the evening courses and administrations. Because of the male-driven background, the acceptance of a women, especially as a cadet, was frowned upon. This was an instance in which the distinction between the “male idea” and the introduction of