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Nancy Mairs On Being A Cripple Analysis

694 Words3 Pages

Nancy Mair’s “on being a cripple “ is a self-reflecting story about her journey through a daunting illness. She puts forward her life before and after the diagnosis of MS. Nancy represents a powerful character who does not bow to challenges. She shows us that illness is no excuse to give up what you love. She has influenced the hearts of many and inspired so many handicapped individuals to pursue their ambitions. Mairs starts her tale by identifying herself as a cripple because that’s the way she liked to be addressed. Mairs says “I haven’t always been crippled, a fact for which I am soundly grateful" Mairs indulges the audience into her life, where she never had MS and shows gratitude towards the chance of an independent life. Mairs used …show more content…

I think she did this because she wanted the reader to have full knowledge of the content coming ahead. She says “ multiple sclerosis is a chronic degenerative disease …… … . . .. .. interrupting nerve’s signals.”( Mairs , 7 th paragraph) Nancy describes her experience with multiple sclerosis, indicating how hard it is to lose your own body slowly. Mairs hated her disease and conforms to many harsh realities of …show more content…

(Paragraph,11) She explains her successful marriage and her brave children who never gave up on her. And our proud possessions, as she states “ she doesn’t have to worry about being a bad or a good cripple” when with her family. Maris shows the fullness in her life even with MS and how it hasn’t let her fall from doing what she loves. She understands that “ the self-loathing she feels is neither physical nor intellectually substantial. What she hates is not herself but a disease.” Mairs is trying to rise above the self-pity she developed and wants to be free of it. Mairs explains a journey of realization and stops defining herself with MS, but “ she was satisfied with her adjustment. She had suffered, grief and fury and terror,….but now I was at ease with her lot.” Furthermore, inclines the essay away from grief, towards the strong approach, that yes, this is the situation but it's not a reason to stop

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Mair also thinks “ the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.” For example, Mair thinks the word “handicap” conveys that she’s put at a disadvantage. In opposition, Mair feels just like everyone else, which brings us to her exceptional

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239 Words | 1 Pages

In this essay Nancy Mairs presents herself as someone who is crippled. Out of many others possibilities of names to be called Mairs states that she prefers being called "crippled" because it is more straightforward and precise. In addition she states that she would like to be seen as a tough person whom fate/gods have not been kind to. The word "crippled" also evokes emotion from people which is also what she would like. Furthermore Nancy Mairs does not like other words such as "disabled" or "handicapped" to be used as a description her.

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Nancy Mairs Essay Crippled, handicapped, or disabled? Nancy Mairs describes herself as crippled even though many people who are disabled hate that word. In the passage Nancy Mairs discusses her view and opinion on the three words. Upon discussing the three words she uses tone, word choice, and rhetorical structure to enhance her claims. Nancy Mairs describes herself as crippled and she goes on to tell us that she “would never refer to another person as crippled.

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Nancy Mairs describes herself as a “cripple” and only that. In the passage, she describes her reasoning behind her fondness of the word “cripple” and not other terms more openly used by others such as “disabled” or “handicapped.” To achieve getting her message out she uses different tones and specific words. Mairs applied a positive tone when describing the definition of cripple. She makes the reader see “cripple” in a positive way referring to a Gospel and defining it as “a lover of words.”

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In the passage Nancy Maria prefers to call herself “cripple”. She finds “disabled” and “handicapped” to be inaccurate of her condition. Nancy Mairs uses tone, word choice, and rhetorical structure to convey feelings on the term “cripple”. Nancy Mairs tone throughout the passage was neutral. Statements like “I am cripple.

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Even though she was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, she is still able to have the strength to achieve anything that is possible to her. Because of having MS, the unpredictable course of the disease were terrifying to her. Each night she would get into bed wondering whether she will ever get out again the next morning. Whether she be able to see, speak, to hold a pen between, knowing that one day might come. With the horrible situation in Nancy's life she had the strength to overcome any obstacle.

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In “Unspeakable Conversations” she details her experience. Harriet McBryde Johnson effectively uses the rhetorical appeals of ethos and pathos, along with her uses of first-person narrative and descriptive language, to support her argument that contrary to stereotypes, a person living with a severe disability can live a happy and fulfilling life. Harriet McBryde Johnson was born in 1957 with a neuromuscular disease. At the time of this essay, she had been disabled for over four decades. Born to parents who both taught foreign language, they were able to afford hired help but she knew it could not be for her whole life.

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Despite the fact that Nancy Mairs chose a well diction and sarcastic tone to evoke readers empathy toward her essay , she also evokes a sympathetic response to her audience by telling reader that she does not feel sorry for being a cripple. She uses satirical description of her feelings , by allowing reader to see that she also felt sympathy for herself. Although Mairs, evokes empathy when telling her story, her sympathetic response toward her illness shows that she felt disconnected with her illness and that she did not have nothing else than to take what her destiny brought her. According to Mairs “

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Murphy lacks mobility and sensation in his lower body other than the feeling of occasional muscle spasms, and has limited movement in his upper body below the neck including his arms. Murphy writes the story as it recounts events throughout his entire life, from childhood onwards. He was sixty-two when he wrote the novel. The story provides Murphy’s anthropological commentary on the life of a person with a disability and how society views and treats people with disabilities (Murphy, 1990). Murphy’s performance patterns both support and inhibit his occupational engagement.

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n Nancy Mairs essay, “Disability”, she illustrates the lack of representation of people with disabilities in the media. While disability plays a major role in Mairs’ life, she points out the various ways her everyday life is ordinary and even mundane. Despite the normalcy of the lives of citizens with disabilities Mairs argues the media’s effacement of this population, is fear driven. She claims, “To depict disabled people in the ordinary activities of daily life is to admit that there is something ordinary about the disability itself, that it may enter anybody’s life” (Mairs 14). Able bodied people worry about the prospect of eventually becoming physically impaired.

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People with disabilities are often viewed as less capable, less intelligent and not available to cope well in society. Mairs uses the different persuasive strategies such as ethos, logos and pathos to create a conscious awareness to build a world in which despite the differences everyone is treated with equality and dignity. She imagines her body as something other than problematic, but a reason to fight to build a world in which people wants her in. Mairs mentions in page 169 “I imagine a world where people, allowed the space to accept- admit, endure, embrace- their diverse and often difficult realities.” As Robert M Hensel, a famous Guinness world champion and a man with spina bifida said once “There is no greater disability in society, than the inability to see a person as

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People with disabilities and their caretakers are stigmatized for not being able to keep up, but they are not viewed as not having a “real” disability if they are too productive. Instead of viewing this as a symptom for their disease or disability, Hillyer believes this is a healthier way of living, and she encourages her readers to adopt similar techniques for managing their responsibilities. She especially criticizes the unrealistic, fast-paced speed that women are expected to maintain, despite personal obstacles. Hillyer, having lived in the intersection between the feminist and disability communities for most of her life, emphasizes the importance of allowing women to abandon the traditional concept of a highly productive “superwoman” and instead replace it with the knowledge that every woman dealing with a disease or disability, in themselves or loved ones, is a

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226 Words | 1 Pages

In the passage Nancy Mairs calls herself cripple. She uses different rhetorical mode and devices such as similes to the reader an emotional appeal. In the passage cripple is used to symbolize handicap and disabled. This gives the reader an emotional appeal to how she’s feeling. Nancy Mairs being called handicap lowers confidence, making her feel weak.

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807 Words | 4 Pages

This quote shows that even though Mairs sometimes has difficulty accepting her illness, she knows that there is a growing acceptance of people who must deal with the difficulties that she faces. This ultimately lends a hopeful and positive tone to an otherwise serious and depressing section of her essay. This contrast in tone, but general feeling of hope is key to the type of emotions that Nancy Mairs is trying to educate her readers about. Mair is successful in using multiple rhetorical strategies to connect with the reader.

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575 Words | 3 Pages

The words has been brought for ages as an insult it is often referred to someone who is slow and weak. Throughout history it has a negative connotation and Mairs has many comments to make about how disability does not fit well in our youth-oriented, physical-fitness-obsessed culture, and on how social expectations influence whether she adapts or fails to adapt. It simples represents Mairs

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