Nurture In Fences

Challenging the Status Quo of Nature vs. Nurture and Gaining Strength (4)

Nurturing children doesn’t necessarily show love; it shows discipline and responsibility that all of us have learned and know. Nature is always a controversial subject because it’s based off our DNA, but our personalities are developed by how we are raised. We are unique and form our own identities later on in life after being nurtured. Society’s views can limit our horizons because of race and having strict right and wrongs. In the play Fences by August Wilson, although Troy Maxson can be seen as controlling, this attribute came from his past, and he ends up growing and overcomes many obstacles because of his critical thinking process. The conflicts created with his

He copes with his past by having humor towards stereotypical situations. He teaches Cory the same lessons, but structured them using baseball terms, strikes, to limit the amount of times Cory can disrespect or not follow a standard. Cory eventually “fights” back during a confrontation with a bat but neither of them physically injury each other shows that deep down they do care for each other even though they have differences. Troy’s stern upbringing doesn’t necessarily get passed on to Cory but Cory has learned bitterness and anger because of his father. Even though Troy went through a lot as a child, needing to take on the world alone, and getting mistreated, “the role of [being] a father is the most complex” (Nadel 208), probably because no one can ever prepare for parenthood, the only foundation you have to use is what you were taught. Children most of the time are who they’re parents are but it seems like that type of cycle skipped a generation because Cory doesn’t fit in that category. He goes against it, by standing up for himself early on and by asserting himself, by challenging the house alpha role. Cory has become a man through the restrictions by his father but sooner than his

The physical fence was seen differently by everyone but Troy’s perspective was that, “the fence represents added restrictions placed upon him. Thus he half-heartedly erects one section of the fence at a time and completes the job only after accepting a challenge from Bono” (Shannon 203). The challenge goes back to baseball, meaning that Troy will put time into something if its competition based or to prove something. Bono is his best friend that he met in prison but he has shine a certain type of light on Troy. Troy doesn’t seem the type to have many friends because he can’t even convey his thought processes right to his family. But Bono actually has Troy how to be human, meaning that to learn to forgive and how to interact with people, Bono is the voice of reason, or Troy’s