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On The Road American Dream

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Born in the 1920s, Jack Kerouac has grown through a time in which was a diverging age, yet has endured anxieties of what America should represent. The American Dream playing a role in this period, was the ideal life in which consolidation and cultural hegemony were sought at the expense of individualism and spiritualism. Yet, these ambitions still left Americans with lingering anxieties, thus being the reason why Kerouac had taken up a new philosophy; the Beat Generation. Known for advocating purification and illumination through sensory awareness, factors including drug use, alcohol, sex, and other illegal acts all take part of this new movement. Because of society’s longing for the American Dream had become a social fad, Kerouac published …show more content…

Through this, it can be noticed that Kerouac wanted the wandering mind to be able to do as pleased through simplicity. The characters, Sal and Dean both wanted nothing more than to be able to explore what the world had to offer, even if it meant waiting endless hours for a ride from strangers. Hitchhiking was the less dangerous, legal way for the characters to travel, yet this did not always satisfy them. Kerouac also wanted to show that while most Americans would choose hitchhiking over illegal acts, Sal and Dean accepted that they would most likely never follow the “typical American” guidelines. Stealing cars was another preferred form of transportation for it was “a wild yea-saying overburst of American joy…(he only stole cars for the joy rides)” (Kerouac 21). With this, Kerouac proceeds to relate this unlawful act to Americanism, or at least his view of it. Part of the American dream was to fulfill an almost flawless lifestyle and represent the good doings of American, but Kerouac was tired of this and quite frankly, did not believe that was the way to life. Through the actions of his characters, he wanted to create a new message and replace the fakeness of the American Dream. Not everyone is perfect, and neither is America. So why should one pretend it is? Not only were hitchhiking and illegal car stealing part of this new Beat Generation, drugs and alcohol also played effect and are present in Kerouac’s

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American Writer and Musician, James McBride has written multiple books and has voiced his opinions in magazines as well as newspapers. In this particular essay, which appeared in National Geographic in 2007, he talks about how hip-hop has influenced the world and how he realized that he has missed an important part of his life. There are many rhetorics used in this essay, -“Irony, Metaphors, Hyperbole and Allusions. ”- are some of the more notable ones. While talking about his biggest nightmare, a feeling of disjoint comes into his mind, “It is no longer…hip-hop planet.”

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For example, in paragraph 10, McBride presents the position “The rap artists come and go, but the conditions that produced them linger… It took a massive hurricane in New Orleans for the United States to wake up to its racial realities” (McBride, 2). In this passage, McBride explains that racial issues contributed to the formation of hip-hop. Furthermore, he clarifies that hip-hop is inspirational because it forced America to realize some of the dilemmas that people faced. More evidence can be found in paragraph 11, which states, “At its best, hip-hop lays bare the empty moral cupboard that is our generation’s legacy.

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The Beat generation rebelled against America's conformist society. People of the Beat generation were largely anti-war and against racism. The beat generation showed itself in art such as poetry and music. The rock star Elvis Presley’s dance moves were considered vulgar by conservative mainstream society.(Doc D) The Yippies were hippies who were involved in politics in(Doc I) the Yippies were a part of some riots sparked by the assassination of

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Altschuler discusses media commentator Jeff Greenfield’s opinion about the influences of Rock and Roll on American youth. Greenfield states, “Nothing we see in the counterculture [of the 1960’s], not the clothes, the hair, the sexuality, the drugs, the rejection of the reason, the resort to symbols and magic – none of it is separable from the coming to power in the 1950s of rock and roll music.” He continues with “Brewed in the hidden corners of black American cities, its [Rock-n-Roll] rhythms infected white Americans, seducing them out of the kind of temperate bobby-sox passions out of which Andy Hardy films are spun. Rock and Roll was elemental, savage, dripping with sex; it was just as our parents feared.” (Altschuler, 8) Rock and Roll stood as a powerful alternative to the conformist ideals Americans had valued.

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What is the American Dream? The American Dream is the ideal that every U.S. citizens achieve their dreams through hard works and determinations, as portrayed in The Great Gatsby; a novel that pursuits the American Dream, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Through the uses diction and imagery, the author, Fitzgerald has successfully revealed how each character in the story pursuit their own versions of the American Dreams; prompted numerous life lessons at the end of the story. To begin, the author uses man great diction to create certain tones, where these tones then lead to ways that the characters pursue their American Dreams, and expose life lessons that readers can easily take away. For example, in chapter 5, the author states, “Gatsby got himself

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1. The American Dream is what everyone was striving for in the novel was about gaining wealth and material possessions to find happiness. 2.

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The american dream is an ideal of everyone to achieve the hope of having a better life and making great amounts of money but in that sense they aren’t realizing what things they are leaving back and how much they’ll have to sacrifice or loose to gain that thought of American dream. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald and “ Harlem” by Langston Hughes both shows how the american dream gives hope but the pursuit of hope demolishes. Which is illustrated by the characters showing the corruption of wealth and their moral values. Gatsby the most wealthiest and meticulous person from West Egg which represents new money a society parades its cash through obvious utilization and luxurious drinking and partying but his american dream was only Daisy

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This can mean exploring the enchanting sights of nature or beginning a family of your own. Chris, one of the many characters with the idea of seeing the surrounding world in the pursuit of contentment, vacated his own life to seek the thrill he was looking for. The author includes quotes from passages such as, “It should not be denied… that being footloose has always exhilarated us. It is associated in our minds with escape from history and oppression and law and irksome obligations,with absolute freedom… Wallace Stegner,The American West Living Space,” (krakauer 15). This quote expresses the craving for freedom people get when reminiscing about the American dream and the allure that attracts them to it.

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The American Dream is pursued by the novel Fahrenheit 451 by the character Guy Montag when he decides to break the law in search of knowledge and freedom. Pop! That's the sound of the fire popping the burning wood from Montag's flamethrower as he burns the rest of the books. Freedom is a big subject in Fahrenheit 451, books have been outlawed due to the knowledge they contain. Montag is essentially trying to find himself and understand what happiness is, and the only way to do that is to remember the importance of true freedom.

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The “American Dream” has been around since America was founded, the idea of a “self-made” man. According to Dictionary.com, the American Dream is “the ideals of freedom, equality, and opportunity traditionally held to be available to every American.” The “American Dream” can never be attained by those chasing it, and it is indeed corrupt. The dream is never fulfilled. In Fitzgerald's novel, multiple characters throughout the story are left feeling embittered.

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America has always lured people with an unfulfilling promise of more; people come to America with nothing to try and gain something that’s unobtainable; Unfortunately, what they find is far from what they wanted to gain. F. Scott Fitzgerald expressed just how much of a lie the American dream was in The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald lived as a captive of the dream 's unlawful grip that promised so much but gave so little. He was born middle class and tried his hardest to become more than what his father was, but as ambitious as he was he never gained the wealth and elite status that he desired. The Great Gatsby was his way of stating the way that things were at the time, and he writes about how the American dream is unobtainable through symbolism.

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The Great Gatsby is a wonderful novel that explains the drive and want to have the American Dream. F. Scott Fitzgerald and his life really show the true meaning of the American Dream and how hard and difficult it is to achieve it. He went through many hardships during his life and yet he still was able to come close to achieving the American Dream. The Idea behind the American Dream is that anyone can go from being poor to rich and live a healthy lifestyle and get the most out of life without being financially unstable.

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"The negative side of the American Dream comes when people pursue success at any cost, which in turn destroys the vision and the dream." In this quote, by Azar Nafisi, it explains how dreaming can be tainted by reality, and it that if you don 't compromise you may suffer. In the book The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the American Dream is one the many themes in this book. The American Dream that most people in this book obtains to have is wealth, statist, a fun social life, and someone to lust. It is the life we all strive to have until we obtain it and see it 's meaningless composure.

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The American dream states that any individual can achieve success regardless of family history, race, and/or religion simply by working hard. The 1920’s were a time of corruption and demise of moral values in society. The first World War had passed, and people were reveling in the materialism that came at the end of it, such as advanced technology and innovative inventions. The novel The Great Gatsby exploits the theme of the American Dream as it takes place in a corrupt period in history. Although the American Dream seemed more attainable than ever in the 1920’s, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby demonstrates how materialism and the demise of moral values in society leads to the corruption and impossibility of the American Dream.

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Fitzgerald focused on the shift in the American Dream - from being the idea of self-fulfillment, dignity and comfort that is achieved through hard work, to being equated with the pursuit of wealth and power, and identifying happiness with having money. The novel depicts the rise and fall of the concept and describes the causes of its decay. The downfall of the American Dream is most accurately shown through the main protagonist of the story – Jay Gatsby. To reiterate, the American Dream is the concept that anyone can achieve a better life and become self-fulfilled, if they put enough effort to it and make the most of their abilities.

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