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Cultural effects on personality
Cultural effects on personality
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More handpicked essays just for you.
Cultural effects on personality
Cultural effects on personality
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
In the 2013 online article, “The Chris McCandless Obsession Problem”, author Diana Saverin describes the Alaskan wilderness travel phenomenon along with attempting to uncover the ‘McCandless Pilgrims’ “root of motivation. Sparked by the release of both Jon Krakauer’s and Sean Penn’s “Into the Wild”, numerous individuals pack their backpacks and eagerly step into their (sometimes newly-bought) hiking shoes and tramp into the Alaskan Wild to pay homage to their hero Chris McCandless. Filled with personal anecdotes and interviews, Severin’s Outside article takes a new approach Into the Wild commentary by directing attention to the lives McCandless’s story affected indirectly rather than critiquing on McCandless himself. In response to what appears to be a huge amount of troubled McCandless-inspired tramping stories, Saverin provides an unbiased rationale as a attempt to explain why so many are “willing to risk injury, and even death, to..visit the last home of Alaska’s most famous adventure casualty”. Saverin begins her article with anecdote- telling the unfortunate experience of young lovers and adept adventure seekers, Ackerman and Gros.
From their he hitchhikes across the northwest, where he mostly lives on the streets and takes up a few jobs for little money.. On his journey he meets a few people who he grows close relationships with and maintains in contact with for the remainder of his short life. After two years pass of his freestyle traveling, McCandless gets the idea of pushing his mind and body to the extreme by living deep in the Alaskan wilderness, alone and with the little supplies he has. He prepares himself by researching edible plants as well as hunting. He then leaves South Dakota, the place that he has been working the past few months, to head up north.
McCandless was searching for freedom and the chance to truly become an individual. Alaska gave McCandless a place where he could be far away from everything that held him back. One of these was certain human relationships in his life. “You are wrong if you think Joy emanates only or principally from human relationships.” (Krakauer,42) McCandless did not feel that
The idea of stepping off the grid and away from modern society to be in the wilderness was an idea that McCandless also shared with Krakauer and Thoreau. McCandless took this idea to an extreme degree, getting rid of his map so that he could live totally off the grid and apart from society. Although Thoreau shared this value he did not take this idea to the same level, instead he enjoyed smaller scale wilderness trips. In the epigraph, Thoreau states, “It can never become familiar, you are lost the moment you set out,” which shows his free-spiritedness that once he is out in the world he is lost in nature as he becomes detached from traditional societal life. Additionally in this chapter, as Krakauer shares his experience climbing the Devil Thumb he shares, “Those mountains heralded the approach of my desideratum (ITW 137).”
He was enthralled by the greenery and lively surroundings not found in the grey concrete jungles of civilization. Krakauer's descriptions of the surroundings and the environments McCandless was in helped explain his motives for the adventure and helped readers understand the need to escape by being bordered by nature. McCandless would surround himself with "tall grasses [that] sway in the breeze"(88) and would constantly be encased by "a bleached dome of sky, huge and empty" (32). The descriptions put readers in the setting and help them understand what McCandless saw. He saw a certain beauty that many people may be blind
Rhetorical Analysis of Jon Krakauer’s “Into the Wild ” Jon Krakauer ’s purpose in writing Into the Wild is to recount Chris McCandless’ journey, physical and metaphysical, from college in Georgia to his death in Alaska, through the use of factual, and anecdotal evidence. Krakauer uses factual evidence to establish that he is a trustworthy narrator capable of giving the reader a realistic scope on the events in the story. Jon uses anecdotal evidence to see into Chris’ psyche from the various perspectives found in the book’s excerpts, including how Jon understands the events.
Born in A Different Life Life on the road is an idealistic way to escape from societal problems. There is no denying that it grants individuals satisfaction by allowing them to fulfill their goals, as well as providing immense freedom and control over one’s life; however, it is a fundamentally illogical path to take due to nature’s malevolence. In Into The Wild, Krakauer writes a biography about a young man named Chris McCandless, in which he illustrates the similarities between himself and McCandless’s overly ambitious journey to accomplish feats in the wilderness. Coinciding with their similarities, they also faced an oppressive father figure at home, which lead the both of them to believe that their journey will provide them an answer to their problems at home. McCandless planned to survive in Alaska by living off the land while Krakauer wanted to be the first one to climb the Devil’s Thumb.
In Into The wild, Krakauer narrates the last couple of journeys Mccandless had on his adventure to Alaska where he ultimately died. Mccandless Touched many people's lives through all of his journeys. Mccandless went on these journeys because he was confused in life when he figured out his dad had cheated on his mom. This changed Mccandless to the point he began to hate his parents. Mccandless had a lot of confidence in himself so he left on an adventure to find his identity.
Journal 1 Krakauer, Jon. Into The Wild. New York: Villard, 1996. Print. Journal 2
“Into the Wild,” contains the story of Christopher Johnson McCandless, an adventurous young man who perished in the Alaskan brush. His story has captured the imaginations of people across the world, perhaps none more so than that of his biographer, Jon Krakauer. Krakauer sees McCandless as an adventurous, possibly brilliant young man who left civilization in search of the greater meaning of life. In the author 's note Krakauer makes it clear that he won 't be an “impartial biographer,” the story is too personal. The similarities between Krakauer and McCandless are difficult to ignore.
The novel Into the Wild written by Jon Krakauer centers around a young man named Chris McCandless who embarks upon an adventure leading to his tragic death; however, critics accuse McCandles of being naive and dumb, but on the other hand, he could be considered a transcendent. McCandless embodies transcendentalist thought by becoming one with nature and then ultimately withdrawing from the world and everyone in it. Throughout the novel, McCandless struggles by alternating between the two philosophies of transcendence, but ultimately he attempts to focus on self-regulation to make himself happy. Often to accomplish this task, he avoided the “impending threat of human intimacy” and avoids relationships by leaving quickly (55). Thus, McCandless,
Without a safety net, he had to rely on his own survival skills in the wilderness. Incomplete planning and inadequate supplies McCandless’ brought with him on his journey to Alaska highlights his naiveness and impulsiveness. McCandless had decided to not attempt to cross the Teklanika River, however there was a basket he could have used to cross that was just down the river, but“Because he had no topographic map, however he had no way conceiving that salvation was so close at hand” (Krakauer 174). McCandless also had abandoned his car without thinking of the possibilities that he might need it for travel and health safety (Krakauer 29). McCandless was overpowered by the scale of the landscape and suffered heat strokes from extreme temperatures in July (Krakauer 29).
Throughout Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer gives his own in-depth look of how he feels about the young Chris McCandless. While doing so, he shows the opinions and stereotypes Chris has gained before and after he was in the wild landscapes of Alaska. It conveys how Krakauer feels toward this boy’s journey. Although Krakauer tries to maintain neutrality in analyzing the young Chris McCandless’ life and death, his own views become evident in the Author’s Note.
However, Jon Krakauer proves his argument that McCandless was not arrogant, foolish, antisocial, or crazy by giving examples of other young men who were similar to McCandless to show that his journey wasn’t unprecedented. He also proves that McCandless wasn’t antisocial because he developed personal relationships with Ronald Franz, Wayne Westerberg, and Jan Burres in such a short amount of time and explaining the many times that McCandless respected the Alaskan Bush. Krakauer admits that McCandless may have suffered from hubris; he was still a victim of circumstances. Krakauer proves that McCandless had an intrinsic motivation to discover and that he wasn’t alone because Krakauer too ventured into the Alaskan Bush when he was younger. The Alaskan Bush is a very difficult place to survive if one isn’t prepared for many challenges such as hunting for food or staying warm in the frost ridden
When McCandless graduated from college, he found the possibility to go away for a while, “He had fled the claustrophobic confines of his family” (Krakauer 55). McCandless could finally go away looking for a journey full of adventures, but he wasn’t going to five stars hotels or luxurious places. His journey was precarious and wild, that was exactly what he was looking for. Places that were difficult for someone to reach and loneliness was abundant, the only interaction was with nature and savage animals. Happiness engulfed McCandless when backpacking anywhere, it was his joy.