Birth by Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye

Place is a simple term as pronounced and written. However, it can never be overlooked in any artwork because it carries a lot of meaning. The writer informs readers what he/she thinks is right based on the place.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Birth by Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More It starts with having an experience of a certain place and observing it carefully. Just as the writer, the reader cannot be left behind when the topic is brought on board. Any writer aims at influencing the reader to accept his/her ideas. The place therefore defines clearly the setting of the artwork. It enables the reader to have a better understanding because there can be a direct relationship between the written material and the place. When well considered, place improves the quality of written work as it enables the writer to bring out characters and themes clearly. This mesmerizes readers since it evoke s their feelings. The novel coming to Birth by Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye can exemplify this. The novel revolves around Paullina Okello as the main character. She appears in different places that clearly shows her character. The novel starts by showing the relationship between Paullina and her husband Martin Were. The setting is in Kenya as the names Okello and Weri suggest. In the novel, the writer shows that place shapes the life of an individual. Paullina visits Nairobi, which is a different place with different characters. The urban setting is completely different from the rural setting because Paullina does not have a good understanding the place (Oludhe 34). Through place, the writer portrays Paullina as naà ¯ve since she could not behave according to the expectations of the city.Advertising Looking for essay on literature languages? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Paullina could run away from vehicles because she was not used to busy and congested places. The setting shows Martin as a caring husband because he had to go by foot to pick his wife from the bus station. Martin lives in a slum area where human conditions are appalling. The place portrays the social class of martin. The reader is tempted to sympathize with Martin because of the tribulations he faces. Rooms are described to be too small and congested and the toilets are very messy, which brings out the theme of poverty. Place becomes very important because it discloses other tenets of human live. Paullina cannot withstand the environment that ends up causing health complications resulting to a miscarriage. The situation brings out Martin’s violent character after beating up his wife ruthlessly. This leaves the reader wondering whether it was Paullina to blame or Martin. Furthermore, the reader can attribute Martin’s violent behavior to the place. Slum dwellers are known to be violent and ruthless. This is because of hard lif e experienced in slums. Paullina can tolerate Martin’s bad behavior because she is used to cultural norms. Marjorie tries to capture the feelings of the reader by describing the awful condition in which this couple lives, if one would actually have any help to offer, he or she would do it without hesitation.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Birth by Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More As time goes, Paullina starts attending classes where she finds a different class of people. The environment challenges her to an extent of wanting to know how to read and write, of which she manages with time. This marks an outstanding turning point in her life. With education, she becomes a respected woman. She becomes very assertive to demand divorce from Martin. A woman who could not feed herself becomes well up to a point of being a breadwinner in her family as well as Martins family in the upcountry . This clearly brings out the theme of change. She actually decides to leaves her to Mr. and Mrs. M in the modern estate. Mrs. M is more learned compared to Paullina because she is a nurse and her husband is a Member of Parliament. Mr. M has cash that he uses during campaigns to earn votes from citizens. The writer uses place to bring out the theme of contrast. This comes out when the life of Mr. M is compared to that of Martin and Paullina. Martin could not afford even his own fare when he went to pick Paullina at the bus station. Mr. M can feed a whole congregation. In this environment, Paullina is portrayed as someone who knows politics. She could encourage women to fight for their rights. Marjorie tries to bring out the theme of politics and the subject of corruption. She elucidates that politics and corruption are tied in the third world.Mr. M responds to the wishes of citizens during campaigns but immediately forgets their interests after he is elected. He is no longer there f or citizens because he is in power.Advertising Looking for essay on literature languages? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Marjorie uses different places to bring out her reasoning. Marjorie uses place to show how events change with time. The novel starts by depicting the lives of Africans during colonial period and moves on sequentially to the postcolonial era. At the start, we see how the colonial regime erected curfews that restricted people from moving at night. This was witnessed mostly in towns, especially in slum areas. Place brings out the theme of fear and insecurity. The small group that is allowed to move at night has to speak loudly so that police officers may hear what they say. Operational anvil that denies people their freedoms characterizes the period. Works Cited Oludhe, Marjorie. Coming to Birth: Women writing Africa series. Nairobi: Feminist Press, 2000. 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Definition and Examples of Semantic Satiation

Definition and Examples of Semantic Satiation Definition Semantic satiation is a phenomenon whereby the uninterrupted repetition of a word eventually leads to a sense that the word has lost its meaning. This effect is also known as  semantic saturation or verbal satiation. The concept of semantic satiation was described by E. Severance and M.F. Washburn in The American Journal of Psychology in 1907. The term was introduced by psychologists Leon James and Wallace E. Lambert in the article Semantic Satiation Among Bilinguals in the Journal of Experimental Psychology (1961). For most people, the way theyve experience semantic satiation is in a playful context: deliberately repeating a single word over and over again just to get to that sensation when  it stops feeling like an actual word. However, this phenomenon can appear in more subtle ways. For instance, writing teachers will often insist that students use repeated words with care, not just because it demonstrates a better vocabulary  and a more eloquent style,  but to avoid the loss of significance. Overuse of strong words, such as words with intense connotations or profanity, can also fall victim to semantic satiation and lose their intensity.   See Examples and Observations below. For related concepts, also see: BleachingEpimoneGrammatical Oddities That You Probably Never Heard About in SchoolPronunciationSemantics Examples and Observations I began to indulge in the wildest fancies as I lay there in the dark, such as that there was no such town, and even that there was no such state as New Jersey. I fell to repeating the word Jersey over and over again, until it became idiotic and meaningless. If you have ever lain awake at night and repeated one word over and over, thousands and millions and hundreds of thousands of millions of times, you know the disturbing mental state you can get into.(James Thurber, My Life and Hard Times, 1933)Have you ever tried the experiment of saying some plain word, such as dog, thirty times? By the thirtieth time it has become a word like snark or pobble. It does not become tame, it becomes wild, by repetition.(G.K. Chesterton, The Telegraph Poles. Alarms and Discursions, 1910)A Closed LoopIf we pronounce a word over and over again, rapidly and without pause, then the word is felt to lose meaning. Take any word, say, CHIMNEY. Say it repeatedly and in rapid succession. Within some seconds, th e word loses meaning. This loss is referred to as semantic satiation. What seems to happen is that the word forms a kind of closed loop with itself. One utterance leads into a second utterance of the same word, this leads into a third, and so on. . . . [A]fter repeated pronunciation, this meaningful continuation of the word is blocked since, now, the word leads only to its own recurrence.(I.M.L. Hunter, Memory, rev. ed. Penguin, 1964) The MetaphorSemantic satiation is a metaphor of sorts, of course, as if neurons are little creatures to be filled up with the word until their little bellies are full, they are sated and want no more. Even single neurons habituate; that is, they stop firing to a repetitive pattern of stimulation. But semantic satiation affects our conscious experience, not just individual neurons.(Bernard J. Baars, In the Theater of Consciousness: The Workspace of the Mind. Oxford University Press, 1997)Disconnection of Signifier and Signified- If you stare continuously at a word (alternatively, listen to it over and over), the signifier and signified eventually appear to fall apart. The aim of the exercise is not to alter vision or hearing but to disrupt the internal organization of the sign. . . . You continue to see the letters but they no longer make the word; it, as such, has vanished. The phenomenon is called semantic satiation (first identified by Severance Washburn 1907), or loss of the sign ified concept from the signifier (visual or acoustic).(David McNeill, Gesture and Thought. University of Chicago Press, 2005)- [B]y saying a word, even a significant one, over and over again . . . you will find that the word has been transformed into a meaningless sound, as repetition drains it of its symbolic value. Any male who has served in, let us say, the United States Army or spent time in a college dormitory has had this experience with what are called obscene words . . .. Words that you have been taught not to use and that normally evoke an embarrassed or disconcerted response, when used too often, are stripped of their power to shock, to embarrass, to call attention to a special frame of mind. They become only sounds, not symbols.(Neil Postman, Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology. Alfred A. Knopf, 1992) OrphanWhy has my fathers death left me feeling so alone, when he hasnt been a part of my life in seventeen years? Im an orphan. I repeat the word out loud, over and over again, listening to it bounce off the walls of my childhood bedroom until it makes no sense.Loneliness is the theme, and I play it like a symphony, in endless variations.(Jonathan Tropper, The Book of Joe. Random House, 2004)Boswell on the Effects of Intense Inquiry (1782)Words, the representations, or rather signs of ideas and notions in the human race, though habitual to all of us, are, when abstractly considered, exceedingly wonderful; in so much, that by endeavouring to think of them with a spirit of intense inquiry, I have been affected even with giddiness and a kind of stupor, the consequence of having ones faculties stretched in vain. I suppose this has been experienced by many of my readers, who in a fit of musing, have tried to trace the connection between a word of ordinary use and its meaning, repeating th e word over and over again, and still starting in a kind of foolish amazement, as if listening for information from some secret power in the mind itself.(James Boswell [The Hypochondriack], On Words. The London Magazine, or, Gentlemans Monthly Intelligencer, Volume 51, February 1782)