Culture and Society

Paper Summary:

The paper outlines the short stories "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner and "The Overcoat" by Nikolai Gogol where the characters' social statuses forced them to go through a series of hardships in their life that lead to their ultimate destruction. The paper shows how the character of Emily in "A Rose for Emily" faced the fear of rejection if she did not fulfill her duty to her society, while Akaky, from "The Overcoat", was not able to fit the appropriate standards of respectable men in society. The paper demonstrates how cultures define people because of their social class and that no matter whether we are a part of the upper or lower class of society, we are still going to have problems, eventually die and never take anything with us to the grave.

From the Paper:

"A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner is a story of a lady who is in the aristocratic social class of her time. As an aristocrat of her time she had a very important responsibility to her society. "...Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town, dating from the day in 1894..." 2 Emily did not only have an obligation to her society, but she also had an obligation to her family. Her father did not let her date anyone because he had very strict moral views of women. With this in hand we have to see her as being a person that is a victim of the society that she was raised in because as a lady she did not only have a hard time with her family but also a hard time trying to fulfill her responsibility to her society that drove her to make drastic things in her life. She was a person that was never allowed to be attached to anyone for a long period of time and being the lady in such a society, you must fit into a certain standard way of living."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology Third EditionRobert H. Lavenda, Emily A. Shultz, pages 16 2007
• The Story and Its Writers An introduction to short FictionThe Overcoat by Nikolai Gogol pages 482 - 503. 1840

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