Television and the Cultural Ideal of Fatherhood. (Television and Culture Final Paper - 04-23-12).

Joseph Melanson

Television and Culture

Prof. Conaway

22 April 2012

Television and the Cultural Ideal of Fatherhood.

             Since the birth of television, the cultural role of the father has evolved and adapted through several decades of family sitcoms. This cultural representation of fatherhood has also probably in some way played an influence upon men and boys as a proper example to emulate through popular images through the medium of television. Television, through its popularity and pervasiveness has provided examples of what could be construed as models of what could be considered as appropriate behavior for males to display in their roles of fathers and what other members of the family could interpret as an ideal of fatherhood and masculinity. Does television, in its attempt to entertain, actually devalue and undermine the father as cultural role model in society?

              Culture defines what is proper behavior for a citizen of it’s society. According to Blankenhorn (1995), “men, more than women, are culture made” (17).  In the 1960’s shows like Leave It To Beaver and The Andy Griffith Show present us with a positive cultural role model of fatherhood and masculine ideal. According to Watson (2008), “in TV households throughout the 1960’s good manners were essential” where “children asked to be excused before leaving the dinner table and adults never engaged in shouting matches or argued in mean-spirited ways” (190). “Perhaps for most viewers” Watson (2008) states this presentation of the father “was an unrealistic picture of family dynamics, but it offered a model of respectful and loving communication” (190). Nevertheless these fathers presented within these shows provided an example of the male who was able to maintain control of himself within his surroundings, who served as a dependable role model for his children, and was able to interact in his environment in ways that were culturally and socially appropriate.

             Television, through its pervasiveness and power to influence, can affect what millions of people come to understand as the cultural ideal of fatherhood. According to Vande Berg, Wenner, & Gronbeck (2004), a culture is a “social group’s system of meanings” and these meanings are “socially derived understandings” concerning “persons, places, things, ideas, routines, rituals, and strategic behavior (social action)” (393). These “socially derived understandings” come into our homes through the television, and are assigned meanings in the viewer’s mind. According to Pehlke, Hennon, Radina, & Kuvalanka (2009), “television sitcoms have widespread acclaim” and “television families seem to affect the way in which people think about marriage and the family as both married and divorced individuals have cited the use of such portrayals as guides for their own behavior” (para. 12). Pehlke et al. (2009) goes on to say that “television viewing has the potential to influence people’s understanding of the diverse ways in which fathers carry out their roles in families” and this “may have a powerful impact on how the father role is enacted and evaluated in daily family life” (para. 14). Television, through its pervasiveness, has the power to present certain images and ideals which can become the embodiment of popular culture beliefs.

             Males learn how to communicate by watching how other males successfully communicate with others, and communication is an integral part of any culture. According to Vande Berg et al. (2004), “individuals generally are taught from infancy on to conform their understandings and their behaviors to social standards for meanings when communicating with others” (39). When a person watches television there is a myriad of images of ways in which people are communicated to, and whether these images are socially appropriate or not, whether it is dysfunctional or functional behavior, nevertheless these images, in some form or other, becomes assimilated into the mind of the viewer. Much of what is communicated on television sitcoms is considered humor, and if this humor is on television then it can be presumed by the viewer to be socially appropriate forms of self-expression. Some viewers may make the distinction that humor is the culturally highest form of self-expression, and that anything done in the pursuit of this humor may be a rewarded by one’s culture. In many of our modern television sitcoms “the initiator of the joke typically enjoys the greater amount of power and status” (Scharrer, 2001, para. 6). According to Chory-Assad (2004), “verbal aggression has become more common than physical aggression in all television genres, but particularly in sitcoms” (para. 5). This aggressive style of communication can become a popular avenue of communication through it’s televised use and transmission, influencing how males, as well as females, communicate amongst themselves, and with others.   

             Behavior that is modeled without negative consequences can become institutionalized as acceptable behavior. In the television sitcoms of the 1950’s, such popular shows like Father Knows Best, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, and even I Love Lucy, presented the father figure as the rational head of the household who never lost control, and always had words of wisdom for his wife and children. These early examples of “fictional families” modeled “contemporary family life” and “acted as important socializing agents” by offering “implicit lessons about appropriate family life” (Pehlke et al., 2009, para. 16). “These television families”, according to Pehlke et al. (2009), seem to “affect the way in which people think about marriage and the family,” by presenting a rational, masculine idea of fathers (para. 21). Society accepts or condones what it allows as acceptable behavior in its social roles. With the introduction of such characters as Archie Bunker on the show All in the Family, “caustic comments made by lead characters were presented not as rudeness but as the hallmark of a clever and feisty personality, the more acrid the insult, the more it was rewarded with laughter and applause” (Watson 190). Perhaps television encourages behavior which is less about believing in equality among people and ideals within the social environment, and more about developing the capacities of ones cleverness and feistiness of one’s personality.

            The image of the male that is embodied on the television influences the level of respect conferred to the father by the rest of the family. “People used to come up to me when I was on other programs to tell me they liked the show”, says Ed O’Neill, the actor that spent 11 seasons jamming his hands down his pants as Al Bundy on Married…With Children, but now plays Jay Pritchett, Modern Family’s cranky but loving grandpa” (Svetkey, 2009, para. 2). The image of a bitter and disgruntled Al Bundy is a popular image that had been televised as a popular show, and exists in some form in syndication, although it offers a negative image of the father, despite what seems to be social approval conferred to actor Ed O’Neill for his popular role. According to Scharrer (2001), “domestic comedies featuring working class families (The Honeymooners, All in the Family, Roseanne) present the father figure as more foolish than comedies featuring middle or upper class families (Leave It to Behavior, Father Knows Best, The Cosby Show)” and the father on sitcoms is often presented as a “buffoon whose stupidity is a frequent source of laughter” (para. 18). The images that come into our homes via the television presents the image of the father that we come to know and expect, and what value we attach to those images may be influenced by our repeated viewing of television embodiments of fatherhood.

            Television is a popular and necessary part of our daily lives, feeding us both our entertainment and information concerning our society and culture. Television has the power to transmit ideas and meanings concerning our various social roles, and what can be construed as socially appropriate, or inappropriate behavior for the various social roles that we find within our culture. If in the genre of television sitcoms for instance, feature the same variation of character: the foolish, bumbling caricature of fatherhood in the attempt to entertain society, then some amount of the population may take this model as a valid and permitted model to follow and emulate as a social representation in one’s environment. But if society presents characters only for the sake of entertainment, and entertainment is embodied in dysfunctional characters, then society devalues the portion of itself that it permits the projection of characters who lack social value to embody a role that would be more valuable in educating and enlightening a society, rather than only for the transient product of entertainment. Social roles and institutions are only effective as society values them, and if the embodiment of these social roles are only used in pursuing how obscene and vulgar the archetype of the father on television can be, then that social role can only be devalued, and perhaps made the new standard, not only on television, but in society as well.

Works Cited:

Blankenhorn, D. (1995). Fatherless America: Confronting Our Most Urgent Social Problem. New York, NY: BasicBooks.

Chory-Assad, Rebecca. “Verbal Aggression in the Media”. North American Journal of Psychology (2004). Vol 6, No. 3. pp. 415-422. Academic Search Complete. HTML.

Pehlke II, Timothy A., Hennon, Charles B., Radina, M. Elise., Kuvalanka, Katherine A. “Does Father Still Know Best? An Inductive Thematic Analysis of Popular TV Sitcoms.”  Fathering 7. 2. (2009): 114-139. PDF. Academic Search Complete

Scharrer, Erica. “From Wise to Foolish: The Portrayals of the Sitcom Father, 1950’s – 1990’s”. Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media. Winter 2001. pp. 23-40. Academic Search Complete. PDF.

Svetkey, Benjamin. “Modern Love”. Entertainment Weekly. (2009) Issue 1074.

            Academic Search Complete. 10490434.

Vande Berg, Leah R., Wenner, Lawrence A., Gronbeck, Bruce E. Critical Approaches to Television. 2^nd ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. 2004. Print.

Watson, Mary Ann. Defining Visions: Television and the American Experience in the 20th Century. 2^nd ed. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub., 2008. Print.

Third Written Assignment for American Literature II (04-21-2012)

Joseph Melanson

American Literature II

Prof. McAllister

15 April 2012

Third Written Assignment

1. Consider one of the pieces of literature from Modules 6 and 7 and explore its connections to the political and social context in which it was written. Give specific examples from the work to support your response.

            When Bob Dylan’s song “The Times They Are A-Changin’” came out in 1964, America had already been through two long brutal wars in World War II, in the Korean war, and now it was entering the early stages of the Vietnam conflict. Bob Dylan references Noah in the Bible’s Book of Genesis, where God told Noah to build an ark and save himself and the people he cares for.

            “Come gather ‘round people

            Whenever you roam

            And admit that the waters

            Around you have grown

            And accept it that soon

            You’ll be drenched to the bone”. (1-6. 1531-32.)

           Dylan calls to the people of power, those educated people, those who have the ability to influence others, those who can get the world’s attention with their way with words to use their power for good.

           “Come writers and critics

           Who prophesize with your pen” (10-11. 1531-32).

             Dylan warns these people “the chance won’t come again” and to choose your words carefully “for the wheel’s still in spin”, and “there’s no tellin’ who that its namin’” (13-16. 1531-32).

             Dylan speaks to the government officials specifically in these lines, “Come senators, congressmen” and in “there’s a battle outside and it is ragin’”, he informs them “It’ll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls” (25-26. 1531-32).

 But no matter what happens “the times they are a-changin’.”

3. Select one poem from Modules 6 or 7 and write a clear and detailed explanation of its poetic structure (stanza form, rhyme, rhythm) and language (sentence structure, diction, figurative language).

           The poem is 16 stanzas, at five lines each. The lines in each stanza are more or less the same size, ranging from nine words in one line of one stanza, to two in another stanza. It is in relation to the purpose of the stanza, that the words are used. The rhyme seems to center on the word “you” which figures prominently in the poem. In almost every line, other words that rhyme with “you”, words like “who”, “two”, “do”, “through”, “blue”, and “Jew” are used in comparison or contrast of the word “you”, this

word referring to Sylvia Plath’s father.

            She has been under his stifling heel for thirty of her years, perhaps the sum of her life, being confined and crushed by his existence. She relates him to the German people and nation, perhaps equating the idea of her father to the idea of Germany, and all the atrocities and torment it had cost the world in the past few decades of Plath’s writing this poem. A “Polish town” flattened by the “roller, Of wars, wars, wars” (1519, 16-18). “I thought every German was you” (1519, 29) and equating herself to a “Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen” (1519, 33). As much as the horrors and atrocities of the German dictator Hitler still live and terrify the people who live at the time of Plath’s poem, so does the legacy of Plath’s father still effects her. In order to be free of him and the power and influence that he had over her, she must kill him, in her own mind anyway.

5. Sometimes people who are taking a literature study ask me, “Why aren’t there any happy stories/poems/plays? Everything seems so bleak and depressing.” Reflect on the readings of Modules 1-7 and then write a response for me to offer to students who voice this complaint. Use examples as appropriate.

           I think that there are no “happy stories/poem/plays” in our anthology because the urge in the one who desires to record themselves and communicate with others, the urge to become an artist generally does not come from a peaceful, happy experience of the world. I believe the artist is attracted to understanding and expressing parts of themselves that may not necessarily be allowed to express in one’s environment and in one’s age.

            Generally too, the most affecting events of life do not come from long periods of happiness, but rather from traumatic events, death, war, injustice. It is the artist that tries to make sense of, and reconcile for themselves and others through art, the common experience of living that we all share. It is the artist that is compelled to try to make sense of his times both for himself and others.

            Mark Twain writes about being alienated in his own country, within his own family and community in “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”. At one point Huck, his protagonist, believes that he will suffer in the fires of hell forever if he goes against the practice of slavery that was common in his time.

            Stephen Crane in “Maggie: A Girl of the Streets” writes about the tenements and slums that destroy people in its confining spaces with dysfunctional people, in its mindless and manual labor jobs which reduce the human to a mere machine.

            In “Barn Burning” by William Faulkner, its protagonist must abandon his family when he can no longer take place and maintain his place within the family’s dysfunction.

            Perhaps there are no happy stories because life is generally not happy for most, that we catalog all sorts of trauma and pain, but the artist is compelled to do something with or about these events, over the regular person who just watches them go by.

Works Cited:

Crane, Stephen. “Maggie: A Girl of the Streets”. Perkins and Perkins 706-747.

Dylan, Bob. “The Times They Are A-Changin’”. Perkins and Perkins 1531-1532.

Faulkner, William. “Barn Burning”. Perkins and Perkins 1187-1198.

Perkins, George, and Barbara Perkins, eds. The American Tradition in Literature.

12^th ed. Ed. Vol. 2. New York: McGraw Hill, 2009. Print.

Plath, Sylvia. “Daddy”. Perkins and Perkins 1519-1522.

Twain, Mark. “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”. Perkins and Perkins 154- 327.

Response to Post about Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" (American Literature 04-13-12).

What comes around goes around, and I think these later generations realize how much of this is true. The sins of the father fall upon the son, the wars we fight are the ones that destroy ourselves, and our capacity to be real among ourselves.Since we are what we leave behind, are we the results of fighting in wars, in hating other people, of elevation ourselves over some, resenting our status underneath others, always against and opposed to some certain type of people. Until the global wars destroyed people on apocalyptic scale did we as a race of people begin to understand global annihilation was possible. We as Americans, enjoyed a certain peace and freedom from global oppression, in the various forms that arose, either within a country or from without. But other parts of the globe are becoming stronger, and America will see its own destruction someday, if perhaps not by nuclear apocalypse, then by economic policy of over confident men. Apocalypses come and go, in both big and small forms, in global and in the personal form, and it is "the writer" or "the critic" that shapes the events going on around us into a narrative form to give comfort to one another, and in hopefully offering some kind of advice that another human being might find useful and advantageous in the correct circumstances.

Post to Lulu Essay (Creative Non-Fiction 04-12-12).

I would like to first offer as my piece of advice, is to read your words aloud. Brooks Landon, a professor of writing at the University of Iowa, recommends reading your essays aloud to yourself, before you read them to the class. You must first understand that we will hear your essay in our heads as we read, your words and sentences must carry our attention. If our attention is not carried along, but instead having to pass over words like obstacles, of characterization, narrative, descriptions, events, etc., that stop and start our attention then it is very difficult to read. Your words must flow from the tongue, as they should flow from the paper. A piece of writing is like a one sided conversation with the reader. As John Mayer says, "say what you need to say" but don't get it confused and go overboard. Perhaps one needs to write an essay, read what we have, and then decide upon what we want to accomplish with our piece of writing. What doesn't fit into this criteria, may probably need to be tossed.

Some suggestions:

1). You need to break up your piece into coherent sentences that state a complete idea. Once that idea is complete, and you have enough sentences, you must develop coherent paragraphs.

2). "The war affected the children who grew up during that time". How? Why? In what ways can you give to give a more detailed perspective of the time. How did the children play and amuse themselves?

3). Remember that your verbs and adjectives can be used for descriptors of characteristics to paint the people that you are writing about. Look at you words and then look through a thesaurus to more sharply define and fine tune what you are trying to say. Look for the word that feels right, or the words that feel honest, as words in the thesaurus may give various people various impressions. That is why you have to find the right words to settle upon to what you want to attach to the people in your writing.

Late Response to Daniel (Creative Writing Non-Fiction 04-12-12).

Daniel, I apologize for such a late submission, I have been sick, and dealing with my grandmother who has recently broken her arm. I would first offer Brook Landon's advice in reading your works aloud before submitting them. The power of the piece relies on the sentence. A writer carries the reader's attention along the sentence, as I am doing to you as you read this. You read aloud in the voice of your mind, and the mind can only hold so much at a time. That is why the sentence needs to be consciously created as a vehicle to carry the reader's attention, from the beginning to the end. Remember when you write you are speaking to someone in their head, and when we speak to others we are generally more capable in effectively communicating than when we write, that is until we just learn another form of speech, only this one one-sided and written down. That is why reading aloud will help you to be able to hear how other people will read you. The ear will help you notice what the eye can't see. Writing for me is similar to speech, and I think this is evident in the readings of our anthology, or any successful writing. When our writing sounds like a collection of conversation, details, characterization, in one big jumble, then that is what we're going to come accross as. I do the same thing myself and then wonder how to proceed. I think to be successful we have to do more thorough investigation of the study of the genre in which we are writing. I think we have to have a clear idea of what we're trying to accomplish in mind, and then cut whatever doesn't fit that idea or theme, as it is easy to come up with more and more ideas, instead of focusing the ones that we already have. A piece of writing to me, should be like a snapshot of a time and place, a complete idea that can stand by itself. Perhaps by studying the various drafts that you did that you will be able to compare and contrast them to see what works and what doesn't. Some suggestions for your first draft, as that is the one that I looked at.

1). End of second paragraph. "steaming cups of caffeine". Until you know for sure what is in the cups you assume it contains caffiene. You and I know what you mean but it is only because we both assume it is coffee.

2). Beginning of third paragraph. “looking out the small glass”. Another assumption for the reader that you are looking out the window. More description is needed to define what the window is.

3). Middle of third paragraph. “utter death”. What does utter death smell like? A suggestion is a butcher shop. Nothing smells worse than a butcher shop. This is another instance where you could use descriptions to describe and add atmosphere to the story.

4). Beginning of fourth paragraph. “As 11 am rolled in”. How does time roll in?

5). Beginning of fifth paragraph. “traveling by third rail”. This needs to be described as not all of us are familiar with trains. What the reader may or may not know must always be kept in mind, as we do not all have the shared experiences.

Hope these suggestions help.

Denise responds to my post and my counter response (Discussion Post to Creative Non-Fiction 04-08-12)

On 4/6/2012 at 9:41 PM, Direnzo, Denise wrote:

Joe, thank you for sharing this portrait of your grandmother. It was rather heartbreaking to read. She was (or perhaps still is) clearly a very unhappy woman and managed to bring great unhappiness to your life as well. It made me feel very sad for you.

Some questions I had after reading it were:

Do you have any pleasant memories at all about your grandmother? Did she have any redeeming qualities whatsoever?

I am wondering if maybe, because of the ways in which you suffered at the hands of your grandmother, this subject matter is too highly charged for you. I am also curious to know what your intention was in writing this portrait? 

My response -

Redeeming qualities - she tried as best that she could from the level that she was on. I remember her taking me to Niagara Falls a few times, at least once to her hometown in Del Rio, Texas. She would play catch with me. She treated me like a king, but it only created a tyrant, selfish, and always expecting to be gratified. She was no Einstein, and I believe being raised by her alone, resulted in much frustration as a kid. Growing up, a child needs someone to talk to, to feel comfortable with in expressing who they are. In the home is where we become ourselves, learning and being taught what is and what is not appropriate to say and do in public. Without that reciprocation in the home and by throwing food and objects to win someone's affection only makes a person an emotional cripple.

As far as my intention in writing the piece was only in being motivated to complete the assignment yet I had become possessed with the spirit of the thing when I started, and kept going with it.

My Grandmother, My Child (Portrait Essay for Creative Non-Fiction 04-06-12)

            My grandmother Juanita Melanson, is 80 years old. She was born and grew up on the American side of the Del Rio river, in Texas. I guess there’s Mexican counterpart on the other side of the border as well. She grew up with eight brothers, one brother died as a teenager, allegedly drowned, and one sister. On the occasions that we would visit her hometown in my youth she would take me to swim in a river that went through town, the same river that her brother was drowned. Now that I think about it, it was like taking someone to swim in the drainage pond, small inconsequential rivers that course through the suburbs. You had to get out from time to time, due to a dirty diaper sailing by. She met and married my grandfather, George A. Melanson at the end of WWII. She folded and packed parachutes, while he was being trained to be a mechanic.

             I remember when I was a teenager, she had thicker, more muscular arms than I ever did as a teenage boy. Now she wheezes and coughs, a ghost of her former self. We have seen much death together, my grandfather died on our couch in the middle of the day, after we had just returned from Kmart. My father died some months later, a result of a drug overdose, I never knew him. We for some reason did not attend his funeral, despite the fact that he was buried at the same cemetery as my grandfather. It was only three of us for a number of years until my mother died in 2009, succumbing to her asthma.

            My grandmother was never that bright, in one instance of my childhood I remember her telling me to unplug the microwave in case of a thunderstorm because if lightning struck the house the microwave oven would blow up like an atom bomb. Once she told me that something was wrong with an old television set we had, a massive old T.V. which became the stand for another when the first one died. She told me never to turn it on because if I did it would explode. I remember one time I psyched my friend up and we were prepared ourselves to die in a suburban Hiroshima. I said goodbye to my friend who sat on the couch and watched as I pulled the knob. I had expected to meet Jesus, but instead it only confirmed that my grandmother didn’t know what she was talking about when nothing happened, a lesson I was taught over and over and over a hundred thousand times. I learned to entertain her mindless babble, what else could a young boy do?

             I went to the YMCA for swimming lessons when I was about eight to ten years old, why I don’t know, but it was just one of those things that an idiot parent puts an unfortunate child through. I was like a fish out of water, I remember looking down at these kids that were a few years younger than I was, who were looking up at me with the same look as the adults with them, what’s wrong with this boy that he has to take a swimming class with us kindergarteners? Once we were in the water and my swimming aptitude was obvious to everyone but grandmother, it was quickly noted by the adult staff, and mentioned to my grandmother, that I was in the wrong place, and that I should be swimming in an intermediate, or an advanced swimming class. My grandmother, she would have never come up with this idea.

            Once I almost lost my fingers in the hood of the LTD, after she dropped it without seeing where I was and what I was doing. I yanked my fingers away at the last second, before the hood dropped like a guillotine. Like a great many things in her life, she never noticed. It was only one of many instances that I knew I may live with her under the same roof, but mentally I was there alone.

            Another time she daubed some stuff on my eye, for some kind of eye disorder that she diagnosed me with one day. Her concoction only resulted in puffing up my eye, one of my classmates getting the opportunity to advertise to the class, “JOE GOT BEAT UP”. I never again let myself be the guinea pig for her stupidities again. At an early age I realized she was one half stupid, the other half insane.

            As the day for my road test got closer, my grandmother thought she would give me her driving crash course in a couple of days. Little did she know that I had been covertly teaching myself to drive for a couple of years. These urges to drive would come and go, mostly around the availability of my friends. Once a friend of mine slept over, and after my grandmother went upstairs to bed, we took off in her car, and roamed the suburbs in the night, polluting various roads, houses, and cars with eggs and our graffiti. Once I drove myself in the early hours of the night to go to Sylvan Beach, a destination of preoccupation designated as a goal when next I had the urge for the road. That time I came home at 5 A.M. to find my grandmother standing at the front door furiously waiting for me to come home as I often waited for her to come home with dinner. I listened to her scold me, then I went up to bed, vowing to be ever more careful, but knowing I would never give up my surreptitious wanderings behind the wheel in the night.

            She used to tell me when I was a child, “everything you touch turns to shit” and often I would have to listen to her tell me “if I didn’t have you, I would have a million dollars”, and often I heard her lament “I wish I could just crawl into a hole and die”. After a period of years, I began to feel the same way too.

            My grandmother sent me to this family by the name of Christian, to be babysat, when I was around five years old. They didn’t live up to their last name. I would get locked in rooms, and once I had to urinate which I did, through the ventilation shaft in the floor. Another time I was awoken to the two brothers, one my age, another older, stabbing my feet with forks. Another time I was shitting myself from being dosed with laxatives in something I ate or drank. Another time, the eldest brother hid my bike and told me he threw it in the neighborhood pond. I told my grandmother every single time, and she kept sending me back. I think it was the time I beat the youngest son with a stick that she had to finally admit it wasn’t working out for any of us. After the Christians, my grandmother found me another babysitter, a woman who ran a foster home a few houses down from our home. Here I witnessed and heard a great many things about troubled kids and teens, once I witnessed a vicious fist fight between two teenage boys, now that I think about it, I think the eldest, strongest one of them had saved me from being sodomized. But at least I got my first sexual encounter with the granddaughter of the foster lady, so I can’t say it was all that bad of an encounter.

            My grandmother abused diet pills when I was a kid. She would come home in a bad mood, complaining about the people she worked with. “Those goddamn people, those goddamn people”, she would say, apparently it got rough at the Napa auto parts warehouse in Eastwood. Then she would go upstairs, take her pills, and then come down singing and humming loudly, another lesson to a young boy in her insanity. I learned how to amuse myself, playing alone in the basement with my G.I. Joes, then hiding in my room watching television, wishing in my teenage years I had someone sane to talk to, wishing it was one of my other family members had lived, wishing I wasn’t alone.

             My mother once came to see me, and she didn’t last more than five minutes. My grandmother was always criticizing her for her lack of responsibility, her supposed lack of parental concern. “Where’s your mother”, she would ask a little boy, “she don’t care about you”, a lesson to a little boy that I was nothing more than a chore and an obligation that my mother couldn’t afford to be bothered with. When my mother showed up one time, I remember them getting into an argument. “If you didn’t want a kid then you shouldn’t have opened your legs”, my grandmother told her daughter, in front of her son. My mother departed in tears. I remember my mother saying to me in tears before she went out the door, “this is why I don’t come to see you”. My mother left, leaving me alone with this crazy woman, a woman whose head, for many years, I wanted to bash in if it didn’t mean the rest of my life in New York State prison.

             My grandmother was not someone that I could look to confide in when I was a child and a teenager. If one had a bad day at school, her advice was to eat something; this was also the advice for a good day too. Food is the only means that you have in life to manage your emotions seems to be the greatest message she ever sent to me. Her limited capacity to comfort me was spent on McDonald’s, Kentucky Fried Chicken, an any other manner of fried foods. My emotions I ate for thirty seven years until lately they have become an acrid, and burning ache in my gut.

             Because of my grandmother, I am forever alone. I learned at a young age that family means nothing but chores and obligations, relationships are nothing but hoops to jump through, a job that doesn’t pay very well. And so I care not for anyone else but I, and I am now a monster in the suburbs, I am what my family has made me.

Professor's Comments: 

"GRADE: 96

Joseph, this is a powerful essay, since it captures reader interest from beginning to end as it develops in meaning and intensity. You impress your audience throughout with a very distinct narrative voice, well constructed, flowing sentence patterns that control grammar, usage, and mechanics; well placed descriptive detail/imagery; active verbs and deliberate use of literary devices such as story line, character development, dialogue, scene and setting. Containing no stereotypes or clichés, your language choices are fresh and surprising as you succeed in getting the reader to care about and wait for the outcome. Grounded in a dilemma/conflict that gets the reader involved, the significance/theme or “greater truth” of your subject matter is consistently interwoven throughout the narrative, as you focus on family conflict and personal identify. Well developed connections between factual information and personal meaning demonstrate truth-telling and why your topic is important. By the end, you’ve evoked a strong emotional/intellectual response in the audience and created a very successful piece -- excellent work, Joseph! Grade for Essay 3 is A".

Angela Christian (Attempt at Memoir Essay for Creative Non-Fiction 04-05-12).

Joseph, this is a powerful choice of a topic for your first essay, as it captures reader attention with your use of clear sensory descriptions and distinct dialog.  One major difficulty is that this submission is not a final draft but more of a revised draft in progress. Nevertheless, you’ve written plenty of fully developed paragraphs with a narrative voice that is strong and authentic, drawing readers into the events as you vividly describe them. I enjoy your use of dialog and think adding even a bit more dialog can enhance your future creative nonfiction essays. Dialog helps to create a specific scene, which allows the events to seem like they’re immediate and unveiling before the reader’s eyes.  Were you to revise and bring this piece up to a final draft, I'd suggest that you smooth out the organization and development of details so that they are presented in well structured sentences and logically sequenced paragraphs, set within a storyline containing a beginning/middle/end framework. In revising, you might also want to establish a clearer central focus, conflict and theme. As suggested earlier, you might also want to use Smarthinking.com for detailed feedback on your essay drafts; access info is on your Angel homepage. Overall Joseph, your writing here generates intense interest with its authentic  truthtelling and emotional impact. Grade for Essay 1 is B.

This is my idea for either a memoir or an essay of place. When I was young, the people who were baby sitting me had a daughter Angela, who was still in diapers, while I was about five or so. Although I don’t remember pushing her down, a neighbor across the street called and told the mother I did, and I was tormented for years by her two brothers, one my age, the other a few years older, and the other teenagers in the neighborhood. What follows is random ideas that I have had about that time, ideas that I hope to use and incorporate in the development of my essay. .  

02/19/2012-

What follows is all I could excavate from my mind at the event of being falsely accused of pushing Angela, a toddler down, when I was around seven years old. I had been placed in this house by my grandmother, as she needed a baby sitter until she got home from work. The Angela incident was not my first contact with her or her family. I realize now that I had pushed her away from me as I had seen her pull turds out of her diaper, and I didn’t want her filthy hands touching me, or she was trying to offer me her feces. I could get no further than what I currently have at the moment. I just came to a blank wall. It brought up painful memories and reignited old truths of my family. I think the next step would be to figure out in what order theses pieces go to tell the whole and real story. But for now I’m stumped.  

Write about where malice came from (angela and then bullying),

I am outside with Angela in the front yard in the summer, the youngest of the current crop of the family named Christian. For some reason we are outdoors, near the road, in the front yard of the house this family owns. I am here because my grandmother had the need of a baby sitter, and somehow had come upon the woman of this household in which she felt completely safe to leave me.

The family consisted of the mother who had the mind of a baked potato, I think even then I was able to intuit on some level that she was just a baby making machine, a collector of children. The father was a truck driver who would give an awesome show of tucking his shirt in his pants in the morning before he went to work, with his pants unzipped, and wide open. He seemed awfully comfortable with whatever came flying out into our view, regardless of whether the audience was his children, or somebody else’s. Then there was the older brother Robert, and the other brother a dim-witted fool named Jason who was my same age. Apparently he got hit on the head with a hammer when he was a baby, a story that he had told me more than a few times in order that we may come to some kind of level of understanding, or as a result from being hit on the heat with a hammer during his developing infancy. Apparently the hammer dropped spontaneously by its own free will off of the top of a shelf and struck poor Jason the toddler crawling unattended by the morons that comprised his family. Robert used to tell me how great he was. Where was Robert when the hammer fell, I wondered to myself

            The last of the family that I come to meet is the toddler of the family, the youngest of them, named Angela. She was a beautiful little girl, with the fearless personality of childhood until the reality of humanity smacks you on the bottom, and shreds your peace of mind with their yelling.

            Generally we did not come into contact with one another, me and Angela, as I was usually in school with her brothers, or with them wandering the neighborhood after school, or watching television in their living room as I waited for my grandmother to pick me up after work. I believe this happened when I was in the first grade, as I came to be enrolled in this school when I decided to tell my grandmother that the teacher at the old school was giving me a hard time, when I was really embarrassed from some embarrassment at some chastisement that she had given me in front of the class. I decided that I no longer wanted to be in this school, and tell my grandmother that I was having problems with the teacher.

I think I was only one of three people at the house at the time-mother, angela, and me, she falls to the ground and cries loudly, the lady across the street calls the mother who comes rushing out of the house to accuse me of pushing the girl down, and grabs Angela and takes her in the house to check for wounds. I stand there thinking, “I didn’t push her down, why would she say that against me?”

I don't remember if I did, after that constant antagonism from the two brothers and the neighborhood kids,

parents should have never kept babysitting me after that,

One day I decided to take a nap, and the boys bedroom was where I was allowed to go for my slumber. I awoke some time later, arising because of my need to urinate, and I stumbled half asleep to find the door of the bedroom locked for some reason. It had happened before they had told me, Angela likes locking doors. A timid boy, I was uncomfortable with having to attract attention to myself, in order that I may be released from a room that I should never been allowed to be incarcerated in to begin with. If I didn’t have to go to the bathroom, I probably would have laid back down and daydreamed until someone had the need to unlock the door to my freedom. I knocked. I yelled for Angela. How could my door be locked unless she who was known to be responsible for locking doors, was here in the house somewhere? I pleaded for her to come to unlock the door, the sensation for the need to urinate becoming stronger with every moment. I looked around the boys bedroom, this sensation beginning to burn deep inside of me now. I notice a vent on the floor by the window. I go back to the door, in one more futile attempt to get someone to come to my aid by yelling and pounding on the door. All I hear is quiet, I must be the only one in the house. I can’t stand it anymore so I go back to the vent and stand over it, aiming as surely as I could in order not to get anything on their carpet as evidence of what I was about to do. I urinated in stops and starts, in order that my pee went through the holes in the vent, rather than pooling and spreading over onto the carpeted floor as it had threatened to do when I started. I also worried about someone coming along to liberate me, hoping that they could wait until I had finished what I already started. Finally I emptied my self of the contents of my kidneys into the household ventilation, generally not my first choice Christians and the time I got locked in bedroom and pissed in vent, locked in boys bedroom had to pee down the drain,

hid banana in chair cushions, Mrs. Christian said, “if you don’t want the banana don’t take it, but don’t hide it in the couch Joe”.

older bro hides my bike and said he threw your girls bike in neighborhood pond, Is this where I beat Jason with a stick?

When did I fight with them in the front yard of the grandparents place, when I got the scars on my face from the gravel under the mailbox?

I could never remember the actual event, but I remember standing in the living room of the Christians, after I had apparently beat Jason with a stick, his mother yelling at me “look what you did to my son” over and over again as he lay on the couch with  both eyes blackened. I don’t remember if I did, or for what particularly was the reason for my attack, or whether I felt glee, or shame, or wrongfully accused of beating up Jason.

ask g-mom how I came into their being,

ADIP- describe the angela incident, the torment of the neighborhood, bullies growing up,

climb tree w/ Jason we were in this fir tree that was twice as tall as a telephone pole. 

my gmom always telling me if I didn’t have you I’d have a million dollars, other things to that effect, believing suicide was my only option for many years finally goin to , childhood as a necessary part of the novel

Later on this Spanish kid, olive-skinned like me, moved into the neighborhood when the torment of years had grown quiet, a mutual understanding between and the rest of the kids in the neighborhood becoming that they wouldn’t harass me or my grandparents apartment if only I stayed indoors after school, and on the occasions where I had to take the bus, sat as far forward to the bus driver as possible, and kept my head down and my mouth shut.

This kid moves in and I see he has a lazy eye. Joel, a few years younger, and my only friend in the neighborhood, informs me that his name was Carlos, and his lazy eye was the result of an accident with a B.B. gun. One eye would be looking at you and the other would be searching the sky for stars overhead. I would get creeped out more by his eye, more than I ever would from this small statured mouth piece. I felt sorry for him, and I think I understood on some level that his taunts were somewhat valid, as I shouldn’t have pushed her down, as they had made me aware from the years of overt hostility whenever I left my home to go outside, to stroll to the two malls that existed behind our neighborhood, or ride my bike through the neighborhood to visit Joel, my single friend. Carlos, unlike me, had to stare at the world through his obvious disfigurement, and always seeing ugliness reflected back at him. One day I would escape this neighborhood, and begin another life, with other people, in the real suburbs and not this watered down, white trash version of suburbia. While Carlos, on the other hand, would always be an obvious spectacle wherever he may go in life, and so I forgave him for what he was doing to me.

But when he called me a child molester one summer afternoon, I had to become hostile.

“HERE COMES THE CHILD MOLESTOR”, he brazenly declares to the crowd, as the neighborhood kids played a game of baseball, in an empty lot between houses. Some of these children, like the Christians and the Hispanic kid, were far down the street and around the corner from where they really lived. I was on my way to my friend Joel’s house, my only friend in the neighborhood, and who associated with a variety of these children through his activities, and those of his younger brother and sister. I stopped my bike and sat upon it.

“SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU DEAD EYE MOTHERFUCKER”, I roared at him one day, as callous, as hateful, and as spiteful as I could summon from all the years of my twisting torment at their hands. 

“I AM NOT A CHILD MOLESTOR AND I’LL FUCKING KILL ANYONE WHOEVER CALLS ME THAT AGAIN. I’LL GO HOME AND GET A FUCKING BASEBALL BAT AND BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF YOU YOU FUCKIN SPIC. FUCK ALL OF YOU”. I remember the looks I got from them, they knew not to push me too far. I was probably close to being hysterical, but Jason knew for all of them, too well that my threats were real.

After that they never said a word in the next few times I came across them playing softball in that field. After awhile they abandoned the lot for some other group activity, and I came and went as I pleased.

when I am near the group of children, he makes boasts, challenges, and taunts in an attempt to

Forks in feet

Angela – Christians, neighborhood, (grandmother making me go tricker treating) ( grandfather’s death, (timmy) sammy and pepys death, fathers death, great grandmothers death (washington D.C. boy scouts) April of same year my grandfather died.

describe the bullying after angela, the Christians, the whole neighborhood,

Early- when I get antagonized by somebody I flashback to the time when Jason smother was yelling at me “look what you did to my son”  as he laid on the couch, his eyes all black and blue, he looks like he was near death and I don’t even remember hitting him.

Beating up Jason

his mother yelling at me look what you did to my son over and over as he lay in bed/couch with black eyes,

Jason hit w/ hammer on head as a baby

angela

Bullies forcing me to trun inward

Telling the story of being tormented by the bullies which was their belief that I intentionally pushed her down according to neighbor across the street.

Angela started the fire

Jason and Rob putting laxative in something I ate or drank

Specter of angela throughout book

Flashbacks to childhood bullies tormenting him on the bus over angela and he wonders regretfully why he didn’t stab them at random. I would probably have gotten less time. Prison isn’t so bad. Does he make this a story where he goes back for revenge?

She lures me up to the top of the jungle gym, a girl that lived in our neighborhood, but who still seemed not to be involved with any of the other children in the neighborhood. I never saw her on the streets, only on the bus, she talked to this red headed kid, who lived directly behind the Cushman’s, whose children were around my age, Cindy and Andrew, a few years younger. Jill Van tassel throws/ pushes me off the top of the jungle gym after luring me up there, “that’s for Angela”, she says to me from the top of the jungle gym, looking down at me, at my stunned and probably concussed form. It was one of those circumstances where there was no other children around in a play ground full of them, no teachers that must have been around happened to be looking in that direction, or came to notice the prone body of a child as I laid there staring at the sky for a few minutes. I remember laying there in the sand, the wind knocked out of me after falling from what must have been a considerable height, wondering why no one was coming to my aid.

climbing the big fir tree five stories high, all these years later wondering if it was a ploy to get me to the top and push me off and he chickened out, or did this happen in the peaceful years!!!, before “Angela”. , ask g-mom how I came into their being,

            A never healed concussion resulting from the push off the jungle gym by Jill V.

Headaches as a kid, being brain boiled by bullying, slovenly fat boy without friends in a neighborhood full of children.

My grandmother who was alternatively overly fussing, or standoffish, who got irate when you interrupted her from the internal world that she often swam in during the years of my youth. I quickly learned to go into my own mental retreat, some how as a little boy knowing that my grandmother was only good for feeding me, housing me, lavishing gifts on me but never reliable for any kind of conversation that was of any substance or meaning to anyone that had ever walked the earth. I remember starting a conversation in the hopes of hearing something rational, I would have settled for anything earthly, but then, like now, I could only find some blasphemy of the English language that contained no useful filler for either the intellect or the imagination. Only a mish mash of nonsense that sent the boy to spend the precious years of his youth in inventing the entertainment to occupy him in his own solitary confinement. I think the only thing that brought me up from the basement, or after I graduated to the electronic loneliness of my bedroom, was my grandmother calling me to me, informing me that dinner was ready, or the food she brought home was here, or when she made popcorn to entice the monster that she was creating to exit the comfort of his cage and spend sometime in entertaining the babbling of her defective brain.

I had no escape from the house but into my own internal world. This world comprised all my toys and possessions. I had all the G.I. Joes that the store could sell, along with Star Wars characters and vehicles, He-Man, a sizeable amount of Legos which became ever evolving prototypes of vehicles and devices/ weapons for the various battles. I took a plank of wood my grandfather had . G.I. Joe and Star Wars characters combined together to fight the all powerful Cobra Commander and his strong but secret army, hidden in various strongholds that were surreptitiously built to avoid discovery. Generally the Cobra Army attacked various locations throughout the globe for political and economic gain. My hybrid G.I. Joe, Star Wars, team would assemble, some of them fortunate enough to wear the exoskeleton that explained why the larger figurines of the He-Men were on the field of battle. There would be land, sea, and air battles that always led to the climatic infiltration of Cobra headquarters that I imagined were in deep caverns underneath the middle of a desert, but whose actual location was in my grandfather’s work area, passed on to me after he succumbed to cancer, a result of being in contact with Agent Orange that my grandfather had dropped form helicopters while serving in Vietnam.  

Flashbacks to the day I allegedly pushed Angela to the ground and wonder if I really did that.

I am standing in the driveway of the Christian’s house waiting for my grandmother to return to pick me up after she got out of work. Angela, the beautiful toddler comes out into the sunshine with her mother. The family moves around me . I see Angela pulling turds out of her diaper, holding them in her hand like small treasures. I am disgusted on all levels of my being. She holds them up for my inspection, the most disgusting things I have ever seen.
            “Look Joey”, she says holding them up to me as if she was making burnt offerings to a deity. I was sickened.

I had no choice but to let the family know what was going with their precious Angela.

“Angela is pulling her shit out of her diaper”, I inform them.

“She does that”, Jason informs me. Then they go on to tell me that they have even said that she had eaten them before, and I had seen her one time pull her turds out of her diaper, and was holding one in her hand, so may be that one time I did push her down, or push her away from me not wanting her filthy hands on me but forgetting this until later in life, filthy handed kid touching me.

            I remember playing with the brothers in the front yard of my grandparents apartment. It was a child’s basketball hoop, which came with one green rubber ball, and a red version. I remember Robert telling me that he was taking the red ball with him as it was time for the brothers to go home. I followed him to the end of the driveway, ordering him to give it back to me. He refused. I attacked him like a dog and sank my teeth into his arm. I remember a brief struggle where I was eventually shaken loose. I could see my grandmother observing from the front door. I ended up in the gravel, cuts on my face from the rocks.

            “YOU MADE MY ARM BLEED. I’M GOING TO TELL MY FATHER”, Robert threatens me, but I was more concerned about having the red ball back in my possession.

            I told my grandfather that Jason had punched me in the stomach on the bus, thinking he was going to rescue me by going and having a conversation with Mr. Christian about his boy’s behavior.

            “That’s why you gotta hit him back, you gotta hit him hard”. And so to make my grandfather proud I beat Jason about the head with a stick.

                                                                                                                                   

Advertising, Ratings, and the finales of MASH and Seinfeld (Post to Television and Culture 04-04-12)

“Customers expect, and are already participating in a two way dialogue,” said Daina (sic) Middleton, Performics CEO. “It’s imperative for marketers to listen to customers and adopt strategies that engage them in every channel of their media mix - across all platforms, devices and screens” (Knight para. 1).

As various means of connecting with one another become the norm, many people are more able to discuss their preferences for products through social networking. With the popularity of social networking growing, it becomes another avenue for people to discuss what products they like or dislike.

“A recent ROI Research/Performics report”, according to Knight, “finds that 74% of entertainment consumers share their experiences on social media”, and “more than half of socnet users 'follow' travel brands to learn about deals/offers and just over 40% indulge in car talk before making a new car purchase” (para. 2). According to Knight (2011) “more than one-third of survey respondents say they talk about purchases on social media specifically to talk express their satisfaction” (Knight para. 3).

Other avenues with which people are watching their favorite shows also have an effect as well. It is now a common practice for those who measure ratings to take DVR and TiVo viewing into consideration as these avenues effect the total numbers of people watching popular shows. With “delayed viewing” taken into consideration, according to Carter (2010), “many other established shows, like CBS’s “Two and a Half Men,” and NBC’s “Law & Order SVU,” added about 15 to 20 percent to their totals” (para. 8). This is a significant number of viewers.

The effect of other methods of watching television programs, like streaming and illegally downloading effect the bottom line of advertising. If people are watching programs through these methods, then viewers miss the advertising that advertisers had spent a great deal upon in development in order to be seen during these shows. This effects the bottom line in advertisement, as the original advertisement is missed. This also effects the programs that rely on this advertisement, as well as the networks themselves, and perhaps the people that sell the products that are being advertised. What is probably hurt the most is the jobs of all these people.

The last episodes of MASH and Seinfeld were the last chance for viewers and fans of theses shows to see their favorite characters. These episodes were in effect the last chance to say goodbye to characters which people were emotionally invested in and had probably followed for a number of years. The reason why these shows finales were so popular is because there wasn’t the popularity of the internet and other avenues to attract viewers attention. Television shows were also more of a shared culture back then, and if you missed the show there was no second chance at watching them, unless it was on reruns or via the VCR. Back then television was a shared, singular object of culture.

The last episode of Seinfeld failed for me because it made fun of a fat man being robbed which caused them to become arrested. The episode makes a poor attempt at humor, for the sake of humor, rather than being a proper ending for this show.  

The last episode of MASH showed familiar characters who were at war, who had been through many difficult trials, finally returning safe to their homes, and like us probably never going to see each other again. People had become familiar with these characters and had grown attached to them. This show was a reflection of life for many people who had been through WWII, the Korean, and Vietnam wars.

Carter, Bill. “DVRs Bring Some Shows a Boost in Ratings”. The New York Times.com September 27, 2010. Web. 

Knight, Kristina. “Why ratings are more important than ever”. Bizreport.com. August 18, 2011. Web.

The Three Clusters of Personality Disorders (Abnormal Psychology 04-02-12)

Joseph Melanson

Abnormal Psychology

Prof. Cloninger

23 March 2012

The Three Clusters of Personality Disorders.

             According to Butcher, Mineka, and Hooley (2010), personality disorders are the results of “inflexible and maladaptive” traits of dysfunctional behavior and thinking which causes the person  to be “unable to perform adequately at least some of the varied roles expected of them by their society (p. 341). The two main categories which “characterize most personality disorders are chronic interpersonal difficulties and problems with one’s identity or sense of self” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 341). According to Butcher et al. (2010), “the criteria for diagnosing a personality disorder, the person’s enduring pattern of behavior must be pervasive and inflexible, as well as stable and of long duration” (p. 341). Butcher et al. (2010), goes on to state personality disorders “cause either clinically significant distress or impairment in functioning” and manifest in “at least two of the following areas: cognition, affectivity, interpersonal functioning, or impulse control” (p. 341). Personality disorders are classified into three categories called “clusters”, Butcher et al. (2010) states, “on the basis of what where originally thought to be important similarities of features among the disorders within a given cluster” (p. 341).

              According to Butcher et al. (2010), the first cluster of personality disorders, is “Cluster A” and this “includes paranoid, schizoid, and schizotypal personality disorders” (p. 342). Generally the people that manifest symptoms of these disorders “often seem odd or eccentric, with unusual behavior ranging from distrust and suspiciousness to social detachment” (Butcher et al, 2010, p. 342). An example of this cluster is the Schizoid Personality disorder and the sufferers of “are usually unable to form social relationships and usually lack much interest in doing so” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 346).

             According to Alloy, Acocella, and Bootzin (1996), the “schizoid personality disorder is defined by one fundamental eccentricity, a preference for being alone” (p. 266). The person with the Schizoid Personality disorder usually doesn’t have close friends, “with the possible exception of a close relative” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 346). Unable to “express their feelings” they seem “as cold and distant”, and lacking “social skills” they can be viewed as “loners or introverts, with solitary interests and occupations, although not all loners or introverts have schizoid personality disorder” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 346). They find no joy in many activities, including “sexual activity”, they “rarely marry”, and are not “emotionally reactive”, rarely having strong emotions, “but rather show a generally apathetic mood” which gives others the sense of being “cold and aloof” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 346). According to Butcher et al. (2010), “they show high levels of introversion (especially low on warmth, gregariousness, and positive emotions)” and are “low on openness to feelings (one facet of openness to experience)” (p. 346). “Little is known about the causes of this disorder as it, “like paranoid personality disorder, has not been the focus of much research” and the traits of this disorder have “been shown to have only a modest heritability” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 347).

            “Theorists propose that individuals with schizoid personality disorder” display “aloof behavior” due to “maladaptive schemas that lead them to view themselves as self-sufficient” and “view others as intrusive” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 347). “Their core dysfunctional belief might be, “I am basically alone” or “Relationships are messy [and] undesirable” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 347).

             According to Butcher et al. (2010), the second cluster, “Cluster B” includes “histrionic, narcissistic, antisocial, and borderline personality disorders” (p. 342). “Individuals with these disorders” tend to be “dramatic, emotional, and erratic” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 342). An example of one of these disorders, the Histrionic Personality Disorder, is what Butcher et al. (2010) characterizes as “excessive attention seeking” and “emotionality” the “key characteristics” of the “histrionic personality disorder” (p. 349). They “feel unappreciated if they are not the center of attention; their lively, dramatic, and excessively extraverted styles often ensure that they can charm others” but many “tire of providing this level of attention” to behavior which is “often quite theatrical and emotional” and “sexually provocative and seductive” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 349). According to Alloy et al., (1996), their actions are often manipulation “aimed at attracting attention and sympathy” (p. 268). “Their speech is vague and impressionistic and they are seen as “self-centered, vain, and excessively concerned about the approval of others, who see them as overly reactive, shallow, and insincere” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 349). “The prevalence of this disorder” is estimated “at 2 to 3 percent, and some (but not all) studies suggest that this disorder occurs more often in women” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 350). “A recent careful analysis of the issue suggested that the higher prevalence” of this disorder in women “actually would not be predicted based on known sex differences in the personality traits prominent in the disorder” and suggests a sex bias “in the diagnosis of the disorder” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 350).

            According to Butcher et al. (2010), “Cluster C: Includes avoidant, dependent, and obsessive-compulsive personality disorders” (p. 342). “In contrast to the other two clusters”, Butcher et al. (2010) states, “people with theses disorders often show anxiety and fearfulness (p. 342). An example of one of these disorders is the Obsessive-Compulsive personality disorder or OCPD as it is referred to, and it is characterized by “perfectionism and an excessive concern with maintaining order and control” (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 360).

            This personality disorder is characterized by “excessive preoccupation with trivial details, at the cost of both spontaneity and effectiveness” (Alloy et al., 1996, p. 269). These personalities obsess over “mechanics of efficiency – organizing, following rules, making lists and schedules – that they cease to be efficient, for they never get anything important done” as well as being “stiff and formal in their dealings with others and find it hard to take genuine pleasure in anything” (Alloy et al., 1996, p. 269). “For example, they may spend weeks or months planning a family vacation”, planning all the activities, “and then derive no enjoyment whatsoever from the vacation itself” when things do not go according to the original plan (Alloy et al., 1996, p. 269).

            “This personality disorder” differs from “obsessive-compulsive disorder” despite “a superficial similarity – the shared emphasis on rituals and propriety – has led to their bearing similar names, the two syndromes are quite different” (Alloy et al., 1996, p. 269). According to Alloy et al., (1996), “compulsiveness is not confined to a single sequence of bizarre behaviors” like “constant hand washing, but is milder and more pervasive, effecting many aspects of life” (p. 269). “While obsessive-compulsive disorder is not common, obsessive-compulsive personality is fairly common (more so in men than in women), and, people suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder generally do not also show obsessive-compulsive personality disorder” (Alloy et al., 1996, p. 269).

            “Though some jobs would seem to require a degree of “compulsiveness””, those with OCPD “rarely do well in their occupations due to a preoccupation “with trivia” and “because of their concern over doing things “just right”, they generally have tremendous difficulty making decisions and meeting deadlines (Alloy et al., 1996, p. 269). 

            There is a great deal of difficulty in diagnosing the various personality disorders across the three clusters due to their similarities, and the lack of research into them. Often people are diagnosed as having one personality disorder, while more properly fitting the criteria of another. Until there is more research and development into personality disorders, the study of them remains an incomplete science, and “a special caution is in order regarding the diagnosis of personality disorders” due to lack of “sharply defined” criteria (Butcher et al., 2010, p. 343).

References

Alloy, Lauren B., Acocella, Joan., & Bootzin, Richard R., (1996). Abnormal Psychology:

Current Perspectives. (7^th ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill Inc.

Butcher, James N., Mineka, & Susan., Hooley, Jill M. (2010). Abnormal Psychology.

(14^th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.