Example of writing a response paper
I'll be concentrating on language reading and writing practices in today's post of the day. Before that, we should be aware of something: in the essay you will see, there will be a lot of metaphorical points, and the aim is to get genuine meaning going on in the essay. I will first read the essay and then respond to it. Also, I'm going to concentrate on the following idea: Tenor. This idea enables you to comprehend what you are reading, glean the true meaning hidden in the words, and go deeper into any material you come across. It is a concealed idea, concept, or deeper meaning.
So get a cup of tea, attempt to understand the real issue, and search for the "tenors" with me. Here is the essay by Orhan Pamuk.
RESPONSE:
Humans do not like to be separate. Humans do not like to be pushed away from the whole. They come to a single life to be part of something, to feel sense of belonging or perhaps more of them: to be loved. “No man is an island.” as John Donne said. This is a norm of being a human, but it can also be said that despite their tendency to be in a unity or in a culture which involves variety of different identities, they incline to feel ‘separate’ or to be ‘different’ from the others. It can be thought what a big dilemma is, but this is what it is going on in this world during all those years. Humans love to be part of a relationship for sure but they do not want everyone to be part of it so that they can feel their ‘selves’ are pure, unique and distinct from the other people. They think: “What is mine is better than the others”. This is somehow cognitively placed in humans’ minds. This process is called ‘Otherization’ which is to say I and You, to find the power in themselves to make the others ‘other’ and push them out of the borders. In ‘NO ENTRY’ essay of Orhan Pamuk, it is mentioned about the otherization process which is displayed in a subtle example of itself. There is a door and some people are allowed to come in but some are not. This is written in a very allegorical way, but when it is thought the actual meaning, the tenor, underlying the piles of blankets, it can be clearly seen that it tries to draw a picture of how otherization process make other people feel as ‘others’ and what this process make them do.
How does ‘Otherization’ make feel the people? That is one of the questions going on in the essay. In the essay, it can be seen basically the ‘door’ example showing the process. Firstly, it shows that how ‘the door’ suddenly come to be seen by people and make them feel ‘I am other.’ It can be understood from here that even if people can again be apart from the others and be with the people they admire, they do not do this and choose a way to show it the other people. If it had not been written that ‘No Entry’ script, no one would have cared even for a second. As it is seen in the essay, “This door that previously meant nothing to him is now a rude reminder that there are limits beyond which his imagination cannot go: the imaginary world in which he had been travelling so blissfully is now cast in shadow. In this life, there are a lot of examples of these situations. In a classroom, for instance, there are a lot of students that make groups and do not allow anybody else in. This is a grouping culture in a classrom and even if it is a small culture example, it has broader effect than its size. The ‘otherized’ students who sit in a corner of the class and watch the group who have a great connection and laugh in front of them can feel very desperate, this can make them ask: “What is that gives some people this privelege and not others?” The feeling other situation is not limited to this. There is the ‘key’ issue mentioned in the essay. It is mentioned in the essay in a sentence, “Instead of arranging to furnish keys to all admissible individuals, with which they might lock the door when they leave before pocketing key like any ordinary citizen, the privileged owners have written NO ENTRY.” This issue tries to tell that actually they have a chance not to make the others feel ‘other’ while they still can have an environment with some specific people. The meaning is that they do this ‘self vs. other’ issue a big deal and they do it deliberately. As mentioned in the introduction part, people love this being difference situation. “They all take pleasure in finding ingenius ways to enumerate the virtues that set them apart from all others, but without actually saying so.” They do this deliberately and the person who personally understands this deliberate attitude towards her/him can feel very bad about this dirty face of humans. This can make the person hate everyone and make herself/himself ‘other’ from the society willingly this time. The result is a lot of lonely men even though they come to life to be loved and seen once and ‘I am an outsider after all at all costs.’
As it mentioned before, people deliberately make poeple the others. They somehow exercise a power over those who feel ashamed and underestimate themselves. There comes a big division between self and others. As in the essay, “There are those who can enter and those who cannot. The world is full of pointless divisions like this. So many passersby will give this one no particular importance but the fact remains that there are still some people who give it enough importance to take the trouble of nailing such a sign on their door.” So, there are poeple who take these otherizations seriously even though they can ignore all of these because it is actually a trap for the outsiders, but unfortanetly people can get hurt from these. “So, it is that the traveler begins to think about his own particular virtues, pleasures, belongings and relationships; one by one he turns them into things he must proudly claim and protect.” This means a circle which starts and going from a single self to the others who feel outsider; so, he/she starts to make some people insider and some poeple outsider; and there comes otherization. This is a circle which will never end because of this attitude of people. They think, “If they do to me, then I do it, too.” This is one of the worst parts of otherization.
As a result, in essay ‘NO ENTRY’, there are a lot of subtle messages which are tenors such as ‘key’, ‘door’. These try to show what otherization is and its results on people. How otherization make people’s lives terrible and miserable may be inferred from this paper as well. Well, there are a lot of examples out there, and there may be, but the point is how many of us will be one of them. It says in the essay, “They’d achieved their aim: there is a growing disquiet on the other side of the door.” How many of us will make these others ‘other’ is the key point. It is up to people to be part of this circle even if it seems too hard. “Do you defend Niggers, Atticus? “Of course I do, Don’t say nigger, Scout. That’s common.” “That’s what everybody at school says.” “From now on, it’ll be everybody less one…” As can be seen in this dialogue, from now on, let the ‘otherers’ be less than one.
As you see, I responsed to the essay in this way. You can write response papers like this, you can write fictions on your own or you can even write a diary. The point is to write and use the vocabulary as much as possible. Writing and reading are the best way for you to improve your abilities and to practise vocabulary and grammar you have learned. Good luck to you all!
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