Rhetorical Analysis Of I Am A Cripple

In the passage, Nancy Mairs discusses the many different ways she is presented in society. She informs the reader on how society sees her and how she sees herself. Mairs uses multiple rhetorical features such as tone, word choice, and rhetorical structure to give reasoning as to why she presents herself as a "cripple."

Mairs uses ethopoeia to explain her reasoning for calling herself a cripple. She lets the readers know that she is a cripple because of her multiple sclerosis. “Disabled” by contrast, suggested any incapacity, physical or mental. And I certainly don’t like “handicapped,” which implies that I have deliberately been put at a disadvantage, by whom I can’t imagine .” Mairs is honest about

    To begin with Mairs use of diction and syntax is very simple and clear. She uses vocabulary not complex in order for people who have multiple sclerosis understand better. Mairs utilizes pathos throughout the passage to inform and give out what the message about how some terms can damage somebody. For example, “And I certainly don’t like “handicapped”(Mairs 1).”

In this passage, Nancy Mairs presents herself as being “cripple.” She gave herself that name many years ago without any motive to do so. Nancy Mairs wants people to see herself as a fate or god. Mairs uses medium simple sentences, tone, and diction to present why she calls herself “cripple” instead of “disabled” or “handicap.” Nancy Mairs elaborates on herself at the start of this passage by stating “I am a cripple.”

By stating “Whatever you call me, I remain crippled,” and “I like the accuracy with which [“cripple”] describes my condition,” she presents herself as straightforward and sincere. Mairs is being honest as to what she feels in regards to the word “cripple.” Mairs’s word choice is also to be taken into consideration. She described other words used in place of “crippled” as “euphemisms” and

Nancy Mairs, author of this passage, who has multiple sclerosis talks about herself and her decisions on why she calls herself a “cripple.” While she does this, she also criticizes words like “handicapped” and “disabled.” She tells a small story and her views on certain things while also explaining the reasoning behind calling herself a “cripple.” Mairs conveys why she is a cripple in her mind through her tone, word choice, and passage structure. Mairs your in this passage is calm at first but as she gets more into a sensitive topic, for her, she begins to be much more upset.

In the essays “On Being a Cripple”, written by Nancy Mairs, and “Living Under Circe’s Spell”, written by Matthew Soyster, both authors strive to communicate to the reader what it is like to live with MS. Although both writers have a similar purpose, they both use exceptionally different methods of communicating their experiences with MS. Overall, Mairs’ essay proved to be more effective than Soyster’s, because of her varied use of rhetorical devices that all work together to create an effective argument. On the other hand, Soyster’s essay was less effective because he only relied on pathos to convince the readers of his argument.

She explains her aversion to these three terms to further develop her reasoning behind choosing the term “cripple”. She begins her final paragraph with the declarative statement: “Whatever you call me, I remain crippled.” She explains that the goal sought after by these less blunt terms is not met. The terms “Disabled”, “handicapped”, and “differently abled” all aim to describe Mair’s condition in a gentler way than “cripple”, yet Mair points out the reality that these gentle terms do nothing to change the reality of her

Mairs begins the essay with a term to define herself: “a cripple” (267). She wants “society to wince” in order to portray society association on language (268). She takes a simple word and identifies that it is not only acceptable, but her preference to describe herself. By saying she wants people to wince it can be implied that she wants to stand out in her own way. She does not want people to feel sympathy for her because of her disease, but to see her as a person.

Mairs wanted to make clear that crippled and disabled are two words that are different. She made that point in order to “equalize the chances in the great race of life” (268). In order to equalize herself, she chose to be called a “crippled.” The word “crippled” meant to her a word that seemed straightforward and precise. She wanted to make the word “handicapped” clear, as she stated, “I certainly don’t like ‘handicapped,’ which implies that I have been put as a disadvantage” (268).

On her essay entitled ‘’On Being a Cripple, the author Nancy Mairs uses her confident tone and seductive ways of telling details to tell her own story as a person who experienced both conditions of being a healthy attractive woman who becomes over the years someone who depends on a wheel chair in order to help her moving yet independent in her mind accepting her situation and taking advantage of every new day with joy and satisfaction. Mairs Starts her essay with an expressive epigraph that gives the reader a hint about the strong piece of writing that he is about to read. Associating the tittle to Louise Bogan’s quote is a cleaver trigger to hook the reader’s attention, too. The writer, who lives the experience of being crippled for the

In “On Being a Cripple”, Nancy Mairs, an American poet and essayist, describes her personal battle with multiple sclerosis, a degenerative disease of the central nervous system with no known cure. She begins with a personal account of falling into a toilet because she loses control over several motions. Mairs prefers to be called a cripple rather than a disabled or handicapped person, although she acknowledges that this is not the same as others’ preference. She explains her journey from being a young, active child, to losing control of her body and developing a blurred spot in one eye in her late twenties. As her body continues to break down, Mairs tries to stay involved by participating in activities like bridge and

In Nancy Mairs’ article for The New York Times, “Disability”, published in 1987, she expresses her distaste with the media's representation of handicapped people. Mairs, who struggled with multiple sclerosis herself, clearly and sharply conveys this disgust by stating, “I’m not, for instance, Ms. MS, a walking, talking embodiment of a chronic incurable degenerative disease.” (Mairs 13), and that she is actually, “the advertisers’ dream: Ms. Great American Consumer. And yet the advertisers, who determine nowadays who will get represented publicly and who will not, deny the existence of me and my kind absolutely”(Mairs 14). Mairs is greatly upset that disabled people are defined by their disabilities and, therefore, are underrepresented in public media. This might lead to one asking themselves, but why are they? And the answer, according to Mairs, is quite simple, “To depict disabled people in the ordinary activities of daily life is to admit that there is something ordinary about disability itself, that it may enter anybody’s life”(Mairs 14). Mairs concludes by pointing out how this effacement could have dangerous consequences for both disabled people and, as she called everyone else, TAPs (Temporarily Abled Persons) alike. Treating disabilities as an abnormal characteristic (as opposed to viewing them “as a normal characteristic, one that complicates but does not ruin human existence” (Mairs 15)) can cause one of these repercussions, as it makes the

In her essay, Mairs describes how society uses different terms to describe people’s appearance such as disabled, handicapped, and cripple. She claims that society’s poor use of language and meaning has resulted in the way society thinks on the terms disabled, handicapped, and cripple. An example of this is when Mairs uses the word cripple as she claims that people wince at the word when they hear it. She says the word makes her appear as a tough customer as she is want to been seen as someone who can face the harsh reality of her condition. Mairs argues “Society is no readier to accept crippledness than to accept death, war, sex, sweat, or wrinkles”(Mairs p.241) which states that society isn’t willing to acknowledge people with disabilities as they are put at a disadvantage. She also states that society doesn’t want to acknowledge the fact that a disability could potentially be worse than death as she uses her own experience to show her audience that the evil of humanity is not only death. She claims that society doesn’t take the issues of disabilities seriously as they treat those with disabilities differently rather than acknowledging them for who they are.

In Nancy Mairs ' "On Being a Cripple," she deliberates the relationship between the English Language, American Society, and her struggle with multiple sclerosis (MS). Mairs criticizes people for wincing at the word "cripple," and using terms like “differently abled,” because they lack reality and accuracy. She equivalents society’s inability to accept crippledness with death, war, sex, sweat, and wrinkles. Through the usage of ethos, pathos, logos and other rhetorical devices, she effectively tells her story and proves that there is power in words, from which she could come to terms with a new fact of her identity, and to accept the incurability of her disease.