This paper seeks to analyze three journals that we have read during this term. The analysis of these journals will require my personal opinion and reflection on the journals. It will discuss the issues described in the journals from a wide perspective. The three journals to be analyzed include the following:
- Speech Acts
- She’s My Dad
Walter Benjamin, Theses on the Philosophy of History
Speech of Acts
This is a speech written by John Searle in July 3rd, 2007. The issues brought by Searle have become the usual escapades in the daily lives of most people. The author has practiced a linguistic analysis on the spirit of Austin. This has been achieved under very careful elucidation of some important concepts in the modern society of linguistic developments. Language is an important and useful aspect in finding the solution to most philosophical and complex problems and puzzles in the society.
There is no way we can account for the meaning of a text without considering the context of the speech. Searle claims that sentences do not purely express the proposition of an individual, but the context of the sentences does this in a much understandable manner. There are several ways of bringing out some issues in the journal, depending on the way an individual faces the situation in the texts. This will eventually lead to the distortion of information brought forward in the passage. For this reason, it is important to understand the context of the sentences rather than understanding the individual sentences.
She’s My Dad
This is an article by Melina Marchetta where the main heroine is a young girl studying at High School. This girl has undergone several dramatic and important transformations in her lifetime experience with her father. This article makes us appreciate the value of our culture, emancipation and self determination. This is very clear from the way this young girl is determined to find out the secrets that her family has hidden from her, and this becomes the main goal of her life.
The main heroine’s relationship with her father can be viewed from several perspectives. For example, falling in love with her father might be viewed as a mistake on the one hand, but to some extent she was not intended to do so, on the other hand. The main heroine is so determined to attain emancipation in her life that she says “I will run one day. Run for my dear life”. This gives her the strength to carry on no matter what situation she finds herself in. She is also determined to have free time and space to make her own decisions in life and never to be gagged by any individual in the society and her entire family. Horrifically, she died at the ultimate end while trying to achieve this status quo.
Walter Benjamin, Theses on the Philosophy of History
In this journal by Benjamin Walter, the author focuses specifically on the difference between historicism and the historical materialism. The primary difference is expressed in the manner in which the history articles attribute the factors relating to the cultural differences in most societies. This clearly brings out the difference in the way in which the past history and the present history present the facts therein.
The difference in this case takes a redemptive approach to the understanding of the past events, as opposed to the recent history which goes ahead to discuss both the present and the future, yet claiming that all these still lie under the subject of history. In a nut shell historicism is concerned with the understanding of the past, which is opposite to the history of materialism that understands the current and future prospects of life in the society.