Essay Example on Memories are the foundation of the human Body

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Memories are the foundation of the human body These memorable life experiences positive or negative mold an individual to be who they are There are several interdependent parts of the body which work together in order to define a person as a human being In The Giver by Lois Lowry a community as a whole lack all memories in exchange for a loss of awareness Beyond the book in real life many comparisons can be from that of a disorder Inside The Giver s demented dystopian society the community s lack of memory can be associated with psychological disorders in modern day such as amnesia and other difficult psychogenic disorders Sometimes when an event is simply too difficult for a person to cope with they protect and defend themselves by blocking that memory of the event Amnesia can be blamed for this occurrence When people lose their ability to memorize information or recall information that is stored in memory they have amnesia It can be caused by many things including traumatic experiences and brain injury Acting a little forgetful is completely different to having amnesia which refers to a large scale loss of memories that should not have been forgotten These may include important milestones in life memorable events key people in our lives and vital facts we have been told or taught Nordqvist

There are a wide range of the different types of amnesia some include anterograde amnesia retrograde amnesia and psychogenic amnesia Patients with anterograde amnesia often show normal memory for events prior to the incident responsible for the memory loss but have severely impaired ability to recall information about events occurring after the incident Whereas with retrograde amnesia there is almost always a gradual restoration of most of the lost information with anterograde amnesia there is quite often no such recovery and patients are left with a permanent and debilitating condition McLeod Lastly psychogenic amnesia which is characterized by abnormal memory functioning in the absence of structural brain damage or a known neurobiological cause It can occur from the effects of severe stress or psychological trauma Mastin This next kind of amnesia pertains mostly to The Giver cultural amnesia Cultural amnesia points to the obscuring of human history through hiding or re translating key historical events that threatened to overwhelm humanity On one end of the spectrum is a denial or severe repression of these memories It is a survival strategy and can be called a skillful adaptation that creates alternative meaning to replace the previous fear and confusion Fitts The Giver portrays an 11 year old boy named Jonas living in a futuristic society that has eliminated all pain fear love war and choice Jonas is given the opportunity of being the Receiver of memory So when Jonas community turned to sameness it abandoned all memories of events and emotions but that does not mean those events are gone completely

The novel presents a situation in which an overpowered government can control their people by getting rid of memories of history and using that as a weapon to obtain total control of the community and the citizens within Louis Lowry has managed to display that memory when not in complete control is a source of individual and growing power A mass concept in The Giver is one individual holding all the good and bad memories that the citizens are forbidden to be exposed to It would cause chaos love warfare sadness starvation etc These citizens do not know those feelings everyone suffers from memory loss because it is as if they have never experienced them before As a receiver Jonas is exposed to new environments feelings and emotions he never knew of People who suffer from amnesia or memory loss are like Jonas and his community they do not what true happiness feels like because they have never encountered the negative and low parts that life has to offer He had seen a birthday party with one child singled out and celebrated on his day so that now he understood the joy of being an individual special and unique and proud Lowry 121

This is said when Jonas is scarred after experiencing the memory of war and The Giver tried reminding him that not all memories are terrifying This shows that memories can be pleasant and the joy of being an individual can help shape a person's personality The community does not understand this therefore taking away a factor that distinguishes personality Positive memories like a celebration or a success leave a great impact on our lives This again connects to the unfortunate disorder of amnesia A person who suffers from amnesia would lose their sense of identity due to both pleasant and unpleasant memories shaping who we are One of the children raised an imaginary rifle and made an attempt to destroy him with a firing noise Then they were all silent standing awkwardly and the only sound was the sound of Jonas s shuddering breaths He was struggling not to cry Lowry 134 This comes up in The Giver when Jonas is at the playground and sees Asher with other children playing war After experiencing war himself he immediately reacts This shows how bad memories also shape our personality as they help stimulate our fears and sudden reactions to events

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