Phenomenal Woman free essay sample

Phenomenal Woman is one of the most quoted poems in literary history. This poem was written in 1978 by Maya Angelou to tell a story of how as woman, through our many obstacles, we still were phenomenal. Angelou is a poet, historian, songwriter, playwright, dancer, stage and screen producer, director, performer, singer, and civil rights activist. She was born Marguerite Johnson, April 4, 1928 in St. Louis, Missouri. She grew up in St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas. Maya Angelou’s life wasn’t always silver and gold. Maya Angelou’s parents divorced when she was a young child and her and her older brother were sent to live in Arkansas with their grandmother. At the age of seven, during a visit to her mother’s, Angelou was raped by her mother’s boyfriend. She only told her brother that this accord and days later, her mother’s boyfriend was killed by her uncles for his act on her. We will write a custom essay sample on Phenomenal Woman or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page She thought that her words had killed him and she stopped speaking. She went on not speaking for five years and when she finally spoke, her and her brother moved back with their mom now in San Francisco. Maya earned a scholarship to the Labor School to dance and act. At the age of 16, she became pregnant and dropped out of school to work and raise her son. Angelou begin her career in a different way than most poets. She began as a dancer, then a Calypso singer and later moved to Harlem to join the Harlem Freedom Writers. In 1959, at the request of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. , Maya Angelou became the northern coordinator for the Southern Christian leadership Conference. From 1961 to 962 she was associate editor of The Arab Observer in Cairo, Egypt; and from 1964 to 1966 she was feature editor of the African Review in Accra, Ghana. She returned to the U.S. in 1974 and was appointed by Gerald Ford to Bicentennial Commission and later by Jimmy Carter to the Commission for International Woman of the Year. At the urging of her friend, writer James Baldwin, she began writing about her life experiences. The result of her efforts became the 1970 best-selling memoir about her childhood and young adult years entitled I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. This me moir made Angelou an international literary star. The first woman director in Hollywood, Angelou has written, produced, directed, and starred in productions for stage, film, and television. In 1971, she wrote the original screenplay and musical score for the film Georgia, Georgia, and was both author and executive producer of a five-part television miniseries â€Å"Three Way Choice†. She has also written and produced several prize-winning documentaries, including, â€Å"Afro-Americans in the Arts†, a PBS special for which she received the Golden Eagle Award. In 1978, Maya Angelou wrote Phenomenal Woman. This poem was inspired by all the trials and tribulations Angelou faced in her youth. Her poem illustrates the love a woman has for herself even though she isn’t considered beautiful. She used this publication to empower not only herself, but all women in the world that have faced obstacles or just didn’t know where they would turn to next. This poem spoke about woman in an inner sense than on what’s seen by the eye. True enough, the first thing you see when you see a woman or anyone else is their physical aspects. In this poem, Angelou wanted to focus mostly on all the wonderful things a woman can offer skin deep. Maya Angelou writes about experiences she has faced. She points out that she isn’t the most beautiful woman in the world, but she has so much more to offer than just beauty. The poem uses a repetitive pattern in each stanza. Angelou starts the stanza with a description of someone’s reaction to the woman as they notice her. The reactions are all categorized by wonderment. They question why she is so happy and what others see in her. The stanzas continue by developing the persona. The persona is described as a vivacious woman. Kelly Cecil describes Angelou’s purpose for her descriptions by stating: â€Å"She uses imagery so that the proud, confident persona can be better understood†.

The Social Transformation of American Medicine

The Social Transformation of American Medicine Starr divides the history of medicine into two books in order to emphasize two separate movements in the development of American medicine. The first movement was the rise of professional sovereignty and the second was the transformation of medicine into an industry, with corporations taking a large role. A Sovereign Profession In the first book, Starr begins with a look at the shift from domestic medicine in early America when the family wants the locus of care of the sick to the shift towards the professionalization of medicine in the late 1700s. Not all were accepting, however, as lay healers in the early 1800s saw the medical profession as nothing but privilege and took a hostile stance to it. But then medical schools began to emerge and proliferate during the mid-1800s and medicine was quickly becoming a profession with licensures, codes of conduct, and professional fees. The rise of hospitals and the introduction of telephones and better modes of transportation made physicians accessible and acceptable. In this book, Starr also discusses the consolidation of professional authority and the changing social structure of physicians in the nineteenth century. For instance, before the 1900s, the role of the doctor did not have a clear class position, as there was a lot of inequality. Doctors did not earn much and a physician’s status depended largely on their family’s status. In 1864, however, the first meeting of the American Medical Association was held in which they raised and standardized requirements for medical degrees as well as enacted a code of ethics, giving the medical profession a higher social status. Reform of medical education began around 1870 and continued through the 1800s. Starr also examines the transformation of American hospitals throughout history and how they have become central institutions in medical care. This happened in a series of three phases. First was the formation of voluntary hospitals that were operated by charitable lay boards and public hospitals that were operated by municipalities, counties, and the federal government. Then, beginning in the 1850s, a variety of more â€Å"particularistic† hospitals formed that were primarily religious or ethnic institutions that specialized in certain diseases or categories of patients. Third was the advent and spread of profit-making hospitals, which are operated by physicians and corporations. As the hospital system has evolved and changed, so has the role of the nurse, physician, surgeon, staff, and patient, which Starr also examines. In the final chapters of book one, Starr examines dispensaries and their evolvement over time, the three phases of public health and the rise of new specialty clinics, and the resistance to the corporatization of medicine by doctors. He concludes with a discussion of the five major structural changes in the distribution of power that played a major role in the social transformation of American medicine:1. The emergence of an informal control system in medical practice resulting from the growth of specialization and hospitals.2. Stronger collective organization and authority/the control of labor markets in medical care.3. The profession secured a special dispensation from the burdens of hierarchy of the capitalist enterprise. No â€Å"commercialism† in medicine was tolerated and much of the capital investment required for medical practice was socialized.4. The elimination of countervailing power in medical care.5. The establishment of specific spheres of professional authority. The Struggle for Medical Care The second half of The Social Transformation of American Medicine focuses on the transformation of medicine into an industry and the growing role of corporations and the state in the medical system. Starr begins with a discussion on how social insurance came about, how it evolved into a political issue, and why America lagged behind other countries with regards to health insurance. He then examines how the New Deal and the Depression affected and shaped insurance at the time. The birth of Blue Cross in 1929 and Blue Shield several years later really paved the way for health insurance in America because it reorganized medical care on a prepaid, comprehensive basis. This was the first time that â€Å"group hospitalization† was introduced and provided a practical solution for those who could not afford typical private insurance of the time. Shortly after, health insurance emerged as a benefit received via employment, which reduced the likelihood that only the sick would buy insurance and it reduced the large administrative costs of individually sold policies. Commercial insurance expanded and the character of the industry changed, which Starr discusses. He also examines the key events that formed and shaped the insurance industry, including World War II, politics, and social and political movements (such as the women’s rights movement). Starr’s discussion of the evolution and transformation of the American medical and insurance system ends in the late 1970s. A lot has changed since then, but for a very thorough and well-written look at how medicine has changed throughout history in the United States up until 1980, The Social Transformation of American Medicine is the book to read. This book is the winner of the 1984 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction, which in my opinion is well deserved. References Starr, P. (1982). The Social Transformation of American Medicine. New York, NY: Basic Books.