Gregory
frequently used negative diction throughout his essay to establish his purpose.
By using negative diction the author could get a sense of how he feels toward
the situation. At the bottom of page 279 the author states, “The teacher
thought I was stupid. Couldn’t spell, couldn’t read, couldn’t do arithmetic.
Just stupid.” Not only does the author use words with a negative connotation
such as stupid and couldn’t, but he repeats them to exaggerate the bad
experience he had. The author’s manipulation of these words with negative
connotations radiates a feeling of despair or shame. It lets the reader know
that Gregory felt shame in the fact that his teachers thought he was “stupid”.
The effect that the use of these words bring is evident and made a clear
distinction of his purpose.
Gregory
also utilized figurative language to share his purpose. On page 280 Gregory
states, “I was pregnant with poverty. Pregnant with dirt and pregnant with
smells that made people turn away, pregnant with cold and pregnant with shoes
that were never bought for me, pregnant with five other people in my bed and no
Daddy in the next room, and pregnant with hunger.” In this quote Gregory
introduces his feeling of shame by using a metaphor to compare poverty to a
word with a negative connotation, a process that takes a long time, pregnancy.
By comparing poverty to pregnancy the reader can associate the long process to
poverty and see how the author truly felt about living in poverty. The author’s
use of this extended metaphor makes the reader try to view the situation
through his eyes, how living with no dad and 5 other siblings and nothing to
eat must feel. His shame was in the fact that he had no dad, that he was living
in poverty, and by writing this metaphor the author made that clear to the
reader.
Throughout
the essay Gregory is describing a personal-case example and many details from
his personal-case examples contributed to his purpose. By using personal-case
examples the author can share his own experience concerning shame and that’s
exactly what Gregory did. On page 281 it says “’My daddy said he’d give…
fifteen dollars.’ . . . I was crying too.” These sentences describe the first
time Gregory felt shame, the author was ashamed because the teacher embarrassed
him by basically calling him poor in front of his class and his crush. By
sharing his first-hand experience the author shares his experience with shame
and how it deeply upset him. The author carries this personal-case example with
him forever and will always recognize it as the first time he felt shame and
therefore directly contributed to his purpose. He felt shame because he was a
boy living in poverty and had no control over that and it affected him greatly.
People face shame regularly and Gregory was
brave to share his experience with many readers. By doing this he lets the
reader know shame is common and that no one is alone. Gregory is just one
among billions of people who have experienced shame in a lifetime.