Reflection of RCA

Throughout this semester, I wrote many different types of writing. In the final writing, we have to write an essay about researched critical analysis. This assignment asks us to craft an argumentative essay in response to my selected essay topic question examining otherness in a text. Although we have given a few options for us to choose, they are still very confused in the early stage. I don’t know which theme I should choose as my last paper. However, after the teacher’s advice and the knowledge learned before the review. In the end, I selected the third option which does a close reading of a text that depicts an “other”, an individual with a different identity from me. In addition, analyze the themes and ways in which identity issues are treated, noting intersectionality Of multiple identities. Because this option seems to be more interesting. At the same time, because I didn’t know much about the movie or most of the American TV show, I chose to analyze a novel, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Although, this book has been read in high school. But an esoteric book needs to be read many times to truly understand it, just as its author has spent a lot of thought and a lot of experience to write it. At the same time, each re-reading can let the reader discover something that was not noticed before. Although we always feel that we already know it, it still gives us a lot of surprises. Sometimes I even suddenly found out that the original protagonist said this sentence has another meaning. The Great Gatsby was described in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, society entered a period of rapid prosperity, the capitalist countries represented by the United States have shown great prosperity. In addition, this is a classic literary work, which is like a mirror reflection of the people in the pursuit of so-called success. And the irony of it has become a major artistic feature of the work, so I chose to analyze this novel. Before I started writing, I first searched for the sources related to this novel and the topic, and I chose 2-3 of them to perform annotation. This also helped me to understand the sources well and choose the quotations that are useful for my argument. In the Great Gatsby, the destruction of the American dream is one of the focuses of the text. As a result, my thesis statement is: Although the American Dream is the dream that every American citizen has been pursuing, Gatsby’s pursuit of it displays the tragedy of American society, embodying the distorted idealism and the fall of the American Dream. In the argument, I also describe the reasons for Gatsby’s failure in pursuing the American Dream through different aspects. For example, Gatsby distorted the original intention of the American Dream, treating he love, Daisy, as an American Dream, and the influence of different social classes on him. In each claim, I also used the quotation from the original text and the quotation of the outside sources to support. With the quotation and my explanation on the thesis and each claim, which would make the argument more powerful and persuasive. Finally, I think that the purpose of writing this argument is to tell people that on the road to success, we should also adhere to the principles of integrity and goodness. Pursuing a material life is not wrong, but we must face it in the right way. As a result, while people strive to obtain material wealth, they should also understand the importance of spiritual wealth.

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