Cultural assumptions affect the presentation of people or groups in media by the stereotypes placed on them by a culture or society. This enables author and directors to represent people with a limited amount of background and have the audiences and reader recognise characters circumstances or identities with such a small amount of information often based on the first description or vision of a character.
For many the homeless people are just the unfortunate souls who sleep on park benches and push around shopping carts full of the remains of their previous lives. There is many common cultural assumptions regarding homeless people but one prevailing theme in literature and film is the inherent danger and sadness in the life of a homeless person. …show more content…
The windows are all boarded up; the inside walls are falling down, smashed in… You’re sharing the place with ten or fifteen people; it varies from night to night. The number of rats is higher… The wind comes pounding at the boarded- up windows … like a wrecking ball. There’s no heat, no light… And this place is coming down. You knew that all along, but you didn’t think … it was going to fall down around you.” (Blink and Caution. page 86-87)
Not only does the condition of the building itself pose a danger to Blink and the other inhabitants but later in the novel there is a violent altercation which forces Blink outside. Blink is unsurprised by the incident listing a variety of people that could be responsible for it and the ways that it could affect him if he was present.
Matthew Flinders’ Cat is the story of an alcoholic homeless man living in Sydney a few years before the Olympic Games in 2000. Billy O’Shanessy was once a promenade barrister who now sleeps under a statue of the explorer Matthew Flinders’ cat, Trim, outside the State Library. In the novel Billy often presents some of the risks that he faces in his everyday life. In this quote Billy remarks one of hazardous aspects of his …show more content…
Steve Lopez is a columnist for the LA Times and meets a mentally ill homeless man called Nathaniel Ayers playing music on a two stringed violin outside his office building. Lopez becomes interested in Ayer’s life and how an extremely gifted ex-Julliard student became homeless for a story for his column. After Ayer’s story is published someone donates their musical instrument so Ayer’s can have working instrument. But he is only allowed to play it at a homeless shelter called Lamp.
This scene occurs after Ayer’s leaves the centre and finds a place on the street to sleep and Lopez joins him after a spur of the moment decision. Ayer’s recitation the Lord’s Prayer before he goes to sleep the scene contrasts with the words in the prayer. “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” is spoken as the vision of many homeless people are clustered around a beat up car hiding from some of the more dangerous characters that wander the streets. This contrast highlights the differences between of what the audience who associate with heaven and the situation that is presented. The scene continues presenting contrasting audio and imagery accompanied by the despairing instrument string music in the background. The narration in the middle of the scene only highlights the despondency of
For many the homeless people are just the unfortunate souls who sleep on park benches and push around shopping carts full of the remains of their previous lives. There is many common cultural assumptions regarding homeless people but one prevailing theme in literature and film is the inherent danger and sadness in the life of a homeless person. …show more content…
The windows are all boarded up; the inside walls are falling down, smashed in… You’re sharing the place with ten or fifteen people; it varies from night to night. The number of rats is higher… The wind comes pounding at the boarded- up windows … like a wrecking ball. There’s no heat, no light… And this place is coming down. You knew that all along, but you didn’t think … it was going to fall down around you.” (Blink and Caution. page 86-87)
Not only does the condition of the building itself pose a danger to Blink and the other inhabitants but later in the novel there is a violent altercation which forces Blink outside. Blink is unsurprised by the incident listing a variety of people that could be responsible for it and the ways that it could affect him if he was present.
Matthew Flinders’ Cat is the story of an alcoholic homeless man living in Sydney a few years before the Olympic Games in 2000. Billy O’Shanessy was once a promenade barrister who now sleeps under a statue of the explorer Matthew Flinders’ cat, Trim, outside the State Library. In the novel Billy often presents some of the risks that he faces in his everyday life. In this quote Billy remarks one of hazardous aspects of his …show more content…
Steve Lopez is a columnist for the LA Times and meets a mentally ill homeless man called Nathaniel Ayers playing music on a two stringed violin outside his office building. Lopez becomes interested in Ayer’s life and how an extremely gifted ex-Julliard student became homeless for a story for his column. After Ayer’s story is published someone donates their musical instrument so Ayer’s can have working instrument. But he is only allowed to play it at a homeless shelter called Lamp.
This scene occurs after Ayer’s leaves the centre and finds a place on the street to sleep and Lopez joins him after a spur of the moment decision. Ayer’s recitation the Lord’s Prayer before he goes to sleep the scene contrasts with the words in the prayer. “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” is spoken as the vision of many homeless people are clustered around a beat up car hiding from some of the more dangerous characters that wander the streets. This contrast highlights the differences between of what the audience who associate with heaven and the situation that is presented. The scene continues presenting contrasting audio and imagery accompanied by the despairing instrument string music in the background. The narration in the middle of the scene only highlights the despondency of