ShmoopTube
Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.
Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos
Young Adult: Universal Themes Take Two 341 Views
Share It!
Description:
If you classify yourself as a "young adult," then you'll probably identify with a lot of these themes. If you don't...well, grow up already, won't you?
Transcript
- 00:04
Universal Themes, Take Two, a la Shmoop. Remember back when we finished talking about
- 00:10
Universal Themes…
- 00:11
…and you cordoned off that section of your brain, certain you’d never need to use it
- 00:15
again?
- 00:16
Well, it’s time to dust off those brain cells and bring ‘em back out of storage…
Full Transcript
- 00:19
…because it’s time for Universal Themes… the revenge.
- 00:26
Back in Unit One, we talked about two universal themes…
- 00:28
…Individual versus Society…
- 00:31
…and Individual versus Self. Remember when Junior from The Absolutely True
- 00:38
Diary of a Part-Time Indian had to fly in the face of his community and seek his education…
- 00:43
off the reservation?
- 00:46
For his senior prank, we wonder if he… TP’d his teepee…?
- 00:53
Or the way that Esperanza from The House on Mango Street had to work so hard to avoid
- 00:58
being trapped in one of her culture’s typical… women roles?
- 01:03
Those are both examples of the Individual versus Society.
- 01:06
They’re both fightin’ the Man. And then there’s the universal theme of
- 01:13
Individual versus Self.
- 01:15
We see that one rear its head when Junior has doubts about where he belongs…
- 01:18
…or what choices he should make.
- 01:21
And in Speak, when Melinda has to deal with the shame she feels for being raped.
- 01:26
We have also discussed the theme of Individual versus Individual…
- 01:29
…where one person is pitted against another.
- 01:32
Face to face. Mano a mano. Live on Pay per View.
- 01:41
We see this theme when Melinda goes against Andy in Speak…
- 01:44
…and when Junior finds himself at odds with his best friend, Rowdy.
- 01:49
All these guys are missing is a mud wrestling ring.
- 01:52
Well, wouldn’t you know it…
- 01:55
…there is yet a fourth universal theme centering on the struggles of an individual…
- 02:00
…Individual versus Nature.
- 02:05
Like when Moby Dick continually thwarts Captain Ahab’s attempts to capture him…
- 02:10
…or when Robinson Crusoe runs into a slew of problems on a desert island…
- 02:15
…or when those nasty trees start throwing apples at Dorothy.
- 02:21
Okay, so they feel she could use more fruit in her diet. There’s a nicer way to get
- 02:26
the point across. But nature isn’t limited to physical elements.
- 02:29
Sometimes a person’s biology can cause just as many headaches as a great white whale.
- 02:36
Plus, your biology is much trickier to… harpoon.
- 02:40
This is the type of struggle Shawn undergoes in Stuck in Neutral.
- 02:45
It’s a battle royale between his consciousness and his biology.
- 02:49
It seems a little like Individual versus Self…
- 02:51
…and yeah, there’s a little of that thrown in there, too…
- 02:54
…but it’s not just a moral, ethical or spiritual dilemma he’s dealing with.
- 02:58
Shawn really has no choice… his biology, i.e. his condition of cerebral palsy, is an
- 03:04
obstacle for him…
- 03:05
…and prevents him from talking to his father.
- 03:07
He may not have to track his biology for months on end in a whaling boat…
- 03:11
…but, in the end, his ordeal can result in just as much… blubber.
Up Next
Sure, Edgar Allan Poe was dark and moody and filled with teenage angst, but what else does he have in common with the Twilight series?
Related Videos
Dr. Seuss was a failure to start, but he soon learned to follow his heart. He wrote books about things that he knew, and soon enough, his book sale...
Emily Dickinson was a New England poet/hermit with a fascination with death and immortality. She wrote over 1000 poems in her lifetime, most of the...
