Wednesday, February 7, 2018

ENG 102-1105--"Requiem for a Champ"--Reverse Outline/Reflection--JUNE JORDAN ON MIKE TYSON

ENG 102-1105
Prof M Judd
University of Nevada, Reno
Spring 2018
James Langelle


"Requiem for a Champ", June Jordan--Reverse Outline & Reflection


Reverse Outline:


  1. Description of the boxer’s neighborhood in Brooklyn
  2. The neighborhood appearance only slightly changed with the weather conditions.
  3. Jordan visualizes what the boxer might have seen as he was growing up in the neighborhood.
  4. A brief paragraph on the odds of success.
  5. It was the boxer’s background and upbringing that made him what he is.
  6. The writer showing empathy for the subject, painfully.


Reflection:


    There is no doubt that the professional heavyweight boxer and one-time champion suffered from an inferiority complex, not with his physical ability, but with the opposite sex. His career, the personal one, is marred with a string of sexual abuse and assault cases, including the one that sent him to prison for rape in 1992. Whether this was the result of his childhood in the neighborhood alluded to in “Requiem” or a victim of his phenomenal success and the wealth that it brought, will probably have to be assessed at a later time.
   In recent years, the champ has followed the path so many star athletes have, that of success beyond their dreams; only to find themselves bankrupt in old age, doing cheesy commercials in faraway places like Australia, as in Tyson’s case.
    June Jordan’s brief article serves not just as a  freestyle poetic reminder of where success often leads, but a warning to take advice from what a friend of mine once told me,
    “Be nice to people on the way up, you may run into them on the way back down.”


References:
“Chronology of Mike Tyson”, Las Vegas Sun, Sept. 18, 1998
(The advice came from Don Gomez, Journalist, Author)







Posted by at

...

RED FLAG
Checkpoint Charlie: NATO, Article 5 and the Berlin Wall
There was no North American Treaty Organization, NATO, immediately following the close of World War Two. By the close of the decade, due to pressure from the Soviet Union, particularly in Germany, the alliance was formed with 12 initial members. The concept of “collective security” had been around for over 30 years, at least on the Continent, with respect to the World War One League of Nations; neither the United States nor the Soviet Union were members. (09 March 2025)
Red Flag: The U.S.-Japan Security Pact of 1960
The recent statement by the White House concerning a “bilateral” treaty between the United States and Japan from 1960 raised the issue of the former’s lack of a security-military commitment, with the latter doing the heavy lifting. It comes as no surprise in light of other treaties such as NATO in Europe with the U.S. again carrying The Weight.
Part and parcel to how it all unfolded had to do with certain ambiguous positions by the two nations coupled with the American public not totally informed of the agreement. The situation was quite different in Japan. (09 March 2025)

...

BORDERLANDS
Ukraine: The Art of the (Peace) Deal
Nations are big on treaties, enforcing them is another matter. This paper traces some of the more recent, failed and otherwise, then takes a close look at one of the most controversial in history, The Versailles Treaty at the end of World War One. (09 March 2025)

Ukraine and The Rubio Doctrine The purpose of this report is to test the secretary’s three core principles against the Ukraine conflict to see if they are viable and would have been if he became president in the 2015 election. (09 March 2025)

Ukraine Betrayed: American Robber Barons to Steal Rare Minerals
Ukraine possesses significant reserves of rare earth minerals and other critical raw materials that are essential for modern technology and industry. According to reports, Ukraine has deposits of 22 out of 34 minerals identified as critical by the European Union. (09 March 2025)

...

MOONDUNES
Space Station Freedom 1993: The “Fiscal Black Hole"
Space Station Freedom was a NASA-led initiative proposed in the 1980s aimed at creating a permanently crewed space station in low Earth orbit. The project was initially announced by President Ronald Reagan in his 1984 State of the Union Address, highlighting its potential as a platform for scientific research and international collaboration in space exploration. (09 March 2025)