Preview

picking cotton essay

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1562 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
picking cotton essay
Let The Truth Finally Be Revealed
Jennifer Thompson was a straight-A student at Elon University in Burlington, North Carolina. She had her life all planned out: maintain straight A’s, graduate with a 4.0 GPA, and marry her boyfriend, Paul. Jennifer said frightened “Who is that? Whose there?” I said, “Allowing myself to think it must be Paul, or someone playing a stupid joke” (12). Then suddenly she looked and saw a stranger in her room. Before she knew it, she was getting raped. During her attack, she made sure she paid attention to her attacker’s features and his voice. The rapist began to hiss “Shut up or I’ll cut you!” he hissed, “while clamping a glove hand down her mouth” (12). He proceeded to brutally rape her, with a knife at her throat. “I’m afraid of knives.” I told him, “I can’t relax until you put it down. Can you put it outside? On my car?” (15-16). Jennifer stayed as calm as possible, trying to remember as many details about her assailant as she could, until she managed to escape. She tried staying calm and having conversations with this man and stayed calm the entire time. When she had the chance and knew he wasn’t there she began to run and was shouting for help. As she ran screaming to the top of her lungs a nice family opened the door and let her in. They took care of Jennifer and took her to the hospital. Through an inept summary and analysis of Picking Cotton, readers will be able to understand key points throughout the book, and determine why or why not they should pursue reading the book.
After Jennifer got out of the hospital police were all over her case they detectives wanted to find out who would do such a thing? So the police would have to take Jennifer down to the police department where she would meet with Detective’s. As she got to the police department Jennifer went down to meet a sketch artist. Once the sketch was done, the lead detective on her case was Detective Gauldin. Detective Gauldin decided that it would be best if the

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Cotton Gin is another example of positive progress that came at a cost. In Document 3 Cotton Production 1800 - 1860, It shows how the amount of money the cotton gin earned and the amount of slaves needed to make this money. This shows positive progress because, they could create cloth faster and this made people to earn money faster. This all came at the cost of needing more slaves, which is the opposite of what it was intended for.…

    • 81 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    The nonfiction novel, Lucky, written by Alice Sebold, is a memoir of a life changing and detailed experience of the author’s violent rape and its aftermath. Alice survives a brutal attack and learns that life is about survival. Entering college for the first time in her life, not having a strong relationship with her parents and just a few friends to confide in; the assault only creates her emotional health to spiral downwards. Alice slowly progresses and responds to her traumatic incident while surrounded by perplexed people.…

    • 1028 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Imagine a young woman living life to the fullest and loving it, when suddenly, she is raped. Out of shame, she keeps this hard truth a secret and to make matters worse, she finds out she is pregnant. She feels as if having an abortion is her only option, so she gets the abortion. Afterward, she feels relieved because she is not carrying the rapists’ baby anymore; however that relief does not last long. Her ears meet the sharp cursing of people protesting, calling her a monster. She rushes past the people to hurry back home, ashamed of what she did. The only trace of her left behind that next day is a note that reads “Murder was never the intent, only the riddance of a horrible memory. He already took part of me that night, and I will not let…

    • 1802 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The cultural event that I attended was the lecture with the Picking Cotton authors Jennifer Thompson and Ronald Cotton. The event was located in Memorial Coliseum where Jennifer Thompson and Ronald Cotton talked about there story. I chose to attend this activity not only for my cultural event, but also because I thought it would be interesting and helpful. I actually enjoyed reading the book and I wanted to hear more about their story and experiences. I was really interested in seeing what they looked like and being able to put a face to the characters of the book. I’m really glad I went to this event because it was great to hear what they had to say and the advice they gave everyone. I think it had a large impact on not only…

    • 272 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Anne P. Beatty, who wrote Survival Skills at a School in LA, provides an inside look into a high school phenomenon in South Central Los Angeles, California. Her article illustrates a few events that take place at a high school where death and violence commonly occur. Since attending these schools, students have adjusted to the violence in such a way that they partake in routine procedures, like “the students coming around for donations” (Beatty; par. 5). when a fellow peer passed away. While a majority of adults continually struggle to cope with the occurrence of death, this story tells a tale of children who have practically become accustomed to it. Beatty provides a distinct look at this urban school setting through her inside view of student emotions, evidence of pain within the kids, and the feelings that she evokes from the audience despite her straightforward tone. (simple)…

    • 1064 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    After finishing O’Connor’s story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” I found that the ending was very shocking but not troubling just because it was unexpected. I believe that this ending is troubling whether it was unexpected or expected. There were many foreshadows leading up to the tragic ending. For example, when O’ Connor writes “In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady.” (203) she foreshadows the car accident that later happens down the dirt road of Georgia. Another foreshadow in the very beginning of the story is when the grandmother see’s in the newspaper that the misfit has escaped in Florida and that they should not head that way, but everyone ignores her and they go anyway. On the way to Florida the family “... passed a large cotton field with five or six graves fenced in the middle of it, like a small island.”(203) foreshadowing the death of the family. Some other foreshadowing in the story is when they end up at Red Sammy’s Barbeque where they again here about the misfit through Sammy, the owner. Grandmother and Sammy bond over the hatred towards violent citizens such as the misfit. We may also see the color “red” as a foreshadow of death because blood is red.…

    • 489 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    One spring day, Melinda catches a fever and stays home. While in complete solitude, she reflects on her rape and has a Oprah Winfrey show going on in her head.The evidence states, “My head is killing me, my throat is killing me, my stomach bubbles with toxic waster. I just want to sleep. A coma would be nice. Or amnesia. Anything, just to get rid of this, this thoughts, whispers in my mind. Did he rape my mind too?” (Anderson, 165) When Melinda Sordino says “My head is killing me, my throat is killing me, my stomach bubbles with toxic waste.” She is metaphorically talking about how sick she is from coping with the feelings of depression and solitude. “I just want to sleep. A coma would be nice. Or amnesia.” She wants to forget what went down That August Night.“Anything, just to get rid of this, this thoughts, whispers in my mind. Did he rape my mind too?” What this shows is how badly Melinda being raped has such an effect on her mind. It is bruised her spirit and scarred her mind. What’s worse is…

    • 1323 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Morrison's novel is fixated on the mental repercussions of assault and mishandle. Dr. Robin E. Field concentrates on Morrison's representation of these injuries. "Such is the situation with Sethe, the most unmistakable of the novel's numerous sufferers, who bears the physical scars of subjugation's horrendous brutality upon her back" (Field 3). Sethe was assaulted by two youthful white young men who held her down and stole her milk, keeping her from bolstering her girl. “After I left you, those boys came in there and took my milk. That’s what they came in there for. Hold me down and took it” (Morrison 19). Sethe thought of her as milk for her little girl to be her most imperative ownership, and in losing it, she lost a vast piece of herself.…

    • 232 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Picking Cotton

    • 460 Words
    • 2 Pages

    When a traumatic event happens, a multitude of people are affected. In Picking Cotton: Our Memoir of Injustice and Redemption written by Jennifer Thompson-Cannino and Ronald Cotton, the story of Thompson’s rape and Cotton’s conviction is unraveled through the perspective of both authors. The emotions that both Thompson and Cotton endure in the aftermath of the rape are shown with the alternation of speaker.…

    • 460 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Readers are impacted by the raw writing in Missoula; it sparks conversations that would not otherwise be started. Rape and sexual assault is such a taboo subject in today's society, however, this book breaks the stigma and forces students to speak about the unspeakable. Requiring students to read Missoula would shine a light on campus rape and sexual assault numbers, victims, and perpetrators. In the same way, this book gives encouragement to victims of rape and sexual assault to prosecute their perpetrators, when otherwise, they would be persuaded not to report the…

    • 539 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Cotton Slavery

    • 766 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Before the common ideas of slavery there was two hundred years full of progressing hatred, promise, and potential freedom for African Americans. These years were not accompanied by slaves picking cotton but split up into three stages or generations. The first is the Charter Generation which was a time for promise and potential freedom. The Plantation Generation was the production of products like rise, tobacco, indigo, and was also the beginning of slave degradation. The Revolutionary Generation was an age for ideas about slavery and what it really means. All of these fall under a time before the cotton fields so commonly thought of when someone mentions slavery.…

    • 766 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Every time J would try and defend herself, another girl would yell over her. I remember I was speechless, it was as if I was suffocating in my own dismay for J. My hands were drenched in sweat and trembling, but I just watched. I was a bystander to a bullying.…

    • 1021 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Phrase used by politicians and whites to describe the importance of the cotton in the south…

    • 1246 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Emerson Red Monologue

    • 882 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Emerson has been grieving every day for two years and now tears are not able to fall from her eyes anymore. She decided to go talk to Brandon in prison. As Brandon walks up the glass, he is very hesitant to pick up the red phone. Ms. Emerson had a smile on her face which confused Brandon. “You took the greatest thing that happened to my life but now here with you to hear your side of the story,” she said. With tears coming down his eyes and face turning bright red. “I hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me for the awful act I committed. My sister and I decided to run away from home because we was being treated really poor there. I knew that my sister was very hungry because she could not walk talk. We didn’t have any money so I decided to go look some food. As I was walking through your neighborhood and I notice that your door was open. So I walk in and went toward the fridge and I heard someone walking down the stair. I stood still because I did not know what to. He stared yelling and was going to call the police. I just couldn’t let him call the police because they was going to send us back to a foster house. I just could not let me sister suffer in another foster house. So I grabbed a knife and stab him in the chest. I ran away as fast as I could not knowing what I just did. I promise I did not mean to kill him. I am very sorry for what I did and I hope that I spend the rest of my life in prison so that can bring a smile to your face,” said Brandon.…

    • 882 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Pregnancy Project

    • 505 Words
    • 3 Pages

    While her fake baby bump continues to grow over the next six and a half months, Gaby carefully records how she is treated and what is being said about her (for better and for worse) both in and out of school. With her project’s final step, Gaby emotionally confronts her fellow students and their teachers about stereotyping and teen pregnancy during a special school assembly. Then shocks them by ripping off her padded “baby bump,”…

    • 505 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays