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Beauty: When The Other Dance Is The Self

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Beauty: When The Other Dance Is The Self
English H101-02
Assignment #4

The Cause and Effects of Low Self-Esteem In her essay “Beauty: When the Other Dance Is the Self”, Alice Walker examines the lasting and dangerous effects low self-esteem launched onto her life after a terrible accident. This accident caused her physical deformity and thus affected her ability to trust the intentions of others or her own beauty. With the increase of mainstream media and news, the pressures to maintain conceptualized “beauty” in today’s society have led to an increase in low self-esteem victims in both genders of all age groups. Low self-esteem stems from personal identity uncertainty and can lead to an obsession with self-appearance and to trust issues. Alice Walker’s low self-esteem began after an …show more content…
Following the accident, Walker began to question herself. She worried that she did not appear as the same beautiful person to her family, friends, and classmates anymore. This obsession with her self-appearance caused her grades to slip and for her relationships with her family members to suffer. Her right eye injury not only affected her vision, but her ability to see beauty and have confidence in herself. “I do not pray for sight. I pray for beauty.” She ranted in her essay. Alice walker failed to accept that her physical metamorphosis merely altered her outside appearance and did not change her from who she was before the accident. Inside of Walker was a battle attacking who she identified herself as. This misconception of her own identity and self-worth resulted in her diminishing
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