Ben Denno
AP Language
1/29/14
Neden Evidence Essay
Across the world and throughout time, societies have been held together by the unspoken rules that members of each society acknowledge and accept. Unspoken rules are often the instincts individuals act on, or can be as complicated as loopholes in documents. An unspoken rule can carry the weight of governmental policies, be a life or death deciding factor, or be as frivolous as the way a school hallway operates.
When the United States were young, and the first President, George Washington, was in office, he made decisions that today remain as unspoken rules for the federal government. The most prominent of his creations was the Presidential cabinet, a system of advisors in many different areas, positions not mandated in the constitution of the United States. President Obama currently has an even larger cabinet than Washington’s, which remains unspoken and unwritten as a necessity, yet central to the nation.
In the wild west of the nineteenth century, violence was rampant, and with lawmen scattered across hundreds of miles, most people were forced to rely on a code of unspoken rules and ethics. In the western classic, “The Shootist,” a cowboy tells the audience he lives by the rules “I won’t be wronged, I won’t be insulted, and I won’t be laid a hand on.” These rules he lives by throughout the movie, never explaining to his enemies or friends, simply reacting to what they do based on his own set of unspoken rules.
One of the most treacherous places on earth is the halls of a high school, a place littered with unspoken rules that literally keep things flowing smoothly. Among these are the rule of walking on the right side, not cutting corners too close, and not stopping in the middle. Unspoken rules keep people alive, lives moving forward, and efficiency at a high point. Unspoken rules represent the cultural normalities of a time and place, and the way they are treated defines how people interact.
AP Language
1/29/14
Neden Evidence Essay
Across the world and throughout time, societies have been held together by the unspoken rules that members of each society acknowledge and accept. Unspoken rules are often the instincts individuals act on, or can be as complicated as loopholes in documents. An unspoken rule can carry the weight of governmental policies, be a life or death deciding factor, or be as frivolous as the way a school hallway operates.
When the United States were young, and the first President, George Washington, was in office, he made decisions that today remain as unspoken rules for the federal government. The most prominent of his creations was the Presidential cabinet, a system of advisors in many different areas, positions not mandated in the constitution of the United States. President Obama currently has an even larger cabinet than Washington’s, which remains unspoken and unwritten as a necessity, yet central to the nation.
In the wild west of the nineteenth century, violence was rampant, and with lawmen scattered across hundreds of miles, most people were forced to rely on a code of unspoken rules and ethics. In the western classic, “The Shootist,” a cowboy tells the audience he lives by the rules “I won’t be wronged, I won’t be insulted, and I won’t be laid a hand on.” These rules he lives by throughout the movie, never explaining to his enemies or friends, simply reacting to what they do based on his own set of unspoken rules.
One of the most treacherous places on earth is the halls of a high school, a place littered with unspoken rules that literally keep things flowing smoothly. Among these are the rule of walking on the right side, not cutting corners too close, and not stopping in the middle. Unspoken rules keep people alive, lives moving forward, and efficiency at a high point. Unspoken rules represent the cultural normalities of a time and place, and the way they are treated defines how people interact.