PREJUDICE OF DEFORMITY
During this weekend I was passed along one of the strangest making of movies I have encountered in long time. I was revisited by a story based on the real life of a man who suffered with deformity of face, head and body. The movie being that of so called “freak of nature,” an animal of a human and a total anatomy of imperfect godliness.
The actual film was the story that Joseph Merrick.
Who actually was this man tagged for life and after death as “The Elephant Man”
Joseph Merrick [Referred to as John Merrick]
Joseph was born in the early time line of 1862 in London, England.
His mother was Mary Jane Merrick but most facts do not list the father’s name.
Joseph was gravely deformed which history designated started around his second birthday and continued to total deformity around his 12th birthday. . Nearly over 100 years a radiologist, Amita Sharma diagnosed that he suffered from Proteus syndrome from CT scans of Merrick’s skeleton., which so peculiar is a hereditary disorder characterized by multiple lesions of the lymph nodes overgrowth on one side of the body, or abnormally large head (macrocephaly) partial gigantism of feet, and darkened spots or moles on the skin. During his lifetime it was said that he had been wrongly diagnosed as having elephantiasis. This disorder is of the lymphatic system that causes parts of the body to swell in huge sizes.
THE MOVIE:
The 1980 film of the movie about this man showed both factual and dramatically scenes. The movie displayed both responsive to the sensitive sides of his human feelings and his association of modern day prejudices of his deformity in the prejudices of society. This caused his life much misery and confinement, even to working in a circus as a freak act and subjecting himself to mocked as an animal. he gentleman known as “The Elephant Man”
The movie was based on the books The Elephant Man by Christopher De Vore and Eric Bergren and other Reminiscences & by Sir Fredrick Treves; also The Elephant Man: A study of Human Dignity by Ashley Montagu. The movie received 8 nominations for an Academy Award.
The Significant Prejudice of Deformity:
I found the movie and the research I did of Joseph Merrick totally fascinating. Thinking of him I feel compelled to say if he could-- he most wanted to just be ordinary. However, his life was" extraordinary" setting a history of differences unlike none ever known. He carried a difference in having a deformity and the society which is considered as civilized persons invaded his life to feel secluded and hated for whom he was and what he wasn’t. He was not an elephant, but he was a man. This should make one thinks of differences in a whole new light. All nations of people in some form or fashion have the roots of prejudices. Deformed by them we often hurt in displaying prejudice, and even cause discourse of someone who has feelings to want to belong as part of the human race.
Written by:
MIISRAEL
Hometown Memphis, Tennessee
Posted By: MIISRAEL Bride
Monday, April 25th 2011 at 4:30PM
You can also
click
here to view all posts by this author...
