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Analysis Of Speech Sounds By Octavia Butler

Decent Essays

The short story “Speech Sounds” is a science fiction story written by Octavia Butler. This essay portrays a central theme that really opened my eyes as well as many others. This theme is to never take your ability to communicate for granted. Communication is a huge part of our culture and civilization. I never truly realized how important communication really was until reading this story. Without it, we cannot express our feelings in a correct manner. Not being able to connect with other individuals results in it being very hard to cooperate with others, causing chaos amongst society. In a short amount of time, the world would turn on each other causing mass amounts of violence. Likewise, this is similar to the story “Speech Sounds.” There are many takeaways one can have after reading this story.
Additionally, there is some background information about the author that is significant to the story. In June 1947, Octavia Butler was born in Pasadena, California. Butler had a very rough childhood. Moreover, growing up in the racially integrated community of Pasadena, Butler experienced ethnic diversity when racial segregation was at its worst. Being an African American and being diagnosed with dyslexia, made it extremely tough for Octavia at this point in her life. Also, she started working with her mother cleaning houses at age seven. “Speech Sounds” was published in 1983 which was during the cold war.
In the story, the unknown epidemic has civilization in chaos and severely limits humankind's ability to communicate. Many of the citizens are deprived of their ability to read or write. Others lose the ability to speak. Society identifies themselves by carrying items or symbols that represent their name. Furthermore, individuals communicate through common sign language and gestures that can commonly result into mayhem. Correspondingly, it appears common that the folks who obtain the illness, are the ones who are attacking the non-infected humans. One very important quote that directly represents the effects of the virus is, “The illness, if it was an illness, had cut even the living off from one another. As it swept over the country, people hardly had time to lay blame on the Soviets. The illness was stroke-swift

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