Myths et heroes

        I’m going to talk about myths and heroes. To begin with, I’d like to state the definition of the two terms of the subject. To me, a myth is a popular belief or tradition embodying the ideals and institutions of a society. A hero is someone admired for his or her achievements, noble qualities and great courage. The subject of my oral presentation can be divided into two parts: First, I would like to introduce the different point of views about heroes. Secondly, I will show what Americans heroes are.

          First, I will speak about the vision that people have of heroes. We watched a video in which we saw students of a campus, in America, who expressed their point of view on the question: What is a hero? For them there are many definitions of heroes: a hero is someone who sacrifices is reputation to help others, who makes a change in your life for the better. So in a nutshell, a hero is willing to help people who need it. In the second time we have seen a lot of pictures about heroes. First, there was a photo of the September 11, 2001. It represents the terrorist attack of the twin towers. Here we saw the firefighters who move towards the rubble. In other words these ordinary people became national heroes. Secondly, we watch two others pictures. The first about a war hero and the second about a champion. So with these two documents we could define what’s hero?

        Then, we worked on the American hero and more particularly on Afro-American heroes. So first, we studied a mural painted by street artist Mr. Brainwash. This mural was drawn in 2008 in Los Angeles. It’s a symbolic moment because it’s just after the election of Barrack Obama. We can see in the wall, Barrack Obama, Martin Luther king and Rosa Parks, Who are paint in black and white against a red background. These persons are key figures of the civil rights movement. In the left sit they are sentences, which are written for people who walk past. These sentences are “Rosa parks sat so that Martin Luther King could walk. Martin Luther King walked so that Barack Obama ran, so we could fly.” It’s a chain reaction in reference of actions of the civil rights movement. “Rosa Parks sat” refer to 1955 when she refused to give up her bus seat to a white passenger. Then “Martin Luther King could walk” because thanks to Rosa he starts the Montgomery bus boycott. Furthermore, he became in 1957 the leader of the civil rights movement; he also became famous for his speech “I have a dream” and finally he was awarded of the Nobel Peace prize in 1964. At least thanks to each of these major figures Barack Obama could run, that is run for election. To sum up, all of these key figures of America are heroes because of their good deeds, their common fight for the liberty and equality.

        To conclude, these documents are very representative of the notion myths and heroes. In my opinion, heroes are necessary for the proper functioning of our society. And for all these reasons as Calvin Coolidge says: “heroism is not only in the man but in the occasion.”            

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