Your Thoughts on Tone - Essay Example

The use of tone in literature and everyday life In literature, tone is that choice of words which enables the reader to understand the attitude of the writer towards a particular subject. Apart from literature, tone is also used in speech so as to convey the attitude of an individual towards a given issue. For example, two people can be talking, and one asks the other their opinion concerning the state of unemployment in the country, and the other responds “It is the way it is. What can we do?

” The tone in that statement is enough to tell that the speaker is resigned and does not expect the situation to change. In “Second Home”, Haegele writes about how when she was a child, her father built her a doll house with his hands even though he could have purchased it (1). Haegele’s tone is nostalgic as she remembers how her mother told her about the way her father spent the winter nights building her the doll house. Haegele’s “Second Home” and Jackson’s “Growing up Black in the Whitest City in America” are similar in that both use a nostalgic tone to reminisce their childhood (1).

Haegele remembers how her father natured her passion for playing with things that were authentic either because they had been handcrafted or been owned by others but did not spoil (1). As for Jackson, the memories are about how it was like to grow up a black boy in an almost all-white neighborhood.The difference in tones occurs when while Haegele uses an appreciative tone throughout the work, Jackson’s tone is more reflective. Haegele appreciates the fact that her father was caring enough to build her and her sister individual doll houses, Haegele is also appreciative of the fact that she can still play with objects that fascinate her, despite her age (1).

Jackson uses a more reflective tone in trying to understand how he escaped the drugs, murders, and crimes that surrounded him in his youth (1). Jackson reflects that it was common sense that kept him alive and out of the penal system even when all around him were falling prey (1). Works CitedHaegele, Katie. Second Home. 4 Mar. 2013. Web. 4 May. 2015. Jackson, Mitchell. Growing Up Black in the Whitest City in America. 7 Mar. 2014. Web. 2015.