StudentShare
Contact Us
Sign In / Sign Up for FREE
Search
Go to advanced search...
Free

Caught in the Undertow; Escaping the Grip of Child Abuse by Goldstein - Book Report/Review Example

Cite this document
Summary
The paper "Caught in the Undertow; Escaping the Grip of Child Abuse by Goldstein" explores and presents main developments and themes in the book observed, lessons learned from this book. and implications of the book on the concepts of culture and leadership…
Download full paper File format: .doc, available for editing
GRAB THE BEST PAPER97% of users find it useful
Caught in the Undertow; Escaping the Grip of Child Abuse by Goldstein
Read Text Preview

Extract of sample "Caught in the Undertow; Escaping the Grip of Child Abuse by Goldstein"

Goldstein, Jeffrey. Caught in the Undertow; Escaping the Grip of Child Abuse. Ney York: PublishNext, Book Review The author, an endearing protagonist in this story, walks the readers through his emotional and breath-taking journey, as he falls victim of an a abusive father that subjects him to verbal, physical and psychological abuse, and is forced to seeks solace in some other better place. He puts up with other challenges besides abuse, and his perseverance and remarkable tenacity amid this struggle inspires the readers who would be compelled to have a similar attitude in their everyday struggle. Aspired by those he chose as role models, Jeffrey structures around him a resourceful attitude and finally gets past his adversity. Jeff intends to reach a wide range of audience including non-academic global readership, generally believed to have done little to address child abuse. This work can be fairly termed as a constant ringing bell in our modern social settings aimed at a mass audience. His commitment to connect with these readers emotionally is vivid as he creates disturbing scenes of his abuse to an extent of having him see therapists as early as at 14. The readers are lost at some point though, where he doesn’t give details about the progress he had with the therapists. His relentless optimistic tone through the story overshadows the plight that comes with child abuse making it difficult for other victims in the society to connect with him. Nevertheless, the book is a thrilling read and is recommendable to audiences of all ages. Main Developments and Themes in the Book The book is structurally a memoir of Jeffrey’s childhood as he underwent an abusive relationship with his maternal father who he describes and portrays as having had two personas; at a time pleasant yet with a regular tendency to explode with range and anger (Goldstein ,pg 2-109). Jeffrey would emulate his grandparents from whom he would learn to address sensitive issues and assume different choice of words do depict even some body organs like penis at a tender age. Raised at a time of raging modernity, the Beatles would inspire his attitude and would overcome bullies and win girls at the same time. The themes of ill parentage, abuse, negligence, perseverance, optimism and leadership are underscored in the book and the choice of setting for the storyline creates a touch of reality with Jeffrey’s situation. The abusive father would belittle the kid, attack him physically and subject him to pain. This would leave him in panic an element that affects the kid psychologically. The father would pull a different face before his neighbours who would then think of him as a good dad. That proved more hurting to Jeffrey than the physical abuse that he would go through. The neighbours would imagine all was well yet he would suffer in silence. He would be disillusioned at some point seeing how the father would get away with this (Goldstein pg 136-208). Suffering, diseases and death are other themes that shape up Jeffrey’s work. His sister, Sheryl, would succumb to Leukemia an element that would leave the family torn in emotional pain and feelings of loss to a point of the mother seeing Jeffrey as more evil and should have thus died. The death is devastating for the family and Jeffrey’s perseverance yields him some optimism that he does well academically and in other fields. He is social and has some time to engage in extracurricular activities where he does well. Though he has to go through therapies even when so young, we realize a sense of victory as he overcomes his adversity. He comes off as a talented leader in many aspects, an attribute shaped up by his experiences. He is a blended leader whose qualities feature in many types of leadership. Lessons learnt from this book The book illuminates the need for the society to act and have in place a world free of childhood abuse. It is a reminder that a lot of children are being abused in the society today, an element that affects them psychologically in the long run. The book is a wakeup call to neighbours and those connected to others socially that those around us are not who they act to be. Jeffrey’s father would get a dad of the year award from his neighbours yet he tormented his child every time an opportunity represented itself. The lesson here is that many children are suffering in closed doors. There is needed a means to establish how children fair in the hands of their parents. Jeffrey would wear a different face at school. He would hide it from teachers and friends, who would entirely remain in the dark about his sufferings. This underscores the need to have a program at schools to identify children who might be victims of abusive parents. This would save them from this plight and save their lives. The book offers some lessons on need for a positive attitude, perseverance and optimism. Jeffrey’s attitude has such an impact on readers and reminds everyone there is a silver lining upon every dark cloud. He bears with his suffering and the abuse does not stop him from being relevant socially, in sports and other arenas. He performs better than others and uses his plight to inspire himself to greater heights. His choice to have it down as a literature narrative and present a life changing read wraps up the reward for positive attitude, optimism and perseverance. Implications of the book on the concepts of culture and leadership Jeffrey’s idea of leadership is diverse, rich in perspectives and blended in a manner that would shape up many leadership styles. The book is a consistent source of direction for the society, and his decisions as demonstrated in the entire book create a vivid image of his leadership qualities. His attributes are motivational and influential in nature and would compel others to follow sooth. The other characters in form of his father and mother also demonstrate different aspects of leadership.   Jeffrey portrays himself as a person whose decisions are not limited to the perceptions of those around him. His approach has a direct impact on transformational type of leadership. He reinforces the idea behind the concept of transformational leadership as he attempts to reshape and help us rethink about child abuse in the society today (Martindale pg 20-36). He challenges and inspires the readers and provokes reaction as they emulate him and share this idea with others. Jeffrey validates essence of charismatic leadership. Readers are stimulated to think independently (Martindale pg 20-35). The author reveals what happens in closed doors and the possible plight that kids may go through. Jeffrey is literally chocked by his dad. He is forced to make decisions in many areas calling for situational type of leadership. He underscores the fact that there lacks a best type of leadership and that different moments and situations calls for different decisions (Blanchard pg 20-35). He would go through abuse but still assume self-leadership roles in the class and pursue his education. REFERENCES Blanchard, Paul Hersey & ken. "Life cycle theory of leadership." training and development journal (1969): 20-35. Goldstein, Jeffrey. Caught in the Undertow; Escaping the Grip of Child Abuse. Ney York: PublishNext, 2014. Martindale, N. "Leadership Styles: How to handle the different personas." Strategic communication management (2011): 20-36. Read More
Cite this document
  • APA
  • MLA
  • CHICAGO
(“Leadership Book Report/Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words”, n.d.)
Leadership Book Report/Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words. Retrieved from https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1684213-leadership
(Leadership Book Report/Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 Words)
Leadership Book Report/Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 Words. https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1684213-leadership.
“Leadership Book Report/Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 Words”, n.d. https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1684213-leadership.
  • Cited: 0 times

CHECK THESE SAMPLES OF Caught in the Undertow; Escaping the Grip of Child Abuse by Goldstein

Sociological Perspective and Child Abuse

The issue of child abuse has caused great confusions among members of the society with regard to governments' desire to control and monitor every activity done on the child.... In fact, many cases have been presented to courts with convictions of child abuse.... The issue of child abuse has caused great confusions among members of the society with regard to governments' desire to control and monitor every activity done on the child.... Upholding the topic of study, this paper will discuss the standing causes of child abuse in the current world and the subsequent effects on personal and societal levels....
7 Pages (1750 words) Essay

Child Abuse: Solutions from Empirical Research

The next writer argues that child abuse by parents and guardians are prompted by substance abuse, mental illness, domestic violence and child behavior.... Child Abuse: Solutions from Empirical Research Name of Course Your Name Name of University Abstract This paper examines the concept of child abuse in modern societies.... These four forms of child abuse are universally accepted as wrong and destructive.... Several studies have been conducted into child abuse that aim at diagnosing and providing a cue to how the issue of child abuse can be solved using empirical studies....
10 Pages (2500 words) Essay

Sexual Child Abuse

In the paper “Sexual child abuse” the author analyzes various ways of sexual activities and behaviors that occurs between a child and an adult person in which an adult person victimizes a child for his sexual satisfaction and pleasure by harassing him sexually.... Recent researches have shown that many times the abuser himself had been a subject to child abuse in his or her past or has been a subject to physical violence.... nother cause contributing to sexual child abuse is the mental state of abuser....
8 Pages (2000 words) Essay

Child Abuse

The concept of child abuse and its effects has been recorded for at least a few decades however there has been a slow progress in the development of effective intervention measures.... In the last decade, the need to increase awareness with the potential impact of child abuse on various domains of development in children has been steadily rising ever since it was found out that various forms of child abuse not only affects a child physically but also emotionally, behaviorally, and psychologically (Kaplan, Pelcovitz & Victor, 1999)....
7 Pages (1750 words) Research Paper

Child Abuse: Sexually and Psychologically Aspects

This essay analyzes child abuse that is a widespread crime crisis here on earth.... child abuse has many aspects.... Enza Mattas, Regional Center for Attention to Mistreated Children (Crami) Coordinator state that 90% of the street children decided to leave their family because of physical abuses and sexual abuse too.... These children are saying that this is the reason why they turned to drug abuse.... Once a child came to this kind of heartaches they do come to be like those who pulled his heart out....
4 Pages (1000 words) Essay

Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment

The author of the paper states that over recent years, cases of child abuse have been on the rise.... In some countries, instances of child abuse are also driven by local myths and traditions.... nbsp;The practice of child abuse has existed in some form or the other since time immemorial.... Of the total reported cases of child abuse, neglect represented 54% of confirmed cases of child abuse, physical abuse 22%, sexual abuse 8%, emotional maltreatment 4%, and other forms of maltreatment 12% (National Committee to Prevent Child Abuse)....
6 Pages (1500 words) Research Paper

Child Abuse: Punishment and Treatment

Statistics speaks about this grim situation: in 2002, 896,000 cases of child abuse and neglect were substantiated across 50 states and that according to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System, about 81% of these cases were perpetuated by parents.... 23) These kinds of reports, however, do not necessarily reflect the actual incidence of child abuse because the figures may still be higher as many cases of abuse are still estimated to be unreported.... For example, mothers are more prone to maltreat their children than fathers or that substance abuse contribute to the emergence of child abuse, among others....
10 Pages (2500 words) Essay

Child Abuse in America

hellip; The author states that in 2012, there were six distinct categories of child abuse cases.... The federal government treats fatal cases of child abuse as negligence of the caregiver rather than maltreatment.... The undercounting of the abused children is another clear indication that cases of child abuse are rising in America (ECM 2010).... These laws have, therefore, contributed significantly to the under-recording of child abuse cases (ECM 2010)....
1 Pages (250 words) Essay
sponsored ads
We use cookies to create the best experience for you. Keep on browsing if you are OK with that, or find out how to manage cookies.
Contact Us