Justin Fontaine

Dr. Rand

URWT

January 31, 2018

L&L

Humans are an inherently stubborn group, easily set in our ways once we decide on what

we think is best. The same can be said, I believe, for how we communicate. Starting at childhood

and working to the rest of our lives we develop certain patterns and habits that shape how we talk

and use language. Or at least that’s what we are led to believe. The same could have been said

for me, that is until I began my racing career. Once I began racing, and in the years that

followed, my way of speaking began to evolve in a way that allowed me to not only blend in, but

cement myself as a part of a community that until my career began, I had never been associated

with.

I was raised in what, at the time, I would have a considered a fairly normal home as it

pertained to language and how we talked. None of us had deep southern accents. My father,

despite being born in Rumford Maine, didn’t have the distinguishable North Eastern way of

speaking that is known so well. I would say the most distinguished of us was my mom. She was

born, raised, and for a decent amount of time, lived in Houston Texas. While there were some

subtle nuances that might lead someone to the conclusion of her heritage, it wasn’t nearly as

distinguished as most other Texas natives I knew. In most definitions, I would label me and my
family’s way of speaking as simply, normal. However, that began to change as my involvement

in what would become my career began to increase.

When most people think of NASCAR, their minds go straight to Republican, beer

drinking, loud screaming, shirtless, American good ole boys with a few tattoos they probably

regret. And for the most part, that assumption is correct. If you wanted to talk with me about the

encounters I have had with fans, even before my driving days, I could talk for an hour. I am

being honest when I tell you, you will never meet a breed like them ever again in your life. And

it is these same fans and overall culture that, over the years, re molded the way I talk and

communicate. When I first got into racing, the crowd I was around was generally speaking the

same. Most of the teams were made up of local fellas from the area who only worked on race

cars out of the sheer passion for it. The local level of NASCAR racing isn’t clean cut. We didn’t

have sponsors to impress, or huge fan bases that followed us. We raced in places like Kingsport

and Newport Tennessee, just try saying those places without a southern accent. Coming into this

new world for the first time in 2014, I thought I had at least a basic understanding of what the

community was, I knew to expect the distinct smell of Marlboro cigarette smoke in the air, and

the red solo cups filled at the bottom with dip. What I had no inclination of was how they spoke,

and it was here that my language slowly began to change. It started fairly subtle, I heard fellow

drivers and team members use terms like, “they was” and “yall”, so in what was partly a

subconscious choice as well as a very conscious effort to fit in, I started talking like that too.

During the first year I raced, I’ll go out on a limb and say I was easily the most well-

spoken driver in the garage. Unlike most people who raced at that level, I had a very strict

English education and it showed compared to them. There was more than one occasion that I

would use a word that was common to me, but entirely alien to another driver who may be twice
my age. By year two and three, I had essentially found out what worked and what didn’t, along

with that I began to adopt a southern twang in my accent that you would only hear out of me at

the race track. And just as I had begun to be a part of this local “hick town” community, I moved

up, and my way of speaking began to change further.

Earlier in the essay I spoked about how an outsider’s first impression of what racers and

race fans are and how they act was probably correct. And that is still true, at least on a certain

level. See once a driver gets to the national stage, the “real NASCAR” as some call it, things

change. Now there are people to impress, real money is on the line and any company on your

racecar wants to make sure their representative is well spoken. Quite frankly that matters more

than results on track nowadays. At that point, I had to force myself back into my old speaking

habits that my parents taught me. I eliminated cursing, poor grammar, and the southern dialect I

had picked up. Now I was talking like one would at a board meeting except I did it at all times.

There was no variation at all. And it worked, the sponsors always appreciated how I spoke to

them and my reputation was pretty much golden. However, I was a running joke amongst my

crew because of squeaky clean I was.

As time went on, I began to work my way back to the middle. I still kept a very clean

way of speaking around my sponsors and people who made big decisions, but I learned to cut

lose with my team when the setting was relaxed. This strategy worked well for me as it made me

both more professional, and more approachable. I can remember early in my professional career

feeling like using big words and sounding “proper” was almost intimidating to my team and

others, and by no means do I mean that in a way to sound arrogant. I equate it to being at dinner

table with a stock broker and trying to listen to him talk about how the market works and having
no idea what’s happening. Its alienating and honestly, annoying. So I found a way to have the

best of both worlds and it is how I have spoken ever since.

Today, I still operate in the middle and it has been extremely effective in my work life.

But I say all this because I think that all of us, regardless of career path or walk of life, or our

own stubbornness have changed our language in some way as we’ve grown. Whether it’s to fit

in, impress someone, or just to sound different, our way of speaking has a way to evolve if we

allow it. My career in racing is just one example of this, I think if you looked around, just about

every single person you talk to has likely adapted their way of speaking to fit a particular time

and place.

Reflection

1. I think it’s important to think critically about our language because it allows to observe

ourselves and grow as people. Becoming a little self-aware and diagnosing how we talk can

give us an opportunity to adapt or grow in our language.

2. The most successful part of my project to me is how I went back and displayed my evolution

as a person within the racing community. I think it works because, just based on my

observations, I don’t see a lot of people look inward at something like their language to see

how its changed.

3. I am proud of the fact that I was able to find a unique subject matter and was able to tackle it

to the best of my ability. I utilized my own writing skills and something in my life that I am

incredibly passionate about and brought them together.

4. I think I would have liked to work more on the specific examples I could have used in my

paper. This essay covers several years of my life so it was difficult to pin point the specific

examples I wanted for the essay.

5. I hope the reader(s) notice how I tried to diagnose the way my language evolved over the

years and can see my argument for how I believe language changes as time goes on.

6. My advice would be the same as it always has been. Write first and face the consequences

later. I don’t believe in outlines or a rigid structure, I believe in getting all of your thoughts

out there and then picking what works and what doesn’t.

7. I tried to take my time more with this project and think about what I was trying to say more. I

found it difficult to get exactly what I wanted on the page the first time through so I would

write a little, set my laptop down, and then revisit it a day or so later when my thoughts were

clearer.
Justin Fontaine

Dr. Rand

URWT

April 3, 2018

What Are You Afraid Of?

I can remember a time fairly recently when I would lay awake at night and stare at my

ceiling. It was at these times of near dead silence that I would contemplate the thought of my

inevitable death. I’m not suicidal or depressed, however the topic both fascinated me and

terrified me. What does death look like? What does it feel like? What immediately follows in the

moment we pass from this tangible world into the realm of the afterlife? I would make myself

sick to my stomach when I thought about eternity how completely unfathomable that concept is.

If one takes a moment to actually attempt to grasp the concept of eternity they’ll make

themselves sick too. But all of this led to a question I’ve been yearning to answer ever since;

why do we fear death?

To start this road to understanding I began to ask myself other things beyond my initial

question. My mind was opened up to so many roads and side streets just because of my initial

curiosity so I wanted to understand more. Does it even make sense to fear it in the first place?

That was my first question. In this life, there are only a handful of guarantees. For example, not

everyone gets to be born. Yet everyone, without question, will die. So, if it is inevitable why be

afraid? In his article “Should You Fear Death?” Dr. Paul Thagard (2012) quotes the philosopher,

Epicurus who said, “Death does not concern us, because as long as we exist, death is not here.
And when it does come, we no longer exist.” What Epicurus was saying to me was, we will

never encounter death directly. Yes, we have relatives and friends who die, but once our time

comes, we are gone. So, to Epicurus, it doesn’t make sense to fear something we never really

coexist with. And yet, millions of people, including myself at one point have been terrified of the

thought of dying. But for some, salvation from this fear has been found in faith.

Religion’s relationship to death is long standing and has given billions of people across

our planet some comfort and peace of mind they may have lacked prior to finding their god.

Among the increasingly diverse catalogue of faiths, Christianity has continuously been the most

prevalent. “In a passage brimming with comfort, the apostle affirms that “to be absent from the

body is, to be at home with the lord” (2 Cor. 5:8)” (Jackson). I found the Bible views death as a

journey; a journey in which our spirit departs our physical body for an eternity in heaven if we

have accepted Christ as our savior. Jackson goes on to discuss what a Christian must do in

preparation for his or her death. To summarize the verses he highlights, the Bible says we must

believe in Christ, turn our back on sin, be baptized to in order to unite with God, and hunger for

the word. The perceived ease of these steps has played an important role in making Christianity

the dominant religion around the world and has given solace to so many who once feared the

great unknowingness of death. But the Christian faith is just one of many takes on the subject. I

wanted to understand more. There are so many other beliefs in the world and to answer my

burning question I needed to find out more about them.

There are estimated to be 1.6 billion people who identify as Muslim. Naturally

considering its scale I wanted to explore more of what they believe about the afterlife. In Islam

one can draw several parallels to the Christian view of death, with a few of exceptions. I found

that Muslims have a much stricter view on not only death, but how a believer is to live in
preparation for their death. “The whole life of a Muslim constitutes of a trial and test by means

of which his final destiny is determined. For him, death is the return of the soul to its creator,

God, and the inevitability of death and the Hereafter is never far from his consciousness. This

serves to keep all of his life and deeds in perspective as he tries to live in preparedness for what

is to come” (Sajid, 2009). The life of a Muslim is spent essentially preparing for what is to come

in death. The Qur’an describes the process of death as the equivalent to a night of sleeping,

including having dreams. Which, even as someone who is not a believer of this religion I find

this strangely comforting. At the time of death, they know their destiny; heaven or hell. Sajid

goes into a more vivid depiction of what happens to a nonbeliever through verses from their holy

book, “The angels beat them on the faces and rear ends as they snatch away their souls.”

Muslims view death as only one facet in their existence. Therefor they encourage their followers

not fear a physical death, but the spiritual death which is caused by moral corruption. The view

of death by the Muslim faith is much more stringent than that of Christianity, which isn’t

technically a bad thing. They believe that life is about preparing for the afterlife, so they have

rules and guidelines that members of their faith must follow to avoid eternal punishment. I was

intimidated researching the Muslim faith because of the lack of room for error. To falter, is to

potentially damn oneself to an eternity of punishment.

Through the previous two faiths I researched and seeping into the third, a consistent them

I noticed is the idea of death not being the end of “life” but more of a stepping stone. However,

Buddhism takes this one step further and delves into the process of being reborn. “To Buddhism,

however, death is not the end of life, it is merely the end of the body we inhabit in this life, but

out spirit will still remain and seek out though the need of attachment, attachment to a new body

and new life. Where they will be born is a result of the past and the accumulation of positive and
negative action, and the resultant karma (cause and effect) is a result of one’s past actions”

(Tang, 1999). Thich Nguyen Tang goes on to say that our fear of death comes from the fear of

ceasing to exist. As we grow older we see more and more impermanence, as he describes, around

us. The afterlife, according to Buddhism, is built around Karma. Karma is the idea that every

action we take in life can result both a positive or negative outcome in our afterlife and can affect

which realm we are reborn into. I found this idea fascinating as it is sort of a “get what you pay

for” idea. The better you are in this life, the better off you will be in the next. There are six

possible realms a person can be born into; Heaven, Human life, Asura, Hungry Ghost, Animals,

and Hell. A Buddhist is destined to be reborn into one of the six realms should they fail to

achieve “Nirvana” which is the pinnacle of human enlightenment. Buddhism interested me

because of its much more “spiritual” take on death. There’s a greater peace of mind found to read

about all of the possibilities after we die instead of just heaven and hell.

I made a conscious decision to avoid atheism as I not only wholeheartedly disagree with

atheism and not believing in anything, but I also did not feel it provided me with real content to

create discussion. Religion creates a fascinating discussion about life, death, and what comes

after. Collectively these religions, as well as others, have captured the minds of billions of

people. Having faith gives us comfort in the inevitability of our own death. We take refuge in the

thought there is a place waiting for us on the other side if we say a certain prayer, do good works,

or reach some level spiritual awareness. But even with the security of faith, we are not immune

to fear. The psychology behind the subject attempts to explain why we fear death and what

exactly that fear means.

“We live in a culture that denies death. We’re taught that death is something we should

shy away from, and try to forget about. If we start contemplating our own mortality – so this
traditional wisdom goes – we’ll become anxious and depressed.” What psychologist Steve

Taylor is saying here is absolutely correct. Very little in our society forces us to confront our

own mortality in a meaningful way. I think that’s what makes experiencing a death in the family

or the loss of a friend as difficult to process as it is. We aren’t used to having to deal with the fear

head on because the world around us tells us not to. The actual scientific term for the fear of

death is death anxiety. Death anxiety is a “feeling of dead, apprehension, or solicitude when one

thinks of the process of dying, or ceasing to be”. This definition has plagued me for so many

nights as laid down before bed. I would let my mind wander to questions that I didn’t have time

to ask during the day and consistently I would always end up at that question. It wasn’t until my

crash at Daytona when I broke my back and shook hands with my own mortality that I was able

to truly move on from the fear. And Taylor went to single out a story to back up what I said from

his own experiences. While writing his book, “Out of the Darkness” Steve interviewed people

recently diagnosed with cancer, or who had closes encounters with death whether health related

or some type of accident. He describes these people as discovering a way to live in the present.

“Facing death had taught them that the future and the past are unimportant, and that life only

ever takes place in the present moment”. These individuals, freed from the bondage of fear, were

able to experience life as it should be, in the moment. He goes on to say that the worries of being

liked by others, successful, or embarrassed were taken away, describing it as “letting go and

releasing themselves from fear.’’

From the research I have done, it becomes apparent to me that what causes the fear of

death is simply the awareness of it. It’s not necessarily how we die, it’s the fact that we will at

all. The thought that one day this world will continue to spin without us is daunting. But now,

after years of being haunted by the prospect, I propose that the very thing that causes us to fear
death can also be what causes us to overcome it. Think back to the people with cancer, it was

only after they were forced to come to grips with mortality that they went on to live the lives

they wanted to. To accept and be aware of our own impending death can motivate us to lead our

very best life. To cease to lose ourselves in the small and insignificant and strive to do something

with our lives that will live on past the death of our physical self. To fear dying is to chain

ourselves up to a dungeon wall, and yet the key to freedom lies within our grasp right at our feet.

The only choice that has to be made is whether or not to pick it up.
 Reflection

1. How I would define inquiry is something like a road map guiding you to a destination.

You’re starting point is the first question you ask, in my case “why do we fear death?”

This first question then leads us to a second question, then a third, and so on. The best

type of inquiry questions do not stop with one answer, instead they lead to more

questions that get us to where we are going. I think the process can teach us how to be

creative with our question asking. I could have stopped with just the psychology behind

the fear of dying but I was encouraged to delve into different facets of the subject which

allowed me to expand my papers reach.

2. I think the most interesting thing I learned was how to not seek the simple answers. I am

a person who likes to get straight to the truth, but this process encourages us to take the

side roads and learn more about the question we are asking before answering it.

3. I struggled with the flow and tone of my paper the most. I found myself having a lot of

topics I wanted to cover but not a good way to fit it all together. While I don’t think it is

perfect, I did my best to overcome the obstacle by using my own words to act as a sort of

tour guide from one paragraph to the next so even when I was quoting a psychologist or

just laying down information, there was a hint of my voice and tone within it.

4. It is important to look at the background of a question because, as I said before, we have

to fully understand our question before we find the answer. If I had left out the religious

component of my paper, I would have a very important angle of my question. I made that

a part of my paper because I feel it expanded the question even further.

5. I am most proud of the research I did. Even with the religious bias I have I did my very

best to thoughtfully research other belief systems and understand them even if it

contradicted what I believe.

6. I wouldn’t say my question changed so much as it became broader. Ultimately, I still

wanted to understand the fear of death, but I put significantly more emphasis in the

religious piece than I ever intended and I’m actually happy with that because it forced me

to open my mind more in the process.

7. I felt I contributed to my group by keeping people on task. You pointed a decrease in my

in-class activity in you review of me, I think I did this because I want my contribution to

class to be nothing less than meaningful. In our group I didn’t talk a whole lot but I feel

when I did it held weight. I didn’t take us off task when I said things, I tried to make sure

we were working efficiently as a group, which we did.

8. I felt my time management was good, when I sit with the intent to write I can pump out a

lot of content at once, so getting the initial paper done was fairly easy. I never felt

stressed with deadlines or expectations that were had of us and I feel I worked on this

efficiently and effectively.

 Works Cited

Buddhist View on Death and Rebirth, www.urbandharma.org/udharma5/viewdeath.html

“Death and Islam.” New Statesman, www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-faith-

column/0000/00/holy-qur-muslims-life-death.

“Islamic View of Death.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 10 Apr. 2018,

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_view_of_death.

Jackson, Wayne. “The Biblical View of Death.” Christian Courier,

www.christiancourier.com/articles/850-biblical-view-of-death-the.

“Should You Fear Death?” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, www.

Psychologytoday.com/us/blog/hot-thought/201206/should-you-fear-death.

“The Psychology of Death.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers,

www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/out-the-darkness/201402/the-psychology-death.
 Reflection for Major Work

1. I think I am most proud of my fear of death paper. I felt the research and work I did for
the paper was well thought out and the question I asked was both provocative and deep in
a way that could make someone really stop and think before answering.

2. I do not think these works accurately represent me as a writer because these were not
papers I genuinely wanted to write. The papers I am most proud of and I think best
represent me are the ones that I had given months of thought to and felt the need to put on
a page. But when it is an assignment with word count minimums, citation rules, and
reflections, I feel my window of creativity shrinks drastically.

3.
This was the first time I used a concept map to write a paper. I learned about structure
somewhat and it helped keep track of some of the themes I wanted to address in my
paper. It was similar to written outlines I had done in middle school but on a more visual
level. It acted as a nice tool to reference when writing but I don’t feel that it was
something I would use again.

4. The writing process I had prior to this course that I used the most was spontaneity. I
avoided having a rigid structure and simply wrote whatever I felt made sense to come
next. My entire introduction paragraph was something I came up with as I opened my
word document. I feel this process works for me because it always reads and feels more
natural. It also makes it easier for me to get into a flow and the words come easier to me.