Saturday, November 30, 2019

My Soul Is Rested free essay sample

Option B The Civil Rights Movement in the United States refers to a set of events and reform movements in that country aimed at bringing to an end public and private acts of racial discrimination and racism against African Americans between 1954 to 1968, Whenever the civil rights is brought up there are names that almost always come to mind like Dr Martin Luther King Jr, Malcolm X, and Rosa Parks. But there are others both black and white that participated in the movement. That are not as famous or not mentioned in history but played a major part in the movement. The book My Soul Is Rested by Howell Raines is a good book that shows exactly from first encounter interviews what went on during the civil rights movement. It has many important interviews that come from the people’s actual point of view of the history of events. Everything that went on during the Montgomery bus boycott of 1955, some of the actual people that participated in the sit-ins, what went on during the Freedom rides and, the campaigns on the school and university integrations Some of the people associated with movement and give an eye witness summary of what went down are student, News reporters, Black and white activist, Lawyers and government officials, and Politicians. We will write a custom essay sample on My Soul Is Rested or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The way the book is laid out is that everything that happened or said is from the people that witnessed and lived it. The book is not focused on one point of view or in a way that the author wants you to take or view what happened under his perspective but in a way that when you read the interviews and recollections, you feel what is going on from the unknown point of view. It puts you in the shoes of the interviewee and makes you see exactly what they are going through. The achievement of the legal victory in the Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education in the year 1954, rejected separate white and colored school systems and by implication overturned the separate but equal doctrine established in Plessy vs. Ferguson. This victory paved the way for integration and the civil rights movement. But many governors and business men where persistent in letting this happen. As a result a lot of schools shut down rather than put up with integration. Autherine Lucy Foster was the first black student to attend the University of Alabama, in 1956. In 1952, Pollie Ann Myers, and Autherine Lucy foster decided to attend the University of Alabama as a graduate student but, knowing that admission would be difficult due to the Universitys admission policies, she and Myers came up to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People for help. On June of 1955, the NAACP secured a court order preventing the University from rejecting their admission applications based upon their race. Days later, the court amended the order to apply to all other African-American students seeking admission. The Supreme Court upheld this in Lucy v. Adams on October 10, 1955. On the very eve of the day Lucy and her friend were to register, her friend got rejected from admissions but Lucy was accepted. Unfortunately, she was banned from all dormitories and dining halls. Lucy enrolled as a graduate student in library science, becoming the first Negro ever admitted to a white public school or university in the state. Her first day of school went good. She sat in front of the class and everything went normal. â€Å"He acts like I’m not here† Is what she said of her professor. (My Soul Is Rested, 325) On the third day of classes, a hostile mob including the Klan assembled to prevent Lucy attending classes. She was escorted out her class as the mob said â€Å"Lets Kill her, Lets kill her,† When asked of what she heard the mob say was â€Å"Hey Hey Ho, where in the hell did Audrey go? Hey Hey Ho, where in the hell did that Nigger go? † (My Soul Is Rested, 327) Lucy was suspended and later expelled for her own safety thee university said. Hamilton Holmes along with Charlayne Hunter was the first two African-American students admitted to the University of Georgia. They where denied their admission to the university but after an eighteen month court battle. Where accepted inside the university. He described his situation by saying. â€Å"I felt that I would be letting down myself and also a lot of other people if I did not accept the challenge. But I tell you, I almost didn’t go, I almost didn’t leave. † (My Soul Is Rested, 334) On one of his days in school he had an incident with the local fraternity KA, They had blocked his vehicle as he was attending class. As he came out and moved the blocked cars, the ringleader of the frat came out and wanted to start trouble with Hamilton Holmes. â€Å"Man, Look, I don’t want any trouble, but if that’s what you want, I’m ready. † He turned around, and he said talking to the boys, â€Å"He sure is talking big ain’t he? (My Soul Is Rested, 335) He managed to scare off the KA boys by pretending to have a gun. His experience in school was not a really welcoming one but after the incident, he did not have any real problems with anyone because they thought he had a gun. Herbert Jenkins was a police chief in Atlanta. He joined the force in 1932 and was made chief in 1947. He was also a member of the Ku Klux Klan. He was assigned as a d river for the mayor in which he had to meet with black people really often. This changed his point of view towards blacks. He said â€Å"†¦. I took a completely different view of this entire situation, because this was the first time I had ever had an opportunity to meet black people that I recognized as better educated, had traveled more, were better off financially than I was, across the board. †. (My Soul Is Rested, 352) He was a good friend of Martin Luther King Sr. He would hear rumors of false accusations about Martin Luther King Jr that he was adopted and that he was smuggled into the united states. He was even contacted by the FBI in trying to do some dirty work for them. On one occasion they wanted to catch Dr King with a white woman in a hotel room only to find out that they were there on a meeting. His cooperation with blacks led the Georgia legislature to pass a bill to take away his police pension. Through it all, he served as chief for 25 years until retiring in 1972 driving the city through racial conflict during the desegregation of public transportation, public schools and parks. he was able to bring all parties to the table helping Atlanta progress mostly peacefully through channels that weaken the other Southern cities. Reporters had it bad. Some Reporters like Richard Veleriani was a diplomatic correspondent with NBC news. In one situation when he was reporting when a man walked behind him and hit him with an Ax handle. They hit him on the side of the head where the bone is at rather than on the top of the head. Richard was stunned and saw that he was bleeding. He r ecalls the conversation with the man that tried to help him. Do you need a doctor? † and I, in a daze looked at my hand and said â€Å"Yes, I think I do. I’m bleeding. † And then he looked at me, he stared me in the face with this ugly look, and he said, â€Å"We don’t have doctors for people like you. † (My Soul Is Rested, 372) Others like Wendell Hoffman, which was the first camera man to be at Selma. Was attacked while he was filming. He recalls that â€Å"They had sticks in their hands, and they were attempting to hit me in the testicles with their sticks, and I was carrying a camera†¦.. And the next time I came to Selma, I went to a store and bought one of these jockstraps†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (My Soul Is Rested, 385) Nelson Benton, a news correspondent in Selma on bloody Sunday for CBS wrote â€Å"†¦.. The film was too graphic†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦We spent the whole afternoon intercutting violence. † (My Soul Is Rested, 386) The civil rights movement was a battle that everyone fought and was affected by. Many organizations such as the SNCC, NAACP, and the SDS were really active in the Civil Rights Movement fought for the struggle which was more than just civil rights under the law. They fought for the fundamental issues of freedom, respect, economic and social equality. They achieved legislative victory in the form of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, that banned discrimination in employment practices and public accommodations; the Voting Rights Act of 1965, that restored and protected voting rights; and the Civil Rights Act of 1968, that banned discrimination in the sale of buying or renting a house. In a political system, after a status had been reached in which every citizen has the same rights by law, the issues of discrimination remains. Even if every person is treated equally by the state, there will never be equality due to discrimination within our society. Works Cited Davis, Townsend (1998). Weary Feet, Rested Souls: A Guided History of the Civil Rights Movement. New York: W. W. Norton Company, 311 Howell Raines (1983) My Soul Is Rested: The Story Of The Civil Rights Movement In The Deep South. New York Penguin Books. Http://www. watson. org/~lisa/blackhistory/civilrights-55-65/ Http://www. voicesofcivilrights. org/project. html

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

How to Sing Happy Birthday in Chinese

How to Sing Happy Birthday in Chinese The Happy Birthday Song has a strangely contested history. The tune was originally composed in the late 1800s by Patty and Mildred Hill, though the lyrics were not the same. In fact, the Hill sisters titled the song Good Morning To All. Somewhere along the way, the phrase happy birthday became associated with the melody. In 1935, the Summy Company registered a copyright for the Birthday Song. In 1988, Warner Music bought that copyright and has been making big bank ever since. Warner Music charged royalties for public performances of the Happy Birthday Song and appearances in film soundtracks. Only until 2016 did the popular song become public domain. In February 2016, a US federal judge closed a case ruling that Warner Music does not hold a valid copyright to the Happy Birthday Songs lyrics and melody. Now, the Birthday Song finally belongs to the public and is considered one of the most popular songs in the world. It has been translated into many languages, including Mandarin Chinese. Its an easy song to learn in Chinese since it is essentially just two phrases repeated over and over again.   Practice speaking the words to this song before singing them. This will ensure that you are learning the words with the proper tones. When singing in Mandarin Chinese, sometimes the tones are not clear given the melody of the song. Notes   Ã§ ¥  (zhà ¹) means wish or express good wishes. ç ¥ Ã¤ ½   (zhà ¹ nÇ ) means wishing you.   Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€š (in traditional form) / Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹  (simplified form) (kui là ¨) can be preceded by  other happy events  such as Christmas (è â€"è ªâ€¢Ã§ ¯â‚¬Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€š / Ã¥Å" £Ã¨ ¯Å¾Ã¨Å â€šÃ¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹  / shà ¨ng dn jià © kui là ¨) or New Year (æâ€" °Ã¥ ¹ ´Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€š / æâ€" °Ã¥ ¹ ´Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹  / xÄ «n nin kui là ¨). Pinyin shÄ“ng rà ¬ kui là ¨zhà ¹ nÇ  shÄ“ng rà ¬ kui là ¨zhà ¹ nÇ  shÄ“ng rà ¬ kui là ¨zhà ¹ nÇ  shÄ“ng rà ¬ kui là ¨zhà ¹ nÇ  yÇ’ngyuÇŽn kui là ¨ Traditional Chinese Characters 生æâ€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€šÃ§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã§â€Å¸Ã¦â€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€šÃ§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã§â€Å¸Ã¦â€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€šÃ§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã§â€Å¸Ã¦â€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€šÃ§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã¦ ° ¸Ã©   Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¦ ¨â€š Simplified Characters 生æâ€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹ Ã§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã§â€Å¸Ã¦â€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹ Ã§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã§â€Å¸Ã¦â€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹ Ã§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã§â€Å¸Ã¦â€" ¥Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹ Ã§ ¥ Ã¤ ½  Ã¦ ° ¸Ã¨ ¿Å"Ã¥ ¿ «Ã¤ ¹  English Translation Happy BirthdayWish to you happy birthdayWish to you happy birthdayWish to you happy birthdayWish to you happiness forever Hear the Song The melody of the song is the same as the birthday song in English. You can hear the Chinese version sung to you by the crooning Mando pop-star Jay Chou.

Friday, November 22, 2019

Qué hacer para trabajar de au pair en Estados Unidos

Quà © hacer para trabajar de au pair en Estados Unidos Trabajar como au pair o cuidador de nià ±os en Estados Unidos puede ser una experiencia gratificante para los jà ³venes que deseen practicar y mejorar sus conocimientos de inglà ©s. Para desempeà ±ar este trabajo es preciso que una familia patrocine a la nià ±era a travà ©s de una agencia autorizada por el Departamento de Estado. El joven extranjero entrar y trabajar en Estados Unidos amparado por una visa de intercambio conocida como J-1. En este artà ­culo se informa sobre los requisitos tanto de las familias para alojar a una nià ±era bajo este programa como tambià ©n aquellos que deben cumplir los jà ³venes extranjeros para calificar. Requisitos de las familias para patrocinar a una au pair extranjera Ser ciudadanos americanos o residentes permanentes legales.En el hogar familiar debe hablarse inglà ©s.Los nià ±os americanos a cuidar por el cuidador extranjero debern ser mayores de tres meses y menores de 18 aà ±os. Las familias corren con la mayorà ­a de los gastos que generalmente incluyen el viaje ida y vuelta en avià ³n y seguro mà ©dico mientras dure la estancia de la nià ±era en Estados Unidos. Requisitos para trabajar como au pair en Estados Unidos Tener entre 18 y 26 aà ±os de edad. Aunque la inmensa mayorà ­a de los jà ³venes que solicitan trabajar como cuidadores de nià ±os son mujeres, tambià ©n pueden aplicar los varones.Tener buenos conocimientos de inglà ©s a nivel oral.Haber acabado los estudios de bachillerato (high school) o equivalente.No tener antecedentes penales. Antes de concederse la visa se requerir documentacià ³n oficial que acredite que no se ha cometido ningà ºn delito. Si se ha sido condenado, la visa ser denegada.Suministrar fotos de su vida y al menos tres referencias que no pueden ser de familiares. Adems de los requisitos legales, hay otros fruto de la prctica que hacen que sea ms fcil que una aspirante a au-pair encuentre familia de acogida. Asimismo, cà ³mo se tramita la visa, cules son las condiciones laborales de los muchachos desempeà ±ando esta labor y, finalmente, se hace referencia a otros programas de intercambio que tambià ©n pueden ser de interà ©s para jà ³venes extranjeros que desean vivir la experiencia americana mientras practican inglà ©s. Tramitacià ³n de la visa J-1 para nià ±eras Rellenar la aplicacià ³n correspondiente.Pagar las cuotas correspondientes. La cantidad varà ­a y es fijada por la empresa socia de la agencia americana autorizada para llevar a cabo el programa de au pair. En general es menos de $1000 e incluye el arancel por aplicar, el de encontrar familia patrocinadora y por la entrevista. En ocasiones, dependiendo del paà ­s, es posible que se tenga  que pagar un sobreprecio por el viaje.Pasar una entrevista en persona y un test psicolà ³gico y otro fà ­sico.Escribir una carta dirigida a una posible familia patrocinadora.Si se va a cuidar de nià ±os menores de dos aà ±os, habr que acreditar que se tiene al menos 200 horas de experiencia cuidando a bebà ©s.Comprometerse por escrito a trabajar por doce meses.Acudir a clases de inglà ©s y participar en una reunià ³n mensual de nià ±eras. Requerimientos que frecuentemente solicitan las familias Aunque la ley no dice nada al respecto, en la prctica se sabe que las familias patrocinadoras buscan nià ±eras que: Que tenga licencia de manejar.No fumar. Condiciones labores de las nià ±eras con el programa J-1 El cuidador tendr recmara propia (cuarto, habitacià ³n) y se le proveer con tres comidas diarias.Se le entregar semanalmente para su uso y disfrute la cantidad de $195.75.Las familias corrern con el gasto de hasta $500 para que la au pair asista a clases de inglà ©s (al menos seis crà ©ditos en una universidad o college comunitario).La jornada laboral no podr exceder de 10 horas al dà ­a ni de 45 horas semanales.El contrato ser por doce meses y se le pagar al cuidador dos semanas de vacaciones. Agencias oficiales intermediarias en el programa de Au Pair Es necesario tener en cuenta que una persona sà ³lo puede ser nià ±era con una visa de intercambio J-1 para si las gestiones se hacen exclusivamente a travà ©s de una de las agencia autorizadas por el gobierno de los Estados Unidos. Este es el listado. Por à ºltimo, esto es lo que debes hacer si la experiencia no es como tà º esperabas y hay problemas serios o te despiden. Esto es lo que debes hacer si el programa de la visa J-1 finaliza antes del tiempo previsto. EduCare Es un programa similar pero diferente al de aupair. Los utilizan las familias americanas para contratar nià ±eras extranjeras para cuidar de sus hijos antes o despuà ©s del horario escolar. En estos casos la au pair no puede trabajar ms de 30 horas a la semana y podrn recibir hasta $1000 para costear sus estudios. En estos casos la compensacià ³n a recibir es menor, estando fijada en $146.81. Evitar problemas con la visa Una vez que se tiene la visa es importante no hacer nada que pueda ponerla en peligro. Para ello una de la informacià ³n fundamental es saber cunto se puede ingresar a Estados Unidos y cuntos son los dà ­as de periodo de gracia para salir, una vez que finaliza el programa. Informacià ³n de interà ©s Para los muchachos interesados en estudiar en EEUU pero creen que no pueden pagarlo, verificar la posibilidad de estudiar dos aà ±os en un Community College: estas son sus ventajas y en esta base de datos se puede comprobar costo en ms de 1,000 colegios comunitarios en todo el paà ­s. Otras opciones con una Visa J-1 de intercambio Existen otras posibilidades para los jà ³venes extranjeros que desean pasar una temporada en EU para aprender inglà ©s y/o disfrutar la experiencia americana. Por ejemplo, el programa SWT para universitarios, que permite que trabajen y viajen durante los meses de verano. Otra opcià ³n son los programas oficiales para staff de apoyo  de campamentos de verano o los de prcticas profesionales (pasantà ­as) para jà ³venes profesionales. Este es un artà ­culo informativo. No es asesorà ­a legal.

Thursday, November 21, 2019

Glass ceiling and glass border are terminologies often used to Essay

Glass ceiling and glass border are terminologies often used to describe barriers women might face in the labour market. Do we see any evidence of these barriers disappearing - Essay Example Since little is known about these challenges, there is a lack of coping strategies developed to avert them. This deficiency in coping strategies limits the availability of opportunities for women’s progression to senior management positions by creating both covert and overt barriers (Donald and Hartmann, 2005, p.478). However, with the advent of globalization, issues of gender equity and gender equality are progressively gaining popularity (Donald and Hartmann, 2005, p.480). This has resulted in an increase in women’s participation in the labor force as they progressively get acceptance in professions, careers and occupations previously reserved for men. However, most of the results from the efforts fall short of set targets and expectations (Thomas and Sally, 2005, p.490). This has necessitated a proper understanding of the covert and overt barriers to women’s progression to top management positions. The slow but progressive disappearance of these barriers will form the major part of this document. IHRM is a practice that encompasses all the activities revolving around coordinating employees and their efforts towards attaining pre-determined goals and objectives at a global scale (Thomas and Sally, 2001, p.89). IHRM also entails the process of sourcing for human resources, allocating them appropriate roles, and effectively putting their skill sets to use to maximize on the organizational effectiveness and efficiency of international firms (Thomas and Sally, 2001, p.89). The term â€Å"glass ceiling† is used to describe the invisible and intangible barrier that prevents women or ethnic minorities from getting into top-level management in a hierarchical system (Olga and Rà ­o, 2012, p.160). A glass ceiling can also be defined as a set of attitudes that fosters the unjust prevention of women and ethnic minorities from getting into highly influential positions (Olga and Rà ­o, 2012, p.163). In most organizations, the existence of the discriminatory barrier in

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Systems Analysis and Design_Aug13 Assignment - Nancy's Novelty Cakes

Systems Analysis and Design_Aug13 - Nancy's Novelty Cakes - Assignment Example 24 Schedule 24 b) Spreadsheet program 25 Task 3- B Graph 26 Increase in Sales Each Year 26 The above given graph clearly indicates that this investment will bring increase to expected sales. 27 Sales v/s Revenue 27 27 Above given graph demonstrates the relationship between sales and revenue. This graph clearly shows an increase in sales due to the increase in revenue. 27 Task 3- C 27 In this analysis I have shown a relationship between different variables such as the overall sales and total revenue. These relationships are demonstrates over a progress of four years and in a steady fashion. These relationships outline a steady line of increase in sales and overall increase in revenue after 2 years. ... ign 33 References 34 Introduction Nancy’s Novelty Cakes is a small confectionery business, which is expert in making novel and special occasion cakes for customers. Up till now, this company has been using a traditional approach for the management of its business operations. In this scenario, it has developed and maintained a file of cakes designs along with costs associated with those cakes. With the passage of time the management realized that this traditional approach is not useful for the successful management of business operations. Hence, they have decided to develop and implement a new technology based system. In this scenario, Nancy’s Novelty Cakes business is looking for an effective way to replace its old manual system they have had for the last 5 years with a new computerised system. I am a member of IT Company that is specialized in design and development of computerised business systems. Our consultancy firm has won a contract from this client. In this case our team is responsible for the development and implementation of a new technology based system for the better corporate operational and procedures management. This report presents a detailed analysis of some of the important aspects associated with the development and implementation of this new system. This report will discuss the requirements specification and design related aspects of Nancy Nancy’s Novelty Cakes business. This report is divided into different tasks and each task addresses specific topic. Task 1 a) System lifecycle model Software/system development lifecycle or simply the SDLC is a theoretical outline or process that demonstrates the phases or steps required for the development of a software application. In fact, this process outlines all the steps from preliminary feasibility

Saturday, November 16, 2019

The Sociological Reactions to the Return of Vietnam Veterans Essay Example for Free

The Sociological Reactions to the Return of Vietnam Veterans Essay The Sociological Reactions to the Return of Vietnam Veterans Upon their return from the Vietnam War, many veterans were shocked upon the reaction (or lack thereof) displayed by the citizens of the States who had remained on the home front. When finally landing back on American soil, many veterans expected to be greeted with celebration and maybe even a parade, acknowledging their service and dedication to the Vietnam cause. However, veterans were instead greeted by protestors who did not agree with the United States’ participation in the war (ironically, not all veterans wholly supported the cause itself, but instead went out of respect and devotion to their country). In an article written by Vietnam veteran Bill Hunt, it is clear to see that not only were strangers hostile towards veterans, but even friends and family treated the returning soldiers with annoyance, anger, or at the best, apathy. He states that it felt like family members had not even known he was at war; they reacted to his return much like one would react to someone returning from the grocery store: with just a casual hello, disregarding the danger and the high level of devotion that had been experienced. Hunt’s family barely acknowledged that he had ever even gone to war. The experiences of Vietnam vets were simply viewed as a part of every-day life. The war was not even taken seriously by many people, and veterans (specifically Hunt) were appalled by the flippant and insensitive (though innocent and thoughtless) comments made by others, family included. To the vets, it had been a hellish experience, and many experienced Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression, and many became dependent on drugs and alcohol to get through the psychological after-effects of being involved in such stressful and torturous circumstances. However, appallingly, many were unable to get the help they needed. Medical aid was not made available to them right away, and a shocking percentage of Americans viewed them as crazy and dangerous to society. Some even thought that the veterans deserved their psychological conditions. Suicide became increasingly common as many veterans experienced completely unfounded hatred and degradation. Part of this is due to the younger generation, which had begun the hippie movement. The ideas of â€Å"peace† and â€Å"love† were emphasized. Because of this, many returning veterans were greeted with shouts of â€Å"baby killer† and other completely untrue and offensive things. They were also given stereotypes of overarching drug use. Additionally, television was available to households for the first time. Because of this, there was no watering-down or censorship of the conditions of the Vietnam War. Many veterans were portrayed incorrectly and much confusion was experienced by the public due to mixed messages. Regardless of the cause, the fact remains that the Vietnam veterans are one of the most unjustly maligned groups of people in American history. The war was politically unpopular and many veterans were accused of a lack of dedication and â€Å"not fighting hard enough†. The disrespect that had been shown towards these veterans was and still is disgusting: regardless of whether or not one agrees with the cause, it is inexcusable that these veterans were not commended for their sacrifice. Comparison to The Return of a Private and Currently Returning Veterans The Return of a Private

Thursday, November 14, 2019

McMurphy as Christ in Ken Keseys One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest :: One Flew Over Cuckoos Nest

McMurphy as Christ in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest In "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest," McMurphy is successfully perceived as a heroic Christ figure. Kesey uses foreshadowing and images, the fishing trip, actions and feelings of other characters to develop this character. Foreshadowing clues and images are used to contribute to McMurphy as a figure of Christ. In the beginning of the novel McMurphy is baptized with a shower before entering the ward. The reader is also introduced to Ellis, a character who spends the entire novel in a cross position "nailed against the wall, arms out," (page 20). Another clue to McMurphy's developing character is presented during the electroshock therapy. McMurphy willingly lies down on a cross shaped table, ending up in the same position Ellis foreshadowed. McMurphy also asks for his crown of thorns. Before the therapy a schizophrenic patient approaches him and says "I wash my hands of the whole deal", as Pontius Pilate said to Jesus before sentencing him to death. Jesus was also friends with a prostitute named Mary, just like McMurphy was friends with prostitutes. The development of McMurphy as a Christ figure deepends, when he leads the patients on a fishing trip. McMurphy takes the "twelve of us [patients] towards the ocean," (page 203) just like Jesus' 12 disciples, to test and strengthen their faith in him and empower them. Fish have also been an important religious Christian symbol, as the fishing trip is an important symbol of the novel. When the trip is over, the Chief describes the sense of change that most of the patients had and even claims that they "weren't the same bunch of weak-knees from a nuthouse anymore." (Page 215). This really shows the way McMurphy is starting to guide and lead the patients, just as Jesus lead his disciples. Finally the actions and feelings of the other characters successfully shows the development of McMurphy as a Christ figure and hero. Clearly smiliarities can be drawn between McMurphy and Jesus' healing. Jesus, made blind men see and mute men speak. McMurphy is the one who prompted the Chief to speak for the first time in years, when he says "Thank-you." (Page 184) and eventually, McMurphy "heals" Chief of his `deafness' and `dumbness'.

Monday, November 11, 2019

Filipino language Essay

Celso Ressurecion – half-indio and half-spanish youth from Pampanga Feliza Reyes – daughter of a Filipino insurgent general Nanding Reyes – Feliza’s father and head of the nationalist rebel group in Baler Azon Reyes – Feliza’s mother Gabriel Reyes – Feliza’s younger brother 2nd Lt. Saturnino Martin Cerezo Capt. Enrique Fossi de las Morenas – replace Lt. Mota as the head of the Spanish in Baler Col. Calixto Villacorte Commandante Teodorico Luna Novicio Fr. Candido Gomez Carreno – parish priest Lt. Jose Mota – head of the Spanish army in Baler Lope – friend of Celso Luming – friend of Feliza V.SUMMARY/PLOT: The story happened during the siege of Baler. A battle between the Filipino forces and Spanish battalion in 1898. A young Filipina, named Feliza who fell inlove with a half Spanish and a half Filipino young man, named Celso who prefer to be a Spanish soldier rather than to be a Filipino katipunero. Feliza and Celso’s love has to be kept as a secret because Feliza is the daughter of Nanding, a rebel leader who has the burning desire to completely annihilate Spanish soldiers in town of Baler. Filipino troops including the father of Feliza started to attack Spanish soldiers. The Spanish battalion inhabited the church as their barracks to protect them from attacks of up armed Filipinos bounding the church. As the siege prolongs, little by little the Spaniards’ supply of foods diminish and many soldiers got sick because of no more supplies of food to eat. Commander Las Morenas and other subsequent commanders got wounded and sick because of being isolated for a number of months. There were some soldiers surrendered because they could no longer bear their sufferings. Even Celso who knew that Feliza got pregnant planned to escape together with his colleagues. That night of their escape Celso was trapped due to his friends’ own fear. He was betrayed by his own friend. Feliza who was patiently waiting for Celso, knew nothing about the execution happened to her love inside the church. Filipino troops have many times tried to convince the Spaniards to surrender because Spanish fleet in manila was already defeated and the war was actually ended. But still they refused to leave. â€Å" Viva Espaà ±a! â€Å" their principle. The last commander who discovered that the news was true. After the confirmation of the news, at last he and his follower peacefully surrendered. The sad thing was that poor Feliza, who longed for her love, who could instead be the happiest woman in the world that time because finally she and her love could be together, did not find Celso in the flock of freed soldiers rather found him inside the church with no more life. A.EXPOSITION In 1898, a band of Spanish soldiers heroically defended Baler (which would later be the capital municipality of Aurora in 1951) against Filipino forces for 337 long and grueling days. Dubbed as the Siege of Baler, the Spanish troops holed up inside the church of San Luis Obispo. This is the setting of the movie Baler, a love story between a young Filipina barrio lass Feliza (Anne Curtis) and Filipino-Spanish soldier Celso (Jericho Rosales) are caught in a forbidden love, torn apart by the societies they came from. Feliza’s father Nanding (Philip Salvador) is an anti-Spanish government fighter, which puts pressure on the young couple to keep their relationship a secret. Outnumbered and out-gunned by the Indios they once governed and abused, the Spanish soldiers in Baler, including Celso and buddy Lope (Mark Bautista), are now forced to hole up in a church as they wait for non-existent military reinforcements to rescue them from the band of Filipinos who have now surrounded them and are waiting for their surrender. B.RISING ACTION Baler wasn’t bad. But it wasn’t good either. It was a very simple story – a love affair between Jericho Rosales’ half-blood Spanish soldier and Anne Curtis (Feliza) native maiden (whose father – Philip Salvador – happened to be a particularly bitter freedom-fighter). This romance was set against the last days of Spanish power in the Philippines when the garrison at Baler – including Jerico Rosales (Celso) character – was forced to hole-up in the local church for almost a year, surrounded by the well-armed local militia. Under these trying circumstances, the two leads keep the faith as best they can, against all odds. And that was pretty much it. Despite its pretensions at being a period historical romance, the entire movie came off almost as blandly as though it were journalistic, rather than dramatic. The crux of the movie should have been the aching of the two lovers; more specifically, Anne Curtis (Feliza) defiance of her father and Jerico Rosales (Celso) ultimate decision to defy his Commander – and by extension his own dreams of eventually seeing his father – in order to finally be with his love. C.CLIMAX The story of doe-eyed Feliza (Anne Curtis), a young Filipina from the capital of Aurora province who falls in love with Celso (Jericho Rosales), a Filipino-Spanish soldier fighting for Spain as the once mighty empire is now on a losing battle defending its overseas territories from the US. Feliza’s dad (Phillip Salvador) an anti-Spanish government fighter which means their love is anything but permissible, and thus are struggling to keep their relationship secret. Outnumbered and out-gunned by the Indios they once governed and abused, the Spanish soldiers in Baler, including Celso and buddy Lope (Mark Bautista), are now forced to hole up in a church as they wait for non-existent military reinforcements to rescue them from the band of Filipinos who have now surrounded them and are waiting for their surrender. D. Moral Lesson: Love is worth fighting for! Love is not easy in a time of uneasiness. But above all, Filipinos were really a freedom fighter. As Spaniards did not surrender, much more the Filipinos. E.REACTION: Baler is primarily a love story between Feliza, the daughter of a rebel commander (Anne Curtis), and Celso, a half-Spanish soldier (Jericho Rosales), set at the twilight years of the Spanish regime in the Philippines. The young couple struggle to keep their forbidden love alive despite familial and political tensions culminating in an almost yearlong blockade known as the Siege of Baler. â€Å"Love is difficult in times of war,† says a Filipino soldier named Lope (Mark Bautista) who is also serving the Spanish army just like Celso. His statement perfectly encapsulates the movie’s theme. Complementing the primary conflict of Anne and Jericho’s relationship is a backdrop of clashes between father and son, mother and daughter, duty to family and country, and loyalty and self-preservation. Throughout the movie, Baler explores the question of whether love-be it romantic, familial, or patriotic-can survive the most brutal of human endeavors: war. VI.HISTORICAL ANALYSIS Baler is a history-inspired Filipino movie mainly on a prohibited love between Filipino maiden Feliza Reyes acted by Anne Curtis and Filipino-Spanish Soldier Celso Resurreccion acted by Jericho Rosales. The couples’ love is difficult because of different culture they came from. Feliza is a daughter of an insurgent leader Nanding portrayed by Philip Salvador and Celso is a soldier serving Spanish regime. Their relationship is kept alive even with hindrances such as the famous historical event Siege of Baler where Spanish Army including Celso assigned at Baler, Quezon is trapped in a church surrounded by Filipino Army anticipating for their concede as Philippine-Spanish war is ending. The siege lasted almost a year where it defied the love of the young couple. The film begins on a scene depicting how admirable Baler until the characters and scenes introduced consequences of their fate that becomes a strong emotional medium in actualizing the plot. The way that Lieutenant Mota killed himself instead of surrendering to Filipino troops surrounding him while Celso is watching is genuinely revealing that sacrificing blood and life is evident throughout the story. Indeed it did not fail because the film illustrated first about the love of a young couple and ended tragically with bloodshed. Characterization of Baler was a credit of the movie. Characters complimented each persona portrayed. Anne Curtis as Feliza is quite ironic to be a full blooded Filipina because of her looks but managed to defer it by her acting which made viewers imagine a real beautiful and in loved young Filipina. She portrayed it with grace as though viewers see it as an actual scene from the past. Also, we can acknowledge Philip Salvador as Nanding who symbolized oppressed Filipinos whom are eager to fight Spanish government. This portrayal is effective because it lets the viewers feel how gruesome the treatment of Spaniards. Other than that, Jericho Rosales as Celso acted smoothly throughout the film though some criticize him not fit for the role half Filipino and half Spanish since his beauty was truly for a Filipino Man. Despite that, he portrayed the role that viewers had suspension of disbelief. Seeing him as a true Filipino but was just lucky enough to have a job and to have been born in Spain. He also acted fair enough that he represented both sides of what he loves and what he ought to do. Basically, the setting of the movie, Baler, is also an important symbolism of the movie. It connotes that the place is significant for the young couple who fought for their love and life through wars. It implies their persistent love which was only ended by death. Also, as the movie also denotes, another meaning would be perceive from Baler is that it represented how firm the belief of Spaniards. They managed a year-long battle unknowingly to win or not but was urged because of their pride. Symbolisms are not evident throughout the film but Baler is the leit-motif which was the main point why the movie progressed. The style of the director is highly commendable that even young ones can capture the emotions of the movie. All throughout it depicted scenes and shots that emphasize worthy subjects that contributed to the maturity of the film. The film touched aspects differing from familial, personal life until political feuds. Hence, this film is a must for a person who seeks a touch of history and romance. VII.LITERAL ANALYSIS A.THEME â€Å"Love is difficult in times of war!† B.POINT OF VIEW The Baler screenplay tries to present the Filipino point of view on the issue of the siege, and the international significance of the event for the fledgling Philippine Republic. C.SIGNIFICANT The movie portrayed three (3) significant happening in which we may perceive that created conflict or harmony. First, the reality of Filipinos relationship with the Spaniards was illustrated thoroughly. In the movie, it was established how inviolable the love of the young couple and also how inviolable matters concerning priests or Spanish government rulers. Here they have communicated implicitly that it is unlawful for them to be in these affairs. In present time, this reality is apparent. A good example maybe perhaps our Filipino culture of girls should be conservative. Some continue to obey the belief while the others who don’t are labeled flirt. We cannot escape the fact that some if not majority dwell with this kind of perspective. However, as technology advance, so is our mental openness. Some embrace this kind of philosophy forgetting the old habit which was known worldwide that is â€Å"Mara Clara† style. Second, a reality portrayed was that a person is loyal to its own country no matter what. Established in the movie was how the Spaniards and Filipinos were firm with their own beliefs. The Spaniards remained loyal to their country despite the evidence that were shown to them telling that Spanish era is long gone. On the other hand, Filipinos remained fierce with their battle giving grace to the Spaniards. In these days, we can also relate the loyalty of these people with their respective country in our daily lives. A great example would be a broken family who despite of intense quarrel mange to unite if other clan while oppose to one of their family. This family will join together defending their own ill-treated family member. In this case, we can say that our loyalty remains fully firm from where we came from. Lastly, a reality shown was Love conquers all even if death comes. Tragically, the movie ended revealing that Celso was executed due to accused treachery. In this case, we can see that no matter how big or small circumstances, the love of couple is still present though they are eternally apart. D.CONFLICT While Baler is a story of conflict, betrayal, suffering, self-preservation, selfishness, obstinacy, and self-interest, it is also a story of heroism, courage, love of freedom, patriotism, endurance, chivalry, humanity and above all, it also tells about a noble story of love in time of war— the story of Feliza and Celso. Feliza is the beautiful daughter of Nanding (Phillip Salvador), who’s a member of the rebel movement. This is the very reason why she and Celso have to keep their love a secret. Nanding, whose primary goal is to completely wipe out the Spanish soldiers stationed in the town of Baler, can never accept Celso, a half- Indio, half Spanish soldier who chooses to serve the enemies more than the Filipino insurgents who are struggling and fighting for their independence, their freedom. Feliza is in love with the man her father despises but who and what could stop the two young people who are madly in love with each other?

Saturday, November 9, 2019

Anne Fleche – the Space of Madness and Desire

Tennessee Williams exploits the expressionistic uses of space in the drama, attempting to represent desire from the outside, that is, in its formal challenge to realistic stability and closure, and in its exposure to risk. Loosening both stage and verbal languages from their implicit desire for closure and containment, Streetcar exposes the danger and the violence of this desire, which is always the desire for the end of desire. Writing in a period when U. S. rama was becoming disillusioned with realism, Williams achieves a critical distance from realistic technique through his use of allegory. In Blanche's line about the streetcar, the fact that she is describing real places, cars, and transfers has the surprising effect of enhancing rather than diminishing the metaphorical parallels in her language. Indeed, Streetcar's â€Å"duplicities of expression†(3) are even more striking in the light of criticism's recent renewal of interest in allegory. 4) For allegory establishes the distance â€Å"between the representative and the semantic function of language† (I89), the desire that is in language to unify (with) experience. Streetcar demonstrates the ways in which distance in the drama can be expanded and contracted, and what spatial relativism reveals about the economy of dramatic representation. Tennessee Williams' plays, filled with allegorical language, seem also to have a tentative, unfinished character. The metalanguage of desire seems to preclude development, to deny progress. And yet it seems â€Å"natural† to read A Streetcar Named Desire as an allegorical journey toward Blanche's apocalyptic destruction at the hands of her â€Å"executioner,† Stanley. The play's violence, its baroque images of decadence and lawlessness, promise its audience the thrilling destruction of the aristocratic Southern Poe-esque moth-like neuraesthenic female â€Å"Blanche† by the ape-like brutish male from the American melting-pot. The play is full in fact of realism's developmental language of evolution, â€Å"degeneration,† eugenics. Before deciding that Stanley is merely an â€Å"ape,† Blanche sees him as an asset: â€Å"Oh, I guess he's just not the type that goes for jasmine perfume, but maybe he's what we need to mix with our blood now that we've lost Belle Reve† (285). The surprising thing about this play is that the allegorical reading also seems to be the most â€Å"realistic† one, the reading that imposes a unity of language and experience to make structural sense of the play, that is, to make its events organic, natural, inevitable. And yet this feels false, because allegorical language resists being pinned down by realistic analysis — it is always only half a story. But it is possible to close the gap between the language and the stage image, between the stage image and its â€Å"double† reality, by a double forgetting: first we have to forget that realism is literature, and thus already a metaphor, and then we have to forget the distance between allegory and reality. To say that realism's empiricism is indistinguishable from metaphor is to make it one with a moral, natural ordering of events. Stanley is wrong and Blanche is right, the moralists agree. But the hypocrisy of the â€Å"priggish† reading is soon revealed in its ambivalence toward Blanche/Stanley: to order events sequentially requires a reading that finds Blanche's rape inevitable, a condition of the formal structure: she is the erring woman who gets what she â€Å"asks† for (her realistic antecedents are clear). For the prigs this outcome might not be unthinkable, though it might be — what is worse — distasteful. But Williams seems deliberately to be making interpretation a problem: he doesn't exclude the prigs' reading, he invites it. What makes Streetcar different from Williams' earlier play The Glass Menagerie (I944)(5) is its constant self-betrayal into and out of analytical norms. The realistic set-ups in this play really feel like set-ups, a magician's tricks, inviting readings that leave you hanging from your own schematic noose. Analytically, this play is a trap; it is brilliantly confused; yet without following its leads there is no way to get anywhere at all. Streetcar has a map, but it has changed the street signs, relying on the impulse of desire to take the play past its plots. In a way it is wrong to say Williams does not write endings. He writes elaborate strings of them. Williams has given Streetcar strong ties to the reassuring rhetoric of realism. Several references to Stanley's career as â€Å"A Master Sergeant in the Engineers' Corps† (258) set the action in the â€Å"present,† immediately after the war. The geographical location, as with The Glass Menagerie, is specific, the neighborhood life represented with a greater naturalistic fidelity: â€Å"Above he music of the ‘Blue Piano' the voices of people on the street can be heard overlapping† (243). Lighting and sound effects may give the scene â€Å"a kind of lyricism† (243), but this seems itself a realistic touch for â€Å"The Quarter† (4I2). Even the interior set, when it appears (after a similar wipe-out of the fourth wall), resembles The Glass Menagerie in lay-out and configuration: a ground-floor apartment, with two rooms separated by portieres, occupied by three characters, one of them male. Yet there are also troubling â€Å"realistic† details, to which the play seems to point. The mise en scene seems to be providing too much enclosure to provide for closure: there is no place for anyone to go. There is no fire escape, even though in this play someone does yell â€Å"Fire] Fire] Fire]† (390). In fact, heat and fire and escape are prominent verbal and visual themes. And the flat does not, as it seems to in The Glass Menagerie, extend to other rooms beyond the wings, but ends in a cul-de-sac — a doorway to the bathroom which becomes Blanche's significant place for escape and â€Å"privacy. † Most disturbing, however, is not the increased sense of confinement but this absence of privacy, of analytical, territorial space. No gentleman caller invited for supper invades this time, but an anarchic wilderness of French Quarter hoi polloi who spill onto the set and into the flat as negligently as the piano music from the bar around the corner. There does not seem to be anywhere to go to evade the intrusiveness and the violence: when the flat erupts, as it does on the poker night, Stanley's tirade sends Stella and Blanche upstairs to Steve and Eunice, the landlords with, of course, an unlimited run of the house (â€Å"We own this place so I can let you in† 48 ), whose goings-on are equally violent and uncontained. Stella jokes, â€Å"You know that one upstairs? more laughter One time laughing the plaster — laughing cracked — † (294). The violence is not an isolated climax, but a repetitive pattern of the action, a state of being – it does not resolve anything: BLANCHE I'm not used to such MITCH Naw, it's a shame this had to happen when you just got here. But don't take it serious. BLANCHE Violence] Is so MITCH Set down on the steps and have a cigarette with e. (308) Anxiety and conflict have become permanent and unresolvable, inconclusive. It is not clear what, if anything, they mean. Unlike realistic drama, which produces clashes in order to push the action forward, Streetcar disallows its events a clarity of function, an orderliness. The ordering of events, which constitutes the temporality of realism, is thus no less arbitrary in Streetcar than the ordering of spade: the outside keeps becoming the inside, and vice versa. Williams has done more to relativize space in Streetcar than he did in The Glass Menagerie, where he visualized the fourth wall: here the outer wall appears and disappears more than a half-dozen times, often in the middle of a â€Å"scene,† drawing attention to the spatial illusion rather than making its boundaries absolute. The effect on spatial metaphor is that we are not allowed to forget that it is metaphor and consequently capable of infinite extensions and retractions. As we might expect, then, struggle over territory between Stanley and Blanche (â€Å"Hey, canary bird] Toots] Get OUT of the BATHROOM]† 367 ) — which indeed results in Stanley's reasserting the male as â€Å"King† (37I6 and pushing Blanche offstage, punished and defeated — is utterly unanalytical and unsubtle: â€Å"She'll go] Period. P. S. She'll go Tuesday]† (367). While the expressionistic sequence beginning in Scene Six with Blanche's recollection of â€Å"The Grey oy† (355) relativizes space and time, evoking Blanche's memories, it also seems to drain her expressive power. By the time Stanley is about to rape her she mouths the kinds of things Williams put on screens in The Glass Menagerie: â€Å"In desperate, desperate circumstances] Help me] Caught in a trap† (400). She is establishing her emotions like sign-posts: â€Å"Stay back] †¦ I warn you, don't, I'm in danger]† (40I). What had seemed a way into Blanche's char acter has had the effect of externalizing her feelings so much that they become impersonal. In Streetcar, space does not provide, as it does in realistic drama, an objective mooring for a character's psychology: it keeps turning inside out, obliterating the spatial distinctions that had helped to define the realistic character as someone whose inner life drove the action. Now the driving force of emotion replaces the subtlety of expectation, leaving character out in space, dangling: â€Å"There isn't time to be — † Blanche explains into the phone (399); faced with a threatening proximity, she phones long-distance, and forgets to hang up. The expressionistic techniques of the latter half of he play abstract the individual from the milieu, and emotion begins to dominate the representation of events. In Scene Ten, where Blanche and Stanley have their most violent and erotic confrontation, the play loses all sense of boundary. The front of the house is already transparent; but now Williams also dissolves the rear wall, so that beyond the scene with Blanche and Sta nley we can see what is happening on the next street: A prostitute has rolled a drunkard. He pursues her along the walk, overtakes her and then is a struggle. A policeman's whistle breaks it up. The figures disappear. Some moments later the Negro Woman appears around the corner with a sequined bag which the prostitute had dropped on the walk. She is rooting excitedly through it. (399) The mise en scene exposes more of the realistic world than before, since now we see the outside as well as the inside of the house at once, and yet the effect is one of intense general paranoia: the threat of violence is â€Å"real,† not â€Å"remembered† and it is everywhere. The walls have become â€Å"spaces† along which frightening, â€Å"sinuous† shadows weave — â€Å"lurid,† â€Å"grotesque and menacing† (398-99). The parameters of Blanche's presence are unstable images of threatening â€Å"flames† of desire, and this sense of sexual danger seems to draw the action toward itself. So it is as though Blanche somehow â€Å"suggests† rape to Stanley — it is already in the air, we can see it being given to him as if it were a thought: â€Å"You think I'll interfere with you? Ha-ha] †¦ Come to think of it — maybe you wouldn't be bad to — interfere with†¦ † (40I). The â€Å"inner-outer† distinctions of both realistic and expressionistic representation are shown coming together here. Williams makes no effort to suggest that the â€Å"lurid† expressionistic images in Scene Ten are all in Blanche's mind, as cinematic point-of-view would: the world outside the house is the realistic world of urban poverty and violence. But it is also the domain of the brutes, whose â€Å"inhuman jungle voices rise up† (40I) as Stanley, snakelike, tongue between his teeth, closes in. The play seems to swivel on this moment, when the logic of appearance and essence, the individual and the abstract, turns inside-out, like the set, seeming to occupy for once the same space. It is either the demolition of realistic objectivity or the transition-point at which realism takes over some new territory. At this juncture â€Å"objective† vision becomes an â€Å"outside† seen from inside; for the abstraction that allows realism to represent truth objectively cannot itself be explained as objectivity. The surface in Scene Ten seems to be disclosing, without our having to look too deeply, a static primal moment beneath the immediacy of the action — the sexual taboo underneath realistic discourse: BLANCHE Stay back] Don't you come toward me another tep or I'll STANLEY What? BLANCHE Some awful thing will happen] It will] STANLEY What are you putting on now? They are now both inside the bedroom BLANCHE I warn you, don't, I'm in danger] (40I) What â€Å"will happen† in the bedroom does not have a name, or even an agency. The incestuous relation lies beyond the moral and social order of marriage and the family, adaptation and eugenics, not t o mention (as Williams minds us here) the fact that it is unmentionable. Whatever words Blanche uses to describe it scarcely matter. As Stella says, â€Å"I couldn't believe her story and go on living with Stanley† (405). The rape in Streetcar thus seems familiar and inevitable, even to its â€Å"characters,† who lose the shape of characters and become violent antagonists as if on cue: â€Å"Oh] So you want some roughhouse] All right, let's have some roughhouse]† (402). When Blanche sinks to her knees, it is as if the action is an acknowledgment. Stanley holds Blanche, who has become â€Å"inert†; he carries her to the bed. She is not only silent but crumpled, immobile, while he takes over control and agency. He literally places her on the set. But Williams does not suggest that Stanley is conscious and autonomous; on the contrary the scene is constructed so as to make him as unindividuated as Blanche: they seem, at this crucial point, more than ever part of an allegorical landscape. In a way, it is the impersonality of the rape that is most telling: the loss of individuality and the spatial distinctions that allow for â€Å"character† are effected in a scene that expressionistically dissolves character into an overwhelming mise en scene that, itself, seems to make things happen. The â€Å"meaning† of the rape is assigned by the play, denying â€Å"Stanley† and â€Å"Blanche† any emotion. Thus, the rape scene ends without words and without conflict: the scene has become the conflict, and its image the emotion. Perhaps Streetcar — and Williams — present problems for those interested in Pirandellian metatheatre. Metatheatre assumes a self-consciousness of the form; but Williams makes the â€Å"form† everything. It is not arbitrary, or stifling. Stanley and Blanche cannot be reimagined; or, put another way, they cannot be imagined to reimagine themselves as other people, in other circumstances entirely. Character is the expression of the form; it is not accidental, or originary. Like Brecht, Williams does not see character as a humanist impulse raging against fatal abstractions. (In a play like The Good Person of Setzuan, for example, Brecht makes a kind of comedy of this â€Å"tragic† notion — which is of course the notion of â€Å"tragedy. â€Å") Plays are about things other than people: they are about what people think, and feel, and yet they remove these things to a distance, towards the representation of thoughts and feelings, which is something else again. If this seems to suggest that the rape in Streetcar is something other than a rape, and so not a rape, it also suggests that it is as much a rape as it is possible for it to be; it includes the understanding that comes from exposing the essence of appearances, as Williams says, seeing from outside what we cannot see from within. At the same time, and with the same motion, the scene exposes its own scenic limitations for dramatizing that which must inevitably remain outside the scene — namely, the act it represents. Both the surface â€Å"street scene† and the jungle antecedents of social order are visible in the rape scene, thoroughly violating the norms of realism's analytical space. When Stanley â€Å"springs† at Blanche, overturning he table, it is clear that a last barrier has been broken down, and now there is no space outside the jungle. â€Å"We've had this date with each other from the beginning]† We have regressed to some awful zero-point (or hour) of our beginning. (A â€Å"fetid swamp,† Time critic Louis Kronenberger said of Williams' plays, by way of description. (7) We are also back at the heart of civilization, at its root, the incest taboo, and the center of sexuality, which is oddly enough also the center of realism — the family, where â€Å"sexuality is ‘incestuous' from the start. â€Å"(8) At the border of civilization and the swamp is the sexual transgression whose suppression is the source of all coercive order. Through allegory, W illiams makes explicit what realistic discourse obscures, forcing the sexuality that propels discourse into the content of the scene. The destruction of spatial oundaries visualizes the restless discourse of desire, that uncontainable movement between inside and outside. â€Å"Desire,† Williams writes in his short story â€Å"Desire and the Black Masseur† (I942-46), â€Å"is something that is made to occupy a larger space than that which is afforded by the individual being. â€Å"(9) The individual being is only the measure of a measurelessness that goes far out into space. â€Å"Desire† derives from the Latin sidus, â€Å"star† (â€Å"Stella for Star]† 250, 25I ); an archaic sense is â€Å"to feel the loss of†: the ndividual is a sign of incompleteness, not self-sufficiency, whose defining gesture is an indication of the void beyond the visible, not its closure. The consciousness of desire as a void without satisfaction is the rejection o f realism's â€Å"virtual space,† which tried to suggest that its fractured space implied an unseen totality. Realism's objectivity covered up its literariness, as if the play were not created from nothing, but evolved out of a ready-made logic, a reality one had but to look to see. But literature answers the desire for a fullness that remains unfulfilled — it never intersects reality, never completes a trajectory, it remains in orbit. The nothing from which literature springs, whole, cannot be penetrated by a vision, even a hypothetical one, and no time can be found for its beginning. As Paul de Man reasons in his discussion of Levi-Strauss' metaphor of â€Å"virtual focus,† logical sight-lines may be imaginary, but they are not â€Å"fiction,† any more than â€Å"fiction† can be explained as logic: The virtual focus is a quasi-objective structure osited to give rational integrity to a process that exists independently of the self. The subject merely fills in, with the dotted line of geometrical construction, what natural reason had not bothered to make explicit; it has a passive and unproblematic role. The â€Å"virtual focus† is, strictly speaking, a nothing, but its nothingness concerns us very little, since a mere act of r eason suffices to give it a mode of being that leaves the rational order unchallenged. The same is not true of the imaginary source of fiction. Here the human self has experienced the void within itself and the invented fiction, far from tilling the void, asserts itself as pure nothingness, our nothingness stated and restated by a subject that is the agent of its own instability. (I9) Nothingness, then, the impulse of â€Å"fiction,† is not the result of a supposed originary act of transgression, a mere historical lapse at the origin of history that can be traced or filled in by a language of logic and analysis; on the contrary fiction is the liberation of a pure consciousness of desire as unsatisfied yearning, a space without boundaries. Yet we come back to Blanche's rape by her brother-in-law, which seems visibly to re-seal the laws of constraint, to justify that Freudian logic of lost beginnings. Reenacting the traumatic incestuous moment enables history to begin over again, while the suppression of inordinate desire resumes the order of sanity: Stella is silenced; Blanche is incarcerated. And if there is some ambivalence about her madness and her exclusion it is subsumed in an argument for order and a healthy re-direction of desire. In the last stage direction, Stanley's groping fingers discover the opening of Stella's blouse. The final set-up feels inevitable; after all, the game is still â€Å"Seven-card stud,† and aren't we going to have to â€Å"go on† by playing it? The play's turn to realistic logic seems assured, and Williams is still renouncing worlds. He points to the closure of the analytical reading with deft disingenuousness. Closure was always just next door to entrapment: Williams seems to be erasing their boundary-lines. Madness, the brand of exclusion, objectifies Blanche and enables her to be analyzed and confined as the embodiment of non-being, an expression of something beyond us and so structured in language. As Stanley puts it, â€Å"There isn't a goddam thing but imagination] †¦ And lies and conceit and tricks]† (398). Foucault has argued, in Madness and Civilization, that the containment of desire's excess through the exclusion of madness creates a conscience on the perimeters of society, setting up a boundary between inside and outside: â€Å"The madman is put into the interior of the exterior, and inversely† (II). (I0) Blanche is allegorically a reminder that liberty if taken too far can also be captivity, just as her libertinage coincides with her desire for death (her satin robe is a passionate red, she calls Stanley her â€Å"executioner,† etc. . And Blanche senses early on the threat of confinement; she keeps trying perversely) to end the play: â€Å"I have to plan for us both, to get us both — out]† she tells Stella, after the fight with Stanley that seems, to Blanche, so final (320). But in the end the play itself seems to have some troub le letting go of Blanche. Having created its moving boundary line, it no longer knows where to put her: what â€Å"space† does her â€Å"madness† occupy? As the dialogue suggests, she has to go – somewhere; she has become excessive. Yet she keeps coming back: â€Å"I'm not quite ready. â€Å"Yes] Yes, I forgot something]† (4I2 4I4). Again, as in the rape scene, she is chased around the bedroom, this time by the Matron, while â€Å"The ‘Varsouviana' is filtered into a weird distortion, accompanied by the cries and noises of the jungle,† the â€Å"lurid,† â€Å"sinuous† reflections on the walls (4I4). The Matron's lines are echoed by â€Å"other mysterious voices† (4I5) somewhere beyond the scene; she sounds like a â€Å"firebell† (4I5). â€Å"Matron† and â€Å"Doctor† enter the play expressionistically, as functional agents, and Blanche's paranoia is now hers alone: the street is not visible. The walls do not disintegrate, they come alive. Blanche is inside her own madness, self-imprisoned: her madness is precisely her enclosure within the image. (II) In her paranoid state, Blanche really cannot â€Å"get out,† because there no longer is an outside: madness transgresses and transforms boundaries, as Foucault notes, â€Å"forming an act of undetermined content† (94). It thus negates the image while imprisoned within it; the boundaries of the scene are not helping to define Blanche but reflecting her back to herself. Blanche's power is not easy to suppress; she is a eminder that beneath the appearance of order something nameless has been lost: â€Å"What's happened here? I want an explanation of what's happened here. † she says, â€Å"with sudden hysteria† (407-8). It is a reasonable request that cannot be reasonably answered. This was also Williams' problem at the end of The Glass Menagerie: how to escape from the image when it seems to have bee n given too much control, when its reason is absolute? Expressionism threatens the reason of realistic mise en scene by taking it perhaps too far, stretching the imagination beyond limits toward an absoluteness of the image, a desire of desire. The â€Å"mimetic† mirror now becomes the symbol of madness: the image no longer simply reflects desire (desire of, desire for), but subsumes the mirror itself into the language of desire. When Blanche shatters her mirror (39I) she (like Richard II) shows that her identity has already been fractured; what she sees in the mirror is not an image, it is indistinguishable from herself. And she cries out when the lantern is torn off the lightbulb, because there is no longer a space between the violence she experiences and the image of that violence. The inner and the outer worlds fuse, the reflecting power of the image is destroyed as it becomes fully self-reflective. The passion of madness exists somewhere in between determinism and expression, which at this point â€Å"actually form only one and the same movement which cannot be dissociated except after the fact. â€Å"(I2) But realism, that omnivorous discourse, can subsume even the loss of the subjective-objective distinction — when determinism equals expression — and return to some quasi-objective perspective. Thus at the very moment when all space seems to have been conquered, filled in and opened up, there is a need to parcel it out again into clearly distinguishable territories. Analysis imprisons desire. At the end of A Streetcar Named Desire, there is a little drama. Blanche's wild expressionistic images are patronized and pacified by theatricality: â€Å"I — just told her that — we'd made arrangements for her to rest in the country. She's got it mixed in her mind with Shep Huntleigh† (404-5). Her family plays along with Blanche's delusions, even to costuming her in her turquoise seahorse pin and her artificial violets. The Matron tries to subdue her with physical violence, but Blanche is only really overcome by the Doctor's politeness. Formerly an expressionistic â€Å"type,† having â€Å"the unmistakable aura of the state institution with its cynical detachment† (4II), the Doctor †¦ takes off his hat and now he becomes personalized. The unhuman quality goes. His voice is gentle and reassuring s he crosses to Blanche and crouches in front of her. As he speaks her name, her terror subsides a little. The lurid reflections fade from the walls, the inhuman cries and noises die our and her own hoarse crying is calmed. 4I7) Blanche's expressionistic fit is contained by the Doctor's realistic transformation: he is particularized, he can play the role of gentleman caller. â€Å"Jacket, Doctor? † the Matron asks him. † He smiles †¦ It won't be necessary† (4I7-I8). As they exit, Blanche's visionary excesses have clearly been surrendered to him: â€Å"She allows him to lead her as if she were blind. † Stylistically, he, realism replaces expressionism at the exact moment when expressionism's â€Å"pure subjectivity† seems ready to annihilate the subject, to result in her violent subjugation. At this point the intersubjective dialogue returns, clearly masking indeed blinding — the subjective disorder with a assuring form. If madness is perceived as a kind of â€Å"social failure,†(I3) social success is to be its antidote. Of course theater is a cure for madness: by dramatizing or literalizing the image one destroys it. Such theatricality might risk its own confinement in the image, and for an instant there may be a real struggle in the drama between the image and the effort to contain it. But the power of realism over expressionism makes this a rare occasion. For the â€Å"ruse,† Foucault writes, â€Å"†¦ ceaselessly confirming the delirium , does not bind it to its own truth without at the same time linking it to the necessity for its own suppression† (I89). Using illusion to destroy illusion requires a forgetting of the leap of reason and of the trick it plays on optics. To establish order, the theatrical device repeats the ordering principle it learns from theater, the representational gap between nature and language, a gap it has to deny: â€Å"The artificial reconstitution of delirium constitutes the real distance in which the sufferer recovers his liberty† (I90). In fact there is no return to â€Å"intersubjectivity,† just a kind of formal recognition of it: â€Å"Whoever you are — I have always depended on the kindness of strangers. † Streetcar makes the return to normality gentle and theatrical, while â€Å"revealing† much more explicitly than The Glass Menagerie the violence that is thereby suppressed. This violence is not â€Å"reality,† but yet another theater underneath the theater of ruse; the cure of illusion is ironically â€Å"effected by the suppression of theater† (I9I). The realistic containment at the end of Streetcar hus does not quite make it back all the way to realism's seamlessly objective â€Å"historical† truth. History, structured as it is by â€Å"relations of power, not relations of meaning,†(I4) sometimes assumes the power of reality itself, the platonic Form behind realism, so to speak, When it becomes the language of authority, history also assumes the authorit y of language, rather naively trusting language to be the reality it represents. The bloody wars and strategic battles are soon forgotten into language, the past tense, the fait accompli. Useless to struggle against the truth that is past: history is the waste of time and the corresponding conquest of space, and realism is the already conquered territory, the belated time with the unmistakable stamp of authenticity. It gets applause simply by being plausible; it forgets that it is literature. To read literature, de Man says, we ought to remember what we have learned from it — that the expression and the expressed can never entirely coincide, that no single observation point is trustworthy (I0-II). Streetcar's powerful explosion of allegorical language and expressionistic images keeps its vantage point on the move, at a remove. Every plot is untied. Realism rewards analysis, and Williams invites it, perversely, but any analysis results in dissection. To provide Streetcar with an exegesis seems like gratuitous destruction, â€Å"deliberate cruelty. † Perhaps no other American writer since Dickinson has seemed so easy to crush. And this consideration ought to give the writer who has defined Blanche's â€Å"madness† some pause. Even the critical awareness of her tidy incarceration makes for too tidy a criticism. In Derrida's analysis of Foucault's Madness and Civilization, he questions the possibility of â€Å"historicizing† something that does not exist outside of the imprisonment of history, of speech — madness â€Å"simply says the other of each determined form of the logos. â€Å"(I5) Madness, Derrida proposes, is a â€Å"hyperbole† out of which â€Å"finite-thought, that is to say, history† establishes its â€Å"reign† by the â€Å"disguised internment, humiliation, fettering and mockery of the madman within us, of the madman who can only be a fool of a logos which is father, master and king† (60-6I). Philosophy arises from the â€Å"confessed terror of going mad† (62); it is the â€Å"economic† embrace of madness (6I-62) To me then Williams' play seems to end quite reasonably with a struggle, at the point in the play at which structure and coherence must assert themselves (by seeming to) — that is, the end of the play. The end must look back, regress, so as to sum up and define. It has no other choice. The theatrical ending always becomes, in fact, the real ending. It cannot remain metaphorically an â€Å"end† And what is visible at the end is Blanche in trouble, trapped, mad. She is acting as though she believed in a set of events — Shep Huntleigh's rescue of her — that the other characters, by their very encouragement, show to be unreal. There is a fine but perhaps important line here: Blanche's acting is no more convincing than theirs; but — and this is a point Derrida makes about madness — she is thinking things before they can be historicized, that is, before they have happened or even have been shown to be likely or possible (reasonable). Is not what is called finitude possibility as crisis? † Derrida asks (62). The other characters, who behave as if what Blanche is saying were real, underline her absurdity precisely by invoking reality. Blanche's relations to history and to structural authority are laid bare by this â€Å"forced† ending, in which she repeatedly questions the meaning of meaning: â€Å"What has happened here? † This question implies the relativity of space and moment, and so of â€Å"ev ents† and their meanings, which are at-this point impossible to separate. That is why it is important that the rape suggest an overthrow of meaning, not only through a stylized emphasis on its own representation, but also through its strongly relativized temporality. (Blanche warns against what â€Å"will happen,† while Stanley says the event is the future, the fulfillment of a â€Å"date† or culmination in time promised â€Å"from the beginning. â€Å") Indeed, the problem of madness lies precisely in this gap between past and future, in the structural slippage between the temporal and the ontological. For if madness, as Derrida suggests, can exist at all outside of opposition (to reason), it must exist in â€Å"hyperbole,† in the excess prior to its incarceration in structure, meaning, time, and coherence. A truly â€Å"mad† person would not objectify madness — would not, that is, define and locate it. That is why all discussions of â€Å"madness† tend to essentialize it, by insisting, like Blanche's fellow characters at the end of Streetcar, that it is real, that it exists. And the final stroke of logic, the final absurdity, is that in order to insist that madness exists, to objectify and define and relate to it, it is necessary to deny it any history. Of course â€Å"madness† is not at all amenable to history, to structure, causality, rationality, recognizable â€Å"though† But this denial of the history of madness has to come from within history itself, from within the language of structure and â€Å"meaning. † Blanche's demand to know â€Å"what has happened here† — her insistence that something â€Å"has happened,† however one takes it — has to be unanswerable. It cannot go any further. In theatrical terms, the â€Å"belief† that would make that adventure of meaning possible has to be denied, shut down. But this theatrical release is not purifying; on the contrary, it has got up close to the plague, to the point at which reason and belief contaminate each other: the: possibility of thinking madly. Reason and madness can cohabitate with nothing but a thin curtain between. And curtains are not walls, they do not provide solid protection. (I6) Submitting Williams' allegorical language to ealistic analysis, then, brings you to conclusions: the imprisonment of madness, the loss of desire. The moral meaning smooths things over. Planning to â€Å"open up† Streetcar for the film version with outside scenes and flashbacks, Elia Kazan found it would not work — he ended up making the walls movable so they could actually close in more with every scene. (I7) The sense of entrapment was fundamental: Williams' dramatic language is its elf too free, too wanton, it is a trap, it is asking to be analyzed, it lies down on the couch. Kazan saw this perverse desire in the play — he thought Streetcar was about Williams' cruising for tough customers: The reference to the kind of life Tennessee was leading rear the time was clear. Williams was aware of the dangers he was inviting when he cruised; he knew that sooner or later he'd be beaten up. And he was. (35I) But Kazan undervalues the risk Williams is willing to take. It is not just violence that cruising invites, but death. And that is a desire that cannot be realized. Since there is really no way to get what you want, you have to put yourself in a position where you do not always want what you get. Pursuing desire requires a heroic vulnerability. At the end of â€Å"Desire and the Black Masseur† the little masochistic artist/saint, Anthony Burns, is cannibalized by the masseur, who has already beaten him to a pulp. Burns, who is thus consumed by his desire, makes up for what Williams calls his â€Å"incompletion. † Violence, or submission to violence, is analogous to art, for Williams: both mask the inadequacies of form. Yes, it is perfect,† thinks the masseur, whose manipulations have tortured Bums to death. â€Å"It is now completed]†(I8) NOTBS I Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire, in The Theatre of Tennessee Williams, vol. I (New York, I97I), 246. Subsequent references are to this edition and rear nod by page number in the text. 2 See Conversations with Tennessee Williams, ed. Albert J. Devlin (Jackson, Miss . , I986). 3 Paul de Man, Blindness and Insight: Essays in the Rhetoric of Contemporary Criticism, 2nd ed. , revised (Minneapolis, I983), I2. See de Man, Blindness and Insight, I87ff, where he outlines the critical movements in Western Europe and the U. S. that have thus â€Å"openly raise d the question of the intentionality of rhetorical figures† (I88). Among the critics he cites are Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, and Michel Foucault (to whose work I will turn later in this essay). Subsequent references to Blindness and Insight are noted by page number in the text. 5 Tennessee Williams, The Gloss Menagerie (New York, I97I). 6 Stanley is quoting Huey Long. 7 See Gore Vidal's â€Å"Introduction† to Tennessee Williams' Collected Short Stories (New York, I985) xxv. 8 Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. I: An Introduction, trans. Robert Hurley (New York, I978), I08-9. 9. Tennessee Williams, â€Å"Desire and the Black Masseur,† in Collected Stories (New York, I985), 2I7. I0 Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, trans. Richard Howard (New York, I965). II. Ibid. , 94. I2 Ibid. , 88. I3 Ibid. , 259-60. Subsequent references are noted by page number in the text. I4 Michel Foucault, Power/Knowledge: Selected

Thursday, November 7, 2019

Free Essays on Egyptian Religion

Presentation on Egyption Religion Every aspect of the Ancient Egyptian life was guided through religion. Their religous beliefs where based on Polylthemism which meant "the worship of many gods". Creation, was an event with many tales in the egyption life. One idea of creation was the the ram-god Khnum styled the universe on his potter's wheel. Others said that creation was a spiritual and not a physical act. The divine thought that Ptah shaped the universe. These are just a few examples of the many ideas of how the universe was produced. The story of creation that stands out from the rest and that was believed by many was that of the Sun-god Ra. The egyptians believed that only the ocean existed at first. The creation story of Ra goes as follows... "Then Ra, the Sun, came out of an egg (flower, in some versions) that appereared on the sufrace of the water. Ra brought forth four children, the gods Shu and Geb and the goddesses Tefnut and Nut. Shu and Tefnut became the atmosphere. They stood on Geb, who became the earth, and raised up Nut, who became the shy. Ra ruled over all. Geb and Nut later had two sons, Set and Osiris, and two daughters, Isis and Nephthys. Osiris succeeded Ra as King of the Earth, helped by Isis, his sister-wife. Set, however, hated his brother and killed him, Isis then embalmed her husband's body with the help of the god Anubis, who thus became the god of embalming, The powerful charms of Isis resurrected Osiris, who became king of the netherworld, the land of the dead. Horus, who was the son of Osiris and Isis, later defeated Set in a great battle and became king of the earth." Some early cosomological myths represented the heavens as a great, star-strudded cow, sometimes called Hathor or Athor, curving above the earth. Regardless of the many creation myths and ranking of gods, it's clear the ancient Egyptian generated many deities, that those gods were inherent in nature, and that enabled the E... Free Essays on Egyptian Religion Free Essays on Egyptian Religion Presentation on Egyption Religion Every aspect of the Ancient Egyptian life was guided through religion. Their religous beliefs where based on Polylthemism which meant "the worship of many gods". Creation, was an event with many tales in the egyption life. One idea of creation was the the ram-god Khnum styled the universe on his potter's wheel. Others said that creation was a spiritual and not a physical act. The divine thought that Ptah shaped the universe. These are just a few examples of the many ideas of how the universe was produced. The story of creation that stands out from the rest and that was believed by many was that of the Sun-god Ra. The egyptians believed that only the ocean existed at first. The creation story of Ra goes as follows... "Then Ra, the Sun, came out of an egg (flower, in some versions) that appereared on the sufrace of the water. Ra brought forth four children, the gods Shu and Geb and the goddesses Tefnut and Nut. Shu and Tefnut became the atmosphere. They stood on Geb, who became the earth, and raised up Nut, who became the shy. Ra ruled over all. Geb and Nut later had two sons, Set and Osiris, and two daughters, Isis and Nephthys. Osiris succeeded Ra as King of the Earth, helped by Isis, his sister-wife. Set, however, hated his brother and killed him, Isis then embalmed her husband's body with the help of the god Anubis, who thus became the god of embalming, The powerful charms of Isis resurrected Osiris, who became king of the netherworld, the land of the dead. Horus, who was the son of Osiris and Isis, later defeated Set in a great battle and became king of the earth." Some early cosomological myths represented the heavens as a great, star-strudded cow, sometimes called Hathor or Athor, curving above the earth. Regardless of the many creation myths and ranking of gods, it's clear the ancient Egyptian generated many deities, that those gods were inherent in nature, and that enabled the E...

Tuesday, November 5, 2019

The Use of Guns for Self Defense to Deter Crime

The Use of Guns for Self Defense to Deter Crime The Second Amendment says, A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed. It mentions nothing about self-defense. In modern American politics, however, much of the gun rights debate has centered on the aspect of using guns for defense of life and property. The D.C. handgun case and the Chicago gun ban challenge saw plaintiffs use self-defense as an effective argument for overturning gun bans. Today, several states have enacted often-controversial â€Å"stand your ground† or â€Å"Castle Doctrine† laws permitting, within specific legal parameters, the use of deadly force in acts of self-defense against actual or reasonably perceived threats of bodily harm. In February 2012, the fatal shooting of unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin by Sanford, Florida neighborhood watch captain George Zimmerman propelled state  stand your ground laws squarely into the spotlight of the gun control debate.   Exact numbers for the impact of firearms on crime are difficult to come by. Much of the research into the impact of guns as a crime deterrent comes from the work of Dr. Gary Kleck, a Florida State University criminologist. Guns in Self-Defense Kleck released a study in 1993 showing that guns are used in defense of crime 2.5 million times each year, an average of once every 13 seconds. Kleck’s survey concluded that guns are used in defense of crime three-to-four times more often than they’re used in the commission of a crime. Surveys conducted prior to Kleck’s found that incidents of gun use  in self-defense ranged from 800,000 to 2.5 million each year. A U.S. Department of Justice Survey released in 1994, â€Å"Guns in America,† estimated 1.5 million defensive gun uses each year. According to the U.S. Department of Justice report, Firearm Violence, 1993-2011, about 1% of nonfatal violent crime victims nationwide used a firearm in self-defense. From 2007 to 2011, there were 235,700 confrontations in which the victim used a firearm to threaten or attack an offender. This amounted to approximately 1% of all nonfatal violent victimizations in the 5-year period. Guns as a Deterrent Studies by Kleck and the Department of Justice concluded that guns are frequently used to protect crime victims. But do they serve as a deterrent to crime? Findings are mixed. A study by professors James D. Wright and Peter Rossi surveyed nearly 2,000 incarcerated felons and concluded that criminals are more worried about running into armed victims than law enforcement. According to the Wright-Rossi survey, 34% of the felons responding from state prisons said that they had been â€Å"scared off, shot at, wounded or captured† by a victim armed with a firearm. The same percentage said they worried about being fired upon by armed victims, while 57% said they were more concerned with encountering an armed victim than encountering law enforcement officers. Avoiding Armed Robberies America’s liberal gun laws are often criticized as a contributor to the U.S.’s relatively high rates of violent crime. Homicide rates in the U.S. are among the highest in the world, exceeding homicide rates in some nations that have clamped down on civilian gun ownership. However, Kleck studied crime rates from Great Britain and the Netherlands, two nations with much stricter gun ownership laws than the U.S., and concluded that the risk of armed robbery is lower in America because of loose gun laws. The rate of burglaries at occupied homes (â€Å"hot† burglaries) in Great Britain and the Netherlands is 45%, compared to a rate of 13% in the U.S. Comparing those rates to the percentage of hot burglaries in which the homeowner is threatened or attacked (30%), Kleck concluded that there would be an additional 450,000 burglaries in the U.S. in which homeowners are threatened or attacked if the rate of hot burglaries in the U.S. was similar to the rate in Great Britain. The lower rate in the U.S. is attributed to widespread gun ownership.   Updated by Robert Longley Sources Kleck, Gary, and Marc Gertz. Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense with a Gun. Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology Fall, 1995, https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article6853contextjclc. Planty, Michael, and Jennifer L. Truman. â€Å"Firearm Violence, 1993-2011.†Ã‚  Bureau of Justice Statistics, May 2013, www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/fv9311.pdf. Wright, James D., and Peter H. Rossi. â€Å"PUBLICATIONS.†Ã‚  NCJRS Abstract - National Criminal Justice Reference Service, 1994, www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID155885.

Saturday, November 2, 2019

Recycling of biological waste for local production of vegetables in Research Paper

Recycling of biological waste for local production of vegetables in Nairobi, Kenya - Research Paper Example These foci include: identifying locally relevant options; optimization of composting processes; organization of any waste handling that occurs; the homogeneity and safety of the generated products; and acceptance of the generated products by end users. Here it will be analyzed what roles soil, plants, and oxygen play in composting in rural communities such as the one described here. Usually, what happens with soil is that the moisture in composting tends to have various gases that are eliminated into the air due to organic elements having been introduced into the soil. â€Å"The moisture content of casts is an important driving force controlling the direction of nitrification–denitrification process, thus in dry– wet cycles, increases and decreases in ammonium and nitrate contents, respectively, may occur. Therefore, the decreases in water content of casts over time may favour the predomination of nitrification processes† (Aira, Monroy, & Dominguez, 2005, pp. 470 ). Additionally, plant life is especially important to composting organic elements within the soil. â€Å"The root basis of plants with an age of more than three years are places of ‘retreat’ for earthworms during the dry season when the soil completely dries out up to a depth of 1 meter and more†¦Within this rotting material, small numbers of epigeic living earthworms can be found† (Bierwirth, 2001, pp. 3). Oxygen is also a very important element in the composting process. â€Å"The results [of this study] are relevant to the supply of oxygen†¦to sediments for the phytopurification of waste waters, to the efflux of methane and carbon dioxide from wetlands, and to rice cultivation† (Armstrong & Armstrong, 2001, Abstract). II. Objectives (100 words) The main focus of the research proposal is much in the direction of safe handling of urban wastes, the processing and the quality of the end product as a soil amendment. As mentioned, the work is plann ed to take place in Nairobi. Some of the recent work on urban agriculture and waste recycling will be analyzed. This includes knowing what steps are necessary to take in composting, and how current research has helped inform the approach that will be taken. It is hoped that, with this research, third-world composting in rural Africa will become more widely-accepted and widely-adopted all over. III. Research Questions (1,250 words) Research Questions (50 words) Research questions include the following: a) What are locally relevant options? B) How can composting processes be optimized? c) How is waste handling organized? How homogenous and safe are the generated products? and d) What is the acceptance of the end products by the public? a. Locally Relevant Options for Vegetable Production in Nairobi (300 words) Locally relevant options include trying to control pests. Pests can affect crops, which can then make the problem of yield losses worse, when trying to produce cash crops. †Å"[P]ests may affect yield loss independently in natural farming, but in conventional paddies, multiple pest injury may interact synergistically, compounding yield loss† (Andow & Hidaka, 1998, Abstract). Another locally relevant option for vegetable production in Nairobi might be testing the soil. It is important to know what type of soil is being used for which