To Whom So Ever It May Concern

About six months ago, I devoted a considerable amount of my time searching the Internet for an appropriate graduate school where I could utilize and advance my knowledge as well as achieve my primary goal to work in the areas of graphic and web designing.I narrowed my choices to four graduate schools, namely, Dakota State University, Montana Tech, University of Missouri Kansas City, and University of California, San Diego Extension or UCSD. After further research my final choice was the Digital Arts Center at the UCSD. I was convinced and impressed after talking to friends, alumni and after reviewing available material about the Digital Arts Center that I had made the right choice.I will definitely recommend this School to anyone aspiring to make a career in the Digital Arts. Information Technology enables improved decision-making and information sharing, provides access to resources previously unavailable to business, facilitates learner-centered instructional organizations, makes p ossible new kinds of learning for students, and creates new professional development.In my opinion the happiest person is that person who works in a job that interests him or her. I like to learn new skills and acquiring up to date information, because they can help me to adapt to a fast-changing world, enrich my experiences, explore my interest, and give me higher self-esteem.I believe in the maxim that education is a constant pursuit, and that educated persons devotes their entire life to the quest for knowledge. At present I am working as an aircraft charter Coordinator and dispatcher for a private Jet firm. For the past few years I have been preparing marketing material for my company using Adobe Photoshop and this has brought to the surface my latent talent and desire to work in this fascinating field.My competence in this field has won me numerous accolades from my employers. I am very good at computers and have an innate talent for grasping the nuances of computer hardware an d software. My intention is to change my career to graphic and web designing.A visit to your fascinating web site reveals that the courses of particular interest to me, on offer are, first, digital design and communication, which involves the working with illustrations, photography, publications, etc. This course will help me to develop comprehensive presentation skills. Second, web design and production, this course enables one to create professional level projects.Third, multimedia production, this course makes one an expert in special effects, etc.(digital arts center, n.d). The well-qualified and experienced faculty, excellent laboratory facilities, exceptional research work and the inspiration given to students would provide me with an ideal platform for achieving my goals.I look upon the courses offered by you as avenues to achieve my objective. I assure you that I would keep up my diligence and good demeanor during the course. I hope you find my purpose definitive and that I satisfy your requirements in respect of a promising student. I am eagerly looking forward to prove my capability in your esteemed institution.References.Digital arts center. UCSD Extension. n.d. Retrieved from http://dac.ucsd.edu/index2.htm

Ownership of Two Contrasting Businesses Essay

Asda is the second largest retailer in the UK, and it has been the largest subsidiary of the Wal-Mart family of companies since 1999. The UK’s supermarket sector has also become more competitive. This contest between retailers in the marketplace helps to keep prices down. It also makes sure that organisations always produce and sell the goods that consumers really want. Asda is engaged in food, clothes, electronic and furniture selling. Consumers like price competition, as it means they can buy goods at low prices and save money. Asda is a large national company that makes a profit and it is private as well. Asda has a limited liability which means that they might lose the money they have invested in a business. This company is an incorporated business and it is also a public limited company. The main aims and objectives of Asda are: †¢To provide goods and services that is cheap and affordable to consumers to the public, to reduce the cost †¢To recycling their waste †¢To supporting voluntary services Oxfam is a small not-for-profit organisation and it is a global company because it operates in countries around the world. It is owned by Oxfam Trading Limited Companies and it is in private sector. The main aims and objective of this company are: †¢To Aid third world countries in any way they can †¢To relieve poverty, distress and suffering †¢To educate people about the nature, causes and effects if poverty †¢To campaign for a fairer world †¢To encourage western nations to supply aid to third world countries.

Fluid ingestion can we overhydrate How does hypokalemia fit into this Essay

Fluid ingestion can we overhydrate How does hypokalemia fit into this - Essay Example Most of the time, runners in marathon as they engage on the activity induce or drink fluids in excess to the idea that this will help them stay longer. Not also marathon runners do, but also those who are engaging in tough physical activities like sports who always have liters of water on their side to quench their thirst. Marathon runners should be informed that drinking too much water is not advisable as the engage in that sweat pouring activity. Too much fluid may dilute body salts that will result to the blood to have more water and too little sodium. This situation will cause brain cells to get or absorb more water. It will later swell and push against the skull (De Noon, D., 2003). The human brain would more likely be affected to over-hydration, since this is the organ of the body that is most susceptible to it. During the initial stage of water intoxication or over-hydration, change of behavior can be observed. A person who suffers the effect of over-hydration may suffer drows iness, inattentiveness, nausea and vomiting, weakness and rapid breathing. Adrogue H.J., Madias N.E., (1581-1589), English doctors revealed the dangers of over-hydration. They said, These words from experts support the former idea of the danger that over-hydration can do to humans, and how much we should avoid it. It is not only the early symptoms wherein we should be worry at, but even to the greatest risk that it could give, which is death. Dr. Arthur Siegel, an expert from Mc Lean Hospital in Belmont, MA (Harvard affiliated hospital) declared; April 2006, in Boston Marathon, Cynthia Lucero, 28 years old, died because of over-hydration effects in a 22-mile mark marathon. Another marathon runner, KC Lucero also suffered water intoxication, but fortunately survived. According to her, prior the race she increased her salt intake about a week

BBC DMI project Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

BBC DMI project - Essay Example Leadership is defined as the capability to get whole things done by others. The project leadership skill helps to pay emphasis on the efforts of the group members towards the common objective and thus allowing them to perform better (Andersen, 2006). The effective project leadership skill helps in the decision making as well as problem solving process. It provides direction to the staff members in making important decision related to the execution of the project (Andersen, 2006). It also assists in the team building process. Effective leadership skill of an individual guides the team in case of any conflict that might occur while performing the work. If the employees perform well and pay attention towards the project’s transparency then the project will not lead to failure (Shenhar, 2004). Due to the effectual project management skill, it was assured by BBC that the organisation was on its path in order to deliver the programme without any delays. The Digital Media Initiative programme was absolutely essential for the BBC and it was also stated that the future of British Broadcasting Corporation was coupled with the thriving delivery of the DMI programme (National Audit Office, 2015).

The adventure of sherlock holmes Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

The adventure of sherlock holmes - Essay Example Components such as plot, character and narrator make understanding of the stories quite easy. While a number of publications do not have all the components, others employ all for the purpose of drawing meaning. Doyle uses plot, narrative and character to help simplify the stories and ensure clear understanding of the stories (Doyle, 3). In the ‘Adventure of Red Headed League’, Doyle uses plot, narrator and character to help open up the story to the reader for a better consumption (Doyle, 45). With respect to plot, the sequence of events from one issue to another helps the reader to connect the dots and relate the content of the story. This is what brings an understanding to the reader. For instance, Holmes and Watson are vastly mentioned in the adventure. In the plot, the lines reveal multiple sides of Holmes while being silent on Watson. The plot of the story is choreographed in such a way that Holmes is portrayed as all knowing and tries to jargon through a number of issues. Through this, Doyle makes the story to be understood through the interactions between Watson and Holmes. Holmes as in the story has a character that is questionable (Doyle, 65). Throughout the story, the reader is left pondering on how Holmes is to behave in the next coming lines. Flipping over the pages is eminent as the readerà ¢â‚¬â„¢s attention is drawn to the events. The plot of the story makes it possible to understand the wellbeing of the individuals in the adventure to the extent that it becomes easy to understand the essence of everyone’s role and background. Consequently, in the Red-Headed League, there are events that are characteristics of the use of a plot (Doyle, 80). Mr. Holmes in the story is met by a man disturbed man whose descriptions in the definition of a joke. His concern is to get to the bottom of the messages going about claiming that he is a joker. From this point, his search for the truth makes him to move from one step to the other with Holmes being

Why Has Apple become increasing popular Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Why Has Apple become increasing popular - Essay Example The company started as a computer company with the best known hardware being the Mac computers, the iPhone, iPod music player and the iPad tablet computer. All of the company’s hardware operates on consumer software known as the iOS operating system and for comparison purposes it can be likened to Microsoft’s operating system called Windows. The company has gone through a dynamic metamorphosis from a computer company to a consumer electronics company since its founding days in 1976 to present. The incorporation’s consistent innovation and inventions I the information technology industry has seen it steadily rise to become one of the leaders in the market. This can be attributed to a myriad of factors that have been strategically combined the founders of the company to facilitate the transition of the company from just a mere computer company to a giant in the industry. This paper seeks to discuss the factors behind Apple Inc.’s increasing popularity in the global consumer electronics market.... The advent of the internet and rapid advancement in information technology (IT) resulted in globalization and the propagation of mobile communication devices (West, Joel & Mace 2). Steve Jobs was the co-founder and owner of Apple Computers Inc. and his accredited with turning the company’s fortunes around when he designed, developed and introduced the iPhone into the company’s products portfolio. The company changed its name to Apple Inc. an indication that it was breaking away from tradition and venturing into the consumer electronics industry. The consumer electronics industry is characterized by electronic equipment meant for everyday use in office productivity, entertainment and communication (Gross 3). This can be lauded as Apple Inc.’s turning point to profitability after its slump pre-consumer electronics era. This led to the growth of Apple’s market share into a global phenomenon changing its previous market niche of the US only. The companyâ€℠¢s venture into the consumer electronics market with the iPhone, iPod and iPad revolutionized the mobile device communication and technology (Bostic 1). The combination of the introduction of new consumer electronic products and consistent innovation of mobile phones, personal computers and portable music players can be attributed to Apple’s rise in the industry. Apple Inc. operates in a technology intensive market that is characterized by cutthroat competition and a constantly changing environment in terms of product relevance and market dynamics. Technology is at the core of Apple’s contemporary market that ranges from commonplace consumer products which is the main focus of its niche market to esoteric products. Apple’s Steve

Project Mangement Paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Project Mangement Paper - Essay Example The project management has been defined by many researchers such as Crawford, Pollack and England (2006), Georgieva and Allan (2008), Kwak and Anbari (2008) and Pfeffer (2010), but still there is no single concrete definition for it. However, Dr. Denis Petersen (2009) described project management as the way by which an organisation accomplishes the goal of completing its projects on time. The project is defined as a venture in which financial, human and material sources are combined together in an organised way to perform work that has a unique scope along with a particular set of specifications that have some time and cost constraints (Smyth and Morris, 2007). Malhotra, Majchrzak and Benson (2007) rightly stated that the main aim of the project is to acquire a change that is beneficial for the organisation and that it is defined and measured by setting both qualitative and quantitative objectives. According to Pinto and Slevin (1998) cited by Georgieva and Allan (2008), project mana gement can be best described as the management of a project which has the following characteristics: a beginning and an end, i.e. specific time for completion; a predetermined goal or set of goals; and a set of interrelated activities and a limited budget. In order to manage the projects well, it is important to have good project managers. The project managers are the leaders who have to ensure that everything regarding the project is properly sequenced and planned out –i.e. the issues of raw materials, human resources and finances need to be addressed beforehand. The primary duties of the project manager are building the best team for the project, co-ordinating with the team members, establishing vision and communicating it to the team members, establishing realistic goals, motivating the team members to perform effectively, and encouraging people to stretch while communicating appropriately with each other (Peterson, 2009). Nine Key Skills and Managerial Elements As regards the duration of A3 HindHead project, it can be said that the project management team has considered all the factors of the project: time, cost and quality. Although the project had been in pipeline since 1970s, the right time to control the traffic on the bridge came in 2011. The most important elements considered in the project management of the aforementioned situation are the project’s scope, time, cost, workforce and the procurement for the project. The foremost aspect that needs to be considered is the scope of the project. The project manager needs to first identify the aims, goals and objectives of the clients. It is important to have clarity about the vision of the project; once the vision is clear, the direction will be well-set and goals will be achieved within the agreed time period. Along with the scope of the project, it is important to identify the cost and time limitations, i.e. when the project should be completed, how the project’s progress will be me asured and what will be done to ensure that the obstacles are tackled. Likewise, the budget designing is important so that the project manager has ample ideas about the financial constraints the client faces. Simultaneously, the project manager has to ensure that the workforce is well-motivated and has a clear understanding about the goals and objectives to be attained. For the project manager, it is important to motivate the workforce, especially the workers, so that they perform all the

ExperienceBased Theory Critique Social Science Essay

ExperienceBased Theory Critique Social Science - Essay Example The occurrence of the above mentioned criminal mindset and how the same gets nurtured in an individual right from the its formative age could be explained through Gordon Allport's theory of "The formation of In Groups". The crime and its implications has to be made understood to each and every citizen of the nation right from the stage he or she starts getting the feel of the society and things that have been associated with it. The most important philosophy around which the whole act of crime and crime prevention hovers is that this crime is very much a manmade enigma and the perpetrators or the criminals are not born, they are developed in this society and later become a bane to the same society from where it has been developed. In other words it can be understood that crime is very much a human act and if we take out the civilization clause from the dictionary of human society and make it equivalent to the savagery, this crime is not exactly something which can be termed inhumane. It's something present in very nature of humans and they technically possess every characteristic of an animal. It is a threat that is comparable to anything that has been faced by the society in past but is actually a very intelligent form of threat that waits for the opportunity to transform its ability into an act of crime under the influence of desire. Hence this phenomenon of crime is basically an action which involves at least two human beings with one being the perpetrator and the other one is the victim. Crime prevention is another part of the solution that has to tackle the social complexity of crime. Though the legal procedures and enforcement agencies are very much present to redress the problem, they have miserably failed to provide something which will have some long term impact. They actually provide security either through prosecution or through prevention. Prosecution leads to arrest and a whole lot of legal procedures including the judgment and imprisonment. Prevention deals with stopping a criminal from committing something heinous. The option of committing a crime is to be closed. Hence the target issue is the creation the hindrance for a criminal through wide spread precautionary measures being implemented through every single home to any of the working place or public place present in the locality. The important point is to shield oneself from being a victim. The crime and its different techniques have to be made understood to each and every person. Right from the begin ning i.e., during childhood, one should be made aware of the prevention procedures and the importance of it has to be made a part of the complete thought process. But still after this much precaution the outcome of these procedures has been found to be very much limited and the crime rate is on its way to rise and rise. The most important thing is to act against the cause that make a criminal rather than reducing the opportunities for him to commit some crime. We have to realize that this criminal has been developed from this society only and the problem is in the social pattern and due to these patterns we have to face certain people who have got out of the normal way of social life and are acting against the group of which it is a very important part. So the

Strategic HRM Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 1

Strategic HRM - Essay Example een the purpose of human resources to the strategic objectives in an organization aiming to improve and sustain the organization’s performance (Gratton et al 1999, p. 28). Strategic human resource management works on an ideology that management of human resource of an organization depends on the organization developing a unique culture of its own, distinct from other cultures present in the industry under its jurisdiction. To this essence, it requires an organization to develop consistent policies and programs or strategies aligned well for the achievement of its strategic objectives. The chief aim of every organization is to position itself as the best among other firms – building a competitive advantage. Among the several perspectives of building a competitive advantage in business environment, resource-based view of human resource management looks promising to many organizations perhaps due to its centralization on the internal strength of the organization (Radcliffe, 2005, p. 51). The objective of this essay is to evaluate how the adoption of resource-based view (RBV) model of strategic management can lead to achievement of competitive advantage of a business and the shortcomings of this model to a business organization. To improve an organization’s performance strategic human resource management (SHRM) acts as a supervision practice that connects the organizational role of human resource to the managerial predetermined objectives. The improved performance of an organization will bring its competitive advantage in the line of business operation. There are different perspectives of strategic human resource management (Radcliffe, 2005, p. 52). . For example, universalistic perspective, contingency perspective and the resource based perspective. All of these perspectives describe how merging the strategic objectives of a business to the administrative functions can lead to organizations competitive advantage. The proponents of universalistic

Personal Classroom Management System Essay Example for Free

Personal Classroom Management System Essay Abstract An effective classroom management is essential for the success of the students. The classroom management plan needs to be strong, but also flexible since not every class is the same and the teacher needs to be able to change around the plan to fit the needs of the current class. To construct my own classroom management plan, I have borrowed some ideas from classes I have taken throughout my college career and through my own experiences as a student. My Personal Classroom Management System. In this paper I will attempt to explain my personal classroom management system. I will begin by describing the classroom conditions I will provide for my students. I will specify the behavioral goals for my students and the ways in which I want them to conduct themselves. I will elaborate on how I will grade and assess my students. I will conclude by explaining classroom procedures and how I will intervene when a student is misbehaving. Classroom Environment I believe that it is important to create a safe and encouraging environment for my students. The classroom should be a place where the students feel comfortable asking questions and expressing themselves. No student should feel embarrassed to ask questions or voice opinions. I will explain to my students that we are our own community and everyone has a role to do if the community is to work correctly. I plan to create this type of environment by establishing rules, procedures, and routines for my students to understand and follow. I feel that giving students a daily routine to follow it helps to them to develop personal responsibility. Every morning I will greet my students at the door. By doing this I can see my students in the hallway to make sure that they are following the school rules, but I can also see the students inside the classroom to make sure that they are following our classroom rules and beginning their daily routines. The first thing my students will need to do is find their assigned seating and begin their bell work. This helps them learn responsibility and start the day off productively. I will also have end of the day routines for the students to follow. Twenty minutes before the end of school I will have the students  gather their belongings and pack their backpacks. We will also use this time to clean and organize the classroom so it will be in order for the next day. I want to create an environment where my students and I can learn from our various cultures and backgrounds. I want to have a weekly class session where one student is picked to share something they love about their family’s culture and traditions. This will make all my students feel important and I feel this will also help my students who may be ESL students feel comfortable and help them succeed in school. Parental Involvement  I will develop a relationship with parents at the beginning of the school year. Communication between the parents, students and me is extremely important. I will contact parents to give them good news about their students and not just contact them when their child is misbehaving. I will create a monthly newsletter which I will send home with my students and post on the school website. This newsletter will let the parents know what will be going on in our classroom. This will also give them the opportunity to volunteer for different activities and help them become more involved in their child’s education. Class Rules, Rewards Consequences In order for my students to be successful throughout the school year, they learn and follow the rules starting on the first day of school. In my classroom the rules that must be followed are: 1. Respect and follow all school rules 2. Respect others and their belongings 3. No hitting, touching or using bad language 4. Raise your hand before speaking or leaving your seat 5. Always do your best These rules will be posted in my classroom on the first day of class. We will create a few more rules together as a class during the first week of school as well. We will spend the first two weeks of school reviewing our classroom rules. According to Wong’s Pragmatic classroom students who spend the first two weeks of school reviewing class rules learn better and conduct themselves accordingly (Charles, 132). This will help give my students ownership on their behavior. I will send two copies of the rules home for the students to give to their parents. I will ask that both the students and the parents sign one copy and return it to me and post one copy at home that can be viewed daily. I will also post a progress chart in the classroom for all students to view. The chart will cover the student’s weekly behavior starting fresh each day. At the end of the week students will be able to choose a reward based on the number of gold stars they have. Some examples of rewards include choosing a book to read when finished with class work, choosing a prize from the treasure box, being the daily helper, and being the line leader for the day. I will also use lots of positive praise and behavioral narration to encourage my students to do their best daily. There will also be consequences when the rules are not followed. These consequences will be discussed with both the students and the parents at the beginning of the year. The following are examples of the consequences: 1. Loss of picking from the treasure chest 2. Time taken from recess 3. Time spent in detention before or after school 4. A call to parents 5. A visit to the principal’s office 6. In extreme cases immediate suspension Grading and Assessment I believe it’s important to use a variety of tools to assess students. This is because all students learn in a variety of ways. I plan to use both informal and formal assessment procedures in my classroom. Homework will be used as a study tool and an extension of the daily lesson and therefore will not be graded. Homework will be used for participation points. Instead of grading it I will stamp the assignment to show that the student was given participation points for effort. All assessments will be aligned with the state standards and curriculum. The grading policy and rubrics will be made available for the students and their parents at all times. When I give tests I will only test students on materials we have covered during that week and never use gotcha questions. Students will be allowed to do make up tests if they fail and would like a better grade. Classroom Procedures Everyday my students will be expected to come into the classroom, take their seats and immediately start on their bell work. All pencils should be sharpened before the bell rings. This means students need to get to class on time. When class work is finished early, students will have the choice of choosing a book from our class library or free writing in their writing journals. Bathroom breaks will be taken individually throughout the day and as a class before and after lunch and recess. These are some of the procedures I will implement: Morning Procedures †¢Greet teacher and classmates as you enter the room †¢Unload backpack, sharpen pencils and place supplies on desk †¢Begin bell work Desk Procedures †¢No food, candy or toys allowed at your desk †¢Keep your hands and feet on/under your own desk and not in the aisle †¢Keep the area around your desk clean Line Up/Leaving Procedure †¢Quietly form two orderly lines †¢Keep your hands to yourself/arms crossed †¢No talking in the hallway †¢No running or pushing while in line †¢When leaving the room one line will follow the other to form one line in the hallway Intervention Plan Before deciding on a plan, I will observe, reflect, consult with the student, parents and coworkers, and outline ideas that may correct problematic behaviors viewed in the classroom. After considering the behavior of the child, I will reflect on the role of the environment and classroom routines, and the interactions of the child with fellow students and teachers. I will  be sure to take advantage of the use of specialized staff members, such as the school psychologist and speech therapist, within the school system who are willing to assist me with my plan. This plan will be constructed on an individual basis as not all students will respond to the same methods. Once the plan is implemented, I will observe for positive changes and make adjustments accordingly after a follow up meeting with the parents, student and specialists involved in constructing the initial plan. Reference Charles, C. M. (1999). Building Classroom Discipline. New York: Addison Wesley Longman, Inc.

Orwells Newspeak And Influence On Modern Days

Orwells Newspeak And Influence On Modern Days After the experience of two World Wars and Cold War, George Orwell realized the danger of imperialism and of misled communism/socialism, and then he decided to warn the feasibility of totalitarianism. In addition, he observed the language manipulation from his contemporary period, and he dissolved the language corruption as a tool of totalitarian regime, used for thought control. Orwell changed the feature of Newspeak in real world especially during the wartimes because the setting of the novel is more extreme than the situation of present. As Orwells prediction on the emergence of totalitarianism and of Newspeak, there are lots of linguistic phenomena around us. The realization of Newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-Four implies the continuous existence of language manipulation in the future in the evolved ways. Keywords: George Orwell Nineteen Eighty-Four Newspeak Introduction of George Orwell Eric Arthur Blair, whose pen name is George Orwell, was born in India. After graduation, he worked as the Indian Imperial Police in Burma for five years. Under the combination of the experience in Burma and the influence of his father, who served the British Empire as well, he had developed a strong hatred toward Imperialism. After the service as Imperial Police, he returned to England and experienced the life in slums. Based on his personal experience, he started to dislike all kinds of authorities. Then he joined the Spanish Civil War, and there he found the ugliness of authorities. The greatness of George Orwell is that he dissolves every idea and experience in his works: he expresses a satire on Russia under Stalin in one of his master piece, Animal Farm; he depicts the danger and the feasibility of totalitarian regime in another representative work, Nineteen Eighty-Four. For these reasons, George Orwell remains still around us as a great writer. Introduction of Nineteen Eighty-four The setting of this story is an imaginary world divided into three superpower countries: Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia. These three countries are always in the situation of the confrontation against each other. Among these countries, Orwell especially picked out Oceania that resembles the contemporary Britain as a setting of the story in order to make readers concentrate on the story by feeling the sympathy, which is caused by the similar background. Oceania is a country ruled by one party, whose name is uncertain and is just described as the Party in the book. At the top of this country, there is a man called as Big Brother, who the people do not know whether he really exists or not, however, the people in Oceania could not doubt his existence, but follow his words blindly. As a result, everything in Oceania goes around Big Brother and the Party, and people always obey their orthodoxy. If there is a person who does not follow the order or rebel against it, he or she will disappear w ithout any traces. The totalitarian character of the Party is also shown very clearly at the beginning of the story. The story starts on a bright cold day in April (Orwell 3), however, it is impossible to observe that special-maybe peculiar weather in England in April. Orwell makes use of this kind of trick to create the disharmony of the background, and finally he intends to deepen the potential uneasiness, which is spread through Oceania. This characteristic society is ruled by four major government agencies: the Ministry of Peace, Ministry of Love, Ministry of Plenty, and the Ministry of Truth. Winston Smith, a protagonist of Nineteen Eighty-Four, constantly fabricates the history and cuts off the past from the present as a worker at the Ministry of Truth. While he is working, he confronts many facts that are against the doctrine of the Party. Then he starts to feel uncomfortable about the existence of the Party, has the hatred toward Big Brother in confidence, and is curious about the social mechanism with its motive so that he starts a diary as an attitude of defiance. One day, at work, Winston meets two important characters, who influenced him a lot: one is Julia, who becomes his lover afterward, and starts an affair, which violates the doctrine of the Party; the other one is OBrien, who is regarded as a sort of his company no matter he is an enemy or an associate and gives Winston the forbidden book written by Em anuel Goldsteinà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¢the most influential traitor in Oceania. Through the affair, he becomes very glad for a reason that he violates the orthodoxy of the Party-all form of love and loyalty between individuals are prohibited, instead, all of them should be toward Big Brother and the Party; Through reading, he becomes very pleased, for he understands how the society proceeds to corruption. Finally, Julia and Winston are captured and tortured. The purpose of their torture is not to rebuke their insubordination but to re-education them into love Big Brother and the Party without any doubt. After the torture, both of them are broken in spirit so that when they meet on the road by chance, they can not feel the love to each other. On a sunny day in April, Winston feels love for Big Brother and realizes that he is finally cured. By the protagonist, Winston Smith, it is shown that people in Oceania are always watched whenever and wherever they are, and that the Party does not stop doing propaganda and implements several policies in order to brainwash the nations. The totalitarian state, where we watch through Winstons eyes, seems much more horrible than people expect. The author discloses the unrealized facts how danger the totalitarianism is by dramatically exaggerated conditions in the novel. Unfortunately, for a long time, Nineteen Eighty-Four had been misunderstood as an anti-communist novel, as Orwells former publication Animal Farm was regarded as a condemnation against Socialism, which applied the Soviet Union as a model. Yet, in Why I write, which was written before Nineteen Eighty-Four, Orwell confessed that every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism (Orwell 314) In addition, he stated while he experienced imperialism, Hitler, Totalitarianism, and the Spanish Civil War, etc, he found some lies to disclose and some facts to draw attention. From these evidences, it is shown that Orwell wrote this novel under wholly public-spirited (Orwell 316), not only in order to expose the truth that people did not or could not recognize before-for example, the misleading fact of peoples understanding toward Russia under Stalin, or Japan during the warfare, but also in order to give people a warning for potential danger of totalitarian society. Orwell and Newspeak Before analyzing the relationship between Orwell and Newspeak, it should be better to know the behind-the-scenes story of Nineteen Eighty-Fours birth. In wartime, it was very common that almost all of European-not only the left even also the right, did not understand clearly what Socialist exactly is. They confused the meaning of the terms such as Socialism, Communism, and Stalinism, and treated all of them as the same notion. What was worse, they did not notice flaws of so called Socialism, but just drew applause to everything related to it, especially the Soviet Union. On this widespread social phenomenon all around Europe, Orwell became alerted and started to write Nineteen Eighty-Four, which reflected and exaggerated the contemporary socialistic state. Actually to Orwell it was neither a socialistic problem nor a communistic one. To be more precise, the ill polity was totalitarianism, which could cover both political concepts. Consequently, he decided to write the novel based on his experience and understanding about it, in order to disclose the real picture of totalitarianism. From this perspective, the mechanism in the novel reflects on the contemporary situation. Newspeak is no exception to this rule. For this reason, newspeak can not be treated as an invented tool by Orwell in order to express how horrible the totalitarian state is at all, but an already existed and practiced policy in the real world. In the short run, Orwell named the contemporary abused language planning as Newspeak. Furthermore, in the novel he exaggerated its related policy to the extreme degree in order to maximize its function dramatically. Because of extremely exaggerated newspeak, it is easily and clearly found that there are some more reasons of applying newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-Four, except its main purpose-to show the fear of totalitarianism. To begin with, Orwell designed Newspeak to indicate the possibility of deterioration of the English language by external factors, especially politics. In Politics and the English Language, Orwell stated the interrelation between language and peoples activity. He believed if peoples thought becomes degraded, so does the language people used, and its process could reverse. At the same time, he also mentioned the language did not naturally change, but was shaped by peoples own intentions and ways of thinking. From this aspect, it is shown the bad politics intentionally make the language corrupt in order to pollute peoples way of thinking, and even more peoples life style could be led astray. Secondly, as the mentioned above, newspeak is the product of Orwells experience. During the warfare, he observed many linguistic abuses not only by socialistic government but also by the proclaimed democratic/republic governments. Through the intended misusages of language in politics, Orwell purposed to awaken people not to unconsciously be involved in speaking, writing and thinking in the way the rulers guided. The overstated description of newspeak makes Orwells intention much explicitly. The explanation of newspeak both in the story and the appendix is in harmony with other totalitarian devices so that the author not only can emphasize the main purpose of the story but also can express warning to the corruption of English language. Purpose of the Study This paper is mainly about newspeak not only in George Orwells novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four, but also in the real world. First, the study shall be examined the relation between Orwell and Newspeak. After this, based on the premise that language has a political dimension, it will be inquired into the applied example of newspeak from past to present, and be defined how the way of using newspeak has been changed. By this examination, not only how deeply newspeak has infiltrated into our daily life and how it influence peoples way to think in subconscious but also how newspeak is going to develop and apply to real world in the future will be lighted. Literature Review Relationship between Language, Perception, and Politics The reason for the great reputation about Nineteen Eighty-four is Orwell not only expresses a savage and bitter critiques of modern times, a scarring denunciation of our century and some of its corrupt practices and existing institutions, but implies the feasibility of totalitarian state and the feasible execution of its administration tools. As he predicted, the described policies and devices in the novel have gradually filtered into peoples daily life. Therefore, more and more scholars and researchers have begun to take an interest in the totalitarian features remaining around people. Among them the study on Newspeak has taken on renewed importance in recent days. Much interest has been aroused in the relationship between language, human perception, and politics, because Newspeak is based on Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. Unless the hypothesis is not established, Newspeak cannot exist; without newspeak, the danger of totalitarian state could not maximize. Related to the basic concept of Newspeak, the existence and necessity of political correctness language is suggested by taking the example of making a distinction between impairment and disability, which results in granting more convenience to the disabled by drawing others attention to the difference between these two words. As Orwell, the idea that the different use of language changes peoples perception, and that this interaction produces the possibility of the language in political usage is taken a step forward (Jones and Wareing 36). The related idea, which penetrates the core of newspeakà ¢Ã¢â‚¬ Ã¢â€š ¬the interrelationship among language, perception and politicsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¢is mentioned by Chomsky and Otero: There is a tenuous relationship, in fact several different kinds. I think myself that theyre exaggerated in importance. There is in the first place the question discussed, for example, by Orwell and by a number of others of how language is abused, tortured, distorted, in a way to enforce ideological goals. A classic example would be the switch in the name of the Pentagon from the War Department to the Defense Department in 1947. As soon as that happened, any thoughtful person should have understood that the United States would be no longer be engaged in defense. In would only be engaged in aggressive war. That was disguise that fact. Terms like the free world and the national interest and so on are mere terms of propaganda. One shouldnt take them seriously for a moment. They are designed, often very consciously, in order to try to block thought and understanding. (Chomsky and Otero 471) Meanwhile, Joseph comprehensively deals with its relations from the analysis on the assumption that the language is created in order to fulfill humans political purpose to various issues related to what language should be spoken, whether the spread of a dominant language can equal to the transformation of power, and to who linguistic right should belong to, etc. With regard to the features of newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-four, he says its features, especially its political purpose, is not limited to the characteristic of totalitarian language, and every using language is employed intentionally in various fields such as commercial, religion, and education, etc. (Joseph 120) Unfortunately, there is no overall agreement as to the interaction among language, perception and politics. Most of people, who refute to study on their interaction, insist language should be studied only as an entity on itself, without any other external factor. To those people, the collapse of Communism in Central Europe in 1989 may give much room for argument, because the people from European communist countries was not indoctrinated in spite of the execution of thought control using language as a tool. However, the example they mentioned can be interpreted like this: the circumstance of European communistic countries was not like the extreme totalitarian state in Oceania. The people in those countries could keep a touch with outside world. On that account, there exist several external factors behind the fall of Communism in Europe, and it can not be evaluated that the collapse of European communist countries is caused only be the fail of Newspeak. Anyway, language is used to expr ess humans thought since its emergence. Then language has been closely connected with humans activities, and at the same time, as humans needs arises, lots of words and expressions have been added and disappeared. As the result of this, human language has included sociological characteristic. In this sense, language possesses great influence on both humans mental and physical activities, and vice versa as the concept of Orwells Newspeak. Evaluation of Newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-four While people agree with the feasibility of totalitarian state, there is a rich diversity of opinion on the degree of Owells reflection on the enforced newspeak in the contemporary period. Young examines whether Orwell exaggerated the extent of linguistic corruption in totalitarian societies both by the comparison between Newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-four and its application to real world, especially Nazi Germany and the German Democratic Republic and by the analysis of its effect on Soviet peoples subconscious. Meanwhile, Gerovitch conducts a specific study on the phenomena of newspeak in Soviet Union. His study concentrates on the newspeak of Soviet science in counterpoint to the far-reaching range of Youngs research on the example, and then, the researcher evolves the main idea into the emergence of CyberNewspeak-the combination with Cyberspeak and newspeak, in Soviet Science. Because the present part is primarily the evaluation of newspeak in scope, I am choosing to ignore the stud y related to other things. There also exists the study on childrens early language learning combined with the concept of Newspeak. As the foregoing explanation, these studies estimate Newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-four from various aspects. In detail, Young draws two reasonable conclusions after the scrutinized study on totalitarian language. First, there exist some similarities between the totalitarian language in real world and Newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-four, aside from differences in ideological content (Young 230): both are alike in the aim and the used ways for expressionà ¢Ã¢â‚¬ Ã¢â€š ¬they share the similar intention to confirm the orthodoxy of the rulers, and its goal is brought by euphemisms, superlatives, dehumanizing and abusive expressions (Young 230). Second, Orwells Newspeak is somewhat electric and overall logical than totalitarian language in Nazi Germany and in German Democratic Republic. For reasons, Young concludes Orwells description of totalitarian language is still very accurate, and it is inevitable for the gap between the Orwellian model in the novel and the application in reality for different setting condition. Similar with Youngs view toward Newspeak, another study points out the limitation of Newspeak as novel device. It examines the failed redefinition of the meaning of freedom in communist countries, which represents the limit of newspeak policy in real world. Particularly in Poland, the amalgamation of the meaning of freedom and the concept of newspeak failed because the Communists could not brace the economic element of the word. From the failure of redefining words like freedom or democracy, the study suggests two conditions for the realization of newspeak in reality: language does changed, and it can change in response to political pressures-but only where the change fits meaningfully with the linguistic context; has meaningful continuity with past usage, and looms large in shared experience. (Buchowski et al. 573). That is, Newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-four must change their shape in order to apply themselves into the practical world, and it can be realized only under the rational s ituations. The first conclusion of the study is alike to Youngs one, while it expands it idea to giving what specific limited condition of applying Newspeak to reality. Lastly, there is the research on another feature of totalitarian language in Real World. Different from Orwell, Gerovitch focuses on the flexibility rather than the rigidity [both] of this ideological language [and of Soviet Union] (Gerovitch 13). In his opinion the skillful use of newspeak allowed one to manipulate ideology and to some extent, to define what was permitted in a Soviet context(Gerovitch 15). Newspeak in Soviet Union should have been flexible because newspeak words and expressions were applied to whenever needs to describe Soviet ideology. In this sense, newspeak should have change it meaning according to different purposes, conditions and contexts. As a result, according to Gerovitchs analysis, newspeak applied in real world has more flexibility, while newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-four is fixed in its meaning and use under ultimately controlled society. As the researcher above, with respect to Newspeak, there is general agreement that it mirrors the totalitarian language in the contemporary society to some extent, and that the difference between Newspeak as a novel device and the totalitarian language in the practical world is unavoidable because of the distinction between the imaginary world and reality. Besides, no one deny there still exists the possibility of the emergence of Newspeak in the future. Analysis of Newspeak In Nineteen Eighty-Four, the Party is processing the publication of 10th newspeak dictionary, and they expect the appearance of the complete newspeak system in Oceania in 2050. As readers of Nineteen Eighty-Four know, the two aims of the Party are to conquer the whole surface of the earth and to extinguish once and for all the possibility of independent thought (Orwell 223). The Party desires not only the control of materials but also the thorough surveilance of peoples inside, and newspeak is one of their innovative and tactic devices of the mental control. The concept of newspeak starts from the idea that peoples thoughts and their use of language are interacted. The Party uses the interrelation between the language and peoples thought in order that the Revolution will be complete when the language is perfect because orthodoxy means not thinking-not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness (Orwell 61). In other words, newspeak is created to make the expression of anti-governm ent feelings impossible, and eventually to follow the doctrine of the Party unconsciously. Then which characteristic of newspeak helps the complete reign of the Party over Oceania possible? Under the process of making newspeak, the English language in Oceania has faced five great changes, and their interplay makes the impact to the language maximize. First of all, the biggest feature of English used in Oceania is the changed intention of usage. As mentioned above, newspeak is made to devote to achieve Ingsocs political goal, while Standard English is for expressing and sharing ones thought. According to the Party, English in Airstrip One is divided into three word groups and among them, the feature as the artificial language created in political purpose is vividly showed in B vocabulary words. The second change is that the English language has become more implicative than ever. It is because the Party summarizes various meanings into a few words, which are palatable to its principle, for securing their political legitimacy. Particularly, compound words in B vocabulary words show the political implication much noticeably rather than other newspeak terms. The terms, which have more implication than the past, distort the original meaning of the words with other vocabulary consisting of the prefix/suffix and the word. To take the example of compound words in B vocabulary words, the Thought Police, which indicates a police officer who finds out the person thinking anti-government idea, consists of the word thought and police. In the past, the police officer did not relate with thoughtcrime. Yet, when the Party becomes to need to eliminate unorthodoxy, the word the Thought Police is created with the birth of the word thoughtcrime, which can point out anti-Big Brother concept. Me anwhile, ungood can be one of the most striking words, which not only include prefix in words form but also results in the vagueness of the words meaning because of its implication. In the case of ungood, it is made when the prefix un-, which means not, attaches in front of the word good. It is the antonym of good under the doctrine of Oceania. For prohibiting the expression of anti-government idea, the Party cuts out bad, which has the possibility to show the doctrine against Ingsoc. Thus after completing the process of newspeak, the exact notion of goodness and badness will disappear, because there are no precise words to express what bad and good means, while there are only the word good and its antonym un-good. However, there exists slight difference between un-good and bad, which even the dictionary can not clearly demonstrate. As a result, the lack of precise way to express the words meaning, he or she only could use abstract description, which may evoke various kinds of inter pretations by different people and leads the vagueness in meaning, if a person tries to explain what badness is. For this reason, Symes saying that Standard English has more vagueness rather than newspeak seems wrong. Similar to Oldspeak, newspeak also is full of vagueness, however, the vagueness of newspeak is resulted only from political abuses while the imprecision of Standard English has various resources. Another representative example, which has a prefix/suffix, is the title of four main government quarters: the Ministry of Love, the Ministry of Plenty, the Ministry of Truth, and the Ministry of Peace. According to the order of newspeak, their abbreviations are Miniluv, Miniplenty, Minitrue, and Minipax. The abbreviation of every ministry of Oceania is combined with an prefix mini- and each afterward words abbreviation. Thus, in case of the Ministry of Truth-Winston Smiths work place, its name is combined with mini- and true. To account the meaning of this combined word, it se ems to mean the minimized truth, because the prefix mini- means small. According to this kind of interpretation, ironically, the abbreviation of each agency explains what they do much clearly rather than the originally united words. It is because the actual work the Ministry of Truth do is concealing facts and distorting information, although its original name seems the place that offer the truth to people, Same as Miniture, Miniluv is the place that people are tortured, not encouraged to love each other; Miniplenty represents not richness but famine; Minipax causes wars rather keeps worlds peace. Therefore, the English language in Oceania has more implication, which leads the vagueness of words meaning, and the vagueness in meaning and expression produce the corruption of the language. Thirdly, the English grammar becomes more regularized because simplified forms of words. In detail, in newspeak, there is no precise way to distinguish the difference between word classes, because the Party removes one of them if two words share the same root no matter which class the word belongs to. For instance, the verb think in Standard English is used both as a noun and as a verb at the same time according to the rule of newspeak. In this manner, the barriers among different words class has been taken down. Moreover, it becomes also very easy to transform words class. In the case of adverbs and adjectives, the stage of transformation is totally different from the case of nouns and verbs. (Some nouns and verbs are united into one word.) In newspeak, most of adjectives have the suffix -ful while adverbs got -wise. Thus, there are only a few adjectives, which has a strong meaning, left. For example, speedful and speedwise replace other similar words such as rapid, rapidly, and fas t, etc. The pattern of tense change also contributes to the setting of the regularized grammar system. In Oceania, irregular verbs and nouns no longer exist. In consequence, the form of every past tense changes that -d or -ed is attached after a noun or a verb, and it can be a plural form if -s or -es is added after a noun. Under the regularized grammar, peoples spiritual becomes simplified because they do not need to consider whether the word is an irregular one or not. Thus, the systemized grammar makes the rule of the Party much easier to manipulate, distort, and control. In this sense, the role of the regularized grammar system seems like a lubricant, which makes the rule of the Party smoother. Fourthly, the structure of newspeak becomes simplified. Not only it is influenced by the regularized English grammar in newspeak, but also the range of vocabulary becomes much smaller than before the Revolution because of the reduction of the number of English vocabulary. In detail, most of words have only one meaning remained but others, which may be danger for the Party to execute their doctrine, rejected. To take the example of the word free, now it only can be used as the meaning of without or no. Free does not means political or physical freedom any more. As the number of the reduced meaning of free, the structure of newspeak becomes much simpler than of Standard English. In addition, the appearance of lots of abbreviations promotes its simplification but at the same time, it also adds the difficulty of interpretation. Comintern, for instance, remind people of the closed and enthusiastic socialist/communist group rather than the composite picture of universal human brotherhood, red flags, barricades, Karl Marx and the Paris Commune (Orwell 351). The last feature belongs to the irony of its usage. Though the main slogan of the Party is made of the imperfect newspeakà ¢Ã¢â‚¬ Ã¢â€š ¬though the definition of freedom in newspeak dictionary is already without the things mentioned, many people still use it in various meaning, it emphasized the irony of newspeak by the sentence consisting of words, which have opposite meaning. WAR IS PEACE. FREEDOM IS SLAVERY. IGNORANCE IS STRENGHT. Every line of the slogans consists of two contradictory words: war and peace, freedom and slavery, and ignorance and strength. In the practical world or in Oceania before the Party, its composition seems very ridiculous and irrational, however, in 1984, it has no problem to deal like this in Oceania, where even 2+2=5 can be believed if the Party insists. To forbidden unorthodox idea and to strengthen the control over the population, the Party is obliged to emphasize sentences meaning by strong tone made of contraction, and this results in the increased irony of newspeak. These described features of newspeak actually reflect Orwells observance and opinion about contemporary totalitarian language. For example, the changed formation of English language in Oceania reflects one in modern English, and Winstons hatred toward newspeak reflected the authors. The explanation of the example is like this: he once wrote the range of verbs is further cut down by means of the -IZE and DE- formations, and banal statement are given an appearance of profundity by means of the NOT UN- formation (Orwell 160), he might have thought that the English language could loss its vividness by the change of formation when he wrote Politics and the English Language(1946). As times went by, his thought might change and expanded to the worry about the imprecision of modern English. Then he made use of newspeak to express his anxiety toward the decreasing number of verbs, which could result in the uncertainty of English words and phrases. In summary, Orwells worry and idea about totalitarian language comes through newspeak, and the consequence of newspeak can be observed: under the diminished range of expression and simpler way of thinking, people become brainwashed, and eventually they just follow the governments direction without any doubt. Newspeak Applied in Real World 4.1 Newspeak in Wartime It is a well-known fact that Orwells Newspeak reflects the language corruption by the authorities in his contemporary period. Thus, we can find how newspeak developed and changed by shedding new light on Newspeak in war times. One of Soviet propagada expert once mentions Newspeak in the report: We have created in our press a special language-the language of a socialist for a socialist citizen onlyà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦This language is unfamiliar and sometimes unintelligible to the masses, even to the leftist masses, in the capitalist countries.  [1]   The advanced citation about Newspeak in communist countries seems half right and half wrong. Actually, even the leftist in communist regimes sometimes could not understand or confuse the meaning of expressions, which is applied the concept of Newspeak. It is because Newspeak is both radical and deliberate language reform in order to conceal the original purpose of the

Free Pride and Prejudice Essays: Narrative Techniques :: Pride Prejudice Essays

Narrative Techniques of Pride and Prejudice This essay will focus on Chapter 53 or Vol III, Chapter 11, depending upon the edition of the novel. This passage is taken from Bingley and Darcy's first visit to Longbourn after their return to Meryton. The passage focuses on Mrs Bennet's foolishness and Elizabeth's feelings about the proceedings. Mrs Bennet's speeches in the passage point to her ignorance, which is part of Austen's narrative technique of letting characters reveal themselves through their speech. The effect is particularly comic due to Mrs. Bennet's utter ignorance, which manifests itself in moral insensitivity, as seen in her belief that Lydia is "well married" in her disgraceful union with Wickham, and in lack of simple knowledge, as seen in her commenting that Newcastle is "a place quite northward, it seems." Because of this, she manages to be obsequiously polite yet quite rude, as we can see from the contrast between her invitation for Bingley to shoot birds on Mr Bennet's manor "When you have killed all your own birds" and her insult to Darcy that Wickham has "not so many [friends] as he deserves." Austen uses a similar treatment for Mr Collins, whose sycophantic language is even used when he is criticising Elizabeth's class [?] in his proposal to her, and whose excessive praise makes him utterly ridiculo us. The length of Mrs Bennet's speeches betray[s] the fact that although she says much, she thinks and means very little, [very good.] a technique which is repeated in Mr Collins's speeches and letters and on Lady Catherine's argument against Elizabeth marrying Darcy on her visit to Longbourn. This is emphasised here by the fact that she is the only one quoted in direct speech as speaking aloud in the whole passage. Despite Elizabeth's sense, her own feelings are kept to herself while her mother chatters away indiscreetly on anything that enters her mind. Elizabeth's poor reasoning as she listens to her mother disgrace herself shows the extent of her shame and misery. Although this scene is largely seen from the viewpoint of Elizabeth, Austen sometimes speaks as the omniscient narrator to reveal little ironies about Elizabeth herself. For example, after Elizabeth feels that "The first wish of my heart... is never more to be in company with either of them", which the reader should know to be silly, especially with regard to

Essay --

Jefferson Finis Davis was born on June 3,1808, in ____ Kentucky. He was the tenth of ten children. Davis was named after the third president of the United States of America, Thomas Jefferson. During his childhood Davis moved twice; he moved at the age of 3 to St.Mary Parish, Louisiana. Less than a year later he moved to Wilkinson County, Mississippi. Three of his brothers served in the war of 1812. He began his education in 1813 at Wilkinson Academy, near the family cotton plantation. Davis Later attended a catholic school called Saint Thomas. When he was there he was the only protestant student in attendance. Davis went on to attend Jefferson College in Washington, Mississippi, in 1818, and then attended Transylvania University at Lexington, Kentucky, in 1821. His father Samuel died on July 4, 1824, when Jefferson was 16 years old. He attended the United States Military Academy starting in 1824. He was placed under house arrest after his involvement in the eggnog riots. In June 182 8 he graduated 23rd in a class of 33. Following graduation, Second Lieutenant Davis was assigned to the 1st Infantry Regiment he was stationed at Fort Crawford, Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin Territory. Zachary Taylor had recently been placed in command of the fort when Davis arrived in early 1829. Davis returned to Mississippi on furlough in March 1832 this was his first leave since arriving at the fort. The Black Hawk war broke out while Davis was still in Mississippi. He quickly returned to the fort in August 1832. At the end of the war, Colonel Taylor assigned him to the transportation of Black Hawk to prison. Davis soon fell in love with Sarah Knox Taylor, his commanding officers daughter. They pursued Sarah’s father for permission to marry but he... ...inted and then elected to the U.S. Senate. He resigned his position to run for Governor of Mississippi. Although he was not successful, he was ultimately named Secretary of War under President Pierce. He went back to the Senate in the 1840s and remained there until Mississippi seceded January 9, 1861. Davis waited for official notification and addressed the Senate on January 21, 1861 calling it the â€Å"saddest day of his life.† He returned to Mississippi. Davis was first named as Major General for the Army of Mississippi on January 23, 1861 and then elected as Provisional President of the Confederate States of America and inaugurated in February. He was selected because of his military and political background. When Virginia joined the Confederacy, Davis moved the Capital to Richmond in May 1861. By November he had been elected to a full-six year term as President.

Blogs and Attention Seeking Bloggers :: Internet

Blogs and Attention Seeking Bloggers Web logs are one of the newest things popping up on the Internet. â€Å"What is a web log?† one may ask. Well, a web log, otherwise known as blog, is a place on the web where a person can go to write down anything that they feel like writing in an archive that they have created. It’s a personal site almost like a diary, but it’s posted where anybody can gain access. Wondering why somebody would want to put their lives online made me think that bloggers are just seeking some kind of attention. I looked into this to see what attention they are looking for and discovered many things. Not all blogs seek attention, but some do. It all depends on which kind of blog the person created. The first thing about blogs that I discovered is that there isn’t one kind. A theory about the kinds of blogs that there are came from one of my classmates Adam who said that there were really three types of blogs. Adam puts blogs into three categories: Advertisement and non-personal informative, Personal, and The Hybrid. I also read an article by John C. Dvorak, a writer for PC Magazine. In his article, ‘The Blog Phenomenon’ Dvorak classifies bloggers into five categories; Ego gratification, Antidepersonalization, Elimination of frustration, Societal need to share, and Wanna-be writers. From this I realized that there must be different types of bloggers and they aren’t all the same. Adam’s theory and Dvorak’s article interested me enough to take a closer look at what blogs are all about. As I looked and thought about it there weren’t only three kinds of blogs, there seems to be more like a million. Then as I was looking I asked myself, Are bloggers looking for some kind of attention, and if so, what attention are they seeking and from whom To begin my research I started observing a blog that I randomly chose. My first instinct was that bloggers are teenage kids looking for a way to tell their boyfriend of girlfriend how much they loved them and that they couldn?t live with out them. Then when I started observing the blog â€Å"We Are Full of Shit,†I noticed that Jeremy Olson who started this blog took news articles and expressed his feelings about them. His blog was about sharing his point of view with the world, and sometimes it gave surprising reactions.

The Accidental Tourist Essay

Life just is. You have to flow with it. Give yourself to the moment. Let it happen. † -Jerry Brown If an individual allows changes to occur in one’s life, then love can be the wonderful result of that acceptance. The theme of reasons why we love and how we love different people is demonstrated throughout the book The Accidental Tourist, written by Anne Tyler. There are two main characters that undergo and accept the changes in their lives, and one character that stays static throughout the book, helping one of the characters to change.Macon Leary is first grounded by loneliness and comfort, then slowly opens himself up to what appears to be a whole new world for him. Then, there is Sarah Leary, who controls some of the changes in her life, and tries to make the best of the rest of them. The character that remains the same throughout the book is Muriel Pritchett—a dog-trainer who takes an interest in Macon and helps him to accept the changes in his life. Above all, the universal theme of this book is love—a surprising new journey for all the characters.In the beginning of the book, it is explained how Macon and Sarah Leary’s son is murdered and how their marriage suffers because of this. Sarah leaves Macon, which is the beginning stage of Macon’s renovated life, but one that does not start off happily: â€Å"He didn’t eat real meals anymore†¦His hair, which Sarah used to cut for him, jutted over his forehead like a shelf. Ande something had caused his lower lids to droop. He used to have narrow gray slits of eyes; now they were wide and startled†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (14). Macon is not at all used to living alone.He wants to control everything and likes nothing to be left to chance—Sarah’s departure is not something he can control and he does not deal with it well. Macon begins to think that he cannot live without his wife, but soon realizes a few things that really make him think about the marriage: Hi s brain buzzed with little worries†¦The worries changed, grew deeper, he wondered what had gone wrong with his marriage. Sarah had been his first and only girlfriend; now he thought he should have practiced on someone else beforehand.During the twenty years of their marriage there’s been moments—there’s been months—when he didn’t feel they had really formed a unit the way couples were supposed to. No, the stayed two distinct people, and now always even friends. Sometimes they’d seemed more like rivals, elbowing each other, competing over who was the better style of person†¦ (15-16) Macon realizes that he and Sarah never actually became one person; they had always stayed as two separate people living in a stale, routine marriage. Finally, Macon comes to terms with the fact that Sarah is not coming home to him: â€Å"Well, of course she wasn’t there.He knew it the instant he stepped inside that house, when he smelled that sta le hot air and heard the muffled denseness of a place with every window shut. Really he’d known it all along. He’d been fooling himself. He’d been making up fairy tales† (41). Macon knew that when he got home from his business trip that Sarah would not be there waiting for him like she used to. Although he did not ask for this change in his life, and after living alone for a while, moves back with his sister and brothers—a comfortable change for him.This all begins to change when Macon meets an unusual woman working at the animal hospital where he takes his dog and becomes acquaintances with her. Muriel allows Macon to open up to her, and Macon shows his willingness to do so: ‘I lost my son,’ Macon said. ‘He was just†¦he went to a hamburger joint and then†¦someone came, a holdup man, and shot him. I can’t go to dinner with people! I can’t talk to their little boys! You have to stop asking me. I don’t mean to hurt your feelings but I’m just not up to this, do you hear? She took one of his wrists very gently and she drew him into the house, still not fully opening the door, so that he had a sense of slipping through something, of narrowly evading something. She closed the door behind him. She put her arms around him and hugged him. (189-190) At first, Macon does not give Muriel Pritchett a second thought, but before he knows it, he is dating her and soon living with Muriel and her young son. This shows a tremendous change for Macon, and a step forward in his life. Muriel helps Macon to see the world in a different way.She is the character that seems to know exactly what she is after in life, and therefore does not change during the course of this book. On the other hand, all Macon does throughout the book is change his life in extreme ways. Macon learns how to love and trust Muriel in a way that he never has with anyone. In an addition to Macon’s changing life, ther e is his wife, Sarah, who makes the decision to leave Macon a year after the death of their son. Sarah feels that Macon does not express his emotions as she would like him to, and that he does not provide her with the comfort she needs and has needed in the past.This frustrates Sarah greatly and she does not feel as if she can continue in the marriage: I said to you the other day, I said, ‘Macon, now that Ethan’s dead I sometimes wonder if there’s any point to life. ’ Do you remember what you answered? †¦ ’You said, ‘Honey, to tell the truth, it never seemed to me there was all that much point to begin with. ’ Those were your exact words†¦ ’You just go on your same old way like before. Your little routines and rituals, depressing habits, day after day. No comfort at all. ’†¦ ‘I just can’t live with you anymore,’ Sarah said. 3-4) Sarah is heart-broken with this decision, as is Macon, but s he is just not happy with her marriage. During Macon and Sarah’s separation, Sarah starts to move on and begins dating a man. Though she has an apartment of her own, which is what she wanted, Sarah realizes how much she truly loves and misses Macon, and makes a slight and almost unnoticeable attempt to get back together with him much later in the book during a conversation between her and Macon: ‘It [the rain] looks like strips that just fade away about halfway down from the sky. ’ ‘I wish I were there to watch it with you,’ Sarah said†¦ ‘Macon?Do you†¦What’s her name? The person you live with? ’ ‘Muriel,’ he said. Which he knew before she asked, he suspected. ‘Do you plan on staying with Muriel forever? ’ ‘I really couldn’t say,’ he said. (289-290) Sarah is now the one longing for Macon. Macon thinks that the only thing to do is go back to Sarah, since, after all, he had bee n longing to get her back for some time. Macon returns to his house with Sarah, leaving Muriel: â€Å"He rode on through the city, up Charles Street, into his old neighborhood. He parked and cut the engine and sat looking at the house.The downstairs windows were dark. The upstairs windows were softly glowing. Evidently, he had come home† (291). Macon is reluctant about coming home to Sarah, but in the back of his mind he still feels like he needs her because they shared so much of their lives together. Soon after, while Macon is on another business trip to Paris, his back goes out and Sarah flies in to take care of him. Things seem to be going well, but then Sarah sees Macon packing his things a few days later, which provides yet another change for Sarah, as well as Macon: Sarah said, ‘Macon? †¦ ‘What are you doing? ’ ‘I’m packing to leave. ’ ‘But what about your back? ’ she asked. ‘And I’ve got all those a ppointments! And we were going to take a second honeymoon! ’ ‘Sweetheart,’ he said. He lowered himself cautiously till he was sitting on the bed. He picked up her hand. It stayed lifeless while she watched his face. ‘You’re going back to that woman,’ she said. ‘Yes, I am,’ he said. ‘Why, Macon? ’ ‘I just decided, Sarah. I thought about it most of last night. It wasn’t easy. It’s not the easy way out, believe me. †¦ he saw now how such couples evolved. They were not, as he’d always supposed, the result of some ludicrous lack of perception, but had come together for reasons that the rest of the world would never guess. (339-340) Macon realizes that he is happier with Muriel, and although he does not want to cause Sarah pain, this time, it is Macon that is making a change that Sarah cannot help—instead of the other way around. Therefore, Sarah must accept these changes in her life, along with all the ups and downs.Finally, Muriel Pritchett is shown to be the one character that does not go through changes in the duration of the book, already having experienced major alterations in her earlier life. Muriel assures Macon of himself and makes Macon feel needed for the first time in a long time: â€Å"Macon presented himself in front of her, holding out the pizza. ‘Ta-da! ’ he whispered. She looked up at him and gave that perky smile of hers—an ornate, Victorian V. ‘Ma,’ she said, ‘I’m going now! Macon’s here! ’ It had been a long time since anyone made such an event of his arrival† (196).Macon shows that he is beginning to allow himself to care for Muriel, and to be happy with her and this change in his life—being needed. Later on, when Macon is at his sister’s house, he begins to actually miss Muriel: Macon laid the photos aside without looking at the rest of them. He knelt to pat Ed ward†¦Macon suddenly wished he were at Muriel’s. He wrapped his arms around Edward and imagined he smelled her sharp perfume deep in Edward's fur†¦ above all else he was an orderly man†¦ There was no room in his life for anyone as unpredictable as Muriel. Or as extreme.Or as†¦well, unlikable, sometimes†¦ Then he knew what mattered was the pattern of her life; that although he did not love her he loved the surprise of her, and also the surprise of himself when he was with her. (201) As much as Macon never thought he could care for Muriel, he finds himself almost loving her, and loving himself more whenever he is with her. He begins to enjoy his time with Muriel, and now moves with the flow of life, instead of life passing him by while he is still standing still. After Macon leaves Muriel to get back with Sarah, he finds that Muriel will not give up on him.She follows him to his business trip to Paris: â€Å"‘†¦why Muriel? Why are you doing this? ’ ‘Because I felt like it,’ she said. ‘You felt like spending five days alone in a Paris hotel? That’s what is will be, Muriel. ’ ‘You need to have me around,’ she said. ‘Need you! ’ ‘You were falling to pieces before you had me† (318). Muriel is very persistent—just like when she had been pursuing Macon; she refuses to give him up. In the end, Macon cannot refuse Muriel, and leaves Paris without Sarah. This shows Muriel to be a stagnant character in this book—with her unwillingness to give up and her belief in the goodness of people.In conclusion, Macon and Sarah prove to be the characters that undergo the most rapid changes, and Muriel remains static. Above all, Macon’s desire to control his own life in such a regimented way as packing for trips with a great notion of order is probably due to the fact that he does not trust other people. He feels that he cannot rely on others a nd instead can only trust himself. However, this all changes with the help of Muriel, who proves to be one of the most beneficial people to come into Macon’s life.Sarah learns the hard way that you cannot always go back to people and places in your life and try and fix things that are not worth fixing, or not capable of being salvaged. In this case, it was she and Macon’s marriage. Sometimes it is better to let go of the past and move on to the future. The main theme of this book is love, and it is substantiated by Macon’s capability to lose sight of his fear and love someone completely different from himself and all that he has known. All of this happened because of one individual’s acceptance of change and the flow of life. The Accidental Tourist Essay Life just is. You have to flow with it. Give yourself to the moment. Let it happen. † -Jerry Brown If an individual allows changes to occur in one’s life, then love can be the wonderful result of that acceptance. The theme of reasons why we love and how we love different people is demonstrated throughout the book The Accidental Tourist, written by Anne Tyler. There are two main characters that undergo and accept the changes in their lives, and one character that stays static throughout the book, helping one of the characters to change.Macon Leary is first grounded by loneliness and comfort, then slowly opens himself up to what appears to be a whole new world for him. Then, there is Sarah Leary, who controls some of the changes in her life, and tries to make the best of the rest of them. The character that remains the same throughout the book is Muriel Pritchett—a dog-trainer who takes an interest in Macon and helps him to accept the changes in his life. Above all, the universal theme of this book is love—a surprising new journey for all the characters.In the beginning of the book, it is explained how Macon and Sarah Leary’s son is murdered and how their marriage suffers because of this. Sarah leaves Macon, which is the beginning stage of Macon’s renovated life, but one that does not start off happily: â€Å"He didn’t eat real meals anymore†¦His hair, which Sarah used to cut for him, jutted over his forehead like a shelf. Ande something had caused his lower lids to droop. He used to have narrow gray slits of eyes; now they were wide and startled†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (14). Macon is not at all used to living alone.He wants to control everything and likes nothing to be left to chance—Sarah’s departure is not something he can control and he does not deal with it well. Macon begins to think that he cannot live without his wife, but soon realizes a few things that really make him think about the marriage: Hi s brain buzzed with little worries†¦The worries changed, grew deeper, he wondered what had gone wrong with his marriage. Sarah had been his first and only girlfriend; now he thought he should have practiced on someone else beforehand.During the twenty years of their marriage there’s been moments—there’s been months—when he didn’t feel they had really formed a unit the way couples were supposed to. No, the stayed two distinct people, and now always even friends. Sometimes they’d seemed more like rivals, elbowing each other, competing over who was the better style of person†¦ (15-16) Macon realizes that he and Sarah never actually became one person; they had always stayed as two separate people living in a stale, routine marriage. Finally, Macon comes to terms with the fact that Sarah is not coming home to him: â€Å"Well, of course she wasn’t there.He knew it the instant he stepped inside that house, when he smelled that sta le hot air and heard the muffled denseness of a place with every window shut. Really he’d known it all along. He’d been fooling himself. He’d been making up fairy tales† (41). Macon knew that when he got home from his business trip that Sarah would not be there waiting for him like she used to. Although he did not ask for this change in his life, and after living alone for a while, moves back with his sister and brothers—a comfortable change for him.This all begins to change when Macon meets an unusual woman working at the animal hospital where he takes his dog and becomes acquaintances with her. Muriel allows Macon to open up to her, and Macon shows his willingness to do so: ‘I lost my son,’ Macon said. ‘He was just†¦he went to a hamburger joint and then†¦someone came, a holdup man, and shot him. I can’t go to dinner with people! I can’t talk to their little boys! You have to stop asking me. I don’t mean to hurt your feelings but I’m just not up to this, do you hear? She took one of his wrists very gently and she drew him into the house, still not fully opening the door, so that he had a sense of slipping through something, of narrowly evading something. She closed the door behind him. She put her arms around him and hugged him. (189-190) At first, Macon does not give Muriel Pritchett a second thought, but before he knows it, he is dating her and soon living with Muriel and her young son. This shows a tremendous change for Macon, and a step forward in his life. Muriel helps Macon to see the world in a different way.She is the character that seems to know exactly what she is after in life, and therefore does not change during the course of this book. On the other hand, all Macon does throughout the book is change his life in extreme ways. Macon learns how to love and trust Muriel in a way that he never has with anyone. In an addition to Macon’s changing life, ther e is his wife, Sarah, who makes the decision to leave Macon a year after the death of their son. Sarah feels that Macon does not express his emotions as she would like him to, and that he does not provide her with the comfort she needs and has needed in the past.This frustrates Sarah greatly and she does not feel as if she can continue in the marriage: I said to you the other day, I said, ‘Macon, now that Ethan’s dead I sometimes wonder if there’s any point to life. ’ Do you remember what you answered? †¦ ’You said, ‘Honey, to tell the truth, it never seemed to me there was all that much point to begin with. ’ Those were your exact words†¦ ’You just go on your same old way like before. Your little routines and rituals, depressing habits, day after day. No comfort at all. ’†¦ ‘I just can’t live with you anymore,’ Sarah said. 3-4) Sarah is heart-broken with this decision, as is Macon, but s he is just not happy with her marriage. During Macon and Sarah’s separation, Sarah starts to move on and begins dating a man. Though she has an apartment of her own, which is what she wanted, Sarah realizes how much she truly loves and misses Macon, and makes a slight and almost unnoticeable attempt to get back together with him much later in the book during a conversation between her and Macon: ‘It [the rain] looks like strips that just fade away about halfway down from the sky. ’ ‘I wish I were there to watch it with you,’ Sarah said†¦ ‘Macon?Do you†¦What’s her name? The person you live with? ’ ‘Muriel,’ he said. Which he knew before she asked, he suspected. ‘Do you plan on staying with Muriel forever? ’ ‘I really couldn’t say,’ he said. (289-290) Sarah is now the one longing for Macon. Macon thinks that the only thing to do is go back to Sarah, since, after all, he had bee n longing to get her back for some time. Macon returns to his house with Sarah, leaving Muriel: â€Å"He rode on through the city, up Charles Street, into his old neighborhood. He parked and cut the engine and sat looking at the house.The downstairs windows were dark. The upstairs windows were softly glowing. Evidently, he had come home† (291). Macon is reluctant about coming home to Sarah, but in the back of his mind he still feels like he needs her because they shared so much of their lives together. Soon after, while Macon is on another business trip to Paris, his back goes out and Sarah flies in to take care of him. Things seem to be going well, but then Sarah sees Macon packing his things a few days later, which provides yet another change for Sarah, as well as Macon: Sarah said, ‘Macon? †¦ ‘What are you doing? ’ ‘I’m packing to leave. ’ ‘But what about your back? ’ she asked. ‘And I’ve got all those a ppointments! And we were going to take a second honeymoon! ’ ‘Sweetheart,’ he said. He lowered himself cautiously till he was sitting on the bed. He picked up her hand. It stayed lifeless while she watched his face. ‘You’re going back to that woman,’ she said. ‘Yes, I am,’ he said. ‘Why, Macon? ’ ‘I just decided, Sarah. I thought about it most of last night. It wasn’t easy. It’s not the easy way out, believe me. †¦ he saw now how such couples evolved. They were not, as he’d always supposed, the result of some ludicrous lack of perception, but had come together for reasons that the rest of the world would never guess. (339-340) Macon realizes that he is happier with Muriel, and although he does not want to cause Sarah pain, this time, it is Macon that is making a change that Sarah cannot help—instead of the other way around. Therefore, Sarah must accept these changes in her life, along with all the ups and downs.Finally, Muriel Pritchett is shown to be the one character that does not go through changes in the duration of the book, already having experienced major alterations in her earlier life. Muriel assures Macon of himself and makes Macon feel needed for the first time in a long time: â€Å"Macon presented himself in front of her, holding out the pizza. ‘Ta-da! ’ he whispered. She looked up at him and gave that perky smile of hers—an ornate, Victorian V. ‘Ma,’ she said, ‘I’m going now! Macon’s here! ’ It had been a long time since anyone made such an event of his arrival† (196).Macon shows that he is beginning to allow himself to care for Muriel, and to be happy with her and this change in his life—being needed. Later on, when Macon is at his sister’s house, he begins to actually miss Muriel: Macon laid the photos aside without looking at the rest of them. He knelt to pat Ed ward†¦Macon suddenly wished he were at Muriel’s. He wrapped his arms around Edward and imagined he smelled her sharp perfume deep in Edward's fur†¦ above all else he was an orderly man†¦ There was no room in his life for anyone as unpredictable as Muriel. Or as extreme.Or as†¦well, unlikable, sometimes†¦ Then he knew what mattered was the pattern of her life; that although he did not love her he loved the surprise of her, and also the surprise of himself when he was with her. (201) As much as Macon never thought he could care for Muriel, he finds himself almost loving her, and loving himself more whenever he is with her. He begins to enjoy his time with Muriel, and now moves with the flow of life, instead of life passing him by while he is still standing still. After Macon leaves Muriel to get back with Sarah, he finds that Muriel will not give up on him.She follows him to his business trip to Paris: â€Å"‘†¦why Muriel? Why are you doing this? ’ ‘Because I felt like it,’ she said. ‘You felt like spending five days alone in a Paris hotel? That’s what is will be, Muriel. ’ ‘You need to have me around,’ she said. ‘Need you! ’ ‘You were falling to pieces before you had me† (318). Muriel is very persistent—just like when she had been pursuing Macon; she refuses to give him up. In the end, Macon cannot refuse Muriel, and leaves Paris without Sarah. This shows Muriel to be a stagnant character in this book—with her unwillingness to give up and her belief in the goodness of people.In conclusion, Macon and Sarah prove to be the characters that undergo the most rapid changes, and Muriel remains static. Above all, Macon’s desire to control his own life in such a regimented way as packing for trips with a great notion of order is probably due to the fact that he does not trust other people. He feels that he cannot rely on others a nd instead can only trust himself. However, this all changes with the help of Muriel, who proves to be one of the most beneficial people to come into Macon’s life.Sarah learns the hard way that you cannot always go back to people and places in your life and try and fix things that are not worth fixing, or not capable of being salvaged. In this case, it was she and Macon’s marriage. Sometimes it is better to let go of the past and move on to the future. The main theme of this book is love, and it is substantiated by Macon’s capability to lose sight of his fear and love someone completely different from himself and all that he has known. All of this happened because of one individual’s acceptance of change and the flow of life.

The Breakfast Club

The Breakfast Club This paper is an analysis of five dissimilar teenagers representing a cross-section of middle class high school students in the suburbs. The students meet each other for the first time during a Saturday morning detention session. Each student arrived to the school by different means, which is a precursor to determining the type of individual each one is. The group is comprised of a â€Å"princess†, an â€Å"athlete†, a â€Å"brain†, a â€Å"criminal†, and a â€Å"basket case†. These are the roles the students play during the week. Because of typical stereotypes and status levels, at the onset, the students don’t want anything to do each other at the beginning of the detention session. However, once confronted by the controlling principal and realizing they have a whole day to spend together, the students begin to interact. Once the students start communicating with each other, they realize that they are more alike than unlike. Each one of them has their own issues they are dealing with, they each long for self-acceptance; they all fight against peer pressure; they all desire parental approval. Eventually through the course of the day, they break through the barriers and begin to understand each other and accept each other as well as themselves. The students eventually develop a group identity and call themselves, â€Å"The Breakfast Club. † Claire is the â€Å"princess†; an upper-class, popular prom queen who was punished with detention after she ditched classes to go shopping. She enjoys her wealth, but this causes others to envy her. She is a bit shy and doesn’t easily reveal information about herself. She is very insecure with herself because she is not very smart and isn’t athletically inclined which is why she wants to be a part of the â€Å"in† crowd at school. She feels neglected by her parents and is yearning for attention from them. She was driven to school for the detention session in a BMW by her father. As he dropped her off he explained to her that this is a strict punishment and perhaps she shouldn’t skip school to go shopping. Bender the â€Å"bad boy† on the other hand, is a lower-class young man who is perceived to be a ociopathic criminal; he is desperate for attention at school. This may be due to a lack of attention at home or perhaps abuse. Because of his rebellious nature, Bender finds himself in detention more often than not. Bender wanders up to the school by his own free will. His parents are not shown at all during the film. Andrew the â€Å"jock† is a regimented and determined wrestler who wants break free from the athlete role in order to think for himself. His father demands that he succeeds athletically as he doesn’t tolerate losing, he requires Andrew to be No. in his athletic endeavors. His father doesn’t care what Andrew wants in life, he just wants him to win all of his wrestling matches. Andrew was dropped off to the school by his father who was chastising him before dropping him off and explaining that he could potentially lose his athletic scholarship due to his behavior. Brian the â€Å"nerd† is a straight – A student who struggles with expectations of high grades. His parents seem to push him to do very well in school. However, he doesn’t have any confidence in himself and relies upon his success in school to motivate him. His self confidence was crushed when he received a failing grade in shop class. He was sent to detention because a teacher found a gun in his locker which he was going to use to kill himself; however, it wouldn’t have worked because it was a flare gun. Brian was dropped off to the school by one of his parents and his younger sister. He was told to get his homework done while in detention. Lastly, Allison the â€Å"kook† is an introvert who is ignored by her peers. She is a very quiet girl hardly ever speaking, which makes it difficult for people to understand her. When she does speak, she usually does so in self defense. She longs for attention, in order to receive it; she acts like a mentally unstable individual. She suffers from boredom and is very reserved. She shocked the group when she emptied her purse which held nothing but useless items in an attempt to gain attention from the others at the beginning of the detention session. Allison was dropped off to the school, but you can’t tell by who as the person drives off before any words are exchanged. She states that she did nothing wrong to get sent to detention. She displays very peculiar behavior during the detention session. At the onset of the detention session, each student’s status is conveyed by their existing peer social status in school. They form bonds, with whom they feel most comfortable with, for example, Claire and Andrew immediately sit down next to each other and begin exchanging conversation about the friends they have in common within the â€Å"popular† crowd that they are a part of. Brian is next in line in the school social status scene because of his intelligence but he is still considered to be a geek by his peers. In contrast, Allison and Bender are at the bottom of the school social scene. As the morning detention session progresses, each member of the group surrenders their previous roles as they assume new positions within the group. Bender, who usually has a low-status position, assumes a leadership role because of his expertise with detention. He is on a first name basis with the janitor and Mr. Vernon, the principal. Mr. Vernon displays a tough outer shell but seems to fear Bender. Bender is clearly the dominating force in the group. His rebellious personality is displayed when he breaks the established rules and moves from his seat after being told not to. He also tore up a library book and removed a screw from one of the library doors so it couldn’t stay open in order for Mr. Vernon to keep an eye on them. When Mr. Vernon questioned the group as to why the door is closed and wouldn’t stay open the group covered up for him. This behavior clearly displays Bender’s disregard for authority. Instead of being condemned by his peers, Bender’s questions and actions are valued within the group. He leaves the session with a new found respect for his new friends as well as an attraction to Claire whom he had constantly made fun of for being a snob throughout the detention session. He also dropped the tough guy persona and accepted himself as someone who was good in his own way. Claire and Andrew also go against their normal high school behaviors during the session. Andrew no longer appears to play the macho athlete role and actually cries in front of the others as he describes how his father has pressured him to be someone he doesn’t want to be. He expressed how at times he wished for his knee to give out so he wouldn’t be able to wrestle anymore. He finally comes to realize that he doesn’t need to be the man his father expects him to be and that his life is his own to determine and not what his father desires. It is clear that he that he has broken from the grips of his father when he leaves the detention session partnered with Allison. Allison seems to be the epitome of defiance towards his father's law to stay on course and choosing his own path from now on. Claire appears to be very conceited and often asks the group â€Å"Do you know how popular I am? Everyone at this school loves me. † Looking at her from the others perspective, she appears to be very self-centered and more important than the others. Although Claire leads the group to believe she had been sexually active due to peer pressure, she ultimately admitted to the group that she is still a virgin. Allison actually tricked her by lying and being deviant, having Claire to admit she was a virgin. Allison then expressed to the group that being sexually active is actually a double edged sword in their social setting because if a girl admits to being sexually active, she is considered to be a slut while if she denies being sexually active she is considered a prude. Her observation demonstrates she isn’t exactly who the group perceives her to be. Eventually the group allows Claire to see that there is much more to life than being popular in school. On the surface, Brian appears to be submissive; however, the traditional geek ends up asking bold questions and seems to become more secure than his new-found friends. Throughout the session, Brian seems to follow along with whatever his peers are doing while at the same time reminding them that there isn’t supposed to be any â€Å"monkey business. † He actually goes against his normal behavior and along with Andrew and Claire partakes in smoking marijuana with Bender. The group views Brian as their most intelligent member and therefore, they encourage him to write their required 1000 word detention essays. This opportunity allows him to have a bit of power within the group. Through the peer discussions, it becomes apparent that Brian and his parents have required him take on more than he can handle which drove him to his breaking point. Through the relationship with his newfound friends, Brian is able to release the load and the perception of himself being an academic over achiever. He leaves much more confident than when he came and is determined to let go of his past failure. Allison is very quiet during the detention session; her mode of communication was squealing for the first half of the session. The others see her as an outcast and her strange behavior while at detention confirms their perception. During lunch, she takes a sandwich out of her bag, removes the meat, and puts cereal and sugar in its place. She appears to be satisfied with the lunch that the others find disturbing. Until this point, the other students had barely noticed her presence in the room. She continues performing random acts throughout the movie. It is clear that she craves attention both positive and negative and this is her way of obtaining it. While speaking to Andrew, she confides that the attention that she receives at school is much more than she will ever receive at home. She finds her life at home unsatisfying and expresses that her parents don’t give her any attention. Allison’s parents consider her an outcast. She leaves the school well respected by Andrew who seems to have developed a liking to her. She realizes that she should be respected by all as long as she acts as though she wanted the respect she deserved. The janitor â€Å"Carl† is the eyes and ears of the school. He seems to know the students at the school very well and tells Mr. Vernon â€Å"Someday, these kids are gonna take care of me,† Mr. Vernon told him â€Å"don’t count on it. It appears as though Carl previously attended the school. He shows much respect to the students and seems to be able to relate to them and their issues. Mr. Vernon is the school principal who dislikes Bender because he doesn’t have any respect for authority. He is very uptight and tries to get the students in trouble. It appears from his behavior that he thrives in h is position of power; one may safely assume that when he was the age of the students, he probably wasn’t popular or well liked by his peers. Carl caught Vernon reading the private school files; he then blackmails him to keep quiet. He eventually bonded with Carl and declares that he has various fears about the current generation. The group went through the predictable developmental stages including forming, storming, norming and performing phases. The group was formed because each of the students broke a school rule. While in this stage, the students are becoming oriented with each other and learning more about the group. The rules and procedures are being established. During the storming stage, conflicts begin to arise and social tension is apparent. For example, Claire expressed that she doesn’t â€Å"belong here. Bender continuously antagonizes Claire. Bender and Andrew have shouting matches almost bringing them to blows. Also, Allison had a strange outburst during Claire’s disclosure about her parents. The principle tries to set clear expectations and norms by telling the students that there is to be no moving, no talking, and no monkey business while in detention. However, in his attempt to establish the norms; the results prove to be unsuccessful because the group does not agree to Mr. Vernon’s rules. Instead, the students become quite rebellious and show disrespect for authority. Most of this behavior is exhibited by Bender who uses his status, power, and leadership within the group. In regards to performing, the group eventually accomplishes its task which was to write the 1000 word essay with Brian as the leader of this undertaking. The group also achieves other goals such as killing eight hours of detention while remaining free of boredom. They learned about each other and experienced and new found respect for through self-disclosures. They also rebelled against the established norms with each other. By the end of the day, they had established their own cohesive group and learned to look past their stereotypes of each other. However, they question whether or not they will remain as friends come Monday morning. I believe that this movie is a true depiction of high school life in the suburbs, as each group of students has stereotypes about the other groups amongst their peers. It is up to us the individuals to break down the barriers that prevent us from appreciating each others qualities and learn not to criticize and/or condemn our peers.