Rhododendron essays

Rhododendron essays The plant rhododendron belongs to the family Ericaceae which also includes the Heath, and there are about eight-hundred fifty species which grow worldwide (Turner and Szczawinski, 171-2). The Heath family is a large one with so many species, all of the poisonous species fall into two of its subfamilies, one of which is These cultivated plants occur naturally in temperate regions of the northern hemisphere and in the mountains of Southeast Asia. They are located in the Himalayas with seven-hundred species, southwest China, Burma, and in New Guinea with over three-hundred species (Turner and szczawinski, 172). It has been popular as ornaments in gardens and has led to a major horticultural industry with There are twenty-seven species native to North America, (Turner,172) and is the state plant of Washington. This specific plant is called R. macrophyllum or the Pacific rhododendron (Pojar and Mackinnon, 61). It forms a shrub layer in forests ranging from shoreline pine groves to stands of Douglas-fir and western Hemlock up in the mountains. Usually they are located everywhere from homes to freeway sides and also in the forests. The rhododendron shows a great variety in size, habit, and flower color, colors from white to pink, dark-purple, yellow, red, and orange (McKenzi,1). They range from small shrubs to small trees with evergreen leaves that are leathery. The leaves are short stalked, simple, and alternate, and the flowers are large, bell-shaped, and born in dense clusters. They are best grown on acidous soil with a ph of 4.5 and 6.5, included with lots of moisture and organic material (McKenzie, 3). The leaves, flowers, pollen, and nectar of many rhododendron species contain several toxins (Kingsbury, 50). These toxins are called grayanotoxins or andromedotoxin, a resinoid carbohydrate (Kingsbury, 51). ...

buy custom The Advances in DNA Technology essay

buy custom The Advances in DNA Technology essay Introduction: The study of geneticdiseasebegan longago. In thepastpeople that suffered geneticdiseasewere leftalone. Theywere despisedand often separated from the rest of the community. Genetic diseases are highlyunpredictable. Despite the fact that genetic diseaseshave been studiedin the past, the studies done have still not reached a bottom line on the symptoms and treatment of diseases. Researchers havetherefore, sunkdeepto study genetic diseases. The target of the study is to findpossibletreatment and modes of managing such conditions. Further studies have also been done on ways of handling people with genetic diseases. These studies areoftendone by medical practitioners especially nurses. They include forums and medical courses thatassistthem to understand and such patients and be able to help them together with their families. Genetic diseases: The human bodyis madeof cells. In each cell, there are significant structures called DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). DNA occurs in small bits on a chromosome. The chromosomeis composedof DNA strands. Genes are then the segments of DNA thatare foundon the chromosome. These genescarrythecharacteristicof an individual. Every person has 23 pairs of chromosomes. In rare occasions, these genesgetdefects that result in genetic disorders and diseases. A genetic disease is anillnessthat comes as a result of defects in the human chromosomes or genes. It is usually caused byvariationor alteration (mutation) of a gene. The genetherefore, codes for a protein that forms acharacterof a person.The defective genes lead to the making proteins withpoorstability which is not, three dimensional.These are the folded proteins. These proteinsare eliminatedfrom thecellthat later result in to a disease due to impaired cellular function. In other cases, the cell may fail toeliminatethe defective proteins which ac cumulate and result in genetic disorders (Gendel 2000). These diseases are eitherhereditaryor environmental. These diseases come invariousways. Genetic disorders can result from an abnormal number of chromosomes. That is the chromosomes could be less or more than thenormalnumberwhich is 23 chromosomes in each cell e.g. Down syndrome. The chromosomes can alsoexpandorrepeatitself in the cell.This results in tomutationof chromosomes.The resulting chromosome isdefectiveand causes disorders e.g. Huntingtons disease. A person cangetgenetic disease by inheriting defective genes from his or her parents. One of the parents could have a defective gene which theypassto the child duringconceptionof pregnancy (Mehta2010). Most of these diseases are rare. They canhardbe found incommonsettings. However, cystic fibrosis is one of the most common genetic disorders. Technological advances in genetic diseases the existing demands on genetic patient care, researchers have found out ways through which they can detect genetic diseases. These tests can detect both the inherited and the non-inherited disorders. The tests candetectwhether a person is a carrier of the disease. Prenataltestcan also be done to detect whether the unborn child willcontracta genetic disorder or not. Genetictestinvolve theanalysisof body tissues, blood and body fluids to detect the presence offaultyDNA. These genes couldhave been lost, misplaced in the body cell, inactivated, or over expressed in the cell. DNA testing can be done by two ways: Using DNA probes.These are short strings that have complementary sequence to the gene muted in the cell. Thisprobeis injectedinto the patient. If it finds the mutated gene, it binds to it and can be detected. The genetypecan also be detected by comparing the sequences. The DNA sequence that is faultyis comparedto a normalsequencetodetectthe fault in the sequence. The key proteins in the cell of the patient can also be detected. Some of these defective proteinsproducemalfunctioned genes. There are more advanced technologies that have come up to detect genetic disorders. According to Gendel (2000), researchers have sought out atherapyused to detect and correct misfolded proteins. This therapy uses a molecule drug called Pharmacological chaperones. The molecule binds to themisfoldedprotein and makes its three dimensionalform. Once the protein has formed the three-dimensionalformit takes itspositionin thecelland performs its function. The method can be used for other conditions that are a result ofmisfoldedproteins. Reason for genetic testing There are several reasons as to why anindividualcan go for genetic testing. Genetic testing canhelpin the determination of whether anindividualhasdefectivegenes in his or her body. This is in the context of those that already have the defective genes, but have not shown any signs for genetic disorders. For instance, a person can be tested for breast cancer, or olon. Genetic testing can be used to determine if an individual is a carrier of the defective genes. Carriers do notgetto have symptoms of the disease. They do not get infected by the disease, but can pass thediseaseto their children. This is in the cases of individuals that have adiseasethat is rotating in the family. Prenatal testing also includes genetic tests in which the mother of the unborn childis screenedfor genetic disorders such as cystic fibrosis, Spina Bifida, and Down syndrome. This test eliminates the chances of the unborn child tocontractthe disease. Samples of amniotic fluidare takenfor analysis of the disease (Daar 2008) these advances in genetic studies have also influenced nursing practices. The nursesgettrainingto become professionals in taking care of patients suffering from genetic disorders. The roles of nurses havehencebeen increased. It is theroleif nurses to ensure that the patients suffering from genetic diseasemakethe right choices andundergothecorrecttreatment and counseling (Smith, Ladd, Pasquerella 93). The nurses roles have also changed in with the rise in technology. The nurses roles include: Access hereditary and nonhereditary disease. This includes theassessmentof presence of diseases in the individual. Takedetailedfamily history of thepatientthat could be suffering from genetic disorders.This will help in the prediction of dominant or recessive genes in the individual tested. Interpret laboratory results for genetic disorders. This is one of thecrucialroles that involveconclusionof laboratory investigations. From these results, the nurse canconcludediagnosis and treatment. Provide genetic counseling, and consultation for genetic health care. This is beneficial for patients that are undergoingstressfulmoments as they undergo treatment of these disorders. There was anexpectantwoman overwhelmed by the news of a having a potentially aneuploid fetus. The woman had a fetus that had to be tested of geneticdefectivediseaseusing amniocentesis.She also had to go through the test, todetermineherfateand that of her unborn child.She had to make the decision in a short time frame. This is because the test has to be done before the child has developedfully. This would help the doctors determine ways through which they can help the unborn child be born without the expected disease. This situation puts the patient in a stress mode. The patient undergoes atoughmoment as she tries to make decisions about her unborn child with limited finance. In addition, she did not have social support. Such patients oftenresulttocrisis. The patient finds themselves withanxietyandconfusion. In some cases, they have atendencyof forgetfulness. She also has to deal with thethoughtthat her pregnancy may notsurvive. If the babyis born, she may have tobearthe child with the fatal geneticillnessof Huntington disease. In such a situation, the nurses role is crucial. The nurse to whom theladyis attending should play herpartso as to assist the patient tomanagethe situation. The nurse cantakethe patient through counseling session so as tolowerthe negative pressure that the patient is undergoing. On such a situation the nurseshould: Build a relationship between the patient and herself. This willeasetheatmospherebetween them, and the patient will be able to open up. She or he should assess the condition of thepatientandmakeaplanon how the goalswill be accomplished. The nurse should collect information from thepatientthat can be used in the diagnosis and treatment of the disease. During this phase, the nurse shouldbreakdown thecrisistoidentifywith the situation of the patient.At leastexplorethesituationin every point from the patients perspective.This way it will be easy for the patient to set goals. Theactionphaseinvolves the collection ofdatanecessary for the plan set in the beginning phase. The nurse should bekeentoeliminateall hindrances that willjeopardizetheaccomplishmentof the goals. These hindrances include lack of finances and lack of social support. He or she should capitalize on the strong points that willencouragethe patient to go through the therapy. After settling these details, and the information obtained is sufficient, the implementation process can commence. Terminationphasethis is thephasein which the nurse takes time toreviewon the progress of the patient. He or she will countercheck theprogressof the patient against the goals they hadsetat the start of therapy. Once theprogressis satisfactory, the nurse can thenreleasethe patient and terminate the counseling sessions. In case the goals set in thebuildingphase have not been accomplished, then the goals are reset. The patientis observedfurther until he or she recovers from the crisis. The ccanceller is careful when ending the counseling session with patients on his or her feelings.The woman that had difficulty in the decision making about the Huntington disease testing, agreed to do the test. The following are points to consider while handling apatientwith indecision on genetic disease. Ensure aneutralatmosphere between the patient and the counselor. The counselor should not impose his or her personal values to the patient; rathertakethe patient step by step until they have realized the problem in their perspective. The counselor should bekeennot to usedirectivenesson the patient.The counselor should use non defectiveness which willcapture, attention of the patient.However, in some cases he or she can usedirectivenessin the interrogation process but with an apologetic tone (West Student 2002). Crisis management Much often than not peoplegetin to difficult situations.In such timesit ishardto decide on the way forward. A person mayoptto find a counselor to assist them in decision making. It is usuallybetterbeingin a position, to make a decision early than to wait for some time. The situation maygetdepressive to handle. According to France (2007), there are three faces that encircle crisis management. 1. Phase one: impact phase: this is the reaction of an individual towards a certainsituationthat he or she have encountered. In such aninstanceoften theimmediatesolutions employed will not have worked out thesituation. Therefore, it turns out to be a problem that weighs heavy on the person. Anindividualmay notacceptbeing in thesituationthat they have found themselves engaged in at that time. A person mayreachanextentasking of themselves why he or she have gotten in to the problem.There are three dimensions which people may respond to a situation. Internal- external: this category clouds the person who feels that he or she is thecauseof the problem he or she is facing. Such anindividualmay be clouded by low-self esteem. Stable-unstable: this reaction refers to the decisions that arepermanentor temporary. A person may respond to an impact by picking on a decision that islong-lastingwhile another person may choose aplanthat is notpermanent. This category reactsfasttogetsolutions that will solve the situation fast. Global-specific: global attributions involve perceiving similarities across morenarrowapplications. 2. Phase two: coping phase: when a person has gotten overwhelmed by a situation and the firstapproachhas not worked, the person tends tofinda secondary solution. This is the way forward to deal with the situation. If the situation is not changing with the solution employed in the first instance, the individual tends to find a way to eliminate the problem completely. 3. Phase three: withdrawal: this phase comes in when thesolutionused do not work as planned by the person in the situation. In this phase, the individual maydecideto withdraw from the situation. Hence in this instance, the person finds out ways of getting rid of thesituationwithout solving it. In the case, of people suffering from genetic diseasescrisismanagement can be applied. Most patients, who are diagnoses by the disease, oftengetdepressed. This is because of the fact that they have contracted a fatal diseasee.g. in the case of Huntingtons disease. Some may overcome thefearof contracting the disease. The patient who can afford medication tries to get treatment. In other cases, patients without financialsupportmay find it more difficult. If the challenges and barriers become overwhelming for the patient, he or she mayresolvetowithdrawal. The patient then chooses to give up fighting theillness. At this point, the patient survives without any drugs or patientcareas he or she waits forfate. In conclusion, genetic disorders are notpredictable. They can behereditaryor non hereditary. Most of these diseases arefatalandrenderanindividualhelpless. In some cases, they cause premature deaths. As a result, it isbeneficialfor patients suffering from genetic disorders, to undergo treatment andtherapy. On the other hand, for anindividualthat has had family members dying sequentially of a certain disease, shouldresolvefor genetic testing. This can help them know if they have adominantor recessive defective gene which they are passing to other generations. Expectant mothers should also consider genetic testing for the good of the unborn child and the family as a unit. Medical personnel also need to come up in large numbers to find ways of improving patient care in hospitals. These personnel play acrucialrole in the recovery of patients suffering from genetic diseases. They shouldimprovethe patient care service to assist patients with such disease, and their family memberstoo. Genetic counseling plays a significant role in the management of these diseases (Ethobey 2010).Hence it is a worth course in building better medical services geared towards a healthy people. Buy custom The Advances in DNA Technology essay

Technology Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 14

Technology - Essay Example From just 60,000 users in the year 2007 to more than 200million users in the year 2014 what are the reasons for this immense growth? How has twitter changed how we communicate? One of the main reasons that have influenced the growth of twitter is the free media coverage that the company receives. Virtually all media outlets and various other social networking platforms mention twitter. The number of unique visitors twitter has every month has further proved this. The company also spends a lot of money marketing their brand and this has made twitter one of the biggest social platforms in the world. Twitter also has the approval of many big corporations. Twitter is the preferred social media platform for most of the fortune 500 companies. These big companies use twitter as a way of connecting with their customers. With the big companies setting the trend, smaller companies have also started using twitter as their preferred social media platform. Twitter has also been ranked as the no. 1 social brand. Twitter was ranked at position one while Facebook was ranked at number four. The company has invested a lot of money to make twitter a social brand and this has started to pay off as twitter has grown to become one of the largest social media platforms of the 21st century. Twitter has changed the way the world communicates. Today, Twitter has become more than just a social media platform as it is used to share information (Anderson 48). People get breaking news from twitter and can discuss about virtually anything using the popular hash tag. Twitter has also been able to remove the celebrity filter. It is now possible to get to know what your favorite celebrity is doing and catch up with them. Twitter has also been able to simplify the conversation. Using just 140 characters, people are able to speak their mind without having to answer to anyone (Wright 99).

Managing and evaluating informal education Essay

Managing and evaluating informal education - Essay Example Organisational culture has no concrete definition; different researchers have defined in various forms so that ambiguity of the word is cleared to a certain extent. According to Denison (1990) and Celand (1994), cited by Nayak et al. (2011), organisational culture can be defined as â€Å"an environment of organisation which is made up of beliefs, practices, customs, knowledge and conventionalised behaviour of a specific social group†. In other words, several researchers have associated different terms with the word ‘culture’ such as shared meanings of symbols, rituals, beliefs, and myths that evolve with the passage of time and reduce variability in human nature and control while shaping employees’ behaviour within the organisation. Since people are valuable assets of organisations, they are the ones who run the business activities of organisations in the form of teams; culture helps in giving them a meaning, shared vision along with set of rules, principles and standards according to which they have to behave in the respective organisation. There are three levels in organisational culture as identified by Nayak et al. (2011) i.e. artefacts of culture that can be observed, followed by shared values and then common assumptions. When levels are considered as layers, then when the level is deeper, it becomes difficult to diagnose and analyze organisational culture by going at that level. Lund (2003) has stated that organisational culture in any type of organisation is defined by the shared beliefs, values, perceptions or customs that are held and followed by employees within that particular organisation or its unit. Since organisational culture is a reflection of behavioural norms, beliefs and values that are being used by organisation’s employees, they give meanings to the situations when they encounter it and these culture characteristics

US Political Parties And Elections Essay Example for Free

US Political Parties And Elections Essay The architects of the United States constitution had not envisioned the predominant role that political parties were to play later in the United States politics. No provision for their operations had been outlined by the constitution in relations to the system and process of governance. This emanated from a general belief that political parties were rich grounds for corruption and would impede the general decision making process of individuals on important issues facing the nation. Political parties then were considered by the likes of James Madison to be factions that would usurp the powers and the roles of the government. With time however, political parties emerged as the political environment got more conducive for them. The have evolved through time and have played an important role in the politics of the United States.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Analyzing political parties in the United States from far is not likely to bring any meaningful insights. The American party system is weak in terms of organization and composition. They contain class and ideological differences that normally bring divisions internally. The American political field has been in overtime now been characterized by a two party. These two parties are not ideologically unique as they strive to take an all inclusive approach. By the turn of the 20th century, political parties were the in thing and the American citizens would align themselves either as Republicans or Democrats. By then elections could record over an 80 percent electorate’s turnout. This turnout continued to decline with time. For example the second half of the century recorded the lowest turn out. It stood at 63% in the 1960s elections and has continued to decline to barely 50% in the recent elections. This probably emanates from the inability of the parties to mobilize enough support for their parties (David Pomerantz, March 1990).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Although major parties have continued to draw public support over the years, they have not been without the incidences of major fallouts that would threaten their existence. In the early part of the 20th century, the Republican Party had been rocked with an eminent fall out that was emanating from ideological differences between the conservatives. This row was a characteristic of both parties but it is the Republican Party that bore the greatest blunt. It led to a split that would see the formation of the progressive party that went ahead to field its own presidential candidate in the elections. This candidate lost but clocked the highest amount of votes every by someone outside the two key parties.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The role of the political parties in the first half of the century was significant and electorates were guided by the parties in their voting patterns. The major breakaway a times experienced in the two parties emanates from the rise of charismatic leaders whose popularity sometimes surpassed even party boundaries.   The rise of the Progressive Party and the American Independent Party of 1968 is a witness to this. In both these occasions these parties were held at the realm of the leaders whims such that after the leaders decide to join the mainstream the parties are broken up and rejoin the major parties.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Political parties exist to serve a number of factors in the political scene. These would range from articulation of the populations demands, bringing together of the various diverse interests in the society, promoting stability and coordinating governments activities and institutions. Almost all political scholars are in agreement that there has been a decline of political parties’ role in accomplishing the above. These changes have been more pronounced from the 1950s. Prior to this, parties were effective in representing the broad views of the various interests and coalitions.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The changes that have occurred in the political parties in America can be measured rather subjectively by looking at their membership, identities, voting parties and turnout. Unlike the early times when membership and activism in the party was respected and widely acknowledged, statistics indicate that from the 1980s, only close to two percent of the whole American population could pride themselves of playing any active role in their specific parties. Whereas by then activism was party based and was meant to mobilize and popularize the party, nowadays it is candidate oriented and to an extension, issue based. This is one factor that has been identified as weakening the major parties. It is apparent that political parties have been on the decline and in their place, have given rise to politics that revolve around certain candidates rather than the parties. Ross Perot was able to make a political in road in both 1968 and 1996 because of this decline. The congress too has decreased its traditional pattern of voting along ones party’s orientation. Congress members have been voting predominantly in regard to issue at hand and the perceived electorate’s pressure rather than along the traditional party lines. A look at the presidential elections in the recent years indicates major differences in the emphasis on the importance of political parties. Whereas in the presidential elections, at the turn of the century up to the new deal, the likes of Roosevelt were appealing to the electorates through the party machineries and structures. This is a trend that has come to change. Campaigns then would be based at the party level (Daniel H., Dennis R. J B, 1991). Reagan and Clinton are good examples of presidents that took to their campaigns to the public with minimal regard of their parties. This is in the understanding that it is not the parties that put them in the office but the public. This by passing of the political parties by the president has continuously eroded the role that they play in mobilization. People now vote for individuals and no longer for the parties. A look at the major political parties might give an insight into why political participation and their role have been on the decline. The Democratic Party mainly draws its support from the liberal groups, civil rights movements, middle and lower class workers and minority groups especially in the south. In the recent times there have been no major sensitive issues that could elicit the emotions of these varied groups and woo them into supporting the parties. Ideologically the two parties look almost similar and so have the candidates. This should explain the reason why many voters seem to have lost interest in their parties, choosing to back their preferred candidates instead. The relative success of the independent candidates indicates that a good proportion of the electorate is choosing to remain unaffiliated to either of the parties and opting to remain neutral. Peoples’ involvement in political parties has declined to near zero percent. A trend that has grown throughout the century is where the candidates no longer use the party for their campaigns utilizing the professionals rather than party amateurs. Candidates no longer respond to the dominant issues through the party organs but rather do it through the media. This brings us to the phenomena that is characteristic of the 80s and continues to grow from strength to strength. The media is slowly usurping the role of political parties in the candidate’s efforts to present their issues to the public. Although media campaigns have always been there in the American election, they have taken a gigantic role in marketing the candidates rather than the parties. Candidates can now present themselves to the electorate with no endorsement from the relevant parties. This trust in the media as the channel through which to popularize themselves has eroded and diminished the powers and authority that a party has over a candidate. The traditional practice, for example, would be for the party members or officials to sit down and select one of their own to be a running mate in the presidential race. This has changed as media attention sometimes seems to be focused on those who are ready to market themselves in the public. The role of party campaign machinery and financing is also dwindling and candidates are relying more on their won individual campaign organizations, hence loyalty to parties is minimal. With the parties’ role declining, so does the party’s interaction with the constituents decrease. However, at the grass root level, this has been the trend throughout the century and has seen party candidates being chosen through the primary process. But generally, the parties have lost touch with the constituents and it is up to the candidates sensitize the constituents; they act as a link between the grass root supporters and the parties. Involvement of the constituents is reduced only to their voting in the primaries (Cohen, Jeffery E, 2001). A comparison of the role of the political parties between the United States and Europe paints a grim picture for America. In Europe, for example in Britain, the parties still play a crucial role in articulation of important issues. This is unlike the same roles played by parties in the U.S. Indeed, a look at the trend throughout the 20th century as the parties roles in national politics and individuals lives decline so have their strength. Important issues are now articulated not by the political parties themselves but rather by social movements and personalities. The role of political parties has declined in the elections and has taken a candidate based approach. The candidates themselves resort to using the media to publicize themselves and their manifestos rather the party organs. This is explained by the rising significance of the media in articulation of policies and in bringing together the various interest groups contrary to how it was in the first half of the century. There has been a polarization of the major divisions that existed in the society resulting to people having unanimity in the sensitive issues.   References David Pomerantz, March 1990. The decline of American Parties 1952-1988: book reviews. Washington monthly. Daniel Hellinger and Dennis R. Judd Brooks, 1991. The decline of the parties, excerpted from the book, the democratic faà §ade. Cole publishing company. Cohen, Jeffery E, 1/1/2001. American political parties: Decline or resurgence? CQ Press.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner :: essays research papers

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Coleridge's poem â€Å"The Rime of the Ancient Mariner† is written about a Mariner telling his tale of sin and forgiveness to a small group of young men on their way to attend a wedding. The Mariner claims to be responsible for the deaths of everyone on board of a ship he once sailed because he killed a creature that was supposed to bring them the wind they needed to resume sailing after hitting a plateau in the ship’s movement. Through the writing style in â€Å"The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,† Coleridge tries to convince the reader that the events told in the poem could possibly have been real, thus leaving the reader to partially believe the strange story and Coleridge is right to do so. The theme of â€Å"The Rime of the Ancient Mariner† is God’s forgiveness. The Mariner believes that God has forgiven him for his sins and is telling his tale to the young men on their way to a wedding. The Mariner explains that he killed an albatross, and the entire crew dies because of it. The Mariner, however, survives and asks God’s to forgive him for his sins. When the Mariner prays for forgiveness, the curse preventing the souls of the crew from entering Heaven is broken, the Mariner’s life is spared and Angels from Heaven escort the souls of the dead crewman to the afterlife. In closing, the whole point of the story becomes clear in the following lines. "Farewell, farewell! but this I tell To thee, thou Wedding Guest! He prayeth well, who loveth well Both man and bird and beast. "He prayeth best, who loveth best All things both great and small; For the dear God who loveth us, 03 He made and loveth all." The Mariner, whose eye is bright,

Confessions of a Shopaholic

Existential consumption and irrational desire Richard Elliott University of Oxford, Oxford, UK If marketing is truly the â€Å"ultimate social practice of postmodern consumer culture† (Firat, 1993) then it carries the heavy burden of â€Å"determining the conditions and meanings of life for the future† (Firat and Venkatesh, 1993). Certainly, social theory is now focusing on consumption as playing a central role in the way the social world is constructed, and it can be argued that marketing is too important just to be left to marketers as it plays a â€Å"key role in giving meaning to life through consumption† (van Raaij, 1993).Marketing has been criticized from within as being a â€Å"technique† without moral regard for the consequences of its actions, and there is no shortage of critics of its most public face: advertising. This paper aims at identifying some of the issues raised by postmodern and poststructuralist accounts of consumption. In particular, it is argued that consumption can be conceptualized from cultural, social and psychological perspectives as being a prime site for the negotiation of conflicting themes of freedom and control.It is proposed here that in postmodernity the consumption of symbolic meaning, particularly through the use of advertising as a cultural commodity, provides the individual with the opportunity to construct, maintain and communicate identity and social meanings. This use of consumption as a resource for meaning creation and social transactions is a process that involves the making of choices that are sufficiently important to be considered as existential.This is not an attempt at rehabilitating the practice of marketing, but is intended to demonstrate that the consumer is far from being a passive victim but is an active agent in the construction of meaning. In part this can be seen as a response to Olander’s call for â€Å"consumer research for the consumer’s sake† (Olander, 1993), but also as providing theoretical underpinning for concepts such as â€Å"advertising literacy† (Ritson and Elliott, 1995a) which attempt to build new socially located and meaning-based-models of advertising.Exploring some consumption dialectics As a heuristic device to help unpack some of the complexity of the consumption experience, five dialectics will be explored and their (sometimes polar) tensions used as analytical frames for reviewing competing discourses on the meanings of consumption: My thanks to Geoff Easton and Rolland Munro for discussions which improved the ideas in this paper, some of which have been explored in Elliott and Ritson (1995). Existential consumption and irrational desire 285 European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 1 No. 3/4, 1997, pp. 285-296.  © MCB University Press, 0309-0566 European Journal of Marketing 31,3/4 286 (1) the material versus the symbolic; (2) the social versus the self; (3) desire versus satisfaction; (4) rationality versus irrationality; and (5) creativity versus constraint. It is acknowledged that binary oppositions are essentially structuralist and thus in danger of betraying the complexity of the poststructuralist accounts they are being used to elucidate here, and that they are inevitably reductionist.However, postmodernism is riven with contradictions, even Baudrillard’s account of postmodernity is itself a totalizing â€Å"meta-narrative† (Hebdige, 1989), so we must learn to participate in the â€Å"tolerance of incompatible alternatives† (Lyotard, 1984) and â€Å"the juxtaposition of opposites and contradictions† (Foster, 1983) called for by postmodern theorists in the hope that it can develop our understanding(s) of the meaning(s) of these complex ideas.As a heuristic device, these bipolar oppositions should not be read as posited structures but merely as aids to coming to grips with the sometimes mind-numbing interrelations between what are often incommensurable co ncepts. The binary opposition is false and should, of course, be allowed to â€Å"melt into air† (Berman, 1983). The material versus the symbolic As soon as a product’s ability to satisfy mere physical need is transcended, then we enter the realm of the symbolic and it is symbolic meaning that is used in the search for the meaning of existence (Fromm, 1976).Central to postmodern theories of consumption is the proposition that consumers no longer consume products for their material utilities but consume the symbolic meaning of those products as portrayed in their images; products in fact become commodity signs (Baudrillard, 1981). â€Å"The real consumer becomes a consumer of illusions† (Debord, 1977) and â€Å"the ad-dict buys images not things† (Taylor and Saarinen, 1994). This semiotic perspective of products as symbols raises difficult questions about the location of cultural meaning.The term symbol itself can relate to the product that carries meaning or to the meaning it carries, and the interpretation of meaning is a complex product of what is contained in the representation and what the individual brings to the representation (LeVine, 1984). Symbolism can be analysed semiotically by examination of the system of signs and what they signify. It has been realized, however, that this leads to an infinite regress as one sign leads to another without there ever being anything â€Å"real† outside the system.All meaning is socially constructed and there is no essential external reference point, so ultimately â€Å"There is nothing outside the text† (Derrida, 1977). To complicate matters further, symbolic interpretation is essentially non-rational improvisation that does not obey the codes of language but operates at the unconscious level (Sperber, 1975). A Jungian analysis goes even further and suggests that the full significance of a symbol cannot be Existential grasped in purely intellectual terms, if it becomes fully definable in rational consumption and terms it is no longer a true symbol (Storr, 1973). rrational desire But even for the sign-dependent human being things are never purely material nor purely meaningful, there is always a mediated relation between matter and meaning. This mediated process operates through the materiality 287 of language as a dynamic force in the transformation of an indeterminate range of human possibilities into a restricted moral economy of meaning, in which we are simultaneously authors of and authored by the language with which we try to communicate (Pfohl, 1992).This relationship is partly a function of the individual’s ability to understand and control the interaction between the material and the symbolic, and material objects themselves are always in transit and their meaning is likewise on a trajectory (Appadurai, 1986). The social versus the self The functions of the symbolic meanings of products operate in two directions, outward in constructing the social world – social-symbolism – and inward towards constructing our self-identity: self-symbolism (Elliott, 1995).Consumption of the symbolic meaning of products is a social process that helps make visible and stable the basic categories of a culture which are under constant change, and consumption choices â€Å"become a vital source of the culture of the moment† (Douglas and Isherwood, 1978). The meanings of consumer goods are grounded in their social context and the demand for goods derives more from their role in cultural practices rather than from the satisfaction of simple human needs (Douglas and Isherwood, 1978). Consumer goods, then, are more than just objects of economic exchange, â€Å"they are goods to think with, goods to speak with† (Fiske, 1989).Consumption as a cultural practice is one way of participating in social life and may be an important element in cementing social relationships, while the whole system of consumption is an unco nscious expression of the existing social structure through a seductive process which pushes the purchasing impulse until it reaches the â€Å"limits of economic potential† (Baudrillard, 1988). It is within this social context that the individual uses consumer goods and the consumption process as the materials with which to construct and maintain an identity, form relationships and frame psychological events (Lunt and Livingstone, 1992).The self-symbolic role of material goods is long established in social anthropology and the individual’s attachment to objects may be a culturally universal function which symbolizes security, expresses the self-concept and signifies connection to society (Wallendorf and Arnould, 1988). Consumer goods are not only used to construct our self-identity but are also used by others to make inferences about us that guide their behaviour towards us (Dittmar, 1992). But now in postmodernity we are able to use consumer products to become any of our â€Å"possible selves† (Markus and Nurius, 1986) inEuropean Journal of Marketing 31,3/4 288 which we utilize consumer goods to construct pastiches of others we have been exposed to via the media or more directly. â€Å"In cyberspace, I can change myself as easily as I change my clothes† (Taylor and Saarinen, 1994). But the choices as to which self to construct and present are attended by the possibility of social consequences which may be very negative for example, a failure of a young person to utilize symbolic capital in the form of knowledge of the appropriate meaning of advertising can lead to rejection by the peer group (O’Donohoe, 1994).Desire versus satisfaction The symbolic gratification promised by advertising manages to recode a commodity as a desirable psycho-ideological sign (Wernick, 1991), and the operation of advertising at the unconscious level is driven by the search for an imaginary self which motivates the individual with desire for cohere nce and meaning (Lacan, 1977).Advertising feeds the desire to achieve the unobtainable unity of the self with destabilized meanings (Featherstone, 1991), images which separate commodities from their original use and offer the possibility to reconstruct the self by purchasing the symbolic meaning of goods and constructing a â€Å"DIY self† (Bauman, 1991). For as Williamson (1978) points out, â€Å"The conscious chosen meaning in most people’s lives comes from what they consume†, and this is energized by the attachment of bodily desire to symbolic meaning where the inchoate needs of the pre-linguistic self are channelled into language.Central to Lacanian theory is the mirror-phase, where the child recognizes itself in a mirror and assumes an image through a transformation from the imaginary to the symbolic. The symbolic for Lacan is linked with absence, in that symbols represent a world of people and things that are not there. The â€Å"real† can only be ap proached through the symbolic medium of language, yet language itself contains the contradictions and fragmentations of gender, power and meaning (Kristeva, 1980).The symbolic focus of much promotional activity in postmodernity is desire, and for Lacan desire exists in the gap between language and the unconscious. â€Å"Desire does not desire satisfaction. To the contrary desire desires desire. The reason images are so desirable is that they never satisfy† (Taylor and Saarinen, 1994). Postmodern consumption is inextricably linked with aspects of sexuality, both conscious and unconscious, as it promises the satisfaction of previously taboo desires through imagery and representations (Mort, 1988).These desires are constructed through the symbolic linkage between consumption and the human body (Kellner, 1992), and operate in large part through the consumption imagery with which we are surrounded and which makes even mundane consumer actions, such as looking in shop windows, high ly significant in our psychic lives (Bocock, 1993). Thus meaning is created through a search for links between identity (the social) and the self and the pursuit of sexual satisfaction through consumption, both of which are doomed to failure.Rationality versus irrationality Existential This postmodern fragmentation of the experience of self has been termed the consumption and condition of â€Å"multiphrenia† by Gergen (1991), who points out that the new irrational desire opportunities for exercise of choice are almost unlimited and so bring with them a â€Å"vertigo of the valued† where the expansion of â€Å"wants† reduces our choice to â€Å"want not†, a multiplicity of competing values and beliefs which make â€Å"the very 289 idea of rational choice become meaningless†.The mass media, and advertising in particular, are responsible for an â€Å"expansion of inadequacy† which is encouraged by a barrage of new criteria for self-evaluation. Cushman (1990) argues that we are in an era of the â€Å"empty self† in which alienation and loss of community can be solved by the â€Å"lifestyle† solution in which the consumer constructs a â€Å"self † by purchasing and â€Å"ingesting† products featured in advertising, a behaviour which can be construed as, at best, of limited rationality.In the Lacanian perspective there is a stress on the individual subject as being fragmented and incoherent, and this leads to the framing of the consumer as simultaneously both rational and irrational, able to both consume and reject what is being consumed, to desire and yet consume without satisfaction (Nava, 1991). â€Å"Identity becomes infinitely plastic in a play of images that knows no end. Consistency is no longer a virtue but becomes a vice; integration is limitation† (Taylor and Saarinen, 1994).The consumption of meaning, even the meaning of supposedly unambiguous television soap operas, is always am bivalent and contradictory (Ang, 1985), and the modes of rationality which operate in the space between the unconscious world of the imaginary and the symbolic world of language are little understood as they are constrained by the â€Å"despotic signifying semiologies† which limit the possibilities for other forms of semiotic systems and other forms of rationality (Deleuze and Guattari, 1983).The conceptualization of other modes of (ir)rationality is paralleled by the recent development in social cognition of the theory of motivated choice, which emphasizes the role of emotion in decision processes (Forgas, 1992; Kunda, 1990). Motivated choice is where judgement is driven by an emotional desire to arrive at a particular conclusion, where biased information search and reasoning processes are used â€Å"to arrive at those conclusions they want to arrive at† (Kunda, 1990).From these perspectives, cool, rational, informationprocessing choice is at least uncommon, and may i n fact be very rare, for â€Å"the real, the really real, is irrational, that reason builds upon irrationalities† (de Unamuno, 1962). Creativity versus constraint The dialectic between freedom and control in the consumption domain is typified by the influence of advertising. The ability of consumers to resist the influence of advertising and thereby exercise freedom has been minimized by the Marxist analysis of its central role in the maintenance of capitalism (Leiss etEuropean Journal of Marketing 31,3/4 290 al. , 1990) which operates through the creation of â€Å"ideological hegemony† (Goldman, 1992). Marxists have also portrayed advertising as a â€Å"magic system† (Williams, 1980) of magical inducements and satisfactions which validates consumption, if only in fantasy, by association with social and personal meanings and thus transforms goods which had rational use-value into irrational symbols.This focus on the power of the symbolic is further developed by Williamson (1986) who argues that advertisements function at an unconscious level at which the consumer is unable to resist latent meaning transfer. More recent post-Marxist analyses have weakened their deterministic stance and recognized that â€Å"the meanings and uses of products cannot be entirely controlled† (Williamson, 1986).However, hegemony still exists, but now depends on affective gratifications provided by mass-mediated popular culture where â€Å"everyday life in amusement society proceeds within a dialectic of enfeeblement and empowerment† (Langman, 1992). From a post-structuralist perspective limited freedom is allowed to the individual through consumption choices: â€Å"for most members of contemporary society individual freedom, if available at all, comes in the form of consumer freedom† through which the individual must take responsibility to invent and consciously create a self-identity (Bauman, 1988).Through the â€Å"new existentialism† (Laermans, 1993) consumers can exercise the freedom to create new meanings for goods through their own idiosyncratic performance of everyday life (de Certeau, 1984). This freedom can be used for collective and individual resistance against the imposed meanings of the dominant cultural categories, particularly through the choice of style and the use of bricolage tactics (Fiske, 1987; Hebdige, 1979).A sustained argument for the active exercise of freedom through consumption is developed by Willis (1990), who characterizes the consumption choices of the young as the behaviour of â€Å"practical existentialists†. The young are seen as exercising choice through consumption-related symbolic creativity which operates via the concept of â€Å"grounded aesthetics†, a process which builds higher-level symbolic meaning structures from the mundane concrete experiences of everyday life.This allows the young a small creative space for making the received social world, to some ext ent, controllable by them. This process is very similar to the marginal â€Å"tactics† (de Certeau, 1984) by which the powerless make sense of consumption, and in relation to advertising would allow them some control over the meaning of a text, but not control over the agenda within which the text is constructed (Morley and Silverstone, 1990).This is a limited freedom where we â€Å"make our own spaces within the place of the other† (Fiske, 1989) but yet it is potentially liberating in that to escape from dominant meanings is to construct our own subjectivity (Condit, 1989), and can therefore be conceptualized as â€Å"authentic† existential choice, rejecting the â€Å"bad faith† of accepting the dominant consumption meanings as inevitable or unproblematic (Sartre, 1969). Advertisements can be seen as cultural products in their own right, and Existential young people consume them independently of the products and have a creative consumption and symbolic r elationship with them.Although Willis (1990) sees advertising as irrational desire manipulative to some extent, he emphasises the scope for individual choice and creativity in meaning and identity construction, as individuals use advertising images as personal and social resources. These are invested with specific 291 meanings anchored in everyday life, via the process of grounded aesthetics, which are then used to construct or maintain personal and social identities. These creative practices are particularly prevalent amongst young people of â€Å"Generation X† (O’Donohoe, 1994; Ritson and Elliott, 1995b).The construction of social identity through â€Å"styles of consumption† is referred to in terms of lifestyle membership of â€Å"neo-tribes† by Bauman (1990), where one may join the tribe by buying and displaying tribe-specific paraphernalia. The neo-tribe is informal, without authority and only requires acceptance of the obligation to take on the iden tity-symbols of the tribe. The consumer may thus exercise the freedom to choose social groupings through existential consumption.The exercise of choice through consumption now flows across national boundaries in a global cultural economy through the operation of advertising â€Å"mediascapes† which are image-centred strips of reality which offer the consumer a series of elements â€Å"out of which scripts can be formed of imagined lives, their own as well as those of others living in other places† (Appaduri, 1990). If aspects of advertising imagery can be appropriated at will by â€Å"practical existentialists† then they may, as Baudrillard (1983) suggests, â€Å"live everywhere already in an ‘aesthetic’ hallucination of reality†, in which the real and the simulated are indistinguishable.However, the extent to which, in a â€Å"mediacratic† age, advertising reflects reality or actually creates it is problematic. Are the â€Å"practica l existentialists† using advertising or is it really using them? Schudson (1984) suggests that advertising is â€Å"capitalist realist art† and that although it does not have a monopoly of the symbolic marketplace, different social groups are differentially vulnerable especially during transitional states of their lives. This form of art idealizes the consumer and portrays as normative, special moments of satisfaction.It â€Å"reminds us of beautiful moments in our own lives or it pictures magical moments we would like to experience† (Schudson, 1984). This suggests that young people in particular, who are at a transitional state in their lives, may be subject to excessive influence by â€Å"buying-in† to advertising’s depiction of a false reality. In contrast, young people may be exercising (limited) freedom in their use of advertising as a cultural commodity for â€Å"even as the market makes its profits, it supplies some of the materials for alte rnative or oppositional symbolic work† (Willis, 1990).This dichotomy between creativity and constraint (Moores, 1993) in the context of advertising is represented by the problematic of hegemony, which sets parameters on the freedom to construct meaning (Ang, 1990). Hegemony European Journal of Marketing 31,3/4 292 does not dominate from outside but is a â€Å"thick texture† which interlaces resistance and submission, opposition and complicity (Martin-Barbero, 1988) and which therefore poses difficult problems for ethnographic analysis to unpack.Structuration theory (Giddens, 1984) offers a solution to the dualism of structure versus agency, by positing that the â€Å"structural properties of social systems are both medium and outcome of the practices they recursively organise†. Thus the consumption of advertising can be both an active and creative practice yet is carried out within constraints imposed by material situation and ideological hegemony. Desire, irrati onality and choice Desire develops from physical need through a growing awareness of the existential choice between a desire to have and a desire to be, desire being defined by absence or lack of being (Sartre, 1969).Lacan’s identification of language as the symbolic order which develops from the pre-verbal imaginary order accompanied by increasing anxiety about the self has been reframed by Kristeva (1980) as the two orders of the semiotic and the symbolic. The imaginary/semiotic order is unconscious whilst the symbolic order is rational, but there is potential for â€Å"slippage† between the two orders of meaning, with a regression to the unconscious and irrational order of the imaginary where desire for the unattainable comfort of the perfect mother holds sway.The gap between the fantasy world of consumption day-dreams of perfect pleasure and the disappointments of reality is the basic motivation for Campbell’s (1987) â€Å"autonomous imaginative hedonismâ⠂¬  which results in limitless wants and a permanent state of frustration. The limited resources of the individual consumer must therefore require choices to be made, choices of which desire to feed and which to deny, which meanings to consume and which to reject or avoid. This vital act of consumer choice may not be to choose that which is most pleasing, but to reject that which is most distasteful.Bourdieu (1984) suggests tastes that â€Å"when they have to be justified, they are asserted purely negatively, by the refusal of other tastes†. We may define ourselves not by what we like, but by what we dislike, and it is strong negative emotional reactions to the consumption practices of others that may structure our social categories. This â€Å"refusal of tastes† seems to operate at the level of the imaginary/semiotic and be driven by pre-verbal inchoate emotion. While consumption may often operate at the level of the imaginary/semiotic or day-dream, it can also have â€Å"real† effects in facilitating the construction of self-identity (Falk, 1994).Phenomenological descriptions of the everyday consumer experiences of women (Thompson et al. , 1990) have surfaced a dominant theme of being in control/being out of control which reflected an anxiety about not buying in the â€Å"right† way, so that women felt guilty when they perceived themselves as not making rational purchase decisions. However, they nevertheless admitted to making purchases in a â€Å"dreamlike† way when they were â€Å"captivated† by a product. In this situation, to act in a self-perceived rrational fashion, to surrender to the symbolic, is itself an authentic existential Existential act of creating meaning through choice, the choice to be irrational. consumption and But to what extent is existential consumption the conscious exercise of irrational desire freedom through choice as idealized by existentialism? Certainly there are severe limits to the fr eedom contained in consumption choices due to individuals having unequal access to the necessary resources, so existential 293 consumption may only exist for some people in some societies.However, the lived experience described by consumers (Elliott and Ritson, 1995; Thompson et al. , 1990) conveys a strong sense of Sartre’s â€Å"engagement† even if not at the level of decisional seriousness discussed by Kierkegaard (Macquarrie, 1972). Marxists may dismiss an individual’s claim to be making conscious choices about consumption as â€Å"false consciousness† but this is to deny the â€Å"situated meaningfulness of everyday consumer experiences† (Thompson et al. , 1990). The freedom of practical existentialism is authentic, even if it is constrained by inequalities in the economic system and by ideological hegemony.The emotion-laden experiences of the consumer – irrational, incoherent and driven by unconscious desires; constrained by the market economy yet obtaining limited freedom through existential consumption and symbolic creativity; able to build a DIY self through consumption yet suffering an expansion of inadequacy through advertising – this constructs the subjectivity of the postmodern consumer with whom postmodern marketing (Brown, 1995) must deal. References Ang, I. (1985), Watching Dallas: Soap Opera and the Melodramatic Imagination, Methuen, London. 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Is literature the expression of the human condition

Is Literature the Expression of the Human Condition Oh yes, is literature the expression of the human condition or is it not? Yes, literature is and for only one reason, Normans Conquest 1066. But also literature is recorders of history, recordings of time. Literature also a sequence of words, it can consist of all meanings, expressing the human condition, emotions, recorders, it defines life. The human condition is experiences of being human in a social, cultural, and personal context, it's an aspect of positives and negatives of being human.So forth, literature is shown in Death of a Salesman, where Willy is stuck in his wn past and everyone but him knows that. But like all humans, we all have dreams, hopes, and plans. â€Å"LINDA: He'll find his way. WILLY: Sure. Certain men Just don't get started till later in life. Like Thomas Edison, I think. Or B. F. them was deaf. [He starts for the money on Biff. † Goodrich. One of bedroom doorway. ] I'll put my Willy hoping that one day for Biff to be a famous salesman, like one of the best salesman out there, at the top with Thomas Edison, or B.F. or Goodrich. But both Linda and Willy knew that Biff would never be a major success in business, but even though they knew it, they still hoped and believed in him. The American dream was to be the number one, at the top better than everyone else and that's what Willy always wanted, he wanted to be the best, especially the best salesman. He was living in the past and ruining all hopes of ever becoming the best. He Just couldn't grasp on the fact that the future was coming sooner then he thought, and wasn't ready for it.CHARLEY: â€Å"Nobody dast blame this man. You don't understand: Willy was a salesman. And for a salesman, there's no rock bottom to the life. He don't put a bolt to a the law or give you medicine. He's a nut, he don't tell you man way out there in the blue riding on a smile and a ack†that's an shoeshine. And when they start not smiling earthqua ke. And then you get yourself a couple spots your hat and your finished. Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream boy, it comes with the territory. Charley insisting that Willy a salesman and no matter he always will be, his dream will never die, and even when your salesman and it's not going the best it possibly can or you're not the best in the world there's no rock bottom. Also as you can see in Great Gatsby ,Literature is expressing that humans can be split by wealth The poor do their own thing, nave their own parties and hen the more wealthy class stay with their group and have their own events. But also in this book it prove one man's love for a women and how long and how far people are willing to go to prove their love.Well for Gatsby he Just never gave up on the girl of his dreams, he followed her, set up every moment perfectly, planned everything. â€Å"Whenever you feel like criticizing any one†¦ Just remember that all the people in this world havent ha d the advantages that you've had. â€Å"(l) In life, not everyone has the opportunities as others would get, so it's like that saying â€Å"Don't Judge a book by its cover. † Because if you are criticizing people Just off looks, or what you think they might be or what they might have done, you might never know, and maybe you would be wrong.You never know what some people have been through, until that day you learn how to go up to them and stop Judging and talk to them and find out who they really are. In humans we have the intensity to always Judge someone, will it be looks, wealth, personality, how they talk, or what they do. No matter where you go it's in the human condition that someone or everyone will Judge you, either it will be said to your face or in their mind. It's human nature for Judging, to also debate weather how we will get treated or act. â€Å"Gatsby's wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy's dock†¦. is dream must have clos e that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He seemed so did not know that it was already behind him. † (182) Gatsby gets so close to the girl he's in love with, so close but yet so far. Emotions is one of the key part to the human condition, love can play a big role in life, it can take control over your mind, soul, heart, everything, it can be the best feeling in the world or it can be the worst. It can feel like heaven but hurt like hell. But if love didn't hurt or give the pain it gives then there would be no reasons to come back to it.Or to keep falling in and out of love. In The Adventures of Huckflnn, Huck lies throughout the book, but in some cases it's for the best, to either save himself or someone he cares about. But it's like Truth vs. Lies vs. Life and death, for example â€Å"Honest, I'll tell you everything Just as it happened, your majesty. The man that had a-holt of me was very good to kept saying he had a boy about as big as me that he was sorry to see a boy in such a me, and ied last year, and dangerous fix; and when they was all took by surprise by coffin, he lets go sure! finding the gold, and made a rush for the of me and whispers, ‘Heel it now, or theyll hang ye, and I lit out. It didn't seem no good for ME to stay†I couldn't do nothing, and I didn't want to be hung if I could So I never stopped running till I found the canoe; told Jim to hurry, or theyd catch me get away. and when I got here I and hang me yet, and said I was afeard you and the duke so was Jim, Jim if I 55) wasn't alive now, and I was awful sorry, and and was awful glad when we see you coming; you may askHuck is lying to save himself, but also he got lucky that the man that was holding him, his son died that year and was around his age and height, but it reminded n of his son. The man felt sorry for Huck, that he was in such a dangerous fix, so when the man got a chance to let Huck run, he did. The human condition, is like when we get a chance to lie we u sually take it, Just as long as we get what we want, Just put words together and make it into sentences that people want to hear, but it's all bull shit.An nice over being a asshole, out in the world there are mainly assholes, but ho can really blame them since if your too nice you get taken for granted. In Winesburg Ohio, literature is expressed through many of ways, in all of the short stories. In â€Å"Hands† a guy uses his hands to talk but he got kick out of his home town for doing that, for the town people thought he wasn't the same as them, and they didn't like people who where different, they wanted everything the same everyone the same. The coming of industrialization, attended by all the roar and rattle of affairs, the shrill cries of millions have come among us from overseas, trains, the growth of cities, of voices that he going and coming of the building of the interurban car lines that weave in in and out of towns and past farmhouses, and now these later days the coming of the automobiles has worked a tremendous change in lives and in the habits of thought of our people of Mid- America. â€Å"(56) Urbanization and travel have changed America, as the humanity started to change so did movement, traveling, and more to advance into the future.Making life easier, but in Winesburg Ohio, towns were full of one type of people because if you were different they would either run you out of the town or end up killing you, having someone different then veryone else Just wasn't common for them. Going on, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, as a slave suffering was a daily thing, and white folks were stupid for insistence†¦ â€Å"l have often been utterly astonished, since I came to the north, to find persons who could speak of the among slaves, as evidence of their It is impossible to singing, contentment and happiness. conceive of a greater mistake.Slaves sing most when they are most unhappy. The songs of the slave sorrows of his heart; and he is relieved represent the by them, only as an aching heart is relieved by its often tears. At least, such is my experience. I have sung to drown my sorrow, but seldom to express my happiness. Crying for Joy, and singing for Joy, were uncommon to me while in the Jaws of slavery. alike The singing ofa man cast away upon a desolate considered as island might be as appropriately evidence of contentment and happiness, as the singing of a slave; the songs of the one and of the prompted by the same emotion. (2. 9) other are The white folks that seen the slave singing songs, and dancing thought that they were happy, but never really understand that they were hoping for slavery to stop, to be free. Every man and every women should have equal rights no matter what color black, white, yellow, blue.. ect. All humans are equal that how God made us, Just because some are better in other things than others, doesn't make them less human or equal, slavery could work either way. So why put yo urself in a position that you wouldn't want to be in, in the first place.The Things They Carried, as literature is the expression of the human condition, it can be a not so pretty site at time. Life's already like a war, it's like the battlefield of life, but then to add to it, we got the most horrible thing know to mankind â€Å"war. â€Å"When I'm out there at night, I feel close to my own body, I can feel my blood moving, my skin and my everything, it's like I'm full of electricity fingernails, and I'm glowing in the dark– I'm on fire almost–l'm burning away to nothing–but it doesn't matter because I know exactly where I am. (1 1 1) War can change all aspects of a man, it's one of the most burial things in this world and watching with your only two pairs of eyes. We all have our own limits, till we finally break, and watching as your comrades or one of your best friends get shot, either critically injured, or to point they die. Will always change someone, c hange their life forever, war is not something to Joke about as are men fight for our safety and for us, we sit back at home living our life, like nothing going on. I'm skimming across the surface of my own history, moving fast, riding the melt beneath the loops and spins, and when I take a blades, doing high leap into the dark and come down thirty years Timmy's later, I realize it is as Tim trying to save life with a story. â€Å"(246) In this quote it shows what people really would do to save someone life, because one life can make a big differences. But Literature is the expression of the human condition, for life is something worth wild, as words have all different kinds of meaning they all can be inter twined with each other, which can tell stories and which makes history as we know it.

Example of Formal English Letter Exchange Between 2 Parties

Example of Formal English Letter Exchange Between 2 Parties Free Online Research Papers Example of Formal English Letter Exchange Between 2 Parties Dear Mrs. Nancy, I am a girl and a freshman in college. Several weeks ago, I had a crush on a boy, who was a sophomore in the same department with me. I am very confused and don’t know how to deal with my feelings because I had no such experience before. When I was in the senior high school, I was a very hard-working student. My mother always told me that how important it was to get into a good university and how great to be a college student. Therefore, I studied so hard everyday during and after school that I almost had no time for any kind of recreation. I was not allowed to go out with my classmates. As a result, I had little chance to get along with others, boys in particular. But now I have fallen in love with him and I want to know him. So I need some advices from you. Sincerely yours, Confused Mary Response: Dear Mary, You are very lucky that you had fallen in love with someone, because love is the precious emotion of human beings. However, first love is always rough, especially you had no experience of dealing with the opposite sex. But that’s ok. You can learn it yourself from your classmates. College is like a miniature of the society. It is filled with people of all kinds and you have to get along with them. And then, you will learn how to get along with people. As to your question to love, I give you a vital advice that you must not be too aggressive to him, or he will be alarmed. You ought to approach him in a mild way. Since you are in the same department, you can know him by asking for advices from him. They can be about study, schoolwork, classes, and various matters. There will be lots of reasons for you to approach him. Then, you will become friends. And you will have even more opportunities to be with him. You two will be very good friends. Little by little, you will know him more. Then you will be able to consider whether he is the one you want. If the answer is yes, try to confess yourself to him what you think of him; but, if you were refused, don’t be depressed. You can still take him as a friend or just a stranger you have never known. But I cannot give you any insurance. All I can do is only you my opinions. Who can decide are only you. Any decision can influence what will happen in the future. So you have to receive the consequences to come. To sum up, â€Å"Think before you leap,† or you will hurt yourself from top to end. Sincerely yours, Mrs. Nancy Research Papers on Example of Formal English Letter Exchange Between 2 PartiesStandardized TestingPersonal Experience with Teen PregnancyComparison: Letter from Birmingham and CritoEffects of Television Violence on ChildrenHip-Hop is ArtTwilight of the UAW19 Century Society: A Deeply Divided EraCapital PunishmentHarry Potter and the Deathly Hallows EssayIncorporating Risk and Uncertainty Factor in Capital

General Daniel Harvey Hill in the Civil War

General Daniel Harvey Hill in the Civil War Daniel Harvey Hill: Early Life Career: Born in the York District of South Carolina on July 21, 1821, Daniel Harvey Hill was the son Solomon and Nancy Hill.   Educated locally, Hill received an appointment to West Point in 1838 and  graduated four years later in the same class as  James Longstreet,  William Rosecrans,  John Pope, and  George Sykes.   Ranked 28th in a class of 56, he accepted a commission in the 1st US Artillery.   With  the outbreak of the  Mexican-American War  four years later, Hill traveled south with  Major General Winfield Scotts army.   During the campaign against Mexico City, he earned a brevet promotion to captain for his performance at the  Battles of Contreras  and  Churubusco.   A brevet to major followed his actions at the  Battle of Chapultepec. Daniel Harvey Hill - Antebellum Years: In 1849, Hill elected to resign his commission and left the 4th US Artillery to accept a teaching post at Washington College in Lexington, VA.   While there, he befriended Thomas J. Jackson who was then serving as a professor at the Virginia Military Institute.   Actively engaged in education over the next decade, Hill also taught at Davidson College before receiving an appointment as superintendent of the North Carolina Military Institute.   In 1857, his ties to Jackson tightened when his friend  married his sisters wife.   Skilled in mathematics, Hill was well-known in the South for his texts on the subject. Daniel Harvey Hill - The Civil War Begins: With the beginning of the Civil War in April 1861, Hill received command of the 1st North Carolina Infantry on May 1.   Dispatched north to the Virginia Peninsula, Hill and his men played a key role in defeating Major General Benjamin Butlers Union forces at the Battle of Big Bethel on June 10.   Promoted to brigadier general the following month, Hill moved through a number of posts in Virginia and North Carolina later that year and into early 1862.   Elevated to major general on March 26, he assumed command of a division in General Joseph E. Johnstons army in Virginia.   As Major General George B. McClellan moved to the Peninsula with the Army of the Potomac in April, Hills men took part in opposing the Union advance at the Siege of Yorktown. Daniel Harvey Hill - Army of Northern Virginia: In late May, Hills division played a central role in the Battle of Seven Pines.   With the ascent of General Robert E. Lee to command of the Army of Northern Virginia, Hill saw action during the Seven Days Battles in late June and early July including Beaver Dam Creek, Gaines Mill, and Malvern Hill.   As Lee moved north following the campaign, Hill and his division received orders to remain in the vicinity of Richmond.   While there, he was tasked with negotiating an agreement for the exchange of prisoners of war. Working with Union Major General John A. Dix, Hill concluded the Dix-Hill Cartel on July 22.   Rejoining Lee following the Confederate victory at Second Manassas, Hill moved north into Maryland. While north of the Potomac, Hill exercised independent command and his men comprised the armys rearguard as it moved north and west.   On September 14, his troops defended Turners and Foxs Gaps during the Battle of South Mountain.   Three days later, Hill performed well at the Battle of Antietam as his men turned back Union assaults against the sunken road.   Following the Confederate defeat, he retreated south with his division serving in Jacksons Second Corps.   On December 13, Hills men saw limited action during the Confederate victory at the Battle of Fredericksburg. Daniel Harvey Hill - Sent West: In April 1863, Hill departed the army to begin recruiting duty in North Carolina.   Following the death of Jackson after the Battle of Chancellorsville a month later, he was irritated when Lee did not appoint him to corps command.   After protecting Richmond from Union efforts, Hill instead received orders to join General Braxton Braggs Army of Tennessee with the provisional rank of lieutenant general.   Taking command of a corps consisting of the divisions of Major Generals Patrick Cleburne and John  C. Breckinridge, he led it effectively at the Battle of Chickamauga that September.   In the wake of the triumph, Hill and several other senior officers openly expressed their unhappiness with Braggs failure to capitalize on the victory.   Visiting the army to resolve the dispute, President Jefferson Davis, a longtime friend of Bragg, found in the commanding generals favor.   When the Army of Tennessee underwent a reorganization, Hill was intentionally left without a comma nd.   In addition, Davis decided not to confirm his promotion his promotion to lieutenant general. Daniel Harvey Hill - Later War: Reduced to major general, Hill served as volunteer aide-de-camp in the  Department of North Carolina and Southern Virginia in 1864.   On January 21, 1865, he assumed command of the  District of Georgia, Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.   Possessing few resources, he moved north and led a division in Johnstons army during the final weeks of the war.   Taking part in the Battle of Bentonville in late March, he surrendered with the rest of the army at Bennett Place the following month.    Daniel Harvey Hill - Final Years: Settling in Charlotte, NC in 1866, Hill edited a magazine for three years.   Returning to education, he became president of the University of Arkansas in 1877.   Known for his effective administration, he also taught classes in philosophy and political economy.   Resigning in 1884 due to health issues, Hill settled in Georgia.   A year later, he accepted the presidency of the  Georgia Agriculture and Mechanical College.   In this post until August 1889, Hill again stepped down due to ill health.   Dying at Charlotte on September 23, 1889, he was buried at the Davidson College Cemetery. Selected Sources: Civil War: Daniel Harvey HillCMHLC: Daniel Harvey HillNorth Carolina History Project: Daniel Harvey Hill

Strategic management analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words - 1

Strategic management analysis - Essay Example The company is the largest coffee chain store in the world and has its operations in 61 countries with more than 20000 stores. The product portfolio of Starbucks includes hot and cold drinks, sandwiches, coffee beans, snacks, pastries, etc. The company has its foundation in Seattle long time back in 1971 as a roaster and retailer of local coffee bean and has expanded to a large extent since then. The company is the market leader in its coffee segment and its basic strategies are competence based strategy and the focus strategy based on which it adds value to its products and establishes the image of luxury and elegance (About Us 2012). The report presents the strategic management analysis of Starbucks considering its international segment out of the three segments. The country chosen in its international segment is UK. Starbucks entered the UK market in 1998 with the investment of $83 million and launch of more than 60 stores (Lussier 2008). The present coffee shop market environment of UK is very competitive with presence of multiple players in the market including branded coffee shops, independent retail stores and small coffee stores presenting a tough competition to Starbucks (Weston 2009). The report analyses the external environment of Starbucks with respect to UK coffee market, strategic capability of the company and the strategic fit with the help of suitable models such as Porter’s five forces, value chain analysis and PESTEL analysis. Task A (1): Analysis of Starbucks external environment Macro-environment: PESTEL Analysis Political: Impact 3 of 5- Coffee beans is grown in the developing countries. The major aspects about which the discussions keep going on in the UK political environment are work conditions and child labor. The political influence is also high through tariffs and taxes (Press Release – Project Cafe11 UK 2011). Economic: Impact 4 of 5-The major business challenge for the industry as a whole is related to the economic rec ession of 2008. Owing to the recession period, consumers have become much more cautious with their discretionary expenditures due to the presence of high unemployment and debts on individuals (Weston 2009). Socio-cultural: Impact 5 of 5- People in UK spends more and more on coffee. It is included in their trend to go out and have a cup of coffee. The expenditure on tea by UK people is 623 million pounds, while on coffee it is 738 million pounds. Customers visit the coffee shops not only for having a coffee drink but also for sitting down and have a relaxed time out of their daily hectic routine (The Future of the Coffee Market 2012). Technological: Impact 4 of 5- Technology has become advanced as better as well as cheaper coffee machines are available to make a good coffee at home, for instance Senseo. Environmental: Impact 3 of 5- There is a considerable increase in the environmental awareness due to which coffee companies in UK have to remain concerned about the way their coffee b eans are produced and roasted, the way of the designing of the supply chain and the manner in which they prepare and finally sell their coffee products (Weston 2009). Legal: Impact 3 of 5-

Chinas Historical Dynasties Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Chinas Historical Dynasties - Assignment Example During the Sui Dynasty, a lot of progress was made in China. For instance, the dynasty led to the unification of the whole nation making the society more stable and peaceful for economic and political development. Apart from agricultural acreage increasing significantly, the skills industry made advances. The economic activities, as well as agricultural practices during this dynasty, contributed to the development of Grand Canal. The end of this dynasty was followed by the emergence of many other dynasties including the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) under the leadership of Zhu Yuanzhang. This dynasty, however, started to collapse under Emperor Yang, who led a luxurious as well as a corrupt life. His engagement in occasional wars made the country fall into misery. The Wagang Army together with the rebellion peasants groups made Sui’s regime unstable. In addition to this, the strangling of Emperor Yang led to the complete collapse of the dynasty.During the Sui Dynasty, a lot of progr ess was made in China. For instance, the dynasty led to the unification of the whole nation making the society more stable and peaceful for economic and political development. Apart from agricultural acreage increasing significantly, the skills industry made advances. The economic activities, as well as agricultural practices during this dynasty, contributed to the development of Grand Canal. The end of this dynasty was followed by the emergence of many other dynasties including the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) under the leadership of Zhu Yuanzhang. This dynasty, however, started to collapse under Emperor Yang, who led a luxurious as well as a corrupt life. His engagement in occasional wars made the country fall into misery. The Wagang Army together with the rebellion peasants groups made Sui’s regime unstable. In addition to this, the strangling of Emperor Yang led to the complete collapse of the dynasty. The Ming Dynasty is claimed to the peak of wall building in China. The Min g court built walls in the north that measured more than 4,600 miles. In addition to adding more miles, the emperors in this dynasty ordered for the enlargement of previous dynasties’ walls into multiple-line walls. This dynasty is also associated with the construction of the greatest fleet in the 15th century; the dynasty was marked by the extensive expansion of the Chinese commerce to other markets in the world.Spiritual traditions description of Chinese history