Free Essays on Daisy Miller & Huck Finn- American Adventures

NOSEWAKS@aOl.com March 20, 2002 DAISY MILLER AND HUCK FINN-AMERICAN ADVENTURERS After reading the two American classics â€Å"Daisy Miller† by Henry James, and â€Å"Huckleberry Finn† by Mark Twain, I thought about the messages these authors were saying about their societies. Both authors lived at a time when very influential things were happening in their worlds. The Civil War, and the ceaseless turmoil between social classes. Twain and James both wrote these two stories around the same period. Like everyone, they were influenced by their surroundings and personal experiences. Although they were both very different people with completely different backgrounds, they both managed to have leading characters that had the common problem of not fitting in their societies. Although James’ Daisy Miller and Twain’s Huck had a common problem, they both had very different ways of coping with it. They both had different strategies of living in an environment they didn’t completely control. Henry James had the very plain Miller family traveling throughout Europe at a time when many people in the world were immigrating to the Unites States. Her family was wealthy enough to pay for such a trip where she was able to stay at the most extravagant hotels in Europe. James makes it clear numerous times that the Miller family was new to this level of money. While Daisy stayed in these hotels she had a chance to see what the people of her new status were like. Coming from a background that was not as fortunate as the people she stayed with in Europe, she wanted what she couldn’t have had. She wanted to be part of the privileged society. In Europe, James has her finally getting what she wanted- the ability to interact with societies upper class. Daisy’s flaw was that she had the tool to be with the 1900th century aristocrats (money), but she didn’t have the culture to pass as one. This is a tragic conflict for her.... Free Essays on Daisy Miller & Huck Finn- American Adventures Free Essays on Daisy Miller & Huck Finn- American Adventures NOSEWAKS@aOl.com March 20, 2002 DAISY MILLER AND HUCK FINN-AMERICAN ADVENTURERS After reading the two American classics â€Å"Daisy Miller† by Henry James, and â€Å"Huckleberry Finn† by Mark Twain, I thought about the messages these authors were saying about their societies. Both authors lived at a time when very influential things were happening in their worlds. The Civil War, and the ceaseless turmoil between social classes. Twain and James both wrote these two stories around the same period. Like everyone, they were influenced by their surroundings and personal experiences. Although they were both very different people with completely different backgrounds, they both managed to have leading characters that had the common problem of not fitting in their societies. Although James’ Daisy Miller and Twain’s Huck had a common problem, they both had very different ways of coping with it. They both had different strategies of living in an environment they didn’t completely control. Henry James had the very plain Miller family traveling throughout Europe at a time when many people in the world were immigrating to the Unites States. Her family was wealthy enough to pay for such a trip where she was able to stay at the most extravagant hotels in Europe. James makes it clear numerous times that the Miller family was new to this level of money. While Daisy stayed in these hotels she had a chance to see what the people of her new status were like. Coming from a background that was not as fortunate as the people she stayed with in Europe, she wanted what she couldn’t have had. She wanted to be part of the privileged society. In Europe, James has her finally getting what she wanted- the ability to interact with societies upper class. Daisy’s flaw was that she had the tool to be with the 1900th century aristocrats (money), but she didn’t have the culture to pass as one. This is a tragic conflict for her....

Writing Tips How to Use Commas and Semicolons

Writing Tips How to Use Commas and Semicolons â€Å"Comma v.  Semicolon? Aaargh!! I’ll just pick one†¦ I figure I have a 50% chance of getting it right.† Does this sound like you? If so, you’ve come to the right place. Let’s raise your average with these writing tips. Did you know you can HEAR the difference? The first thing I like to talk about with commas vs. semicolons is the sound of them. Commas are a pause with an invitation to continue, whereas semicolons are a full stop. You will be able to hear the difference. Read the following sentences aloud, paying attention to the *sound* of the punctuation: [CORRECT] In high school I was certain of my academic strengths; the daughter and younger sister of doctors, I excelled in math and science and dreaded every English course I was ever forced to take. [CORRECT] I took a wide variety of classes, from psychology and sociology to business and criminal justice, hoping to find something, whether it were a class or a specific topic, that captivated my interest. [CORRECT] Addison’s Disease is a chronic adrenal insufficiency that leads to liver failure, kidney failure, effusions, and in some cases, death; I was determined that it would not kill my brother. Can you hear how your inflection goes up with each comma, and down with each semicolon? The upward inflection of the comma makes us think there is something more coming. The sound of a semicolon, on the other hand, is often the same sound that comes along with a period. It is more final. If you didn’t get that the first time around, go ahead and read the sentences above again, until you hear it. Why is it useful to know how a punctuation mark sounds? It allows you to read your sentence aloud and to determine whether you’ve chosen correctly. If you have a semicolon in your sentence but the inflection sounds right going up, you know to switch it to a comma. And vice versa. Also, on a more basic level, if you find yourself pausing and inflecting upward and yet you have no comma there at all, add one! Here’s an example: [INCORRECT] I have learned a lot about myself, and my capabilities throughout my career. See how you want to pause and inflect upward after â€Å"capabilities† because of the comma after â€Å"myself†? Add a comma! [CORRECT] I have learned a lot about myself, and my capabilities, throughout my career. Or just delete the comma after â€Å"myself† and the inflection changes: [CORRECT] I have learned a lot about myself and my capabilities throughout my career. One more example: [INCORRECT] Although, I had many successful closings, there were always a few that were unsuccessful. Why put a comma after â€Å"Although† when you would not pause here when speaking? [CORRECT] Although I had many successful closings, there were always a few that were unsuccessful. I hope this lesson listening for commas v. semicolons was helpful. Category:Grammar Writing TipsBy Brenda BernsteinOctober 24, 2010 8 Comments The Essay Expert says: October 26, 2010 at 8:59 am Thanks for the comment Jackie. Now listen for whether you want a full stop or a pause between Good Stuff and I often struggle. Could these be two sentences standing on their own? If so look at using a semi-colon! Log in to Reply The Essay Expert says: October 26, 2010 at 11:42 am Ill work on that Beth! Log in to Reply Eric Nilsson says: June 27, 2012 at 11:40 am Dear Essay Expert, I dont quite agree with the comment that a semi-colon represents a full stop; I see it rather as a long pause. A full stop is a period and, when you think about it, a semi-colon is a combination of a pause and a stop (period on top and comma on bottom). Perhaps, because I love commas, I could be considered a Comma-adore (pronounce the a sound only once). Log in to Reply The Essay Expert says: June 27, 2012 at 11:47 am Thanks for your comment Eric. In my mind, the semi-colon, when used to separate what could be two full sentences, is closer to a full stop than to a pause; in a list of long items, the semi-colon inserts a long pause. My opinion: When used to separate two potentially distinct sentences, the semi-colon serves to connect two thoughts so related to each other that a period would serve as too wide of a separation. Log in to Reply Xelor says: March 20, 2019 at 6:05 am Dear Ms. Bernstein, Kudos and thanks for sharing your inflection-based pedagogy for comma and semicolon use. I found myself tutoring a teen for whom the sentence-structure approach learning rules about and how to recognize independent and subordinate clauses, appositives, parenthetical remarks, and coordinating conjunctions was as recondite as quantum mechanics. Moreover, I know well enough how to punctuate and had helped my own kids (all grown now) master a smattering of grammars nuances, I was anxious over the prospect of having to help a child who hadnt fully grasped the basics; thus I Googled for guidance. Using the search term inflective comma, I noticed your site among Googles first few results. It is just what the doctor ordered. I delivered an overview of what commas and semicolons do, telling my charge that if what precedes and follows the punctuation mark he inserted can stand alone as a complete sentence, use a semicolon; otherwise, use a comma. Imperfect guidance, yes, but given where the boy was, it seemed as fitting as any place to start. Next, I had him read this webpage, whereafter I clarified bits about which he inquired. Lastly, after telling him its called punctuation because its the written indicator of changes in a speakers voice, I suggested he simply speak his sentences in his head and listen for the pauses, variances in tone and emphasis, and so on, and simply toss in a comma where his inflection changes. What a difference! The young man, in mere minutes, went from period-only punctuation to near perfect. He was a little comma happy, but, hey, he used them, and, in turn, his voice came through, which, most importantly, means readers can unequivocally discern his meaning. The boys bright, his thoughts coherent, and on the strength of that, hes been a B-student; however, his poor punctuation has kept him from being an A-student. Hes got a graded writing assignment due Friday, so well see what happens and go from there. With any luck, hell soon be ready for em dashes, hyphens and ellipses. Whoo hoo! So, on his behalf and mine, thank you for maintaining this website. It was an inspirational godsend for me and a palpable aid for the young man Im tutoring. As didactic Internet content goes, one cant ask for more. Cheers, Xelor P.S. I dont know how the boy, whos a tenth grader, became a poor punctuator; maybe he skipped class on those days. Who knows? Its obvious, however, that between about the seventh and tenth grades, none of his teachers have acted to correct what is clearly but a mechanical issue, one that, given the boys manifested acumen and critical thinking skill, could long ago have been corrected. Perhaps they felt his earning Bs was good enough to obviate their bothering to intervene? In any case, their omission thus has unquestionably resulted in the boys grades and GPA being lower than he deserves. Who knows what impact that may have on his college prospects? Whatever affect it has, it likely wont be positive, and thats a doggone shame. Log in to Reply Brenda Bernstein says: March 20, 2019 at 6:21 am Thanks so much for sharing this story, Xelor! As a blogger, I never know what impact my writing will have, and I’m so thrilled I helped in this way. Your message was very well punctuated btw! Watch out for affect/effect 😉. Log in to Reply Xelor says: March 20, 2019 at 7:28 am Youre welcome. Im glad, then, that I bothered to share a little anecdote affirming for you that your contribution to the Internet has positively affected at least two people. The affect error is my bad; I didnt carefully proofread my remarks, behavior, or lack thereof, really, thats typical of my postings on the Internet. Failing to proofread results occasionally in my publicly making errors I know better than to make. The affect/effect error is an unusual one for me insofar as Im an old school dude who thinks impact is only a noun and effect is both a noun and verb. FWIW, affect/effect sentence began as I dont know how thatll affect his college acceptance outcomes, but in revising it, I left affect, but I cant say why. Worse, in my mind is the omission of a coordinating conjunction yet would have done nicely in the sentence that begins with moreover. Oh, wellwe all make mistakes, but hopefully not too many. LOL God bless and all the best, Xelor Log in to Reply Brenda Bernstein says: March 20, 2019 at 8:25 am Hi Xelor, I figured there was an explainable oversight here. I am all-too-familiar with errors that come from editing. And I definitely observed that your grammar is meticulous! By the way, I try to keep impact as a noun as well. Log in to Reply

Choose a person, object, or event that you find interesting and that Essay

Choose a person, object, or event that you find interesting and that you can readily research - Essay Example Vietnamese people follow annual rules for the New Year. They are very careful about what they do the first day of the New Year because, according to them, it will later determine their luck for the rest of the year. Therefore, Vietnamese people prepare for the New Year beginning two weeks before the actual New Year’s Day. Vietnamese people then have more rituals at midnight and on the first morning of the New Year. For example, my family prepares many things for New Year’s Day. We spend a lot of money, and we make substantial plans in advance for New Year. We buy new clothes and new shoes, paint and clean the house, cook three days worth of food, and pay off all debts. We go to the marketplace and the shopping mall to buy food, firecrackers, and flowers. The Vietnamese marketplace is very crowded the week before the New Year. After four o’clock, the markets close down so people can go home. We cook many kinds of food that our grandparents liked to eat when they w ere young. We also burn incense and artificial money to honor our grandparents, as we always believe that our grandparents will return from the other world to visit our family. Even though they don’t appear incarnate, my family believes that our grandparents exist around us even though they are dead. Thus, we always understand that to worship our ancestors means showing respect to our ancestors. After these rituals, we always invite the relatives and neighbors to sit around the table. Most of us sit at the table to share food together in the party. There are many such rituals that might seem different to outsiders. When our family has a party, we have to provide enough chairs for all people who are invited. If we lack bowls, dishes, tables, and chairs, we can borrow them from the neighbors. The next time another family has a party, we do the same thing for them. Then, we prepare for New Year’s Eve. We have more rituals on New Year’s

How do you think domestic and foreign intelligence should work in this Assignment

How do you think domestic and foreign intelligence should work in this country - Assignment Example Foreign intelligence encompasses security surveillance orchestrated by cross-border powers and personalities. Intelligence service is the most sensitive national institution that must be accorded utmost autonomy to prevent the country from vulnerability to terrorist attack. America being the presumed global superpower is a target for terrorism and other forms of violent attacks. The U.S. depends on both its domestic and foreign intelligence information to fight and or contain the world’s terrorism. It requires a highly confidential, competent and effective intelligence service both from domestic instruments and from foreign input (Marks, 2010). After the September 11 attacks, cooperation and close coordination is required between national and international intelligence in America (Marks, 2010). However, there should not be complete merge of the two institutions. While they should cooperate to deliver coinciding information, their individual autonomy should also have clear demarcation. The country’s security management should establish a central coordinating body that harmonizes information dissemination from either side of the security institutions. The role of this body would be to provide further scrutiny to the intelligence information before delivering credible vigilant information to the government. The specific roles of these two institutions should also have distinct stipulations to avoid conflict and duplication of surveillance information. Furthermore, the authenticity of foreign intelligence surveillance is dully enshrined in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of

Applied Linguistics Essay Example for Free

Applied Linguistics Essay Stylistics is the study and interpretation of texts from a linguistic perspective. As a discipline it links literary criticism and linguistics, but has no autonomous domain of its own. [1][2] The preferred object of stylistic studies is literature, but not exclusively high literature but also other forms of written texts such as text from the domains of advertising, pop culture, politics or religion. [3] Stylistics also attempts to establish principles capable of explaining the particular choices made by individuals and social groups in their use of language, such as socialisation, the production and reception of meaning, critical discourse analysis and literary criticism. Other features of stylistics include the use of dialogue, including regional accents and people’s dialects, descriptive language, the use of grammar, such as the active voice or passive voice, the distribution of sentence lengths, the use of particular language registers, etc. In addition, stylistics is a distinctive term that may be used to determine the connections between the form and effects within a particular variety of language. Therefore, stylistics looks at what is ‘going on’ within the language; what the linguistic associations are that the style of language reveals. Contents * 1 Early twentieth century * 2 Late twentieth century * 3 Literary Stylistics * 3. 1 Poetry * 3. 2 Implicature * 3. 3 Tense * 3. 4 The point of poetry * 4 See also * 5 Notes * 6 References and related reading * 7 External links| [edit] Early twentieth century. The analysis of literary style goes back to Classical rhetoric, but modern stylistics has its roots in Russian Formalism,[4] and the interrelated Prague School, in the early twentieth century. In 1909 Charles Ballys Traite de stylistique francaise had proposed stylistics as a distinct academic discipline to complement Saussurean linguistics. For Bally, Saussures linguistics by itself couldnt fully describe the language of personal expression. [5] Ballys programme fitted well with the aims of the Prague School. [6] Building on the ideas of the Russian Formalists, the Prague School developed the concept of foregrounding, whereby poetic language stands out from the background of non-literary language by means of deviation (from the norms of everyday language) or parallelism. [7] According to the Prague School, the background language isnt fixed, and the relationship between poetic and everyday language is always shifting. [8] [edit] Late twentieth century Roman Jakobson had been an active member of the Russian Formalists and the Prague School, before emigrating to America in the 1940s. He brought together Russian Formalism and American New Criticism in his Closing Statement at a conference on stylistics at Indiana University in 1958. [9] Published as Linguistics and Poetics in 1960, Jakobsons lecture is often credited with being the first coherent formulation of stylistics, and his argument was that the study of poetic language should be a sub-branch of linguistics. [10] The poetic function was one of six general functions of language he described in the lecture. Michael Halliday is an important figure in the development of British stylistics. [11] His 1971 study Linguistic Function and Literary Style: An Inquiry into the Language of William Goldings The Inheritors is a key essay. [12] One of Hallidays contributions has been the use of the term register to explain the connections between language and its context. [13] For Halliday register is distinct from dialect. Dialect refers to the habitual language of a particular user in a specific geographical or social context. Register describes the choices made by the user,[14] choices which depend on three variables: field (what the participants are actually engaged in doing, for instance, discussing a specific subject or topic),[15] tenor (who is taking part in the exchange) and mode (the use to which the language is being put). Fowler comments that different fields produce different language, most obviously at the level of vocabulary (Fowler. 1996, 192) The linguist David Crystal points out that Halliday’s ‘tenor’ stands as a roughly equivalent term for ‘style’, which is a more specific alternative used by linguists to avoid ambiguity. (Crystal. 1985, 292) Halliday’s third category, mode, is what he refers to as the symbolic organisation of the situation. Downes recognises two distinct aspects within the category of mode and suggests that not only does it describe the relation to the medium: written, spoken, and so on, but also describes the genre of the text. (Downes. 1998, 316) Halliday refers to genre as pre-coded language, language that has not simply been used before, but that predetermines the selection of textual meanings. The linguist William Downes makes the point that the principal characteristic of register, no matter how peculiar or diverse, is that it is obvious and immediately recognisable. (Downes. 1998, 309) [edit] Literary Stylistics In The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, Crystal observes that, in practice, most stylistic analysis has attempted to deal with the complex and ‘valued’ language within literature, i. e. ‘literary stylistics’. He goes on to say that in such examination the scope is sometimes narrowed to concentrate on the more striking features of literary language, for instance, its ‘deviant’ and abnormal features, rather than the broader structures that are found in whole texts or discourses. For example, the compact language of poetry is more likely to reveal the secrets of its construction to the stylistician than is the language of plays and novels. (Crystal. 1987, 71). [edit] Poetry As well as conventional styles of language there are the unconventional – the most obvious of which is poetry. In Practical Stylistics, HG Widdowson examines the traditional form of the epitaph, as found on headstones in a cemetery. For example: His memory is dear today As in the hour he passed away. (Ernest C. Draper ‘Ern’. Died 4. 1. 38) (Widdowson. 1992, 6) Widdowson makes the point that such sentiments are usually not very interesting and suggests that they may even be dismissed as ‘crude verbal carvings’and crude verbal disturbance (Widdowson, 3). Nevertheless, Widdowson recognises that they are a very real attempt to convey feelings of human loss and preserve affectionate recollections of a beloved friend or family member. However, what may be seen as poetic in this language is not so much in the formulaic phraseology but in where it appears. The verse may be given undue reverence precisely because of the sombre situation in which it is placed. Widdowson suggests that, unlike words set in stone in a graveyard, poetry is unorthodox language that vibrates with inter-textual implications. (Widdowson. 1992, 4) Two problems with a stylistic analysis of poetry are noted by PM Wetherill in Literary Text: An Examination of Critical Methods. The first is that there may be an over-preoccupation with one particular feature that may well minimise the significance of others that are equally important. (Wetherill. 1974, 133) The second is that any attempt to see a text as simply a collection of stylistic elements will tend to ignore other ways whereby meaning is produced. (Wetherill. 1974, 133) [edit] Implicature In ‘Poetic Effects’ from Literary Pragmatics, the linguist Adrian Pilkington analyses the idea of ‘implicature’, as instigated in the previous work of Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson. Implicature may be divided into two categories: ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ implicature, yet between the two extremes there are a variety of other alternatives. The strongest implicature is what is emphatically implied by the speaker or writer, while weaker implicatures are the wider possibilities of meaning that the hearer or reader may conclude. Pilkington’s ‘poetic effects’, as he terms the concept, are those that achieve most relevance through a wide array of weak implicatures and not those meanings that are simply ‘read in’ by the hearer or reader. Yet the distinguishing instant at which weak implicatures and the hearer or reader’s conjecture of meaning diverge remains highly subjective. As Pilkington says: ‘there is no clear cut-off point between assumptions which the speaker certainly endorses and assumptions derived purely on the hearer’s responsibility. ’ (Pilkington.1991, 53) In addition, the stylistic qualities of poetry can be seen as an accompaniment to Pilkington’s poetic effects in understanding a poems meaning. [edit] Tense Widdowson points out that in Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ (1798), the mystery of the Mariner’s abrupt appearance is sustained by an idiosyncratic use of tense. (Widdowson. 1992, 40) For instance, the Mariner ‘holds’ the wedding-guest with his ‘skinny hand’ in the present tense, but releases it in the past tense ( his hands dropt he. ); only to hold him again, this time with his ‘glittering eye’, in the present. (Widdowson. 1992, 41) [edit] The point of poetry Widdowson notices that when the content of poetry is summarised it often refers to very general and unimpressive observations, such as ‘nature is beautiful; love is great; life is lonely; time passes’, and so on. (Widdowson. 1992, 9) But to say: Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore, So do our minutes hasten to their end William Shakespeare, ‘60’. Or, indeed: Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime, Nor hours, days months, which are the rags of time John Donne, ‘The Sun Rising’, Poems (1633). This language gives us a new perspective on familiar themes and allows us to look at them without the personal or social conditioning that we unconsciously associate with them. (Widdowson. 1992, 9) So, although we may still use the same exhausted words and vague terms like ‘love’, ‘heart’ and ‘soul’ to refer to human experience, to place these words in a new and refreshing context allows the poet the ability to represent humanity and communicate honestly. This, in part, is stylistics, and this, according to Widdowson, is the point of poetry (Widdowson. 1992, 76). [edit] See also * Discourse analysis * Acrolect * Aureation * Basilect * Stylometry * Literary language * Standard language * Official language * Classical language * Liturgical language * Gender role in language * Poetics and Linguistics Association * Internet linguistics [edit] Notes 1. ^ Widdowson, H. G. 1975. Stylistics and the teaching of literature. Longman: London. ISBN 0582550769 2. ^ Simpson, Paul. 2004. Stylistics : A resource book for students. Routledge p. 2: Stylistics is a method of textual interpretation in which primacy of place is assigned to language. 3. ^ Simpson, Paul. 2004. Stylistics : A resource book for students. Routledge p.  3: The preferred object of study in stylistics is literature, whether that be institutionally sanctioned ‘Literature’ as high art or more popular ‘noncanonical’ forms of writing. . 4. ^ Lesley Jeffries, Daniel McIntyre, Stylistics, Cambridge University Press, 2010, p1. ISBN 052172869X 5. ^ Talbot J. Taylor, Mutual Misunderstanding: Scepticism and the Theorizing of Language and Interpretation, Duke University Press, 1992, p91. ISBN 0822312492 6. ^ Ulrich Ammon, Status and Function of Languages and Language Varieties, Walter de Gruyter, 1989, p518. ISBN 0899253563 7. ^ Katie Wales, A Dictionary of Stylistics, Pearson Education, 2001, p315. ISBN 0582317371 8. ^ Rob Pope, The English Studies Book: an Introduction to Language, Literature and Culture, Routledge, 2002, p88. ISBN 0415257107 9. ^ Richard Bradford, A Linguistic History of English Poetry, Routledge, 1993, p8. ISBN 0415070570 10. ^ Nikolas Coupland, Style: Language Variation and Identity, Cambridge University Press, 2007, p10. ISBN 0521853036 11. ^ Raman Selden, The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism: From Formalism to Poststructuralism, Cambridge University Press, 1989, p83. ISBN 0521300134 12. ^ Paul Simpson, Stylistics: a Resource Book for Students, Routledge, 2004, p75. ISBN 0415281040 13. ^ Helen Leckie-Tarry, Language and Context: a Functional Linguistic Theory of Register, Continuum International Publishing Group, 1995, p6. ISBN 1855672723 14. ^ Nikolas Coupland, Style: Language Variation and Identity, Cambridge University Press, 2007, p12. ISBN 0521853036 15. ^ Christopher S. Butler, Structure and Function: a Guide to Three Major Structural-Functional Theories, John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2003, p373. ISBN 1588113612 [edit] References and related reading * ed. David Birch. 1995. Context and Language: A Functional Linguistic Theory of Register (London, New York: Pinter) * Richard Bradford. 1997. Stylistics (London and New York: Routledge) * Michael Burke. 2010. Literary Reading, Cognition and Emotion: An Exploration of the Oceanic Mind (London and New York: Routledge) * David Crystal. 1998. Language Play (London: Penguin) 1985. A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics, 2nd edition (Oxford: Basil Blackwell) 1997. The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, 2nd edition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) * William Downes. 1998. Language and Society, 2nd edition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) * Roger Fowler. 1996. Linguistic Criticism, 2nd edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press) 1995. The Language of George Orwell (London: Macmillan Press) * MAK Halliday. 1978. Language as Social Semiotic: The Social Interpretation of Language and Meaning (London: Edward Arnold) * Brian Lamont. 2005. First Impressions (Edinburgh: Penbury Press) * Geoffrey Leech and Michael H. Short. 1981. Style in Fiction: A Linguistic Introduction to English Fictional Prose (London: Longman) * A McIntosh and P Simpson. 1964. The Linguistic Science and Language Teaching (London: Longman) * George Orwell. 1949. Nineteen Eighty-Four (London: Heinemann) 1964. Inside the Whale and Other Essays (London: Penguin Books) * Adrian Pilkington. 1991. ‘Poetic Effects’, Literary Pragmatics, ed. Roger Sell (London: Routledge) * ed. Thomas A. Sebeok. 1960. Style in Language (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press) * Michael Toolan. 1998. Language in Literature: An Introduction to Stylistics (London: Hodder Arnold) * Jonathan Swift. 1994. Gulliver’s Travels (London: Penguin Popular Classics) * Katie Wales. 2001. A Dictionary of Stylistics, 2nd edition, (Harlow: Longman) * ed. Jean Jacques Weber. 1996. The Stylistics Reader: From Roman Jakobson to the Present (London: Arnold Hodder) * PM Wetherill. 1974. Literary Text: An Examination of Critical Methods (Oxford: Basil Blackwell) * HG Widdowson. 1992. Practical Stylistics (Oxford: Oxford University Press) * Joseph Williams. 2007. Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace, 9th edition (New York: Pearson Longman) [edit] External links * Checklist of American and British programs in stylistics and literary linguistics * The British Poetics and Linguistics Association * http://www. brianlamont. com/ Retrieved from http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Stylistics_(literature) Categories: Applied linguistics | Language varieties and styles | Linguistics Hidden categories: Wikipedia articles needing style editing from October 2010 | All articles needing style editing Personal tools. * Log in / create account Namespaces * Article * Discussion Variants Views * Read * Edit * View history Actions Search - Top of Form Bottom of Form Navigation * Main page * Contents * Featured content * Current events * Random article * Donate to Wikipedia Interaction * Help * About Wikipedia * Community portal * Recent changes * Contact Wikipedia Toolbox * What links here * Related changes * Upload file * Special pages * Permanent link * Cite this page Print/export * Create a book * Download as PDF * Printable version Languages * * БÐ µÃ »Ã °Ã'€Ã'Æ'Ã' Ã ºÃ °Ã'  * БÃ'ŠÐ »Ã ³Ã °Ã'€Ã' Ã ºÃ ¸ * Catala * Cesky * Dansk. * Deutsch * Eesti * Espanol * Esperanto * Francais * Galego * * Ido * Bahasa Indonesia * Italiano * * Kiswahili * Magyar * ÐÅ"Ð ¾Ã ½Ã ³Ã ¾Ã » * Nederlands * * Polski * Portugues * Romana * Ð  Ã'Æ'Ã' Ã' Ã ºÃ ¸Ã ¹ * Slovencina * Srpskohrvatski / Ð ¡Ã'€Ð ¿Ã' Ã ºÃ ¾Ã'…Ã'€Ð ²Ã °Ã'‚Ã' Ã ºÃ ¸ * Suomi * Svenska * Ð £Ã ºÃ'€Ð °Ã'â€"Ð ½Ã' Ã'Å'Ð ºÃ ° * This page was last modified on 4 March 2011 at 05:48. * Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. 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The Yellow Wallpaper as a Guide To Insanity and Madness -- Yellow Wall

The Yellow Wallpaper as a Guide To Insanity   Ã‚   "There comes John, and I must put this away- he hates to have me write a word" (p659). As evident by the above quote, Gilman places the narrator of "The Yellow Wallpaper" as secluded as she could be; she is placed in a large house, surrounded only by her husband and by little help (Jennie), when it is unfortunately clear that her relationship with her husband is based on distance and misunderstanding: "It is so hard to talk with John about my case, because he is so wise, and because he loves me so"(p 663). Gilman further confines her narrator as it becomes clear that the poor soul has absolutely no one to talk to; that is, no one who can understand her. The narrator is cornered by her loved ones, she is isolated from the world under her husband-doctor orders, she is thus physically confined to her shaky mental realm.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The next aspect of the narrator that zooms us into her state is her tone: "I really have discovered something at last.... The front pattern does move- and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it!" (p 666). Gilm...

Mother and Daughter, a Heavenly Relationship Failed Essay

Daughter and mother relationship is an endless topic for many writers. They are meant to share the bond of love and care for each other. In the real world, however, their relationship is not as successful as it ought to be. The stories â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother† and â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† are the examples of this conflict. Lorrie Moore is distinguished for the clever wordplay, irony and sardonic humor of her fiction. â€Å"How to Talk to Your mother† is a short story in her collection Self-Help. It is about a failed relationship of a daughter and her mother over time. Similarly, Tillie Olsen’s â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† portrays powerfully the economic and domestic burdens a poor woman faced, as well as the responsibility and powerlessness she feels over her child’s life. Both stories have the same theme, but each has different technique, and the conflicts from the characters are opposite. Poor communication over time is the theme both stories share. In â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother,† Ginny, the author, faded the relationship with her mother as time goes and things changed from 1939 to 1982. In 1952, Ginny started to break away by slamming the door and say â€Å"Don’t I know it† (Moore 105) when her mother asks about her crush in junior high. Then, she becomes a young adult with a new life and would not come home for holidays. However, it is not until her mother called her by her sister’s name that makes she feels uncomfortable. â€Å"Learn that you have a way of knowing each other which somehow slips out and beyond the ways you have of not knowing each other at all† (Moore 103). The simply â€Å"How to† title belies the complexities of broken communication between mother and daughter. Ginny attempts to communicate with her mother throughout decades, but it never works. In â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing,† the mother faced the same problem with poor communication. Readers feel deeply sorry for the mother as she is economically alone, lonely, overworked and tired. The mother is always busy and preoccupied with other children. â€Å"I was working, there were four smaller ones now, there was not time for her† (Olsen 191). She has little or no time to talk to Emily, the daughter. The only time they met each other is at night, when Emily is struggle over books and the mother be ironing, or do other house chores. In both stories, the mothers and daughters have really  poor communication. Each character has her own life and stared to ignore their love ones. Ginny lives her wild life with romance. On the other hand, the mother in â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† is so busy with her low-class life. As a result, their relationship failed as time rolls. Although both stories share similarity, each story was written with different styles, point-of-views, and languages. Lorrie Moore presents â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother† in reverse chronological order, from latest to earliest. This technique supports her main idea by illustrating the broken communication pattern existing since the narrator’s childhood. With this style, readers find it amusing as they can read forward or backward. Moreover, this kind of writing is very rare in literature. Tillie Olsen’s â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† was written in a traditional flashback. It started with the mother blaming herself for Emily’s outturn. Then, she remembered all the life events that result in bad decisions she made for Emily. Both stories also have different point-of-view. â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother† is told in second-person, using â€Å"you,† instead of â€Å"I.† The second-person narration distances the narrator from the pa in inflicted by her mother, father, and lovers. This is Moore’s clever choice. Readers can relate and sympathize with Ginny. On the other hand, â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† is told in first-person. The mother is telling readers about her faults and her attempts to help Emily through difficult years. Readers can see the hardship the mother faced and understand her situation. Nevertheless, Moore writes the story like one would write in her diary, very informal. The full title is â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother (Notes),† and the language is not very aesthetic. On the contrast, Olsen writes her story in formal, literature language. In response to her story, Helen Pike Bauer writes: â€Å"Olsen’s story is a dialogue between circumstances and desire, constraint and love, absence and presence, silence and speech, power and helplessness.† The conflicts of each character are opposite. The primary conflict in â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother† is between Ginny and herself. She feels like she has her own life and her mother becomes annoying. In 1971, she wrote: â€Å"Go for long walks to get away from her. Walk through wooded area; there is a life you have forgotten† (Moore 103). Throughout the story, readers can see the  broken relationship is resulted from the external events of her life. She has three abortions and involving many relationships with men that she don’t even like. â€Å"Sometimes you confuse her with the first man you ever love, who ever loved you †¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Moore 102). Ginny almost blamed herself for their relationship. Her mom is always there, in her house since 1967. A year before death, her mother tells her: â€Å"Is that any way to talk to your mother (Moore 101)?† While Ginny experienced the external conflict of her life, the mother in â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† faced an internal conflict involving Emily. She makes a very meaningful statement at the end of story: help Emily to know that â€Å"she is more than this dress on the ironing board, helpless before the iron† (Olsen 193). The mother constantly referred to the bad decisions she had made for Emily during her childhood. She sent Emily to live with her relatives as a toddler and came back with â€Å"all baby loveliness gone† (Olsen 188). Then, she sent her off again to a convalescent home. These decisions caused the mother to constantly nag at her internal self. Emily turned to a comedic teen is the result of the mother’s ignorant and poor relationship, which makes the mother blaming herself. She feels like the conflict is caused by her and Emily deserved a better life. Thackeray says, â€Å"God cannot be everywhere and therefore he made mother.† Parents are the caretaker of their children. From their experiences, they know what is best and they would never mean ill for them. â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother† and â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† are short stories that remind readers to cherish their relationships with parents. Both stories have the same theme of communication, but each has different technique, and the conflicts from the characters are opposite. Their situations are very difficult: poverty, low-class, and early motherhood. Lorrie Moore writes â€Å"How to Talk to Your Mother† to mock the popular â€Å"How-to† style. She marks off each stage of the plot by repeated works and ideas of heart, babies, containers, and unsuccessful talks between mother and daughter. Tillie Olsen writes â€Å"I Stand Here Ironing† with many symbolisms. For example, the iron is the torment, outside pressures. The dress is her problem, or Emily. The mother is ironing out the problem from inside her heart. Both stories carry the same message of mother and daughter relationship that most people faced the same path. In the society right now, there are many children experienced  child abuses. As for many parents, they could not get their kids to listen to them. The heavenly relationship failed as lives go on.

Meeting Essential Care Needs Essay

Mrs Gale is a 70 year old widow and retired unskilled worker. The patient lives alone and relies on her son to provide basic care, medication and meals. Mrs Gale has a history of weight fluctuation owing to lifestyle but is currently at risk of malnutrition due to Parkinson’s disease. Mrs Gale shows signs of early dementia and suffers from poor mobility and pain caused by arthritis. Mrs Gale also has mild depression triggered by loss and has become socially isolated. All names have been changed as per the Nursing and Midwifery Council confidentiality guidelines (2008). Mrs Gale is a 70 year old widow and retired unskilled worker. The patient lives alone and relies on her son to provide basic care, medication and meals. Mrs Gale has a history of weight fluctuation owing to lifestyle but is currently at risk of malnutrition due to Parkinson’s disease. Mrs Gale shows signs of early dementia and suffers from poor mobility and pain caused by arthritis. Mrs Gale also has mild depression triggered by loss and has become socially isolated. All names have been changed as per the Nursing and Midwifery Council confidentiality guidelines (2008). Introducing the nature of essential care needs Daily activities of living such as; eating, breathing, and mobilising were seen by Roper (1976) as a method of identifying the needs of a patient. By understanding what a patient requires in order to function normally, a nurse can address what is missing and produce a care plan accordingly. The Roper, Logan and Tierney’s model of nursing identified the activities that are deemed essential and suggests that it is not important to treat all the activities at once (Roper et al. 2000). Yura & Walsh (1983) believed that it is impossible to separate a person into their needs and therefore you cannot treat one without treating the others. Newton (1991) concluded that in order to conduct a holistic approach, all factors need to be considered. Along with the essential needs there are also the physical, psychological, sociocultural, politico-economic, and environmental factors that will need consideration. Factoring these into patient care produces a person centred approach (Steinbach 2009). This means that a patient will experience care that is individually tailored to them. In order to meet the needs of Mrs Gale, the care will be assessed according to differences in her human needs, her social role, her expectations of care and her lifestyle behaviours. This is because as an older adult, Mrs Gale’s needs are different to those of younger adults and children (Copeman 1999; Yura & Walsh 1983). There will be particular focus on Mrs Gale’s nutritional needs as this is an area of concern due to her Parkinson’s and the risk of malnutrition associated with it. The involuntary shaky movements associated with Parkinson’s disease causes an increase of energy expenditure which can lead to weight loss. Other symptoms and her medication can also decrease food intake. Fortunately medication such as levodopa contains medication that minimises these side effects (Green n. d. ). Mrs Gale’s poor mobility and pain levels will also affect her ability to consume nourishment as well as the ability to prepare, serve and purchase food and drink. Roper et al. (1996 cited Bloomfield & Pegram 2012) stated that when addressing psychological needs it is important to understand that Mrs Gale’s appetite will be affected by her emotional state. Mrs Gale’s cognitive impairment may also lead to her forgetting to eat or consuming too much (Beardsley 2000). The environmental factors to consider for Mrs Gale are the layout of her home, having a suitable eating area, available food storage and how is Mrs Gale able to purchase food (Copeman1999; NICE 2006). Mrs Gale has been identified as being from a working class family; this means she has learnt behaviours which may impact on her health such as not buying suitable foods (Browne 2005). The financial costs of healthy foods, available funding, benefits and local care provisions via the social care system or local government schemes will also need deliberation (Copeman1999; Age UK 2012). Changes due to the aging process also need to be addressed. Calcium reabsorption increases especially in women after the menopause, this decreases bone density. Lean tissue decreases as fat increases with age; there is also a decline in the percentage of body water meaning that body temperature is more difficult to control. Thirst decline and decreased renal function means that older people can become dehydrated (Copeman 1999). The function of the bowel reduces, meaning that the elderly are more susceptible to indigestion and constipation. The risk of constipation is also increased with Parkinson’s disease (Parkinson’s UK 2011). The final consideration is the deterioration of the sensory system. Taste, smell, vison, pain and touch all decline meaning that food may not be as appealing (Copeman 1999). Exploration of the evidence underpinning the delivery of care In order to determine the nutritional care of Mrs Gale the nursing process will be used. Nursing was described as a problem-solving process with 4 stages termed; assessment, planning, implementation and evaluation by Yura & Walsh (1967) (cited Aggleton & Chalmers 2000). This principle is still used in clinical practice today and is considered to be best practice (Bloomfield & Pegram 2012). By carrying out an assessment nurses can identify the causes of problems that require medical involvement. Nettina (2006) described assessment as; the collection of data that will identify actual or potential health problems. This means that a health assessment is carried out to determine what care is currently required or care that will be required in the future. Assessment begins with a complete nursing history and finishes with a nursing diagnosis which is based on facts and evidence (Yura & Walsh 1983). Assessment is carried out by observing the patient as a whole and includes; making notes on the patient’s dress, expression, non-verbal cues, deformities, and absence of parts such as teeth (Yura & Walsh 1983). Data collection is done by using various assessment tools such as; measuring weight and height, calculating body mass index (BMI) and screening tools such as the Malnutrition Universal Screening Tool (MUST) (Copeman1999; Stratton et al. 006). The use of BMI alone has raised questions due to people falling outside of the normal range and still being healthy (McWilliams 2008). Evidence for the use of the MUST was concluded from research that was conducted by Stratton et al (2006). However, the MUST is recommended by NICE and is used regularly to identify those at risk of malnutrition (McWilliams 2008). In order to plan care effe ctively there are three phases that must be considered. The first investigates the main concerns of the practitioner and patient. Subsequently the goals of the practitioner and client are determined. Finally the required nursing interventions are recorded (Carpenito-Moyet 2006). Planning can be used to design strategies to assist the patients, for example diet plans and calorie allowance (Copeman 1999). With Mrs Gale the simplest and inexpensive intervention will be to promote a healthy diet and encourage foods with high-nutrient content (Holmes 2012). During planning, goals are determined that will lead to ultimate health and wellness (Yura & Walsh 1983). These goals are developed by open dialogue between patient and practitioner and are assigned a time scale to be completed by (Carpenito-Moyet 2006). For example Mrs Gale has poor nutritional intake as a diagnosis and a goal could be to improve this. However, if the poor nutrition is due to money, then a time scale of a few weeks would allow time to sort out benefits and buy the correct nutrition. If the poor nutrition was due to behaviour issues, then a longer time period would be assigned in order to assist with help in changing that behaviour (Carpenito-Moyet 2006). The Orem model of nursing (2001) states that the nurse must act for the patient to increase their learning and awareness of their condition. However, in order for care to be implemented effectively a nurse must have intelligence, interpersonal and technical skills (Yura & Walsh 1983). The ability to build relationships with clients and other practitioners is important to form trust and identify where a multi-disciplined approach can be used (Aggleton & Chalmers 2000). Communication plays a huge role in the implementation of care due to continued discussion and questioning with the patient. The nurse must look for verbal and non-verbal cues from the patient and continue to collect data (Aggleton & Chalmers 2000). By doing this the nurse will be able to use their clinical judgement and have an adaptive approach to care (Yura & Walsh 1983). A nurse must also be realistic and recognise their strengths and weaknesses. This will allow recognition of assistance and possible referrals to other practitioners that maybe required (Siviter 2008). This sharing of information and asking for help is part of the NMC’s code of conduct (2008). A nurse must also have the knowledge to recognise normal and abnormal human functioning and the evidenced based interventions that can be used (Brooker & Nicol 2011). The care should also be safe, have the patient’s best interests, involve the multi-disciplinary team (MDT) and the patient, and informed consent should be obtained (NMC 2008). Evaluation of achievement is conducted to see if the best action or intervention has been used. Reflection will indicate if current goals should be maintained or if new goals are required for the patient (Siviter 2008). However, the achievement of the goals can be subjective and difficult to measure. To evaluate if the goals have been achieved, listening and observation needs to be conducted and it is important to remember that non-achievement is not failure. It is possible that new more achievable goals are needed or that the current intervention is not effective for the patient (Brooker & Nicol 2011). Short term an appropriate goal will be the achievement of weight maintenance or gain and long term will be the changing of negative health related behaviours (Siviter 2008). This will be educated via referral to a dietician and via information guides such as; the Parkinson’s and Diet leaflet, designed by the Parkinson’s Disease Society (2008). Diet can also be supplemented with high energy and protein drinks such as Fresubin and are prescribed via a dietician or General Practitioner (Holmes 2012). Mrs Gale’s weight can be monitored every 4-6 weeks, if there are changes in her medication or every 3 months if stable (Green n. d. ). Mrs Gale can also be directed to age UK who can provide details of benefits, home and shopping assistance (Age UK 2012). All of Mrs Gale’s nutritional needs have been assessed, planned and evaluated. The implementation of this care will depend on the cooperation by Mrs Gale. Practitioners have to remember that patients have the right to refuse treatment. After all the evidence is presented and all questions and concerns are addressed the patient will have an informed choice (NICE 2007). Personal development plan (University of Southampton 2012) Identified areas for further development Heart: Intrinsic motivation (Developing compassionate care) On refection I believe I need to develop my communication skills, especially when dealing with older people and cognitive impairment. This will make sure my care remains person centred (Steinbach 2009). I must also develop my understanding of how and when to use the available assessment tools so that I can complete the nursing process (Yura & Walsh 1983). I must also improve my questioning techniques so that when I am faced with a client, such as Mrs Gale, I can collect all the relevant information I will need to plan her care (Aggleton & Chalmers 2000). Suggested activities and experiences that will assist in future development In order to facilitate my development I will need to nurse patients with a variety of medical and cognitive conditions; this can be achieved while on placement. This will improve my communication skills and my confidence (NMC 2008). Furthermore I need to observe nurses in a ward or community setting while they implement the most appropriate assessment tool for their patient. This can be done while on placement and by contacting the community care team and arranging to shadow a community nurse. While completing practice experience one, I was able to take part in the planning process. I will need to continue with this so that I am confident in planning essential care. Identified areas for further development Nerve: Self-belief and self-efficacy (Developing themselves and advocating for the service user or carer) To develop my self-belief and to be an advocate for my patient I will need to work on my confidence (NMC 2008). I will need confidence in applying the best nursing practice (Yura & Walsh 1983). I will need confidence in speaking up and making sure my patients receive the correct care and any available funding that they might need. If I am unable to provide this service I must have the ability to refer my patients or to ask questions so that this can be achieved. Suggested activities and experiences that will assist in future development To develop this confidence, I must work alongside mentoring staff and observe dieticians, community nurses and general practitioners. By doing this I will appreciate how other professions care for my patient. Similarly I will gain understanding of which profession I would refer my patient to for future treatment. Working as part of a multi-disciplinary team will improve my confidence and allow for questioning (NMC 2008). Identified areas for further development Brain: Critical and analytical skills (Application of appropriate theory/research to practice) In order for me to apply theory into practise, I must research the care of various conditions and begin to understand the theoretical knowledge behind that care. This process has begun with the research I have conducted on Parkinson’s disease and also on my research into the use of BMI and MUST (Eknoyan 2008; MAG 2003). I will also need to visit other areas of practice to see the nursing process being applied (NMC 2008). Suggested activities and experiences that will assist in future development I must attend any available courses, workshops and meetings that deal with patient care and conditions. While on practice experience two, I would like to attend a nutrition workshop and discover the benefit of supplementary foods and drinks available. I will arrange to work with and observe dieticians within a hospital setting and question them on transferring this knowledge to community settings.

President Barack Obama and Gun Rights

President Barack Obama and Gun Rights In the run-up to the 2008 presidential election, many gun owners worried about the consequences of victory for Democrat candidate Barack Obama. Given Obama’s record as an Illinois state senator, where he stated his support for an all-out ban on handguns, among other gun control stances, pro-gun advocates were concerned that gun rights might suffer under an Obama presidential administration.   National Rifle Association Executive Director Wayne LaPierre  said prior to the 2008 election that â€Å"never in NRAs history have we faced a presidential candidate - and hundreds of candidates running for other offices - with such a deep-rooted hatred of firearm freedoms.†Ã‚   After Obama’s election, gun sales reached a record pace as gun owners snatched up guns, particularly those that had been branded assault weapons under the defunct 1994 assault weapons ban, out of an apparent fear that Obama would crack down on gun ownership. The Obama presidency, however, had limited impact gun rights. Obama’s Gun Record as State Lawmaker When Obama was running for the Illinois state senate in 1996, the Independent Voters of Illinois, a Chicago-based non-profit, issued a questionnaire asking if candidates supported legislation to â€Å"ban the manufacture, sale, and possession of handguns,† to â€Å"ban assault weapons† and to instate â€Å"mandatory waiting periods and background checks† for gun purchases. Obama answered yes on all three accounts. When that survey came to light during his run for the White House in 2008, Obama’s campaign said that a staffer had filled out the survey and that some of the answers did not represent Obama’s views, â€Å"then or now.† Obama also cosponsored legislation to limit handgun purchases to one per month. He also voted against letting people violate local weapons bans in cases of self-defense and stated his support for the District of Columbia’s handgun ban that was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2008. He also called it a â€Å"scandal† that President George W. Bush did not authorize a renewal of the Assault Weapons Ban. During the 2008 campaign, Obama said that he had â€Å"no intention of taking away folks’ guns,† but added that he would support â€Å"reasonable, thoughtful gun control measures† that respected the Second Amendment while also â€Å"cracking down on the various loopholes that exist.† He expressed his intent, as president, to make sure law enforcement was given access to information that would allow them to trace guns used in crimes back to â€Å"unscrupulous gun dealers.† Obama and Assault Weapons Just weeks after Obama’s inauguration in January 2009, attorney general Eric Holder announced at a press conference that the Obama administration would be seeking a renewal of the expired ban on assault weapons. â€Å"As President Obama indicated during the campaign, there are just a few gun-related changes that we would like to make, and among them would be to reinstitute the ban on the sale of assault weapons,† Holder said. To gun owners wary of increased pressure on gun rights, the announcement seemed to serve as validation of their pre-election fears. But the Obama administration dismissed Holder’s statements. When asked about a renewal of the assault weapon ban, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said: â€Å"the president believes there are other strategies we can take to enforce the laws that are already on the books.† U.S. Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, D-New York, introduced legislation to renew the ban. However, the legislation did not receive an endorsement from Obama.   Ã¢â‚¬ËœCommon Sense’ Gun Control   In the aftermath of a mass shooting in Tucson, Ariz., that wounded U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, Obama renewed his push for â€Å"common sense† measures to tighten gun regulations and close the so-called gun show loophole.   While not specifically calling for new gun control measures, Obama recommended strengthening the National Instant Background Check system in place for gun purchases and rewarding states supplying the best data that would keep guns out of the hands of those the system is meant to weed out. Later, Obama directed the Department of Justice to begin talks about gun control, involving â€Å"all stakeholders† in the issue. The National Rifle Association declined an invitation to join the talks, with LaPierre saying there is little use in sitting down with people who have â€Å"dedicated their lives† to reducing gun rights. As the summer of 2011 ended, however, those talks had not led to recommendations by the Obama administration for new or tougher gun laws. Strengthened Gun Reporting on the Border One of the Obama administration’s few actions on the subject of guns has been to strengthen a 1975 law that requires gun dealers to report the sale of multiple handguns to the same buyer. The heightened regulation, which took effect in August 2011, requires gun dealers in the border states of California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas to report the sale of multiple assault-style rifles, such as AK-47s and AR-15s.   The NRA filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking to block the new regulation from taking effect, calling it a move by the administration to â€Å"pursue their gun control agenda.† Summary of Gun Rights During Obama’s First Term The story through much of his first term in office was a neutral one. Congress did not take up serious consideration of new gun control laws, nor did Obama ask them to. When Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives in the 2010 midterm, chances of far-reaching gun control laws being enacted were essentially squashed. Instead, Obama urged local, state, and federal authorities to stringently enforce existing gun control laws. In fact, the only two major gun-related laws enacted during the Obama administration’s first term actually expand the rights of gun owners. The first of these laws, which took effect in February 2012, allows people to openly carry legally owned guns in national parks. The law replaced a Ronald Reagan era policy that required guns to remain locked in glove compartments or trunks of private vehicles that enter national parks. In addressing this law, Obama surprised his pro-gun right critics when he wrote, â€Å"In this country, we have a strong tradition of gun ownership thats handed from generation to generation. Hunting and shooting are part of our national heritage. And, in fact, my administration has not curtailed the rights of gun owners - it has expanded them, including allowing people to carry their guns in national parks and wildlife refuges.† The other law allows Amtrak passengers to carry guns in checked baggage; a reversal of a measure put in place by President George W. Bush in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Obama’s two nominations to the U.S. Supreme Court, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan were considered likely to rule against gun owners on issues involving the Second Amendment. However, the appointees did not shift the balance of power on the court. The new justices replaced David H. Souter and John Paul Stevens, two justices who had consistently voted against an expansion of gun rights, including the monumental Heller decision in 2008 and McDonald decision in 2010. Earlier in his first term, Obama had expressed his express support for the Second Amendment. â€Å"If you’ve got a rifle, you’ve got a shotgun, you’ve got a gun in your house, I’m not taking it away. Alright?† he said. Gun Rights During Obama’s Second Term On January 16, 2013 - just two months after 26 people were killed in a mass shooting at Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut - President Obama kicked off his second term by promising an â€Å"overhaul† of gun laws to end what he called the nation’s â€Å"epidemic† of gun violence However, the legislation to overhaul gun control failed on April 17, 2013, when the Republican-controlled Senate rejected a measure banning assault-style weapons and expanding gun-buyer background checks. In January 2016, President Obama began his final year in office by going around the gridlocked Congress by issuing a set of executive orders intended to reduce gun violence. According to a White House Fact Sheet, the measures aimed to improve background checks on gun buyers, increase community safety, provide additional federal funding for mental health treatment, and advance the development of â€Å"smart gun† technology. Obama’s Gun Rights Legacy During his eight years in office, President Barack Obama had to deal with more mass shootings than any of his predecessors, speaking to the nation on the subject of gun violence at least 14 times. In each address, Obama offered sympathy for the loved ones of the deceased victims and repeated his frustration with the Republican-controlled Congress to pass stronger gun control legislation. After each address, gun sales soared. In the end, however, Obama made little progress in advancing his â€Å"common-sense gun laws† at the federal government level - a fact he would later call one of the biggest regrets of his time as president. In 2015, Obama told the BBC that his inability to pass gun laws had been â€Å"the one area where I feel that Ive been most frustrated and most stymied. Updated by Robert Longley

7 Back to School Tips for Teachers

7 Back to School Tips for Teachers Going back to school after the summer break can be exciting, nerve-racking, and hectic for teachers. The summertime is a time for refreshment and renewal. That is important as the beginning of the school year is the most critical time of the year and it can also be the most stressful. Even during the time off, most teachers are looking for ways to improve their class for the upcoming year. Going back to school gives teachers a chance to make small adjustments or significant changes depending on where they are at in their careers. Most veteran teachers have a pretty decent idea of what they need to do to get ready for the new school year. They typically plan to make a few minor tweaks to their overall approach. Younger teachers may totally revamp their approach to how they teach based on their small sample of experience. First-year teachers often come in excited and with no real idea of what it takes to teach. They have ideas that they think will work only to realize quickly that the application of those ideas is much more difficult than the theory of them. No matter where a teacher is in their career, here are some tips that will help them transition back to school quickly and effectively. Reflect on the Past Experience is the ultimate learning tool. First-year teachers will only have their limited experience as a student teacher on which they can rely. Unfortunately, this small sample does not provide them with much information. Veteran teachers will tell you that you learn more in the first few weeks as a teacher than you did during your entire time in a teacher education program. For teachers with at least one year of experience, reflecting on the past can be a valuable tool. Great teachers are constantly looking for new ideas and methods to apply to their classroom. You should never be afraid to try a new approach, but understand that sometimes it works, sometimes it needs tweaking, and sometimes it will need to be thrown out altogether. Teachers must rely on their experiences when it comes to all aspects of their classroom. A teacher must allow experiences, both good and bad, to guide their overall approach to teaching. It Is a New Year Never come into a school year or classroom with preconceived notions. Every student who walks into your classroom deserves the chance to come in with a clean slate. Teachers may pass along pertinent educational information such as standardized test scores to the next teacher, but they should never pass along information about how a particular student or class behaves. Every class and every student is unique, and a different teacher may get other behavior. A teacher who has preconceived notions can be detrimental to the overall development of a particular student or a group of students. Teachers should want to make judgments about a student or a group of students based on their own unique experiences with them and not those from another teacher. Sometimes a teacher can have a personality conflict with a particular student or class and you never want that to cloud how the next teacher handles their class. Set Goals Every teacher should have a set of expectations or goals that they want their students to reach. Teachers should also have a list of personal goals to improve in specific areas of weakness that they have. Having goals of any kind will give you something to work towards. It is also okay to set goals together with your students. Having a shared set of goals will push both teacher and students to work harder to obtain those goals. It is okay that goals be adjusted either way as the year moves along. Sometimes your goals may be too easy for a particular student or class and sometimes they may be too difficult. It is essential that you set high goals and expectations for all your students. Just remember that every student has their own unique needs. The goals you set for one student, may not be applicable for another. Be Prepared Being prepared is the most important aspect of teaching. Teaching is not an 8:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. job as many people outside the realm of teaching may  think. It takes a lot of extra time and preparation to do your job effectively. The first day of school for students should never be a teacher’s first day. It takes a lot of time to get ready for school to start. There is a lot of work that needs to be done with both your classroom and your instructional material. A smooth year begins with preparation. A teacher who waits until the last moment to get everything ready is setting themselves up for a rough year. Young teachers need more preparation time than veteran teachers, but even veteran teachers must spend quite a bit of time preparing for the upcoming school year if they plan to have a fantastic year. Set the Tone The first few days and weeks of school will often set the tone for the entire school year. Respect is often won or lost in those first few days and weeks. A teacher should seize that opportunity to establish a solid rapport with their students, but at the same time respectively show them who is in charge. A teacher who comes in with the mindset that they want every student to like them will lose respect quickly, and it will be a difficult year. It is virtually impossible to gain a classes respect as an authoritarian back once you have lost it. Use those first few days and weeks to drill components such as procedures, expectations, and goals. Start out hard as the classroom disciplinarian and then you can ease off as you move throughout the year. Education is a marathon and not a sprint. Do not think that you cannot spend the time to set the tone for the school year. Make these things a priority early and your students will learn more in the long run. Make Contact Getting parents to trust that you have their child’s best interest in mind is paramount. Make extra efforts to contact parents several times within the first few weeks of school. In addition to classroom notes or newsletters, try to contact each parent personally early on by setting up parent meetings, calling them on the phone, emailing them, conducting a home visit, or inviting them up for an open room night. Establishing trustworthy relationships with parents early on when things are going good will make it easier should you begin to have issues. Parents can be your biggest ally, and they can be your biggest enemy. Investing the time and effort early on to win them to your side will make you more effective. Plan Ahead All teachers should plan ahead. It is not easy, but planning does become easier as experience is gained. For example, a teacher can save lots of time by keeping lesson plans from the previous year so that they can use them for the upcoming year. Instead of redeveloping their lesson plans, they make adjustments to them as needed. Teachers can also make copies for several weeks or months of work before school begins. Planning events such as fundraisers and field trips before school starts will save time later. Planning ahead will be beneficial if an emergency occurs and you have to be gone for an extended period of time. Planning also tends to make the overall course of the school year go smoother.

Book review of Night by Elie Wiesel Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Book review of Night by Elie Wiesel - Essay Example Elie later found out later that both his mother and sister were killed at the camp they were transported to. Elie and his father were sent to Auschwitz, a work camp, then from Auschwitz to Buna, and on to Buchenwald. While he and his father were in the concentration camp in Buchenwald, shortly before the war was over and the prisoners released. Elie’s father passed away from dysentery. There were many times when the young boy could think of no reason to survive the agony and pain of his life, yet his father’s memory and words kept him going. At a young age he was made to deal first with the death of his family, secondly with the death of his own childish innocence, and thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, he was made to deal with the temporary death of the God he had always known and believed deeply in. His father begged him many times not to lose the faith of his religion as it would keep him strong, yet in the midst of his pain the young Elie wondered how there could be a God that allowed so much suffering. He started to doubt his own faith, and wonder just where God was, and why he could not hear the cries of the masses of tortured people. Elie begins his story by describing the ghetto where he and his family, along with many others from their community were held captives. Even at this juncture, after having been dragged from their homes and herded like cattle into an area surrounded by barbed wire, somehow these Jewish people were still hopeful for their futures, still believed their lives would be normal again one day soon. Elie notes that â€Å"Most people thought that we would remain in the ghetto until the end of the war, until the arrival of the Red Army. Afterward, everything would be as before. The ghetto was ruled by neither German nor Jew; it was ruled by delusion.† (Wiesel 12). These delusions appeared to be all-consuming; perhaps the alternative of thinking what might be about to happen to themselves,