The West African Regional War Essay Example For Students

The West African Regional War Essay The West Africa Regional WarFor observers of the West Africa regional war, the recent calm in the war-torn Mano River Union (MRU) states Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea has given rise to optimism. Guarded, as this optimism might be, the decrease in violence in West Africa during the second half of 2001 is an important development given the scope and intensity of fighting that gripped these states earlier in the year. While observers agree that the current absence of widespread violent conflict in the MRU is a much-welcomed development, it must not mask the profound cleavages within these societies, the tenuous nature of the UN-imposed peace in Sierra Leone, and the continued serious threat of renewed warfare in the region. A brief overview of the horrendous and persistent conflicts that have engulfed the MRU over the past decade underscores the need for vigilance by the international community in its pursuit of lasting peace in West Africa. The past dozen years of violent conflict in West Africa have led to the death, injury, and mutilation of hundreds of thousands of people and the displacement of millions more. Conservative estimates place the total number of war-related deaths during the seven-year civil war in Liberia (1989 1996) at 150,000, more than 5 percent of Liberias estimated population (SIPRI Yearbook, 1996). We will write a custom essay on The West African Regional War specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now But this number only begins to tell the story of the horror that civil war brought to this small nation of 2.8 million United Nations Development Program (UNDP), Human Development Report, 1995. Hundreds of thousands more Liberians were injured, displaced, and terrorized by the conflict, and today the tiny state remains the hostage of its corrupt and brutal dictator, Charles Taylor. After the war spread into Sierra Leone in 1991, it had a similarly devastating effect. As in Liberia, armed insurgents preyed on the rural populations, raping, pillaging, and forcefully inducting children into their ranks. During the eight years of warfare that followed, it is estimated (conservatively) that over 60,000 of Sierra Leones estimated 4.2 million inhabitants were killed and hundreds of thousands more injured, mutilated, and displaced (SIPRI Yearbook, 2001; UNDP, Human Development Report, 1995). The 2001 UNDP Human Development Report ranks Sierra Leone last out of the 162 nations rated on the human development index (HDI), a composite measure based on life expectancy, education, and gross domestic product per capita. Most of the refugees sought shelter in neighboring Guinea. The end of the 1990s housed over 500,000 refugees housed in hundreds of camps and settlements in Guinea, one of the largest refugee populations in the world (U.S. Commission for Refugees, Guinea: Country Report 1999, www. refugees.org/world/countryrpt/africa/1999/guinea.htm). While the destabilizing effects on Guinean society of large numbers of Liberian and Sierra Leonean refugees was profound throughout the 1990s, sustained cross-border conflict did not break out between Guinea and her neighbors until 2000. Cross-border attacks into Guinea by Sierra Leones Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and various Liberian-based rebel groups precipitated a harsh military response from the Guinean military, which led to thousands of militia and civilian casualties. Of course, fighting in West Africa during the 1990s was not confined to the MRU states. Serious bloodshed occurred in Guinea-Bissau (1999), the southern Casamance region of Senegal (ongoing), and Nigeria (ongoing) and conflict threatens to engulf c?te dIvoire. Sometimes referred to as the arc of conflict in West Africa, these wars escape simple classification. While the war that started in 1989 in Liberia has become regionalized in the rest of the MRU, the other areas of instability in West Africa are based on intra-state phenomena. Nevertheless, the broader and deeper that instability grows in West Africa, the greater the risk that conflicts will merge and spread, further exacerbating conditions that make West Africa the most impoverished region in the world. The Big PictureIn light of this fighting and the gloomy specter of a growing regional war in West Africa, the United States Institute of Peace convened a group of experts on the conflicts in West Africa and formed a working group to bring together individuals from various national and international agencies and organizations to shed light on the nature of the conflicts in West Africa and recommend appropriate American responses. In this way, the group endeavored to inform itself and support the Bush administrations new Africa team that was confronted with complex and difficult polic y choices. This effort led to four gatherings of the West Africa Working Group (WAWG) between March and August. From the outset, the working group adopted a big picture analytical focus. That is, the group quickly agreed that the series of conflicts in the MRU stretching over the 1990s and into the 2000s should be looked at as a whole. Conceptually, the MRU conflict was therefore seen as a regional war with regional dimensions. Thus, what started in Liberia in 1989 is related to the war in Sierra Leone and to the fighting that broke out in Guinea in 2000. And while different dynamics are responsible for the instability radiating beyond the MRU into other parts of West Africa today, these conflicts further menace regional peace and complicate efforts to find a lasting peace across the West African region. The working group attracted a diverse array of U.S. and foreign specialists that varied depending on the topic of the particular session. The group included representatives from Capitol Hill, British and French governments, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University, intelligence agencies, International Peace Academy, Interaction, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), National Security Council, Pentagon, Physicians for Human Rights, State Department, United Nations, and United States Agency for International Development. The views expressed here represent a summation of issues examined by the WAWG, highlighting the most salient findings and policy recommendations. There were few points of disagreement during the many hours of discussions, both over what has led to the current crisis in West Africa and how the United States should move forward in the region. Perhaps the most significant and sustained point of contention within the WAWG was the degree of optimism/pessimism shared over the current process of demobilization, disarmament, and resettlement (DDR) in Sierra Leone. While some WAWG members were cautiously optimistic that the RUF is finished as a military force, others believed that the rebel group will dig up its guns and resist expulsion from the diamond fields. These group members also concluded that the UN mission lacks the will to confront the RUF if such a scenario plays out. Causes of the ConflictThe group quickly reached a consensus that there are many deleterious forces at play in the region, beyond Charles Taylor and the RUF, that have led to violent conflict in the MRU. .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 , .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .postImageUrl , .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 , .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825:hover , .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825:visited , .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825:active { border:0!important; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825:active , .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825 .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .u34400184f7bf6551aa3d8359cf9dd825:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: The Problem of Sustainability Essay Internal factors stemming from poverty, lack of economic opportunity, ethnic animosities, and a history of political abuse and corruption have fueled the brutal conflicts. External factors have also had a major impact on the duration and ferocity of the conflict, especially the interventions of Burkina Faso and Libya (states that have reportedly trained and armed Taylor and the RUF) and the activities of non-state actors, mostly profiteers such as diamond, timber, and arms traffickers. Working group participants also reached the early conclusion that while the poor socio-economic factors in the regions West Africa contains 11 of the worl ds 20 poorest states were exacerbating both the duration and intensity of the regional conflict, efforts to change the state of underdevelopment in West Africa will be fruitless until the security aspects of the problem are addressed (UNDP, Human Development Report, 2001). Accordingly, the group focused its analysis on containing and ending the fighting. U.S. Interests in West AfricaThe working group agreed that underlying the proliferation of the so-called soft threats (non-traditional security threats to the United States, like the spread of contagion, international criminal networks, and terrorism) is the growing phenomenon of state collapse. In Afghanistan, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Indonesia, and Somalia, the deleterious effects of the crumbling state are plain to see. In each of these cases, instability and violence have ultimately led to the weakening, and in some instances the failure, of central government and to direct costs for the United Stateseconomically, militarily, in terms of regional stability, and in humanitarian terms. While each of the above cases has elicited a strong policy response from past and current administrations, U.S. policy toward the war in West Africa is still taking shape. Yet state collapse in Liberia (1989) and Sierra Leone (1991) now threatens to spread to a number of West African states including the bordering nations of Guinea and c?te dIvoire. A review of what is at stake for the United States in West Africa illustrates the importance and urgency of developing a policy to stop the spread of the conflict in the region and to cut the legs out from under the wars two main vectors: Liberias Charles Taylor and Sierra Leones RUF. The cycle of state collapse now occurring in the three member states of the war-torn MRU places the entire West African region at risk. Indeed, this area is home to numerous military dictatorships and simmering ethnic rivalries. And as we have already witnessed in other parts of the world, as fighting and instability spread in West Africa, so too does the growth of terrorist networks and international criminal organizations; the destruction of the environment; the spread of disease, refugees, poverty, and ethnic strife; and the general unraveling of living conditions for the regions nearly 240 million people. Nowhere in West Africa is stability more important to the United States than in Nigeria, the continents most populous nation (estimated to be 126 million in 2001, according to the World Fact Book, www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ni. html) and our most important regional ally. Not only does the United States rely on Nigeria as a major source of oil (10 percent of U.S. imports in 2000), but Nigeria is also one of two (along with South Africa) focal points of American foreign policy in sub-Saharan Africa. The United States has strongly supported the democratic government of President Olusegun Obasanjo and has established a strong military cooperation program with Nigeria that has led to the training of five battalions of Nigerian soldiers. Moreover, the United States clearly has an interest in supporting the success of next years important local elections (scheduled for April) and state and federal elections in 2003. The partnership with Nigeria therefore presents an important test case for the United States: support for our friend will not only increase the chances for domestic and regional stability in West Africa, it will demonstrate to other friendly African states that the United States is engaged on the continent. Indeed, increased U. S. engagement in the region is also necessary to counter the deleterious effects of the activities of corrupt non-state actors, the potential growth of militant Islam, and Libyan expansionism in West Africa. The United States should also maintain a keen interest in the success of the United Nations Armed Mission to Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL). Since its near collapse in 2000, UNAMSIL has regrouped with the strong support of the British and today appears to be more coherent and effective. The success of this mission is essential to the strengthening of the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operationsa development that is clearly in the interest of the United States. Moreover, the United States has invested heavily in the mission. In fiscal year 2000, the United States contributed over $128 million to UNAMSIL, a figure that grew to nearly $190 million in fiscal year 2001. This accounts for a significant proportion of the U. S. humanitarian aid budget, funds that are desperately needed elsewhere. Finally, the intangible costs of American inaction in the region would be substantial. The marginalization of African crises from American foreign policy concerns perpetuates the perception within the international community that the United States does not care about the plight of Africans. This undercuts our status as the international leader for democracy, human rights, and peace and damages our national credibility abroad. Just as the marginalization of West Africa jeopardizes U.S. interests, targeted American engagement in the region could bear ample fruit. U.S. engagement in the region in cooperation with our French and British allies could provide an important test case and perhaps a model of Western cooperation that could be called upon elsewhere on the continent (notably in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, DRC) to address war and state collapse. The working group agreed that the key to future collaborative efforts in the region between the United States and its Western European allies will be to identify ways to harness Frances considerable regional influence and elicit policies from Paris that are more compatible with our own. In addition to working more closely with our Western allies on the formation of Africa policies, U.S. cooperation with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) could also set an important precedent for future cooperative actions on the continent.U. .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff , .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .postImageUrl , .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff , .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff:hover , .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff:visited , .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff:active { border:0!important; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff:active , .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .ue5ccffcfcc098c99239563cc610a5bff:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: The World of Culinary Arts EssayS. Policy toward the RegionAccording to administration sources, Americas policy toward Africa is based on three goals: increasing peace and stability, spreading democracy, and increasing economic prosperity on the continent. Within this approach there are several substantive policy priorities: addressing disease (HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria), opening markets (Africa Growth and Opportunity Act, AGOA, and perhaps the creation of AGOA II designed to increase the number of items covered by the free-trade agreement), political liberalization, and ending wars on the continent (especially in the DRC, Sierra Leone, and Sudan). The government intends to do this while at the same time supporting African states such as Senegal, Mali, Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa, Mozambique, and Botswana, where socio-economic progress has been made. In West Africa this policy undergirds a number of U.S. programs. First, the United States has continued to support UNAMSIL financially and through military training of African peacekeepers. The U.S. government has also worked closely with the United Kingdom and supported Britains lead role in restoring peace in Sierra Leone. Finally, the United States continues its military and financial support to the Cont? government in Guinea. These efforts comprise part of a broader U.S. strategy in West Africa designed to support our regional allies and contain the spread of the war. The main target of this policy has been the Charles Taylor government in Liberia. The administration has thus attempted to break the link between the Taylor regime and the sale of conflict diamonds through the support of legislation in the United States and of UN sanctions on diamond exports and arms sales and a travel ban on Liberian government officials. In addition to its containment policy toward Taylor, the United States has also attempted to shore up regional allies like Presidents Kufour (Ghana), Konar? (Mali), Wade (Senegal), and Obasanjo (Nigeria). It is also clear that the United States has little choice but to work with President Gbagbo (c?te dIvoire), despite his contested rise to power, to preserve stability. Challenges to U. S. PolicyBeyond these policy thrusts, the working group identified several challenges to the administrations policy and important questions that have yet to be addressed. Short-Term Issues How can the United States best support the United Kingdoms lead role in Sierra Leone? What else should the United States do to bring about a more democratic regime in Liberia? How can the United States avert increased instability in Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, and c?te dIvoire while fostering socio-economic liberalization in these states? How should the United States collaborate with the French to foster economic development and good governance in West Africa? How will the administration prepare the political terrain in Washington to win support for these initiatives on the Hill? ong-Term Issues What are our long-term commitments to UNAMSIL and how will the United States define an exit strategy? How does the U.S. government envisage moving from DDR to economic growth in Sierra Leone and the rest of the West African region? ConclusionThe working group agreed that the international community, striving to end the horror of West Africas regional war, must begin by overseeing the successful resolution of conflict in Sierra Leone. Yet despite recent progress made in ending that war and the implementation of DDR, a number of unpleasant realities remain, making policy formation for the United States and the rest of the international community extremely difficult. UNAMSIL thus must be seen for what it is: a quick-fix, capacity-building effort that is not sustainable over the long run. The economies, political organs, and state institutions in Sierra Leone and Liberia are in a shambles and human capital is entirely depleted. The Kabbah government is a shell, and as one WAWG member put it, There is no there there in Sierra Leone. Still more troubling is the possibility of further violence and destabilization in the region: the RUF continues to menace the peace process; the Cont? and Gbagbo governments lack legitimacy at home and are threatened from within their own states; and tensions remain high between northern Muslims and southern Christians in c?te dIvoire after several years of divisive ethnic politics that have set the groups against one another. More broadly, profound socio-economic problems grip the entire West Africa region, making it fertile ground for future violent conflict. This reality points to several fundamental questions for the U. S. government: have the events of September 11 given rise to a renewed appreciation of the dangers of collapsed states? Or, will the current war on terrorism continue to draw attention and resources away from the crises in West Africa? And finally, can the United States work with its European (especially French) and African allies to help manage conflict and build economic prosperity in the region? Recommendations1.Provide strong support to British leadership in Sierra Leone. 2. Successfully marry the administrations West Africa program with the ambitious conflict prevention/development programs being articulated at the U.S. Agency for International Development. 3. Consider Sierra Leone a model for learning how the United States should approach complex humanitarian crises, state collapse, and regionalized conflict in Africa. 4.Increase U.S. domestic political will to engage in the region through public education and awareness building. 5.Find a middle ground for working with the French on the role Liberias Charles Taylor will play in the future of the region. 6. Develop a mid- and long-term regional plan for West Africa that accounts for big-picture economic and human development trends. 7.Implement the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act as soon as possible and draft and then implement AGOA II, thus extending the number of products covered by the legislation. 8. Buttress socio-economic development in Nigeria, the most populous and perhaps most important U.S. ally in sub-Saharan Africa. 9. Cut off financial resources to warlords who gain sustenance from non-state profiteers like diamond and timber buyers as well as from state actors intent on creating instability to further their own political and economic goals. 10.Continue military assistance to the key regional armies to professionalize them and build linkages with the United States. 11. Speed up debt forgiveness, especially for those countries that play by the rules and are in the process of socio-economic liberalization. 12.Increase aid to the region as an investment in stability, socio-economic development, and the creation of new markets for the United States and to help prevent state collapse. Words/ Pages : 3,186 / 24

Cival Rights Act 1964 essays

Cival Rights Act 1964 essays When the Government Stood Up For Civil Rights "All my life I've been sick and tired, and now I'm just sick and tired of being sick and tired. No one can honestly say Negroes are satisfied. We've only been patient, but how much more patience can we have?" Mrs. Hamer said these words in 1964, a month and a day before the historic Civil Rights Act of 1964 would be signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson. She speaks for the mood of a race, a race that for centuries has built the nation of America, literally, with blood, sweat, and passive acceptance. She speaks for black Americans who have been second class citizens in their own home too long. She speaks for the race that would be patient no longer that would be accepting no more. Mrs. Hamer speaks for the African Americans who stood up in the 1950's and refused to sit down. They were the people who led the greatest movement in modern American history - the civil rights movement. It was a movement that would be more than a fragment of history, it was a movement that wou ld become a measure of our lives (Shipler 12). When Martin Luther King Jr. stirred up the conscience of a nation, he gave voice to a long lain dormant morality in America, a voice that the government could no longer ignore. The government finally answered on July 2nd with the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is historically significant because it stands as a defining piece of civil rights legislation, being the first time the national government had declared equality for blacks. The civil rights movement was a campaign led by a number of organizations, supported by many individuals, to end discrimination and achieve equality for American Blacks (Mooney 776). The forefront of the struggle came during the 1950's and the 1960's when the feeling of oppression intensified and efforts increased to gain access to public accommodations, increased voting rights, and better educational oppor...

Being Good

Outline Impression defining B person 1 Official impression 2 sense of common sense C paper II history of etiquette old British style B postal family 1 original 2 extended C regulations old-fashioned / unused new wind III type of etiquette common sense aspect B-style 1 social 2 business IV When using A when the appropriate time is B 1 What kind of conditions should be changed 1 Indicator 2 Parallel V vs. Personal opinion Really important thing B Etiquette is a relative reason 1 Correct If you take time to write down the definition of a good meaning in the vocabulary, you might find your answer there. What do you think is the definition of good? It is wonderful if the answer is positive; otherwise, you should find a lesson that you have learned before, which is a belief that you should feel this when you are good It creates. When you realize what you need to do or if you realize that your motivation has disappeared under certain circumstances, please move the change in the right direct ion. This usually means saying no to someone you usually say; it can also mean standing on someone you have never seen before. This is hard work, but it is worth it. I will decide what a good person personally meant to you. Some people think that being a good person is as easy as not hurting other people. But that is not necessarily about what you do, but about what you do for others. Being a good person also includes helping others like other people. You need to decide what you think is a good person. Please select a character model. Having a character model gives you an example of how it corresponds. This person should have the qualities you want to achieve. Think about how you can better embody the quality you admire. Think about how to apply these qualities to work, creative pursuits, personal relationships, meals and lifestyles. The most precious thing I had with my children happened when we volunteered. Being a good parent is part of a good example. It is a good citizen, to re cognize the plight of people in need, respond to it, and show your responsibility through actions. I clearly remember taking my daughter Emily to send clothes and food collected in our community to the low income community in Chicago. I will never forget how she responded to the face of appreciated people accepting donation. Every time delivery is over, I will have breakfast for my dad / daughter at a local coffee shop. So I will talk about when other people will lend my hands and how to hand them over to those who appreciate these items. In addition to providing opportunities to teach feelings, these breakfast experiences are a good combination of moments for us two people.

Never Elements Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Never Elements - Essay Example Besides, this literary work can be considered as a temporary escape from the real world to an imaginary world under the earth. Thesis statement: In the literary work Neverwhere, Neil Gaiman makes use of strange and invisible characters and a fantastic location below the earth to prove the futility of materialistic life, and the scope of a different life. Most striking elements in the novel: This section is divided into three: Strange characters, Fantastic location, and Invisible characters. Strange characters The characters in the novel, like Door, Croup, Marquis, Hunter, etc., appear to be strange because they symbolize life in a magical context. One can easily identify the fact that the novelist portrays the protagonist (say, Richard Mayhew) as the representative of the mortal world. On the other side, Door represents the link between the mortal world and the imaginary world. In Neil Gaiman’s fiction, the narrator made clear that, â€Å"He looked to see where she had come f rom, but the wall was blank and brick and unbroken† (25). She appears to the protagonist as a mystery because she does not try to reveal her real identity. Besides, the strange characters never try to communicate with the human beings who are living in the mortal world. Once, Door seeks help from the protagonist and this incident breaks the secrecy of the underground world. The strange characters in the novel are not interested to lead normal lives because they are aware of the fact that the possibility of their survival is related to the secrecy of the underground world. To be specific, the underground dwellers are symbolic of the devil and his followers, who are forced to flee from the heaven. Within this context, some of the strange characters like Islington, and Lamia represent sin. On the other side, the characters like Door, Marquis and Hunter represent virtue. Still, this basic difference adds strangeness to the characters that are forced to live beneath the earth to co mplete their mission. Fantastic location The novelist makes use of the location to help the reader to find out the differences between the mortal world and the virtual real world. To be specific, the map of the London Subway, printed on Richard’s umbrella is symbolic of the virtual real world. The narrator made clear that, â€Å"Then a click, and it blossomed into a huge white map of the London Underground network, each line drawn in a different color, every station marked and named† (3-4). One can see that the novelist exploits the scope of commonplaces as locations. The dwellers of London Below, known as Rat-Speakers, never try to reveal their identity in the real world. Besides, they are not aware of the life beyond their area. The market place at the Floating Market is symbolic of an underdeveloped society, where barter system still prevails as an economic system. The people who live in the underworld depend upon this economic system. Still, the dwellers of the und erworld make use of urban transportation mode to travel. In the novel, the underground railway network leads to the Earl's Court. So, one can see that the abandoned transportation method under the earth’s surface is used by the dwellers of the underworld. In the novel, the character named as Hunter hesitates to enter the real world and decides to stay at an underground station, which is under a museum known as British Museum. So, the novelist makes use of the fantastic location (say, the world beneath the city of

Idealized versus Real Identity in Carson's Audubon Essay - 2

Idealized versus Real Identity in Carson's Audubon - Essay Example For Carson,   James Audubon’s realist works are not authentic because they signify forced renditions of natural birds. She presents a unique notion of the difference between substance and form in human identity. In â€Å"Audubon,† Carson uses image, diction, sarcasm, and metaphor to argue that, when people are blinded with their love for physical appearance and social stratification, they cannot perceive the difference between human form and substance and see the truth about their identities.The poem employs images of inauthentic portrayals of birds to depict the disparity between people’s perception and the reality of their identity. The images of the birds cannot be trusted as truthful because they are dead, in the same way, that perceptions of humanity tend to be false because people base them on idealistic, but inaccurate, views of themselves. Carson puts open and close quotation marks on the phrase â€Å"drawn from nature† (2) because Audubon did no t paint them as they are. Audubon paints them, not as they are, but as how he wants them to be. Carson accentuates that â€Å"†¦[Audubon] hated the unvarying shapes/of traditional taxidermy† (5-6). She suggests that he is not satisfied with the roughness of actual animal nature. He prepares them to be more palatable to his tastes and audience. But to change nature indicates deception. Some people also enjoy deceiving others with appearances. They will enhance or hide their natural features, in order for them to be acceptable in their society. Furthermore, a number of people take pains in being who they are not. Carson emphasizes how Audubon changes what a bird must be, according to how he wants them to be seen.   She describes the â€Å"flexible armatures of bent wire and wood/ on which he arranged bird skin and feathers† (7-8).   Nothing is natural in his paintings because the actions of the birds and their appearances are contrived.

Immigration Study Essay Example for Free

Immigration Study Essay For many immigrants, becoming an American has been shaped by Americans and the American governments identification of them racially. Latino and Hispanic immigrants are one race in particular that often has trouble adjusting to life in America. Most Latinos that wish to come to America have a much different view of America than Americans do. They see America as this wonderful place with endless opportunities, money and freedom. Yet, once they actually come to America, Latinos usually find it is not what they had expected. Many of them struggle to find jobs, struggle to find a place to live, and have a hard time fitting in. America may have a far better economy than Mexico, but Hispanic immigrants rarely get the jobs or the pay that they hope for when they come here. It can be nearly impossible for some immigrants to find work at all; sometimes because of their race and other times because of their lack of experience or their lack of education. Many Latino immigrants get stuck with jobs that most Americans do not want, like fast food restaurants, housekeeping jobs, farming, and landscaping. These jobs rarely give good pay, forcing them to get two or even three jobs just so that they can afford to feed their families. In the book The Circuit, Francisco Jimenez writes about his family struggling to make it in America many years ago. Jimenez writes about leaving Mexico to come to America as a child and constantly having to move in order for his parents to find work. In one chapter Jimenez says, â€Å"After stopping at several places and asking for work, we found a rancher who still had a few cotton fields left to be picked. He offered us work and a tent to live in. It was one of many dark green tents lined up in rows. The labor camp looked like an army settlement†(Jimenez 54). Like many immigrants today, Jimenez and his brothers had to work on the farms instead of going to school to help support his family. On top of trying to find jobs and money, immigrants also battle with fitting in. They are looked down on by many Americans because they are a different  race with different traditions and cultures. Americans frequently accuse Hispanics of taking all of the available jobs; leaving none for anyone else. In an article entitled, â€Å"Is This a White Country or What?†, Lilian Rubin talks about the way white Americans and natural-born citizens feel about immigrants. Rubin writes, â€Å"For whites the issue is compounded by race, by the fact that the newcomers are primarily people of color. For them, therefore, their economic anxieties have combined with the changing face of America to create a profound uneasiness about immigration†(Rubin 227). Several white Americans are also afraid that Hispanics and other immigrants are going to overpopulate in America; making it less of a â€Å"white† country. Rubin explains, â€Å"Americans have always worried about the strange rs who came to our shores, fearing that they would corrupt our society, dilute our culture, debase our values†(Rubin 227). Hispanics are too often misjudged for trying to find jobs and for coming to America. They must live in a country where a majority of the population tries to segregate them from the white society. In another article called, â€Å"Best of Friends, Worlds Apart†, Mirta Ojito describes two friends who drift apart because they are different races. Ojito writes, â€Å"The two men live only four miles apart, not even 15 minutes by car. Yet they are separated by a far greater distance, one they say they never envisioned back in Cuba. In ways that are obvious to the black man but far less so to the white, they have grown apart in the United States because of race. For the first time, they inhabit a place where the color of their skin defines the outlines of their lives-where they live, the friends they make, how they speak, what they wear, even what they eat†(Ojito NYT-3-1). For Latino and Hispanic immigrants, leaving their native country to come to America is not always what it seems. They face a lot of disappointment when realizing that America is not the perfect place that they pictured it to be. Losing hopes about getting the â€Å"American dream†, they must fight to find jobs, jobs that normally do not pay well at all. For immigrants, finding a place to live and raise a family can be an extremely difficult, especially in society where white people are seen as superior. Some children have to give up their education to help their families make money. For most Latinos and Hispanics, coming to a new country means leaving behind important  traditions to find their place in a white country. Works Cited Jimà ©nez, Francisco. The Circuit. New York: Scholastic, 1997. Print. Paula, Rothenberg. American Culture, Identity, and Public Life Course Reader. Worth Publishers, 2013.

CFC (Chlorofluorocarbons) :: science

CFC The beginning of the CFC(chlorofluorocarbons) era started in 1928, when CFC' were invented by a Du Pont chemist. CFC' were best known as "freons" and became famous as a safe, nonflammable refrigerant. It's invention became a great triumph when Freon took the place of sulfur dioxide or ammonia which was used as the working liquid in refrigerators. It eventually became widely used in automobile air conditioners and nontoxic propellants in aerosol cans. It's insulating properties also was used for blowing agents for plastics and foam cups. Thus CFCs became used all over the world and its business got bigger and bigger until late in 1973. Sherwood Rowland and Mario Molina, two distinguished chemists, came up with a surprising result in his calculations concerning the CFCs and ozone layer. CFCs are basically inactive in the troposphere(around the altitude of 50,000 feet) so it would gradually drift upward until they reached the mid-stratosphere.(about 100,000 feet) At this point CFCs would be broken down by short-wavelength ultraviolet radiation from the sun. This radiation is the one which would not reach the lower atmosphere in large amounts because of the ozone layer. When these CFCs do brake down, they released atomic chlorine which then would react with the ozone and convert it back into plain oxygen. The even worse part of all this is that these chlorine molecules do not become inactive after the first reaction with the ozone and would be available to destroy more ozone molecules. Thus this process would be the fun ction of a catalyst; a single chlorine atom involved in a chain reaction to destroy many ozone molecules. Rowland and Molina eventually agreed that this thinning of the ozone shield can cause a catastrophe for Earth's living beings, including humans, by allowing large amounts of the deadly ultraviolet-B radiation to reach to Earth's surface. Rowland and Molina checked their calculations again and again to make sure that these figures had not a single mistake in it because this conclusion was likely to destroy an $8 billion industry already in the United States. However, the lives of the living beings were far more important than businesses so in 1974 Rowland and Molina, having their calculations checked by their colleagues, explained their theory in a paper in the eminent scientific journal Nature. Later the only reasonable conclusion they drew out was that the use of CFCs be banned. When these calculations were released to the public, Du Pont, the major CFC manufacturer, did everything they can to convince the people that the calculations were unproven and theoretical.

Entrepreneurship

History of entrepreneurship[edit] Etymology and historical usage[edit] First used in 1723, today the term entrepreneur implies qualities of leadership, initiative and innovation in manufacturing, delivery, and/or services. Economist Robert Reich has called team-building, leadership and management ability essential qualities for the entrepreneur. [5] The successful companies of the future, he has said, will be those that offer a new model for working relationships based on collaboration and mutual value. 6] The entrepreneur is a factor n microeconomics, and the study of entrepreneurship reaches back to the work in the late 17th and early 18th centuries of Richard Cantillon and Adam Smith, which was foundational to classical economics. In the 20th century, entrepreneurship was studied by Joseph Schumpeter in the 1930s and other Austrian economists such as Carl Menger, Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich von Hayek.The term â€Å"entrepreneurship† was coined around the 1920s, while the loan from French of the word entrepreneur itself dates to the 1850s. It became something of a buzzword eginning about 2010, in the context of disputes which have erupted surrounding the wake of the Great Recession. [clarification needed] What is an entrepreneur[edit] Entrepreneur (i/pntraprSn3r/), is a loanword from French. It is defined as an individual who organizes or operates a business or businesses.Credit for coining the term entrepreneur generally goes to the French economist Jean-Baptiste Say, but in fact the Irish-French economist Richard Cantillon defined it first[7] in his Essai sur la Nature du Commerce en G ©n ©ral, or Essay on the Nature of Trade in General, a ook William Stanley Jevons considered the â€Å"cradle of political economy†[8] Say and Cantillon used the term differently, however.Cantillon biographer Anthony Breer notes that Cantillon saw the entrepreneur as a risk-taker while Say considered the entrepreneur a â€Å"planner†. [9] Cantillon defined the term as a person who pays a certain price for a product and resells it at an uncertain price: â€Å"making decisions about obtaining and using the resources while consequently admitting the risk of enterprise. † The word first appeared in the French dictionary entitled â€Å"Dictionnaire Universel de Commerce† compiled by Jacques des Bruslons and published in 1723.

Curriculum Design Essay

Chapter 7 ASCD Yearbook Fundamental Curriculum Decisions, 1984 People cannot intelligently discuss and communicate with others about curriculum without first making very clear what their interpretation of a curriculum is. In this chapter, we will be thinking of a curriculum as a written plan for the educational program of a school or schools. Curriculum design them will consist of those considerations haying to do with the contents, the form, and the arrangement of the various elements of a curriculum. We distinguish between curriculum planning and instructional planning with curriculum planning being the antecedent task. Curriculum planners are forced to make design decisions almost from the outset of their work. The design decisions revolve around three important considerations: (1) the range of school levels and schools to be covered by the curriculum, (2) the number of elements to be included in the curriculum, and (3) the nature and scope of each of those elements. Each of these requires additional explanations. Decisions about the range of school levels and schools to be covered by the curriculum normally are mot very complicated, and the range usually coincides with the sphere of authority of the board of education. Districts may elect to plan a curriculum from kindergarten through grade 12; they may elect to plan one curriculum for the elementary schools and one for the secondary schools; or they may elect to direct each school unit to plan its own curriculum. Planning groups will have to decide about the number of elements to be included in the curriculum. Among the options for inclusion are: (1) a statement of goals or purposes, (2) a statement of document intent and use, (3) an evaluation scheme, and (4) a body of culture content selected and organized with the expectancy that if the culture content is judiciously implemented in classrooms through the instructional program, the goals or purposes for the schools will be achieved. To this list, some would add suggested pupil activities, instructional materials, and so forth, but these matters belong more rightfully in the domain of instructional planning and we will not consider them here. A few comments about each of these four elements will be helpful to the reader in understanding their import for curriculum decisions. Most curriculum writers would agree that it is desirable to include a statement of goals or purposes to be achieved by schools through the implementation of the planned curriculum. They may disagree as to what the goals ought to be, or they may disagree about the degree of specificity of the statements to be included. The most famous statement of goals or purposes for schools became known as the Seven Cardinal Principles of Education as formulated by the Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Schools in 1918. They were health, command of the fundamental processes, worthy home membership, vocation, civic education, worthy use of leisure, and ethical character. There is less consistency among curriculum writers in terms of their insistence upon including a statement of document intent and use in a curriculum, and, in practice many curricula do not contain such statements. Curricula have, in the past, contained statements intended to reveal the philosophy or point of view of the planners but this is not what we mean by a statement of document intent and use. A statement of document intent and use should be forthright and direct about such matters as: (1) how teachers are expected to use the curriculum as a point of departure fur developing their teaching strategies, (2) the fact that the curriculum is the official educational policy of the board of education, (3) the degree of universality in expectancy with regard to the discretion of teachers in implementing the curriculum, and (4) the degree to which teachers are to be held accountable for the implementation of the curriculum. These are illustrative of the kind of statement that may be formulated, but each planning group will have to decide on the number and character of such statements. With the amount of emphasis put upon curriculum evaluation in recent years, some mandate with respect to the curriculum evaluation is a very reasonable option for inclusion in a curriculum. The most common method of pupil evaluation used in the past has been the standardized (norm referenced) achievement test. In most cases, there were no deliberate attempts to relate published curricula to the test batteries. Therefore, any leap in assumption about the directness of the relationship between curriculum content and whatever was measured by the tests was likely to be untenable. All the more reason for formalizing an evaluation scheme by including it in the curriculum. In one form or another, a curriculum must include a body of culture content that has been deemed by the planners and directing authorities to be important for schools to use in fulfilling their roles as transmitters of culture to the oncoming generations of young people. The basic curriculum question is, and always has been, that of what shall be taught in schools, and a major function of a curriculum is to translate the answer to that question into such forms that schools can fulfill their commitment and demonstrate that they leave done so. Most of the remainder of this chapter is devoted to discussion of this element of a curriculum; so we will leave it at this point. But it should be made clear that from these options as potential elements of a curriculum, there emerge two dimensions of curriculum design. One is the choice of and the arrangement of the elements to be included in the curriculum. The other is the form and arrangement of the contents of each of the elements internally. The design problem is greatest in the case of the form and arrangement of the culture content and it is the one most frequently discussed under the heading of curriculum design by curriculum writers past and present. . Culture Content-Knowledge-Curriculum Content A curriculum is an expression of the choice of content selected from our total culture content and, as such, it is an expression of the role of the school in the society for which the school has been established to serve. A word needs to be said here about the meaning associated with the expression â€Å"culture content.† Ralph Linton provided us with a classical and very useful definition of â€Å"culture.† He stated: â€Å"A culture is the configuration of learned behavior and results of behavior whose component elements are shared and transmitted by the members of a particular society† (1945, p. 32). The term â€Å"society† is ordinarily used to refer to a group of individuals who live together with common norms and shared frames of reference. Societies tend to generate their own culture and to transmit that culture to oncoming generations within that society. So long as societies and their cultures remained in a primitive state, their cultures were simple and could be transmitted to oncoming generations by direct contact between the young and the older members of the society. But as societies became more complex and the scope of their culture content increased so that the transmission of the culture content to the young could no longer be accomplished by direct contact in daily living, societies were forced to create institutions to take on the responsibility for all or part of the cultural transmission task. The school is one of those institutions. The church is another. Both of these institutions have unique roles to play in society, and they tend to transmit different culture content to the young. Parochial schools tend to do both. As Smith indicated in Chapter 3 of this Yearbook (not in this reading – JG), the culture content selected to be included in the curriculum of the school may be thought of as equivalent to the knowledge to which school students are to be exposed. In any case, it is critically important to be aware that not all culture content, or knowledge, accumulated by society comes under the purview of the school; curriculum planning is a process of selecting and organizing culture content for transmission to student by the school. The process is very complex, involving input from many sources, but the organized end-result of the process is the design of the curriculum. The most sophisticated mode of organization of culture content for purposes of teaching is reflected by the various disciplines such as history, chemistry, or mathematics. In addition to the established and recognized disciplines, school subjects have been created out of conventional wisdom m the applications of selected portions of the disciplines to applied areas of our culture such as vocational subjects, social studies, or reading and handwriting. In general, the separate subject organization of culture content has predominated in curriculum design. Another way of speaking about curriculum content is to refer to cognitive content, skill content, and value or attitudinal content. As Smith discussed more fully in Chapter 3, all three types of content represent knowledge in some from either in the form of direct knowledge or a knowledge base. The three forms have been used as a classification schema or a taxonomy for curriculum content formulation. Historic Curriculum Design Conflicts One must realize that tire basic curriculum question is, and always has been, one of what shall be taught in the schools. An immediate corollary to that question has been that of how shall what has been chosen to be taught in the school be organized so as to best facilitate the subsequent decisions about teaching and learning. Those two questions are the primary curriculum questions, and the organized decisions made in response to them culminate in a curriculum design. A few reflections about our curriculum past will illustrate settle of the conflicts in curriculum design that have taken place. In her study, Sequel observed that curriculum as we use the term today was not a subject of professional discussion until after 1890 (1966, p. 1). Rugg contended that decisions about curriculum content prior to the 20th century were decided primarily by textbook writers and textbook publishers (1926, Pp. Ill-11). It was not until 1918 that Bobbitt wrote the first definitive work on curriculum and since that time curriculum writers have directed their attention to the substance and organization of curriculum content (curriculum design) and to the processes of curriculum planning, implementing, and evaluating. By the early 1900, the stage had been set for the separate subjects organization of the culture content to be used in schools. In our very early elementary or primary schools, for example, pupils were taught to read, to write, and to compute; the subjects were called reading, writing, and arithmetic. Much later such subjects as geography, history, and civics were added to the curriculum. In our early secondary schools, pupils were taught a selection of subjects (disciplines) that were directly associated with the disciplines taught at the college or university. Even though the separate subjects organization of culture content was used before curriculum became an area of professional study, it is still with us. True, subjects have ben added and others altered, but it remains the dominant approach to curriculum design. The separate subjects mode of curriculum design has been significantly challenged only once in our history. That challenge came with the advent of the Progressive Education movement. A principal belief of the Progressive Education movement was its dramatic emphasis on the learner in school settings. A substantial portion of the Progressive emphasis on the learner was stimulated by John Dewey’s (1916) call for more active and less passive learning in schools. This focus on the learner when applied to the organization of curriculum content led to endeavors remove away from the separate subjects organization of tire curriculum content. The movemen away from the separate subjects organization (sometimes called subject-centered) was toward the integration, or fusion, of subjects under the assumption that such integration would not only facilitate learning on the part of pupils but would additionally make the knowledge, skills, and attitudes more easily available to the pupils in post-school life (the transfer problem). The basic process involved here was the fusion of the contents of two or more of the separate subjects into another organization in which the individual subjects lost their separate identities. As one might expect, names were associated with the various integration or fusion attempts. Figure 1 adapted from Hopkins (1941, p. 18) illustrates the variety of names associated with curricula resulting from integrative or fusion processes. Hopkins here polarized the subject curriculum and the experience curriculum. The broad fields curriculum was placed in the center so as to show that it had a reasonable num ber of the characteristics of the two extremes. Others as indicated on either side depending on emphasis. Space in this volume will not permit extensive description of curricula developed as part of the efforts to move away from separate subjects organization. The best we can do here is to identify some of them and cite sources for further investigation on the part of the reader. For example, in their hook The Child-Centered School, Rugg and Shumaker (1928) presented brief descriptions of the curricula of the Lincoln School, The Frances Parker School, and others of that time. In most cases, the curricula were built around child-centered units of work, but attention was focused as needed on such basic subjects as reading, mathematics, history, geography, and so forth. One of the most extreme departures from separate subjects organization was proposed by Stratemeyer and others (1957). The authors proposed the â€Å"persistent life situations† concept as a basis for dealing with the curriculum building issues of scope, sequence, continuity, balance, and depth. At the junior and senior high school levels, special mention should be made of the core curriculum. The core curriculum idea was to get away from nothing but the discipline-centered curriculum. Most core programs were organized around larger and more flexible blocks of time, and the content was generally centered on personal and social problems and problems of living. In many respects the core curriculum idea was an attempt to solve the general education problem in our upper schools. It is important to note that in practice in schools, curriculum design failed to get very far away from the subject- or discipline-centered design. The most lasting effect of the movement was the broad fields idea as represented by social studies, language arts, and general science, and they have persisted mostly in curricula for elementary and junior high schools. Contemporary Arguments About Curriculum Design Probably the most persistent movement in curriculum design in recent years has been the proposed use of specific behavioral objectives as a basis for curriculum organization. Curriculum writers have long proposed that curricula ought to contain statements of goals or objectives, but not as the only content of a curriculum. Some contemporary writers have proposed that curricula should be thought of in terms of the anticipated consequences of instruction, or intended learning outcomes. (For example, see Popham and Baker, 1970; Johnson, 1977). The culture content in such cases would either be implied in the objectives or be considered as an instructional decision. A distinct advantage of this type of curriculum design is that supervision of the implementation and of the evaluation of the curriculum is simplified and facilitated. Such proposals are in direct contrast to a proposal that a curriculum should he composed in four parts: (1) a statement of goals, (2) an outline of the culture content that has the potential for reaching the goals, (3) a statement of the intended use of the curriculum, and (4) a schema for the evaluation of the curriculum (Beauchamp, 1981, p. 136). They are in even greater contrast to those who would include instructional considerations such as suggested activities for learners and instructional materials to be used. Curriculum planners should be warned that the inclusion of all of these things produces fat and unmanageable curricula. With respect to the culture content of curricula, two organizational concepts persist both in the literature and in the practice of writing curricula. The first is the tendency to continue with the basic framework of the subjects, or disciplines, that are to be taught. The second is to break the subject areas down into three identifiable components: (1) cognitive, (2) inquiry and skill, and (3) affective (value, moral, attitudinal). Curriculum planners will probably wish to begin their thinking about design with the familiar, which will unquestionably be the conventional school subjects. They will consist of mathematics, social sciences (including social studies as a subject), the natural sciences, fine and applied arts, health and physical education, communications, and other languages. At the secondary school level, planners will add to these whatever vocational and technical subjects they may wish to offer. Some planners will wish to add an area that may be termed social problems, molar problems, or problems of living that may call for applications of elements learned in various conventional subjects. Curriculum planning is an educative process. For this reason classroom teachers should be involved in the undertaking. A very important reason for their involvement is that the process of curriculum planning presents an opportunity for them to engage in analysis of the culture content so that they may be more effective in their classrooms at the level of instruction. The analytic process of breaking down the culture content into cognitive, affective, and inquiry and skill components is one way that teachers may become mote knowledgeable about what they do. Also in this process of analyzing the culture content, the content is more specifically related to goals and at the same time it fosters better curriculum implementation. For these reasons, teachers’ participation in curriculum deliberations has been proposed frequently as a needed dimension of continuous teacher education. In Chapter 3, Smith raised the very important question of the utility of the culture content selected to be part of the curriculum content, and he posed several ways in which the utility of knowledge can be emphasized. In a more specific vein, Broody, Smith, and Burnett (1964) suggested on, potential uses of learnings acquired in school to he taken into consideration. They are the associative use, the replicative use, the applicative use, and the interpretive use (pp. 43-60). Very briefly, the associative use of knowledge refers to the psychological process of responding to a new situation with elements of knowledge previously acquired. The replicative use refers to situations that call for direct and familiar use of schooling such as when we read a newspaper, write a letter, or balance a checkbook . The applicative use occurs when an individual is confronted with a new problem and is able to solve the new problem by the use of knowledge acquired in the study of school subjects through previous experience in solving problems demanding similar applications. The interpretive use of schooling refers to the orientation and perspective the individual brings to new situations because the individual has acquired ways of conceptualizing and classifying experience. Much of the discussion about uses of schooling (especially use external to the school) is an elaboration of the transfer problem that has plagued educators ever since Edward Thorndike first set forth his theory of transfer through the existence of identical elements in 1908. The most easily explained is the replicative use as described above because of the direct similarity between the use external to the school and the mode of learning and practice in school. Take reading for example. Reading from school materials is directly similar to reading of materials outside the school. But when it comes to applying knowledge or making new interpretations or associations between knowledge required in school and life situations external to schools, a more complicated transfer situation exists. Unfortunately, many of the questions raised about utility and uses of schooling have not been answered through curriculum design. Nor are they likely to be because so much is dependent upon classroom teaching technique and the design of instructional strategies. The best efforts in curriculum design have been through the generation of new courses (subjects if you please) in which the content is purportedly more like life external to the school. Reference here is made not only to specialized courses such as technical, vocational, commercial and occupational courses but also to courses designed around molar problems, problems of living, and core programs. In many respects, the broad fields courses were designed for purposes of saving time during the school day and to facilitate the transfer of knowledge acquired. But whatever the curriculum design, if teachers are not aware of and sensitive to the kind of analyses of the content to be taught as we have been discussing it, the uses of schooling will not be maximized. All the more reason why teachers should be part of the curriculum planning effort and participate in the required dialogue. In summary, then, what courses of action with respect to curriculum design appear to be the most appropriate for today’s curriculum planners? The most important aspect of curriculum design is the display to be made of culture content once the content has been selected. The total amount of culture content is constantly growing thus making the problem of selection for curriculum content more difficult as time goes on. Unquestionably, the role of those schools (elementary and secondary) that operate under compulsory school attendance laws must constantly be examined in terms of what they should or should not offer in their curricula. The elementary school curriculum has always been designed with general education in mind. In our contemporary society, the secondary school seems to be moving in that same direction. Both, however, have seen fit to divide the content selected into realms or courses as appropriate. Scope and sequence have long been two major problems in curriculum design. The display of course content into topical outline is one way planners can watch for discrepancies in scope and sequence. It also helps with horizontal articulation among the various subjects. To help teachers generate greater insight into the content outline, it is desirable that the curriculum design reveal the expected cognitive, inquiry or skill, and affective outcomes. These are conventionally arranged in the design of the content in parallel with the topics in the outline. flow behaviorally the outcomes are to be stated is optional to the planners. These outcomes should also be thought of in terms of any goals or purposes that may be stated in the curriculum. What else to include in the design is optional to the plan. It has become quite conventional to think of goals or purposes first and then to select the content. Such procedure is quite arbitrary because all content is selected with some purpose in mind. Nonetheless, a statement of goals and purposes is a useful element in curriculum design. I would add to the topic outline and the expected outcomes a directive statement about the intended use to be made of the curriculum and a statement outlining a scheme for evaluating it.

Montesquieu Thesis essays

Montesquieu Thesis essays His real name is Charles De Secondat and was born near Bordeaux. He held a philosophy emphasizing that, law in general is conformed by human reason,(Bk I: Ch 1). Laws are derived from the relations of people to their environment. The relations regarding Montesquieus philosophy towards laws being the derivative of the nature of the region help to constitute his book called The Spirit of the Laws. (Roustan 16): Montesquieu believed that laws were created entirely dependent on a societies origin, needs, culture, atmosphere and propaganda. As he once stated: Laws should be related to the climate of a country, quality of its soil, its situation and extent, and the religion of the inhabitants and their customs (Book IV Ch. 3) Different cultures tend to mash with others, in order to improve their own culture. A country tending to have an ill environment (China) will reform itself in order to improve relations with other countries for its own benefit. Laws are derivative of the relations of people to their environment. Different countries tend to have different views and passions towards law. What elaborates the reason for these differences? Is it environmental factors that formulate different perspectives towards law? There has to be some thesis that can explain these differences in thought: The mountaineers preserve a more moderate government, because they are not so liable to be conquered. They defend themselves easily, and are attacked with difficulty; ammunition and provisions are collected and carried against them with great expense, for the country furnishes none. It is, then, a more arduous, dangerous enterprise to make a war against them; and all the laws that can be enacted for the safety of the people are there of least use (Montesquieu XIV; Ch.2) There are reasons for a country to have diverse laws in comparison to others. The environment controlling our world is so diverse tha...

Environment assessment of Apple Inc Research Paper

Environment assessment of Apple Inc - Research Paper Example According to Porter, the threat of substitutes shapes competition within an industry and unless there is demand for a particular product, substitutes may not have any specific impact (Grundy, 2006). It was observed that although Apple is the most favored company as a retail vendor of tablets, its market shares have gone down significantly due to launch of low cost tablets by the competitors such as, Samsung, Asus and Blackberry. In addition, consumers are shifting towards budget phones with similar software and outlook owing to their declining disposable income (The Wall Street Journal, 2014). Previously, Apple faced low competition level as that of innovation was low; but presently, almost all companies are competing at the same level in terms of software and hardware superiority. There is little product differentiation that Apple can incorporate regarding software, but it can utilize the same strategy that the competitors are applying for hardware. Apple needs to upgrade the hardware features offered within a specific price range; in other words, the consumers must be provided with better product related services without increasing the cost. Bargaining power of buyers According to the Porter’s model, the bargaining power of buyers is determined by the concentration of consumers in an industry, product differentiation, brand identity and price sensitivity (Miller, 1988). The major opportunity lying ahead of Apple is that of capturing the market of emerging economies.

The General Systems Theory Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

The General Systems Theory - Essay Example But in reality complexities exist, thus Jordan’s taxonomy had many implied drawbacks (Skyttner, 2005). Beer and the Viable System’s Model: The viable system’s Model provides us with a more complex model of a system as compared to the one provided by Jordan. In this theory the author Stafford Beer related the performance of an organizational system with that of a human brain, in his book ‘Brain of the Firm’. According to him, a viable business has the abilities to self-repair, of self-awareness, recursion and the ability to maintain identity. Beer designed principles which must be followed by the organizations in order to be viable. These principles provided guidelines for the information flow in the organization through various channels, their cost effectiveness and their capacity to convert data relating to the need of every level of organization that suits their needs and how these activities should be coordinated without any loss or trouble. The f ive sub managerial systems that were described by Beer translated the flow of information through the organization and how they interrelate. Through these systems he showed how each level is dependent on the other level for the flow of information and as the levels increase, so does the responsibility and the sensitivity of the information. Thus, in his model System One is the lowest level of the organization and is the one that needs to be controlled, it includes the operational departments or subsidiaries with lowest level of information that is provided by higher levels, whereas System Five completes the system by monitoring the balance between the systems, it mainly constitutes of the shareholders and board of directors of the organization. Beer also devised... The computer designed on the basis of the concepts of Klir’s GSPS has the ability to solve issues for the user. His theory was based on various mathematical algorithms which correspond with engineering techniques to solve an issue. It has four functional units: the control unit, meta methodological support unit, a knowledge base and a set of methodological tools. The algorithms used are specified in order for problems dealt through these tools. Metamethodological support unit arranges the problems on the basis of their generality. Knowledge base unit stores the information related issues which can not be solved through the system. The user interface will work either through the conceptual framework or through a direct connection to the main unit. Klir's problem-solving approach and system design can be sufficient for well-structured situations. Through history teams of experts in both technological and no technical aspects of the problem assembled and processed the necessary d ata and came up with alternative approaches which defined the benefits and shortcomings of every aspect. These researchers defined the relations between the theories where it was possible by producing quantitative analyses and predictions, where they were appropriate to give content to the most general aspects of the environment. Through these procedures, a gap was tried to be filled between the technical and non-technical theorists, so that a form could be given to every general theory wherever possible.