Reflection Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 27

Reflection - Essay Example She was objectified and deemed only good for her physical features. A trend that has been a vice in all generations. Our music nowadays is full of explicit content. Songs describing women in a graphic and vile manner has filled our airwaves. What is even more distressiing is that women seem to enjoy this negative attention thus encouraging the men. Sara Baartman same as most Khoi-San women was well rounded with large buttocks, large breasts and an elongated labia. One can understand that the typical African woman in those days was a sight to behold but beauty should be admired and not ridiculed. We are all fearfilly and wonderfully made and in the image of God. His work should not be the subject of mockery and ridicule but we should simply marvel at it and be in complete awe. It is important to ask ourselves why men rarely are the subject of such acts of exploitation and abuse. Sara Baartman was born in South Africa and even while there she lived as a slave to a Dutch farmer in Cape Town. Sara was then promised great wealth if she moved to England Africa was by then referred to as the black continent mostly because its inhabitants were black. Even while she was living in her motherland she was still being subjected to racial discrimination as she worked as a slave, a role mainly played by Africans who were seen as the inferior race. It was unheard of that a white would be a black man’s slave. While in Europe, racial discrimination was at its peak at the time and Sara felt its full brunt. To the Europeans she was simply a weird specimen that was to be observed to staisfy their curiosity. No one amongst them ever made an attempt to learn about the Hottentot Venus a a person. Did she have a sense of humour? Was she temperamental? Was she intelligent? Very few attempts if any were made to learn more about her innerself. The curiosity was on her extraordinary physical features. But you have to wonder, because the

Paper critic for program evaluation Research Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Critic for program evaluation - Research Paper Example Jemmott III, PhD; Loretta S. Jemmott, PhD, RN; Ann O’Leary, PhD; Zolani Ngwane, PhD;Larry D. Icard, PhD; Scarlett L. Bellamy, ScD; Shasta F. Jones, PhD; J. Richard Landis, PhD;G. Anita Heeren, MD, PhD; Joanne C. Tyler, DSc; Monde B. Makiwane, PhD, tries to give a clear perceptive of what are factors behind this worrying trend in South Africa. This paper will critically analyze the article in various ways such as the methodologies used, settings, aims and objectives, theoretical and empirical perspectives and much more. Background Setting- the study focused on the primary schools in a large, black township and rural settlement found near Cape Province. The setting of the study seems to focus mainly on the rural and poor families. But the reality is that HIV is a pandemic affecting every member of the society-either directly or indirectly-despite or his/her economic or social status. In this regard, there is some biasness as far as the setting of the study is concerned. Particip ants- random sampling method was used to select nine of 17 matched pairs of schools. The selected students were mainly in their sixth grade. However, the researcher had the consent of the parents or guardians before interviewing the students. This is a rather good move as far as the study is concerned. ... Stakeholders-stakeholders are different types of people who have direct or indirect interest on the outcome of the study results. Stakeholders regularly hold competing and occasionally combative perceptions on the appropriateness of the study. The interests of the stakeholders are affected by the outcome of the result. There is no clear identification of the concerned parties throughout the study. This is because of unclear definition of the significance of the study. Program theory The results of the study represent a theory based, contextually appropriate methods for HIV/AIDS reduction among the South African adolescents. The meta-analyses indicates that results from the school level were almost similar to the results obtained from individual level, although slightly more significant statistically. While logic models and program theory are frequently used interchangeably, the more accurate definition of a logic model is the graphical theory. The importance of logic models in this t ype of study cannot be ignored. This is because logic models are used as tools to plan, develop, manage, communicate and evaluate program or study. The logic models are effectively used in this study. For example, tables 1, 2, 3 and 4 give description of logic models as used in the study. Table 1 shows the number of students used in the study. 558 girls and 449 boys participated in the study. Linking this to the logic model, then Table represents the input section of the model. Table 2 presents descriptive statistics for sexual behaviors through intrusion condition and assessment period. This is the activity section of logic model. Table 3 is a representation of the estimated intervention effects during the follow-up period, intra-class correlation

Auditing2 case analysis Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Auditing2 analysis - Case Study Example Therefore for a business to address this issue, it has to put in place control measures that will reduce the number of risks the business is exposed to. This is not a fool proof measure but rather ways of mitigating the extent of loss in case the business suffers. This paper therefore seeks to identify the inherent risks in the case presented, point out internal control weaknesses, the best sampling techniques to use in testing the reasonableness of the various departments. 1. In the case given, the CFO and CEO worked together in the previous company. There is an inherent risk that they are incompetent in discharging their duties and had to leave the company. This is a risk that HFC needs to be aware of and put in place measures to identify and mitigate any loss that may arise due to their incompetence. The order and shipping department has the potential to incur inherent risk whereby the quality of the goods may not meet the required standards to satisfy customers. Another risk is in credit approval. Currently, once a customer is approved, they remain credit worthy until the cease doing business. The inherent risk here is that the customer may leave a bad and irrecoverable debt to the company. This clearly is a risk that can be mitigated by introducing an internal control policy to do a background check on customers before approval. The company can also set limits to the amount that a customer can be advanced by the business. 2. An internal weakness simply means the possibility of the internal checks to detect or deter any fraudulent activities either willingly or not willingly. There are several weaknesses in the company such as placing orders over the internet and via phone calls. It poses a threat to loss of stock since this is an asset with high liquidity. With the advancement of technology, there is a risk of receiving fake orders coupled with the weak controls in credit approval, and consequently loosing cash in form of stocks.

Literary History and the Concept of Literature Essay Example for Free

Literary History and the Concept of Literature Essay Literary history and the concept of literature I From the 1970s onwards, much has been said about the writing of history and literary history that has cast doubt on its intellectual credibility. For example, Hayden White’s Metahistory (1973) included an influential analysis of the metaphorical foundations of 19th century history writing. In 1979, Jean-Francois Lyotard criticized grand narratives in La Condition postmoderne (The Postmodern Condition), and in 1992 David Perkins presented a whole array of sceptical epistemological and methodological arguments directed against literary history in Is Literary History Possible?. The questioning of literary history has not however resulted in the abandonment of large-scale literary-historical projects, rather it has inspired attempts to base such ventures on better designs and better foundations. Not least, many new ideas about the field have been put forward in connection with the preparation of two major works of literary history sponsored by the ICLA. It is also natural to point to two theoretical publications from 2002: the collection of essays, Rethinking Literary History, edited by Linda Hutcheon and Mario J. Valdes, and Marcel Cornis-Pope and John Neubauer’s brief presentation of the ideas behind a history of literary cultures in East-Central Europe. [ii] The Swedish project â€Å"Literature and Literary History in Global Contexts†, which was started in 1998 and will terminate in 2004, focuses specifically on some theoretical problems associated with the writing of literary history. We who participate come, mostly, from various fields within oriental studies or from comparative literature. Since the project is sponsored by the Swedish Research Council we all work, or once worked, at various Swedish universities. One of the special features of the project is the interest devoted to world histories of literature, a genre where the general problems of literary history become especially visible and acute. (I shall return to this perhaps unfamiliar genre in a moment. ) Three important cruces in connection with world histories of literature have been singled out for special discussion within the project: (i) the understanding of the notion of literature, (ii) the understanding of genres, and (iii) the understanding of interactions between literary cultures. These three sets of issues will be made the subject of four volumes of literary-historical studies and theoretical reflections, and these volumes will represent the main concrete outcome of the project. In this paper, I shall concentrate on the first of the questions, about the notion of literature. I shall say a few words about the concept of literature itself, point out some of the difficulties that it occasions in a world history of literature, and conclude with a brief discussion of how such problems may be approached and dealt with. II In a sense, of course, there are very many concepts of literature: if every nuance is taken into account, it may well be the case that each person has their own. Yet if, conversely, one looks at the situation very broadly, one can say that there is an everyday concept of literature in Western culture which is widely shared. That concept came into being in the course of the 18th century. Before that, no exact counterpart to our present concept of literature existed either in Western culture or elsewhere, and the distinction between imaginative literature and non-fiction was not of primary importance in the classification of texts. Wilt Idema and Lloyd Haft have given a concise and clarifying account of how earlier cultures thought about texts and their basic divisions. As long as no more than a few written works are in circulation in a given society, all texts are more or less equally important and valuable. If there is a dramatic increase in the number of writings, with a corresponding differentiation in their content and character, the texts are likely to be subdivided into the categories of â€Å"high† literature, professional literature, and popular literature. â€Å"Literature† (or high literature) is then the term for texts which are felt to be of general educational value and which are, accordingly, regarded as part of the necessary intellectual baggage of every cultured person†¦. Works which contain useful knowledge but remain limited to one specific area, such as medicine or military science, are classified as professional literature. Works intended only to amuse, and which have (or are considered to have) no educational value, fall outside the scope of â€Å"literature†Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. We may call these more or less despised writings â€Å"trivial literature†. In the kind of intellectual culture described in this quotation, the fundamental distinction among texts is the one between culturally important texts and culturally less significant ones. In most such cultures – classical antiquity, classical Chinese culture, classical Sanskrit culture, and so forth – the class of culturally important texts would comprise most of what we call poetry, history writing, and philosophy, and normally also other kinds of texts – some administrative texts, some texts concerning magic, some letters, et cetera. Oral vernacular texts, or relatively unadorned fictional narratives, what we call fictional prose, would normally form part of popular or trivial literature. For complex social, economic, and cultural reasons, this way of classifying texts came to undergo great though gradual transformations in Western Europe from the late 17th to the early 19th centuries. One of the very many crucial factors behind the process must have been the growing importance of a new, more rigorous conception of empirical truth, associated with the natural sciences. High literature, in the special sense described by Idema and Haft, had always aspired to truth in the sense of great human significance. As the distinction between empirical truth and empirical non-truth became more rigid and more significant – and as many other, more or less related developments were taking place – new groupings began to emerge in the textual universe. Poetry became dissociated from scientific writings, and successively also from history, philosophy, oratory, and letters. On the other hand, fictional prose, especially in the guise of the increasingly appreciated novel, came to be regarded as one of the genres of poetry. With this, our modern notion of literature had effectively taken shape, and the term â€Å"literature† (whose main meaning in the 17th and 18th centuries had been something like â€Å"education† or â€Å"culture†) successively developed into today’s normal designation of the concept. [v] III The late 18th and early 19th centuries saw the beginning of the writing of literary history – of the history of national European literatures, of the history of European literature as a whole and, at least from the 1830s onwards, of the world history of literature. World histories of literature thus comprise a genre which has existed for around 170 years. Among its modern instances are such impressive works as the German twenty-five volume Neues Handbuch der Literaturwissenschaft (New Handbook of Literary Studies), published between 1972 and 2002, and the Russian Istorija vsemirnoj literatury v devjati tomach (History of World Literature in Nine Volumes) from 1983-94. [vii] However in the English-speaking world the genre is more or less extinct, and its very existence appears to be overlooked in the contemporary international discussion about the globalization of literary studies. These debates are primarily inspired by the widespread interest in colonial and postcolonial studies and place the last few centuries at the centre of attention, while the traditional world histories of literature are, in principle, universal in scope, and are meant to cover all times and cultures. In many respects, it seems a good idea to have a world history of literature to fall back on. Such works can relate the various literary cultures of the world to one another and put them into perspective. Thus they may create a much needed overview, much as a map of the world helps us to comprehend certain fundamental geographical realities. To some extent, works like the Neues Handbuch der Literaturwissenschaft and the Istorija vsemirnoj literatury do just that, and of course they also contain a wealth of information and intelligent discussion. Yet, despite their often remarkable qualities, world histories of literature are typically profoundly problematic for a number of reasons. Two major problems have their roots in the very concept of literature. First, the concept is, in itself, an everyday notion. If employed without additional explications or stipulations, it is too imprecise and inconsistent to form the basis of a reasonable classification. Second, the concept of literature is a relatively recent Western invention. Its application to other times and cultures will easily lead to anachronistic and ethnocentric distortions. On the whole, world histories of literature are content to sweep such problems under the carpet. They typically prefer to rely on the everyday notion of literature and to include the resulting contradictions in the bargain. For instance, the concept of literature is traditionally used in such a manner that the criteria for a work to be classified as literature vary depending on the time and the culture one is speaking of. Modern literature is most often seen as consisting of just fictional prose, poetry, and drama. When there is talk of older periods, the concept of literature is however used very inclusively. [ix] For example, ancient Roman philosophy, history, and oratory are not excluded as being non-fiction; instead, such writers as Lucrece, Caesar, and Cicero are considered part of the European literary heritage. The same duality appears in the treatment of other literary cultures. Thus, for instance, the sacred Vedic texts (circa 1200 – circa 500 B. C.).

Constructivism Essay -- Philosophy Philosophical Learning Essays

Constructivism What is constructivism? Constructivism is a philosophy of learning that "refers to the idea that learners construct knowledge for themselves---each learner individually (and socially) constructs meaning---as he or she learns (Hein, 1991, p.1). In other words, "students construct their own knowledge based on their existing schemata and beliefs"(Airasian & Walsh, 1997, p.1) Constructivists deny the existence of one "true" body of knowledge that exists independently of the learners and espouse the idea that "there is no knowledge independent of the meaning attributed to experience (constructed) by the learner, or community of learners (Hein, 1991, p.1). Knowledge is "a personal and social construction of meaning out of the bewildering array of sensations which have no order or structure besides the explanations...which we [the learners] fabricate for them (Hein, 1991, p.1). To construct a meaning to the philosophy of constructivism, the misunderstandings of constructivism, its value in the world of teaching, a nd its influence in instructional technology will be discussed. Misunderstandings lead to an Understanding Because constructivism is sometimes viewed as a new pedagogy rather than a new philosophy of learning, many incorrect assumptions are made about its implications and applications to learning and the learners. By examining some of the misunderstandings surrounding constructivism, one can gain an understanding of the nature of constructivism and how its implications can be successfully applied to teaching. The first myth of constructivism is that "students should always be actively and reflectively constructing"(Clements, 1997, p.1). The constructivists view learning as "an active process i... ...The fallacy of constructivism. Clio, 24(3), 4 pages. Available at: Galileo Periodical Abstracts. Hein, George E. (1991, October). Constructivist learning theory: the museum and the needs of people. Paper presented at the CECA Conference in Jerusalem, Israel. Kamii, Constance and Janice K. Ewing. (1996). Basic teaching on Piaget’s constructivism. Childhood Education, 72(5), 4 pages. Available at: Galileo Periodical Abstracts. Lunenberg, Fred C. (1998, June). Constructivism and technology: instructional designs for successful education reform. Journal of Instructional Technology, 25(2), p. 75- 82. o’Donnell, Angela M. (June, 1997). Constructivism by design and in practice: a review. Issues in Education, 3(2), p. 285-294. Wilson, Brent G. (1997, March). Reflections on constructivism and instructional design. Instructional Development Paradigms, 18 pages.

Oxford Guide to British and American Culture Essay

I would like to talk about the culture dictionary, more specifically about the Oxford Guide to British and American Culture. The importance of such dictionaries became unquestionable when the culturological approach to the study of languages appeared. This approach means the unity of the language and culture. To acquire a language, a person should have the knowledge of special features of communication, behavior, people’s mind, habits, values, traditions in the country which language he/she learns. Surely, the history and specific features of the particular country are embodied in its language. A language is a part of a culture. So the more you know culture of a particular country, the more you understand its language. In the most of dictionaries you can find cultural information and culture words. For example, â€Å"Whitehall† and â€Å"fly-fishing† in the Macmillan Dictionary and Thesaurus online, â€Å"Big Ben† in the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English online. КÐ °Ã'€Ã'‚Ð ¸Ã ½Ã ºÃ ¸ Ð ºÃ °Ã'€Ã'‚Ð ¸Ã ½Ã ºÃ ¸Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. But if we compare these words with the same words in the Oxford Guide to British and American Culture, we will see that the second dictionary gives us more information and explanations about particular words and even gives us a lot of illustrations. So I would like to talk about this dictionary. It is published by the Oxford university press. This is the most up-to-date Guide to British and American culture that gives us an insight into what’s important in both countries today, what’s popular, and what people feel strongly about. It’s written for learners of English, in language that’s easy to understand. This Guide includes 10 000 entries of such areas as history, monuments, legends, festivals, music, food, shopping, literature and so on. It also includes special entries with extra vocabulary on topics such as advertising, football, beer and soap operas. This vocabulary is highlighted in dark type. So let’s look at entries of this dictionary and find out what information we can find there. Entry words or phrases are in dark type. Almost Each entry has grammar information. ( a part of speech, if it is a noun (countable or uncountable, plural or single, if it is a verb, transitive or intransitive), information about the usage of this word or phrase. Many words have the derivatives section which is marked by the special symbol. Many words have a transcription and in some entries we can see both British and American pronunciation. And we can see the information bout a stress. Many words have subject, regional or stylistic labels. If we look at some entries we can see the number in round brackets. It indicates what sense this meaning refers to. For example, the word Manhattan in this entry has the number one. It means that this word is given in the first sense. Many entries have words that are marked by the special symbol ( a star). It indicates an item with its own entry. In this dictionary there are special notes that can help to find out not only the meaning of a particular word but also offer the vocabulary on this topic. The vocabulary is highlighted in dark type. Above some head words we can see numbers. They distinguish separate entries for people, places, etc with the same name. In entries that give the information about people we can see numbers in round brackets that indicate birth and death dates or birth of a living person. In this dictionary there are a lot of â€Å"dummy† entries referring to main entries elsewhere. It can help to find a particular word if you know only its abbreviation. Also the entry gives information about an abbreviation. In some entries there are variants of head words (entry words) and explanations of uncommon words used in entry. There are a lot of examples of their usage in italic type. Many words have many senses. So in entries we can see separate numbered parts. In entries there are cross-references to contrasted entries and related entries. Also this dictionary is very good because it has a lot of illustrations and well-known quotations associated with a character or a person and extracts of famous poems. In this Guide there are boxes with additional information. In entries we can see cultural connotations. Inside front cover we can find information about abbreviations, symbols and labels used in the Guide. Inside back cover there is information about pronunciation and phonetic symbols. In this Guide there are colour pages on history and institutions of Britain and the USA (Maps, history, political parties, education, the Legal System and so on) Using this Guide you can get ideas of what to read. You can choose from lists of books that won the Booker and other prizes plus suggestions for further reading. In conclusion, Id like to say that the Oxford Guide to British and American Culture is a great choice for people who want to find out as much as possible about the culture of Great Britain and the USA without visiting these countries.

‘Stand Up Tall’ by Dizzee Rascal Evaluation Report

There are several features to our production which were included based on research in past examples. To try and create authenticity with our production became one of the aims because of he style of research done and its extensiveness on past examples. One key feature was the speed of the edited scenes. Researched examples always included a fast paced style and this was incorporated. This not only meant scenes of shorter but it increased the length of times given to develop the story. The increased number of scenes due to the nature of the music led to a development in the story which could be told to make up this number and to make up the duration of the track. One of the key strengths of our production I feel is the way in which it closely relates to its genre. With the speed of editing, the urban locations chosen and the ethnicity of the characters involved, it was a very genre specific video. One weakness however I feel is the lack of varying camera angles. Close ups were used a large percentage of the time. Understandably, due to the videos narrative nature and the fact that there are no scenes which involve speech embedded in our video, or cut-scenes, it is difficult to correctly convey feelings or reactions without needing to focus on a characters expression. However, there are more ways to do this. High angle shots can signify authority and low angle shots the adverse. Establishing shots could be used to set a whole scene to the audience. If we were given the chance to do it again, I would greatly vary the amount of types of shots used. It is important to add variety to the style of camera work to increase the size of the parameters for creativity, which is what the narrative style of our video did indirectly. An example in our video where more camera angles could have been incorporated is the scene which shows the phone call between Tariq, the main character, and his pregnant ex-girlfriend. Although the camera work here is good and it conveys successfully the message it wants to, it doesn't vary in camera angle between the two characters. It tends to stay with medium close ups. In a video I analysed called ‘Stand Up Tall' by Dizzee Rascal, the artist is in a majority of the shots but is seen from different angles such as over the shoulder, long shot, medium close ups and close ups. I think our group could have worked better as a team. The main flaw was our inability to meet up, discuss ideas and become all aware as to which stage of production we are at. We at times thought different things were occurring and we didn't all pull in the same direction until towards the end of production when editing. These are the sessions where we worked well as a group. When editing, we looked at the production and any idea brought up by one of our group members were considered. This process happened several times and this ensured us that we were all happy with the final production. Another disappointing thing about our group was the lack of met deadlines. However, this directly came as a consequence as a lack of deadlines set. Although the work was shared between the group, it was very disorganised as to when it should be done. It was very difficult for this reason to know whether we were ahead or behind schedule with the only dates determined was the final deadline for all work. Although I have no first hand experience as to how a real film production team works, I assume due to the scale of their work and the time they spend on it that they would be much more organised than we were. I feel a real film production team would make a priority a schedule to refer back to as to what should be done before a certain stage but we failed to do this. BBFC's film classifications detail parameters to meet a certain certificate. We wanted our production to be available for viewing pre-watershed and this meant it could not involve any swearing, scenes of nudity or scene of extreme violence. Our production met these criteria. I had decided to show ten members of our audience a screening of our music video in an attempt to establish how these members would appreciate its qualities and informs us of some flaws. I was happy with many of the responses because they were intelligent answers. I decided to outline nine features of our work and asked then on the questionnaire to circle one of the words excellent, good, satisfactory, disappointing and poor. And then there was a tenth open ended question asking them to detail how well they felt it went with the genre of music. The results of this investigation were positive. According to our results, our camera work and mise-en-scene features were very good. This could be down to the emphasis this took when deciding to produce a narrative music video with the absence of speech. The quality of our editing was though of well also. This could be down to the way we each combed through thr music video when editing and discussed ideas thoroughly during the editing process. However, one thing which disappointed was the lighting. It was at times unclear as to what was happening due to the poor lighting at times. The responses to the open ended question at the end of the production was positive. The most mentioned feature which related it to past examples was the use of scenes, synchronised which changes in the beat of the music and mentioned to speed of the editing. The synchronization of the beat to scenes was apparent in the very beginning when the door closes as the heavy beat drops in the music. And the fast paced editing came about as the research into previous examples showed us that it was important to music and music videos of this genre.