Threat of National ID essays

Threat of National ID essays In William Safires The Threat of National ID, Safire argues against a National ID Card, that he says will be used by zealots as the holy grail of snoopery. Safire bases his argument around a comparison of a lost pet with newly developed chips implanted underneath their skin that would let animal shelters alert owners, of their pets whereabouts. In comparison, Safire says of the cards, it would be like making everybody in the United States under penalty of law to carry what the totalitarians used to call papers. Safire seems to strongly appose the ID card, and rightfully so. I believe that like Safire says, In time the card would contain not only a fingerprint, description of DNA and the details of your eyes iris, but a host of other information about you. The reason proponents think these cards should be created is to help prevent future incidences like those that occurred on September 11, 2001. My personal opinion is that this card would not stop these events from occurring. The hijackers of the planes on 9/11 had passports, this goes beyond our National ID to International ID and it still could not stop them. Also I feel that even if the government was effective in not giving these cards to terrorists, they could still obtain them just as they do passports, birth certificates and other forms of identification by both legal and illegal means. Here are another couple of thoughts to ponder. What happens if these cards get stolen or lost? Would I have to wait in an airport like Tom Hanks in the film The Terminal, would I be denied a job or be placed in custody because of what someone who had stolen my card had did while in its possession? If the card isnt returned after being lost, there will have to be a lot of expensive security measures to make sure I am the one who receives a replacement, and not my ...

An Overview of Graphic Memoirs and Graphic Nonfiction

An Overview of Graphic Memoirs and Graphic Nonfiction Although the term â€Å"graphic novel† is broadly used, the term â€Å"graphic memoir† is relatively new and has not had wide usage. Hearing the phrase â€Å"graphic memoir† is partially self-explanatory in that a memoir is an author’s account of personal experiences.   However, when you consider the word â€Å"graphic,† you may not think of â€Å"graphic novel,† your mind may think instead in terms of those movie ratings that warn of  Ã¢â‚¬Å"graphic violence or â€Å"graphic sex scenes.†Ã‚  Ã‚  It may be confusing to understand how a â€Å"graphic memoir† could be for children. What Graphic Memoir Means However, there are other definitions for â€Å"graphic,† including â€Å"of or relating to the pictorial arts† (pictorial: â€Å"having or using pictures†)  that better describe what the term â€Å"graphic† means in the context of â€Å"graphic memoir.†Ã‚   If you are familiar with graphic novels and comic books, you know they use panels of sequential art with the text generally embedded as dialogue or just under the panel as a description.  One of the easiest ways to describe a graphic memoir is to say it is a memoir written and illustrated using the same general format found in a graphic novel. In short, both the words and the pictures are crucial to telling the story. Another term that publishers are using more frequently  to describe nonfiction books that use a graphic novel format is â€Å"graphic nonfiction.† A graphic memoir would be considered a subcategory of graphic nonfiction. Good Examples of Graphic Memoirs There are much more graphic novels, such as Rapunzel’s Revenge, for kids than there are graphic memoirs.  One excellent graphic memoir for middle-grade readers (ages 9 to 12) is Little White Duck: A Childhood in China, written by Na Liu and illustrated by Andres’ Vera Martinez. The combination of words and pictures tends to make graphic memoirs appealing to even reluctant readers and this book is particularly well done. To learn more, read the book review of Little White Duck: A Childhood in China.   One of the most well-known graphic memoirs is Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Mariane Satrapi. It is on YALSA’s Ultimate Teen Bookshelf, which is a list of â€Å"must-have† teen materials for libraries and includes 50 books. Persepolis tends to be recommended for teens and adults. Another graphic memoir that has received a great deal of positive press and a number of starred reviews is March (Book One) by Congressman John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell. The publisher, Top Shelf Productions, describes Lewiss memoir as a graphic novel memoir. No Standard Terms Yet Since there is, as of the beginning of 2014, no widely accepted term to describe nonfiction that combines words and pictures like graphic novels do, and even fewer memoirs that do so, it can be quite confusing. Some sites still refer to such books as â€Å"nonfiction graphic novels,† which is an oxymoron since a novel is fictional. Tween City, a site for librarians, has an excellent list of graphic nonfiction for tweens under the heading â€Å"Nonfiction Graphic Novels.†Ã‚  So, what does this mean for readers? At least for now, if you are looking for graphic nonfiction or graphic memoirs, you may need to use a variety of search terms, but it is becoming easier to find titles within the genre. Sources: Merriam-Webster, dictionary.com

Someone who has made a big impact on my life Research Paper

Someone who has made a big impact on my life - Research Paper Example The reason why Steve Jobs inspired me was that he was not a college graduate, yet he was capable of being more innovative than those who had graduated from the same college that he dropped out of. Steve Jobs’ remarkable personality made me wonder what I was capable of doing because I had the opportunity to learn, unlike him. So I started working harder in order to give my best to the courses that I was studying and kept nagging my teachers about the practical approach of everything that we learnt. This helped me learn more about practical stuff along with theory. Moreover, I learnt how important volunteering is because it brings you closer to the people who need help and you learn more about a person’s needs in such situations. Plus, the sense of peace and calm that we get is phenomenal. Steve Jobs was an active volunteer and helped me learn the true spirit of volunteering and made me volunteer at an orphanage for quite some time. Furthermore, Steve Jobs gave me a sense of doing things out of the ordinary just to be the best and different. For example, in a science project when everyone was using thermopile to make their science projects, I used my savings to make a model out of metal and got it welded and painted. This made my project look the most practical and the most innovative. I once read a quote from Steve Jobs which was â€Å"Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me †¦ Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful†¦ that’s what matters to me†. (Le Grant. R.) Since then I have made it a habit to reconcile what I did throughout the day and each day I make sure I do at least one considerable good deed and a small achievement that can make me say, â€Å"Yes, I did some good today.† Thus, by trying to follow the footsteps of Steve Jobs, I have made a great impact on my life and on others’ around me. I feel that when you follow someone who has made an impact on the world, you become a change maker in your

Sustainable Practices in Facilities Management Assignment

Sustainable Practices in Facilities Management - Assignment Example Due to increasing environmental concerns worldwide, the governments are under pressure to intervene in the affairs of the society through statutory regulations for streamlining the operations of the general public, local authorities, businesses and other agencies in the backdrop of global warming. â€Å"There is enough for everybody’s need, but not enough for anybody’s greed† – Mahatma Gandhi. Nilsson (2008) states â€Å"In the past, the statement (Ibid) might have been overlooked as being a somewhat idealistic point of view, but in the light of climate change, the truth becomes very evident†.   Industrial and technological developments leading to air pollution caused by the automobiles, water pollution by industries, depleting water table and deforestation as well as imbalances in ecosystem due to extinction of species necessitates coordinated actions at all levels as the pace of development at the current rate with uninhibited use of precious na tural resources is not sustainable in the long run. The corporate community is expected to rise up to the occasion as they have been primarily responsible in the first place for this deplorable environmental phenomenon in the name of growth and industrial development. Carbon Intensity U.S. and China are the world’s two largest emitters, and reducing the Carbon intensity by these nations as well as the EU and fast developing countries such as India, Brazil and Russia holds the key for success by the world in climate change. However, the targets are mainly aimed at human induced Carbon-Di-Oxide (CO2) emissions only. However, in a comprehensive approach the need for land reuse, reforestation, biomass fuel cropping, recycling of waste and renewable energy and its perceived effects on ecosystem have also gained attention and lead the socially responsible people including corporate citizens to realize the need for their cooperation and participation, apart from the complex internat ional negotiations starting from Kyoto Protocol. Finamore (2009) states â€Å"a carbon intensity target will require each province and major enterprise to measure, report and reduce their CO2 emissions and energy consumption, year-on-year, acting as a driver for greater efficiency and renewable†. UK is committed to 80% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050 at the recent Copenhagen Climate Change Summit in December 2009.    A 2 Z Retail’s total carbon footprint Carbon footprint means the total amount of greenhouse gases produced by an organization (or individual) in its activities, expressed in terms of measurable units of carbon dioxide. The direct greenhouse gas emission by burning fossil fuels for various needs of energy and transportation is called as Primary Footprint. The Secondary Carbon Footprint is the total of the indirect emissions generated in relation to the manufacturing process involving use of several intermediary products, consumables and services. Total carbon footprint in relation to a company is the sum of all emissions of CO2 (carbon dioxide), including Primary and Secondary footprints in a given time frame, calculated usually for a year. The calculation is based on the consumption of different type of fuels by the different activities. For example, for each (UK) liter of Diesel consumed, 2.7 kg carbon dioxide (CO2) is emitted, and for each liter of heating oil, it works out to 3.0 kg. The activities such as travel by train or bus (public transportation) for a distance of 10 to 12 km or by

Compare London and Westminster Bridge Essay Example for Free

Compare London and Westminster Bridge Essay These two poems, though written within 10 years of each other, convey very different views on London. They were both written during a time of revolution and change. Both these poems were written at the turn of the 19th century, in Georgian times, to illustrate the authors views on the City of London. At the time, the industrial revolution was underway and there was a vast growth in the population, due to medical advances and a more promiscuous culture with prostitution in the formation of new cities. There was a revolution started in France and because it was a respected country within Europe at the time, with its pioneers in architecture, gardening and thought, the French had major influence in England. Being its neighbouring country it caused ripples of change and rebellion in European thought. This affected many people in England; the poet Blake was one of them. His revolutionist ideas were conveyed in this poem, London. This was contrary to Wordsworths poem, Upon Westminster Bridge, which picked out the imagery of London and its glory, without relating that the frivolous consummations of the monarchy and the church, created a vast gap between the rich and the poor, which Blake picked up on. Wordsworth was most probably ignorant of the fact that the mass of the English population in London was poor, because he was a tourist in the city. Or he could have realised the fact yet looked past it deciding that it would make a better poem to elaborate on Londons splendour. The poem also, seems vastly over the top and many people may just take the poem at its face value and dislike it, but Wordsworths poem describes London as glittering in the smokeless air and having a calming aura. These statements, I think might be sarcastic. At the time it was written, the Industrial revolution was happening and the chimneys of most factories would be blurting smoke for most hours of the day, and even if they had stopped over night the remnants of months of coal burning would not dissipate within 8 hours. Also to describe London as calming is a little far fetched. London is the heart of the United Kingdom, a port and an important centre of commerce. It is near impossible for us to imagine it as calm even in The beauty of the morning; Wordsworths most famous works are dedicated to the beauty of the awe-inspiring lake district, so it is not hard to imagine he could have been shocked and repulsed by London. Upon Westminster Bridge sets off on the word Earth this could mean that London was the centre of the commercial world, and that at the same time was the best place on Earth to be. This could be another example of sarcasm due to London being half-built during the revolution. Its face meaning though is to start the poem off as a harmony of nature and architecture. The first line shows Wordsworths typical naturalistic view upon the city, as he relates with many of his other poems. He was an early romantic poet; he admired nature and natural form, his extreme idyllic view on London could be seen as sarcastic or ignorant. The second line is monosyllabic yet that doesnt have any relevant dynamic effect on the style of the poem. Dull is the first word that goes against the happier grain of the poem. It relates a feeling of miserableness and boredom, and could be seen to insult the reader that doesnt agree with his poem, as he would have a dull, soul, and an unopened, insensitive mind. This could be a reason why many take the poem on face value, because no one would want a dull soul as the poem suggests. The end of the line uses enjambment to connect the second line to the third. This line creates imagery; the word sight implies our soul would be touched by London. Majesty is a powerful word, exaggerating the overall romantic theme of the poem and an overview of England as a powerful and unique nation with high status in the world. Line 4 uses a simile and personification to make the city seem as one single body, wearing the beauty of the morning, possibly as a disguise to cover the corrupt people it houses. Wordsworth is viewing the city in the morning, when the city would be very quiet and peaceful. Wordsworth was also standing on Westminster Bridge; from which he had a higher, isolated view over the scene of London. At dawn, London would be showered with the golden light of the sun, the river would appear to gleam and the un-crowded streets would be filled with crisp air. The ground would be covered with dew, all idealistically perfect compared to the reality that within one hour of his view, the streets would awake and the whole scene would change. Blake had a completely different viewpoint on London, his first line opens with a romantic wander through the chartered streets, this is a contrast, he himself whilst romantic and free thinking, is in a city governed by rules, entrapments and corruption. He then repeats this idea in the next line with the chartering of the themes, contrary to Wordsworths gliding river, this implies that London is overpowering nature. He then alliterates marks 3 times to give an exaggeration of the theme of suffering. Every from the 3rd line is then repeated in the second stanza to generalise everyone as saddened, depressed and constricted. Blakes poem is different to Wordsworths in its entirety. Blake is describing from a low viewpoint, in the streets between the dirty houses, at about 10:30 at night, with a serious, constricted and darkened theme. Wordsworths is from a higher viewpoint on the bridge, at about 5:30 in the morning with not many people about with a happy, elated theme. The techniques, each use to create these effects are also different, Wordsworth uses a typical romantic style sonnet, and both Poems use their structure to emphasise the words in them. William Blakes London is written in four, four line stanzas. Each line of each verse has the same number of syllables; this creates a regimented, almost mechanical effect. It uses alternate line rhyming to make the poem sound regular and accentuates the last word of each line. Each verse of the Blake poem attacks a different aspect of London. It is clear that Blake found London a very corrupt and immoral place. Whereas in contrast Wordsworths poem is written in the form of an Italian sonnet the octave of which describes the man made elements of the city, the last sextet refers to natural beauty. This poem also uses alternate line rhyming to create the effect of order. It is written in prose using iambic pentameter. This device brings attention to emphasise the meaning of the rhyming words. William Blakes poem conveys his feelings in a more abstract style, when he uses the people and buildings of London to represent the institutions which they are associated with. He uses the image of a church to criticise religious establishments and a palace to signify the state, and authorities that control it. He gives the image of the soldiers sigh running in blood down palace walls. Here he is attacking the monarchy and government for condemning young men to death by sending them off to fight in foreign wars. He uses hyperbole to criticise London and the sadness and malice of the people who live there. Blakes London brutally painted is a dark, dirty, disease ridden and deprived place Unlike the Wordsworth poem it leaves you in no doubt as to the authors feelings on the subject. In the last verse of Blakes, it gives us his time scale; midnight, and he shows us the corruption of innocence, with youthful harlots. The last stanza accentuates the uncleanness of the area, how London was plagued with diseases and how life in the slums of the city is very short. It may be an example of the typical life of people in London. With children being the product of prostitution and sexual promiscuity, the children are then raised in a poor, unhygienic even uneducated area then marry and die due to blights and diseases. Marriage is supposed to be a happy occasion, but here it shows to be an institution, which carries people to their deathbeds. This may be due to sexually transmitted diseases, which were ravaging through the population at the time. Blakes entire poem is blunt and to the point, describing what was going on and that he was unhappy about it and the fact that people were ignoring it. Wordsworths poem is far less melodramatic than Blakes, it is a snapshot in time of London in the morning, with no look at the types of people who live there, or of their pasts and futures. Blakes overall poem display a message of sadness and disgust towards London, its monarchy and the authorities housed there. I think that the style of Wordsworth is very ineffective at relating his like for London as it seems to almost be sucking up to Londons builders and rulers and so it does not provoke strong feelings or thoughts. Even if the reader acknowledges there is sarcasm in the style, it still does not show accurately the problems of London or that anything should be done about it. Blakes poem on the other hand is very effective at relating his own feelings towards the city, and of provoking our own so that we are appalled by the conditions and mistreatment people were forced to live with at the time he wrote this. I prefer Blakes poem because the atmosphere he builds, through his phrases and his technique, is far more powerful than the atmosphere Wordsworth attempted to make. It is far more descriptive and flows more poetically than Wordsworths and I believe he was overall a better writer.

I Am a Survivor :: Law College Admissions Essays

I Am a Survivor    I grew up the youngest in a family of five. My mother and father divorced when I was a few months old. My mother struggled to take care of five young children on her own. Because her parents died when she was a little girl, she never considered giving us up for adoption or to relatives. My natural father never kept in touch with us. He never helped my mother care for us and so I never knew him and have no recollection of him.    My mother tried her best to ensure we had a good family life by marrying twice after her divorce from my natural father, but neither man in her life served as a role model for my three older brothers. My brothers suffered the most from the breakup of my parents' marriage and my father's abandonment of his parental duties. All three have ruined their lives through drug abuse and crime. My oldest brother lives from day to day without any hope and with the constant internal battle against a drug addiction, which he often loses. My second oldest brother has been in and out of state mental institutions for over fifteen years. He is forty-two years old and is schizophrenic. My third oldest brother is somewhere in New York City, and he doesn't want to be found. He calls my mother from time to time to let her know that he's alive.    I talk about my brothers first because even though they had problems growing up, they managed to protect and shelter me from their troubles. They made me believe in fairy tales and tried to shield me from the ugly reality of the world. It was because I lived a child's fairy tale life that I would later learn that fairy tales don't come true. I would learn to struggle, suffer, and survive.    When I was eighteen years old my mother moved away and left me in New York City with my friends to attend college. I guess my mother thought I would easily succeed and become the first college graduate in our family and I would easily learn to be responsible and independent. She must also have assumed that because I had never struggled for anything, I would be okay and I would doubtless succeed in becoming a lawyer. I Am a Survivor :: Law College Admissions Essays I Am a Survivor    I grew up the youngest in a family of five. My mother and father divorced when I was a few months old. My mother struggled to take care of five young children on her own. Because her parents died when she was a little girl, she never considered giving us up for adoption or to relatives. My natural father never kept in touch with us. He never helped my mother care for us and so I never knew him and have no recollection of him.    My mother tried her best to ensure we had a good family life by marrying twice after her divorce from my natural father, but neither man in her life served as a role model for my three older brothers. My brothers suffered the most from the breakup of my parents' marriage and my father's abandonment of his parental duties. All three have ruined their lives through drug abuse and crime. My oldest brother lives from day to day without any hope and with the constant internal battle against a drug addiction, which he often loses. My second oldest brother has been in and out of state mental institutions for over fifteen years. He is forty-two years old and is schizophrenic. My third oldest brother is somewhere in New York City, and he doesn't want to be found. He calls my mother from time to time to let her know that he's alive.    I talk about my brothers first because even though they had problems growing up, they managed to protect and shelter me from their troubles. They made me believe in fairy tales and tried to shield me from the ugly reality of the world. It was because I lived a child's fairy tale life that I would later learn that fairy tales don't come true. I would learn to struggle, suffer, and survive.    When I was eighteen years old my mother moved away and left me in New York City with my friends to attend college. I guess my mother thought I would easily succeed and become the first college graduate in our family and I would easily learn to be responsible and independent. She must also have assumed that because I had never struggled for anything, I would be okay and I would doubtless succeed in becoming a lawyer.

The Seven Phases of the Systems Development Life Cycle

COMPUTERIZED PAYROLL SYSTEM FOR TURNSHOP (A SUPERMARKET) PURPOSE AND PROBLEM(Initiation): Firstly the purpose of this system is to help Turnshop to solve it problem in the running of it accounting department which the whole company relies on it, so that they can have accurate, reliable and fast processing of their payroll system in the company.For now the payroll system of the company is process manually and since there are 2000 employees and more actives of the company it make it very hard and tedious to accomplish this task in the company, it also cause a high room for errors, overtime, resources and money and it will help the company a lot if they have a computerized payroll system (CPS). PlANNING The cost of the computerized payroll system (CPS) is about 50,000 Ghana cedis. since we will install a two new severs for them to handle most of most of their data, one of the sever will act as a recovery and the other works as the main.And also the cost will include a free demonstration and practical tutorial for the accounting staff in TURNSHOP as well with three (3) months training using the computerized payroll system (CPS). we will help during the period of transition. It will be a user friendly and easy to install and use. 1. Since the company already has some hardware requirements already this can be use for the computerized payroll system(CPS) ,so we only need to install the software on the computers and laptops in the company and link them to the sever.SAP solutions will be installed to provide the company-wide accessibility so that they can accelerate an accurate financial closing cycle at any level. This will provide the business management solutions through the financial record of the employees and the management of finance in the company such The Detailed Employee List contains all the pay, deduction, benefit, state, And local tax codes, and monthly, quarterly, and yearly totals for each Employee. The report also provides wage and withholding informati on.Print the Detailed Employee List to review all the employee records That is set up in Payroll. It will eliminate the manual payroll and transaction system in the company which is time consuming and also there is a bigger chance of having errors. FLOWCHART FOR THE EMPLOYEE PAYROLL SYSTEM REQUIREMENTANLAYSIS Beginning the payroll process for the company starts with obtaining the proper documentation from employees. The human-resources department and the accountant department will need to forward an internal form or a copy of the accepted-offer letter complete with the appropriate paperwork to us.Once this process is verified as finished, recording of employee information can begin and designing and deploying for the payroll period can start. Question will be also ask and it will be both open and close questions, to help us get the full understanding of how the payroll works in the company. For example What is salary package in the organization? How the salaried will be paid? How do they calculate the local tax codes, and monthly, quarterly, and yearly totals? And many more DESIGN STAGE OF THE SYSTEMIn the design the organization system will be targeting a hierarchy as follows: Company -> Cluster -> Business Unit (BU) -> Department -> Employee, The salary for an employee is made up of various salary components. Each salary component has 3 rules associated with it, a Calculation Rule (Calculate component as percentage of another component, or percentage of a fixed number or a fixed number), an Eligibility Rule (whether an Employee/Dept is eligible for a component) and a Constraint Rule which limits the maximum and minimum of a component. These rules are editable and can be edited by a user end user.Also these rules are inherited top-down, but if defined at a lower level, the lower level rule takes precedence. The database will contain Attendance, Leaves, Bonuses tables and these rules are also supposed to interact with each of the tables. The client will be gen erating payroll for multiple clients each hosting a Separate Database instance. They may each have a different interpretation of each component and may have different components. We are only looking to support SQL Server, and payroll generation will be an offline activity and also an online activity in some instant.It will work upon where to put the logic which uses these rules to generate the individual tax components (which will include Tax Deductions, Tax Write-offs, Allowances, etc). The system will take an employee Id and generate a payroll for that month. The order of our priorities is: 1. The ability to adapt changes to new clients quickly 2. Long term maintainability 3. Performance 1 and 2 outweigh 3 here by a large factor as this will be an offline activity. Maintainability and Quick Customizability are very important; we will be deploying the application for different clients.Client A may have a Salary Component Rule as ((0. 3 * Basic) + 800) and Client B as (0. 2 * Basic) + (0. 1 * Attendance Bonus) Also report on the payroll will be created in this stage. DEVELOPMENT STAGE After the System Design it leads to Development where the information system is built and programmed. Here we develop all the necessary ideas we got through the requirement stage and the design stage and send them a prototype so that they can try and gives us the feedback, also this phase where the bugs are worked out of the system. A contingency plan is also developed at this point.A contingency plan is an emergency management document. If the power goes out – what happens to the system? What is the back up? How fast can it be brought back up to speed? INTEGRATION AND TESTING STAGE This is the formal integration and testing of the system. Testing has been done on the development phase, but in the Integration and Testing Phase it is a formal, documented testing procedure, not only to assure that the system performs as designed, but testing the roll-out of the system. If th ere is already another system in place with data, how fast can that data be migrated into the new system and useable to the company?Usually, the system is rolled-out over a weekend so that if anything goes wrong, the old system is still active and available. Integration and Testing is vital for the decision to go with the new system, trusted to the system. Also In this stage the functionality of the individual sub systems in the payroll are tested to ensure proper operation. After successful testing of each subsystem the entire system of the payroll is tested to ensure all subsystems work together properly and so that an employees can check every information on his or her payroll.

Television: the Undiscovered Drug

Television has brain-washed the majority of our youth. The first thing I hear as I get home are TV mumbles. I open the door and to no surprise there is my younger brother in full motion on the coach, hand in remote, flipping through channels. My brother could not be any more of a coach potato. He watches TV all day and night. I refer to him as the human TV guide. So much endless television can dull our minds, take away time from completing important activities, and has exposed us to a world of violence. First off, Television has dulled the mind of our youth easily.Youths today are used to having their information passed to them on a silver platter. Not as many teens like to read anymore because it involves too much work. My brother hates to read, not only because there are words involved in that activity, but also because it is now impossible for him to visualize the world presented within the book. It is also impossible for him to focus on a book because of the short attention span he has developed, and reading books just takes too much time for him. Television presents the world to him, a different world every thirty minutes, which holds his attention. Similar article: Teenagers’ Leisure TimeThis now leaves him no mental work to do, except to decide which channel he would like to watch. Because watching television requires no mental work, the brains of the adolescents that watch television are not stimulated enough. This may lead to a slower learning process, which would then explain my brother’s inability to memorize the multiplication table. Second, Television consumes time youths should be dedicating to more important and more essential things in their lives. Television takes away time that should be devoted to homework.When my brother gets home from school, he will immediately flip the television on, leaving his homework for later. When he finally decides to do his homework, the television will remain on, and he will sit on the couch with his books propped up in front of him, giving it only half of his attention. Homework takes longer to complete, and it probably will not be his best work since only half of his co ncentration was focused on it. Television also takes time away from quality family time. Most adolescents do not have a strong family connection.Families whose only time together is at the dinner table will waste precious quality time with their heads turned towards the television. The youth of today lose the strong morals and values they can get when spending time with their family. Television can even take away time from friends. When I spend time with my friends, I like to talk with them or go out. When my brother spends time with his friends, they spend the whole day watching the television. Their conversation revolves around what they are watching on the television. Most teens have the majority of their day devoted to the television. Lastly,Television has exposed a world of violence towards our youth causing them to be apathetic towards situations. Many television shows make at least one of the three aspects, violence, drugs, and sexual immorality, a normalcy. Adolescents of to day model their behavior after characters who live in world of violence, and they do not realize that what they are doing is wrong because to our youth, whatever they see and hear on television is right. For example, my brother has become a lot less sensitive towards all his friends at school. He thinks its okay to laugh if somebody gets hurt accidentally even if it could be serious.Or abruptly scream nonsense! He also believes its okay to manipulate people as long as he gets his way. Violence on television is glamorised and styled, and watching it does not hurt. So maybe this contributes to my brothers way of thinking their is no consequences. It is pretty short sided to blame everything on television because my brother should know what is â€Å"right† and what is â€Å"not† but how can he be really sure when television glorifies all sorts of violence? In Conclusion, When television was first invented, its purpose was to bring the family together and perhaps present a way in which we could receive information faster.In modern times, the television has managed to affect our youth in various ways we would not have imagined. The family gathering concept has disappeared. We have accomplished a faster way to transmit information, but it was a little too much information a little too fast for the wrong audience. I suppose my brother chooses to react this way because he is already too accustomed to being a coach potato. Television has taken over our way of life and we must stop the effects it has had on our youths and our society before it is too late.

Overview of Systemic Functional Linguistics

Overview of Systemic Functional Linguistics Systemic functional linguistics is the  study of the relationship between language and its functions in social settings. Also known as  SFL, systemic functional grammar, Hallidayan linguistics, and systemic linguistics. Three strata make up the linguistic system in SFL: meaning (semantics), sound (phonology), and wording or lexicogrammar (syntax, morphology, and lexis). Systemic functional linguistics treats grammar as a meaning-making resource and insists on the interrelation of form and meaning. This study was developed in the 1960s by British  linguist  M.A.K. Halliday (b. 1925), who had been influenced by the work of the Prague School and British linguist J.R. Firth (1890-1960). Examples and Observations SL [systemic linguistics] is an avowedly functionalist approach to language, and it is arguably the functionalist approach which has been most highly developed. In contrast to most other approaches, SL explicitly attempts to combine purely structural information with overtly social factors in a single integrated description. Like other functionalist frameworks, SL is deeply concerned with the purposes of language use. Systemicists constantly ask the following questions: What is this writer (or speaker) trying to do? What linguistic devices are available to help them do it, and on what basis do they make their choices?(Robert Lawrence Trask and Peter Stockwell, Language and Linguistics: The Key Concepts. Routledge, 2007)that language use is functionalthat its function is to make meaningsthat these meanings are influenced by the social and cultural context in which they are exchangedthat the process of using language is a semiotic process, a process of making meaning by choosing.Four M ain ClaimsWhile individual scholars naturally have different research emphases or application contexts, common to all systemic linguists is an interest in language as social semiotic (Halliday 1978)how people use language with each other in accomplishing everyday social life. This interest leads systemic linguists to advance four main theoretical claims about language:These four points, that language use is functional, semantic, contextual and semiotic, can be summarized by describing the systemic approach as a functional-semantic approach to language.(Suzanne Eggins, An Introduction to Systemic Functional Linguistics, 2nd ed. Continuum, 2005) Three Kinds of Social-Functional NeedsAccording to Halliday (1975), language has developed in response to three kinds of social-functional needs. The first is to be able to construe experience in terms of what is going on around us and inside us. The second is to interact with the social world by negotiating social roles and attitudes. The third and final need is to be able to create messages with which we can package our meanings in terms of what is New or Given, and in terms of what the starting point for our message is, commonly referred to as the Theme. Halliday (1978) calls these language functions metafunctions and refers to them as ideational, interpersonal and textual respectively.Hallidays point is that any piece of language calls into play all three metafunctions simultaneously.(Peter Muntigl and Eija Ventola, Grammar: A Neglected Resource in Interaction Analysis? New Adventures in Language and Interaction, ed. by Jà ¼rgen Streeck. John Benjamins, 2010)Choice as a Basic Sy stemic Functional ConceptIn Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) the notion of choice is fundamental. Paradigmatic relations are regarded as primary, and this is captured descriptively by organizing the basic components of the grammar in interrelated systems of features representing the meaning potential of a language. A language is viewed as a system of systems, and the linguists task is to specify the choices involved in the process of instantiating this meaning potential in actual texts through the resources available for expression in the language. Syntagmatic relations are viewed as derived from systems by means of realization statements, which for each feature specify the formal and structural consequences of selecting that particular feature. The term choice is typically used for features and their selection, and systems are said to display choice relations. Choice relations are posited not only at the level of individual categories such as definiteness, tense and number but also at higher levels of text planning (as in, e.g., the grammar of speech functions). Halliday often stresses the importance of the notion of choice: By text . . . we understand a continuous process of semantic choice. Text is meaning and meaning is choice (Halliday, 1978b:137).(Carl Bache, Grammatical Choice and Communicative Motivation: A Radical Systemic Approach. Systemic Functional Linguistics: Exploring Choice, ed. by Lise Fontaine, Tom Bartlett, and Gerard OGrady. Cambridge University Press, 2013)

The Pharaohs Double Crown of Egypt

The Pharaoh's Double Crown of Egypt Ancient Egyptian pharaohs are usually depicted wearing a crown or a head-cloth. The most important of these was the double crown, which symbolizes the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt and was worn by pharaohs starting with the First Dynasty around the year 3000 BCE. Its ancient Egyptian name is the pschent. The double crown was an amalgamation of the white crown (Ancient Egyptian name hedjet) of Upper Egypt and the red crown (Ancient Egyptian name deshret) of Lower Egypt. Another name for it is shmty, meaning the two powerful ones, or sekhemti. The crowns are seen only in artwork and no specimen of one has been preserved and discovered.  In addition to the  pharaohs, the gods Horus and Atum are depicted wearing the double crown. These are gods that are closely allied with the pharaohs. Symbols of the Double Crown The combination of the two crowns into one represented the rule of the pharaoh over his united kingdom. The red deshret  of Lower Egypt is the outer portion of the crown with cutouts around the ears. It has a curled projection in front that represents the proboscis of a honeybee, and a spire in the back  and an extension down the back of the neck. The name deshret  is also applied to the honeybee. The red color represents the fertile land of the Nile delta. It was believed to have been giving by Get to Horus, and the pharaohs were the successors of Horus. The white crown is the interior crown, which was more conical or bowling pin shaped, with cutouts for the ears. It may have been assimilated from the Nubian rulers before being worn by rulers of Upper Egypt. Animal representations were fastened to the front of the crowns, with a cobra in attack position for Lower Egyptian goddess Wadjet and a vulture head for the goddess Nekhbet of Upper Egypt. It isnt known what the crowns were made of, they could have been made of cloth, leather, reeds, or even metal.  Because no crowns have been found in burial tombs, even in those that were undisturbed, some historians speculate they were passed from pharaoh to Pharaoh. History of the Double Crown of Egypt Upper and Lower Egypt were united around the year 3150 BCE with some historians naming Menes as the first pharaoh and crediting him for inventing the pschent. But the double crown was first seen on a Horus of the pharaoh  Djet  of the First Dynasty, around 2980 BCE. The double crown is found in the Pyramid Texts. Nearly every pharaoh from 2700 through 750 BCE was depicted wearing the pschent in hieroglyphs preserved in tombs. The Rosetta Stone and the king list on the Palermo stone are other sources showing the double crown associated with pharaohs. Statues of Senusret II and Amenhotep  III are among many showing the double crown. The Ptolemy rulers wore the double crown when they were in Egypt but when they left the country they wore a diadem instead.

Religious Service Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Religious Service - Term Paper Example A case of observation is the name. For Christians, the place of worship is called a church, for Islam a mosque, while for the Buddhist, a temple. It is also evident that the religions have unique symbolic cultures that differentiate them from one another as I observed with Islam when I once attended a religious service. This paper will describe the material and non- material culture of the mosque, a place of a warship by Muslims. Mosque A mosque is a place of worship for the Muslim faithful. It is evident from my observation of Muslim congregation and the mosque building that the design and building materials used in the construction of the place of worship mostly depends on heritage, culture and the resources in the community that hosts the mosque. However, it is noticeable that there are certain architectural features common to all mosques. For instance, the mosque’s parts are practical and show a sense of tradition and continuity among all the Muslims across the globe (Penn ey 10). Common architectural features include a minaret which is a slender tower rising at the top of a mosque (Penney 12). The minaret usually varies in height, number, and style. It may be square, octagonal, or round in shape and are in most cases covered with a pointed roof as noted by Penney (12). In the case of the mosque I attended, I was able to observe that it had a tall, slender and round-shaped minaret (Penney 14). On the minaret, there is a loudspeaker used to sermon people to prayers commonly called adhan (Hephaestus Books 14). The mosque is divided into two sections in which, men and women attend the service in different rooms. However, the services are conducted with the leadership of an Imam who is stationed on men’s side. The dress code is usually a veil gown mostly white in color for men and black for women. Every member of the congregation is required to remove the shoes before entering the mosque and put on the shoe shelf. This is mainly to preserve the cle anliness of the mosque and a sign of humility to God. The shelf is placed near the door to prevent pilling of shoes at the door.

Risk Management Issues Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Risk Management Issues - Essay Example 54, 2009). One decision that appears from this scrutiny is the quantity of resources that the organization should have to provide cushion for potential failures that can take place during the way of its trading actions. In view of the fact that trading revenue is doubtful, despite the fact that, a significant risk management activity concentrates on the risk extent crisis - calculating how huge potential failures could be. Corresponding activities entail the examining as well as enforcement of risk-related trading restrictions, by this means helping the risk amended performance assessment of individual trading bureaus (Chapman & Ward, p. 42, 2003). These two phases of the risk management function turn the resources distribution decision into an optimisation issue: very small sum puts the firm in front of extreme levels of risk, although excessively huge sum increases financing expenditures as well as lessens productivity. The point of complexity with which the risk management role is carried out has progressed considerably during current years. Evidently, there are still significant issues whose answers would improve the task’s usefulness all the more. These issues come under three groups: (1) risk management functions, (2) risk forms, and (3) risk measurement execution concerns (Abkowitz, p. 76, 2008). The risk management issues put huge stress on attempting to get the â€Å"probability distribution† for the income of the entire company. Risk managers are particularly â€Å"interested in the extreme left-hand tail of this distribution as a predictor of the largest ex post loss that the firm could experience† (Olson & Wu, p. 65, 2007). After that, to offer assurance of firm-wide solvency, the organization would have resources more than that quantity. Then again, this whole quantity of resources should as well be distributed between the individual trading bureaus so that their job can be assessed on a risk-amended base. As a result of unsati sfactory correlations with bureaus’ revenue flows, the level of possible failures for the entire organization is not more than its total for the individual trading companies, forming the following procedural problem: if risk managers assess the company’s resources satisfactoriness condition initially and after that disaggregate the outcome for distribution to individual companies, they are susceptible to reserve misallocations between bureaus (Khan & Zsidisin, p. 89, 2011). The substitute of calculating capital prerequisites on the individual company level primarily and after that combining the outcomes with the help of a set of approximate correlations, alternatively, is prone to the possibility of overcapitalising the company altogether. Despite the fact that a lot of companies acknowledge the contradiction of depending on both approaches, the most excellent existing practice in the derived business supports the â€Å"bottom-up approach† (Smith & Merritt, p. 7 9, 2002), to a certain extent due to a custom of calculating the different sorts of risk (such as credit, marketplace, functioning) autonomously as well as being acquainted with the different comparative significance of these risk forms amid companies. The expansion of a incorporated tactic which conserved this point of specialisation devoid of giving up exactness on the universal level would be a considerable step ahead. Authoritarian organizations force funds prerequisites on