Speech of Distinctively Visual free essay sample

Hi everyone Today, I would like to show you how distinctively visual elements in my chosen text such as: gesture, composition, emotion expression, color and lightning†¦ can be used by the composer to affect an audience’s response to these themes- Suffering Poverty Love The distinctively visual text I have chosen is one in a series of photographs of Agent Orange victims after the Vietnam War. This photograph was taken by an anonymous photographer which shows an Agent Orange affected child being bath by his mother. The photographer had purposely taken this photograph to illustrate lives of people who have got the affection of Agent Orange. The photographer has skillfully captured the emotional expression in the photo, and effectively used the color and lightning to suggest how much they must have suffered from Agent Orange. The photo is mainly in black and grey. These are colors of darkness and sadness to indicate their suffering present and future life. We will write a custom essay sample on Speech of Distinctively Visual or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Lightning is also effectively used as light is focused on the mother and her child who draw the attention of the audiences. Most importantly, the photographer has captured the images of the frowning mother, the crying son which has leave strong impression to the audiences and make them aware of their suffer. These victims are not only suffering from Agent Orange but they also live in poverty. Through the composition in the photo, the poverty these people are living in has been successfully illustrated. In this photo, at the front of the house, where everything is exposed, the mother bathed her son in a basin and with only an old, big bucket to fill water. The house behind them is old, broken and rundown. Everything has shown a life of deprivation and misery. Those are completely what happen in their daily life and are not purposely arranged. This fact has help make the audiences understand and create the feelings of sympathy towards them. Even though their life is in poverty and full of suffer, they still love each other as a family. It is proven by their gesture in the photo. The mother uses her gentle hands to bath and also to embrace and comfort her son, who is crying in pain. By looking at this image, we can see how the mother love towards her son can help her overcome all of the obstacles in life, which will deeply move the audiences. It is clear that my text is contain harsh images about the consequences of Agent Orange though enlightening how much its victims suffered, their life in poverty as well as their love towards each other. The photographer’s use of distinctively visual textual elements has helped him successfully convey his ideas to the audiences.

Learn About Consonant Clusters in English Grammar

Learn About Consonant Clusters in English Grammar In linguistics, a  consonant cluster (CC)  is a group of two or more consonant sounds that come before (called an onset), after (called a coda) or between (called medial) vowels. Also known simply as a cluster, these occur naturally in written and spoken English - though sometimes may be altered phonetically. This process, called consonant cluster simplification (or reduction) sometimes occurs when at least one consonant in a sequence of adjacent consonants is elided or dropped. In everyday speech, for instance, the phrase  best boy may be pronounced  bes boy, and first time may be pronounced firs time. Onset consonant clusters may occur in two or three initial consonants, wherein three are referred to as CCC while coda consonant clusters can occur in two to four consonant groups. Common Consonant Clusters The written English language contains up to 46 permissible two-item initial consonant clusters, ranging from the common st to the less common sq, but only 9 permissible three-item consonant clusters, as Michael Pearce posits in his book The Routledge Dictionary of English Language Studies. Pearce illustrates the common three-item initial consonant clusters in the following words: spl/  split, /spr/  sprig, /spj/  spume, /str/  strip, /stj/  stew, /skl/  sclerotic, /skr/  screen, /skw/  squad, /skj/  skua, wherein every word must start with an s, be followed by a voiceless stop like p or t and a liquid or glide like l or w.   In terms of codas, or consonant clusters that end words, they may contain up to four items, though they are often truncated in connected speech if the consonant cluster is too long, as in the word glimpsed being acceptably written as glimst. Consonant Cluster Reduction In spoken English and rhetoric, oftentimes consonant clusters will be truncated naturally to increase speed or eloquence of speech, oftentimes dropping the same consonant if it occurs at the end of one word and again at the beginning of the next. This process, called consonant cluster reduction, is relatively variable but confined by linguistic factors that inhibit the operation of reducing these words. Walt Wolfram, writing in Dialect in Society, expounds, with respect to the phonological environment that follows the cluster, the likelihood of reduction is increased when the cluster is followed by a word beginning with a consonant. What this means for average English users is that cluster reduction is more common in phrases like west coast or cold cuts than in west end or cold apple. This technique can also be found in poetry to force similar-sounding words with different consonant endings to rhyme. Take for example the words test and desk, which dont rhyme in their original form, but if one uses consonant cluster reduction, the rhyme Sittin in my des, takin my tes can be forced through truncation, as Lisa Green describes in African American English: A Linguistic Introduction, this is most common in the poetic raps of African American origins in the United States.

Karl Marx and Marxism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Karl Marx and Marxism - Essay Example This essay highlights the mode of production is therefore the basis of society, and it consists of everything in the spectrum of production, from raw materials to social relations between workers.   Therefore, each of Marx’s four-prong critique of alienation are all related to Marx’s formulation of historical materialism.   Political change in this society can only occur through change in the modes of production, which would in turn change the surplus value equation and decrease this alienation.   The state has its basis in the mode of production, and the conflict between intercourse and production is complicated by the alienation of labor.   Basically, this represents Marx’s point of view that the Hegelians were isolated and unable to connect with the real world, while he was able to see historical progress in a new way and thus see new developments such as surplus value and worker alienation.  As the paper declares  Marx establishes the legitimacy o f his arguments by stating that communism is not an over-intellectualized or abstract process, but a real phenomenon based on the real world and real events, such as the capitalist labor process as he sees it.   He supplies these events throughout his text in the form of historical processes that are seen to be continuing in the present.  He states that the conditions of the communist movement are not installed by ideas, but already exist.  Ã‚  Ã‚  

Interview Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Interview - Essay Example ii. There are no important factors to as an undergraduate student which will help you learn effectively in your course. iii. There factors that are important to UEL graduates to assist them to learn effectively. iv. There are factors that are not important to UEL graduates to assist them to learn effectively. Introduction According to Carnell and Lodge (2012:56-57) asserted that learning is not simply the passive receiving of information. Learning means to change your beliefs, behaviours, and attitude in relation to the ideas being encountered. Learning is actually not all about gaining something from instructors or trainings but it can also be the things that we learn from other people’s experiences then to tolerate difficult things yourself. In that sense, learning is not seen as a single step process. It usually takes by and by processes to shape itself. Learning something is compared to keeping a treasure in the mind forever, it is not remembering it but considering it the way it is and the way it can be. Learning is considered as an activity of construction, but one of reception (Hewitt, 2009). Sisakhti outlines contemporary views on learning when they assert that education needs to be focused on the learner (1998:205), insisting on leaner participation in the learning process as joint course-designer, evaluator, and decision-maker. The learner is a person with various needs and they need to be considered as an integral part of learning, as also must the specific life contexts of those people who are involved in the process of teaching and learning. Effective learning involves not only acquisition of strategies, but also the monitoring and reviewing the learning in order to ascertain whether particular strategies were effective. A classroom is viewed as a very complex and multifaceted environment. Therefore, for effective learning to be attained in such an environment, it requires clearly set out strategies. A learning process for it to be considere d effective needs to include those factors that the students view as being helpful to them. The modern learning institutions such as East London University have been at the forefront of providing university education, engaging and delivering a supportive learning environment for all the students irrespective of the social backgrounds and ages. The UEL also provides equipments such libraries, computers, adequate and qualified teaching staff, and a silent and serene environment for learning, although some of these factors pose some significant challenge. The paper is going to discuss those factors that the graduate students of University of East London (UEL) find useful to promote effective learning. Methodology A mixed method of quantitative and qualitative will be used (Collis, & Hussey, 2009).The relevant quantitative data collection methods for this research are surveys with closed-end questions and sampled the questionnaire after choosing 3 from 7 interviews. Qualitative data col lection methods were interviews. The advantage of these interviews is that it allows the interviewer to clarify the subject answers and seek for follow-up information. Since the utilization of one method is considered to relay more coherent and accurate results, the research document was more inclined in utilizing interviews. The other method of data collection was conduction of a survey (Collis & Hussey, 2009). The interviews were conducted on seven University of Eas

Abuse in the Movie Unleashed Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Abuse in the Movie Unleashed - Research Paper Example The research paper "Abuse in the Movie Unleashed" talks about the abuse within the film "Unleashed" particularly the kind of abuse with the utter disregard of the rights and needs of a fellow human being. The film Danny the Dog also released as Unleashed is a stark and compelling reminder of the segments of society that promote and condone abuse for their own selfish ends, and how victims are treated. These sordid details are often never brought to light as they are shameful to civilized societies, yet they persist in secrecy either with or without the support of corrupt officials and criminals. Fighting to the death is common in Taiwan, Bangkok, Vietnam and many other nations where this illicit sport draws crowds yearning to see one human being inflict punishment on another till he gives up, is maimed for life or worse still, loses his life just to please the organizers, his manager and a bloodthirsty crowd who are looking for cheap thrills but should clearly know better. All such a ctivity is illegal and punishable by Law in all civilized cities of the world. Originally released as Danny the Dog, French director Louis Letterier’s action thriller starring Jet Li in the lead role was his first experiment with the action thriller genre. He was originally interested in music but began his foray into films by studying at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. Louis has gone out to direct such action thrillers as the Transporter & Transporter 2, The Hulk, and the Titans.

Effects of donepezil in healthy young adults

Effects of donepezil in healthy young adults Rationale: The cholinergic system is involved in the modulation of both bottom-up and top-down attentional control. Top-down attention engages multiple executive control processes, but few studies have investigated whether all or selective elements of executive functions are modulated by the cholinergic system.. Objective: To investigate the acute effects of the pro-cholinergic donepezil in young, healthy volunteers on distinct components of executive functions. Methods: We conducted a double-blind, placebo-controlled, independent groups design study including 42 young healthy male participants who were randomly assigned to one of three oral treatments: glucose (placebo), donepezil 5 mg or donepezil 7.5 mg. The test battery included measures of different executive components (shifting, updating, inhibition, dual-task performance, planning, access to long-term memory), tasks that evaluated arousal/vigilance/visuomotor performance, as well as functioning of working memory subsidiary sy stems. Results: Donepezil improved sustained attention, reaction times, dual-task performance and the executive component of digit span. The positive effects in these executive tasks did not correlate with other attentional arousal/visuomotor/vigilance measures. Conclusions: Among the various executive domains investigated donepezil selectively increased dual-task performance in a manner that could not be ascribed to improvement in arousal/vigilance/visuomotor performance nor working memory slave systems. Other executive tasks that rely heavily on visuospatial processing may also be modulated by the cholinergic system. Cholinergic manipulations consistently alter sensory-driven, bottom-up attention but their effects on top-down, controlled processing have been less explored (e.g. Furey et al. 2008b; Hasselmo and Stern 2006; Sarter et al. 2001; Thomas et al. 2008), specially as pertains executive functioning. Executive-type processing comprises a wide range of cognitive processes that have a role in the control of action and are considered a function of the central executive in the multiple component model of working memory (see Baddeley 2007, p. 11; Repovs and Baddeley 2006). In the latest version of this model the central executive is responsible for manipulating information contained in subsidiary slave components that store information of different modalities for short periods of time, as well as information activated from long-term memory (Baddeley 2007; Repovs and Baddeley 2006). Today, executive processing is considered a multiple construct, consisting of different cognitive domains or components that, despite being correlated, are dissociable (Collette et al. 2006; Fisk and Sharp 2004; Friedman et al. 2006; Mantyla et al. 2007; Rabbitt 1997; Smith and Jonides 1999). Miyake (2000), in their influential paper on the diversity of executive functions, showed the dissociability of four postulated executive functions: updating, or modification of the content of working memory by deleting no longer relevant information and incorporating more relevant data (Miyake et al. 2000; Shimamura 2000); inhibition, the ability to inhibit distracting information when selecting relevant information, or to attend selectively to one stream of information while discarding others (Baddeley 1996a; Kane and Engle 2000); shifting, the ability to suppress response strategies when shifting between different tasks (Miyake et al. 2000; Monsell 2003); and dual- task performance, the abili ty to perform in parallel two tasks that rely on different cognitive systems (see Baddeley et al. 1997; Logie and Della Sala 2001). Other types of executive processes that were not evaluated by Miyake (2000) have been suggested as separate cognitive entities. One of these is planning, the ability to organize behavior in relation to a specific goal (Owen 1997; Shallice 1982), and the other is the efficiency of access to long-term memory (Baddeley 1996b, 1998; Fisk and Sharp 2004). Acute administration of anticholinergic drugs has been shown to impair executive functions by many authors (Curran et al. 1991; Green et al. 2005; Rusted and Eaton-Williams 1991; Rusted 1988; Rusted et al. 1991; Rusted and Warburton 1988) but in these publications usually only one executive test was used, mostly with unknown loading on the different executive components discussed previously. These finding are therefore not comprehensive in examining the executive domains that are affected by cholinergic manipulations. Aside from studying anticholinergic effects in different executive components, in order to demonstrate that the cholinergic system is in fact directly responsible for executive effects it would be important to show that drugs which increase the availability of acetylcholine, or pro-cholinergics, have the opposite effects. To this end, we studied the modulatory role of the cholinergic system on the 6 different types of executive processes outlined above by investigating dose-dependent effects of acute oral doses (5 and 7.5 mg) of donepezil, a potent, specific, non-competitive inhibitor of acetylcholinesterase (Jann et al. 2002; Shigeta and Homma 2001) that increases the availability of acethylcholine. We administered acute doses to young healthy volunteers because neurologic/psychiatric disorders and aging (Gron et al. 2005), as well as chronic use (Poirier 2002; Tsukada et al. 2004), alter the status of the cholinergic system. To assess executive functioning we employed tests that have been shown to reflect each of these 6 separable processes. To evaluate updating, inhibition and switching we used tasks described by Miyake (2000) that showed high loading in the confirmatory factor analysis performed by these authors in each of these executive components. For dual-task performance we employed a standardized paradigm (Baddeley et al. 1997; Della Sala et al. 1995; Greene et al. 1995). For evaluating access to long-term memory we used word generation tasks (see Fisk et al. 2004), and for planning we selected the ecological Zoo Map Test (Wilson et al. 1996). We also evaluated arousal and sustained attention/vigilance changes that could interfere with executive measurements, in addition to performance on other working memory subsidiary components (see Baddeley 2007; Repovs and Baddeley 2006) that store visuospatial data (visuospatial sketchpad), phonological information (phonological loop), and integrated inform ation from different modalities, including activated long-term memory (episodic buffer). MATERIAL AND METHODS Participants: participants were 42 healthy native Portuguese speaking volunteers (aged 18 to 35) with body mass index between 20 and 25, with at least 12 years of schooling. They were non-smokers, in good physical and mental health as determined by medical history, scored within normal ranges in the Beck Depression Inventory and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (Gorenstein and Andrade 1996), and were on no psychotropic medication at the time of the study. Procedure: this was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, independent group-design study in which participants were randomly allocated to three acute oral treatments formulated in identical capsules (14 subjects each): placebo (glucose), donepezil 5 mg and donepezil 7.5 mg. The Ethics Committee of the institution (Universidade Federal de Sà £o Paulo UNIFESP) approved the study protocol (project no. 0335/07) which was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. All subjects provided written informed consent and their IQ was estimated using the Ravens Progressive Matrices (Raven et al. 1988). On the day of the experiment participants were required to have a light breakfast after which they receive treatments. They were submitted to a test battery (see below) at 210 min. after treatments (close to peak-plasma concentration of donepezil: Jann et al. 2002) that lasted 1.5 h. with no prior training to insure that executive processing was involved (see Rabbitt 1997 ). Tests were presented in 4 randomly assigned orders, balanced between treatments. Test Battery Executive tasks Plus-minus task (Miyake et al. 2000): a measure of shifting that consisted of three lists of 30 two-digit numbers (the numbers 10-99 pre-randomized without replacement) on a single sheet of paper. On the first list, the participants were instructed to add 3 to each number and write down their answers. On the second list, they were instructed to subtract 3 from each number. Finally, on the third list, the participants were required to alternate between adding and subtracting 3 (i.e., add 3 to the first number, subtract 3 from the second number, and so on). List completion times, omission and comission errors were determined. The cost of shifting between the operations of addition and subtraction was then calculated as the difference between the time to complete the alternating list and the average times to complete the addition and subtraction lists. All the lists were performed under articulatory suppression (uttering the letter T) to prevent the use o phonological stratergies while the task was performed. Letter memory task (Miyake et al. 2000): a measure of updating in which several letters from a list were presented serially for 2000 ms per letter. The task was to recall the last 4 letters presented in the list. To ensure that the task involved continuous updating, the instructions required that participants rehearse out loud the last 4 letters by mentally adding the most recent letter and dropping the 5th letter back. For example, if the letters presented were T, H, G, B, S the participants should say, T . . . TH . . . THG . . . THGB . . . HGBS and answer HGBS at the end of the trial. The number of letters presented (5, 7, 9, or 11) varied randomly across trials to ensure that participants would continuously update their working memory representations until the end of each trial. After practicing on 2 trials with 5 and 7 letters, participants performed 12 trials for a total of 48 letters recalled, which took approximately 12 minutes. The dependent measure was the proportion of let ters recalled correctly in the right serial order. Stroop task (Stroop 1935): a test of inhibition that consists of a Word Colored Page, with common words printed in colors, and a Color-Word Page with names of colors printed in incongruent colors. The examinee must name the ink colors as quickly as possible. For each list the test yields two scores, the number of errors and the time necessary to complete the task. In addition, scores from the word colored page (which measures naming speed) are subtracted from those of the color-word page (naming with inhibition) to yield a score of the extra time needed for overriding the inconcruency of word name versus ink-color name. Dual-task paradigm (Baddeley 1997; Della Sala et al. 1995): evaluates dual-task performance. This is a paper and pencil test which involves a visuospatial tacking task (circle crossing) and a phonological/verbal one (digit span). The digit span task consists of the 90 sec. long repetition of digit sequences presented orally which the subject had to repeat in the proper order. Lists of increasing number of digits are read aloud at the rate of one digit per second and the participants are asked to repeat them in their order of presentation (forward digit span, which measures phonological loop functioning). Participants digit span was taken to be the maximum length at which subjects repeated correctly 5 of 6 sequences of digits. Spans or scores were the number of digits contained in the last sequence repeated correctly. The circle crossing task consists of traversing with an X a chain of 240 circles linked with arrows to form a path laid out on an A3-sized sheet of paper, which was pra cticed with a 240 circles path. Subjects are required to cross-out the circles as rapidly as possible for a period of 90 sec. The dual-task condition consists of the simultaneous execution of both tasks within a 90 sec period. To quantify participants performance we used the measure proposed by Baddeley et al. (1997), the mu index which expressed the overall percentage loss in the dual-tasks in relation to single tasks considering the contributions of both tasks to be of equal weight: mu = [1- (pm + pt)/2] x 100, where pm and pt were, respectively, the proportional phonological loss and visuospatial loss in the performance in the dual-task condition in relation to the single-task condition; pm equaled the number of correctly repeated digit sequences for the single-task (ps), and for the dual-task (pd), both divided by the total o sequences remembered (pm = ps pd); pt equalled the number of traversed circles for the single-task (ts) minus those traversed in the dual-task (td), divid ed by ts [pt = (ts td)/ts]. Zoo Map Test (Wilson et al. 1996): a task that measures planning abilities from the ecological Behavioural Assessment of the Dysexecutive Syndrome test battery (BADS). Participants are given a map of a zoo and a set of instructions relating to places they have to visit (e.g. elephant house, lion cage) and rules they must stick to (e.g. starting at the entrance and finishing at a designated picnic area, using designated paths in the zoo just once). There are two trials with identical aims that involve a visit to six out of the 12 possible locations. The first trial consists of a high demand version in which the planning abilities of the participants are rigorously tested. In the second, or low demand version, the participant is simply required to follow some instructions to reach specific locations. Scoring was based on the total number of errors in the high and low demand tasks, as well as the difference in time to conduct the high and low demand tasks [i.e. planning/thinking time a nd execution (drawing time) of the route in the high demand trials minus the drawing time in the low demand task (Allain et al. 2005)]. Word and letter fluency (Lezak 2004): to test access to long-term memory participants were told to orally generate as many words as possible that belonged to a given category and that began with a given letter in 2 minutes each. The participants were instructed not to use proper nouns or morphological variations of words and to void repetitions. Scores were the total number of words generated and errors. Executive digit span (modified from Della Sala et al. 1995): this task was the same as the digit span described above in the dual-task performance except that participants had to repeat the sequences backwards (backwards digit span). Spans or scores were the number of digits contained in the last sequence repeated correctly. A delta score (backward minus forward digit span) was also calculated because participants capacity to recall items backwards depends on their forward span. Other working memory test Corsi block test [computerized version based on Miyake et al. (2001)]: participants were shown a set of blocks (drawn as white boxes) and asked to remember the order in which they were tapped (shown as changing color). One box at a time turns black for 650 ms each, a duration short enough to discourage the use of idiosyncratic coding strategies. Five similar but different configurations of blocks were used in each trial to discourage participants from using numerical coding of box locations. Immediately after a sequence of taps, participants repeated the order (Corsi Block task direct, a measure of the visuospatial sketchpad) by clicking on the boxes with the mouse. Once the sequence of flashing boxes was completed, they had unlimited time to respond. There was a practice trial with two taps each, after which the sequences progresses in length from three to 10 taps or until the participants made two mistakes with a sequence of the same number of taps. Scores were the largest number of blocks recalled in the right sequence. The same procedure was conducted at the end of this task, except that subjects were asked to remember the taps in the inverse order (Backwards Corsi Block task, a general measure of executive functioning). Delta scores as calculated for digit span were also computed. Counting span [Conway et al. (2005) in the version designed for adults by Engle et al. (1999)]: a task of working memory capacity that evaluates storage in the episodic buffer component of working memory (see Baddeley 2007). Participants were presented with displays on screen which consisted of a random arrangement of three to nine dark blue circles, one to nine dark blue squares, and one to five light blue circles. The participants task was to count and remember, in the right serial order, the total number of dark blue circles presented in consecutive displays which varied randomly in number from 2 to 6 (3 sequences each). Scores were the number of correct sequences retrieved. Arousal/vigilance/visuomotor performance measures Psychomotor Vigilance Test (Dinges and Powell 1985): a portable device (Model PVT-192, CWE, Inc, Ardmore, PA) was used. The task consists of responding by button press to a small, bright red-light stimulus (light-emitting diode digital counter) as soon as it appears. Consecutive stimuli appear randomly in the range of 2 to 10 s for 5 minutes, resulting in 30-45 reaction time (RT) measures, depending on RT latency (Roach et al. 2006). Participants are instructed to press the button as soon as they see the stimulus, but not to press the button too soon (which yields false-start warnings on the display). Each subject was allowed a single 1-minute acclimation practice before the task commenced. Scores were mean total reaction time (RT), mean 10% fastest and slowest reaction times (Mean F RT and Mean S RT), all of which indicate arousal/psychomotor performance (Lim and Dinges 2008) and measures that indicate better sustained attention/vigilance (Lim and Dinges 2008), the percent change i n RT throughout the test (% change) and slope reaction time (negative numbers indicate slowing from the beginning to the end of the test). Statistical analysis To compare treatment groups we employed one-way analyses of variance (ANOVAs) with treatment as factor (3 levels: placebo, donepezil 5 mg and donepezil 7.5 mg) followed by post hoc Tukey HSD tests when appropriate. The level of significance adopted was pà ¢Ã¢â‚¬ °Ã‚ ¤0.05. Only measures that elicited significant drug effects are reported below. Magnitude of effects on the executive measures was determined through effect size calculations (Cohen d, Cohen 1988) as proposed by Snyder et al. (2005) and Fredrickson et al. (2008). In addition we calculated the Pearson Product Moment correlation between changes in arousal/vigilance measured by the PVT and the variables that showed significant effects. RESULTS Comparability of treatment groups The ANOVAs showed the comparability of participants in the three treatment groups in terms of age, body mass index and estimated intelligence measured by Ravens Progressive Matrices (ps>0.27), so performance differences between treatments could not be accounted for by these characteristics. Treatment effects (Table 1) Data on PVT task of one subject in the placebo group and data on fluency test of one subject in the placebo group and of two subjects in donepezil 7.5 mg group were lost due to technical problems with the equipments. The ANOVAs showed PVT treatment effects for the minimum reaction time (F2,38=4.42, p [Table 1 and Figure 1 near here] Magnitude of effects Effect sizes (see Table 1) comparing placebo and 7.5 mg of donepezil were large (pà ¢Ã¢â‚¬ °Ã‚ ¥0.8, see Cohen 1988; Sloan et al. 2005) for most of the PVT measures, as well as the delta score of the digit span. The remaining comparisons between these groups yielded medium effect sizes (between 0.5 and 0.8), that together with large effect sizes are considered meaningful differences (Cohen 1988; Sloan et al. 2005), and included the dual-task measure. Correlations between executive and other general attentional measures In order to determine whether arousal/vigilance/visuomotor changes were responsible for the observed executive effects, we calculated Pearson Product Moment correlations between the PVT measures and the executive measures that showed significant effects of donepezil (mu dual-task index and delta scores of the digit span). Correlation values were small and non-significant (all ps>0.05 and rs between -0.22 and 0.17). 5. Sample sizes In order to show that the sample size was adequate for this set of data we calculated the number of individuals necessary to show significant differences between placebo and the donepezil dose that showed significant differences in relation to placebo (7.5 mg). To do so we used the calculations proposed by Rosner (1999) [with an ÃŽÂ ± of 0.05 and 80% power]. This takes into account the mean values of the groups under comparison and their common standard deviation. We carried out these calculations considering one-sided differences since our hypothesis was that donepezil would increase performance (see table 1). DISCUSSION In the present study we completed a comprehensive examination of the potential capacity of a pro-cholinergic drug to improve executive functions in healthy young adults exploring diverse processes associated with executive tasks. Our findings extend previous reports on the acute nootropic potential of this drug in young, healthy volunteers (Hutchison et al. 2001; Thompson et al. 2000; Zaninotto et al. 2009). More specifically, an acute 7.5 mg dose of donepezil improved arousal/vigilance/visuomotor measures in addition to increasing performance especifically in the executive dual-task domain. An increment in delta digit span was also observed, a task that has unknown loading on the 6 executive components studies here. A role for acetylcholine in modulating executive function is consistent with earlier work reporting impairment after acute doses of the antimuscarinic scopolamine (Ellis et al. 2006; Green et al. 2005; Rusted et al. 1991a; Rusted 1988; Rusted and Warburton 1988; Thomas et al. 2008). However, in the present study we found this effect to be highly selective within the broad battery of executive domains. Only the dual-task domain measure was sensitive to the effects of donepezil while this drug left the remaining 5 tested executive domains unchanged. These evidences suggests cholinergic enhancement in the coordination of two tasks that rely on different cognitive systems, possibly due to activation of cortical cholinergic inputs which facilitate cognitive processes by increasing filtering of noise and distractors, which are necessary under taxing attentional conditions (Sarter et al. 2001). The magnitude of these positive changes reflected medium effect sizes which are treated as clinically meaningful (e.g. see Sloan et al. 2005) and that should be considered in light of the fact that the participants had optimum baseline performance having been young, highly educated, physically and mentally healthy, not deprived of sleep, food or otherwise compromised. The present result was not mediated by increases in speed of information processing, improvement in performance that relies in subsidiary working memory systems, nor task demands, as discussed below. This (see Logie and Della Sala 2001) lends support to the idea that the cholinergic system is involved in the executive process that coordinates different specialized functions when considered together with previous reports of scopolamine induced impairment of dual-task performance (Rusted and Warburton 1988). It is also noteworthy that patients with Alzheimer ´s disease, which is in part characterized by cholinergic deficiency (Everitt and Robbins 1997), display particular problems in dual-task in comparison with single-task performance using the same (Baddeley et al. 1991; Greene et al. 1995; Kaschel et al. 2009) and different (MacPherson et al. 2007, see also Logie and Della Sala 2001) dual-task paradigms. Hence, we here obtained a pharmacological dissociation that confirms behaviou ral data suggesting the separability of dual-task coordination from other executive domains (e.g., Baddeley 1996b; Baddeley and Della Sala 1996; Bourke et al. 1996; Bourke 1997; Miyake et al. 2000; see also de Ribaupierre and Ludwig 2003). It could be argued that this was solely due to the lack of power of the study. Sample size calculations taking into account data from the placebo and donepezil 7.5 mg groups showed that the number of participants necessary for the obtention of statistical effects in the measures that were statistically significant here were close to that used in this study. However, the number of individuals in each group had to be larger than 66 to show significant effects in the remaining executive domains (Table 1). To our knowledge no study in this field of research has ever used such a large sample size. Hence, we believe that dual-task performance, among the executive domains investigated here, is particularly sensitive to improvement by increases in acetylcholine levels. On measures of general attention, donepezil improved (significantly with large effect sizes) sustained attention, arousal and visuomotor performance in the PVT, cognitive functioning measures that have been previously shown to be affected by cholinergic manipulations (Furey et al. 2000, 2008a; Meinke et al. 2006). These changes could in themselves have led to better executive performance, but this seems unlikely in the present case because better overall attention would not have benefited only this single executive component. In addition, no significant correlation was found between these general attentional scores and those of the executive tasks that were enhanced by donepezil, and r values were small. The changes in executive functioning found here could also not be ascribed to improvement in the subsidiary working memory systems which were unchanged by donepezil, in accordance with previous lack of effects with other acute cholinergic manipulations of the articulatory loop and visuospatial sketchpad (see Mintzer and Griffiths 2007; Rusted 1988; Zaninotto et al. 2009), as well as the episodic buffer (see Zaninotto et al. 2009). These changes could also not be attributed to task difficulty, as the letter memory task was at least as demanding as the dual-task. This latter task involved continuous updating of information of letter sequences, some of which extended way beyond subjects spans, for approximately 12 minutes, and showed no treatment effect. Performance in this task was unchanged by donepezil administration, but a similar n-back updating task has been shown to be impaired by acute doses of scopolamine (Green et al. 2005). In the latter case, though, the n-back task relied h eavily on visuospatial perception and processing, which seem particularly sensitive to cholinergic manipulations (Ellis and Nathan 2001; Thomas et al. 2008; Zaninotto et al. 2009). In retrospect we noted that none of the executive tasks used here made specific demands on this type of processing, neither did the executive inhibition task employed by Mintzer and Griffiths (2007), which was unaltered by acute scopolamine administration. In effect, Thomas (2008) suggested that visuomotor and working memory processes that subserve visuospatial executive function are specifically dependent on cholinergic neurotransmission. Hence, enhancement of cholinergic activity could cause specific top-down optimization of visuospatial input processing which could lead to improved executive visuospatial performance, especially if the extensive involvement of executive functions with visuospatial short-term memory is taken into account (see Miyake et al. 2001). Based on this suggestion it may be hypothesized that the improvement in the delta digit span measure obtained here (high effect size) and in a recent donepezil study (Zaninotto et al. 2009), as well as impairment after anticholinegic drugs (Guthrie et al. 2000) reflect effects of cholinergic manipulations because backward digit span seems to involves activation of occipital visual cortical areas (more so than the forward version of this test) in addition to prefrontal ones (see Sun et al. 2005). Therefore, a conjunction of executive attention and facilitated visual processing by donepezil may have led to the increase in performance in this task. Although we found cholinergic effects it is not possible to determine whether the present finding are due to the activation of nicotinic or muscarinic receptors because donepezil increases the amount of acetylcholine that can activate all acetylcholine receptors. Both types of receptors have been found to interact functionally, having synergistic effects particularly on visuospatial attention (Greenwood et al. 2009), working memory, and vigilance tasks (see Ellis et al. 2006; Erskine et al. 2004) so our data may reflect the effects of their combined activation. In sum, acute oral administration of 7.5 mg of donepezil to young, healthy volunteers had a selective positive effect in executive dual-task performance that was seemingly independent of the donepezil-induced improvement on broad attentional processes (arousal/visuomotor/vigilance) and working memory slave systems, corroborating the proposal that this type of executive processing constitutes a separable cognitive construct. In addition, improvement in the digit span delta scores points to the role of cholinergic modulation on other central executive measures, possibly those that rely more heavily in visuospatial processing.

The Character of Safie in Mary Shelleys Frankenstein Essay -- Franken

The Character of Safie in Frankenstein      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Even though she is only mentioned in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein for a relatively brief period, the character, Safie, is very interesting as she is unique from the other characters in that her subjectivity is more clearly dependent on her religion and the culture of her nation. Contrasts can be made between the Orient and the European society which attempts to interpret it. Often, this creates stereotypes such as western feminists that have viewed "third-world" women as "ignorant, poor, uneducated, tradition-bound, religious, domesticated, family oriented, (and) victimized"(Mohanty 290). Of course, some of these things could also have said of European women of the time period, although no one would argue the point since Oriental women were viewed as being more oppressed. Strong contrasts can also be made in relation to the differences between Safie's development as a foreign character and her subjectivity as a female character in relation to those of the other female characters of the book. While the other female characters lack depth into how their religion and culture affect them, Safie's religion and Arabian culture sculpt her into a subject with feminist qualities juxtaposed against her fulfillment of European domestic ideology.      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Many theorists, such as Benveniste who said, "Consciousness of self [or subjectivity] is only possible if it is experienced by contrast," argue that one's subjectivity can only exist in their relation to the Other(85). The subject's relation this "Other" depends on which aspect is being examined. For example, when dealing with gender, it would be the relationship between Man and... ...it fulfilled the domestic ideology of   the European society. The society itself   was phallogocentric and, by nature, riddled with its own subjectivity, such as the Orientalism inherent in Europe, which attempted to examine the Orient which had "a brute reality obviously greater than anything that could be said about them in the West"(Said 304).    Works Cited    Beneviste, Emile.   "Subjectivity in Language."   Course Reader.   83-88    Mohanty, Chandra Talpade. "Under Western Eyes:   Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses."   Course Reader. 289-300    Said, Edward W.   "Introduction to Orientalism."  Ã‚   Course Reader. 303-312    Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein.  Ã‚   Ed. Johanna M. Smith.  Ã‚   Boston:   Bedford Books, 1992    Smith, Johanna M. "'Cooped Up':   Feminine Domesticity in Frankenstein."   Bedford Books, 1992 270-285    The Character of Safie in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein Essay -- Franken The Character of Safie in Frankenstein      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Even though she is only mentioned in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein for a relatively brief period, the character, Safie, is very interesting as she is unique from the other characters in that her subjectivity is more clearly dependent on her religion and the culture of her nation. Contrasts can be made between the Orient and the European society which attempts to interpret it. Often, this creates stereotypes such as western feminists that have viewed "third-world" women as "ignorant, poor, uneducated, tradition-bound, religious, domesticated, family oriented, (and) victimized"(Mohanty 290). Of course, some of these things could also have said of European women of the time period, although no one would argue the point since Oriental women were viewed as being more oppressed. Strong contrasts can also be made in relation to the differences between Safie's development as a foreign character and her subjectivity as a female character in relation to those of the other female characters of the book. While the other female characters lack depth into how their religion and culture affect them, Safie's religion and Arabian culture sculpt her into a subject with feminist qualities juxtaposed against her fulfillment of European domestic ideology.      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Many theorists, such as Benveniste who said, "Consciousness of self [or subjectivity] is only possible if it is experienced by contrast," argue that one's subjectivity can only exist in their relation to the Other(85). The subject's relation this "Other" depends on which aspect is being examined. For example, when dealing with gender, it would be the relationship between Man and... ...it fulfilled the domestic ideology of   the European society. The society itself   was phallogocentric and, by nature, riddled with its own subjectivity, such as the Orientalism inherent in Europe, which attempted to examine the Orient which had "a brute reality obviously greater than anything that could be said about them in the West"(Said 304).    Works Cited    Beneviste, Emile.   "Subjectivity in Language."   Course Reader.   83-88    Mohanty, Chandra Talpade. "Under Western Eyes:   Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses."   Course Reader. 289-300    Said, Edward W.   "Introduction to Orientalism."  Ã‚   Course Reader. 303-312    Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein.  Ã‚   Ed. Johanna M. Smith.  Ã‚   Boston:   Bedford Books, 1992    Smith, Johanna M. "'Cooped Up':   Feminine Domesticity in Frankenstein."   Bedford Books, 1992 270-285   

Cafes Monte Case Essay

The company located in Milan, Italy. It was found by Mario Salvetti as a manufacturer and distributor of premium finest coffees. The company faces a hard decision that may affect their future. The company wants to know whether or not they should keep working in the same investing. An important meeting was there among the top management team’s members to discuss the future of the company. The company’s performance was good in 2000. Profit was shown at the financial statement. Giacomo Salvetti the CEO of the company needs to decide which to choose as the business strategy for the company: 1) Keep working in the premium coffee market. 2) Transfer to the private brands market. The current capacity of the coffee production in 2000 was 350,000 K/M , with added additional capacity of 150,000K/M. The cost of the additional units was 6 billion liras. More facts about the profitability and the liquidity were required beside the cash flow and the profit plan to quantify strategic alternatives and to help in making this decision. The idea of changing was not easy to the CEO to accept without a clear image of the financial consequences. The report was provided by the marketing manager showed that the premium market is very volatile. On the other hand, the private brands market is more stable. (Full capacity at the price of 8,800 liras). Price is lower in the private market than the premium. The volume is depending of the number of retailers. ( Every additional retailer need at least 500,000 K/Y). The report was provided by the manufacturing director showed that costs are different in each amount of the volume and quality of beans. These costs include the cost of beans, labor and fixed cost. The company is able to save 65% of selling costs, 75% of R&D costs and 50% of administrative costs, if they choose the private brands market.(Director of strategic planning). Private brands’ retailers will pay slowly- 90 days instead of 30 days. (Financial officer). I took the sales price as the current price 8,800 liras. Most of the expenses are decline compare to what they were in 2000 beside also the profit. Marketing expenses were no longer there because the marketing percentage became 0% in this volume of the private market. The reason of having this decline is the gross margin of the private market comparing to the margin of the premium market. Sales price and cost in private market are less than what they are in the premium market. Cash flows are not stable during the year. It looks vary from quarter to another. In the cash flows, the retailers will pay in 90days (3months) period of time as what it is in the private market. The cash opining was 50% in the first month and 25% in next 2 months. The other expenses were divided by the 12 months equally. Variable and selling costs are showing in page(5). I don’t recommend the full transition to private market. The profit will be lower than what it is even if it is less volatile. There is no reason for the company to lose its premium market if the profit is low, too. I would support the chance of mixing the premium and the private markets together, because of the profitability there.

Germaine Greer Quotes

Germaine Greer Quotes Germaine Greer, Australian feminist later living in London, published The Female Eunuch in 1970, with its feisty tone assuring her place in the public eye as an in your face feminist. Her later books, including Sex and Destiny: the Politics of Human Fertility and The Change: Women, Ageing, and Menopause, drew fire from feminists and others. Less well known is her career as a literature scholar and professor, where her unique perspective comes through, as in her 2000 essay, Female Impersonator, about male poets speaking as female voices, or her book, Slip-shod Sibyls: Recognition, Rejection, and the Woman Poet, where she controversially suggests that a reason many pre-modern women poets are absent from standard curricula is that they were not that skilled, focused on the morbid exercise of wallowing in emotion. Selected Germaine Greer Quotations Womens liberation, if it abolishes the patriarchal family, will abolish a necessary substructure of the authoritarian state, and once that withers away Marx will have come true willy-nilly, so lets get on with it. I think that testosterone is a rare poison. The real theater of the sex war is the domestic hearth. The surest guide to the correctness of the path that women take is joy in the struggle. Revolution is the festival of the oppressed. I didnt fight to get women out from behind vacuum cleaners to get them onto the board of Hoover. The house wife is an unpaid employee in her husbands house in return for the security of being a permanent employee. Man made one grave mistake: in answer to vaguely reformist and humanitarian agitation he admitted women to politics and the professions. The conservatives who saw this as the undermining of our civilization and the end of the state and marriage were right after all; it is time for the demolition to begin. Yet if a woman never lets herself go, how will she ever know how far she might have got? If she never takes off her high-heeled shoes, how will she ever know how far she could walk or how fast she could run? One may not reach the dawn save by the path of the night. After centuries of conditioning of the female into the condition of perpetual girlishness called femininity, we cannot remember what femaleness is. Though feminists have been arguing for years that there is a self-defining female energy, and a female libido that is not expressed merely in response to demands by the male, and a female way of being and of experiencing the world, we are still not close to understanding what it might be. Yet every mother who has held a girl child in her arms has known that she was different from a boy child and that she would approach the reality around her in a different way. She is a female and she will die female, and though many centuries should pass, archaeologists would identify her skeleton as the remains of a female creature. The blind conviction that we have to do something about other peoples reproductive behavior, and that we may have to do it whether they like it or not, derives from the assumption that the world belongs to us, who have so expertly depleted its resources, rather than to them, who have not. The compelled mother loves her child as the caged bird sings. The song does not justify the cage nor the love the enforcement. The management of fertility is one of the most important functions of adulthood. Perhaps women have always been in closer contact with reality than men: it would seem to be the just recompense for being deprived of idealism. All that remains to the mother in modern consumer society is the role of scapegoat; psychoanalysis uses huge amounts of money and time to persuade analysis and to foist their problems on to the absent mother, who has no opportunity to utter a word in her own defense. Hostility to the mother in our societies is an index of mental health. Mother is the dead heart of the family, spending fathers earnings on consumer goods to enhance the environment in which he eats, sleeps, and watches the television. There has come into existence, chiefly in America, a breed of men who claim to be feminists. They imagine that they have understood what women want and that they are capable of giving it to them. They help with the dishes at home and make their own coffee in the office, basking the while in the refulgent consciousness of virtue. Such men are apt to think of the true male feminists as utterly chauvinistic. The sight of women talking together has always made men uneasy; nowadays it means rank subversion. Women fail to understand how much men hate them. All men hate some women some of the time and some men hate all women all of the time. The tragedy of machismo is that a man is never quite man enough. For a male child to become a man, he has to reject his mother. Its an essential part of masculinisation. Freud is the father of psychoanalysis. It has no mother. All societies on the verge of death are masculine. A society can survive with only one man; no society will survive a shortage of women. The most threatened group in human societies as in animal societies is the unmated male: the unmated male is more likely to wind up in prison or in an asylum or dead than his mated counterpart. He is less likely to be promoted at work and he is considered a poor credit risk. Human beings have an inalienable right to invent themselves; when that right is pre-empted it is called brain-washing. Freedom is fragile and must be protected. To sacrifice it, even as a temporary measure, is to betray it. Older women can afford to agree that femininity is a charade, a matter of colored hair, ecru lace, and whalebones, the kind of slap and tat that transvestites are in love with, and no more. Women over fifty already form one of the largest groups in the population structure of the Western world. As long as they like themselves, they will not be an oppressed minority. In order to like themselves they must reject trivialization by others of who and what they are. A grown woman should not have to masquerade as a girl in order to remain in the land of the living. Youre only young once, but you can be immature forever. The older womans love is not love of herself, nor of herself mirrored in a lovers eyes, nor is it corrupted by need. It is a feeling of tenderness so still and deep and warm that it gilds every grass blade and blesses every fly. It includes the ones who have a claim on it, and a great deal else besides. I wouldnt have missed it for the world. Love, love, love- all the wretched cant of it, masking egotism, lust, masochism, fantasy under a mythology of sentimental postures, a welter of self-induced miseries and joys, blinding and masking the essential personalities in the frozen gestures of courtship, in the kissing and the dating and the desire, the compliments and the quarrels which vivify its barrenness. Oh, because falling in love turns you into an immediate bore. And its dreadful. Every time a woman makes herself laugh at her husbands often-told jokes she betrays him. The man who looks at his woman and says What would I do without you? is already destroyed. The only perfect love to be found on earth is not sexual love, which is riddled with hostility and insecurity, but the wordless commitment of families, which takes as its model mother-love. This is not to say that fathers have no place, for father-love, with its driving for self-improvement and discipline, is also essential to survival, but that uncorrected father-love, father-love as it were practiced by both parents, is a way to annihilation. Every time a man unburdens his heart to a stranger he reaffirms the love that unites humanity. If a person loves only one other person, and is indifferent to his fellow men, his love is not love but a symbiotic attachment, or an enlarged egotism. English culture is basically homosexual in the sense that the men only really care about other men. The principle of the brotherhood of man is narcissistic... for the grounds for that love have always been the assumption that we ought to realize that we are the same the whole world over. Woman cannot be content with health and agility: she must make exorbitant efforts to appear something that never could exist without a diligent perversion of nature. Is it too much to ask that women be spared the daily struggle for superhuman beauty in order to offer it to the caresses of a subhumanly ugly mate? It is fatally easy for Western folk, who have discarded chastity as a value for themselves, to suppose that it can have no value for anyone else. At the same time as Californians try to re-invent celibacy, by which they seem to mean perverse restraint, the rest of us call societies which place a high value on chastity backward. Loneliness is never more cruel than when it is felt in close propinquity with someone who has ceased to communicate. Even crushed against his brother in the Tube the average Englishman pretends desperately that he is alone. I mean, in Britain its two women a week killed by their partner. Thats a shocking statistic. Most women still need a room of their own and the only way to find it may be outside their own home. There is no such thing as security. There never has been. Probably the only place where a man can feel really secure is in a maximum security prison, except for the imminent threat of release. Security is when everything is settled. When nothing can happen to you. Security is the denial of life. Developing the muscles of the soul demands no competitive spirit, no killer instinct, although it may erect pain barriers that the spiritual athlete must crash through. Women are reputed never to be disgusted. The sad fact is that they often are, but not with men; following the lead of men, they are most often disgusted with themselves. I have always been principally interested in men for sex. Ive always thought any sane woman would be a lover of women because loving men is such a mess. I have always wished Id fall in love with a woman. Damn. A full bosom is actually a millstone around a womans neck... [Breasts] are not parts of a person but lures slung around her neck, to be kneaded and twisted like magic putty, or mumbled and mouthed like lolly ices. The only causes of regret are laziness, outbursts of temper, hurting others, prejudice, jealousy, and envy. Perhaps catastrophe is the natural human environment, and even though we spend a good deal of energy trying to get away from it, we are programmed for survival amid catastrophe. Only one thing is certain: if pot is legalized, it wont be for our benefit but for the authorities. To have it legalized will also be to lose control of it. Act quickly, think slowly. Energy is the power that drives every human being. It is not lost by exertion but maintained by it, for it is a faculty of the psyche. Libraries are reservoirs of strength, grace and wit, reminders of order, calm and continuity, lakes of mental energy, neither warm nor cold, light nor dark. The pleasure they give is steady, unorgastic, reliable, deep and long-lasting. In any library in the world, I am at home, unselfconscious, still and absorbed. The essence of pleasure is spontaneity. Australia is a huge rest home, where no unwelcome news is ever wafted on to the pages of the worst newspapers in the world. Psychoanalysis is the confession without absolution. Evolution is what it is. The upper classes have always died out; its one of the most charming things about them. We in the West do not refrain from childbirth because we are concerned about the population explosion or because we feel we cannot afford children, but because we do not like children. Never advise anyone to go to war or to get married. Write down the advice of him who loves you, though you like it not at present. He that has no children brings them up well. It is in our interests to let the police and their employers go on believing that the Underground is a conspiracy, because it increases their paranoia and their inability to deal with what is really happening. As long as they look for ringleaders and documents they will miss their mark, which is that proportion of every personality which belongs in the Underground. Well, thats all right. I dont mind. Theyve called me mad ever since I was born. About These Quotes Quote collection  assembled by  Jone Johnson Lewis. Each quotation page in this collection and the entire collection via Jone Johnson Lewis. This is an informal collection assembled over many years. I regret that I am not be able to provide the original source if it is not listed with the quote. Citation information:Jone Johnson Lewis. Germaine Greer Quotes. About Womens History. URL: http://womenshistory.about.com/od/quotes/a/germaine_greer.htm . Date accessed: (today).

Mozart concerto essays

Mozart concerto essays Flute Concerto No 2. In D, K.314 Rondo I chose Mozarts Concerto No 2 In D, K.314 Rondo for this assignment because I truly enjoyed listening to the piece and felt a story being told. There is no significant title to the piece, so the story I found was more a reflection of my mood and my own feelings. Mozart used many dynamic orchestra performances throughout the concerto, giving it an edge and challenge. The piece is eloquently crafted and rhythmically shaped. One of the most outstanding elements of this piece is the harmony created by the flute and the orchestra when they accompany each other with seeming flawlessness. The piece began very soft and eloquently. The flute was enchanting with its wavering tones producing high and low sounds that blending rhythmically. The piece begins this way, very soft and subtle making the listener feel relaxed and calm. I though of soft pools of water with dancing butterflies nearby when the flute was downplayed to the strong and challenging orchestra which first began at .48 in the piece. The orchestra was bold and strong, combining sounds of violins, pianos, and more. The feeling then changed to that of a challenge. I began to see a larger animal, such as a menacing tiger or lion enter my vision. It was a balance between peace and triumph. The orchestra then faded out as the flute began to play a solo piece at .59 seconds into the concerto. The flute was a bit rougher, sounding louder, as though it was proving something to the orchestra. I envisioned a battle. The sounds of the orchestra and the flute were symbolic of my tiger and butterfly, eyeing each other wondering who did not belong. The butterfly began dancing closer and closer to the tiger, as the flute played louder and the sounds were much more crisp and clear. The orchestra again chimed in after a few more seconds of the flutes session. The battle between the orchestra and the flu...

Research Paper (Ford Motor Company) Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

(Ford Motor Company) - Research Paper Example The company’s customers are brand loyal and keep returning to it. Ford has also created good will in the society through its efforts in community relations. It started a breast cancer awareness campaign in which numerous celebrities were roped in. more-over, the company has extensively donated to charities and has held fund-raisers. Ford’s employee base is very strong. It offers various incentives to its employees who are motivated and deliver quality work. For instance the â€Å"thumbie† award is handed over to employees who are proficient, show strong commitment to work and to customers. The company is also known to offer high wages. As a result the staff remains content and happy. Ford has also maintained good relations and is well communicated with its current and prospective investors. The company is very prompt in its reporting’s of earnings and losses all of which can be publicly accessed. Ford’s network of distributors is very dense and has many dealers spread world over. The Weaknesses: Economic recession has worried investors at Ford about dipping sales and profits. The cash position of the company has fallen down to $4 billion from $15 billion in just a year. It also faces the possibility of a credit downgrade. As a result share-holders are not getting their desired return on investment. Ford used a â€Å"voluntary separation program† to lay off its employees during recession times. The workers were not informed about the possibility of job cuts before hand. As a result, motivation levels got affected. Even though the HR at Ford, downplayed this, but layoff hit employees hard who become insecure of their jobs. Ford also cut down on their overtime after 2001. This led to rising frustration amongst the workers for being worker and not being compensated appropriately. Around 10 plants work over time in Ford today. Ford’s relations with its customers have also been rocky. Last year it recalled around 2 mil lion vehicles which coasted the company billions of dollars. (Drucker, 1995) Performance Gaps Ford’s relationship with its customers has severed over the years. Its customer benefit program’s performance should have driven revenues home but they did not. Ford’s management was also under the wrong impression that it was handling its employees well. The performance of its employees should have improved over the years to dramatic results but it did not. Ford’s HR felt that they understood employee needs but they failed to realize that employees were more desirable of flexible benefits and communication existed within the Ford. There is a severe lack of motivation at the moment. Ford’s revenue should have been past 20 billion dollars but it is not Addressing the Gap Role of Human resource department is very important to bridge any gaps between performance expectations and performance delivered. In-order to address the weaknesses Ford needs to revamp th e morale of the employees. Conduct one-on-one performance appraisals with the employees, have a thorough understanding of employee expectations and set expectations of the company. Employees should be regularly compensated with bonuses and awards. This will automatically boost their confidence and their belongingness to the Ford. HRD should also work on good relations with the customers. For this the employees who are directly in touch with the clients should be sent through a training program on relationship management. Conferences and seminars should be conducted to groom and train the employees on this aspect. Thirdly, HR needs to hire people who are pro at their communication and bargaining skills

Government and its Policies for Entrepreneurs Essay

Government and its Policies for Entrepreneurs - Essay Example The legislations made with respect to entrepreneurs and enterprises are complicated and cumbersome. Entrepreneurs find these legislations difficult to grasp without the help of proper legal help. They think that legislations should be made in a way that they are easy to understand and follow by everyone. Also some critics of government believe that its policies have hurt the economy and market structures. By holding on to the status quo government has stifled entrepreneurial activities. People believe that government needs to do more to help them succeed in their enterprising efforts. "The American economy is dying, but not from natural causes. It is being strangled to death in a coordinated pincer attack. America's ability to survive, produce and prosper is being systematically destroyed by socialistic taxes and regulations that make U.S. production of virtually everything increasingly uneconomical. Simultaneously, the same legislators and government officials who are impeding American producers are opening the floodgates to cheap foreign goods that are not burdened with the same debilitating taxes, regulations and mandates" (Jasper, 2003). Government should pass legislations to support a market economy in support of entrepreneurs in particular. ... Government Policies Government is currently making policies for different sets of groups. Different group have different needs and wants. There could be some policies that encompass all and sundry but at some level government has to look at the specific groups. Some groups make bigger investments in their enterprises while some start their business on a small scale. Some belong to a particular ethnic group with specific needs while some belong to another. Government can make policies on two different levels that general policies for all and specific policies for particular sectors or groups as one policy fits all can not work in case of entrepreneurs. Blanket Policies Government can pursue certain blanket policies applicable to all entrepreneurs. The government has already established special organizations like SBA that support small businesses. These organizations support start up firms regarding the whole procedure of conducting business. General legislations apply to all small businesses and industries. Following important blanket policies could be adopted by the government: Financing and Capital The most important blanket policies that US government could adopt would be regarding financing and capital availability. Whenever someone wants to start a new business the most difficult step becomes financing. Entrepreneur takes a lot of risk while trying to establish a new business venture. They put in all their efforts and hard work to make their business succeed. Some even leave their routine and comfortable jobs for their enterprising ventures. They can all do this only if a solid financing is provided to them. Government's rule becomes crucial here. Currently organizations like Small Business Administration (SBA) provide