Literary Analysis on Everyday Use by Alice Walker Essay

Literary Analysis on Everyday Use by Alice Walker - Essay Example vealed by the use she intends to put the quilts to, and by the fact that her sudden interest in her heritage has been sparked by her exposure to an American reinterpretation of it. Dee is one of the people W.E.B. Du Bois refers to in The Souls of Our Striving, who struggle with the apparent incompatibility of their family heritage, and the Black heritage that is filtered through the context of American life. In contrast, Maggie, who still lives in the family home, lives her culture every day, shown simply by the fact that she will use those quilts every day, and by the fact that she realizes the quilts themselves are less important than the family memories that they represent. In Everyday Use Walker uses characterization and symbolism to show the reader that culture is something that people live, and that culture as a learned institution does not provide one with full understanding. Complex and well-developed characterization forms a significant part of understanding the way culture is portrayed in the story. We are first introduced to Mama, whose first name we never learn – she simply identifies herself as â€Å"a Johnson†. (Walker 518)Mama lacks education and quick wits, but she â€Å"can work outside all day† (Walker 518) and â€Å"kill and clean a hog as mercilessly as a man†. (Walker 518) Despite seeming proud of her physical prowess, Mama shows dissatisfaction with herself when she begins to think of Dee, remembering that while Dee â€Å"would always look anyone in the eye†, (Walker 518) Mama herself is unable to. When we first see Maggie, she is â€Å"almost hidden by the door†. (Walker 518) Maggie’s character remains hidden to the reader for most of the story – it is only towards the end, and in contrast with Dee, that we are shown her depth of character. As the story unfolds, we see that Maggie an d Mama are similar in how they identify with family and memories, and in showing these similarities we see that Maggie herself is part of the family and

Article Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words - 1

Article Analysis - Essay Example Targeting the investors and potential investors in the Canadian stock exchange, the article warns them of the imminent crisis that has already started taking shape on the economy of Canada. It also targets the policymakers who are supposed to take into account the pitfalls and offer solutions of how the situation can be improved. According to them, an investor who opts to hold their investments in the Canadian BMO Capital Market Authority or any investment banks in the country risk making losses from their investments. They provide evidence supporting their hypothesis which indicates a losing trend that the Loonie has been facing in the recent years. Basically, the subject of their argument is the contribution of the oil crisis to the poor performance of the Canadian dollar in relation to other currencies and the U.S. dollar. Other contributing factors to soring the situation have been discussed, which include low buying of the government bonds and the decreasing demand for Canadaâ⠂¬â„¢s triple-A-rated sovereign debt. The poor performance of the loonie against other currencies prompted Walter & Karen to write this article. Most importantly however, it was the poor sale of the country’s crude oil that made the issue more serious warranting their reference to the poor performance of the currency. The fact that Canada’s oil prices have been performing poorly in reference to other oil producing states is evidence to this. Trading at about $ 65 a barrel, the Canadian oil poorly performs against international oil prices. In the article, 'Loonie' Slips on Oil Patch Walter & Karen explores the influence of Canada’s oil reserves on the performance of the Canadian dollar. While the global crude oil prices have remained competitively high, the poor price of the Canadian oil proves to be a liability to the country’s economy and exchange rate. The major contributing factor of this trend is the boom in the U.S. oil in the Northern American regio n. A barrel of the Canadian oil trades at only $65 dollars, while the international market prices stand at $115 per barrel. Contrary to other currencies that move along with the changes in the oil prices, the loonie has been facing a downward performance against the dollar, shedding off 0.5% this year. The biggest disadvantage of the Canadian currency, points out experts is over reliance on petrol exports. The weak currency is expected to remain weak so long as the oil prices remain low. Effects of the poor prices of the oil have not only negatively influenced on the currency performance, notes Walter & Karen. The shocks of this have been felt by the economy, negatively affecting the annual economic growth which the central bank forecasted to drop from 2.3% to 2%. Moreover, the prices have also contributed to a widening trade deficit, reaching up to C$2 billion. As experts continue loosing hope in the recovery of the dollar, more investors keep pulling out of the market. Data indica tes so, as bonds have been facing a decreasing trend since June of last year, hitting the lowest point in November. As more people shy from bond buying that was the biggest source of income for the country’s funds, the face value of the currency seems to be overvalued. The oil

Mythic proportions Essay Example for Free

Mythic proportions Essay Linton Heathcliff is a contradiction in terms. His name signifies the unnatural union between Heathcliff and the Lintons or between passion and convention and his sickly nature demonstrates the impossibility of such a union. In Linton both love and convention emerge as corrupted by each other. He is described as a pet, a puling chicken and a whelp. Like both his parents, however, Lintons view of the world is singular, and it is his inability to see it in any way but his own terms which renders him absolutely available for manipulation by Heathcliff. Hareton Of his generation, Haretons character is perhaps the most intriguing, reversing the comparative lack of interest we feel for his father, Hindley. Hareton is brutalised by Heathcliff, structurally repeating Heathcliffs own suffering at the hands of Hindley. Haretons relationship with Cathy has similarly been read as mirroring Heathcliffs with Catherine, in as much as he is desirous of impressing her, and he is proud in her presence. His love of Cathy, however, might be said more closely to resemble Edgars love of Catherine in as much as it is moderate yet tender, devoted yet restrained. Hareton also exhibits an unwavering love for Heathcliff, in spite of the ill-treatment he has received at his hands. Like Catherine, Hareton is constant in his initial affections, and when Heathcliff first arrives into his life they form an alliance against Hindley. Although Haretons name is inscribed above the door of Wuthering Heights, his inability to read, coupled with the repetitious doubling of names and signatures, means that he fails to inherit his rightful property. Hareton is dispossessed by Heathcliff, but can also be seen as a rewriting of Heathcliff, a surrogate or symbolic Heathcliff. The development of Haretons characterisation revolves around his education. He is initially nursed by Nelly, the novels surrogate mother, and under her tuition he begins to learn his letters. However, left to the ministrations of his dissolute and unpredictable father Hindley, Hareton grows wild and uncultivated, unable to read, and with no social skills. His attempts at self-improvement are the source of mockery and derision by Linton and Cathy, and it is not until the end of the novel that he is able to acquire the skills necessary for him to achieve social status with Cathy and come into his rightful inheritance. The domestic romance which typifies the final union between Cathy and Hareton may well resolve some of the conflicts that thwart the other relationships in the novel, but their union lacks the grand passion, the wild power of the original love between Catherine and Heathcliff. Cathy Structurally the second Cathy can be seen as revising her mothers story. She achieves her identity at the price of her mothers, and Edgar always differentiates her in relation to the first Catherine, whose name he never diminished. Unlike Linton, who has the misfortune of inheriting the worst of both his parents, Cathy appears to have inherited the best from both of hers. Nelly sees Lockwood as a possible escape route for Cathy should he be induced to fall in love with her. We are privy to reports of Cathys pride, and her insensitive mockery of Haretons lack of formal knowledge. The revolution of the novel in which she and Hareton form their attachment is something of a mythical resolution, a romantic conclusion which transcends the central conflicts of the novel to restore a traditional novelistic plot of courtship and marriage. Cathy and Haretons relationship restores to the novel and version of domestic bliss that was the Victorian ideal, but it is well to bear in mind that Brontes is a version in which Cathy clearly has the upper hand. Nelly Nelly Dean is the second and dominant narratorial voice in this novel. She takes up the story from Lockwood and gives it both substance and credence. Lockwoods inability to read the signs of the culture in which he finds himself cannot sustain the story, though it acts to remind us that all narratorial voices, including Nellys, are partial. Nelly Dean is a local, and has known each generation of the Earnshaw and Linton families. She is therefore well-placed to offer Lockwood a commentary upon the events she describes. Her position of servant is differentiated from that of that of other servants, both in terms of the fact that she appears to move effortlessly between the two houses, mediating between their differences, and in terms of her voice. Nelly Dean does not share a regional dialect with the other servants but she understands it perfectly. She also emerges as an educated woman, having read most of the books in the library at Thrushcross Grange the house of culture and in having experienced the vicissitudes of Wuthering Heights the house of nature. In keeping with her dual roles, Nelly has two names, Ellen, her given name which is used by those wishing to accord her respect, and Nelly, the name her peers and familiars employ. Nelly is one of the most interesting characters in this novel, not least because of the language she uses. She occupies a unique cultural position in this novel. She has access to a range of discourses that might be considered beyond her ken in terms of her position as a family servant; yet as the central narrator Bronte presents her as a speaking subject, partially excluded from culture but nonetheless positioned so as to be able to comment upon it. Nelly acts as a surrogate mother to many of the motherless characters in this novel: she brings up Hareton for the first five years of his life; she cares for Cathy from birth through to her marriage to Linton; she regrets the brevity of her charge of Linton, which is forced by circumstance; and she acts as confidant and advisor to Catherine and Heathcliff. She also acts as a mother-figure to Lockwood as she nurses him back to health. As surrogate mother Nelly provides food and moral sustenance to her nurslings. Nelly Dean is most carefully, consistently and convincingly created for us as the normal woman, whose truly feminine nature satisfies itself in nurturing all the children of the book in turn. This reading of Nelly as the mother-figure alerts us to another of her roles, for Nelly is a mother goose, the teller of this fairytale, the keeper of its wisdom. The name might also be a corruption of Mother Gossip. Both of these definitions are pertinent to the figure of Nelly, since the knowledge she conveys is at least twofold: it is about womens experience, and it is about the nature of love. Nelly knows that her story has to entertain and ensnare us. Yet her voice is rooted in the realist narrative. With her love of a well-brushed hearth and gleaming copper pans, Nelly weaves for us a fairy tale of mythic proportions. Given our narrators sympathies we are inevitably drawn to the novels celebration of passion, and find the strictures of its dominant discourses of marriage and religion as stifling and incomprehensible as do its main protagonists.

College Freshman - How NOT to Gain Weight Essay -- Proposing a Solutio

College Freshman - How NOT to Gain Weight Starting college life is far from difficult; in fact it is fun starting a new way of life. Life without the constant objections from your parents and annoyance from your little sibling is one of the many advantages you gain from college. Cancelled classes, late night parties and deleterious amounts of food make college enjoyable; however, this can lead to weight gain. â€Å"Freshman 15† is not a myth and although you may not be unfortunate enough to gain 15 pounds, you might gain some weight. To avoid gaining weight, freshmen should eat healthy, avoid alcohol, and maintain a positive moral.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  One of the problems that cause weight gain is the lack of parental supervision over what the student consumes. In college, a student can easily stock themselves in fatty snacks such as Twinkies, cookies, chocolate, and chips. Also, the all-you-can-eat buffet seems to most likely run out of the pizza, french fries, and ice cream before the salad. A students schedule sometimes plays a factor in the consuming of too many snacks. If a student is in a hurry, he or she will grab a pop tart and be out of the door with a 200 calorie breakfast. A student should keep away from the high-fat snacks and concentrate on salubrious foods. At the cafeteria, a student should try to eat salads and attempt to eat new kinds of foods since the buffet has so much to offer. And for food on-the-go, one should try to buy healthy snacks or try to wake up earlier ...

Lack of effective communication

When a mountaineer goes up for the mountain’s peak, when a pilot soar high in the sky with his plane and when a treasure hunter goes for the hidden treasure with his map, there are two things they all need to have- a compass and a watch. They are but small, simple gadgets yet their importance cannot be denied. Like a compass, communication gives direction to the players in the organization. As a watch, communication defines the perfect timing of every course of action. Having the best players in a team, the best facilities and enough resources cannot give an organization the assurance of its success. This is simply because, as Keith Denton said, 1â€Å"More often, what is required is the simplest need of all-communication.† What brings all the elements of an organization or a team together is communication. Consider a basketball team who is behind by two points in the last few seconds of the game. If the team has a time-out to utilize, shall the coach call for a time-out or just leave the chance to the players? If not, who will be responsible? It could not be just anyone. Effective communication plays an urgent and essential role in this situation. First, in identifying what the problem is. Communicating factual and accurate information on the nature of the problem is the first step in solving a problem. In the business set-up, the earlier the problem is identified, the more time is provided to the team or the organization to solve it. Consider a manufacturing company which is experiencing a significant decline in its production rate for the past three months. Shift production supervisor A accounts the problem to the old machines they are using. Supervisor B blames it to the shift on the standards of the Quality Control department. Supervisor C thinks the problem is due to the newly imported raw materials from a new supplier. Suppose the production head asked only supervisor A and then agreed to address the problem immediately to the management. So the management decided to buy new production machines in order to cope up with its production. Supervisors B and C did not coordinate their evaluations on the problem because they were not asked. After few months, production increased only by few percentage. Re-evaluation revealed that the problem is due to the newly imported raw materials and not on the old machines. This is just one of the many tragic results of lack of effective communication. If only the production head was able to ask the other supervisors, or the supervisors coordinated their evaluations to the production head, even if they were not asked, then their evaluations could have been considered in the management’s decision in solving the problem. The cost of the new production machines could have been saved and the raw materials supplier could have been immediately reprimanded and replaced. Sad to say, time and effort lost in this situation can no more be saved; they are permanently lost. Communication is a basic requirement in all aspects of the organization. 2â€Å"The absence of good planning and sound communications also causes projects to fail.† (G. Silver) In fact, communication is a vital tool in the planning stage of a project. In identifying the what, where, when, why, who and how of a plan, information has to flow through communication lines in order to be utilized by planners and decision makers. In delegation, controlling and directing functions of the management, communication is a basic tool. This is the reason why leaders have to be good communicators. In problem solving and decision making, one has to learn how to make him understood by others and learn also to understand others. This can only be made possible by developing effective communication skills and process. 3 A case study done at General Electric Company and Cypress Semiconductor Corp. revealed that 88% of its engineers believed that â€Å"lack of communication and cooperation leads to reduced productivity.† Further evaluation of this result will give us the fact that this is because planners and decision makers rely on available, coordinated information in formulating their business activities. If all needed information are properly communicated to the concerned individuals, then problem solving and decision making will most probably have favorable results. Considering the vitality of effective communication in an organization which is working as a team, it is but fair to conclude that communication can make or break an organization. REFERENCES Denton, D. Keith. Business Horizons. September-October 1993. Retrieved from http://www.howtobooks.co.uk/business/networking. retrieved on September 07, 2006 Silver, Gerald and Myrra. Systems Analysis and Design. Chapter 06. page 22. Addison-Wesley Publishing Co. Mass. USA. 1992 P and Q Survey 1990. Effective Business Communications. Retrieved from http://www.howtobooks.co.uk/business/networking Retrieved on September 07, 2006

What Is a Sigma-Field

There are many ideas from set theory that undergird probability. One such idea is that of a sigma-field. A sigma-field refers to the collection of subsets of a sample space that we should use in order to establish a mathematically formal definition of probability. The sets in the sigma-field constitute the events from our sample space. Definition The definition of a sigma-field requires that we have a sample space S along with a collection of subsets of S. This collection of subsets is a sigma-field if the following conditions are met: If the subset A is in the sigma-field, then so is its complement AC.If An   are countably infinitely many subsets from the sigma-field, then both the intersection and union of all of these sets is also in the sigma-field. Implications The definition implies that two particular sets are a part of every sigma-field. Since both A and AC are in the sigma-field, so is the intersection. This intersection is the empty set. Therefore the empty set is part of every sigma-field. The sample space S must also be part of the sigma-field. The reason for this is that the union of A and AC must be in the sigma-field. This union is the sample spaceS. Reasoning There are a couple of reasons why this particular collection of sets is useful. First, we will consider why both the set and its complement should be elements of the sigma-algebra. The complement in set theory is equivalent to negation. The elements in the complement of A are the elements in the universal set that are not elements of A. In this way, we ensure that if an event is part of the sample space, then that event not occurring is also considered an event in the sample space. We also want the union and intersection of a collection of sets to be in the sigma-algebra because unions are useful to model the word â€Å"or.† The event that A or B occurs is represented by the union of A and B. Similarly, we use the intersection to represent the word â€Å"and.† The event that A and B occurs is represented by the intersection of the sets A and B. It is impossible to physically intersect an infinite number of sets. However, we can think of doing this as a limit of finite processes. This is why we also include the intersection and union of countably many subsets. For many infinite sample spaces, we would need to form infinite unions and intersections. Related Ideas A concept that is related to a sigma-field is called a field of subsets. A field of subsets does not require that countably infinite unions and intersection be part of it. Instead, we only need to contain finite unions and intersections in a field of subsets.

Alcoholism Essay - 2090 Words

Alcoholism is a wide-ranging and complex disease that heavily plagues society. Drinking is defined as the consumption of a liquid, and/or the act of drinking alcoholic beverages especially to excess. Every year alcohol is responsible for 1/2 of all murders, accidental deaths, and suicides; 1/3 of all drowning, boating, and aviation deaths; 1/2 of all crimes; and almost 1/2 of all fatal automobile accidents (Overview 1). Alcohol is a potent nonprescription drug sold to anyone over the national legal drinking age, 21. Unlike carbohydrates, fats, and proteins, which can be manufactured by the body, alcohol is a substance that is not made within the body. It is a food, because it supplies a concentrated number of calories, but is not†¦show more content†¦Relatively speaking, the twelve million U.S. College students drink over 430 million gallons of alcohol a year- that is 3,500 Olympic sized swimming pools filled with alcohol. Binge drinking is the number one public health hazar d for more than six million college students in America (MADD 2). Only five percent of alcohol is eliminated from the body through the breath, urine, or sweat; the rest is broken down in the liver. In the Liver: -Alcohol is broken down in steps by enzymes until only carbon dioxide remain as by-products. -Alcohol is processed at the rate of three tenths of an ounce of pure ethanol per hour (less than one ounce of whiskey) and unprocessed alcohol circulates in the body. (The alcohol from two cocktails, each about 1.5 ounces, drank before dinner is still present in the body three to four hours later) (Overview 2). The liver’s fixed rate of alcohol breakdown means that drinking coffee or taking a cold shower does not speed the sobering process. Therefore, giving coffee to a person who is drunk may make a wide-awake drunk, who thinks he/she is sober enough to drive a car. Occasional users of alcohol, who are healthy, do not appear to suffer negative affects from use of alcohol. In moderate doses, alcohol has beneficial effects: relaxation, appetite stimulation. However, consumed in large amounts, alcohol is a toxin. The short-termShow MoreRelatedAlcoholism : Alcoholism And Alcoholism2482 Words   |  10 Pageslead to extreme alcohol abuse and even alcoholism. The society we live in is strongly prejudiced by alcohol, and affects people of all ages, gender, and background. It has been uncovered to millionaires to the homeless. Alcohol abuse has been a problem throughout the history of humanity; it is a disease which has caused many people to be overcome with trouble, problems, and debts also pattern of drinking that interferes with day-to-day activities. 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Though the negative health consequences of alcohol are widely understood, and, if anything, the social consequences of alcoholism are even more widely acknowledged, it seems that no matter what steps are taken by public health officials or private organizations, no strategy can ever be fully developed for eradicating alcoholism. There are a number of reasons why this is true. This paper will explore some ofRead MoreAlcoholism : An Exploration Of Alcoholism2043 Words   |  9 PagesDrink Too Many: An Exploration of Alcoholism Many adults can enjoy a drink or two from time to time without any issues, but just one drink can cause over seventeen million Americans’ lives to spiral out of control. Though most people do not have issues with drinking alcoholic beverages, many have a condition which causes their brain to function differently when they consume alcohol. This disease can be deadly for both the alcoholic and those around them. Alcoholism can control someone’s life, and