Imagery and Themes in the Epic of Gilgamesh - 1139 Words

Historical Context - Imagery and Themes Rosenberg notes that Gilgamesh is probably the worlds first human hero in literature (27). The Epic of Gilgamesh is based on the life of a probably real Sumerian king named Gilgamesh, who ruled about 2600 B.C.E. We learned of the Gilgamesh myth when several clay tablets written in cuneiform were discovered beginning in 1845 during the excavation of Nineveh (26). We get our most complete version of Gilgamesh from the hands of an Akkadian priest, Sin-liqui-unninni. It is unknown how much of the tale is the invention of Sin-liqui-unninni, and how much is the original tale. The flood story, which appears in the Sin-liqui-unninni version, is probably based on an actual flood that occurred in†¦show more content†¦They included the noble, the commoner, the client, and the slave (37). Women were allowed to own property and do business. Men enjoyed the ability to divorce or take a second wife in the event that the first wife was unable to bear children. Children appear to have been viewed as the property of the parent and without rights (38). The time of economic prosperity that the agricultural gains provided allowed inventions to become more important. The inventions helped society advance further. One of the most important inventions at this time was animal husbandry (39). There are also indications that the people believed in an afterlife. The tombs which were excavated in recent times contained earthly riches such as beads, earrings and knives which would have been useful to the deceased (42). Between 4500 and 2500 BC, there was a period of expansion and growth in the economy and political environment of the Sumerians. Intellectualism and artistry flourished as a result (Mallowan 98-106). Kings who gained enough power and wealth conquered weaker city-states and burned or destroyed cities. These cities were later rebuilt as each one was destroyed (Swisher 45-46). The perception of their natural surroundings were similar to that of the Greeks. It was believed that the earth was a disk surrounded by mountains which held up the sky. The sky was a dome that was filled with air. Under the disk was theShow MoreRelatedThe Battle Of The Epic Of Gilgamesh931 Words   |  4 Pagesthe story of Gilgamesh and Enkidu partaking in their adventure to the edge of the Cedar Forest, and their encounter with a guard, an enemy. Throughout this battle, Gilgamesh loses faith in the couples ability to defeat the guard but is ultimately talked back into his heroic mindset by The Gods. In column VI, having just defeated the guard, Enkidu then finds himself in a similar situation to Gilgamesh, whereby he doubts their ability to defeat Humbaba, and it comes down to Gilgamesh, and his leadershipRead MoreEssay about Comparing The Epic of Gilgamesh with The Odyssey1262 Words   |  6 Pages The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Odyssey both are held in high respect by literature analysts and historians alike for the characterization of the hero and his companion, the imagery brought to mind when one of them is read, and the impressive length in relation to the time period it was written in. The similarities that these two epics share do not end with only those three; in fact, the comparability of these works extend to even the information on the author and the archetypes used. However, TheRead MoreTheme Of Mortality In The Epic Of Gilgamesh1220 Words   |  5 PagesThe Epic of Gilgamesh: A Hero’s Journey Several themes are addressed throughout the Epic of Gilgamesh, but the most prominent lies within the confrontation and acceptance of mortality. Gilgamesh—king of Uruk, ambitious builder, and bravest of mercenaries—seems to be blessed by a combination of two-thirds godliness and one-third manliness, yet plagued by his very own immoderation and naivety. The hero is witnessed engaging in the molestation of his women and exhausting Uruk’s people with manual laborRead More The Transcending Characteristics of a Mythical Hero Essay1520 Words   |  7 Pagesthose of the Ancient Greeks and the Sumerians, predecessors of the Persians, there exists a startling parallelism in imagery and themes of the myths of the respective peoples. The epics of Heracles and Gilgamesh are an exceptionally good example of these similarities. nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;One cannot know with a certainty whether the original creator of the epic of Gilgamesh, whose name is lost in time, or Shin-eqi-unninni, the scribe with whose version we are familiar today, knew anythingRead MoreEpic of Gilgamesh Theme1707 Words   |  7 PagesThemes Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work. Love As a Motivating Force Love, both erotic and platonic, motivates change in Gilgamesh. Enkidu changes from a wild man into a noble one because of Gilgamesh, and their friendship changes Gilgamesh from a bully and a tyrant into an exemplary king and hero. Because they are evenly matched, Enkidu puts a check on Gilgamesh’s restless, powerful energies, and Gilgamesh pulls Enkidu out of his self-centerednessRead MoreAnalysis Of Epic Of Gilgamesh1985 Words   |  8 PagesEpic of Gilgamesh Introduction Epic of Gilgamesh is a piece of the ancient Sumerian poem with a somewhat close resemblance to the biblical text. It is a demigod, Gilgamesh who seeks to find out the meaning of life, death, the presence of an afterlife and ultimately whether eternal life exists. The poem has various characters all who come in at different parts of the verse. The text speaks of interaction between human beings and gods, their might and the adventures carried out by Gilgamesh and hisRead MoreAnalysis Of The Book Lien 2038 Words   |  9 Pagesthe village’s name: â€Å"Lien.† This word is Vietnamese for â€Å"lotus,† which is a water flower similar to a water lily. This refers to the country of the Lotus-Eaters, which was a stop the hero Odysseus made along his journey back to his homeland in the epic poem, The Odyssey. In the original story, Odysseus’s voyage is hindered when he stops in the country of the Lotus-Eaters and some of his crewmen are nearly trapped, for â €Å"any of them who ate the honey-sweet fruit of the lotus was unwilling to takeRead MoreHow Does Comparative Material From The Ancient Near East Help Us Understand Genesis 1-22?2785 Words   |  12 Pagespatriarchal narratives ? Ugarit and Ebla.[footnoteRef:1] Many scholars have argued on the implication of the similarities in the Genesis flood story with Noah and the flood epic that was told in Mesopotamia ? Gilgamesh.[footnoteRef:2] Alexander Heidel has made several comparisons between the flood narrative in Genesis and the epic of ?Gilgamesh?. He discusses the problem with their similarities and makes several possibilities relating to this problem namely, that the people of Babylon borrowed the Hebrew narrativeRead MoreHeracles: The New Jesus Essay1280 Words   |  6 Pagesoral traditions, later to be written, also found their way onto much art through the ages that now are often open to interpretation since the artists are long passed. The vases image and text make it clear the setting of the depiction. The vases imagery is based in The Garden of The Hesperides, at the tree that bears golden apples. Surrounding the tree are Atlass daughters, the Hesperides, who are picking the forbidden fruit owned by Hera. The serpent in the tree is Ladon, sent by Hera to protectRead MoreAnalysis Of The Book Metamorphoses Of The Werewolf 1744 Words   |  7 PagesStarting with Chapter One, the author introduces the reader to the first few accounts of werewolves, or what would be considered werewolves by our current imagery. She discusses the ancient Epic of Gilgamesh, which is the first tale of a werewolf and the first story of a man falling victim to, and being transformed by, a â€Å"wicked woman,† which is a theme that runs through many of the older stories. She also brings up Ovid’s retelling of the Metamorphosis, a Greek story about Lycaon, who attempted to serve

Imagery and Themes in the Epic of Gilgamesh - 1139 Words

Historical Context - Imagery and Themes Rosenberg notes that Gilgamesh is probably the worlds first human hero in literature (27). The Epic of Gilgamesh is based on the life of a probably real Sumerian king named Gilgamesh, who ruled about 2600 B.C.E. We learned of the Gilgamesh myth when several clay tablets written in cuneiform were discovered beginning in 1845 during the excavation of Nineveh (26). We get our most complete version of Gilgamesh from the hands of an Akkadian priest, Sin-liqui-unninni. It is unknown how much of the tale is the invention of Sin-liqui-unninni, and how much is the original tale. The flood story, which appears in the Sin-liqui-unninni version, is probably based on an actual flood that occurred in†¦show more content†¦They included the noble, the commoner, the client, and the slave (37). Women were allowed to own property and do business. Men enjoyed the ability to divorce or take a second wife in the event that the first wife was unable to bear children. Children appear to have been viewed as the property of the parent and without rights (38). The time of economic prosperity that the agricultural gains provided allowed inventions to become more important. The inventions helped society advance further. One of the most important inventions at this time was animal husbandry (39). There are also indications that the people believed in an afterlife. The tombs which were excavated in recent times contained earthly riches such as beads, earrings and knives which would have been useful to the deceased (42). Between 4500 and 2500 BC, there was a period of expansion and growth in the economy and political environment of the Sumerians. Intellectualism and artistry flourished as a result (Mallowan 98-106). Kings who gained enough power and wealth conquered weaker city-states and burned or destroyed cities. These cities were later rebuilt as each one was destroyed (Swisher 45-46). The perception of their natural surroundings were similar to that of the Greeks. It was believed that the earth was a disk surrounded by mountains which held up the sky. The sky was a dome that was filled with air. Under the disk was theShow MoreRelatedThe Battle Of The Epic Of Gilgamesh931 Words   |  4 Pagesthe story of Gilgamesh and Enkidu partaking in their adventure to the edge of the Cedar Forest, and their encounter with a guard, an enemy. Throughout this battle, Gilgamesh loses faith in the couples ability to defeat the guard but is ultimately talked back into his heroic mindset by The Gods. In column VI, having just defeated the guard, Enkidu then finds himself in a similar situation to Gilgamesh, whereby he doubts their ability to defeat Humbaba, and it comes down to Gilgamesh, and his leadershipRead MoreEssay about Comparing The Epic of Gilgamesh with The Odyssey1262 Words   |  6 Pages The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Odyssey both are held in high respect by literature analysts and historians alike for the characterization of the hero and his companion, the imagery brought to mind when one of them is read, and the impressive length in relation to the time period it was written in. The similarities that these two epics share do not end with only those three; in fact, the comparability of these works extend to even the information on the author and the archetypes used. However, TheRead MoreTheme Of Mortality In The Epic Of Gilgamesh1220 Words   |  5 PagesThe Epic of Gilgamesh: A Hero’s Journey Several themes are addressed throughout the Epic of Gilgamesh, but the most prominent lies within the confrontation and acceptance of mortality. Gilgamesh—king of Uruk, ambitious builder, and bravest of mercenaries—seems to be blessed by a combination of two-thirds godliness and one-third manliness, yet plagued by his very own immoderation and naivety. The hero is witnessed engaging in the molestation of his women and exhausting Uruk’s people with manual laborRead More The Transcending Characteristics of a Mythical Hero Essay1520 Words   |  7 Pagesthose of the Ancient Greeks and the Sumerians, predecessors of the Persians, there exists a startling parallelism in imagery and themes of the myths of the respective peoples. The epics of Heracles and Gilgamesh are an exceptionally good example of these similarities. nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;One cannot know with a certainty whether the original creator of the epic of Gilgamesh, whose name is lost in time, or Shin-eqi-unninni, the scribe with whose version we are familiar today, knew anythingRead MoreEpic of Gilgamesh Theme1707 Words   |  7 PagesThemes Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work. Love As a Motivating Force Love, both erotic and platonic, motivates change in Gilgamesh. Enkidu changes from a wild man into a noble one because of Gilgamesh, and their friendship changes Gilgamesh from a bully and a tyrant into an exemplary king and hero. Because they are evenly matched, Enkidu puts a check on Gilgamesh’s restless, powerful energies, and Gilgamesh pulls Enkidu out of his self-centerednessRead MoreAnalysis Of Epic Of Gilgamesh1985 Words   |  8 PagesEpic of Gilgamesh Introduction Epic of Gilgamesh is a piece of the ancient Sumerian poem with a somewhat close resemblance to the biblical text. It is a demigod, Gilgamesh who seeks to find out the meaning of life, death, the presence of an afterlife and ultimately whether eternal life exists. The poem has various characters all who come in at different parts of the verse. The text speaks of interaction between human beings and gods, their might and the adventures carried out by Gilgamesh and hisRead MoreAnalysis Of The Book Lien 2038 Words   |  9 Pagesthe village’s name: â€Å"Lien.† This word is Vietnamese for â€Å"lotus,† which is a water flower similar to a water lily. This refers to the country of the Lotus-Eaters, which was a stop the hero Odysseus made along his journey back to his homeland in the epic poem, The Odyssey. In the original story, Odysseus’s voyage is hindered when he stops in the country of the Lotus-Eaters and some of his crewmen are nearly trapped, for â €Å"any of them who ate the honey-sweet fruit of the lotus was unwilling to takeRead MoreHow Does Comparative Material From The Ancient Near East Help Us Understand Genesis 1-22?2785 Words   |  12 Pagespatriarchal narratives ? Ugarit and Ebla.[footnoteRef:1] Many scholars have argued on the implication of the similarities in the Genesis flood story with Noah and the flood epic that was told in Mesopotamia ? Gilgamesh.[footnoteRef:2] Alexander Heidel has made several comparisons between the flood narrative in Genesis and the epic of ?Gilgamesh?. He discusses the problem with their similarities and makes several possibilities relating to this problem namely, that the people of Babylon borrowed the Hebrew narrativeRead MoreHeracles: The New Jesus Essay1280 Words   |  6 Pagesoral traditions, later to be written, also found their way onto much art through the ages that now are often open to interpretation since the artists are long passed. The vases image and text make it clear the setting of the depiction. The vases imagery is based in The Garden of The Hesperides, at the tree that bears golden apples. Surrounding the tree are Atlass daughters, the Hesperides, who are picking the forbidden fruit owned by Hera. The serpent in the tree is Ladon, sent by Hera to protectRead MoreAnalysis Of The Book Metamorphoses Of The Werewolf 1744 Words   |  7 PagesStarting with Chapter One, the author introduces the reader to the first few accounts of werewolves, or what would be considered werewolves by our current imagery. She discusses the ancient Epic of Gilgamesh, which is the first tale of a werewolf and the first story of a man falling victim to, and being transformed by, a â€Å"wicked woman,† which is a theme that runs through many of the older stories. She also brings up Ovid’s retelling of the Metamorphosis, a Greek story about Lycaon, who attempted to serve

Imagery and Themes in the Epic of Gilgamesh - 1139 Words

Historical Context - Imagery and Themes Rosenberg notes that Gilgamesh is probably the worlds first human hero in literature (27). The Epic of Gilgamesh is based on the life of a probably real Sumerian king named Gilgamesh, who ruled about 2600 B.C.E. We learned of the Gilgamesh myth when several clay tablets written in cuneiform were discovered beginning in 1845 during the excavation of Nineveh (26). We get our most complete version of Gilgamesh from the hands of an Akkadian priest, Sin-liqui-unninni. It is unknown how much of the tale is the invention of Sin-liqui-unninni, and how much is the original tale. The flood story, which appears in the Sin-liqui-unninni version, is probably based on an actual flood that occurred in†¦show more content†¦They included the noble, the commoner, the client, and the slave (37). Women were allowed to own property and do business. Men enjoyed the ability to divorce or take a second wife in the event that the first wife was unable to bear children. Children appear to have been viewed as the property of the parent and without rights (38). The time of economic prosperity that the agricultural gains provided allowed inventions to become more important. The inventions helped society advance further. One of the most important inventions at this time was animal husbandry (39). There are also indications that the people believed in an afterlife. The tombs which were excavated in recent times contained earthly riches such as beads, earrings and knives which would have been useful to the deceased (42). Between 4500 and 2500 BC, there was a period of expansion and growth in the economy and political environment of the Sumerians. Intellectualism and artistry flourished as a result (Mallowan 98-106). Kings who gained enough power and wealth conquered weaker city-states and burned or destroyed cities. These cities were later rebuilt as each one was destroyed (Swisher 45-46). The perception of their natural surroundings were similar to that of the Greeks. It was believed that the earth was a disk surrounded by mountains which held up the sky. The sky was a dome that was filled with air. Under the disk was theShow MoreRelatedThe Battle Of The Epic Of Gilgamesh931 Words   |  4 Pagesthe story of Gilgamesh and Enkidu partaking in their adventure to the edge of the Cedar Forest, and their encounter with a guard, an enemy. Throughout this battle, Gilgamesh loses faith in the couples ability to defeat the guard but is ultimately talked back into his heroic mindset by The Gods. In column VI, having just defeated the guard, Enkidu then finds himself in a similar situation to Gilgamesh, whereby he doubts their ability to defeat Humbaba, and it comes down to Gilgamesh, and his leadershipRead MoreEssay about Comparing The Epic of Gilgamesh with The Odyssey1262 Words   |  6 Pages The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Odyssey both are held in high respect by literature analysts and historians alike for the characterization of the hero and his companion, the imagery brought to mind when one of them is read, and the impressive length in relation to the time period it was written in. The similarities that these two epics share do not end with only those three; in fact, the comparability of these works extend to even the information on the author and the archetypes used. However, TheRead MoreTheme Of Mortality In The Epic Of Gilgamesh1220 Words   |  5 PagesThe Epic of Gilgamesh: A Hero’s Journey Several themes are addressed throughout the Epic of Gilgamesh, but the most prominent lies within the confrontation and acceptance of mortality. Gilgamesh—king of Uruk, ambitious builder, and bravest of mercenaries—seems to be blessed by a combination of two-thirds godliness and one-third manliness, yet plagued by his very own immoderation and naivety. The hero is witnessed engaging in the molestation of his women and exhausting Uruk’s people with manual laborRead More The Transcending Characteristics of a Mythical Hero Essay1520 Words   |  7 Pagesthose of the Ancient Greeks and the Sumerians, predecessors of the Persians, there exists a startling parallelism in imagery and themes of the myths of the respective peoples. The epics of Heracles and Gilgamesh are an exceptionally good example of these similarities. nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;One cannot know with a certainty whether the original creator of the epic of Gilgamesh, whose name is lost in time, or Shin-eqi-unninni, the scribe with whose version we are familiar today, knew anythingRead MoreEpic of Gilgamesh Theme1707 Words   |  7 PagesThemes Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work. Love As a Motivating Force Love, both erotic and platonic, motivates change in Gilgamesh. Enkidu changes from a wild man into a noble one because of Gilgamesh, and their friendship changes Gilgamesh from a bully and a tyrant into an exemplary king and hero. Because they are evenly matched, Enkidu puts a check on Gilgamesh’s restless, powerful energies, and Gilgamesh pulls Enkidu out of his self-centerednessRead MoreAnalysis Of Epic Of Gilgamesh1985 Words   |  8 PagesEpic of Gilgamesh Introduction Epic of Gilgamesh is a piece of the ancient Sumerian poem with a somewhat close resemblance to the biblical text. It is a demigod, Gilgamesh who seeks to find out the meaning of life, death, the presence of an afterlife and ultimately whether eternal life exists. The poem has various characters all who come in at different parts of the verse. The text speaks of interaction between human beings and gods, their might and the adventures carried out by Gilgamesh and hisRead MoreAnalysis Of The Book Lien 2038 Words   |  9 Pagesthe village’s name: â€Å"Lien.† This word is Vietnamese for â€Å"lotus,† which is a water flower similar to a water lily. This refers to the country of the Lotus-Eaters, which was a stop the hero Odysseus made along his journey back to his homeland in the epic poem, The Odyssey. In the original story, Odysseus’s voyage is hindered when he stops in the country of the Lotus-Eaters and some of his crewmen are nearly trapped, for â €Å"any of them who ate the honey-sweet fruit of the lotus was unwilling to takeRead MoreHow Does Comparative Material From The Ancient Near East Help Us Understand Genesis 1-22?2785 Words   |  12 Pagespatriarchal narratives ? Ugarit and Ebla.[footnoteRef:1] Many scholars have argued on the implication of the similarities in the Genesis flood story with Noah and the flood epic that was told in Mesopotamia ? Gilgamesh.[footnoteRef:2] Alexander Heidel has made several comparisons between the flood narrative in Genesis and the epic of ?Gilgamesh?. He discusses the problem with their similarities and makes several possibilities relating to this problem namely, that the people of Babylon borrowed the Hebrew narrativeRead MoreHeracles: The New Jesus Essay1280 Words   |  6 Pagesoral traditions, later to be written, also found their way onto much art through the ages that now are often open to interpretation since the artists are long passed. The vases image and text make it clear the setting of the depiction. The vases imagery is based in The Garden of The Hesperides, at the tree that bears golden apples. Surrounding the tree are Atlass daughters, the Hesperides, who are picking the forbidden fruit owned by Hera. The serpent in the tree is Ladon, sent by Hera to protectRead MoreAnalysis Of The Book Metamorphoses Of The Werewolf 1744 Words   |  7 PagesStarting with Chapter One, the author introduces the reader to the first few accounts of werewolves, or what would be considered werewolves by our current imagery. She discusses the ancient Epic of Gilgamesh, which is the first tale of a werewolf and the first story of a man falling victim to, and being transformed by, a â€Å"wicked woman,† which is a theme that runs through many of the older stories. She also brings up Ovid’s retelling of the Metamorphosis, a Greek story about Lycaon, who attempted to serve

Uncommon Article Gives You the Facts on College Essay Introduction Samples That Only a Few People Know Exist

Uncommon Article Gives You the Facts on College Essay Introduction Samples That Only a Few People Know Exist What You Should Do to Find Out About College Essay Introduction Samples Before You're Left Behind Being in college might be a small struggle for some. The admissions teams are searching for authenticity and caliber of thinking. A lot of my students believe that they don't have a great story to share or they're not unique or special at all. The Basic Facts of College Essay Introduction Samples Utilizing a hook which likewise sets you up for a typical thread throughout the essay is a remarkable approach to set up flow. This essay is targeted at giving out the advantages and the need of legalizing the usage of marijuana. Not only will it help you remain on topic whilst writing, but nevertheless, it permits you to find all your thoughts down while they're still fresh in your thoughts. Therein lies the issue. Ultimately, you can observe these memoir samples to understand how to write one yourself. Writing your memoirs is a wonderful exercise and a great start for a beginning author. The author starts with a rather comprehensive story of an event or description of an individual or place. The second instance is a good example of paraphrasing where the author isn't mentioned by name. The College Essay Introduction Samples Trap As soon as you have summarized the work, you should start your analysis. In case the latter description illustrates you here is a more in depth reflective essay outline which should get you where you must be to put on a firm understanding of the way to compose a reflection paper. The perfect way to craft an excellent persuasive essay is to be ready for every one of the opposition's arguments. A self-introduction essay is, in most circumstances, written utilizing the first-person perspective. Running through the fundamental outline of your paper in the introduction offers readers an opportunity to preview what your paper is all about and your stance on the matter or maybe to evaluate how objective you are going to be. Read widely at first to learn what the well-known themes of discussion are about this subject. This region of the essay is where you restate your general point and to earn an obvious ending of the topic. These seven sample essays respond to a selection of thought-provoking questions. New Ideas Into College Essay Introduction Samples Never Before Revealed There's perhaps no greater way to acquire your readers to finish reading your private statement than to make them guess what it is that you are writing about through the element of mystery. In both instances, you hit your target of greater reader engagement. If you wish to tell a circumstance once you felt fear or anxiety, there's a fine place to set a flashback to produce readers understand you better then, do it also. A lot of people make the error of writing an introductory paragraph that explains what they will speak about in the remaining part of the essay. A book could be listed, but it doesn't mean that you want to absorb the entire thing. The introduction may have lots of responsibility but that doesn't indicate you have to sweat writing it. In the end, the detail of real speech makes the scene pop. Swap sophistication for self-awareness There's a designated part of the application section designated to showcase your repertoire of words. Your summary of the job will be contained within the body. There's no separate application required. Pointing out your opinion will just decrease the strength behind it. The Hidden Truth About College Essay Introduction Samples Writing skills in college isn't restricted to essays. Students frequently start essays speaking about others due to the fact that they find it tricky to chat about themselves. An excellent college essay introduction is essential to making your essay stand out, so there's a great deal of pressure to receive it exactly perfect. Before you even begin writing the content of your college essay, there are a few essay writing basic guide that you need to always remember. Quite simply, your kid is interesting, and they are able to write an intriguing college essay. Use this worksheet for a guideline whilst working on your essay. The War Against College Essay Introduction Samples Your college essay should contain information that relate to the instruction provided to you. To provide you with a remedy about how to compose an impressive college essay, here are a couple of ideas you may wish to consider. A self introduction essay can be helpful for different reasons like employment graduate school or professional pursuits. Just because you've already written a college essay for a single university doesn't mean that it may also apply on your next applications. College life includes writing essays and application letters whether you're in the subject of company or literature. Professor Mitchell obtained a grant to have a category of students to Belgium as a way to study the EU. Thus, State University isn't only the ideal spot for me, it is the sole spot for me.

Examining Role of Engagement System †Free Samples to Students

Question: Discuss about the Examining Role of Engagement System. Answer: Introduction The statement derived from this case study is about the roles and responsibilities played by Human Resource Manager in creating organization based on sustainability. In these case studies, it is said in a Hospital, there is a lack of HR department facility and CEO of that Hospital devolved the key responsibilities such as development training, leadership and health management to the middle managers. However, the problem arises that the middle managers do not really know about the roles and responsibilities of the HRM and their implementation on the ground, this resulted to a lack of improvements and it brought a lot of challenges in the field of Hospital. Accordingly this needs to be addressed about how to bring improvements in the roles of HRM. Next case study deals with a hospital where it has a responsible HR manager and take of the administration of the hospital properly. Therefore, against this background it is important to know about the roles of Human Resource Manager in creat ing a sustainable organization. In the Case study of the first hospital, it has been said that due to the absence of a dedicated HR manager, CEO and his finance manager was running the HR facility and they devolved most of the key functions of the HR to the middle managers of the organization. However, the managers has little knowledge about the policies of HR manager, this resulted to the rise of confusion in the field of HRM and increased the industrial disputation and higher level of staff shortages. Therefore, in this regard, it is important to give advices to the CEO to bring improvements in the field of HR manager roles. The senior manager plays an important role in terms of directing the middle managers in the organization. It is the responsibility of the senior managers to train the middle managers properly in terms of executing work properly. Therefore in this respect firstly, the proper senior manager is needed to be recruited to give proper training to the middle managers. Other than this, the middle leadership in terms of devolution of their power of the HR manager needs to be followed properly (Harding, Lee Ford, 2014). It is important to give proper leadership training to the middle managers. It is therefore, significant to extend the development programs of leadership in order to incorporate the managers of all levels where the leaders can learn from each other (Mollick, 2012). In this respect, the mentorship programs can also bring improvements of the leadership development program. It is important for the organization to give feedback to the middle managers about the roles that they are playing of HRM from the executive leaders and also from the employees who are working under him. Therefore, in this sense, providing a very good feedback and giving recognition to their hard work would give them energy in terms of skills of in leadership and also encourage the working of those employees who are working under him (Van, Davis Ventor, 2014; Susaeta Suarez, 2013). The supportive culture of the organization needs to make sure that the practices of Human Resource Manager are linked with middle manager in terms of implementation of HR levels. It includes the rewards and recognition to the middle managers who are working hard and executing their duties properly. With the proper training, if the middle managers implement the policies of HR manager properly it would lead to the job satisfaction, employment turnover would be reduced. For this the middle managers are needed to be aware of the functions of the HR manager and then implement accordingly (Alfes et al., 2013). The middle managers need to start interacting with the employees and understand their issues. He needs to act as a role model for everyone working under him. Human Resource Sustainability It has been stated that there is a crisis facing the Human Resource Management in terms of staff turnovers which are increasing, declining in loyalty and the diminishing in the growth of productivity. Therefore against this background, it is important to identify the key features which can bring improvements in the HR sustainability in an organization (Enhert et al., 2013). The need for Organizational competencies for the success of corporate must be developed systematically. This incorporates building knowledge systematically and making the diverse productivities and building the potential of human knowledge and management. There should be an ongoing investment in gathering skills and knowledge of the corporate sectors (Enhert, Harry Zink, 2014). The organization needs to keep the right balance between the life outside work and work. To acknowledge the significance of acquiring a life balance and work, the quality of working life is important. It has been stated that over 1300 managers stated that the long hour working leaves a negative impact over the workers. Sustainability of the Human Resource is depending on the organization who are pursuing an integrated strategy in which the relations of the employees are added to the planning of the organization and also the process of implementation. It is important for the organization to develop the capabilities of the organization to combine the strategies and vision in order to make the performance better (Kozika Kaizer, 2012). The HR function can become the partners with the senior or line managers in implementation of strategy by forming a link between the market place and boardroom. The HR manager must ensure the efficiency in the organization by making sure the administrative efficiency. The HR functions must be the agent of changes, shaping the culture and the process and that brings improvements and increases the organizations capacity for bringing further transformations. At the lower level, the HR needs to advocate to become the coordinators, integrators and mentors who is looking forward to link and include the capabilities of a human into the structure of the organization and also including the practices of the organization. The main challenge of HR who is responsible to move the organizations in order to adopt the practices based on sustainability towards the strategies of organizations and also a climate needs to be created which would focus on the potentiality. It is the responsibility of the company to build a profitable environment for the managers in order to take care of their community. The HR manager must take care of the common values, recruit people, develop the employees and also establish policies for the works in order to create a sustainable environment in the organization. The increasing number of HR people who are going beyond their traditional roles and now they focused in understanding what pushes the performance of the business and also to concentrate on the capabilities of the employee for the near future. Conclusion Therefore to conclude, it could be state that the role of HR manager is changing with time and space and they are overlooking the traditional ways in order to incorporate more new strategies to bring improvements in the functions of the HR. The middle managers according to the case study are needed to be trained properly so that they can implement the policies of the Human resource more carefully. The recruitment policy needs to be effective in this sense. At the same time, building the HR capability to bring improvements in the culture of organization is important. References Alfes, K., Truss, C., Soane, E. C., Rees, C., Gatenby, M. (2013). The relationship between line manager behavior, perceived HRM practices, and individual performance: Examining the mediating role of engagement.Human resource management,52(6), 839-859. Ehnert, I., Harry, W., Zink, K. J. (2014). Sustainability and HRM. InSustainability and Human Resource Management(pp. 3-32). Springer Berlin Heidelberg. Ehnert, I., Harry, W., Zink, K. J. (Eds.). (2013).Sustainability and human resource management: Developing sustainable business organizations. Springer Science Business Media. Harding, N., Lee, H., Ford, J. (2014). Who is the middle manager?.Human relations,67(10), 1213-1237. Kozica, A., Kaiser, S. (2012). A sustainability perspective on flexible HRM: How to cope with paradoxes of contingent work.management revue, 239-261. Mollick, E. (2012). People and process, suits and innovators: The role of individuals in firm performance.Strategic Management Journal,33(9), 1001-1015. Susaeta, L., Suarez, E., Pin, J. R. (2013). Economic crisis and communication: The role of the HR manager. Van Rensburg, M. J., Davis, A., Venter, P. (2014). Making strategy work: The role of the middle manager.Journal of Management Organization,20(2), 165-186.

Trench Warfare Essays - Trench Warfare, Military Science

Trench Warfare World War I was a military conflict that lasted from 1914 to 1918. It was a modern war with airplanes, machine guns, and tanks. However, the commanders often fought World War I as if it were a 19th Century war. They would march their troops across open land into the face of machine guns and often slaughter. As a result of this action, a tactic known as trench warfare was implemented. The most recent use of use of trench warfare, before World War I, took place during the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905). This war attracted worldwide attention among military authorities that were interested in studying the latest technology used in war. Many viewed trench warfare to be an effective tactic against enemy advancement. Because of this view, trench warfare proved to be, in World War I, an ineffective and traumatizing experience for all. In September 1914, the German commander, General Erich von Falkenhayn ordered his troops to dig trenched that would provide protection from the allied troops. When the allies reached the trench, they soon realized that they could not break through the line that the trench provided. They also realized that the trench provided the Germans with shelter from their fire. Soon after, the allies began to dig their own trenches and, therefore, trench warfare began. Not very long, after the first trenches of the war were dug, a network of trenches arose. This network spread across France and Belgium for many miles. Within the network, there were three different types of trenches: front line trenches, support trenches, and reserve trenches. The first line of trenches was called front line trenches. These were usually two meters deep and had a zigzag pattern to prevent enemy fire from sweeping the entire length of the trench. In order to prevent the trench form caving in, sandbags were stacked against the trench walls. Between the trenches of opposing forces laid no man's land. This area between the opposing front line trenches was filled with barbwire and mines to prevent enemy crossing. If a soldier was ever injured in no man's land, he usually was killed because of his vulnerability to enemy fire. The second and third types of trenches were the support and reserve trenches, respectively. These trenches were constructed to easily move supplies and troops to the front trenches. All of the trenches were linked to each other by other trenches, underground tunnels, or telephone communications networks. Barbwire was also stretched across the line to protect from enemy attack. While the design of the trenches and the network of trenches seemed like a great tactic, the reality of the life in the trenches was a different story. Life in the trenches took its toll on the soldiers involved in the war. The soldiers in the front line trenches often stayed there for at least 10 days at a time, usually with very little sleep. Katczinsky is right when he says it would not be such a bad war if only one could get more sleep. In the line we have next to none, and fourteen days is a long time at one stretch(p.2). The main reason that soldiers on the front line could not sleep was to be on guard against enemy sneak attacks. Another reason that the soldiers were very tired is that night was used as a time for preparation and maintenance of the trenches. The trenches were constantly being destroyed, either by enemy shellfire, or water damage. Many times, soldiers would be buried alive by the collapsing trench walls. Paul, in All Quiet on the Western Front, states Our trench is almost gone. At many places, it is only eighteen inches high, it is broken by holes, and craters, and mountains of earth.(p.107). Along with very little sleep and the destruction of trenches, soldiers also had to worry about contracting trench foot. Trench foot is an infection of the feet caused by wet and insanitary conditions. Soldiers stood for hours on end in waterlogged trenches without being able to remove wet socks or boots. This caused their feet to gradually go numb and their skin to turn red or blue. If these conditions went untreated, they would turn gangrenous and result in amputation. Another major concern for

Early Latin America CCOT Essay Essays - Free Essays, Term Papers

Early Latin America CCOT Essay Essays - Free Essays, Term Papers Early Latin America CCOT Essay Thesis: Throughout the settlement of the Spanish in Latin America, ____ changed through _____, while ______ persisted through _____. PRIMES of Latin America Conquest (14921570s) Political: Unplanned: King and Council of Indies will take charge To rule, Spain created administrative institutions: the governorship, the treasury office, and the royal court of appeals staffed by professional magistrates Spanish legalism was part of the institutional transfer Religion: missionary sent to convert (catholicism) voluntary + coerced conversion The Mission, Valladolid debate (treatment of natives in the new world spanish city valladolid) De Las Casa (one cannot go to heaven if they keep killing natives, supported natives and wanted them to be protected. Harsh treatment of natives. Nonviolent solutions are available.) The church, represented at first by individual priests and then by missionaries such as the Dominicans, participated in the enterprise By 1530, a cathedral was being built on Hispaniola, and a university soon followed Intellectual: Everything is renamed in Spanish > Latin America Wealthy Creoles went back to Spain to complete education Cities: recreate Spain along grid lines churches maintained records of births deaths etc. (creoles vs peninsularesmake sure creoles cant gain any political/religious power) Military: conquest areas of resistance Disease and conquest virtually annihilated the native peoples of the Caribbean Depopulation of the laboring population led to slaving on other islands, and in 30 years or so, most of the indigenous population had died or been killed natives had no weapons, therefore Spaniards saw them as weak and easily conquered Economy: Route to Asia Spanish and Italian merchants began to import African slaves to work on the few sugar plantations that operated on the islands Looking for trade with Asia Trading ports: possession of gold silver, spices. Spanish take over land, Portugese not as much. Encomienda land to noble > collect taxes from them, as well as the must buy goods from producer Mita > forced labor > Potosi Mines Encomienda + Mita > led to loss of natives (early on) communal manufacturing + farming, provided food + clothing, for domestic market. Disease and conquest virtually annihilated Social: 85% white men small population = tropical dependency Goal: 2 separate republics > miscegenation > depopulation > blacks + miscegenation. As early as 1510, the mistreatment and destruction of the American Indians led to attempts by cleric and royal administrators to end the worst abuses Bartolome de Las Casas (14841566) Dominican friar who initiated the struggle for justice Conquest was not a unified movement but rather a series of individual initiatives that usually operated with government approval Topics of the Exam 1. Renaissance Italy: Greco Roman Humanism/ Individual worth Cultural, Arts/ Literature Intellectuals (John Locke) 2. Reformation: M.L. (95 Theses) R.C.C. abuses, corruption Translated the Bible German vernacular John Calvin French theologian during the protestant reformation. Believed in predestination, monergism, and damnation (punishment for actions committed on earth) 3. Enlightenment Locke Vs. Hobbes (absolutism) Limited Monarchy (Result) 4. Columbus + historical time period 5. Bourbon Reforms Charles III (enlightened despot) reign mid 1700s higher profitability of spanish colonies reforms taxation system grants monopolies to spanish corporations: Cuban Sugar, Buenos Aires: Coffee, Salted Beef, Seeds Spanish flooded local economy w/ cheap goods (local handicrafts/industries cant compete w/ cheap spanish goods Method: New Vice Royalties : New Grenada (1739) Rio de la Plata (1778) Reformation of Mining techniques means more silver for the crown Local Magistrates replaced by provincial governor who report directly to the crown Local Creole Autonomy diminished Increase resentment Creoles wanted independence. Effective? Short term yes for the spanish economy and increase in Spanish control over colonies, but long term resentment of crown by most social classes Settlement Primes (second period) Political: Treaty of Tordesillas (The pope split the world into two where the west would be left for the Spanish to conquer and the east was left for the Portuguese to conquer) Professional bureaucracy based on Spanish system of Legalism Royal Nomination of church officials (govt side by side with church) Encomienda system: Grants of lands Spanish (Indigenous People=labor) Religion: Clergy Missionaries Forced Conversions Church hierarchy develops Churches were set up 1) Pope 2) Cardinotes 3) Archbishops 4) Bishops 5) Priests Loyal to mother country Spain Church not available to natives forces them to follow catholicism and be obedient and pay their funds. Intellectual: Church establishes universities to 1. Convert People 2. Record Birth and Death Record traditional Culture Economic: Silver Mines (Forced Labor) Mercantilistic Policy Social: Arrival of Spanish Women Transatlantic slave trade Castas system develops 1. Racial hierarchy developed Multiracial society is developed Middle Upper class women's patriarchal society Black man + Spanish Women = Mulatto Machismo = male dominated Lower class women enjoyed more social mobility because they owned small business in villages and towns Encomienda system: Grants of

Journal Topics Involving Different Perspectives

Journal Topics Involving Different Perspectives Writing in classroom journals is one powerful strategy to get students to respond to literature, gain writing fluency, or increase dialogue in writing with another student or the teacher.  Journal writing is a great way for students to stretch their thinking and look at things from different perspectives. Most journal writing is done in the first-person point of view, using  I. Journal writing can also be from an omniscient point of view, with the writing is done from an all-knowing perspective. The following topics cause the writer to predict or try to things from an unusual perspective. These may be highly creative, such as describe the events of yesterday from the perspective of your hair. Journal Topics on Perspective Students should have fun as they stretch themselves for these journal writing topics. What one non-living item would you take from your house if it caught on fire?Which five of these things (make a list) would you take from your house if it caught fire?Pretend you met an alien and explain school to him/her/it.Set your clocks ahead to the beginning of next school year. Where are you and what are you be doing?What would you do with a million dollars? List five things you would buy.Youve landed on another planet. Tell the inhabitants all about the earth.Youve gone 500 years back in time. Explain plumbing, electricity, cars, windows, air conditioning and other conveniences to those you meet.What animal would you be? Why?If you were your teacher, how would you treat you?Describe a day in the life of (choose an animal).Describe how you feel at the dentists office.Write about the time as a child you played in a place you thought was magical: a treehouse, a cornfield, a construction site, a junkyard, an abandoned house or barn, a stream, a playground, a swamp, or a pasture.De scribe the perfect place for you. What if your teacher fell asleep in class?Describe the life of your locker.Describe the life of your shoe.If you could live anywhere, what would you choose?If you were invisible, what would you do first?Describe your life five, ten, and then fifteen years from now.How would do you think your parents views would change if they walked in your shoes for a week?Describe your desk in complete detail. Focus on all sides and angles.List twenty-five uses for a toothbrush.Describe a toaster from the inside.Assume you are the last person on earth and have been granted one wish. What would it be?Imagine a world that contained no written language. What would be different?If you could step back in time to relive one day, what would you do differently?You discover you have only six weeks to live. What would you do and why?Imagine you are 30 years old. How will you describe yourself as you are today?Describe how you would feel if you were YOUR parent. What would you do differently?Describe how you would feel if you were YOUR teacher. What would you do differently? What would you do if you were locked inside your favorite department store overnightWhat would you do it all the electricity in the world just stopped?  Ã‚  What would you do if you could travel free anyplace in the world?  You being chased by a villain or villainous group through an abandoned warehouse.  Why?Consider the phrase ‘If I’d known then what I know now, I never would have†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢Ã‚  Finish this sentence: Thats what happens when you follow your heart...Have you ever faced a difficult situation that required making adjustments? What adjustments did you make?The local TV reporter holds a microphone under your nose and says, Channel 14 is doing a survey. Wed like to know: What really matters to you?Describe the group you most identify with and tell why the members of that group might identify with you.  Would you like to be famous? Why or why not? What would you like to be famous for?What advice would you give to someone who stole something but now feels guilty?How do you define beauty? What things do you think are beautiful? If you were a fly on the wall in your house, what would you see your family doing?Script your acceptance speech for an award you never thought you would receive.Script your response to a surprise party...when you already knew about the surprise.Write a letter to a character in a Disney movie.  What do you plan to say to a friend who borrows things from you but never returns them?Write from the perspective of a ghost. What frightens you?We often dont know our own strength until something really gets in our way. Write about a time when you stood your ground.List ways you can entertain your friends without spending any money.

Ways of Praying Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Ways of Praying - Essay Example Prayers of corporate confession focus on the wrong that is committed jointly, rather than the sins of each person. Paul Bradshaw, in his book Two Ways of Praying, describes these prayers as cathedral prayer and monastic prayer. Cathedral prayer is mainly led by ordained, formally appointed ministers, while in monastic prayer each person in the community takes obligation to take turn at the reading, speaking or singing that is part of the prayer (Bradshaw, 1995). Cathedral prayer is the obligation of the whole congregation while monastic prayer is more of individual activity. In addition, cathedral prayer is mainly outward, involving occasional gatherings for prayer that is reinforced by praise and intercession. Monastic prayer is mainly inward-looking, that is communicated through a person’s mind and heart, and thus it assists in forming the person who prays. Moreover, cathedral prayer is supported by externals of worship actions and materials such as candles and vestments, wh ile monastic prayer does not necessary require material support, since it mainly involves silent meditation. Generally, prayer enable us to communicate with God by allowing us to be aware of the encounters with God we experience at various times of our lives. Prayers therefore help us to learn to arrive with fullness of our heart, mind, body, feelings, and experience into the living presence of God and to receive the revealed fullness of God’s own heart, word, body, love, and reality for us in ever-deepening mutual intimacy (Dahill, 2005, p.10). The next part of this paper will be based mainly on corporate prayers of confession in the church. One’s spiritual wellbeing is much related to the spiritual wellbeing of others, thus, goodness of the community is very essential for the goodness of individuals. God uses confession as a means for helping people to move past their sins to better and deeper self lived existence within the communal interdependence. Through corporat e prayers of confession, community is able to turn away from sin and begin the process of healing from the suffering. This type of confession enables community to receive God’s will towards wellbeing, as the sins are washed away because they normally block the community from receiving the goodness. Sins therefore lead to isolation and fragmentation of our society, as we concentrate on seeing the problems as originating outside ourselves, rather than concentrating on ways of resolving these problems as a community. Fragmentation in turn leads to powerlessness, as fragmentation makes us focus on perpetuating the problem rather than participating in forms of it resolution (Suchocki, 1996, p.80). The powerlessness makes people to refuse responsibility for problems that are caused by evils in our society; hence, they distance themselves from efforts to seek forgiveness and addressing the problems. The powerlessness makes people to be more individualistic, thus, the church does not confess its corporate sins. By church shunning confessions of its corporate sins, the God’s merciful power of social renewal is left uninitiated, as church member are more concerned about addressing their individual problems while hiding from the social aspects of all personal sins. Christians therefore become more involved in privately confessing their personal sins, while forgetting that personal confession only is not sufficient to attract God’s forgiveness for social sins of our society. As individuals, we participate in various corporate evils that warrant corporate confession. When the church

Presidential Perspectives Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Presidential Perspectives - Essay Example The difference between Democrats and Republics is apparent in American politics. Democrats and Republicans differ mainly in terms of philosophy, worldview, ideologies, and politics. Democrats are more of socialists and hold that the duty of the government is welfare of the people regardless of individual interests. They support government sponsored programs such as healthcare as well as subsides. Republicans, on the other hand, elevate economic equity and free market; they believe that solutions lay with the people rather than the federal government. Hence, they are more of capitalists, promoting property rights over welfare rights. They also decry active government interference in the economy. Obama’s policies and Mitt Romney’s are contrasting and apparent due to their political divides, which shapes their philosophy, worldview, ideologies, and politics. Alperovitz (2011) asserts that power structure in the United States can be analyzed in four rival approaches, namely: pluralism, State autonomy, elite theory, and Marxism. Pluralism theory holds that groups such as unions and professional associations, civil rights activists, business and financial lobbies govern America. Liberalists assert that there are multiple centers of power, which yield a colossal bearing in the making of laws and policies. According to Alperovitz (2011), state autonomy stresses that the government is always an autonomous force due to its control of military. Hence, they conclude that the government in the United States is the central source of power. Elite theory stipulates that leaders of large organizations inevitably dominate key sectors of the society and that America is no different. Finally, Marxism argues that property owners dominate the society. Those who hold power are predominantly those who own means of production. Policy issues such as taxes, trade agreements, and labor standoffs are a manifestation of this fact. Obama’s ideologies

Dimensional Analysis Lab Essay Example for Free

Dimensional Analysis Lab Essay In this Lab the students were required to do several tests and measurements and then convert these units into other units. There were five tests in all. The first test was measuring the average of three broad jumps in centimeters then find out how many jumps it would take to travel one mile. The second test involved measuring a candy bar (for my group we used a snickers bar) then finding out how many snickers bars end to end it would take to wrap around the equator of the earth. For the third measurement we had to find out how many tootsie rolls were equivalent to a five pound tootsie roll. For the next test we had to find how long it took in hours to get to the center of a tootsie pop. For the final test we had to calculate our speed in mph then find out how many days it would take to get from Indianapolis to Chicago if you only walked five hours a day. The materials we used were a gram scale, tootsie roll, tootsie pop, snickers bar, and a meter stick. Materials 1. gram scale 2. tootsie roll 3. tootsie pop 4. snickers bar 5.

Realm of Labor Essay -- Labor History, Technological Revolution

Separation can develop from anywhere or anyone over periods of time since people’s needs, desires, and goals are very diverse. The variety of people with dissimilar interest can cause tensions among groups, especially in the modern age. There are three categories that contributed to the physical and abstract separation all within the realm of labor: workers versus machines, skilled versus unskilled labors or workers, and immigrant versus non-immigrant workers. These three all intertwine and connect to one another under the world of labor. Along with lectures, historians and writers Herbert G. Gutman, J.M. Roberts, Ann L. Stoler, and Rudyard Kipling addressed the causes and consequences brought about from the three categories, which led to separation. The effects divided workers among themselves, thus created the idea of separation. Before the modern age, workers generally created their own products by hand, but this type of labor process has changed drastically with the rise of new technology and resources. Due to this change, workers were unconnected to their products; since they were no longer involved in the production, they were essentially separated from the creation. During the Industrial Revolution and the Second Industrial Revolution, otherwise known as the Technological Revolution, the rise of technology brought in new machinery that replaced workers. Machines controlled workers; as mentioned in lecture, workers lost all control when they were part of the assembly line. Also in Charlie Chaplin's film, Modern Times, workers had little or no control over the pace of the work, and the smallest distractions can slow down production. This was how workers and labor were described in the mechanized world. Herbert G. Gutman exp... ...inctively divided people; immigrants came in to work and better their lives and lives of their family, but instead were discriminated against and driven out. What make people different in society can result in the process of separation; it can be positive in terms of originality for an individual, but disastrous in the workplace. Separation in labor was proven to cause tensions among workers who were skilled, unskilled, immigrants, and non-immigrants. The division among them was both physical and abstract; the machines separated them as well as race and their own views. People were forced to unite and work together, but their differences created isolation and an inefficient work environment. It is inevitable to group diverse people in one place without conflicts. Separation was analyzed as an outcome of how people work, behave, and interact with others in society.

Andrew Carnegie Essay

The rise of capitalism was characterised by exploitation and opportunity. Opportunities, if taken at the chance, enabled men to access wealth. Andrew Carnegie is the perfect example of an entrepreneur and man who built the roots of American infrastructure. He can also lived the ‘perfect’ American dream. He has a typical ‘rags to riches’ story, which makes him a historical icon and an admirable man. Carnegie is known to have built a fortune on steel. However, the ways in which he made money could be considered an abuse to ethics and moral rights. Toward the end of his life, Carnegie decided to use his wealth for the greater good of the community and encouraged learning. For the above reasons, he can be considered as a robber baron, but I believed that he also worked for the greater good of human nature. Carnegie was able to take opportunities to create a vast fortune. He came from absolutely nothing, but is known as a captain of industry. He monopolised wealth, transport and infrastructure. He was born in Scotland in 1835. His family migrated to America in 1848 when he was thirteen. As a young boy, he worked in a cotton factory in Pittsburgh. He did not have many years of schooling nor attended university but he became the richest man on the planet during the industrial revolution. In this sense, he is the incarnation of the American Dream. One of Carnegie’s sayings; â€Å"The first man gets the oyster, the second gets the shell† explains his career fully. Carnegie had the ability to identify and seize opportunities, to foresee what would happen to industries and to take risks. He also stated that; â€Å"people who are unable to motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity no matter how impressive their other talents† show his ambitiousness. Carnegie was not content with commonplace. His ability to seize opportunities and invest in them helped greatly his career. He saw potential in telegraphing and transport. While he was working in the railroad industry, in 1859, he saw a connection between steel and infrastructure. Carnegie grabbed the opportunity and created a successful steel company, a great example of capitalist exploitation. Carnegie’s steel company, Carnegie Steel, which opened near Pittsburgh in the 1870s, is an example exploitation during the rise of capitalism. Carnegie created employment. The way he ran his company can be believed to be an  abuse of manpower and human capacities. His workplace was similar to modern day sweatshops. He made men work hard. They had long hours, twelve hours per day, six days per week, in extremely poor working conditions. Because steel was in demand at the time, due to the advancements in steam engines, Carnegie decided to keep costs low to attract more people. However that meant that he kept his workers’ wages low as well. This resulted in violent labour strike in 1892. Carnegie always preached for rights of workers and unions. However his actions did not match his rhetoric. A major strike at Carnegie Steel was a clash between capitalism and workers’ unions. It was bloody and violent. It lasted five month. During that time Carnegie went to Scotland and left the company’s general manager, Henry Clay Frick in charge. 300 Pinkerton armed guards were posted around the factory and ten men were killed. Carnegie’s only way out of this dilemma was to sell his factory. He sold it to J. Pier Morgan, for $480 million, in 1901. Andrew Carnegie turned his career from capitalism to philanthropy. When Carnegie sold his steel company to Morgan, he became the â€Å"richest man on earth†, said Morgan the day he bought the company. In 1889, Carnegie had published an essay, in which he stated that, â€Å"the rich have a moral obligation to distribute their money in ways to promote the welfare and happiness of the common man†. He also said that, â€Å"the man who dies rich thus dies disgraced†. During his life he gave away more than $350 millions. Carnegie supported education and reading. He donated money to 2500 libraries around the world. The particular thing about Carnegie’s philanthropist career is that he did not just want to help people; he wanted to help others help themselves. He gave away his money for the improvement of mankind. For example, giving money away to libraries instead of people allowed mankind educate themselves. Consequently, education became easier to access for everyone. Carnegie became one of the most famous philanthropists, a complete opposite to the man whom exploited people in his factory. Andrew Carnegie was both a robber baron and a philanthropist. In my opinion, he worked for the greater good of human nature. He was a man who took opportunities to make his career, as well as giving other opportunities. Even though he exploited people, and the working conditions in his steel  factory are an example of that, he offered them jobs, and a way to make money for their families. I agree that in the end he â€Å"helped others to help themselves†. His massive donation of $350 millions shows his change of heart towards the end of his life. As Carnegie, grew up in a poor social class, I believe that he wanted to give others similar opportunities as he strived for. Giving them a chance for education and free access to libraries. The millions of dollars that he donated gave others a chance to improve their lives. I believe that Andrew Carnegie is a man to be remembered as one whom sought better mankind.

Rationalizing Economic Development and Environmental Sustainability Essay

There happens to be a two-fold task governing the existence of economic development and environmental stability – national progress towards economy depends on natural resources, and natural resources needs replenishment to continue the cyclical mode of economic development. In this manner, these two important national concerns continuously exist with a common approach of relationship. Indeed, the economy depends on the environment and the stability of the environment likewise opts for support from the sectors enriching the economy. In issues occurring between economic development and environmental stability, there are claims that the arousal of the economy inhibits the constancy of the environment. The energy sector primarily is one of the fundamental avenues governing this relationship. An exemplification of such is the report of Woodwell and Ramakrishna (2004) entitled â€Å"World Bank undermines efforts on global warming†: It states there that the World Bank favorably considered the continued support for the expansion of new-fangled sources of fossil fuels, one of the principal causes of climatic distraction. It came up with a decision that interests on recommending support to the less developed countries which are good prospects that can sell oil or gas or coal to the world markets. Furthermore, the alleged deed brings back into the limelight the ongoing inconsistency between the voices of the scientific community that provokes on the world’s state, and the ears of what the economic and political communities bear. In fact, the environment is being changed in conduct that annihilates its life-supporting capacity. Instead, it seeks for immediate efficient steps to stop the erosion. Such report only signifies how the trend of coming up with possible sources of oil, gas or coal can be much of a danger to the environment, to the inhabitants surrounding the possible resources, and to the planet earth as well. Global warming for the past decades continuously alarms the people of its degrading effects on the environment. Drastically, different industries governing the economy surely have directly or indirectly implied to such dilemma. In lieu with this, the question is back to basic – â€Å"What does the environment do to the economy? † Indeed, there is a need to assess the economic value of the environment through its fundamental means, ways, and processes. Taking a look with CIDA’s Policy for Environmental Sustainability, an article called â€Å"Assessing the Economic Value of the Environment† states that taking into consideration the economic values implied to all environmental values, which may be of cultural, aesthetic, or spiritual, is not possible. Moreover, programmers are in constant need to assess the environment’s value to know its value in economic terms, and to assess the economy’s value to identify its value in making of environment decisions. In contrast with the macro and micro level, there is a need to emphasize the pros and cons of doing economical activities that may affect that of the environment. Furthermore, the article â€Å"The Complicated Interrelationships of Poverty, Population and Natural Resources† from the same policy states the sophisticated interrelated web of cause and effect relationships among poverty, population growth, degradation of natural resources and natural resource consumption (11). Three factors such as population, environment and poverty are commonly indivisible. In this manner, such dilemma is perceived in most of the less developed and highly populated countries. Most of the highly populated countries accumulate much of its resources creating a slash on its natural resources yet may incur a probable high or low effect to its economy. Indeed, in terms of economic development and environmental sustainability, the whole process is inevitably diversified. With this, the relationship between the economy and the environment takes action upon the people and their surroundings. Works Cited Woodwell, George M. and Ramakrishna, Kilaparti. â€Å"World Bank undermines efforts on Global Warming. † The Boston Globe 11 August 2004. â€Å"Assessing the Economic Value of the Environment. † January 1992. Canadian International Development Agency. 13 April 2007 â€Å"The Complicated Interrelationships of Poverty, Population and Natural Resources. † January 1992. Canadian International Development Agency. 13 April 2007

Writing Prompts and Topics for the Easter Holiday

Writing Prompts and Topics for the Easter Holiday Journal writing teaches elementary school students to think creatively and gives them an opportunity to practice writing without the pressure of a right or wrong answer. You may or may not choose to review journal entries for correct grammar and spelling, but lifting the pressure of producing a polished piece often frees students to just enjoy the process. Many teachers see a marked improvement in overall writing ability in a short time when they use journals in the classroom. Try to make time at least a few days each week for your students to express their thoughts and feelings through words. Writing Prompts Holidays and other special occasions make good writing prompts because children generally look forward to them and enthusiastically share their thoughts on the topic. Easter writing prompts and journal topics inspire  students to write about the Easter season and what it means to them. It also gives teachers an opportunity to learn more about their students personal lives and how they celebrate the holiday. Suggest that your students share their journals with their parents at the end of the year; its a priceless gift of a scrapbook filled with mementos straight out of their childs mind. You can let your students write stream-of-consciousness style with few restrictions or provide more structure for a journal entry with length recommendations and suggestions for details to include. The main goal of journal writing should be to help students lose their inhibitions and write with the  pure purpose of writing for the sake of writing. Once they get the hang of letting their thoughts flow, most students really enjoy the exercise. Topics for Easter How do you celebrate Easter with your family? Describe what you eat, what you wear, and where you go. Who celebrates Easter with you?What is your favorite Easter book? Describe the story and explain why you like it best.Do you have an Easter tradition with your family or a friend? Describe it. How did it start?How has Easter changed from when you were really little to  now?I love Easter because†¦ Explain what you love about the Easter holiday.How do you decorate your Easter eggs? Describe the colors you use, how you dye them, and what the finished eggs look like.I once got a magic Easter egg†¦ Start a story with this sentence and write about what happened when you received the magic egg.At the perfect  Easter dinner, I would eat... Start a story with this sentence and write about the food you would eat at your perfect Easter dinner. Dont forget dessert!Imagine that the Easter bunny ran out of chocolate and candy before Easter ended. Describe what happened. Did someone c ome along and save the day? Write a letter to the Easter bunny. Ask him questions about where he lives and what he likes most about Easter. Tell him how you celebrate the holiday.

Brooklyn Bridge Construction and History

Brooklyn Bridge Construction and History Of all the engineering advances in the 1800s, the Brooklyn Bridge stands out as perhaps the most famous and most remarkable. It took more than a decade to build, cost the life of its designer, and was constantly criticized by skeptics who predicted the entire structure was going to collapse into New Yorks East River. When it opened on May 24, 1883, the world took notice and the entire U.S. celebrated. The great bridge, with its majestic stone towers and graceful steel cables, isnt just a beautiful New York City landmark. Its also a very dependable route for many thousands of daily commuters. John Roebling and His Son Washington John Roebling, an immigrant from Germany, did not invent the suspension bridge, but his work building bridges in America made him the most prominent bridge builder in the U.S. in the mid-1800s. His bridges over the Allegheny River at Pittsburgh (completed in 1860) and over the Ohio River at Cincinnati (completed 1867) were considered remarkable achievements. Roebling began dreaming of spanning the East River between New York and Brooklyn (which were then two separate cities) as early as 1857 when he drew designs for enormous towers that would hold the bridges cables. The Civil War put any such plans on hold, but in 1867 the New York State legislature chartered a company to build a bridge across the East River. Roebling was chosen as its chief engineer. Just as work was beginning on the bridge in the summer of 1869, tragedy struck. John Roebling severely injured his foot in a freak accident as he was surveying the spot where the Brooklyn tower would be built. He died of lockjaw not long after, and his son Washington Roebling, who had distinguished himself as a Union officer in the Civil War, became chief engineer of the bridge project. Challenges Met by the Brooklyn Bridge Talk of somehow bridging the East River began as early as 1800, when large bridges were essentially dreams. The advantages of having a convenient link between the two growing cities of New York and Brooklyn were obvious. But the idea was thought to be impossible because of the width of the waterway, which, despite its name, wasn’t really a river. The East River is actually a saltwater estuary, prone to turbulence and tidal conditions. Further complicating matters was the fact that the East River was one of the busiest waterways on earth, with hundreds of crafts of all sizes sailing on it at any time. Any bridge spanning the water would have to allow for ships to pass beneath it, meaning a very high suspension bridge was the only practical solution. And the bridge would have to be the largest bridge ever built, nearly twice the length of the famed Menai Suspension Bridge, which had heralded the age of great suspension bridges when it opened in 1826. Pioneering Efforts of the Brooklyn Bridge Perhaps the greatest innovation dictated by John Roebling was the use of steel in the construction of the bridge. Earlier suspension bridges had been built of iron, but steel would make the Brooklyn Bridge much stronger. To dig the foundations for the bridge’s enormous stone towers, caissons- enormous wooden boxes with no bottoms- were sunk in the river. Compressed air was pumped into them, and men inside would dig away at the sand and rock on the river bottom. The stone towers were built atop the caissons, which sank deeper into the river bottom.Caisson work was extremely difficult, and the men doing it, called â€Å"sandhogs,† took great risks. Washington Roebling, who went into the caisson to oversee work, was involved in an accident and never fully recovered. An invalid after the accident, Roebling stayed in his house in Brooklyn Heights. His wife Emily, who trained herself as an engineer, would take his instructions to the bridge site every day. Rumors thus abounded that a woman was secretly the chief engineer of the bridge. Years of Construction and Rising Costs After the caissons had been sunk to the river bottom, they were filled with concrete, and the construction of the stone towers continued above. When the towers reached their ultimate height, 278 feet above high water, work began on the four enormous cables that would support the roadway. Spinning the cables between the towers began in the summer of 1877, and was finished a year and four months later. But it would take nearly another five years to suspend the roadway from the cables and have the bridge ready for traffic. The building of the bridge was always controversial, and not just because skeptics thought Roebling’s design was unsafe. There were stories of political payoffs and corruption, rumors of carpet bags stuffed with cash being given to characters like  Boss Tweed, the leader of the political machine known as Tammany Hall. In one famous case, a manufacturer of wire rope sold inferior material to the bridge company. The shady contractor, J. Lloyd Haigh, escaped prosecution. But the bad wire he sold is still in the bridge, as it couldn’t be removed once it was worked into the cables. Washington Roebling compensated for its presence, ensuring the inferior material wouldn’t affect the strength of the bridge. By the time it was finished in 1883, the bridge had cost about $15 million, more than twice what John Roebling had originally estimated. While no official figures were kept on how many men died building the bridge, it has been reasonably estimated that about 20 to 30 men perished in various accidents. The Grand Opening The grand opening for the bridge was held on May 24, 1883. Some Irish residents of New York took offense as the day happened to be the birthday of Queen Victoria, but most of the city turned out to celebrate. President Chester A. Arthur came to New York City for the event, and led a group of dignitaries who walked across the bridge. Military bands played, and cannons in the Brooklyn Navy Yard sounded salutes. A number of speakers lauded the bridge, calling it a Wonder of Science and lauding its anticipated contribution to commerce. The bridge became an instant symbol of the age. Its early years are the stuff of both tragedy and legend, and today, nearly 150 years since its completion, the bridge functions every day as a vital route for New York commuters. And while the roadway structures have been changed to accommodate automobiles, the pedestrian walkway is still a popular attraction for strollers, sightseers, and tourists.

Skill Application Evaluation Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Skill Application Evaluation - Essay Example The texts and phone calls always lead to disagreements with her. The messages have no significant meanings. Besides, anytime I humbly pass my positive intentions to her through the phone, I only receive negative odds; she misinterprets the intentions since she thinks that I am furious. I have chosen the activity to build a relationship by communicating supportively with my elder sister in order to heal our family relationship. I feel unreal associating positively with friends rather than my sister who is a family member. I am aware she does not intend to do anything to harm me. I am dedicated to give Kerry, my sister, a chance in my life. In addition, I intend to offer her an opportunity to be a sister who can listen and reason with me. Whenever our parents speak, they support and encourage us to be friends and solve our differences amicably. Consequently, our parents silence us to find lasting peace for us. Therefore, the activity I chose for building relationships by communicating supportively and engaging in supportive communication as problem-oriented and not person-oriented, assisted my sister and me, into knowing each other’s character and learning from one another. This skill application in problem solving has assisted me in gaining and learning human differences in terms of character and, hence building my relationships through effective supportive communication. When solving disagreements an individual experiences various problems. In settling conflicts between my sister and I, I experienced challenges from developments of different characters displayed by my sister, since most of the communication between my sister and I, were commanded and dictatorial. One of the characters was my sisters raised voice during the discussion period. Moreover, Life at home was unbearable between my elder sister and i. There were many miss-understandings on how we associate and interact daily. My daily experiences with her concentrated on arguments and

Compare & contrast Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Compare & contrast - Essay Example y are worthless and this is mainly due to the fact that teachers no longer care to find out whether their students have received the knowledge they have been taught or not. It looks at the various ways through which students can be motivated to get interested in their studies so that their education can be beneficial not only to them, but also to the society in which they will work. Education is one of the most important things in the world today; in fact, it is considered a basic human right by most international organizations. In this paper, we shall look at two articles with different approaches to education and we shall compare these approaches to each other. In this paper, we shall compare the different approaches that these two authors have suggested as a remedy for filling up the gaps in education both in the workplace and at school. We shall look at the following: an approach to education, failures in the education system, and finally, the actions to be taken to ensure that education is beneficial. Feuer and Sherry have suggested very different approaches to ensure that people get the necessary education to be able to excel in life. Feuer states that there are so many books on sales each having its own approach that it can be confusing for those who would like to learn more about it. He suggests that it is always best to ensure that those people who are learning about sales are taught only the most important points which they may use when doing their work. There is no need to overeducate them because this will only lead to their confusion during the sales process. Sherry, on the other hand, states that teachers are no longer paying attention to their students’ educational welfare and instead tend to pass them along to the next class even though they have not learned anything in the previous class. This results in the failure of the education system because many of those who receive high school diplomas tend to be practically illiterate and this is all

College Learning Experience Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

College Learning Experience - Essay Example Having spent a couple of months in the university, I am confident to say that the experience has already altered my outlook in life and has somehow enriched my maturity. Through my interaction with my classmates and professors, I am now more receptive of the various ideas presented in the classroom and have also learned to distinguish those which are helpful and those which are of less significance. Armed with the little knowledge and skill I have learned so far, I am more determined to finish college and pursue a degree in nursing. The decision to take up nursing is based on my assessment of strength in biological sciences and my desire of sharing my innate passion of enlightening and caring for people. With a higher level of maturity, interest in learning, and time management skill, the first semester proves to be fruitful indicated not only be the higher grades that I am earning but by my social and moral growth.

Policy on Refugees and Integration in Costa Rica

Policy on Refugees and Integration in Costa Rica COSTA RICAN GOVERNMENT POLICY ON REFUGEE AID AND INTEGRATION INTRODUCTION: THE AMBIGUOUS STATUS OF THE REFUGEE AND COSTA RICA The problem of the refugee originates as a peculiarly twentieth century phenomenon. The displacement of peoples from the very borders that delineate states presented a historical challenge that threatened the integrity and the essence of the latter. As the philosopher Giorgio Agamben abstracts the pertinence of this problem: Every time refugees no longer represent individual cases but rather a mass phenomenon (as happened between the two wars, and has happened again now), both these organizations and the single states have proven, despite the solemn evocations of the inalienable rights of man, to be absolutely incapable not only of resolving the problem but also simply of dealing with it adequately.[1] For Agamben, this inadequacy of the treatment of the refugee problem, despite the international consensus on the existence of the human rights of the refugee, is intimately tied to the theoretical shortcomings of the notion of the Nation-State itself; there is a consistent rupture in t he functionality of the Nation State when confronted with the anomaly of the refugee, i.e., when a subject is separated from his/her state, this subject becomes a disturbing remainder that other states find it difficult to account for. Thus, insofar as the refugee denotes a certain failure of the Nation State to protect its citizens/non-citizens, the case of the refugee denotes the limit of the State. Nevertheless, despite the tension between the notions of the refugee and the state that ground their relationship, there is an attentiveness to this problematic (evinced in Agambens own remark), demonstrated by the general consciousness of the existence of the refugee. Hence, regardless of any discerned policy inadequacies, there still exists a concerted effort to address the problem. The success of various refugee policies certainly may be evaluated, e.g., as with Agambens negative evaluation. In the case of Costa Rica, its treatments of the refugee crises that began in 1980s Central America was an example of some moderate successes, or at least, the desired mobilization of a states capabilities via governmental policy towards the refugee cause. However, this mobilization encountered its own distinct problems, over-determined (following Agambens abstraction of the problem) by the irregular status of the refugee him/herself. The successes and failures of Costa Ricas refugee policy is a particularly significant case study for numerous reasons. To the degree that there was a concerted effort from the Costa Rican officials to alleviate the refugee crisis, the shortcomings relate not to Costa Ricas negligence of this crisis (thusly indicating the direction of an evaluation of this policy in terms of a general apathy on the part of Costa Rica), but the opposite: it is this very effort that provides a compelling case for an analysis of a refugee policy in terms of its affectivity and its limits. That is, Costa Ricas attempt to rectify their refugee problem, rather than ignore it or deal with it in a manner that undermines the notions of the rights of man, provides an excellent paradigmatic case for the possible indexing of refugee policy. It is because of this very commitment to alleviating the problem that Costa Rica, despite any subsequent further critiques regarding the details of their refugee policy, is recognized by the international community as having advanced a fairly successful policy in regards to refugees. As Tanya Bysok notes Costa Rica is often cited as a model for refugee settlement.[2] However, this is not to suggest that the Costa Rican approach is flawless. Whilst some policies of the Costa Ricans have been recognized as effective by social scientists, this praise does not diminish the evident gaps in the Costa Rican policy. In this paper we shall examine the Costa Rican treatment of the refugee and attempt to understand how the refugee was integrated/or non-integrated into Costa Rican society. This analysis will be concerned with Costa Ricas approach; however, whilst there was a clear Costa Rican governmental policy, a significant factor in the Costa Rican case is the large presence of foreign organ izations that were encouraged to participate in a possible refugee solution. Thus, because of the Costa Rican openness to a diversity of aid organizations and volunteers offering support, the qualitative analysis of the success/failures of the Costa Rican approach cannot merely be attributed to the Costa Rican government itself. Whilst this encouragement of international participation may be logically viewed as an autonomous gesture of the Costa Rican government, it can also be construed as Costa Ricas self-acknowledgement of having been fundamentally overstretched in terms of its capabilities to handle the problem. Secondly, this analysis shall be supplemented with an anonymous questionnaire of former refugees in Costa Rica, in order to introduce a non-theoretical personal discourse within the parameters of our text. The method of the questionnaire is placed into the paper to act as a balancing point with the theoretical evaluation. The emphasis on the notion of testimony, a form of empiricism all its own, forwards an account of the Costa Rican policy that evaluates the countrys treatment of refugees from a theoretical standpoint, while also acknowledging the power and significance of such a testimony. COSTA RICAN REFUGEE INTEGRATION ANALYSIS The genesis of Costa Ricas refugee problem may be preliminarily abstracted as a matter of geopolitical positioning. Costa Rica occupied a hazardous place within Central America in the 1980s. The relative stability of Costa Rica was contrasted by the neighboring conflicts in El Salvador, Panama, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Honduras: The 1980s evinced a certain explosion of such geopolitical and ideological tensions in Central America, from which Costa Rica was spared. As Martha Honey notes, the Costa Rica of the 1980s â€Å"appeared to be an oasis of tranquility†[3] It is this status of a certain oasis in Central America, that evidently yielded Costa Ricas refugee problem: as a stable nation, it represented the destination of choice for refugees seeking to avoid war in their native lands. Costa Ricas stability as a source for refugees has continued in the time period since the beginning of the 1980s. Yet the refugee that Costa Rica encounters now is substantially different: Refuge es coming into Costa Rica today tend no longer to be from Central America but instead the vast majority are from Colombia. Many are middle-class, urban professionals.[4] Thus, by no means is the refugee in Costa Rica a homogeneous figure. The wars across Central America in the 1980s that led to such displacement are no longer a significant factor in present Costa Rican refugee policy. The Costa Rican encounter with the phenomenon of the refugee begins in 1980 with increasing hostilities in the neighboring country of El Salvador. The immediate reaction of Costa Ricas treatment of this refugee influx distinguished itself from other nations such as Honduras. Whilst Honduras policy favored the internment of the Salvadorian refugees in camps, Costa Rica from the outset emphasized the process of making the refugee self-sufficient; they sought to sever any dependency of the refugee on the state apparatus itself, while simultaneously integrating the refugee into Costa Rican society. These two approaches immediately evince a lucid difference in treatment. In the case of Honduras, this treatment may be viewed as an isolationist approach, insofar as the site of the camp becomes the home of the refugee it does not represent a zone of inclusion, but rather one of suspension moreover, it is an implicit acknowledgment of Honduras government inability to deal with the phenomeno n of the refugee, placing the refugee in a certain no-mans land, as it waits for the conflict in the home country to cease. In contrast, the Costa Rican emphasis on autonomy and self-sufficiency denotes the acceptance of the refugee immediately into its boundaries. We can abstract this difference in terms of a synchronous thinking and a diachronous thinking. In the case of Costa Rica, the policy does not introduce the phenomenon of two times, i.e., waiting for the war to stop rather, the interruption of the refugee experience is directly addressed, through a minimization of this interruption that is a policy of refugee inclusion in Costa Rica. On the other hand, in the Honduran approach, two times are articulated, a wartime and a non-war time. There is no possible mediation between the times; there is only a case of transition and thus, a passivity on the part of the government that is then transferred to the refugee him/herself this interruption that is the refugee event determines the entire Honduran policy. In essence, Costa Rica attempted to establish the continuity of the refugees’ life, allowing for the possibility of a normalcy to remain in the face of a crisis. Such initial successes of the Costa Rican programme may be attributed to a certain history of human rights discourse that emerges in the country, i.e., that Costa Rica was conducive to internationalism in its support of UN programmes and its own creation of international approaches. This historiographical element is significant to understanding the immediate difference of Costa Rica from its neighbors, as it stresses a historical Costa Rican commitment to human rights. As Alison Brysk notes, Costa Rica qualifies as a global good Samaritan because its record of human rights promotion is enduring and multifaceted, and it makes a meaningful contribution to globally significant initiatives.[5] Hence, Costa Ricas Good Samaritan status is derived from its fidelity to such initiatives on both a regional and global level. Among its contributions, Costa Rica was involved in the peace negotiations that ended three regional civil wars, while also functioning as the seat for the Inter-American C ourt of Human Rights of the Organization of American States (OAS). On the international level, Costa Rica was involved with international organizations such as serving at the initial prepatory conference for the founding of the United Nations, while also initiating the UN Childerns Fund. These historical contributions of Costa Rica may be construed as establishing a certain tradition within Costa Rica that made it more receptive to the specific demands of the refugee influxes that began in the 1980s. Thus, from an ideological perspective, there was nothing in the Costa Rican state ideology that would be adverse to the refugee; rather, the ideology was committed to human rights from its outset. This tradition may help to understand the initial successes of the Costa Rican programme. In the initial stages of the refugee problem in the 1980s, because of such an international tradition of Costa Rican policy, there was no shortage in the country of foreign and international refugee organizations that participated in the alleviation of the crisis. As Basok summarizes these contributions: A number of government and voluntary agencies have participated in refugee settlement [in Costa Rica]. They include local branches of such international organizations as Caritas, the Episcopalian church, and the YMCA. In addition, refugees themselves formed a number of voluntary organizations in the hope of assisting their compatriots. Apart from providing emergency aid to refugees, the UNHCR has also financed most of the refugee urban projects. Financial assistance has been provided by other international NGOS as well.[6] The plurality of non-governmental actors demonstrated a Costa Rican openn ess to the refugee crisis. Moreover, the possibility of refugees themselves forming aid organizations demonstrated a certain autonomy of the refugee within Costa Rica; despite the loss of nationality that is the refugee displacement, the refugees were granted a freedom to organize and assemble regardless of their anomalous status. These international organizations were also complimented by Costa Ricas own approach, which has been termed as the durable solution model, emphasizing integration of refugees into the country of asylum. As an unpublished UNHCR document describes this durable solution model: Self sufficiency projects are the ultimate aim of UNHCR as they allow the refugees to become independent of emergency assistance and be productively integrated in the receiving community. In the under-developed countries with serious unemployment problems, self-sufficiency projects offer the best alternation for the refugees work problem. For the receiving country, these durable solutions are a contribution to the national economy, particularly the projects which include both nationals and refugees.[7] Costa Ricas commitment to what the UNHCR deemed as the most effective program for refugee crisis further explicates the traditional openness of Costa Rica to international consensus, whilst concomitantly identifying Costa Ricas desired integration of refugees. The UNHCRs evaluation further acknowledges the durable solution as beneficial to the new country of the refugee itself: the influx of labour sources provided a boost to the national economy of Costa Rica. Thus, Costa Ricas commitment to the durable solution model may be viewed as both a commitment to international law and the notion of human rights, whilst also a policy decision how to utilize the refugee crisis for the benefit of Costa Rica itself. Nevertheless, what may be termed as Costa Ricas comprehensive solution, insofar as it incorporated the UNHCRs preferred model while simultaneously allowing for the participation of foreign organizations, nevertheless encountered specific problems. Primarily the non-organizational model’s intervention into the refugee problem was problematic: The results, however, were less than satisfactory. In 1985 it became evident to the UNHCR that less than half of the 152 projects registered with government agencies were still active. Most of the others had failed.[8] The infectivity of the multiplicity of organizations according to the quantitative data of the UNHCR tends to suggest that the approach of a strength in numbers, i.e., multiple organizations engaging in the refugee crisis, was unsuccessful primarily because of a lack of cohesion. Inasmuch as the Costa Rican intent was essentially one of no aid is bad aid†, this ultimate failure speaks to a certain consistency needed be tween organizations, in order better to establish links between groups, and affectively address the grounding problem, that of the refugee him/herself. This bureaucratic entanglement between organizations as detrimental to the refugee is easily discernable from the perspective of the refugee him/herself; because a plurality of organizations exists, the refugee is caught in a bureaucratic system, with no connection to the Costa Rican government itself. This serves as an impasse to the desired integration. This collapse of the various international programs led Costa Rica to attempt a more autonomous policy that would be regulated by the government, therein optimistically hoping to marginalize the previous failures through a centralization of refugee policy. This centralization would enable a consistent discourse of the durable solution to emerge in the Costa Rican space. As Ed Mihalkanin notes After the failure of many of the international and domestic refugee projects, the Costa Rican government tried to integrate refugees into already existing jobs.[9] By Costa Rica directly addressing the problem, this focusing of the remit of refugee policy could better serve the goal of integration: as the refugees are located in Costa Rica, the most efficient means towards integration would be to have the government directly involved in the refugee process by opening economic opportunities to the refugee. This shift reflects a certain fundamental ambiguity at the heart of the general theory of refugee policy. While, prima facie, the plurality of non-governmental organizations that operated in Costa Rica to alleviate the suffering of the refugee may be viewed as a logical step, inasmuch as it emphasizes giving aid to refugees in light of any possible limits to the capabilities of the Costa Rican government, this approach simultaneously suspends the notion of an integration into Costa Rican society. That is to say, if integration is the ultimate goal of Costa Rican refugee policy, such integration can only be engendered by the direct intervention of the government itself, as the government is ultimately congruent with Costa Rica. From this perspective, the collapse of the aid programmes emanating from various international sources may be viewed, in actuality, as a step towards a more direct involvement of the Costa Rican government in the refugee problematic, in terms of a more strident form of integration. This strident form would be necessary if the Costa Rican government would become the primary instrument for refugee aid in the nation, as opposed to the organizational plurality. Nevertheless, after the general failure of the international aid programmes, charity organizations, etc., the new Costa Rican government initiative itself faced various de jure issues that prevented the establishing of a greater remit for refugee aid. As Mihalkanin writes, at times Costa Rican laws actually prevented refugee aid, despite any best intentions of the Costa Rican government. This was the case regarding Costa Rican employee law: â€Å"Yet very few work permits were issued since by law only ten percent of a firms workers can be foreigners.†[10] Thus, the attempt to integrate refugees into the Costa Rican labour force already met opposition in a pre-existing law that marginalized the possibility of foreign workers in Costa Rica. As Mihalkanin notes, despite the intent of both the government to integrate the refugees and the employers’ will to aid the refugees by giving them work, this shared movement encountered a double impasse: the de jure situation of the l abour law, coupled with the de facto situation of employers, whom, although giving refuges a workplace, could not register the workers because of the law. Therefore, any type of de jure integration of these refugee workers who were already working in Costa Rica, was not possible because of the law; despite their labour power, and one must conclude, the desire for this labour source, the separation between the de jure and the de facto situation prevented this opportunity at integration. What occurred then is simply a missed opportunity, a miscommunication between government and private sectors, the latter wholly receptive to the influx of refugee workers, but whose hands were metaphorically tied by the Costa Rican law. This problem of the limits of aid in the sphere of labour relations also extends into the basic human rights of Costa Ricans, such as health care: insofar as health care is available to refugees in Costa Rica, access is limited from both a temporal and financial perspective. As a UNHCR report from 2003 noted, â€Å"in Costa Rica, access to social security services is universal, which means that everyone, regardless of nationality, is entitled to health coverage at a very low cost.†[11] Nevertheless, the caveat here is that â€Å"refugees and asylum seekers are entitled to free healthcare cover during their first three months in Costa Rica.†[12] This leads to an immediate problem facing refugees after the three month period of coverage has elapsed; as Gloria Maklouf Weiss, Director of ACAI (Asociacià ³n de Consultores y Asesores Internacionales), a UNHCR partner in Costa Rica recapitulates this problem: â€Å"some refugees are in such economic hardship that they cannot pay even the very small monthly fees.†[13] Thus, considering the situation of the refugee, the three-month time limit appears insufficient for health care coverage. The securing of an employment opportunity in Costa Rica within this same three-month period would have to be a concomitant aim of a programme; otherwise, the benefits of the Costa Rican health care policy are severely limited by the refugees’ inability to generate capital. On this point, the separation of the spheres of employment and healthcare impede the abilities of the refugee to begin a life in Costa Rica; insofar as employment and healthcare are considered as distinct issues, the benefits of healthcare are separated from the refugee labour force. The weakness therefore in this aspect of the policy is not anticipating the contiguity between employment integration and the possibility of health care. It is examples such as these incongruities in the law and policy of Costa Rica itself that failed to provide a comprehensive programme for its refugees. Thus, whilst Costa Ricas position as a stable country remains attractive to refugees in a time of crisis, various gaps in the system prevented a comprehensive plan to address the phenomenon. QUESTIONNAIRE The data in section 2.0 regarding Costa Rica’s history and policy approach to the refugee crisis only provides one side of the picture. This theoretical analysis of Costa Rican refugee policy, considering the constraints on any discourse of this style, is to be supplemented by a questionnaire submitted to four former refugees in Costa Rica. Whilst the sample size of the questionnaire is admittedly small, the necessity of its inclusion rests on a theoretical significance given to the notion of testimony in an effort to verify or contradict the reading provided of Costa Rican refugee policy. The prejudice of the academic discourse is to be alleviated through the survey presentation; thus, the purpose of the questionnaire is based on a theoretical value attached to testimony and the attempt to provide a more complete picture of the refugee policy of Costa Rica. Because of sensitivity to the time concerns of the participants and because of issues with the English language, the que stionnaire was deliberately simple and limited to four questions. QUESTIONNAIRE ANALYSIS While the sample size is admittedly small, and the nature of the questions direct, the data of the questionnaire would seem to indicate a moderate level of satisfaction with the Costa Rican refugee policy. The option for the refugees in Costa Rica appears to be beneficial; the majority of answerers expressed that integration and employment possibilities were available in Costa Rica, whilst also noting the receptivity of the various refugee organizations to the concerns of the refugees. It is germane to note that the questionnaire deliberately avoided inquiring into the personal history of the participants, in respect for ethics and the privacy of the participants. While this may be construed as detracting from the accuracy of the questionnaire, as it brackets out some of the personal histories involved in the participants, the aforementioned ethical position of protecting privacy was taken as paramount. Rather the questionnaire was to function as a cursory testimonial survey of Costa Rican refugee policy, and thus, while no means a complete account, it does indicate that the Costa Rican option for refugees was more positive than it was negative. CONCLUSIONS The difficulty of the refugee problem primarily lies in the problems it engenders vis-à  -vis the traditional structure of the State, which relies for its function on the notion of citizenry. Inasmuch as human rights become an international imperative, the anomalous appearance of the refugee conflicts with the traditional State model. This tension is however a source for the production of new approaches to the refugee problematic. Costa Rica’s position in the ravaged Central America of the 1980s placed the nation into a role of a paradigm case for refugee policy. The Costa Rican approach must be commended at the outset for its commitment to human rights and the welfare of the refugees. The intent of the Costa Rican policy therefore must be viewed in a positive light. However, the complications that arose from the refugee crisis provide valuable data and source material for the possible improvements of refugee policy. Costa Rica’s acceptance of foreign, international and non-governmental charitable organizations to alleviate the crisis, whilst helping the refugees on the â€Å"terrain†, actually hindered the successful integration of these refugees into Costa Rican society, inasmuch as these organizations, as non-Costa Rican entities, actually created a further distance between the refugee and the Costa Rican state. Moreover, once the majority of these organizations had failed, the Costa Rican government was left to complete the so-called â€Å"durable solution.† The impasses to the â€Å"durable solution† may be traced to employment and economic laws of the Costa Rican state, laws which were unable to successfully meld with the desired â€Å"durable solution.† It is various de jure factors, despite the overall Costa Rican government intent and the intent of the private sector to integrate refugees through employment, which hindered the affectivity of this solution. Nevertheless, Costa Rica is still referred in some academic literature as an excellent example of a refugee policy. This seems to be supported by the anonymous questionnaire that was a part of our research; the questionnaire, while its sample size is admittedly small, nonetheless offers a certain support to the notion that Costa Rica was more effective than not regarding the refugee experience. Thus, whilst there are problematics in the policy of Costa Rican refugee integration, it is nevertheless a paradigm from which numerous positives can be drawn, whilst also providing a better insight into the impasses that may present themselves in such a policy: hopefully these cases, will yield a better approach to the difficult notion of the refugee in the future. BIBLIOGRAPHY Giorgio Agamben, â€Å"We Refugees†, accessed at: http://roundtable.kein.org/node/399 Tanya Basok, Keeping Heads Above Water: Salvadorean Refugees in Costa Rica McGill Queen’s Press: 1993. Alison Brysk, â€Å"Global Good Samaritans? Human Rights Foreign Policy in Costa Rica†, in: Global Governance, Vol. 11, 2005. Martha Honey, Hostile Acts: U.S. Policy in Costa Rica in the 1980s, University of Florida Press: 1994. Ed Mihalkanin, â€Å"Refugee Aid, Displaced Persons, and Development in Central America† in: Refugee Aid and Development, Greenwood Press: 1993. UNHCR, â€Å"Health Fair in Costa Rica gives refugees much needed medical care†, March 6, 2006, accessed at: http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/EVOD-6MNF3L?OpenDocument> 1 [1] Giorgio Agamben, â€Å"We Refugees†, accessed at: http://roundtable.kein.org/node/399. [2] Tanya Basok, Keeping Heads Above Water: Salvadorean Refugees in Costa Rica, pg. Xvii. [3] Martha Honey, Hostile Acts: U.S. Policy in Costa Rica in the 1980s, pg. 4. [4] UNHCR, â€Å"Health Fair in Costa Rica gives refugees much needed medical care†, March 6, 2006, accessed at: http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/EVOD-6MNF3L?OpenDocument> [5] Alison Brysk, â€Å"Global Good Samaritans? Human Rights Foreign Policy in Costa Rica†, in: Global Governance, Vol. 11, 2005. [6] Basok, pg. Xviii. [7] Basok, pg. Vi. [8] Basok, pg. Xviii. [9] Ed Mihalkanin, â€Å"Refugee Aid, Displaced Persons, and Development in Central America† in: Refugee Aid and Development, pg. 90. [10] Mihalkanin, pg. 90. [11] UNHCR, accessed at http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/EVOD-6MNF3L?OpenDocument> [12] UNHCR, accessed at http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/EVOD-6MNF3L?OpenDocument> [13] UNHCR, accessed at http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/EVOD-6MNF3L?OpenDocument>