Effective Team and Performance Management Essay - 6

Effective Team and Performance Management - Essay Example The benchmark for turnaround times range between 12 p.m. and 2 p.m. The team leader ensured that each team member was equipped with bottled oxygen and steroids for emergency in case of serious exhaustion. Our team reached the Southeast Ridge Balcony approximately five and half hours after departure. This is one of the most difficult points to climb. Our team gradually ascended along the Balcony from around 8 a.m. to 10 a.m (Kayes, 2004). Did the team project work as expected or not expected? The team project did not work out as planned because not all members reached the summit. Most gave up ascending at Hillary Step due to wastage of time and snarl-ups. One of the expedition leaders breached the agreement regarding the order at which each team would begin for final summit. The team was not armed with radios for communication. One our team member was severely exhausted when we reached the Southeast Balcony. I together with another team pulled the climber with assisted with guide Sher pa. Moreover, our team was caught up in bottleneck. We could not proceed beyond that point because safety ropes had not been fixed. Our team together with other teams joined hands to secure the fixed safety ropes to secure our next mountain climbing session. This marked the onset of series of bottlenecks that were to occur in the course of our climbing. Our sojourn at Hillary Step took roughly an hour. Again, we were caught up in traffic snarl up, since long queue of climbers behind us was waiting for their turn to climb. Ropes had not been fixed as anticipated. We could not communicate to those below us, because we lacked radios. Unnecessary anxiety and confusion among climbers was looming. This point was approximately 28,800 feet beneath peak of Mount Everest. The previous climbers had not secured the ropes to facilitate ascent of those below at reasonable time (Kayes 2004). As a result, some team members arrived at the summit beyond the stipulated deadline at 2 p.m. The bottlenec ks had ripple effects, because it affected the whole operation. Things went astray between 4 p.m. to 5 p.m., because whiteout occurred, which grounded descent to near halt. The turnaround time was set at 12 hours after departure. The bottlenecks caused delays so that 6 hours past the deadline, snowstorm occurred and halted descent. Some team members ran out of oxygen supply. Fatigued ensued. Some team members were conspicuosly absent. The team members who abandoned the summit attempt at snarl up, and few climbers who successfully reached the summit, started arriving at Camp IV between 4.30 p.m. to 6 p.m. What factors contributed to your experience (e.g. personal, social) Mountain climbing at Mount Everest offered opportunity for unique research experience. Authorities restricted public investigations. As a result, empirical data regarding the Mount Everest Disaster of 1996 remains scanty. Also, the chronology of the tragedy was never archived. In order to create sense, the team crea ted chronology of possible events after painstaking review of observations by witnesses and survivors. A recent study (Kayes 2004) highlighted importance of integrated multiple analytic approach to tragedy sense-making. In order to ensure rational chronology of events, each team member conducted individual research, independence of chief investigations outlined in scholarly articles. The chronology was mounted on narratives, which contained

Puplic Opinion and Political Communication - International Political Essay

Puplic Opinion and Political Communication - International Political Communication - Essay Example The September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center prove the universality of the statement that nothing in this world is fireproof. Nothing, and absolutely nothing – is completely free from unprecedented terror. Today, the United States will vouch for that, as Washington has taken all possible damage-control measures to ensure that its people breathe easy. However, unforgettable times can never be erased completely – they can just remain hidden. While the attack on the WTC on September 11 woke America from its complacency, what followed the attack is nothing short of incredulous. The attack affected not just Americans, but also those â€Å"millions of people† all around the world who had depended on America for a better life. Consequently, Washington had to answer its citizens – all of them. The visible damage control measures involved a steady deal of deliberation, a great deal of communication, and a massive amount of persuasion. America’s communication arsenal was put to the finest test – as the country had to answer to visibly all related parties – from citizens to trade partners. The damage was done – when two architectural marvels were torn down – but the damage control required America to sharpen its most potent weapon, and unarguably, the most required weapon – communication. Indeed, intelligent and thoughtful political communication techniques were the only tools that could bail America out of distress. If communication techniques were not up to the mark, America would have lost millions in terms of investment, damage to property, and loss of life. If today, America is again on its feet, it is all thanks to the marvelous communication techniques employed in those times of distress. So, in this research paper, we will attempt to look at the communication angle with respect to 9/11 attack closely. The impact of 9/11 was felt all around the world, and America has so far done a fine job in

Green Postcolonial Reading in Kocharethi

Green Postcolonial Reading in Kocharethi The present paper proceeds from the conviction that postcolonialism and ecocriticism have a great deal to gain from one another. It tries to spell out some of the obvious differences between the two critical schools, search for grounds that allow a productive overlap between them and define green postcolonialism. The paper then attempts a comparative green postcolonial reading of the first novel in Malayalam by an Adivasi/tribal, namely Narayans Kocharethi (1998) and Mother Forest (2004) the autobiography of the Adivasi/tribal activist, C.K. Janu. This juxtaposition raises vital questions regarding the plight of Keralas (the southernmost state of India) indigenous people in a postcolonial nation. The legacy of colonial modernity, language, education, nationalism, gendered subalternity, cultural history and ecopolitics is examined within the framework of green postcolonialism, thereby indicating the moral urgency for a fruitful alliance between the two critical schools of postcolonial ism and ecocriticism to envision an alternative future. The changes associated with globalization have led to the rapid extension and intensification of capital alongwith an acceleration of the destruction of the environment and a growing gap between the rich and the poor. This has had a significant impact on the terrain in which postcolonialism and ecocriticism operate.While both ecocriticism and postcolonialism are committed to locating the text in the world, they conceive of both world and text in radically different ways. In keeping with a commitment to recognize the land as more than a scape, but a picture and a story in which humans participate along with other life forms, ecocritical conceptions of the world tend to privilege non-urban settings, in which those other life forms predominate. Postcolonial criticism tends to envision the world through urban eyes; an obvious historical explanation being the arrival of Third world intellectuals in the metropolitan centres of the First World. Postcolonial theory has frequently asserted the value of positionality in order to foreground the politics of discursive authority. Positionality has generally been thought to include race, gender, sexuality, and class but has more recently come to include geographical and biotic space. In an era of increasing ecological degradation, the mutually constitutive relationship between social inequity and environmental problems has become more stark and vivid. If pressing environmental crises have spurred the development of environmental criticism in literary studies, the increasing awareness of how such crises have been and will continue to disproportionally impact the vulnerable populations of the postcolonial world have made the nexus of postcolonialism and ecocriticism a particularly urgent area of study. Yet, this intersection is fraught with danger. Ecocriticism has been developed primarily from the perspective of Western critics using Anglo-American literature and has often worked from assumptions, common in Western environmental movements, which are extremely problematic in postcolonial contexts. Different conceptualizations of individual places extend to different ways of conceiving the relationship between the local and the global. While stressing the importance of local place, ecocriticism gains its global focus by encompassing the very earth it studies. Postcolonialism also recognizes an interplay between the local and the global, but in a more cautious, indirect way. Wary of the ideological and material implications of globalizing impulses, postcolonialism admits the force of the global in a way that explicitly prohibits its recuperation into a formula that confirms the place of the individual in a universal order, either of nature or culture. The global and the local come together, not by the way of simple synecdoche, or the relationship between macrocosm and microcosm, but in a way such that each interrupts and distorts the other, thereby refusing the possibility of concrete platial or abstract global belonging (OBrien 142). Rob Nixon points out four main schisms between the dominant concerns of postcolonialists and ecocritics. First, postcolonialists have tended to foreground hybridity and cross-culturation. Ecocritics on the other hand, have historically been drawn more to discourses of purity: virgin wilderness and the preservation of uncorrupted last great places. Second, postcolonial writing and criticism largely concern themselves with displacement, while environmental literary studies has tended to give priority to the literature of place. Third , and relatedly, postcolonial studies has tended to favour the cosmopolitan and the transnational. Postcolonialists are typically critical of nationalism, whereas the canons of environmental literature and criticism have developed within a national (and often nationalistic) American framework. Fourth, postcolonialism has devoted considerable attention to excavating or reimagining the marginalized past: history from below and border histories, often along t ransnational axes of migrant memory. By contrast, within much environmental literature and criticism, something different happens to history. It is often repressed or subordinated to the pursuit of timeless, solitary moments of communion with nature (235). Attempts to distinguish between postcolonialism and ecocriticim are always likely to be perilous; and it is against this uncertain historical background that green postcolonialism has made its recent entrance into the critical -theoretical fray. What is green postcolonialism? Graham Huggan and Helen Tiffin provisionally define the field in terms of those forms of environmentally oriented postcolonial criticism which insist on the factoring of cultural difference into both historical and contemporary ecological and bioethical debates (9). Differentiated experiences of colonialism provide the main historical link here. They also point out a continuing environmentalist insufficiency of postcolonial literary and cultural texts which also works the other way round with postcolonial ecocriticism serving to highlight the work of non-European authors or critiquing the Euro-American biases of certain versions of environmentalist thought (9). Both fields articulate historically situated critiques of capitalist ideologies of development. They also combine a political concern for the abuses of authority with an ethical commitment to improving the conditions of the oppressed. Green postcolonialism brings out a truism that clearly applies to, but is not always clearly stated in, the different strands of both postcolonialism and ecocriticism: no social justice without environmental justice; and without social justice-for all ecological beings-no justice at all. Postcolonial criticism, despite what might still be seen as an unduly anthropocentric bias, offers a valuable corrective to a variety of universalist ecological claims-the unexamined claim of equivalence among all ecological beings, irrespective of material circumstances and the peremptory conviction, itself historically conditioned, that global ethical considerations should override local cultural concerns (Huggan 720). Subaltern Studies as history from the lower rungs of society is marked by a freedom from the restrictions imposed by the nation state. Gramsci speaks of the subalterns incapability to think of the nation. Once it becomes possible for the subaltern to imagine the state, he transcends the conditions of subalternity. A consciousness of subject positions and voices can re-empower languages, deconstruct histories, and create new texts of more dense dialogical accomplishment. Part of the project of postcolonial theory would be to push literary texts into this shifting arena of discursiveness, thus enabling new stands of counter narratives and counter contexts to shape themselves and complicate binarist histories. But polysemic, anticolonial subjectivities and their energies, which defy the definitions of the colonizer, are muted and translated into a monolithic national identity, articulated in the rhetoric of Nationalism in Kocharethi, a Malayalam novel on the Malayaraya tribe by Narayan (1998). The tribals of Kerala are never identified as Malayalis. Unique in itself-their lifestyles and languages are significantly different from that of the dominant mainstream. Narayans Kocharethi, the first novel in Malayalam by an Adivasi, is an historical intervention where, far from being the objects of history, the Adivasis now become its new subjects. Narayan,himself a Malayaraya, does not attempt to depict the historical or mythical spheres of the tribal experience. Instead, he unravels, fifty or sixty years entwined with his own life situations. He deftly challenges the incorrect representations of the Adivasis in contemporary cinema, television and publications. The life described in the novel, with all rituals, ceremonies, customs, faith, institutions of marriage, food, clothing and shelter, recall the period prior to the Renaissance in Kerala. Mans raw encounter with the forces of nature is vividly portrayed. The forest is not only life-generating but also life-consuming. Kocharethi is a brilliant account of the life and nature of the Malayaraya tribe. Marriages occurred between cousins. Women always carried sickles and wre unafraid to kill anyone who molested them. If unable to do that, the very same sickle ended their lives. They were in charge of their sexuality. The arrival of colonial modernity converted forests into reserved forests and plantations. Destruction of the old order,and the onset of a new one created identity crises. Kochuraman, the medicine-man, had always used animal fat. But he later resorts to soda-water and moves to the medical college for treatment. The nuances of this transition in the life of the Malayaraya tribe is poignantly captured by Narayan. The feudal landlord, the king and the British Raj are symbols of the various stages of this transition. The oppressive power of nascent laws and authority perplex and terrify the tribals. Apart from nature, humans also torture them. The Malayarayas were cheated in prices and weights of their forest products when the currencies and measures changed into the British system. This cancerous exploitation by civil society forced them to search for education. Kochupillai the teacher leads them into the light of letters. The dream of a government job, migration into the city, love-marriages all follow. Christian proselytisations also occur, creating a hybid of New Christians- always prefixed by the term arayan. Kocharethi takes place at the fag end of this phase, in the early half of the twentieth century. It encloses a space of transition from the colonial to the post colonial within the imagined boundaries of the nation state. Thus, situated in a later milieu of Indian history, Kocharethi in a way addresses the questions of acculturation and education of the subaltern, in short of the subalterns translation as appropriation. Education as a necessary ploy for moulding homogenous identities came packaged with the label promising equality and liberty. But the subaltern aspires for education in order to be liberated from the land and its woes. Kocharethi is filled with the new subaltern dream of a government job. Narayan makes a feeble attempt to parody this process of modernizing the tribal. But the novel fails in demarcating a political position opposing colonial modernity (Pillai par13). Kocharethi reveals the slow acculturation of the native into the economy, culture and politics of the nation state. The native in Kocharethi falls prey to the project of colonial modernity, which the new Indian state sets out to continue in order to prove its capability to self-rule. Kocharethi depicts the plight of the native subaltern caught in the regulative politics of the infallible nation state, and betrayed by the promise of the participatory citizenship, struggling to find voice amidst the homogenized Babel of nationalist discourses. State hegemony, nationalist ideology, dominant language and cultural interpellation all collude to construct the native of Kocharethi as a passive subject (Pillai par16). Kocharethi embraces and enhances the task of colonial modernity to instill middle class values and bourgeois virtues into the gendered nationalsubaltern subject. The new woman, conscious of her identity, is at the same time out of her roots. As Parvathy, the educated subaltern migrates to the city, the narrative, in an allegorical twist leaves Kochuraman and Kunjipennu stranded in a government hospital, at the mercy of state welfare aids. Thus one sees the articulation of gender being translated into a different idiom by the interventions of the modern state. Narayan assumes a nationalist identity by which he sees education of subaltern women as necessary but not at the cost of losing the essence of their femininity and culture. The women of Kocharethi have no role in the struggle for independence. As Parvathy inhabits the secure space of her home, Madhavan and his comrades go out into the public domain to free the nation, thus lending their subaltern identities to structure the hege mony of a patriarchal nationalist culture. Meena T. Pillai points out that a close reading of Kocharethi reveals the nuances through which gender and ethic relations become inextricably linked to the formation of the Indian state(par 22). The novel provides a framework to picture the formation of India as a sovereign, socialist, democratic, republic, where native and gender identities are subsumed and tokenized to strengthen the unifying logic of the nation. Language is a fundamental site of struggle in subaltern discourses resisting translation, because colonization begins in language. The evident pull towards colonial modernity and nationalist themes in Kocharethi is found in its language too, which is very near to standard Malayalam, the disjunctions being minimal. There is no attempt to capture the linguistic and cultural ethos of the language of the Malayaraya tribe (Pillai par 23). The subaltern community in Kocharethi, having lost its language, having been translated and co-opted into the dominant discourse, has also lost the power to name. Parvathi, Madhavan, Narayanan all names of upper caste Hindu gods, speak of the silencing a culture. A community devoid of its language is a community devoid of dignity. Kocharethi is a giving in, a passive surrender to the larger history of the nation state(Pillai par 26). In postcolonial parlance to have a history is to have a legitimate existence but the text denies itself in this legitimacy of being, in Kocharethi the subaltern is deftly muted by the dominant discourse. The discourse of the colonial modernity and the nation state that one finds in Kocharethi co-opts the native and re-fashions him/her according to the norms of the dominant culture. Subaltern translations of the lingo of the nation and nationalism thus become acts of cultural displacement. Claiming the nation in the language also means being claimed by the nation. no one knows the forest like we do, the forest is mother to us, more than a mother because she never abandons us (Bhaskaran 5). The Life Story of C.K. Janu, is an oral life history, transmitted through a mediator, and illustrates the efforts of the non-literate or non-literary to tell her story. This text provides an opportunity to explore how a woman views herself and how her self-perceptions have in turn affected the choices she has made in her life. Janu, is a tribal activist who wages bitter struggles against the government for the land rights of tribal groups. She received no formal education but became actively involved in the literacy campaign in Kerala and learned to read and write, proving herself to be a natural leader. Her work focuses on the promotion and defense of human rights, peace activism, and the demands of the landless tribal people of Kerala. She was part of the three-member delegation from India on a European tour organized by the Global Action Group, and the lone representative from India at conference in Geneva organized by the United Nations in (1999), as well as an active participant in the second Global Action Group conference held at Bangalore in 2000. By sharing her own vision of survival and ideas on the strategies to achieve positive development, she is serving as a voice for her community which has been silenced for centuries. In her autobiographical narration, Janu gives a passionate account of her struggle to get back the lands of which they were dispossessed. Without any means of earning a proper livelihood, her people fear that they risk losing their identity also. The forest meant everything to the tribal groups. Janu speaks of her childhood and her life in the forest, then as a maid in a teachers home .Her involvement with the literacy programme and other social activities lead to her political awakening. She became a worker for the communist party, but was soon disillusioned by the partys hidden agendas and attitude towards her community. She is well aware of the fact that forest flower beetles cannot argue with city microphones that make great noise, but she will fight unto death for the restoration of the rights of her people. Her narration is an eloquent testimonial to her convictions and courage in mobilizing a protest against the government to restore the alienated land to the tribal people, enabling them to regain their sense of identity. The first part of the book deals more with her inner world and conjures before us a holistic world view where nature and human commingle. The sights of the forest like, the hills catching fire, rains falling like a woman with her hair -shorn, the wild water all blood-red gushing angrily(2), the depth and beauty of darkness and moonlight, flowers blossoming are all enthralling. But the sights of civilzation like Vellamunda with unfamiliar pathways strange hills and little streams. and fields with strange looking ridges that did not look like ours(7) are disturbing, The forest is never quiet. Streams are always gushing, the woods mumble, winds howl, frogs croak and creatures cry. The tribal instruments chini and thudi create their own distinctive notes. But civil society has its radios, motor pumps, loudspeakers and school children to offset this harmony. The smell of virgin earth coupled with that of hunger dominates the forest. Janu remembers vividly that when her mother used to come and visit her in Vellamunda she brought the smell of our huts with her(12) The earth has different smells in different seasons(13) and gives out its scent only when worked upon. Again culture with its chemicals, church fumes, clothes and vehicles is nauseating. More than thirty different kinds of plants, crops and fruits are mentioned. Rice, kappa, chena, kachil, karappayam, mothangappayam, honey, tubers, banana are some of them.Insects, fish, crabs, snakes, elephants, pigs, all give company. The lifestyle described is always full of activity. Rest seems to be unknown. The very first paragraph itself describes around twenty different activities. Here is a single sentence describing work, only after sowing germinating tilling transplanting weeding watering standing guard reaping carrying threshing and making mounds of grain would the jenmi make his appearance(15). The sentences in the first chapter do not start with capitals. Upper cases appear only when an item from civil society is mentioned. For example:Dhotis and Shirts (5) Even the i is in the lower casea true technique indicating holism and dwarfing anthropocentrism. Commas are absent between varied items signifying that dualities are insignificant as in carrying dung to the fields digging up the soil with spades sowing pulling out the seedlings transplanting them weeding watering reaping carrying the sheaves of corn and such (1). Here language does not merely reflect reality but also actively creates it. Lives are strongly interlinked with Nature, the earth and the trees. There was no formal educational system, the forest was everythingguide, guardian and philosopher. Slowly, there came people to take the children to tribal hostels. Janus sister was one to face a similar fate. The conditions of these residential schools and hostels were terrible. They were unclean and lacked buildings, water and electricity. There were no proper toilets or bathrooms. Food and uniforms were rarities. Seeping sewage water invited diseases. The government never cared for the Adivasi children. The narration may be in a prelapsarian tongue very different from what academic establishments expect for a life narration. Such life narrations may be hard to identify with, for those who have not suffered (Menon par 16). Janus autobiographical narration, presented as an extended conversation with an editor, conveys her lack of compromise in her assertions. The shifts in tone, pauses or changes in diction reflect her refusal to erase the inevitable gaps and fissures of the actual narrative events. She is not positioned as a cultural icon, but as an ordinary individual with strong communal feelings (Menon par17). This narration, boldly resists taken for granted attitudes towards these neglected segments of the population and speak for them. Thus, through the narration an effort to locate themselves as a subject, leaving behind the object status to which cultural identities have confined them is made. This text illustrates the need for a revisionary method of reading the discourses of people regarded as marginal to the dominant literary tradition. It also prompts one to re assess the psychological simplicity attributed to marginalized groups. The autobiographical narration of Janu is not merely a retrospective summation of past events and experiences. She genuinely wishes to change the state of affairs in the community to which she belongs. Janu is also aware of her limitations in face of the power plays of a manipulative society. Her narration ends with a desire to know herself more. She wishes to position herself in a more liberated future, not only for her own individual benefit but for the welfare of her community as a whole. The story of Janu acknowledges that each aspect of reality is gendered. She often reminds the readers that within womens experiences there are variety of subject positions and voices to be heard and represented. Hers is a humble attempt to evolve a subaltern essence. It brings an anonymous collectivity to the front of the stage, with great courage, no longer assuming the role assigned to them but asserting their own right to a voice and a part in the action,which deviates from a fixed object position which is culturally intelligible, purposefully locating themselves as subjects and revolutionizing earlier autobiographical writing norms, demanding attention and respect. Development paradigms and development goals which lead to the management of natural resources without the participation and consent of the natural resource communities have to be vehemently criticised. Mainstream right / left political parties do not address the concerns of the communities facing social and market exclusions by neoliberal economic policies. Thus, a subaltern ecopolitics wakes up in its stead. The Adivasi is represented as one who is unable to speak and who is to be benevolently rehabilitated, protected, developed and slowly integrated into civil society. This representation as a people without voice silences them. Hence, if an Adivasi like Janu speaks, it cannot be her voice but someone elses from outside! Orientalist stereotyping on one had portrays them as innocent, naive, nature loving, uncorrupted by modernity and on the other hand as immoral, drunkards and wretched living beings. The Adivasi is thus an eternal other, defenselessly marginalized and unrepresentabl e. The monolithic representation of Adivasis distort their plurality and prevent the expression of their anxieties. While migrant land encroachments are natural and legitimised, the Adivasi struggle becomes unnatural and criminal. Janu is a symbol that defies conventional right/left binaries. For her, the personal indeed becomes the political. No political history of Kerala can now be written bypassing her. She disturbs us. Nature cannot be mystically revered when Dalits and Adivasis are shot dead, nor can one be slaves to revolutionary principles that hide casteist ecological implications. It is only Janus realm of Adivasi/Dalit/Green/Feminist politics that can problematize caste, tribe, gender, class and ecological parameters. She has helped redefine the concept of an Adivasi from simple, helpless, illiterate, and uncivilised into one ready to struggle for the basic rights to live. Thus, reading Kocharethi and Mother Forest within a green postcolanial framework raises a lot of vital questions regarding the plight of Keralas indigenous people in a postcolonial nation. It also indicates the moral urgency for a fruitful alliance between the two critical schools of postcolonialism and ecocriticism to envision an alternative future.

Amelia Earhart :: essays research papers

Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things. Knows not the vivid loneliness of fear nor mountain heights where bitter joy can hear the sound of wings. How can life grant us boon of living, compensate for dull gray ugliness and pregnant hate, unless we dare the souls dominion? Each time we make a choice, we pay with courage to behold the restless day and count it fair." Those were the words of Amelia Earhart in a poem she wrote, entitled "Courage." Amelia Earhart knew a lot about courage. Even when faced with impossible odds, she always had the courage to try and overcome them. She had a never give up attitude that made her so attractive to the public and took the science community by surprise. Without that attitude, she would never have been invited to make her first flight across the Atlantic ocean on June 3rd 1928. Because she had the courage to be one of the only women pilots at the time, she was invited by her future husband, George Putnam, to make the 20 hour 14 minute journey across the Atlantic. Although she was just a passenger on the flight, she was still promoted to celebrity status for being the first woman to cross the Atlantic by plane. Although her fame was set with her first flight, she wanted to promote aviation in women. In 1929, she organized a cross-country air race for women pilots named "the Power Puff Derby." She also formed "the Ninety Nines" a now famous women pilots organization. In addition to forming organizations for women pilots, she occupied her four year break from flying with writing her first book, "20 hours, 40 minutes" on her first flight, became assistant to the general traffic manager of TWA and served as vice president for public relations of the New York, Washington, and Philadelphia Airways. Amelia enjoyed public relations, but missed flying greatly during her four year sabatical. In 1932, no one else had ever flown solo over the Atlantic since Charles Lindberg, and Amelia set out to change that. On May 20th, 1932, exactly five years after Lindbergs flight, she set off for her 2nd journey across the Atlantic. She sucessfully completed her flight, breaking several records. She was the first woman to fly the Atlantic and the only person to fly it twice.

Bharati Mukherjee

Bharati Mukherjee was born to a wealthy Hindu family on July 27, 1940 in Calcutta India (Shilpi, 1998). She was the second of the three daughters of a chemist Sudhur Lal and her mother was Bina Mukharfee. She spent her first eight years with her extended family of about 30 -40 people. She has a family that is supportive and always loves education, so she and her siblings always have abundant opportunities to pursue their academic career. She schooled at Anglicized Bengale School between 1944 and 1948. Later, her father relocated to England due to change in job and she lived there until 1951.This gave her the chances to explore, expand, and acquire more skills in English language. By the time she was ten years old, she had written many short stories and had even known that she was going to be a writers. She graduated with B. A honour from university of Calcutta in 1959, she also did her master in English and Ancient culture from University of Baroda in1961 (Shilpi, 1998). She was awar ded a scholarship from university of Iowa to study and earn her M. F. A. in the year she got married a Canadian writers Clerk Blaise. The courtship of which was not up to 2 weeks.She later got her PhD in English and comparative intensive from University of Iowa in 1969. Prior to her PhD, she travelled with her husband to Canada and became a naturalist citizen. In Canada, she had bad times and the life there was unbearable for her because of their discrimination to some certain people called ‘visible minority’ (University of Minnesota, 2006). Having gone through many things in Canada, she decided to relocate to the United States She has been described as a distinguish woman, who had gone through a lot both the good times and the bad times.She has stated it clearly that she is an American writer of Indian origin and that she utterly rejects the hyphenation of her background i. e. India-American writer. She called herself an immigrant in the country of immigrant. She is cu rrently been celebrated as a professor of English language in the University of California. Achievements She focused mainly on the ‘phenomenon of migration. ’(Shilpi, 1998) which revealed the significance of people migrating from one country to another and the feelings they always feels i. e. feelings of alienation.It also reflects Indian culture. Her writings were based on her personal; experience first as an exile from India, an immigrant to Canada and then an immigrant to the United States. Presently she has authored about eight novels and many short stories and at the same time co-authored two books with her husband. She was the first naturalised U. S citizen to win the National Book Critics’ Circle Awards for best fiction (http://www. ou. edu/worldlit/neustadt-2008jurors. htm). While at Canada, she was able to come up with two good novels despite her condition then i.e. the Tigers Daughter-which describe the story of a girl who went back to her home town Ind ia after many years of loosing contact with home. But all she met and gained was poverty and penury. This story described her personal experience in the first year of her marriage, and her venture back into her home town. Later she wrote invisible woman and the sorrow and terror in conjunction with her husband, to describe her personal experience when she was in the racist land of Canada to the extent that she was still humiliated even as a professor (Shilpi, 1998).Then when she got to united state she wrote one of her short stories ‘isolated incidents’ in which she critically review the Canadians perspective about people moving into their country. She even confirmed how the government official’s maltreated some people from other race. In her second book titled Wife; where she described a woman who out of fear and anxiety murdered her husband and later killed herself when she was suppressed by some men. She talked about her experience when she was caught between two worlds: her home and culture, and how she coped with it.She is gifted at writing novel, short stories, essays, travel literature and journalism. In one of her collections of short stories; Darkness: she focused on the southern Asia that desired success and want to be stable, but, fail to resolve and address the issues of prejudice and injustice. This later followed by the book that actually brought her into a lime light: the Middleman and other Stories which won her an award. This was then followed by Jasmine which was the most widespread and the most read of her novels. Her recent works comprise the ‘Holder of the World’, which was publish in 1993 and ‘leave it to me’ which was produced by 1997.She has faced many critics solely on the issues she normally addresses, and even she has been criticised many times by the Indian writers that in her book she always paint India as a land that has no hope or prospects. Conclusion Having gone through the rigorous discrimination in Canada, she had found a way of reaching out and explaining the whole situation in her writings. This has help to greatly reduce the level of treatment the society at large expresses to their immigrants and this will also proffer good and healthy relationships among different tribes.REFERENCES: Shilpi P (1998): Bharati Mukherjee: http://www. english. emory. edu/Bahri/Mukherjee. html: April 25, 2008 University of Minnesota (2006): Bharati Mukherjee http://voices. cla. umn. edu/vg/Bios/entries/mukherjee_bharati. html: April 25, 2008 Bharati Mukherjee http://www. bbc. co. uk/worldservice/arts/features/womenwriters/mukherjee_being. shtml: April 25, 2008 University of Oklahoma (May, 2008): Jurors for the 2008 Neustadt Prize: http://www. ou. edu/worldlit/neustadt-2008jurors. htm: April 25, 2008 Bharati Mukherjee (Sept. , 1998): Leave it to me http://www. randomhouse. com/catalog/display. pperl? isbn=9780449003961&view=rg: April 26, 2008.

Lady in Her Bath

The Renaissance began in the late 15th century and spanned from Italy to throughout Europe, and it was a rebirth of everything ranging from economy to art. Francois Clouet was a painter to the Kings and his work â€Å"Lady in Her Bath†, embraced this new form of artistic expression. In this paper I am going to explain how the â€Å"Lady in Her Bath† painting reflects the culture and ideology of the Renaissance Era and as well, explain some of the values, influences, themes, and techniques used. I will also provide information about the social, political and religious history of the Renaissance Era that influenced its art and artists. The Lady in her bath was painted in 1571 and is said to be the most interesting painting by Clouet; he is also said to be the first ever artist to use the bath as a setting for a portrait (Answer. com). The painting has all the classical signs of Renaissance art, and is secular in theme and emphasizes the grandeur of the individual. Clouet’s painting shows the culture and ideology of the Era by showing how wealthy the woman was and that she must have come from a wealthy family. It was said at one time that the painting of the woman in this picture was one of the mistresses of Henry II, but that has now been ruled out. She (the woman in the painting) is wearing what looks to be a couple of expensive pieces of jewelry, which in the Renaissance Era, it wasn’t normal for individuals to wear jewelry because most of the people were too poor to buy things that weren’t a necessity to support themselves or their families. Another sign that the woman must be wealthy or from a wealthy family is that she has a fresh bowl of fruit sitting next to her while she is bathing. To the poor, baths were to clean themselves up not for relaxation. Some of the techniques Clouet continued to use were the conventions of the international portrait style which was prevalent throughout the courts of Europe. These techniques were passed down from Clouet’s father, Jean Clouet (Answer. com). Oil painting and water color was also other techniques Clouet used. The term Renaissance is French for â€Å"rebirth†, and it was the rebirth of Europe from the 14th through the early 17th centuries. Europe emerged from the economic stagnation of the Middle Ages and experienced a time of financial growth. This Era turned artistic, social, scientific and political thoughts in new directions. The Renaissance generated three ideas that were frowned upon during the Middle Ages; secularism (the belief that religion has no place in the day to day activities), humanism (the cultural and intellectual movement that emphasized secular concerns as a result of the discovery of literature and art), and individualism (belief in the importance of the individual and the virtues of self reliance and personal independence) (Wikipedia. om). Writers and artists began to focus on the individual and their potential. During the time of the Renaissance Era, people were becoming more aware of Christianity and the Catholic religion was being pushed aside. Religious books were being rewritten and new laws were coming into order as well. The wealthy people were the ones keeping the Catholic religion alive while the poor were the ones converting to Christianity. The â€Å"Lady in her Bath† painting by Clouet is not only a beautiful example of Europe’s rebirth, but of art and the artists during that time; from the new techniques that were being used to the different types of paints from oil to water color. And most significantly, it shows the transition from religious only paintings to more secular paintings that depict just how beautiful the human body is; transforming embarrassment and shame to embracement. References Answer.com. Francois Clouet. Retrieved on 01/16/2013 at: http://www.answers.com/topic/jean-and-fran-ois-clouet French Renaissance. Retrieved on 01/16/2013 at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Renaissance History of the Renaissance, Retrieved on 01/15/2013 at: http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.asp?historyid=ac88 National Gallery of Art: The Collection (2008). Francois Clouet, A lady in her Bath. Retrieved on 01/15/2013 at: http://www.nga.gov/collection/gallery/gg41a/gg41a-46112.html

20 Essay Topics on Nutrition What Is On-Point These Days

20 Essay Topics on Nutrition What Is On-Point These Days If you still face some difficulties with making up a catchy investigation paper topic, you’ll find that some options below may be appealing for investigation as they reveal the leading directions in the nutrition science. Have a look at the provided nutrition essay topics in this article to have an idea of what would be on-point to discuss in your own piece of writing. Proper Nutrition as a Vital Element of Enhancing Physical Exercising Productivity Genetic Predisposition to Obesity or Is the Fat Travelling Through Generations? Proper Nutrition as a Popular Method of Rehabilitation the Patients with Cardiovascular Diseases Statistical Analysis of Cases of Anorexia and the Growing Popularity of Such a Style of Life Among Teenagers Recommended Nutrition Plans for People Who Are Fighting Post Alcohol Abuse Syndrome Psychological Paradigm of Obesity and How Our Brain Tells Us to Eat More and More The Age of Coffee Makes People Become More Dependent on Stimulants. Healthy Solution Options. Criteria for Organic Food Growing And Its Comparison with Non-Organic Variation in Terms of Usefulness for Health Selection of Nutrition Supplements for the Most Optimal Effect on Health Means of Organizing Personal Diet for Rapid Weight Loss and to Avoid Undesired Side Effects The Food That Feeds the Brain – Research on Food That Is Helping the Students to Be More Productive Means of Maintaining Decent Level of Nutrition in Marginal Layers of Society Speculations on Body Index Max and Its Medical Value for Maintaining Proper Weight Chemical Medication for Losing Fat – The Process of Burning Fat in the Body Unbalanced Nutrition Leads to Numerous Psychotic Disorders – Statistical Analysis The Means of Teaching Nutrition Basics Starting with Early Age The Role of Protein for Energy Synthesis and the Lack of It in Modern Food Products The Increase of Antioxidants in Commercial Food as Part of the Program for Increasing National Health Level Regular Water Management as a Part of Maintaining Proper Level of Hydration and Its Positive Impact on Health The Classification of Food Allergies and How to Control the Symptoms Appearance by Proper Nutrition Please, use the topics above as a fine source of inspiration and modify them in the most comfortable manner by narrowing down or investigating some peculiar aspects of the given issues supporting them with interesting facts. As a result, you will manage to come up with both actual and interesting writing project that will have scientific value and become an informative manifestation of your knowledge. Sample Essay: Battling Against Obesity among Children Fatty degeneration among kids occurs more and more often in the USA. Investigators state that the third part of all American children suffers from this health issue. Usually, 95% body-mass index is considered as obesity, although according to the doctors this amount can be critical for health. Parents knowing the reasons and caring about their kids’ obesity have more chances to help the children. Usually, the reason of obesity is the mismatch between calories consumption and their spending. Besides, it may be influenced by a variety of reasons, like lifestyle or genetics, etc. Poor diet is reason number one. If the child consumes too much food containing fat or sugar, then there are all the chances to gain the weight. Candies, fizzy drinks, and fast food are popular nowadays and children eat a lot of them. On the other hand, children are dependent on the â€Å"bad treats† like canned pasta, frozen food, salty snacks, etc. Some families can’t buy meat, fish, fresh fruits, and vegetables. All this contributes to weight gain. Lack of exercise is another cause of fatty degeneration. The rule is simple: if you train, then you burn calories; if you don’t train, then calories are being stored. This scheme works for people of all ages, and children are not the exception. It’s better when the child has an active way of life and is engaged not in sport only, but, for example, active games on the playground. Kids with health issues and bad genetics are also in danger zone. If the child has relatives who suffer from overweight or similar illnesses, he or she is more likely to be obese. Besides, some pills may also become the reason of obesity. On the other hand, if the child suffers from overweight, then there are more chances of appearing the health problems like asthma, heart diseases, diabetes, sleep disorders, etc. Not all the problems come from the body, some of them come from the mind. Kids suffering from poor self-esteem, depression or some stressful events have more chances of obesity. It can be simply explained – they eat their feelings. Fatty degeneration also may be caused by budget and family atmosphere. Children from families with small income don’t have a well-balanced diet, besides ignored or abused kids tend to become obese. Children with overweight usually suffer from various emotional issues: depression, apathy, low confidence, lack of nutrition elements, etc. Many kids with obesity bear the mockery of their agemates and abuse harmful food. Both issues are hard enough to struggle and require proper intrusion and thorough support. To treat obesity effectively, the treatment methods should be applied on regular basis. There are several effective ways of curing child obesity: establishing proper eating habits, engaging in a diet, overcoming stress factors with the help of specialists, protecting children from destructive environments, etc. Children obesity can’t be left without proper cure, otherwise, it may lead to serious health issues in adult age (high cholesterol, diabetes, heart diseases, etc.). Support of parents or teachers and proper education may help children stay healthy. Besides, there are various associations which help both parents and children with treatment, support, and information. Reference: O’Neill Learning Center(2009-2010). Discipline-Specific Writing Guide: Nutrition. In consultation with Jill Hamilton-Reeves, FCNS Dept.  https://www.stkate.edu/pdfs/writing-in-nutrition.pdf Hannah Gardiner(2017). Special Report: 2017 Nutrition Trends What to Watch Out For.  nutritioninsight.com/news/Special-Report-2017-Nutrition-Trends-What-to-Watch-Out-For.html?type=article Lucy Gunn (2018). Sports nutrition mainstreams: A key theme at Vitafoods Europe 2018.  nutritioninsight.com/news/sports-nutrition-mainstreams-a-key-theme-at-vitafoods-europe-2018.html Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2015-2020 Eight Edition. https://health.gov/dietaryguidelines/2015/guidelines/. Dehghan, M., Akhtar-Danesh, N., Merchant, A.T. (2005). Childhood obesity, prevalence and prevention. Nutrition Journal, 4:24.  https://nutritionj.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/1475-2891-4-24