People are determined to find a way to categorize books as

Individuals are resolved to figure out how to classify books as incredible or not. It is difficult to concoct a lot of rules and prerequisites that will empower us to name a book as extraordinary. Everyones see point is extraordinary. We have raised the contemplations of the book serving its reason, and how significant that object is. For a book to be extraordinary it ought to achieve what it set out to do. It would be an uncommon thing for a creator to accidently come out with something extraordinary. The significance of the design is a abstract theme. What is relevant to one may not be to another. The topic shouldn't be dim and substantial for a book to be compelling. An extraordinary bit of writing ought to have you leave influenced. There is no way you will have the option to go to a general agreement on regardless of whether a book is incredible or not. Writing depends on a individual connection between the peruser and the novel. I discovered Lolita, by Vladimir Nabokov, to be an extraordinary book. Essentially, it is a masterpiece. Nabokov uses such delightful language. His verse figures out how to make the peruser abnormally OK with a vile circumstance. It is capable to cause you to identify with somebody you would not regularly. This book additionally goes further, demonstrating the complexities of The names of characters in the book show the duality in themselves. They have dull names, for example, Humbert and J.R.,Jr. These speak to the contending natures inside everybody. All through the book Humbert pronounces his unlimited love for Lolita. He accept the job of a parent, in any event, purchasing books on the most proficient method to raise youngsters. Simultaneously, however, he pays her for sexual favors. Each individual has wants which conflict with what is acknowledged by society. What recognizes Humbert from the lion's share is that he follows up on them. In Humbert we discover a man with characteristics we can all identify with. At ...

Critical Paper Dulce Et Decorum Est Essay

Wilfred Owens Dulce et Decorum Est is a melancholy sonnet of his involvement with the First World War. Owen relates his story as he and individual infantrymen walk Ëœknock-kneed, hacking like witches over the no man's land that is the fight front(line 2). The vast majority of the emphasis is on the depletion from fight, yet changes consideration when Ëœhoots of gas-shells downpour down on their position. Exhaustion rapidly goes to ËœAn delight of bobbling (line 9) as the warriors fit their gas covers, however one trooper isn't sufficiently quick. Owen at that point relates his direct story and downfall of the footman chocking to death from mustard gas. The peruser is compelled to observe this repulsive demise and ask ourselves; ËœDulce et descorum est,/Pro patria mori (line 27-28). Lines 1-8 are utilized to depict a scene of war-torn men on a constrained walk over a no man's land. Such expressions as, Ëœold hobos, and Ëœcoughing like witches gives the peruser a thought of what condition that the infantrymen are in. Such expressions signify a negative picture as to relate the infantrymen as transients in poor state of being. With the individuals who Ëœlost their boots presently get themselves Ëœblood-shod, as opposed to being shoeless. The word shod is an early English expression for shoeing a pony, again negative undertone of the infantrymen as sub-individuals. Lines 5 and 7 offer profundity to the condition of discouragement that general infantrymen are in. Owen picks the expression ËœDrunk with weakness to show the profundity of weariness the infantrymen are encountering. To be tanked, as to be inebriated with the supreme weariness; indicating exhaustion as some medication that overpowers the faculties and coordination. They don't offer trustworthiness to the truth they are in until a gas shell sends them into a Ëœecstasy of bobbling for a gas cover. Euphoria is utilized not to give the implication of pleasure and joy, but instead the unmistakable difference of free for all. Lines 9 and 11 end with Ëœfumbling and Ëœstumbling, individually, to give profundity the infantrymens condition of condition. Afterward, in lines 14 and 16, an affiliation is draw between the inundating gas and a man suffocating. Owen portra ys a man in a green ocean suffocating (line 14) to be later plunging at him (line 16); both giving the reference between being immersed in water or poisonous gas. Once more, in line 17, Owen asks the peruser to Ëœpace.. in some covering dream; a reoccurring subject of being denied of air. The subsequent refrain uses the most throaty undertone of such words as to depict the cadaver. From the Ëœgargling ¦froth-adulterated lungs, to the Ëœvile, serious bruises, Owen needs to electrify the genuine underhandedness of war. The peruser is recounted how gas can Ëœcorrupt lungs and put Ëœsores on blameless tongues. This differentiation is essential since it portrays how war can corrupt what is generally sacred. In saying that the cadavers face hung Ëœlike a fallen angels tired of wrongdoing, gives one more reference among malevolence and war, yet it has another significance. To suggest the fiend would be overpowered with such measure of shrewdness infers that one can't get a handle on the revulsions of war. The sonnet at that point closes with a kind of proposal proclamation that to pass on for ones nation is neither right nor sweet. Dulce starts as a moderate walk of dejected fighters, to a fan race for wellbeing, at that point a moderate, instinctive depiction of life being torqued away from man, restricted to the titles proposal for war panic and promulgation. Be that as it may, the fundamental topic isn't to simply show the leftovers of war yet to give the peruser reality of war. He makes the peruser place themselves on the cutting edge to look at death and sadness in the eye.

What to Do If Youre Addicted to Nicotine Gum

What to Do If Youre Addicted to Nicotine Gum Addiction Nicotine Use How to Quit Smoking Print Have You Become Addicted to Nicotine Gum? By Terry Martin facebook twitter Terry Martin quit smoking after 26 years and is now an advocate for those seeking freedom from nicotine addiction. Learn about our editorial policy Terry Martin Medically reviewed by Medically reviewed by Sanja Jelic, MD on July 14, 2016 Sanja Jelic, MD, is board-certified in sleep medicine, critical care medicine, pulmonary disease, and internal medicine.   Learn about our Medical Review Board Sanja Jelic, MD Updated on November 19, 2019 Image Source/Getty Images More in Addiction Nicotine Use How to Quit Smoking After You Quit Nicotine Withdrawal Smoking-Related Diseases The Inside of Cigarettes Alcohol Use Addictive Behaviors Drug Use Coping and Recovery On the surface,  chewing a couple of pieces of nicotine gum every day is much better than smoking. Cigarette smoke contains over 7,000 chemical compounds; 250 of which are known to be poisonous, and upwards of 70 that have been identified as carcinogenic.?? We also know that inhaling secondhand smoke is hazardous, and for a smoker, its a double whammy because we breathe in both mainstream and sidestream smoke. It puts us at risk for heart disease, COPD, and cancer for starters.?? Research is ongoing â€" we dont yet fully understand all of the dangers that cigarette smoke presents. Nicotine Can Hurt Your Health That said, while cigarette smoke is worse than nicotine alone, nicotine is not a harmless drug. There is growing concern that long-term use of nicotine may contribute to cancer.?? Nicotine also affects how our bodies function â€" it puts stress on the heart and increases blood pressure.? Nicotine harms the linings of our arteries which leads to the build-up of plaque, increasing the risk of heart attack and stroke.?? Additionally, nicotine suppresses insulin output creating a hyperglycemic condition in smokers. Nicotine Can Hurt Your Happiness, Too While its true that the amount of nicotine youre getting daily from the gum may be small when compared to smoking, dont forget that nicotine is addictive.?? Regardless of how much or how little youre using, youre still feeding an active addiction. The message youre sending to yourself is that you cant live without nicotine â€" that youre not strong enough to give nicotine up completely. Recovery Takes Time   Recovery from this addiction involves learning how to deal with lifes ups and downs nicotine-free. If you remain dependent on nicotine, regardless of the form it comes in, you run an increased  risk of a smoking relapse. Additionally, as is the case with habit-forming drugs, your tolerance for nicotine will increase over time and so will your intake.?? When the right (or wrong) situation presents itself, you may find its a short jump to lighting up when a piece of nicotine gum isnt handy or just doesnt do the trick in taking the edge off.  Stressful situations  will continue to trigger  the urge for nicotine  until you clear it out of your system and learn new ways of coping. Dont let the junkie thinking that comes with nicotine withdrawal convince you to keep using. If you managed to stop smoking, you can go one step further and eliminate your dependence on therapeutic nicotine as well. Quitting Nicotine Completely Work out a realistic plan to wean yourself off of nicotine gum. If youre chewing 2 or 3 pieces of nicotine gum per day, start by eliminating just one piece. If there are specific times of the day that you use the gum, e.g. first thing in the morning, after meals, etc, choose the one that is the easiest to let go. Substitute a piece of sugar-free gum or a snack instead, and have a plan for a distracting activity should you need it. Once you are comfortable with the new regimen, repeat the process with the second piece of nicotine gum and then the third until you are off of it  completely. It doesnt matter how much time (within reason) that you take between each elimination. Step down when you are feeling comfortable, always keep your goal in mind. We werent born using nicotine. It is possible to leave it behind for good and get on with your life, comfortably  addiction-free. Dont Be Afraid to Let People Know Whats Going on With You Ask for support, and the load youre bearing will become much lighter. Youll be surprised at how understanding folks are. Dont feel ashamed. You are not the first person who has ever had this problem â€" far from it. You deserve a life that is free of nicotine addiction. Believe in yourself â€" you are strong enough to get nicotine out of your body and out of your life. If NRTs Can Be Addictive, Should You Avoid Using Them? No, but use care with this quit aid. All forms of NRT except for the nicotine patch are easy to misuse because you take a dose multiple times a day. The patch is the only NRT that is applied once in the morning and offers time-released nicotine throughout the day.??  We recommend it as our top NRT pick for this reason. NRTs have helped many thousands of smokers stop smoking successfully. Just remember that they are not intended for long-term use. Follow the manufacturers directions exactly, and wean yourself off the NRT product of your choice in the time period suggested.

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman - 1256 Words

Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† depicts a young woman suffering from depression after the birth of her child. This woman is sheltered away by her husband to a mansion in the country, where she persists to retreat into her mind from lack of other stimuli. Through the narrator’s drastic plunge to insanity, Gilman accurately depicts the limited roles available to women of the nineteenth century and the domineering and oppressing actions men took toward them. In just the first five lines Gilman illustrates the male-dominated society and relationship. John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that in marriage. It was customary for men to assume that their gender knew what, when, how, and why to live. John,†¦show more content†¦It shows how hard it was to live with acceptable obedience in a male-controlled culture while still being aggressive enough to stay alive. Simultaneously, the story shows how hard it was to be good , sensual, supportive, necessarily selfish, and above all, sane. During the day the narrator meekly tries to abide by her husband’s rule, while at night, when her wallpaper woman comes out she does too. Through this symbolism Gilman can express the narrator’s struggle with confinement. The confinement expressed in Gilman’s story represents the confinement women of the 19th century experienced, trapped in their socially accepted ideals. The narrator’s mind, as sick minds will, creates a way to express itself. Through the wallpaper the narrator finds refuge. Although at first she says, â€Å"I never saw a worse paper in my life,† as she slowly gives in to her insanity, she becomes, â€Å"really fond of the room in spite of the wallpaper. Perhaps because of the wallpaper.† It is as if she becomes more comfortable with the wallpaper as it begins to reflect her own existence. She soon realizes the paper has two patterns: a front pattern of bars, and a back pattern of a women â€Å"stooping around and creeping. † As the narrator loses her slim hold on the sanity, her interaction with the women in the yellow wallpaper takes over the narration. She begins to lose sleep staying up at night to watch the women, and at one point she remarks, â€Å"The front patternShow MoreRelatedThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman885 Words   |  4 Pagesbeen a stigma around mental illness and feminism. â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† was written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in the 1900’s. â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† has many hidden truths within the story. The story was an embellished version her own struggle with what was most likely post-partum depression. As the story progresses, one can see that she is not receiving proper treatment for her depression and thus it is getting worse. Gilman uses the wallpaper and what she sees in it to symbolize her desire to escapeRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman846 Words   |  4 PagesHumans are flawed individu als. Although flaws can be bad, people learn and grow from the mistakes made. Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper†, gives one a true look at using flaws to help one grow. Gilman gives her reader’s a glimpse into what her life would have consisted of for a period of time in her life. Women were of little importance other than to clean the house and to reproduce. This story intertwines the reality of what the lives of woman who were considered toRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman1362 Words   |  6 Pagesas freaks. In the short story â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, both of these elements are present. Gilman did a wonderful job portraying how women are not taken seriously and how lightly mental illnesses are taken. Gilman had, too, had firsthand experience with the physician in the story. Charlotte Perkins Gilman s believes that there really was no difference in means of way of t hinking between men or women is strongly. â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† is a short story about a woman whoRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman1547 Words   |  7 PagesCharlotte Perkins Gilman s career as a leading feminists and social activist translated into her writing as did her personal life. Gilman s treatment for her severe depression and feelings of confinement in her marriage were paralleled by the narrator in her shorty story, The Yellow Wallpaper. Charlotte Perkins Gilman was born in 1860 in Hartford, Connecticut. Her parents, Mary Fitch Perkins and Fredrick Beecher Perkins, divorced in 1869. Her dad, a distinguished librarian and magazine editorRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman2032 Words   |  9 Pagesâ€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a poem about women facing unequal marriages, and women not being able to express themselves the way they want too. Charlotte Perkins Gilman was born in 1860, and died in 1935. This poem was written in 1892. When writing this poem, women really had no rights, they were like men’s property. So writing â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† during this time era, was quite shocking and altered society at the time. (Charlotte Perkins Gilman and the Feminization ofRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman904 Words   |  4 Pagescom/us/definiton/americaneglish/rest-cure?q=rest+cure). Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper as a reflection of series of events that happened in her own life. Women who fought the urge to be the typical stereotype were seen as having mental instabilities and were considered disobedient. The societal need for women to conform to the standards in the 1800s were very high. They were to cook, clean and teach their daughters how to take care of the men. Gilman grew up without her father and she vowedRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman999 Words   |  4 Pages â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† is a story of a woman s psychological breakdown, which is shown through an imaginative conversation with the wallpaper. The relationship between the female narrator and the wallpaper reveals the inner condition of the narrator and also symbolically shows how women are oppressed in society. The story, read through a feminist lens, reflects a woman s struggle against the patriarchal power structure. In the â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper†, Charlotte Perkins Gilman uses the wallpaperRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman Essay1208 Words   |  5 Pagesthat wallpaper as I did?† the woman behind the pattern was an image of herself. She has been the one â€Å"stooping and creeping.† The Yellow Wallpaper was written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In the story, three characters are introduced, Jane (the narrator), John, and Jennie. The Yellow Wallpaper is an ironic story that takes us inside the mind and emotions of a woma n suffering a slow mental breakdown. The narrator begins to think that another woman is creeping around the room behind the wallpaper, attemptingRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman846 Words   |  4 PagesThe dignified journey of the admirable story â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† created by Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s, gave the thought whether or not the outcome was influenced by female oppression and feminism. Female oppression and feminist encouraged a series of women to have the freedom to oppose for their equal rights. Signified events in the story â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† resulted of inequality justice for women. Charlotte Perkins Gilman gave the reader different literary analysis to join the unjustifiableRead MoreThe Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman1704 Words   |  7 PagesEscaping The Yellow Wallpaper Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) whom is most acclaimed for her short story The Yellow Wallpaper (1891) was a women’s author that was relatively revolutionary. Gilman makes an appalling picture of captivity and confinement in the short story, outlining a semi-personal photo of a young lady experiencing the rest cure treatment by her spouse, whom in addition to being her husband was also her therapist. Gilman misused the rest cure in The Yellow Wallpaper to alarm other

Comparing The Novel Uglies And The Maze Runner

In today s society, equality is a big deal, with many people still fighting for their rights. People all over the world are still being discriminated against, a topic that is not uncommon for a vast amount of dystopian novels. In fact, it s a very common theme for multiple dystopian pieces. Scott Westerfeld s Uglies, Joelle Charbonneau s The Testing, Liam Hughes The Social Classes, Kurt Vonnegut Jr. s Harrison Bergeron, and Wes Ball s interpretation of The Maze Runner all have social discrimination integrated into their story lines. Despite the many problems in dystopian societies, authors also present the classic hero that rises above those issues and works to rebuild their government or community. However, a hero isn t just born, they re made through a series of events such as problems with social class discrimination. When writing the book Uglies, the author, Scott Westerfeld, used a sufficient amount of details to emphasize the differences in social classes and how each class is distinctly separated. By labeling the citizens in the colonies, Westerfeld was able to show how each class was viewed. The novel follows a character named Tally, who is a teenager living in a time set ahead of our own. In this community there are different stages a person goes through while growing up. All citizens first start out as littlies, or kids younger than twelve. Once over twelve the kids move to their own town, called Uglyville, away from their parents and are

Workplace Racial Profiling Free Essays

One of the fundamental rights any individual has is not to be prejudiced against in the workplace. Regrettably, though, reality does not comply at all times with the law; people maintain to be prejudiced against in many ways. The most important reason for all these problems is the discrimination. We will write a custom essay sample on Workplace Racial Profiling or any similar topic only for you Order Now This inequity at work will not die out by itself. The eradication of discrimination, particularly racial profiling in the workplace, needs purposeful, focused and unfailing efforts as well as policies by all parties involved over a constant time. In times gone by, a remarkable boost in employment population has been occurring. Ever since the early history people of different culture and race have played a derivative role wherein these individuals were and still are perceived as less than the ideal employee. Diversity is significant in the workplace; it connotes differences, difference of race, age, religion, sex, and culture etc. People having diverse demographic differences working as one in the organization makes diverse workforce. And it is turning out to be more significant for the organizations to recognize these differences and manage it.   Diversity is the frequent issue in the workforce atmosphere, in a number of companies employees frequently get discriminated due to the diverse features. So it is significant to manage the diversity workforce to value most excellent performance. Most significant aspect nowadays is to train the managers to manage the diverse workforce. Employing associations appoint in workplace racial profiling to manage workplace traditions. Firms rationalize monitoring as well as regulating employee look through claiming that they have to present to their clients a professional-looking personnel or one that attracts customer preferences. Recognizing the ideal workers as well as preserving a standardized business culture has turned out to be increasingly difficult in the aggressive, culturally-diverse market (Edley 2003, p172). Businesses face challenging demands of inevitability and modernism, which necessitates them to optimize effectiveness of construction and delivery procedures while concurrently expanding new services and products. Racial profiling is classified to members of ethnic or racial minority groups who are beleaguered as probable suspects for precedent or potential crimes. Those who employ in workplace racial profiling validate their practices with a fixed purpose to defend people from the expenses of deviance; the consequences of being wrongly accused of an offence are more unconcealed and discriminating than the costs of having one’s managerial obligation called into difficulty or exhibit choices restrained. As the companies of these days are getting more diverse, the necessity of workplace racial profiling is mounting. All nations are having more diverse workforce daily. So it is turning out to be significant for the companies manage the diversity to acquire better results out of employees. Organizations should recognize that competing productively in the new global marketplace will require more than the up-to-the-minute technology, most proficient production processes and products. With the aim of ensuring consistency, solidity, and control whilst executing this multifaceted business strategy, a lot of firms strengthen their efforts to draw and keep persons who obey the rules to the business customs and have the quality of an ideal employee. Simultaneously, firms aspire to augment employee diversity to meet the terms of lawful pressures, business forces, and ethical demands to build up workers from a variety of civilizing backgrounds. These challenging desires for inevitability (via traditionalism) and modernization (via diversity) generate tensions in several organizations around recognizing the ideal workers. Many managers answered this diversity issue with the claim that discrimination is wrong, both morally and legally. But nowadays, managers are voicing a following concept too. A more diverse workforce will augment organizational efficiency. It will raise self-esteem, bring greater entrà ©e to new-fangled segments of the market, and improve production. Companies leading the way in diversity management discovered that by means of embracing the elements of cultural and ethnic diversity in their workforce they have improved their capability in understanding and tapping new markets, in and abroad. While the decree forbids prejudice rooted in status identities, courts have repudiated to develop the compass of anti-discrimination decree within the administrative centres to forbid workplace policies that set demands on identity performances. By failing to give lawful protection based on identity performance, courts present employers unencumbered judgment to build up apparently unbiased workplace policies that place an encumber on minority employees and offer means for prevailing groups to target minorities in violation minority employees’ rights. All want to eradicate the uneven treatment of people in the workplace. One technique that can be used to hold up equal opportunity would be to initiate legislation to guarantee equivalent pay for equivalent work. The problems associated with this resolution would be enormous. How would citizens gauge the value of a person’s labour to another’s? Who would make a decision to this and how would it be put into practice? People’s attitudes toward their co-workers in the workplace are gradually starting to transform. More opportunities emerge for employees nowadays than ever before. The imbalanced treatment will take years to change in the workplace, but change is actually taking place. This subject will remain until people treat each other equally, based on their skills. Time and again, regrettably, reality does not constantly act in accordance with the law – as people have perceived, people maintain to discriminate other people against in diverse ways: they have less access to the labour market, they earn fewer than the said ‘ideal workers’ and they constantly bump heads against the â€Å"glass ceiling† in promotion pursuit (Litvin 2006, p75). There are many remedies into the workplace that have tried to deal with workplace racial profiling. Though there are many improvements for profiling in the office, there are several inequalities. Remedies are considered necessary to secure all employees an equal role in the workplace. Gender parity can be attained. This can occur when all change the attitudes of all to each other. When all achieve that then everybody else can achieve gender fairness in the workplace. References: Edley, C. (2003). The New American Dilemma: Racial Profiling in the War on our Freedoms: Civil Liberties in an Age of Terrorism. Richard C. Leone Greg Anrig Editions. pp170 73 Litvin, D. (2006). Diversity: Making Space for a Better Case.   Handbook of Workplace Diversity. Alison M. Konrad, Pushkala Prasad Judith K. P How to cite Workplace Racial Profiling, Essay examples

Skills Required at Workplace for Overall Self- myassignmenthelp

Question: Discuss about theSkills Required at Workplace for Overall Self. Answer: Statement Respected authorities, I am currently undertaking a student placement programme at Water-Partners. While undertaking the student placement, I have come to know about the various amazing facts and information about the Water-Partner organization. Water-Partner organization is one of the most recognized firm in the area of accounting(Lee 2017). I am currently being learning and developing skills in the area of advisory services and I would like to bring it into your notice that after working and learning under your specialized teams and management I have developed a core understanding of different concepts of accountings and advisory services. My purpose of writing this statement is to bring into the notice of the management that I read about the requirement of a graduate position at the Water-Partners, and I think I am totally suitable for that position, the requirements for the position are: Bachelor of Accounting / or Business (Accounting Major), Strong communication skills, Proven ability to think critically and problem solve, Ability to meet communicated schedules and deadlines, Ability to work in a diverse team environment etc. The result of undertaking the student placement programme at Water-Partner is that I am now fully capable in the area of communication, critical thinking, problem solving etc. I can work in a team and can easily meet the deadlines of the projects. The main point is that I hold a degree in the course of Bachelor of Accounting. I am elaborating below the skills and capabilities that I have learnt and built at Water-Partner. Communication Skills While learning at Water-Partner, I have developed a deep understanding of how to communicate in an organization about various things that ultimately leads to the achievement of the common goals of the organization. Below are some communication skills that I have learnt at your organization(Greny 2012). Good Listener: When I was studying at my university, I use to be a good speaker, but whenever I was asked questions I use to ignore them, while working at Water-Partner, I developed the skill of being a good listener, now I do not put my point until and unless I listens to everyones opinion. Clarity Concision: Another skill I learnt here is the skill of clarity concision in the communication. I understand fully that how to communicate an information in a clear and a concise manner(Lowndes 2011) Critical Thinking Prior to the student placement at Water-Partners, I never use to question new things, new information etc. But the placement programme at Water Partners has developed three core critical thinking skills in me and that are as under(Browne 2015): Curiosity: Now I am always curious about new things and new information, I want to explore more and more. Scepticism: Now I raise more questions about new things, I never get satisfied until and unless even the little things or doubts about the new information is cleared to me(Shermar 2014). Problem Solving: Working under highly trained professionals at Water-Partners has developed the skill of solving even the most complex problems. Being only the intern at Water-Partner I am only suppose to learn the basics but my curiosity has pushed me to learn the cores of your business and I am assisting the managers at the Water-Partners in solving various problems, this was my reward for being an extra-ordinary intern(Tracy 2010). Proven Ability There is no doubt that I am only an intern that is learning the basics of business at Water-Partners under a student placement programme, but my curiosity to learn new things, my ability to solve even the most complex problems, made the managers to believe in me and they assigned me different tasks of such as making audit reports for clients, selecting the best accounting services for the clients and preparing of balance sheets etc and to be very honest I have performed all the assigned tasks with great success(Kerpen 2013). Meeting Deadlines I have developed most of my skills and capabilities only after undertaking the student placement programme at Water-Partners. Now I am more efficient and effective while working on projects. While working as an intern at Water-Partners I was assigned with 7 different tasks that were to be completed before a specific date and out of 35 interns I was the one who is awarded with Extra-Ordinary Intern award for completing all the tasks before the date(A 2017). Working in a Diverse Team In our university during the second year of accounting programme, we were supposed to work in team of 8 members on different projects. This was not the matter of one or two but for at least 7 months I have worked with different teams and groups on different projects, even at Water-Partners, the interns were suppose to work in different teams in a group of 5, as the Water-Partners have 7 different departments, each team required to work with all the departments turn wise. So I have worked with all the 7 departments and that too in a team that has different persons having different opinions. Accounting Degree In addition to all my skills and capabilities, I also have a degree in the course of Accounting, so I do not hold only the practical knowledge about accounting business but I have good theoretical knowledge too. In my course I am amongst the top 7 students that have secured 80% marks. Conclusion Now at the end of this statement, I just want you to know that I have put all the best of my knowledge in this statement and I think I am the most suitable person for the graduate position that is advertised by your organization. Being an intern at your firm, is another plus point for my appointment as I am already familiar with the Water-Partner Organization. I am looking forward for an early as well as a positive reply. Bibliography A, N 2017, 'Importance of Deadlines', Wall Streets Journals, vol 5, no. 10, p. 33, viewed 1 Jan 2016, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4712479/. Browne, N 2015, 'Asking the Right Questions', Personality Growing, vol 12th, no. 50, p. 4. Greny, J 2012, Crucial Conversations, 2nd edn, Hill productions. Kerpen, D 2013, 'The Art of People', Skills Required at Workplace, vol 5, no. 15, p. 5. Lee, C 2017, 'Position of Water-Partner', Business Weekly, vol 5th, no. 100, p. 2. Lowndes, L 2011, 'How to Talk to Anyone', Developing Overall Self, vol 2, no. 100, p. 5. Shermar, M 2014, 'How We Believe', Business Daily, vol 1, no. 12, p. 2. Tracy, B 2010, How one can Creatively Solve Problems, 2nd edn, J.K Marty Press, Bath.

Sports Medicine Essays - Psychology, Applied Psychology, Imagination

Sports Medicine Today in sports athletes endure many mental and physical obstacles from there competitive environment. Many of today's best athletes work with sports psychologists to help them handle the pressures found in this competitive atmosphere. One question that athletes ask is, why cant they play in big games as well as they anticipate themselves doing? Sports psychologists feel that spending all their time on body conditioning and athletic skills will not ensure that athletes reach their peak performance. Through various studies, psychologists conclude that the psyche aspect must also be in shape to maximize the performance potential in sports as well as education or running a business corporation. Psychologists conclude that by fine-tuning athletic skills, and making real-life movements more automatic, it will install a sense of calmness as athletes prepare for the pressure of competition. They call this technique guided imagery. They use this technique for the mental aspect of fundamental skills. Psychologists recommend that athletes mentally practice their events on the eve of competition. When it comes to sports, the winning edge throughout the world of sports may have less to do with strength and talent, and more to do with, what sports psychologists call it, mental toughness. Sports psychologists James Loehr, calls mental toughness, the ability to handle and even enjoy the psychological pressure of a competitive situation. (Harry Hurt, 1996, p.12) Many of today's best athletes seek help from sports psychologists, in order to help them with their overall game. Negative thoughts and psychological pressure from competitive moments; create many distractions for athletes who do not focus mental pictures in their minds. A vivid picture, is one that allows individuals to see stress and negative thoughts as a challenge, rather than a threat. Psychologists assist athletes in coping with many obstacles that might occur, so that when they get in a pressured dilemma, they can react quickly to the situation. Prior to the 1992 Olympics sports psychologists James Loehr, spent a considerable amount of time mentally preparing Jansen's mind to set high goals, so that he wouldn't repeat failure, as he experienced, in the last two Olympics. (Harry Hurt 1996, p.12) Psychological pressure has a major effect on athletes' performance and individual ability, rather than the physical state. Psychologist tries to set high standards for athletes to maintain poise and discipline. Athletes must make sacrifices, in witch they have to follow steps in order to complete these tasks: first, relax, and let your mind replace all the negative thoughts with positive ones. Secondly, learn from mistakes and make adjustments. To achieve ultimate physical performance it is necessary for one's mind and body work in tandem. The mind is a message center that allows the body to accomplish whatever it wants. Coaches and psychologists believe your mind determines, how fast, you can achieve your goals. Psychologists feel as though, with out self-confidence in yourself, nothing really matters, because in your heart and mind, your have already classified your self as a failure! In Today's field of work, sports psychologist are trying to use different techniques to improve athletes' performance. After comprehensive research and development, psychologists came up with the following findings: first, athletes who view stressful situations as a threat, produce hormones and chemicals in their body that can impair physical and mental performance. (Harry Hurt, 1996 p.12) Second, athletes who meet as a challenge create a rush of adrenaline and sugar inside their body. According to medical sources this is called a natural high, which is responsible for athletes exceeding in their performance. Additionally, James Loehr believed that, the findings mentioned above are difficult to perform, but players that develop self-discipline to commit themselves to do it right, succeed in the sports world, as well as life in general. Musicians, actors, professional business executives, sprinters, and athletes are different in terms of their size, quickness, thinking ability, movement and other characteristics associated to this group. To be successful James Loehr has several techniques that are implement into their daily activity that will make them very successful. According to all his research, it all comes down to is, being able to do these things techniques on constant bases and one performance will be far better than the average person will. These techniques will provide the ingredients, in order to allow their brain to clearly see the task before them. The first technique used by many psychologists is called, replace the pain. Athletes in various sports often get depressed and discouraged because of the different aspects of their athletic skills that they cannot accomplish, because of fatigue or pain. To overcome these obstacles sports psychologists have athletes visualize long term

Critical Appraisal of the London Ambulance Case The WritePass Journal

Critical Appraisal of the London Ambulance Case Abstract. Critical Appraisal of the London Ambulance Case Abstract.IntroductionSYSTEMS THINKINGLondon Ambulance ServiceKnowledge management in the London Ambulance Service Information Management Structure within the ambulance complexesA case with the London Ambulance ServicesStrategies to prevent future Crises in the London Ambulance ServicesConclusionRecommendation REFERENCESRelated Abstract.   This paper describes the case of the London Ambulance Services (LAS) Information Management System by using System thinking as the knowledge management tools and appraises its application in the delivery of the services of the organisation. The issue of some of the failures and successes of the LAS especially the issue bordering the failed Computer Aided Despatch (CAD) system was also discussed and suggestions made on how the London Ambulance Services could improve its knowledge management in terms of information sharing in order to achieve great success in its daily operations. Keywords: Knowledge management systems; information management; systems thinking; London Ambulance Services; Computer Aided Despatch (CAD) Introduction Knowledge management involves the acquisition, storage, retrieval, application, generation, and review of the knowledge assets of an organization in a controlled way (Watson, 2003).The purpose of knowledge management is to enable an organization to control its information resources and knowledge resources by remembering and applying experience as this is considered as the basis of future economic competitiveness (Watson, 2003). Knowledge management spreads throughout an organization from the information management systems to marketing and human resources (Aykin, 2007). Information could be seen as the principal key substance to knowledge management in an organisation. Information is regarded as the content of what is exchanged with the outer world as we adjust to it, and make our adjustment felt upon it (Stahl, 2008). It encompasses storage of material resources, as well as the action of other people in the group (Aykin, 2007).   According to Davenport (1993), making information and communication significant and accessible would likely make it more controllable; and accessible information is also discussable which results to increased reciprocity. In a nut-shell, information management processes should include the entire information â€Å"value chain† which involves starting with the definition of the information requirements, then the collection, storage, distribution, receipt, and use of the information (Davenport, 1993). Information and knowledge management can be considered as existing along a continuum as they exhibit relationship with their context (Watson, 2003). Information management in an organisation can be enhanced by using the enterprise resource planning (ERP), because it is the system that brings together all the company’s major business functions together and could also be used to forecast future demands and also enable every one working for the company to have instant access to critical information (Marcic and Daft, 2008).   Knowledge depends on the information received, thus information increases knowledge value as is seen in IT/IS strategy (Wimmer, 2004). In any well structured organization such as the London Ambulance Services, the effectiveness of knowledge management would to a great extent depend on how vital information are being shared within the staff and the residents whom they serve.   This is because information is a vital tool which occupies a central position in managerial decision making and the more and higher-quality information will lead to better performance (Stahl, 2008). The potential benefit of extensive information sharing and wider cooperation has been seriously impeded by the unavailability of robust communications or transportation systems to support them. Advance information sharing can aid in resource assessment and contribute valuable information to plan the response effort more effectively, especially in the first few hours after the onset of the any emergency (Aykin, 2007). In order to make effective and innovative local decisions in an organization, subordinates must have information and training because information provides awareness of potential problems, opportunities, and available resources, training to use the tools they need to act effectively to meet the needs (Simons, 1995). SYSTEMS THINKING Systems thinking and system approach in an organisation was developed and has been in publication over the past 50 years (Macdonald, et al. 2006). It is concerned with the collection, classification, manipulation, storage, retrieval and dissemination of information and forms an important part of effective information and administrative management (Ferreira, et al. 2010). System thinking is essential for the development of the effective organisation the learning organisation (Beardwell Ciaydon, 2007). It enables the ability to conceptualise complex dynamic realities within the systems and its external relationships, and then model them in a simple, coherent way that is yet pregnant with meaning and capable of further elaboration when necessary (Beardwell Ciaydon, 2007). In the case of the London Ambulance Service, system thinking would inevitably give an important insight into the role of information systems sequentially from data to capta to information to knowledge. Information systems serve people engaged in what they consider as meaningful action, as in actions which support another to yield a meaningful result (Sherwood, 2002). System thinking involves the conceptualization of a system which provides support by first defining the nature of the system (Currie and Galliers, 1999). Another benefit of system thinking is that it helps to reduce the complexity of real-world problems by providing a structured way of balancing a broad, complete view with the selection of the right level of detail, and as such, enhances decision taking within short time (Sherwood, 2002). London Ambulance Service The London Ambulance Service (LAS) is the only NHS trust that covers the whole of London and provides patients with the highest quality of care to ensure that patients who reside within London obtains the best health outcome in the world (www.londonambulance.nhs.uk).   The primary purpose of the LAS is to save lives and responds effectively to medical emergencies (london.gov.uk ). It is managed by South West Thames Regional Health Authority and is the largest ambulant service in the world as it covers geographical area of over 600 square miles, resident population of over 6.8 million people (comp.lancs.ac.uk). The London Ambulance Service (LAS) responds to all ‘999’ emergency calls for medical assistance in the capital and is staffed 24 hours a day in three eight-hour watches. The control room of LAS takes an average of 2000 calls a day and coordinates the despatches of vehicles from its fleets of ambulances, motor cycles and air ambulances (Stegwee and Spil, 2001). This efficiency is achieved by the help of MapInfo technology to help improve call handling and response time as it helps the LAS to plot the location of ambulance stations, hospitals and area of high priority calls, as well as planning of the crew deployment during emergencies (Nag and Sengupta, 2007).The service has received awards for information system management that may not be matched for years (Stegwee and Spil, 2001). According to Rowland and Macdonald, (2005), in order to maintain a high quality delivery of all its services, the members of staff from the senior management to the ambulance crew of the London Ambulance Service require the possession of qualifications, experience and qualities which include: theoretical training as would ensure acquisition of the necessary knowledge of the field in which they are required to work. a thorough knowledge of the hazards and failure of the equipment for which they are responsible. an understanding and detailed knowledge of the working practices used in the organisation for which they work, as well as a general knowledge of the working practices in other establishments of similar type. a detailed working knowledge of all statutory provisions, approved codes of practice, other codes of practice, guidance material and their information relevant to their work, and awareness of legislation and practices, other than those which might affect their work. Ability to advice others. the calibre of personality to enable them to communicate effectively with their peers, any staff working under their supervision, and their own supervisors. an awareness of the current developments in the field in which they work. an appreciation of their own limitations, whether of knowledge, experience, facilities, resources, etc, and a preparedness to declare any such limitation. Knowledge management in the London Ambulance Service The London Analysts Support site team (LASS) developed a dataset in consultation with the London Ambulance to ensure that their data is of good quality and suitable for crime analysis purposes. The team work with the London Ambulance Service to extract data suitable for crime analysis professionals there by making the service delivery of the London Ambulance faster and continuous (data.london.gov.uk). The support team identify incidents of assaults injury via a fairly sophisticated search through various codes and descriptions of incidents that occur in the process of responding to a 999 call. Although the information extracted from this group is highly important in identifying and tracking crimes, it is assumed to be secondary compared to the need to record accurate medical information. Hence, this could result to minor variations in the accuracy of the data over time and in different areas in London. Experts in crime analysis utilize the data collated to scan for issues, patterns and trends in general violent crime in London and carry out comparisons and variations with traditional sources of intelligence such as recorded data from the police (data.london.gov.uk). London Ambulance services together with other government agencies such as the police work together to ensure that information are securely shared to protect vulnerable adults, and to ensure that any signs of abuse are reported and investigated immediately in such a way that there is less risk of signs of abuse being missed. They do this by encouraging people to inform authorities of abuse, sharing information and investigating reports and incidents where necessary (redbridge.gov.uk/cms/news_and_events/latest_news/2011/april_2011/organisations_join_forces_to_p.aspx).   Through this cooperative effort, necessary information are efficiently managed and shared whenever cases of emergency occurs and helps in the deployment of necessary solutions to different cases. Information Management Structure within the ambulance complexes Information sharing is the key instrument that enhances the operation of the London Ambulance Services. The information management of each local ambulance station complex is controlled by the local authority and PCT area. An information sharing network is used to pass information urgently to assist various units’ representatives to access support in all cases as they arise. Through information sharing, local authority social services, primary care, mental health and acute trusts and other relevant agencies are networked so as to establish a regular forum to enable specific is plans. This forum enables health and social care workers to advice the London Ambulance crew of any patients that may be posing similar problems to the receptive agencies, and hence could enhance the setting up of an appropriate care pathway. In some cases, a conference may be held in order to get the patients to understand property their health situations. This is often done by the London Ambulance Services via writing notification to patient, carer and advocate inviting them to participate in the conference, and during the process, all the clinical issues will be resolved. A case with the London Ambulance Services In bid to increase the efficiency in the delivery of her duties to the large population in London, the London Ambulance Service introduced the Computer Aided Dispatch system to deliver that goal. This dispatch systems was hoped to stand out as it was highly innovative system that fully command and control functions of the LAS starting from the receipt of emergency call at the control centre, through decisions on which ambulance to allocate to the call, and to mobilize appropriate resources (Howcroft and Trauth, 2005). In this design, the call details would be captured online and tracking devices would be fitted to ambulances so that their locations could be monitored continually to enhance information flow via electronic link room to the control centre, and then to either mobile data terminal or printers on ambulance stations (Hall, et.al. 2007). This computerized despatch system was designed by System Options to increase the service delivery of the London Ambulance Service and was launched into operation on October 26th, 1992. This despatch system lasted just for few hours and then crashed because it was not capable of handling the information loads being placed on it, a problem being blamed on inadequate knowledge management parameter such as system thinking, as the staff and management were in continual conflict over information hoarding (Howcroft and Trauth, 2005; Dutton and Peltu 1996). Some of the problems the despatch system encountered included: lack of confidence in the system being able to automatically locate vehicle locations by staff both within Central Ambulance Control and ambulance crews due to lack of adequate training. Other problems identified were failure of calls to reach ambulances, failure to identify duplicate calls, poor prioritization of error messages, and loss of calls in the system (Day, 2002; cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/A.Finkelstein/las/lascase0.9.pdf). All these problems made the system to close down the next day leading the London Ambulance Services to revert to semi-manual operation (Day, 2002). An inquiry which was ordered to determine the cause of the crash revealed that the system was very complex, making it difficult for any software house to develop a suitable solution (Day, 2002). Besides, System Options had good reputation but lacked sufficient experience for designing or developing packages for safety-critical command-and-control system, otherwise they would have identified the risk and plan measures to avoid it, or to ensure an effective action (Day, 2002; Duquenoy, et. al. 2007; and Clarke, 2001).   The finding of the inquiry team also revealed that the CAD software was incomplete, not properly tuned and not fully tested (cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/A.Finkelstein/las/lascase0.9.pdf). The failure of the dispatch system was also blamed on the inadequate training given to the operators and inadequate testing of the system according to a press release in 1993.   During the training of the staff that was carried out in line with the operation of the despatch system, the ambulance crew and the central control crew staff were trained separately in different rooms which did not lead to proper working relationship between the pair (Mantas, 2004). The report of the press release about the staff training reads:   â€Å"Much of the training was carried out well in advance of the originally planned implementation date and hence there was a significant â€Å"skills decay† between then and when staff were eventually required to use the system. There were also doubts over the quality of the training provided, whether by the Systems Options or the LAS’s own Work Based Trainers (WBTs) (Mantas, 2004). This training was not always comprehensive and was often inconsistent.   The problem was exacerbated by the constant changes being made to the system (Mantas, 2004).   It was also reported that one of the reason for the failure of the London Ambulance Computer Aided Dispatch attributed to the complexity inherent in the system design which was intentional as those in charge of the system development activities had wanted to be in control of all possible outcome (Khosrowpour, 2003).   Besides, top management hoped to bypass the union, and also replace the controllers so as to reduce cost. For this reason, the staff of the union were not involved in the development of the system which resulted to the leaving behind the input of people who were most experienced with the way the ambulance service worked (Macauley, 1996; Rowbotham, et al. 2007). Strategies to prevent future Crises in the London Ambulance Services According to the document submitted by the London Ambulance Service NHS Trust (Wp85) published by the Department of Health in June 2005, outlined a vision of where NHS ambulance services should be within the next five years: Providing significantly more clinical advice to callers and work in a more integrated way with partner organisations; Providing and coordinating an increasing range of mobile healthcare services for patients who need urgent care; Continuing to improve the quality of services to patients with emergency care needs; Providing an increasing range of other services in primary care, diagnostic and healthcare promotion. In order to achieve the above vision, education and development needs for the ambulance service workforce has been redesigned including all the training courses to enable the service to cater for the need of the 800,000 patients it attends to each year (House of Commons Health Committee Report, 2006-7). This is why a school of thought has argued that systems thinking such as soft systems thinking could be a way of conceptualising the social processes in which a particular group of people in an organization can conceptualize their plans and actions they intend to undertake (Wickramasinghe, et al. 2009). This kind of basic thinking relevant to the provision of information systems may not have been properly applied in the provision of the London Ambulance Service Computer Aided Despatch system that failed. According to Currie and Galliers (1999), in order to ensure proper knowledge management and information sharing, any development of a strategy for the future computer aided dispatch within the London Ambulance Service (LAS) must involve a full process of consultation between management, staff, trade union representatives and the Service’s information technology advisers. It may be appropriate to establish a wider consultative panel involving experts in CAD from other ambulance services, the police and fire brigade. cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/A.Finkelstein/las/lascase0.9.pdf. It is necessary that the geographical, social and political environment in which the London Ambulance Service operates in the delivery of her valued services be adequately carried along in the information sharing and information management of both the LAS management and staff via organizing of regular and open consultation with staff representatives (cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/A.Finkelstein/las/lascase0.9.pdf). Furthermore, regular training for the staff of the London ambulance Services on the use of modern IT infrastructure that relates to their service delivery could be done regularly to enable the members of staff to keep abreast of all the updated information regarding the efficient delivery of their duties. This is because; an organisation that encourages learning among its staff promotes exchange of information between employees thus creating a more knowledgeable workforce. In addition, IT contributes to knowledge capture, information distribution, and information interpretation. Conclusion    Information is power, and as such, few people in an organization would like to monopolize it instead of sharing it to facilitate the diffusion of knowledge. Information flows are up, down, and across the organization as information is collected, shared, communicated, and debated (Rescher, 2003). Therefore, information sharing should be encouraged in the operations of the London Ambulance service as this will empower all the staff to be more productive in delivering their duties, and will avert any disaster in future when the organisation considers the design of another despatch system. It is a clear fact that computer-based information systems are essential to the operation of modern businesses especially in all transaction that entails the production of large information in an organization like the London Ambulance Service. Information diffusion means the degree of information sharing within an organization (Simons, 1995). Hence, in the case of the London Ambulance Services, information diffusion should be high so as to maintain free flow of information to everyone in the organization and not hoarding it or making it only available to selected few individuals. Recommendation Information sharing can be viewed as a firm’s willingness to share key information that is timely, accurate, responsive and useful with its staff, associated partners and final consumers of her services. Some of these ingredients of professional knowledge management were not adequately utilized in the circumstances that led to the failure of the London Ambulance dispatch systems. In subsequent future design of a CAD despatch system that will work, the LAS management or any other company that will be used, and the London Ambulance should consider conducting adequate training of all their staff as part of the product development and implementation cycle. System Options was reported to have had no previous knowledge of building despatch systems for ambulance services (Beynon-Davies, 1995), and as such should have not accepted the offer as it falls outside their professional competence especially as there was strict deadline to deliver the contract. Again, the Inquiry report findings reveal that System Options did not used PRINCE project management method which is the acceptable method for managing public sector projects, and the team had no previous project management experience (Duquenoy, 2007). This means that there was no proper knowledge management on the side of the London Ambulance Service as LAS should have ensured adequate project management experience of its contractor. System Options failed to properly apply proper system thinking techniques as it relates to realizing the CAD project within the proposed deadline. They entered the agreement and could not opt out as that would have been unprofessional (Beynon-Davies, 1995).   It is recommended that for a successful professional service delivery, CAD or IT/IS providing firms should maintain a cordial information and time management relationship with its clients. In the case of System Options and LAS, System option should have informed the client of their concerns over the short time frame. Beynon-Davies (1995) identified the issues of poor testing and quality assurance of the despatch system. System Options should have followed the rule of professional system development and implementation ethics which comprises of testing, quality assurance and proper training of all staff involved in the design and final use of the product. REFERENCES Aykin, N. (2007) Usability and internationalization:  Second International Conference on Usability and Internationalization, UI-HCII 2007, held as part of HCI International 2007, Beijing, China, July 22-27, 2007: proceedings, Part 2. China: Springer. Baskerville, R., Stage, J., and DeGross, J. I. (2000) Organizational and social perspectives on information technology:  IFIP TC8 WG8.2 International Working Conference on the Social and Organizational Perspective on Research and Practice in Information Technology, June 9-11, 2000, Aalborg, Denmark. Beynon-Davies, P (1995). Information systems failure and risk assessment: The case of the London Ambulance Service Computer Aided Dispatch System. Athens: European Conference on Information Systems. Clarke, S. (2001) Information Systems strategic management: an integrated approach. USA: Routledge. Currie, W. Galliers, R. (1999) Rethinking management information systems: an interdisciplinary perspective. London: Oxford University Press. Davenport, T. H. (1993) Process Innovation: reengineering work through information technology. London: Harvard Business Press. Daft, R. L. and   Marcic, L. R. (2008) Understanding Management. 6th Edn. London: Cengage Learning Publishers. Day, M. (2002) Gower Handbook of purchasing management: Chartered Institute of Purchasing Supply. USA: Gower Publishing Ltd. Duquenoy, P., Jones, S., and Blundell, B. G. (2007) Ethical, Legal and Professional Issues in Computing. London: Cengage learning EMEA. Dutton, W. H. and Peltu, M. (1996) information and communication technologies: visions and realities. London: Oxford University Press. Ferreira, E., Erasmus, A. Groenewald, D. (2010). Administrative Management. South: Juta and Company LTD. Hall, P. A. V. and Ramil, J. C. F. (2007) Managing the software enterprise: software engineering and information systems in context. London: Cengage learning EMEA. Howcroft, D. and Trauth, E. M. (2005)   Handbook of critical information systems research: theory and application. London: Edward Elgar Publishing. House of Commons Health Committee Workforce planning:  Fourth report of session 2006-07, Vol. 2: Oral and written evidence. Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Health Committee. 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(2007) Operation Management in Context. London: Butterworth-Heinemann. Rowland, D.   Macdonald, E. (2005) Information technology law. London: Cavendish Publishing Limited. Sherwood, D. (2002). Seeing the forest for the trees: A manager’s guide to applying systems thinking. London: Nicholas Brealey Publication. Simons, R. (1995). Levers of control: how managers use innovative control systems to drive strategic renewal. USA: Harvard Business Press. Stahl, B. C. (2008) Information Systems: Critical Perspectives. London: Taylor Frances. Stegwee, R. A. And Spil, T. A. M. (2001) Strategies for healthcare information systems. USA: Idea Group Inc (IGI). Watson, I. E. (2003) Applying Knowledge Management: Techniques for Building Corporate Memories. USA: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers. Wickramasinghe, N., Bali, R. K., Lehaney, B., Schaffer, JH. I. and Gibbons, M. C.   (2009) Healthcare Knowledge management Primer. London: Taylor and Francis Publishers. Wimmer, M. A. (2004). 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Cigarettes Smoking Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Cigarettes Smoking - Coursework Example Smoking cigarettes are harmful and often leads to addiction, which can ultimately lead to death and other health complications. Cigarettes have an addictive element in them known as nicotine and some other flavorful additives, which causes addiction. In the United States, cigarettes account for about 440, 000 deaths annually. There are many causes of smoking, which include, the body needs some nicotine especially in the case of addicts for physical reasons; secondly, for psychological reasons, which is one of the most important factor explaining why people smoke e.g. due to low self-esteem. Either other people get attracted into smoking out of peer pressure especially the youth, or some people develop the habit because they were passive smokers at some point and finally turned into active smokers. Smoking cigarettes cause a number of health problems to the smokers. Firstly, they increase the chances of one developing heart disease, stroke, and cancer. Smoking increases the chances of men suffering from lung cancer by 23 times, while in women it raises the chances by 13 times when compared to non-smokers. In addition, smoking is a slow way of dying because of the harmful effects cigarettes have on the body. Other notable damages smoking has on the body include the effect on the mouth, eyes, stomach and the pancreases and throat. It is estimated that on average smokers in America spend about $1000-$1500 annually in buying cigarettes. Smoking causes weight loss for children born by mothers who are active smokers.

Criminal law coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Criminal law - Coursework Example For instance, the offender may have been stopped by a police officer who arrived before the completion of the criminal act. A complete, but imperfect attempt occurs when the offender carries out all the actions that he had planned out to do, but fails to attain the desired end result. An example here is the attempt to murder a victim, where the offender stabs them with a knife and leaves them to die, but they fail to – after being saved or taken to hospital (Hasnas, 13). The two rationales used in determining or making inferences from an attempt crime include the following: Analyzing the dangerous nature of the acts, and evaluating the dangerousness of the defender. In focusing on the dangerous acts, attention is placed on how close the defendant came, towards the completion of the attempted crime, and this move is aimed at averting the danger that may result from the dangerous ways of the defendant. When the focus is on the dangerous nature of the defendant, attention is plac ed on determining how the defendant has fully developed their criminal intent, and this move is aimed at neutralizing the dangerous conduct. From a legal principle’s perspective, the defendant is considered innocent, until it has been proven that they are guilty of the attempt. The guilty or the innocent status of the defendant is determined by the prosecution team, and not the defendant or the complainant. An example here is the case of a woman who tries to kill the husband with a knife, but the husband escaped the attempt after receiving a cut. In this case, the prosecution must decide whether to charge her for domestic violence or attempted murder, as she cannot be penalized twice for the crime (Fletcher, 149–151). Q 2. Discuss the broken windows theory and provide examples. What has the research shown about the validity of the theory? The broken windows theory is a criminal basis explanation model, which suggests that a society or a part of society which seems lawl ess ends up becoming a breeding ground for lawlessness and crime. The theory builds its arguments on the basis of social cohesion, and has influenced legal practice since the 1980s. The specific claim portrayed by this theory is that – the cases of neighborhoods that look disordered, unfriendly and broken down – tend to nurture the development of crime and delinquent behavior. The theory, further, suggests that a society that lacks a sense of mutual interest and social cohesion will be faced by an increasing level of criminality. The basis of the central theme of the theory is that the prevalence of disharmony and unfriendliness push the members of society into developing thinking habits – of believing that order, fairness and wrong acts do not matter, and that no one cares. The nurture into incivility leads to the development of incivility among the members of the society, causing them to adjust, into fitting into the uncivilized society. As an example, is the case of a stateless society, where conflict resolution models are not present: in such a society, a person who offends another is not punished, therefore the victim is left to decide whether to revenge the offense or not. Another example is the tendency of children brought up in violence filled homes, as they grow up to become violent, because they adjust and develop the tendencies of violent behavior (Gault & Silver, 240-243). Research in verifying the broken windows

Heritage Of Christianity In Ethiopia Theology Religion Essay

Heritage Of Christianity In Ethiopia Theology Religion Essay Christianity and Islam have coexisted in Ethiopia since the celebrated first migration in the formative period of Islam fourteen-hundred years ago. Ethiopia has overcome many attempts in the past to overthrow this coexistence, but modern Ethiopia remains a nation which prides itself on a tradition of religious tolerance between its populations of Christian, Muslim and Jewish citizens. This delicate balance however, is facing a threat by interference from outside interests attempting to establish control in the Horn of Africa. These outsiders are using religious non-governmental organizations such as evangelical Christian missionaries and Wahabist Muslim dawahs to influence the population against the traditional ruling Coptic Church. Heritage of Christianity in Ethiopia The Judeo-Christian history of Ethiopia goes back to the time of Israels King Solomon in the tenth century BCE. The Holy Bible (First Kings) records that the Queen of Sheba (modern Ethiopia), visited King Solomon. The Ethiopian epic Kebra Nagast records that she bore a son by Solomon, Menelik, who is said to have brought the Ark of the Covenant to Ethiopia. This was the beginning of the Solomonid Dynasty of Ethiopia. The Ethiopian Coptic Orthodox Tewahedo Church (hereafter referred to as the Coptic Church) claims the Ark still resides in the Chapel of the Tablet in the Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion in the town of Axum, Ethiopia (Raffaele, 2007). Axum is also the name of the first Christian kingdom of Ethiopia, which was the first of any world nation to adopt Christianity as the official state religion. The Coptics relate that Christianity was first brought to Ethiopia by an Ethiopian royal official who was converted by Phillip the Evangelist, one of the first seven deacons of Christianity. In the fourth century, the Pope of the Coptic Church in Alexandria appointed Frumentius as the first Archbishop of Axum and Axum became officially a Christian nation. It should be noted that before this time the Coptic Church based in Alexandria (also known as the Oriental Orthodox) had already split off from what would become the Catholic churches and the Eastern Orthodox churches. This split was due to difference in opinion on the nature of the Christ (Gascoigne, From 2001, ongoing). This difference of opinion continues to alienate the Coptics from the rest of Christianity to this day, as will be seen. Muslim Heritage in Ethiopia In the year 613, the Companions and Family of the Prophet Mohammad (pbuh) were being persecuted by the Qurayshi clan in Mecca. One of the leading Companions was an Ethiopian slave. The Ethiopian king at this time was known to be a just leader and the Prophet was convinced that his followers would be safest in a Christian country where the people followed the scriptures of the Book rather than among the pagan tribes of Arabia. The Prophet ordered his Companions to migrate (hijra) to Ethiopia for their safety. During the six years the Companions stayed in Ethiopia, many Ethiopians converted to the new religion of Islam. In the sixth year of the first hijirat, a nephew of the Prophet, Amir ibn Umayya visited Ethiopia with an invitation to Negus, the king of Ethiopia to accept Islam. Amir was warmly received by Negus, who against the will of the rest of the royal family and the Coptic Church, converted to Islam. The royal family revolted against Negus and when Negus died, the Prophet off ered the first ever in-absentia funeral prayer (Salatul Ghaib) in his honor (Mohammed, 2012). Islam had established itself in Ethiopia, but Ethiopia would remain officially a Christian nation. The Solomonid Dynasty would continue to reign until the Marxist revolution of 1974 and the royal position was that there were no Muslim Ethiopians. The position of the royal family was that Muslim Ethiopians were foreigners living in the country (The First Hijrah Foundation (FHF), 2012). This foreigner label on Muslim Ethiopians is in part strengthened by ethnic and racial divisions within Ethiopia. Racial and Ethnic Federalism Ethiopia is currently divided into ethnically-based autonomous federal regions. For example, the Somali ethnic region is the most populous and takes up roughly the eastern third of the country with its population 97% ethnically Somali. The Somali people are a Cushitic (black African) ethnic group and predominately Muslim (98%). The next most populous region is Oromo. The Oromo are also a Cushitic ethnic group whose population is religiously divided between predominately Muslim in the eastern portion of the region and evangelical protestant (referred to as Penty) Christian in the west. The Amhara ethnic group is Semitic (like the Hebrew and Arabs) and lives in the highland region of Amhara (Population Census Commission, Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, 2008). The royal family of Ethiopia was of Amharic ethnicity and this ethnic group still maintains dominance in the Ethiopian federal government. The Amharic people are predominately Coptic and the Coptic Church in Ethiopia is p rimarily led by Amharics. This historical dominance of the Amharic people over the other ethnicities of the region has been the cause for some of the conflict in the region that to outsiders may appear to be simply religiously based. Past Religious Conflicts With the emergence and rapid growth of Islam in the sixth century, Ethiopia quickly became an isolated Island of Christendom in a Sea of Islam (Gascoigne, From 2001, ongoing). Although geographically isolated, Ethiopia maintained strong ties to the rest of Christendom. The Ethiopian Patriarch has always been appointed by the Oriental Orthodox Pope in Alexandria and monks from the Ethiopian Coptic Church maintain the unique right of being co-custodians of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. By the end of the thirteenth century, Ethiopia was the only non-Muslim state in northern Africa. During the fifteenth century, Ethiopian monks from Jerusalem attempted to attend the Council of Florence to discuss the re-unification of the Christian Churches. They were denied entry to the council by both the Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox Churches because of the theological differences which had caused them to split off originally. The presence of the Ethiopian monks at Florence did, however, serve to attract the attention of Rome resulting in a Jesuit mission being sent to Ethiopia. This Jesuit presence would last nearly two hundred years and ultimately result in the Ethiopian king, Susenyos, renouncing the Coptic faith as heresy and adopting the Roman Catholic faith. After the departure of the Jesuits, Susenyos succumbed to pressure and reverted back to the Coptic faith. During the sixteenth century when the Jesuit presence was at its strongest, Ethiopia was also facing jihads from the Muslims. The first jihad was from the Sultan Graà ± (aka Ahmad ibn Ibrahim) who had based his sultanate in Harar. His decision to declare holy war on Ethiopia was due in part to marginalization and discrimination against the Muslims influenced in part by the Jesuit missionaries. Graà ± moved an army of Somalis west and destroyed a great many of the Christian shrines and holy places (Gascoigne, From 2001, ongoing). In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries Ethiopia fought to maintain its independence from the colonial powers of Portugal and Italy. The Ethiopian emperor, Haile Selassie, led in the formation of the League of Nations and the Organization of African Unity. After the second world war, Ethiopia backed by the United States, who was looking for a possible Red Sea port annexed Eritrea. Eritrean opinion was divided on this between Christians who were pro-unification and Muslims who were for Eritrean independence. This led to nearly 40 years of conflict. As part of the larger global cold war, a Marxist element emerged in Eritrea. This Marxist element eventually performed a military coup against the royal family, deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in 1974. A period of instability prevailed until 1991 when the current constitution was affirmed and Eritrea was granted independence in 1993. From 1991 until 2012, Ethiopia was under the control of the Prime Minister Meles Zenawi. Occasional wars continued to break out along Ethiopias borders and the conflicts would spill over into the neighboring countries of Somalia and Sudan. Meles supported, and was supported by, the Coptics and the Amharic population. Although no longer in power by law, the Coptics and the Amharic peoples still hold much influence. Meles support of the Coptics and marginalization of the Muslims and Penties is part of the cause of recent violence in the country (Heinlein, 2012). Recent Events On the second of March, 2011 in Asendabo, a Penty allegedly desecrated the Koran. It was believed by the Ethiopian Government that the Kawarja Muslim sect used this alleged act to incite a riot that resulted in up to 10,000 Christians fleeing the area. Approximately fifty churches and many Christian homes were burned to the ground. This was the largest in a series of Muslim attacks against Christians, especially Penties in Muslim dominated regions. In November of 2010, Christian residents of Besheno found warnings nailed to their doors to convert, leave the city, or be killed. On the twenty-sixth of February, 2011, a Muslim mob attacked seventeed Penty college students with rods and sticks for attempting to distribute Bibles in a Muslim village (Macedo, 2011). Although freedom of religion is guaranteed in the Ethiopian constitution, each autonomous region may interpret that freedom in its own way. In November of 2011, the Ethiopian Government identified the Kawarja sect with Al-Qaeda and expressed concern over a growing force of Wahhabi Muslims promoting violence against moderate Muslims and Christians with the aim of making Ethiopia an Islamic country governed by Sharia law. Wahabist teachings would upset the balance between Christians and Muslims and challenge United States interests in the region as well. The Ethiopian Government responded by backing a competing Muslim sect, Al-Ahbash. Al-Ahbash was founded by an Ethiopian and is very anti-Wahabi/Salafi in its beliefs, going so far as to declare takfir against them (declaring the Wahabi/Salafi as heretics). The Ethiopian Government appointed an Islamic Affairs Supreme Council (IASC) that was Ahbash heavy with no representatives from the Wahabi or Salafi sects. This council seeks to create Ahabash based Islamic schools in Ethiopia so that Ethiopians will not have to go to Arabic countries to learn to become Imams (Fentaw, 20 12). With the death of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi in August of 2012, some Ethiopian Christians and Muslims are hoping for unity in the future. Ethiopian college students of both Christian and Muslim faiths joined together to found the group Concerned Ethiopian Students to work toward peace. When Egypt and Libya saw riots in September of 2012 because of the film Innocence of Muslims produced by Coptic Christians living in the United States, Coptic leaders were quick to denounce the film. On the fifth of November, 2012, the new Pope of the Oriental Orthodox Communion was elected and took his place ruling the Coptic Church in Alexandria. The next day he issued a statement stating that the Coptic Church has no political role, but that he fears Sharia law will threaten the religious freedom and safety of the Christian community (Schiava, 2012). On the seventh of November, 2012, the Ethiopian Government announced the newly elected members of the IASC. The government hopes the IASC can bring pe ace within the Muslim community (VanDerWolf, 2012). Muslims, especially Wahabis, had been protesting the elections for months. The Wahabis had requested the elections be held in mosques instead of public meeting halls. The Wahabi fear is that the elections were influenced by the government which they say is trying to ban the Wahabi sect and promote Ahbash (Heinlein, 2012). More than one hundred Muslims are being held on terrorism charges for the protests (VanDerWolf, 2012). The Way Ahead for United States Interests The United States involvement in the Horn of Africa, particularly Ethiopia sits in the same delicate situation as the Coptic Church. With the United States alliance with the Amharic ruling parties of Ethiopia, any move by the government against Islam or any sect of Islam, such as Wahabi, is seen by the radical Muslims as an act backed by or even directed by the United States and Israel (The First Hijrah Foundation (FHF), 2012). The evangelism of the Penty churches into Muslim and Coptic areas is seen by some as interference from the United States, though through such entities as the Ku Klux Klan (comment to (CBS News, 2012). While this may seem ridiculous, it conveys the fear that is bred in the minds of some Ethiopian Muslims. The Ethiopian Coptics may be facing the greatest struggle in their nearly two-thousand year history. If an Islamist faction gains control of the nation, many will flee the country much as most Christians have fled from Iraq and most recently Egypt. Any move by the United States government or American based organizations to aid the Christians in Ethiopia will only strengthen the resolve of the Islamist sects to eliminate the Christian powerbase. Perhaps they may find peace in true democracy in the post-Zenawi era.

Cultural Erasure Essay

The Caribbean can be many things to many people: a geographic region somewhere in America’s backyard, an English-speaking outpost of the British Empire, an exciting holiday destination for North Americans and Europeans, a place where dirty money is easily laundered, and even an undefined, exotic area that contains the dreaded Bermuda Triangle, the mythical lost city of El Dorado, the fabled Fountain of Youth and the island home of Robinson Crusoe. Enriched by the process of creolization, the cosmopolitanism of the average Caribbean person is also well recognized: ‘No Indian from India, no European, no African can adjust with greater ease and naturalness to new situations’ (Lamming 1960, 34). As a concept or notion ‘the Caribbean’ can also be seen to have a marvellous elasticity that defies the imposition of clear geographic boundaries, has no distinct religious tradition, no agreed-upon set of political values, and no single cultural orientation. What, then, is the Caribbean? Who can justifiably claim to belong to it? Of the various peoples who have come to comprise the region, whose identity markers will be most central in defining the whole? For not all citizens of a nation or a region will be equally privileged and not all will have equal input in the definition of national or regional identity. In other words,  because power implies a process of social negotiation, and because power is unequally distributed in social groups, some parties to the process will be more represented than others. This is where the notion of erasure is tied to any appreciation of identity, and played out in the history and politics of colonization and decolonization in the Caribbean. As might be imagined, the colonially-conditioned divisions of race and gender figured (and continue to figure) prominently in the entire process and bring to mind Bob Marley’s advice to Caribbean people: ‘emancipate your minds from mental slavery’ (Redemption Song). Erasure is in large part the act of neglecting, looking past, minimizing, ignoring or rendering invisible an other. Rhoda Reddock (1996) examines the academic and political consequences of erasure at the level of ethnicity, and draws attention to four (among many other) neglected minorities in the Caribbean: the Amerindians of Guyana, the Karifuna or Caribs of Dominica, the Chinese in Jamaica, and the  Sindhis and Gujaratis in Barbados. Although some of these are indigenous and some have lived in the Caribbean for hundreds of years, they are commonly overlooked, even by those who today claim ‘authentic’ Caribbean roots and a commitment to the region as an integrated whole. In this essay I focus on three recent studies that address the ways in which identity and erasure have come dialectically to embody several erased peoples and groups of people in the Caribbean. I begin with the contributions of Sandra Pouchet Paquet, who focuses on the heyday of colonialism, slavery and women in Caribbean history, and laments the fact that ‘The female ancestor is effectively silenced if not erased’ (Paquet 2002, 11) in the writing of that history. To this end she cites Carole Boyce-Davies and Elaine Fido, who, in assessing the literature and historiography of the region, also spoke of ‘†¦ the historical absence of a specifically female position on major issues such as slavery, colonialism and decolonization, women’s rights and  more direct social and cultural issues’ (1990, 1). Next I examine the contributions of Geert Oostindie and Inge Klinkers (2003), who move from the slave period and colonialism proper and begin to discuss the uneven dismantling of colonialism in the various Caribbean countries, and its persistence in others. In the process they focus on erasure at the wider sub-regional level of groupings of countries. Thus, Oostindie and Klinkers protest the common academic and political tendency to assume that the Caribbean is principally an English-speaking group of countries; a tendency that simultaneously erases or minimizes the presence and contributions of other Caribbean peoples. These authors charge that while this erasure is undeniable in the cases of the Spanish- and French-speaking Caribbean, it is particularly evident with regard to the Dutch Caribbean. For while much has been written on the wider region generally, it is ‘seldom with serious attention to the former Dutch colonies of Suriname, the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba’ (2003, 10). And as they go on to argue, most general histories ‘tend virtually to neglect the Dutch Caribbean’ (p. 234). This ‘neglect’ is synonymous with erasure and constitutes a major obstacle for anyone wishing to develop a truly comprehensive understanding of the entire region. Finally, there are Smart and Nehusi (2000), who invoke the idea of erasure and the attempt by African-ancestored people in the Caribbean, but especially in Trinidad, to resist erasure and reclaim their identity. Smart and Nehusi look at efforts of Afro-Trinidadians to forge a diasporic identity in which culture (Carnival) is the centrepiece of African, ancestral lore. Thus, in describing the trade in African slaves and the institution of New World slavery as ‘the largest crime in human history,’ Nehusi speaks of the Maafa, or the African Holocaust, as a terror that has been hushed up: ‘one part of that crime has been the attempt to forget, to pretend that it did not happen and to present a history ethnically cleansed of all traces of this genocide †¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ (Nehusi 2000, 8). Very much in line with the thinking of Smart and Nehusi, Paquet views slavery as a crime and speaks of the ‘depravity of the slave owner’ (p. 42) as she applauds the efforts of Mary Prince to expose the horrors of the system: ‘Prince lays bare for public scrutiny the criminality of slave owners and the legal system that endorses their conduct’ (Paquet 2002, 41). In developing his argument Nehusi hints at a conspiracy or historical hoax which witnessed the abandonment of  black Trinidadians and their treatment as ‘non-persons by a continuing Eurocentric system which refuses to recognize them and their traditions as valid and refuses to recognize the history of struggle, mainly by Afrikan people.’ (Nehusi 2000a, 11). To this Ian Smart adds that ‘Africans all over the globe who have been subjected to white supremacy must be engaged unremittingly in the struggle for liberation in order to be made whole again’ (Smart 2000b, 199). This notion of being ‘made whole again’ speaks directly to the idea of erasure and the recapture of lost identity. Sandra Pouchet Paquet is principally concerned with two things: (a) finding the Caribbean identity and (b) autobiography as a literary genre. She uses the latter to pursue the former. Autobiography does not only tell a story of the biographer, but of the very society and community that shaped and nurtured her/him. So it is not simply a personal recounting of episodes that have shaped one’s life; but if properly written, autobiography can give valuable insights into the social worlds of the various storytellers. To this end Paquet exposes the ‘historical silencing of the female ancestor’ as evidenced in the ‘discovery and republication of the nineteenthcentury narratives of the Hart sisters (Elizabeth and Ann), Mary Prince, and Mary Seacole between 1987 and1993’ (2002, 13). These women bring to light what an inadvertent male scholarship had previously buried: a strong female culture of resistance both before and after emancipation. Unlike similar approaches, this work is careful not to essentialize women. Instead it is sensitive to their individual differences while weaving together common strands in their biographical experiences and narratives to produce a common story of erasure, resistance and strength. In her words they ‘throw light on the idiosyncrasies of a female culture of resistance in the Caribbean before and after emancipation’ (Paquet 2002, 13). Focusing on the signal contributions  of strong women like Elizabeth and Anne Hart, Mary Seacole and Mary Prince, who prepared the way for future leading male Caribbean writers such as C.L.R. James, George Lamming, Derek Walcott and V.S. Naipaul, Paquet does not mince words. In fact she openly acknowledges the unconscious impact of patriarchy, even on those men, and the ways in which they too contributed to the alienation, erasure and misrepresentation of women in Caribbean literary culture (p. 73). Clearly reflecting different social trajectories and individual strengths, the narratives of these four women nevertheless contain and speak to essential elements in the forging of a Caribbean identity. Dialectically, their efforts to reverse erasure through resistance culminated in a powerful story of struggle, setback and triumph of the human spirit. The Hart sisters, whose father was a free black, a plantation owner and a slaveholder, both married white men of influence. This gave them an important measure of social capital and they were able to use their religion (Methodism) and social status as the bases from which to promote ideas about racial equality and the empowerment of women. Mary Seacole was a unique woman for her time. The child of a free black Jamaican woman and a Scottish officer, she always set her sights on the wider world beyond Jamaica, and in time she became a creole ‘doctress’, a traveller and adventurer, entrepreneur, sutler and hotelier. The idea is not to romanticize her accomplishments for Seacole was human and vulnerable, and she betrayed all the contradictions of a woman placed in that age and time: resistance, accommodation and admiration for imperialism which contained ‘the civilizing values she professes to honor’ (Paquet 2002, 56). For while she railed against the injustices of race and sex discrimination she did not directly chal- lenge the idea of a British empire as much as she struggled ‘to redefine her place in it’ (p. 56). Seacole could thus be seen as a prototype of the modern-day Afro-Saxon. Then there was Mary Prince, a slave woman who did not have the privileges of the Hart sisters or of Mary Seacole, and thus has a  different take on the colonial situation. Comparing the two Marys (Seacole and Prince), Paquet writes that Prince embodied ‘an embryonic nationalism formed in resistance to slavery’ while Seacole reflected ‘an acceptance of colonialism after slavery’ (p. 52). Mary Prince was a rebel in spirit and action, and her life story is partly a struggle against erasure that illuminates another dimension of the contradictions of the time: Mary Prince was a ‘West Indian slave marooned in England by laws that made slavery illegal in England, while it was still legal in the colonies’ (p. 31). And as Paquet reports, the erasure and contradiction continue even in the twentieth-century male texts referred to above that are ‘devoid of reference to her resistant, militant spirit’ (p. 32). Though generally muted (erased) the voice of the black woman becomes audible in the narrative of Prince whose ‘individual life story establishes and validates a slave woman’s point of viewâ€⠄¢ while simultaneously serving as the foundation for ‘selfidentification and self-fulfilment in anticipation of the historical changes’ that would later follow in the wake of emancipation (p. 33-4). Thus, viewed together, the autobiographies of the Hart sisters, Mary Seacole and Mary Prince afford us an insight into the practical and intellectual worlds of very different women, and into their multifaceted struggles whether as slaves, as women, as free coloureds, as rape victims, and finally as silenced products of colonial brutality. In humanizing themselves through their autobiographies these women are able to expose the dehumanizing conditions under which so many millions were erased. Another key motif in Paquet is that of home and its relationship to errantry, travel, departure and return. These are central themes in Caribbean literature and reflect the post-colonial condition where the forced migrations associated with slavery and indentureship are the backdrops against which post-colonial peoples now seek to establish diasporic existences and to fashion a new ‘way in the world’. The initial trauma of forced removal from their ancestral lands has led to a spirit ual yearning for rootedness and symbolic return to home. Further, the yearning in question is best represented in the notion of primordialism, for it is only at home that one supposedly finds the acceptance and security from which to begin to negotiate one’s way in the world. Thus, ‘travel as exploration and transforming encounter turns on the quest for El Dorado, the lost world, the aboriginal landscape, identity,  origins, ancestry psychic reconnection, and rebirth’ (Paquet 2002, 196). Viewed in this way the Caribbean is both home and an African diasporic home away from home, and to this end Paquet invokes Wilfred Cartey, Carole BoyceDavies, Claude McKay, George Lamming and Edward Kamau Brathwaite to make the case for a ‘holistic Caribbean’ that comprises ‘a culturally diverse yet traditional’ culture block that stresses ‘the genealogical connection with Africa’ (p. 745). While departure could be non-voluntary or forced (slavery), Paquet also focuses on voluntary departure, as in the Caribbean migrant to England or some other metropolitan centre. Often for economic reasons, it is a sort of voluntary exile in Lamming’s thinking, that has given rise to scores of Caribbean diasporas in various Eu ropean metropoles. London, Berlin or Toronto is really a twice-migrant; first from Africa and second from the Caribbean. The connection to an African home is the centrepiece of much contemporary Afrocentric politics, but that connection is largely mythical and imagined, although many commentators seem willing to forget this fact. This speaks directly to the idea of home and belonging as articulated by two unapologetic Afrocentrists, Ian Smart and Kimani Nehusi (2000). For example, there is Nehusi who sees home as ‘a nurturing place, a space of spiritual, psychological, social, and physical comfort, freedom, security and satisfaction, and ultimately confidence, because we know that we will be understood there †¦ humans feel at home only when they can be themselves in culturally familiar ways. Home is therefore †¦ a space that not merely permits but encourages us to be our own selves and in which we are ‘easy’ – not merely familiar, but comfortable too (Nehusi 2000a, 1-2). This essentialist and romantic theme of ‘Africa as home’ is picked up by  Smart who treats all black people as Africans and affirms that the ‘African mind is one that deals with the big picture. The African mind is fundamentally driven by and towards holism’ (Smart 2000a, 51). And apparently unmindful of the process of creolization, Smart goes on boldly to assert that ‘[t]he core of Caribbean culture is the African heritage’ (2000a, 70). All of this is by way of setting the stage for the claim that Trinidad is an African country whose central cultural marker is the Carnival. According to Smart, Nehusi and several of the contributors to the volume in question, Carnival is an African festival that has become the national festival of Trinidad: ‘Carnival is â€Å"a black thing†, a Wosirian (Osirian) mystery play that was celebrated annually in Kemet (Ancient Egypt) from the very dawn of history’ (Smart 2000a, 29). Lamentably, however, the African origins and the signal contributions of Africans are bring erased by a class and colour conspiracy to wrest the festival from its original African founders. In essentialist language, these authors assume that Trinidad means African, that African means black, and that black means poor or working class (Smart 2000a, 63). Thus, the non-black presence in the Carnival, whether as masquerader, bandleader or owner, or costume designer, is all part of the Eurocentric (which is code for white and upper class) attempt to silence and erase the African. For one contributor, Pearl Springer, the consequence is that the Carnival has been reshaped in such as way that the African presence in the national festival is erased or reduced to that of a street vendor and ‘hired hand’ that does the physical labour in making the mas (Springer 2000, 22). Nehusi is in full agreement with this take on erasure of the black person: ‘Afrikan Trinidadians have been abandoned, declared nonpersons by a continuing Eurocentric system which refuses to recognize them and their traditions as valid and refuses to recognize the history of struggle †¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ (2000a, 11). Another contributor, Patricia Alleyne Dettmers, invokes the universal African and has no difficulty speaking of ‘Africans †¦ born in Trinidad and Tobago’ (2000, 132). Of particular significance here is the fact that these Afrocentric commentators who rail against the erasure of Africans and the suppression of African identity, simultaneously engage in their own erasure of the East Indian, the Chinese and other ethnic groups in  Trinidad (Allahar 2004, 129-33). Thus, in the same volume, Patricia Moran, affirms that ‘the Caribbean woman is basically African’ (2000, 169). As is clear, like the wider Caribbean region as a whole, the books and authors under review here are not free of contradiction and ambivalence. For the Afrocentric case put forward by writers like Smart and Nehusi (and their five co-authors) clearly looks past the well known erasure of the East Indians’ presence and contributions they have made to such countries as Trinidad, Guyana and Suriname. For this reason David Trotman wrote sarcastically of Trinidad’s supposed multi-racial paradise on the eve of independence (1962) and the racially coloured anticipation that filled the Trinidad air at the time: ‘it was a multi-racial picture from which the Indian seemed strangely absent’ (1991, 393). Trotman speaks of the privileging of African traditions to the neglect of Indian ones, and takes issue with one calypsonian, whose calypso titled ‘Portrait of Trinidad’ only identified the Afro-associated elements of steelband, calypso and carnival as national cultural achievements. This led Trotman wryly to observe: ‘In this portrait the Indian is painted out’ (p. 394). Paquet also laments this erasure as it is articulated by George Lamming and V.S. Naipaul (2002, 176, 189-90). The authors of the studies contained in Smart and Nehusi (2000) speak ideologically to what supposedly binds the community together, for example, common blood lines, common ethno-cultural experience, common collective memory, common African origins and so on. I say supposedly for much of this idea of community cohesiveness is rather mythical or fictional. It is part of the essentialization of Africa and Africans that is common among Afrocentrist commentators, and in the process all others are erased. Further, in the move to homogenize and essentialize Africans, they conveniently ignore those social and structural features that divide the community. I am thinking here of internal, class, colour, economic, and  political inequalities within, say, the so-called African diasporic community, not to mention ideological cleavages related to religion, inter- and intra-ethnic rivalries. Given the role played by myths of ethnic descent in the invoking of national unity and cultural identity, Smart and Nehusi problematize the political dimensions of cultural nationalism as it applies to the Trinidad carnival. They give cultural nationalism a colour – black – which means there are major implications for those who are defined out of the societal culture, for example, those who claim East Indian, Middle Eastern, Chinese, etc., descents. To affirm that Carnival is Trinidad’s national festival implies that the so-called Indo-Trinidadians, who, for whatever reasons, do not see carnival as their national cultural marker, are somehow less than full Trinidadians. In the minds of black nationalists, then, the carnival, which was born in Africa, is the supreme African festival and belongs entirely to black people, who, regardless of where they were born, are Africans! Africa is home for all Africans. This is why Smart depicts the Trinidad carnival as ‘the quintessential African festival’ (2000a, 72), and Nehusi sees the street parade segment of the celebration as symbolic of the Africans’ reclaiming their physical, spiritual and cultural freedom: ‘Possession of the streets was a sign of Afrikan possession of self, a spiritual re-connection with ancestors through millennia of cultural practice, a liberation through expression of impulses carried in genes for uncounted generations †¦.’ (2000b, 96). Some critics have charged that the foregoing constitutes part of the larger racist agenda of those black nationalists who want to define carnival in ethno-racial terms: ‘Trinbagonians can then rightly claim their festival as â€Å"we thing† only because it is a â€Å"black thing†Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ (Smart 2000a, 72). The loose invoking of the royal ‘we’ must not be taken as referring to all Trinbagonians, however, for it is tied to the deliberate erasure of the East Indian. Thus, the contributors to the volume in question can be seen as endorsing the myth of merry Africa and spinning tall tales of racial identity and solidarity among Africans the world over. They are unequivocal in their claim that Africa is the cradle of human civilization and the source of ancient human history. In spite of these facts, however, contemporary history is said to be written and produced by white supremacist barbarians bent on erasing the major contributions of Africans. Thus, Alleyne-Dettmers essentializes ‘barbaric Europeans’ (2000, 139), and both Smart (2000b, 199) and Moran (2000, 174) condemn what they refer to generally as ‘European barbarism’, while Olaogun Adeyinka speaks more specifically of the ‘heroic struggles of Africans’ to liberate themselves ‘from Spanish, French and British barbarism’ (2000, 111). Patricia Moran wants to rewrite history for she fears that there is a conspiracy on the part of what she calls ‘white bandits’ and those ‘Aryan marauders’ (p. 175), who, even today, would steal ‘we thing’, which is carnival and steelband! In the assertion of an absolute African identity there is the absolute erasure of the East Indian and other ethnic groups that comprise the society. As the foregoing assessment of Smart and Nehusi (2000) suggests, in the public’s mind, the term Caribbean brings immediately to mind the English-speaking countries of the region and their African-descended populations. Somewhat less immediate are the Spanish-speaking countries of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Even less immediate are the French countries (provinces) of Martinique and Guadeloupe, and the independent, French-speaking country of Haiti. Then there is the almost forgotten, erased, Caribbean: the Dutch-speaking Netherlands Antilles and Suriname. Although scholarship on the Caribbean has devoted considerable attention to the situation of East Indians in Trinidad and Guyana, and their erasure at the hands of both the colonial authorities and the various ‘black’ governments that inherited the seats of power following independence, not much is known about their counterparts in Suriname and other parts of the Dutch Caribbean. In fact, when addressing Caribbean studies generally, Suriname and the other countries of the Netherlands Antilles are usually an  afterthought; a curious appendage of the better-known English- and Spanish-speaking Caribbean. This leads to an incomplete picture of the region for if one were to assess the situation of the East Indians in the Caribbean, the Surinamese case seems to parallel that of Trinidad and Guyana, but the lessons learned in the latter were lost on the former. Indeed, in the years leading up to Suriname’s independence (1975), the East Indian population had the same fears and misgivings as their counterparts in Trinidad and Guyana a decade and a half earlier. And if political independence in these two countries was black in complexion, the social and political erasure of their East Indian populations could be expected to be repeated in Suriname. Thus, Gert Oostindie and Inge Klinkers wrote that: ‘quietly the Hindustani population were only afraid that those who would receive independence (i.e. the Afro-Surinamese) would use this for the enlargement of their own political power’ (2003, 112). As a consequence the East Indians generally opposed independence and opted for continued colonial dependence on the Dutch (p. 103, 112). For Oostindie and Klinkers (2003), then, this is only one reason why any comprehensive attempt to understand the history and sociology of the Caribbean must include the contributions that the Dutch countries have made to the shaping of the region’s wider culture and politics. Yet one must not homogenize all the Dutch countries, for Suriname and Aruba, for example, are quite politically, socially and culturally distinct. And whereas the sentiments of ‘black power’ informed the political sensibilities of Curaà §ao’s population, the ‘political elites of Aruba had always tended to emphasise the Euro-Amerinidian roots of their island as opposed to the African character of Curaà §ao’ (2003, 122). Indeed, as these authors point out, after losing Indonesia the Dutch lost most of their appetite for empire and appeared to retain their Caribbean possessions only reluctantly. And after the independence of Suriname, an  unusual situation was presented whereby the mother country seemed willing to free itself from the responsibilities of Empire, but the colonies in question would not let them off the hook (p. 116, 145). This is reminiscent of what Rosemarijn Hoefte and Gert Oostindie call ‘an example of upside-down decolonization with the metropolis, not the former colonies, pressing for independence’ (1991, 93). As Oostindie and Klinkers convincingly argue, whereas in the British West Indies (BWI) the sentiment for independence was strong in the 1950s and 1960s, this was not the case in the French West Indies and the Dutch West Indies (2003, 46-7). Suriname was the exception, but it was continental and not part of the socalled Antilles or Netherlands Antilles. In the case of the United States, Puerto Rico was a mixed bag with a significant proportion desiring statehood and an equal number preferring the continuation of the status quo, while an insignificant minority has always favoured independence. The US Virgin Islands, on the other hand, has never had any pretensions at independence of any kind. What is most striking about all these non-sovereign Caribbean states today (the remaining British Overseas Territories, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, St. Martin, Martinique and Guadeloupe, Curaà §ao, St. Maarten, Saba, St. Eustatius, Bonaire and Aruba), is that they have a higher standar d of living than the independent states, which leads some to make the perverse claim for continued colonization. The fact of the matter, however, is that all the economies in question are almost totally subsidized by the mother countries so local or indigenous economic development is virtually nonexistent. The higher standards of living are thus quite precarious and artificial and could crash any time the colonial power decided to withdraw. This led to the obvious conclusion that because: ‘from the Dutch side, millions of guilders are pumped into the Antilles and Suriname on a yearly basis,’ it would be far more preferable that ‘today rather than tomorrow that the Netherlands would get rid of the Antilles and Suriname’ (Oostindie and Klinkers 2003, 116). But as noted by Paquet earlier, decolonization is intimately tied to identity, whether juridical or socio-cultural, and wrapped up in the complex Caribbean traditions of errantry, travel, migration and return. So following  the insights of Derek Walcott, after all the travel is over, return to home is on the agenda; but ‘home’ is a nuanced Caribbean with African sensibilities. Further, because finding self is the prerequisite to finding home (Paquet 2002, 171, 173, 186-7; Smart and Nehusi 2000), and because self- knowledge leads to self-realization (Paquet 2002, 184, 187, 191), identity and belonging are inextricably tied to (political) action. Thus, in the case of the remaining British Overseas Territories, there is the ongoing debate over citizenship, passports and legal rights that led to the clumsy creation of a category of ‘British dependent territory passport holders’. This has given rise to what Oostindie and Klinkers call a group of persons with ‘a form of paper identity’ that has turned them into ‘citizens of nowhere’ (2003, 195). The same applies to the Surinamers and other Antillean peoples, who want to retain their distinctive Caribbean cultural identities, but who, mainly for economic reasons insist on retaining Dutch passports, Dutch citizenship, and all associated rights and privileges. And just as growing economic problems (unemployment) and social problems (racial discrimination) led the British in the 1960s to restrict free movement of British subjects from the former colonies to the metropolis, the French sought to encourage economic development in Martinique and Gua deloupe in order to reduce the numbers of those emigrating to France, and The Hague has made similar attempts to limit the numbers of Surinamese and Antilleans who have claims on Dutch citizenship. Once more the parallels are compelling but the consequences of erasure prevent them from being fully grasped. Another instructive parallel that seems lost in the erasure of the Dutch Caribbean concerns the idea of regional federation or integration. When Jamaica decided to pull out of the federation of the ten British West Indian territories in 1961, Trinidad’s Eric Williams announced that 1 from 10 leaves naught, implying that the idea of federation was dead (Knight and Palmer 1989, 14-15). For their part the Dutch Antilles, which are composed  of six islands, were faced with an almost exact dilemma when Aruba was granted ‘separate status’ in 1996. With continental Suriname already independent, Aruba’s status aparte led to a virtually identical sentiment of ‘one out of six would leave nil’ (Oostindie and Klinmkers 2003, 122), and seemed to end all hope or talk of Antillean independence. Based on the forgoing it is clear to see how the Caribb ean, both historically and in contemporary times, is a political project subject to the power politics of entrenched interests, whether of a class, race or gendered nature. Further, as social groups strive to root themselves and to establish identity markers, such politics will see the erasure of some and the promotion of others. The three studies reviewed here highlight dimensions of the colonial period in the Caribbean as well as the politics of decolonization and the politics of nation building in the modern age. While recently the latter has tended to assume clear ethnic dimensions, considerations of class, race and gender are not to be minimized or ignored, for the modern Caribbean was constructed on the politics of social inequality that are directly tied their statuses as dependent capitalist satellites of imperialist centres in an increasingly globalized world. *** References Allahar, Anton L. (2003) ‘â€Å"Racing† Caribbean Political Culture: Afrocentrism, Black Nationalism and Fanonism’. In Holger Henke and Fred Reno (eds) Modern Political Culture in the Caribbean. Kingston, Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press, pp. 21-58. Allahar, Anton L. (2004) ‘Ethnic Entrepreneurship and Nationalism in Trinidad: Afrocentrism and Hindutva’, Social and Economic Studies (53)2: 117-154. Alleyne Dettmers, Patricia (2000) ‘Beyond Borders, Carnival as Global Phenomena’. In Smart and Nehusi (eds) pp. 131-162. 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