Megadeth †“United Abominations” free essay sample

In light of the recent release of â€Å"Death Magnetic,† the highly anticipated album by Metallica, I looked back to their overlooked shadow, Megadeth. Megadeth has always been at odds and shortchanged for almost 20 years. â€Å"United Abominations,† Megadeth’s eleventh studio album, was released in 2007, and has been a success. Yet, I feel some people are put off by it. â€Å"United Abominations† attacks many of the cruel but ongoing issues of today. Topics of war, poverty, and corruption, brought together around the guitar-focused sound, makes this album a â€Å"whole† experience. Glen Drover, a new lead guitarist, was brought in to help with the production of the album. He works very well with Dave Mustaine, frontman and rhythm guitarist, who has gone through many lead guitarists. They have stayed true to their original thrash metal sound of the ’80s, which is not often seen today. The riffs are top-notch, and the solos and leads are screaming; a delight for any metal head. We will write a custom essay sample on Megadeth – â€Å"United Abominations† or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The two guitars are voiced well through the lyrics, each with their own attitude and separate meaning. Dave Mustaine’s voice has matured with time, becoming deeper, and he isn’t using his signature snarl very much, which was in many of their early music. This album takes an especially hard tone with war, especially the Iraq War and its distasteful consequences. Yet, not all is somber in this album, there are some great ballads and metal songs here. If you’re not a fan of metal music, you should check it out and perhaps even surprise yourself. If you are a fan of metal music, this is a definite buy.

Lies of Silence essays

Lies of Silence essays Michael Dillon was the manager of the hotel Clarence, in Belfast (Ireland). He had had an awful day and after work he goes to see his mistress, Andrea Baxter (a Canadian girl who moved to Ireland with her parents and stay to study arts). Dillon thought Andrea was going to leave him but when they met, she told him that she wasnt going to accept the work in London because she wanted to stay with him because she loved him. That made Dillon react and he decided to leave his wife and his job to go with Andrea to London and begin a new life together. Dillon said that the following day he would pack his things, talk to his wife (to leave her) and to his boss (to ask for another employment in London). He would live in the hotel with Andrea until the day they finally go to London. Dillon and Andrea had met for the first time a few months ago. There was a conference about Scottish and Irish poetry in the hotel, and Andrea was doing interviews. Since then they had meet often to make love. However he didnt see that relationship as an affair, he was really in love with Andrea. As he drove home, he thought about several things: He remembered his father saying that the Germans destroyed Belfast. He remembered when he first met his wife, Moira. It was at a party in London. She was a teacher fed up with teaching kids and wanted to go back to Ireland; Dillon was going to Ireland to be the manager of a hotel but he wished he could stay in London. Dillon fell in love with Moiras looks and proposed her. He thought about his fathers reaction to what he wanted to do. His father, who had introduced him to the hotel business (he was the proprietor of Kinsallagh House Hotel), would feel betrayed. When he finally arrived home he found his wife with a friend (Peg Wilton) who he would have to drive home. In the way home, Peg asked Dillon if he would let Moira work in a ...

Exercise Your Editing with This Exercise

Exercise Your Editing with This Exercise Exercise Your Editing with This Exercise Exercise Your Editing with This Exercise By Mark Nichol Editing is as much an art as writing is. Whether you’re finessing your own writing or revising the work of another, the process requires simultaneous attention to multiple issues: spelling, grammar, style, accuracy, formality, and the subjective aspect of substance: providing context, assigning meaning and conveying value, and more. When I was a copyediting instructor, one of my favorite activities was creating error-ridden editing exercises for my students. (Sadistic, I know but they got their money’s worth.) Here, I inflict one such compositional concentration of calamity of on you free of charge. But before you read beyond the following paragraph, copy and paste it and give it your best editing effort, then come back and compare your revision with mine: â€Å"On Jan. 20th, 1960 then-President John Kennedy delivered his notorious Ask Not What You Can Do for Your Country Speech. Kennedy launched not only America’s Space Program that sent men to the moon, but stood up to Russia when they threatened the free world during the missile crisis. During his Presidency, Peace Corps was formed; the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was signed by the Soviets; and the Civil Rights Act was passed. (However, he stumbled when, in a speech in Berlin in 1963, he told the Germans, â€Å"Ich bin ein Berliner.† He intended to communicate â€Å"I am a Berliner,† but the way he said it meant, â€Å"I am a jelly doughnut.†) Only 42-years-old when elected, the youngest president, his legacy is a less than three year presidency compared with Camelot.† Here’s my quick fix, followed by annotations: â€Å"President John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address on January 20, 1961, is memorable for the statement â€Å"Ask not what your country can do for you ask what you can do for your country,† and he answered his own challenge. During his administration, he not only pressed for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to achieve a manned landing on the Moon by the end of the 1960s but also confronted the Soviet Union over that country’s plan to install nuclear weapons in Cuba that would be aimed at the United States. Also, during Kennedy’s presidency, tragically abbreviated when he was assassinated on November 22, 1963, the Peace Corps was formed; the United States, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; and Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The legacy of Kennedy, only forty-two years old when he was elected, is of a brief period of peace and prosperity; indeed, his administration was compared to the glory of King Arthur’s Camelot.† Note the correction of the style of the month and date, and correction of the year itself. Our thirty-fifth president’s name is John F. Kennedy. If I had retained â€Å"then-President† before Kennedy’s name, I would omit the hyphen and lowercase the name of the office, which because of the modifier then becomes an epithet rather than a specific job title. Because Kennedy’s inaugural address is notable for other excerpts as well, I chose, in identifying it, to focus on the line giving it in its entirety and not on the speech. But if you do refer to a speech, style the reference as follows: â€Å"his ‘Ask not what you can for your country’ speech.† (Also, notorious is not an apt description for the address.) If I were editing someone else’s work, I would query for the writer’s approval of insertion of â€Å"he answered his own challenge,† which I think provides a transition to what would otherwise be merely a grocery list of accomplishments. I corrected the erroneous â€Å"not only . . . but also† construction. There is no such entity as â€Å"America’s Space Program,† so the latter two words should not have been capitalized. (And, whenever possible, use the more precise â€Å"United States† in place of America in reference to the nation.) In this context, moon is the formal name of an astronomical feature, rather than a generic word for such a phenomenon, and should therefore be capitalized. Although Russia is an informal alternative to â€Å"the Soviet Union,† it should be avoided in such usage. (â€Å"The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics† was the official name of the country during this period, but the two-word version is acceptable.) A nation is a singular entity and should not be referred to as â€Å"they.† â€Å"Free world† is subjective and provocative in this otherwise neutrally written passage. Because of the lack of specificity and capitalization, â€Å"the missile crisis† implies a previous reference to the incident. It should be referred to by its capitalized full name. As written, the sentence beginning â€Å"During his Presidency† (there is no reason to capitalize presidency, by the way) requires only commas, not semicolons. I retained the latter punctuation marks only because I rewrote the list of achievements in a complex form, with internal commas in the second item. I also revised the passive construction to active form. I inserted the phrase about his assassination to provide context. â€Å"Peace Corps,† like the similarly constructed names of most entities, should be preceded by the article the. Several nations signed the treaty, and if any are identified, all should be identified. The phrase â€Å"of 1964† is part of the formal name of the act. The â€Å"Ich bin ein Berliner† gaffe is a popular myth; residents of Berlin did not, and do not, call jelly doughnuts â€Å"Berliner.† (Beyond that, even if the story were true, the incident is minor when compared with the other highlights of Kennedy’s presidency listed here, and the passage provides insufficient context.) A person’s age, when not applied as a modifier, should not be hyphenated (except for linking ones-place and tens-place numbers, as in forty-two). Also, I prefer to follow The Chicago Manual of Style in spelling ages out. The first phrase of the last sentence is a dangling modifier; â€Å"the . . . president† is incorrectly identified as his own legacy. â€Å"The youngest president† is an awkwardly truncated interjection. My more extended parenthetical is only one of several possibilities. The phrase â€Å"less than three year,† as a modifier for presidency, should be hyphenated; I deleted the entire phrase because it seemed to distract from the point of the passage. Also, there was insufficient context for the reference to Camelot. This passage could be edited in as many versions as there are editors, and, given further context, would be further improved by additional changes. My effort attends to the deficiencies in the several categories I listed in the first paragraph of this post. Share in a comment below how and why your edits differ from mine and others. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Style category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Inquire vs EnquireHow to Punctuate Descriptions of ColorsA "Diploma" is not a "Degree"

Knowledge Management - managing knowledge Essay

Knowledge Management - managing knowledge - Essay Example According to Dimitris Karagiannis (2005), knowledge is a combination of many factors which together makes up strategies that helps in making decisions. It includes aspects of understanding of the organization and its people and the experience with the organization or others in the same line. It includes organized information from documents and other artefacts in the organization or outside. It is a difficult task to organize knowledge and get the best value from it. There must be highly organized initiative in the aspects of organization itself, its people and the enabling environment. According to Sanchez Ron (2001), knowledge management is a technology by itself which helps in assessing the actual and potential contribution to the process of creating and sharing of new ideas and decisions in an organization. It is good to understand that knowledge management is more of a process than a product. It represents a process in which ideas and facts are gathered, carefully analyzed and considered before arriving at any strategy. It forms the bases for effective planning and understanding of a strategy. It provides a way in which unstructured data is processed to become a more useful data that can form basis of strategizing for the benefit of the organization. The process consists of some components that are important and cannot be ignored. It requires consulted effort or collaboration from all quarters of the organization. It is important for all to contribute to the process in order to have diverse knowledge about a subject matter. In requires the aspect of content ma nagement and taxonomy management. Hence any effective organizational management must put into practice the knowledge management process in order to have effective strategies that work for the organization. According to Chun Choo and Nick Bontis, (2007), there are two broadly recognized approaches or technologies to management that are currently practiced in many companies and which are being advocated by many consultant firms. Sound management strategies require an extremely creating synthesis of the two approaches as each helps to offset the limitations of the other. The two approaches that are being advocated in company strategy are tacit and explicit forms of knowledge are being used in organizational management. The two approaches are merely forms of organized knowledge that can be applied in management. They are knowledge approaches which are fundamental in making decision. In the process of codification or articulation, tacit knowledge can be transformed to explicit knowledge. Tacit knowledge approach in strategies As the name suggest, this is the knowledge that cannot be easily shared with other people. It is the knowledge that is possessed inside and which is difficult to communicate to the organization unless through an enhanced process of knowledge management. This is the kind of knowledge that people carry in their minds. It is a form of knowledge that is difficult to access unless one is willing to contribute it to the organizatio

Criticism on mass media found in Stones Natural Born Killers Research Paper

Criticism on mass media found in Stones Natural Born Killers - Research Paper Example The two attractive serial killers have already killed 52 people in the course of three weeks when the story of the movie starts. Both of them gain fame through Wayne Gale, a sensationalistic journalist, and host of the tabloid TV-show American Maniacs. After being bitten by a rattlesnake and searching for anti-venom in a convenience store, Mickey and Mallory get arrested by the police at and end up in prison. After some time Wayne Gale arranges an interview with Mickey, which should be broadcasted right after the Superbowl. The interview provokes a riot between the inmates and the prison guards, giving Mickey and Mallory the chance to flee. Wayne is coming with them and is filming the entire jailbreak. After killing Wayne and leaving his, still recording, camera behind as evidence, they begin a new life. In the end they are shown in a mobile home with two little kids and another one on its way. Even though the road, the route 666 to be precise, is displayed in the first part of the m ovie and in the very end, Natural Born Killers is not by definition a road movie. The Oxford dictionary (2010: 1536) defines a road movie as â€Å"a film of a genre in which the main character is travelling, either in flight or on a journey of self-discovery†. Even though self discovery surely is part of the reason why Mickey and Mallory travel around - which can be seen in the scene where Mallory throws away her old clothes, and with that leaves her childhood behind (Stone, Natural Born Killers, 1994: 0:19h) - that is not the main topic the movie is about.

White Privilege And Male Privilege Essay Example for Free

White Privilege And Male Privilege Essay Peggy McIntosh is an American feminist and she is also an anti-racist activist of The United States of America. Peggy McIntosh is also the associate director of the Wellesley Centers for Women, a speaker and the founder and co-director of the National S.E.E.D. Project on Inclusive Curriculum which is basically the seeking of educational equity and diversity. Peggy McIntosh’s area of expertise is feminism and racism. She deals with equality in society and political world for women. She fights for the equal rights of women as the same rights as men. She also expertizes in the field of racism. According to Peggy McIntosh, whites are taught not to recognize the white privileges and that is why she started to ask what it was like to have these white privileges in life and then she started to write this article on her personal observations and experiences. The article, â€Å"White privilege and male privilege† is based on Peggy McIntosh’s daily experience within a particular circumstance. White Privilege means that the advantages that white people enjoy in society that people of other color cannot enjoy. It is bound to only the white people and it is beyond the people of color in the same society, politics or economic places. It sometimes said to be the advantages that white people have but they do not realize that they have it. According to Peggy McIntosh, she says in her article, â€Å"White Privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, assurances, tools, maps, guides, codebooks, passports, visas, clothes compass, emergency gear and blank checks† (White Privilege and Male Privilege, Peggy McIntosh, 95). Basically, white privilege is the privilege that white people have only not people of other race or color. Peggy McIntosh says that white privilege is an indivisible knapsack. She tries to imply that these privileges are not equally distributed among people of different race and color and to be more specific these are such privilege s that sometimes even the white people are unaware of it just as if these privileges were invisible to them. On this topic, Minnich said that white people are taught to think that their life is morally neutral, normal and average and that people work to benefit others. This is what Minnich said about this topic in Peggy’s article that white people think that they work to benefit others. Peggy McIntosh, in her article talked about the white privileges of people in daily circumstances. She wrote about some of her own experiences. According to me, the most striking ones among all of the effects emphasized by Peggy are that white people can go shopping anytime anywhere without having the fear of being followed and harassed by some detectives, white people can turn on the television or turn the papers of the newspaper and proudly see their race being represented with positive attitudes, white people can be casual if they want to or not want to listen to the speech of the person of another race. White people may use either checks, credit card or cash but in the counters, no one will tell t hem anything about their financial background. Some of the other daily effects that were most striking to me were that white people can swear, dress up as they want, and also even if they did not answer any letters, they would not be called illiterate or that they have bad morals. White people can criticize the government whenever they want to without being said anything to them or even the white people can attend the meetings late without anyone telling them anything about their race. Basically, white people have a lot of privilege and they can do almost anything they want to do. Peggy McIntosh says in her article that white people and also male controls almost everything. She says that they have control over the daily life and they dominate the world. She tells us that being privileged may mean something that almost everything in this world want and I agree with Peggy McIntosh because everyone in this world want to be privileged. But, sometimes privilege might mean the power that someone has to do something which people from other sex are not allowed to do. And also at times, because of the race and sex of people, they are empowered and Peggy McIntosh refers to this as conferred dominance in her article. Peggy also talks about unearned entitlement and this basically means that people may be because of their race or sex are entitled to something and they earn it by birth. They do not have to work to earn it because it is already theirs. They do not need to earn it since it is already belonged to them. According to me, after reading this article by Peggy McIntosh, white people have a lot of power in the United States of America. White people and also males dominate the society and people from other races or sex cannot do anything about it. It is how the things were and it is how it will go on. People tells us that racism is over but it is there in America maybe not shown but it is there hidden. White people still have hatred for other races in themselves but they just learnt a way to hide it and deal with it. White people enjoy a lot of benefits that people that belong to other races or sex or color do not enjoy. Some of these benefits are not even known to the whites. They may not eve n know about it but still enjoy it. Works Cited Kleiner, A. (2003). Who really matters: the core group theory of power, privilege, and success. Doubleday, Random House Inc. Sergiovanni, T. (1999). Building community in schools. Jossey-Bass Inc. McIntosh, Peggy (1988). White Privilege and Male Privilege, A personal account of coming to see Correspondences through work in women’s studies.

The Self-destructive Relationship in Wuthering Heights Essay -- Wuther

On the face of it, it would seem that the relationship between Catherine and Heathcliff is self-destructive to an extreme. Due to the lovers’ precarious circumstances, passionate personalities and class divisions, it seems that fate transpires to keep them apart and therefore the hopelessness of their situation drives them to self destruction. However, although the relationship is undeniably self-destructive, there are elements within it that suggest the pain Heathcliff and Catherine put each other through is atoned for to an extent when they share their brief moments of harmony. Catherine is trapped between her love of Heathcliff and her love for Edgar, setting the two men down a path of destruction, a whirlwind of anger and resentment that Catherine gets caught in the middle of. Catherine is drawn to Heathcliff because of his fiery personality, their raw attraction and one certainly gets the sense that they are drawn together on a deeper level, that perhaps they are soulmates. C. Day Lewis thought so, when he declared that Heathcliff and Catherine "represent the essential isolation of the soul...two halves of a single soul–forever sundered and struggling to unite." This certainly seems to be backed up in the novel when Catherine exclaims â€Å"Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He's always, always in my mind--not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being...† This shows clearly the struggle Catherine feels as she is drawn spiritually to Heathcliff, but also to Edgar for very different reasons. Edgar attracts Cath erine predominantly because he is of the right social class. Catherine finds him "handsome, and pleasant to be with," but her feelings for him seem petty when compared to the ones she harbours... ...ctive. Catherine is pushed to death and Heathcliff to brutal revenge, bordering on the psychotic. Yet before Cathy’s death, the knowledge that the other loves them is strong enough to make Wuthering Heights such a classic love story, and â€Å"that old man by the kitchen fire affirming he has seen two of 'em looking out of his chamber window, on every rainy night since his death,† shows that as they walk together on the moors, their self destruction may have led them to death, but also to what they most desired-being together. Works Cited - MLA Format Bronte, Emily. Wuthering Heights. London: Dover Publications, 1996. Chatterjee, Praving. Emily Bronte. September 28, 2013. Web 22 Apr. 2015. https://emilybronteparminder.wordpress.com/2013/09/28/brontes-contributions/ Wikipedia. Emily Bronte. Web 22 Apr. 2015. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emily_Bront%C3%AB

The Kroger Company

The Kroger Company is an Ohio based retailer and manufacturer of grocery products with over 2,000 retail outlets covering 24 states. There are ten Kroger Marketing Areas that report to Headquarters in Cincinnati, Ohio. The Michigan Kroger Marketing Area covers the State of Michigan with offices in Livonia. The Livonia office supports 83 retail stores in the state with local Marketing, Product Procurement, Personal Training, Merchandising, Market Research and Facility Engineering. The role of a Produce Buyer for Kroger requires many management skills. The Buyer has to depend on many different individuals to get product from the field to the hands of shoppers. The individuals the Produce Buyer deals with includes people inside Kroger and outside organizations such as growers, distributors, brokers, jobbers and trucking companies. The Produce Buyer†s responsibilities include procurement of product, pricing of product, shipping of product, retail-merchandising direction, forecasting and evaluating department performance. The Produce Buyer needs to examine multiple items to develop the plan for getting produce to the consumer. The first step is developing an Ad-plan to meet their sales and profit objectives. The design of an Ad-plan requires current knowledge of market conditions, competition checks, last year†s ad-plans, last year†s sales and movement reports, and sales meetings. Market conditions include product availability, seasonal products, quality of product, growing areas, and product and transportation cost. Analyzing the competition involves visiting competitors† stores and reviewing their advertisements from prior years. Reviewing Kroger†s previous year advertisements assists in developing a base for an effective Ad-plan. The use of sales and movement reports supplies performance of the Ad-plan implemented for the same time period last year. The sales meeting involves the gathering of all merchandising directors and local VP†s to coordinate the process of developing an overall Ad-plan for the Michigan Kroger Marketing Area. The Ad-plan meeting is used to make adjustments and corrections to achieve the sales goals and objectives for the entire organization. The Produce Buyer needs to make use of multiple forms of communication to perform their daily duties. The use of email and faxes are mechanisms to help facilitate the procurement process. Email is used to get market conditions from various parts of the country, transmit purchase orders, confirmation of orders, interoffice communication, store communication and vendor solicitations. Received faxes supply market conditions for the country, vendor solicitations, response to product recalls and survey orders. The phone is used to contact stores about quality problems, receive detailed feedback from brokers, make product orders, schedule meetings, and locate late deliveries. The two key organizing functions a Produce Buyer would use to achieve projected goals are developing Sales Plans and Department Layouts. The Sales Plan and Department Layouts provide stores with information on where and how to display products and gives them ordering guidelines. This information is used to determine what to buy and how much product should be purchased. The placement of product within a store has a direct effect on the amount of product that will be sold. Placing bananas on the end of a display piece will move better than if placed between apples and pears. The growing area would have a direct effect on the quality and appearance of the product that could result in an increase or a decrease in sales. If Florida†s strawberries lacked color, then the determination would be made to purchase from the colorful California variety to produce the needed sales. The process of establishing standards, goals and targets, measuring performance and identifying deviations for the Produce Buyer are the guidelines for a manager to insure plans are carried out or modified to achieve the organization†s strategy. The sales plan is set by the Produce Buyer as a tool for the store produce department manager to use as a guideline to reach the target goals for the buyer. The sales plan supplies the necessary merchandising standards for the stores to help maximize sales. These include special product handling, ordering specifications, fruit layout and cross merchandising tips. The buyer†s performance is gauged by monitoring product movement on a daily basis, by weekly sales reports that recap the previous week†s retail sales and profit and comparison of these figures to the set budget. The other gauge used is the shipment report to evaluate actual movement versus projected movement of the week. The sales plan requires adjustment when projected sales and profit are not met for the week. To compensate for not achieving the week†s targets the following week†s sales plan must be modified in an effort to meet the goals. The Buyer uses a budget as a control tool to set goals for sales, expenditures, and profits. At Kroger, the Buyer strives to achieve both a sales dollar goal and a profit percent goal. These goals are set up in four-week increments called periods. There are thirteen periods in a calendar year. The first step in the budgeting process is to develop a sales forecast and sales budget. In the Kroger organization, each of the ten Marketing Areas† controllers are given a budget by the Cincinnati corporate office for their division. The controller in turn requires that the Merchandising Director of each department submit a sales and rate for the entire year broken down by period. The directors need to consider economic conditions, competitors† actions, and seasonal fluctuations to ensure an accurate forecast. Once the Directors have completed their departmental budgets, they return them to the controller for their review. The controller will apply these budgets to the planned budget for the Marketing area and if needed, the Directors may be requested to fine tune their projections in a effort to meet the needs of the entire company. It is the ultimate responsibility of the controller to ensure the Marketing Area stays on the correct path to return the expected results. The Buyer uses the budget set by the Director of the department as a guideline in planning, organizing, and controlling procurement activities. An operating report is issued at the end of each period, which summarizes the sales, revenues, and expenses and compares actual results to projected budget. The Buyer uses the operating report as tool in measuring performance. The role of the Human Resources department at the Kroger company is staffing, compensation, performance, safety, training and development, and labor relations. Many of these functions can be applied to the role of a Produce Buyer in the organization. The job description for a Buyer is a collaborated effort between Human Resources and the Director of Produce Merchandising. The Human Resources Department acts as a filter in screening out applicants for the buying position who do not meet the minimum requirements of the position. Training programs and workshops are facilitated by Human Resource personnel and are focused on strengthening a Buyer†s professional and personal growth. A Buyer†s Performance Review is normally administered by the Director of Produce Merchandising and then a copy of the performance review and objectives is reviewed and filed in the Human Resources office. The information on the Performance review is use to determine the promotability of a Buyer. Key information related to promotability is highlighted on a Successive Planning Chart in the corporate Human Resources office in Cincinnati. The Planning Chart lists all management personnel in the company and is used to determine when an individual is ready to be promoted and to what position. This process is used when filling a vacant buyer†s position. A Kroger Buyer is faced with individual and group decision-making each day. Weather conditions, late truck arrivals, product quality, and product quantities can cause problems where a Buyer would need make a decision. In many of the cases, due to the highly perishable nature of the commodity, decisions need to be made quickly.

Islamic Media and Orientalism Essay

In recent years, Islam and its adherents have been subject to growing scrutiny in the aftermath of recent events such as the World Trade Center attack in September 11, 2001 and the fierce resistance of Iraquis to American occupation. Unfortunately, most of the interest in Islam and in Muslim communities focus on probing for a connection between Islam as a religious faith and hostility towards Western power and influence that undoubtedly ignores the realities and multi-dimensional aspects of Muslim experience. As the non-Muslim mass media continues to air or post the images of violence in war-torn Iraq or of the foreign-national beheadings by Afghan rebels and mujahedins, persistent stereotypes against Muslim individuals and Islamic nations are reinforced and justified. Thus, an examination of how the identities of Islamic nations, individuals and communities are created and mediated in the Muslim media itself and how it reinforces the non-Muslim perception of Islam as a religious and political identity becomes critical and necessary. Despite the advances in information and communications technology (ICT), Muslims remain at the peripheries of media exchange which contribute to the notion of Islam and Islamic communities as a rigid, closed system. Fandy (1999) attributes this to the inherent political and social structures in Islamic societies and nations that prevent the majority of its people from participating in the local and national dialogue and effectively shuts them out of the global information network. He cites, for instance, the stern censorship policies of the Saudi Arabian government that carries out filtering and removal of content that it deems unacceptable to Islamic culture and beliefs. In the same manner, the Saudi government maintains control over the mass media and communications infrastructure to ensure that opposition to its rule is limited. Even the intellectual discourse of Islam and its interpretation is limited as the State—represented by the King and the royal family—relies on the sanctioning effect of Islam as a religion to validate its rule. Likewise, in Indonesia where Muslims constitute the majority of the population, authoritarian government control pose a grave challenge on the Muslim media’s ability to develop an â€Å"open and pluralistic â€Å"public† sphere† (Hefner 79) which reinforce the notions of orientalism in Islam as a religion or of Islamic countries and peoples’ â€Å"unchanging civilizational identities†. (Hefner 103) The orientalism of Islam and its adherents are further reinforced by the tendency of Muslim mass media to depict Muslim societies as being homogenous and the same. Hefner (1997) observes, for instance, the obvious lack of attempt by the writers and editors of Media Dakwah, a Muslim magazine in Indonesia, to â€Å"represent the broad range of opinion within the Muslim community as a whole. In effect, Muslim media appears to depict Islamic societies as static by its emphasis on Muslim â€Å"otherness† or the â€Å"difference† between Islamic and non-Islamic culture. Aside from the government, Muslim media is regulated by public opinion among Islamic adherents and is effectively pressured to focus on â€Å"the uncompromising truth of Islam, Islam’s superiority to all other religions, and the threats posed to Muslims in a world dominated by anti-Islamic powers. (Hefner 90) The dominant Muslim mass media in Saudi Arabia and Indonesia therefore reinforces the perceived orientalism of the Islamic culture by its seeming resistance to change and the unquestioning passivity by which its audience are conditioned to adhere to Islamic codes and norms, and by its focus on non-compromise and seeming intolerance for un-Islamic practices. However, most of these are motivated by political rather than religious interests. Thus, attempts by the authoritarian government to undermine Saudi oppositions’ attempt at creating an alternative media based on its own interpretation of Islam by exploiting new media techology to expose the corrupt practices, poor human rights record, and un-Islamic acts of the King and his family further reinforces the perception of Saudi Arabia and Muslim countries in general as hostile and unreceptive to the plurality of ideas on Islam. In Indonesia, on the other hand, the intolerance by which Islamic fundamentalists criticize the cosmopolitanism of some Muslim print media effectively keeps publications in check and prevents it from exploring varied themes. Thus, the orientalism of Muslim culture is maintained and reinforce despite the rise and globalization of varied media and communication forms that scholars have generally regarded with optimism in relation to their role in leveling the field for intellectual and political discourse and creating new spaces by which the marginalized can be heard. In the case of Muslim media, the presence of hindrances such as strict religious and moral codes that are oftentimes used by the authorities to justify repression and to censor individual and group expression, have led to the continued marginalization of the Muslim experience and culture. It is in the unfortunate marginalization of the majority of the Muslim population that their culture and the changes in it become subject to the scrutiny of outsiders and to the categorization of orientalism in their identities.

Expressing Quantity in English for Large Amounts

Expressing Quantity in English for Large Amounts There are many expressions used to express large amounts in English. In general, much and many are the standard quantifiers used to express large quantities. The Basics Much is used with uncountable nouns: There is much interest in learning English around the world.How much money do you have?There isnt much butter left in the refrigerator. Many is used with countable nouns: There are many people who use the computer every day.How many students live close to the school?There arent many books on that shelf. The following expressions are often used in place of much and many, especially in positive sentences. a lot oflots ofplenty ofa great deal ofa large number ofthe majority of These expressions can are combined with of in the sense of most, many or much. A lot of people enjoy listening to jazz.A great deal of time is spent understanding these issues. Note that much, most and many does NOT take of. Most people enjoy listening to some type of music. (NOT: Most of people...)Much time is spent understanding math. (NOT: Much of time is spent ...) Formal/Informal A lot of/lots of/plenty of are generally used in informal situations: There will be a lot of food at the party.Theres plenty of time to finish your homework. A large amount of/a great deal of/a large number of/a majority of are used in more formal situations, such as written business English and presentations. There is a great deal of pressure to finish this project on time.There are a large number of individuals who prefer to do banking online. Countable/Uncountable A lot of/lots of/plenty of are used with both countable and uncountable nouns. Theres a lot of juice in this jug.There are plenty of opportunities to learn online.There are lots of people who like chess. A large amount of/a great deal of are used with uncountable nouns such as water, money, time, etc. Theres a large amount of work to be done on this project.There isnt a great deal of time to finish this report. A large number of/a the majority of are used with countable nouns such as people, students, investors, etc. The majority of investors are interested in low-risk opportunities.A large number of our pupils continue their studies at university.

Review of Reading Eggs for Children Ages 4 to 8

Review of Reading Eggs for Children Ages 4 to 8 Reading Eggs is an interactive online program intended for children ages 4-8 and designed to teach children how to read or to build on existing reading skills. The program was originally developed in Australia by Blake Publishing but brought to schools in the United States by the same company that developed Study Island, Archipelago Learning. The premise behind Reading Eggs is to engage students in a fun, interactive program that initially builds a foundation for learning to read and eventually guides them towards reading to learn. The lessons found in Reading Eggs are designed to tie into the five pillars of reading instruction. The five pillars of reading instruction include phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Each of these components is necessary for children to master if they are going to be expert readers. Reading Eggs provides an alternative avenue for students to master these concepts. This program is not intended to replace traditional classroom instruction, instead, it is a supplemental tool in which students can hone and build the skills which they are being taught at school. There are 120 total lessons found in the Reading Eggs program. Each lesson builds on a concept taught in the previous lesson. Each lesson has between six and ten activities that students will complete to master the overall lesson. Lessons 1 through 40 are designed for students who have very little reading skills. Children will learn their first reading skills at this level including sounds and names of the alphabet letters, reading sight words, and learning essential phonics skills. Lessons 41 through 80 will build on those skills previously learned. Children will learn more high-frequency sight words, build word families, and read both fiction and nonfiction books designed to build their vocabulary. Lessons 81 through 120 continue to build on previous skills and will provide activities for children to read for meaning, comprehension, and to continue to increase vocabulary. Here are some key components of Reading Eggs. Its Teacher/Parent-Friendly Reading Eggs is easy to add a single student or a whole class.Reading Eggs has terrific reporting that makes it easy to monitor individual student or whole class progress.Reading Eggs provides teachers with a downloadable letter to send home to parents. The letter explains what Reading Eggs is and provides login information for students to work on the program at home at no additional cost. It also provides parents with the opportunity to have an account to track their child’s progress at no additional cost.Reading Eggs provides teachers with a comprehensive user guide as well as toolkit loaded with books, lesson plans, resources, and activities. The teacher toolkit has several books and activities that they can use in conjunction with their Smart Board to interactively teach lessons to the whole class. Its Instructional With Diagnostic Components Reading Eggs provides teachers and parents with the opportunity to assign specific lessons to students. For example, if a kindergarten teacher is teaching the letter â€Å"K†, the teacher can go in and assign the lesson over the letter â€Å"K† to all of the students to reinforce that concept.Reading Eggs also provides teachers and parents with the option of giving each child a diagnostic placement test. This test consists of forty questions. When the child misses three questions, then the program assigns them to the appropriate lesson that corresponds to how they did on the placement test. This allows students to skip past concepts which they have already mastered and places them at the level in the program where they should be.Reading Eggs allows teachers and parents to reset a student’s progress at any time in the program. Its Fun and Interactive Reading Eggs has kid friendly themes, animations, and songs.Reading Eggs allows users to create and personalize their own unique avatar.Reading Eggs provides users with motivation by providing incentives and rewards. Each time they complete an activity, they are rewarded with golden eggs. Their eggs are kept in their â€Å"eggy bank† which they can use to buy reward games, clothes for their avatar, or accessories for their house. In addition, when a user completes a lesson they earn an animated â€Å"critter†, which they collect as they go through the program.Reading Egg lessons are set up similar to a board game where you move from stepping stone to another by completing an activity. Once you have completed each activity, then you have completed that lesson and get to move on to the next lesson. Reading Eggs Is Comprehensive Reading Eggs has hundreds of extra learning activities and games aside from those in the standard 120 reading lessons.The Playroom is loaded with over 120 learning activities covering a wide range of topics ranging from letter reinforcement to art.My World allows students to visit eight destinations loaded with fun, interactive activities.Story Factory allows students to write and build their own stories and then enter them into a weekly story writing competition.Puzzle Park gives students a chance to earn some more Golden Eggs by completing word puzzles and practicing sight word recognition.The Arcade is a place where students can use their earned Golden Eggs to play much fun, interactive reading games.Driving Tests contains assessments covering sights words, phonics skills, and content area vocabulary. If a student satisfactorily completes a test, they are rewarded a racing car game which they can play to earn more golden eggs.Skills Bank is designed to build a student’s ski lls in spelling, vocabulary, grammar, and punctuation. Music Cafà © allows students to access and play their favorite songs that hear within a lesson. Its Structured Reading Eggs provides students with a comprehensive dashboard located on the left of their screen. This dashboard keeps track of which lesson they are on, how many golden eggs they have earned, and allows them access to their stuff and all the other places they can go to the program.Reading Eggs forces students into order by padlocking activities. You must complete activity one to open activity two.Reading Eggs also locks components such as My World, Puzzle Park, the Arcade, Driving Tests, Skills Bank until a user has mastered the appropriate number of lessons to have developed the skills necessary to use those components. Research on Reading Eggs Reading Eggs has been proven to be an effective tool for children to learn how to read. A study was conducted in 2010 that paralleled the features and components of the Reading Eggs program to essential elements that students must comprehend and possess to be able to read. Reading Eggs uses a variety of effective, research-based learning activities that motivate students to successfully complete the program. The web-based design features those components that have been proven to be highly effective in getting children to be high functioning readers. Overall Impression Reading Eggs is an exceptional early literacy program for parents of young children as well as schools and classroom teachers. Children love using technology and they love to get rewards and this program combines both of them effectively. In addition, the research-based program successfully incorporates the five pillars of reading. You may feel concerned if you think young children may be overwhelmed by the program, but the tutorial in the help section was terrific. Overall, Reading Eggs deserves five out of five stars, because it is a wonderful teaching tool that children will want to spend hours using.

Compair and contrast between the hawk and the Lady in red Essay

Compair and contrast between the hawk and the Lady in red - Essay Example This paper discusses the differences and similarities between the two stories with respect to the major characters. Stressed, lonely, and living in regret, the Lady in Red character re-lives memories of what life used to be when he had money. From trips to Europe, having the best car, friends, and house, but all these seem to have faded and reduced him to a street beggar. The character portrays life on the fast lane and life on the street. The astounding factor in this story is that life is unpredictable, as the character puts it, â€Å"today, you could own the best car, and tomorrow you could be begging on the streets† (LeMieu45). He used to have many friends who would join in the thanksgiving celebration and drink the finest wine. Additionally, loving family members would show up on different occasions and have a good laugh. However, life turned against the professional sports writer, and salesman who had excellent skills in business. All that he was left with was his old car, and his dog, Willow, who never left his side. From begging on the streets and being chased from stores he used t o shop, the character seems to have lost hope and the zeal to live again. However, he finds closure when he packs his car in the usual sanctuary where many homeless people stay. This gives him the motivation that he is not the only one in the universe going through pain and suffering. Similarly, the Hawk character goes through the same tribulations despite having a prosperous past. The Hawk character sleeps in a tent inside a community football pitch. He used to be a reputed football player back in the day, and received recognition from community members. However, after going into business, things failed to work in his favor, and he ended up homeless. Luckily, people of the community were compassionate and let him stay in the field as long as he would not interfere with the daily activities taking place. He once had a caring heart, but all