Conceptualization of Culture and Language in Post Colonial Literature Essay Example for Free

Conceptualization of Culture and Language in Post Colonial Literature Essay Culture and Language are the major issues in the post colonial theory. My assignment will deal with these three factors in terms of colonial perspectives. The post colonialism mainly explores the ideas such as cultural diversity, geographical dimensions, Diasporas, race, ethnicity, marginality, hybridity, national identities, cultural transformation, changes and politics in language etc†¦ Considerations of hybridity run the range from existential to material, political to economic, yet this discussion will not be able to tease out the extensive implications of each consideration. Rather, this discussion aims to explore the notion of hybridity theoretically, synthesizing the vast body of literature to critique essentialist notions of identity as fixed and constant. According to my understanding of Hybridity, there are three ways in which hybridity might serve as a tool for deconstructing the rigid labels that maintain social inequities through exclusion in race, language and nation. By exploring how the hybrid rejects claims of bonds within race, language, and nation, I understood that cultural studies like these are imperative in considering the politics of representation. For the purposes of this discussion, the cultural hybridity refers to the integration of cultural bodies, signs, and practices from the colonizing and the colonized cultures. The contemporary cultural landscape is an amalgam of cross-cultural influences, blended, patch-worked, and layered upon one another. Unbound and fluid, culture is hybrid and interstitial, moving between spaces of meaning. The notion of cultural hybridity has existed far before it was popularized in postcolonial theory as culture arising out of interactions between â€Å"colonizers† and â€Å"the colonized†. However, in this time after imperialism, globalization has both expanded the reach of Western culture, as well as allowed a process by which the West constantly interacts with the East, appropriating cultures for its own means and continually shifting its own signifiers of dominant culture. This hybridity is woven into every corner of society, from trendy fusion cuisine to Caribbean rhythms in pop music to the hyphenated identities that signify ethnic Americans, illuminating the lived experience of ties to a dominant culture blending with the cultural codes of a Third World culture. Framing Cultural Hybridity in post colonial context; Among postcolonial theorists, there is a wide consensus that hybridity arose out of the culturally internalized interactions between â€Å"colonizers† and â€Å"the colonized† and the dichotomous formation of these identities. Considered by some the father of hybrid theory, Homi Bhabha argued that colonizers and the colonized are mutually dependent in constructing a shared culture. His text The Location of Culture (1994) suggested that there is a â€Å"Third Space of Enunciation† in which cultural systems are constructed. In this claim, he aimed to create a new language and mode of describing the identity of Selves and Others. Bhabha says: It becomes crucial to distinguish between the semblance and similitude of the symbols across diverse cultural experiences such as literature, art, music, Ritual, life, death and the social specificity of each of these productions of meaning as they circulate as signs within specific contextual locations and social systems of value. The transnational dimension of cultural transformation migration, diaspora, displacement, relocation makes the process of cultural translation a complex form of signification. The naturalized, unifying discourse of nation, peoples, or authentic folk tradition, those embedded myths of cultures particularity, cannot be readily referenced. The great, though unsettling, advantage of this position is that it makes you increasingly aware of the construction of culture and the invention of tradition. In using words like â€Å"diaspora, displacement, relocation,† Bhabha illustrates the dynamic nature of culture, and the flimsy consistency of the historical narratives that cultures rely upon to draw boundaries and define themselves. As a result, culture cannot be defined in and of it, but rather must be seen within the context of its construction. More significantly, Bhabha draws attention to the reliance of cultural narratives upon the other. In illuminating this mutual construction of culture, studies of hybridity can offer the opportunity for a counter-narrative, a means by which the dominated can reclaim shared ownership of a culture that relies upon them for meaning. This theoretical erspective will serve as the foundation for the considerations explored in this paper, employing hybridity as a powerful tool for liberation from the domination imposed by bounded definitions of race, language, and nation. RACE: Racial hybridity, or the integration of two races which are assumed to be distinct and separate entities, can be considered first in terms of the physical body. Historically, the corporeal hybrid was birthed from two symbolic poles, a bodily representation of colonizer and colonized. These mixed births, mestizo, mulatto, muwallad, were stigmatized as a physical representation of impure blood, and this racism long served as a tool of power that maintained that even in this blending of two bodies, just â€Å"one drop† of black blood would deem the body impure and alien, an abomination. Institutionalized racism created a perpetual state of ambiguity and placelessness for the hybrid body and prevented cultural inclusion via race. However, the expanse of immigration since colonialism and the spectrum of shades of visible difference point to an increasingly hybrid populace in which these classifications of black and white no longer carry the same power of representation, yet the old labels persist. This labeling is significant as it elucidates the continuing power of racial labels in a society set on fixing bodies in racial space by binding them to labels, which are understood to contain fixed truths. I argue that utilizing the conceptual tool of hybridity to deconstruct these labels allows a means by which hybrid individuals can come together in powerful solidarity, rather than allowing their ambiguous place in racial space to render them invisible. Harnessing racial hybridity to project the simultaneously unique but common experience of hybridity can be a means by which the individual subject can join to a marginal community through stories and partial memories. Furthermore, racial hybridity must harness the dualistic experience of passing, or being mistaken for a race other than one’s own. All identities involve passing to some extent, in that a subject’s self can never truly match its image, but racial passing implicitly deconstructs the boundaries of Black and White. In passing, hybridity might function not as a conflict or struggle between two racial identities, but instead as constant movement between spaces, passing through and between identity itself without origin or arrival. The freedom to move between identities carries its own power in defying the claims of essentialized racial identity. Furthermore, the bounded labels of race do not account for the historical and geographic narratives that lie behind each body and inform their identity. In â€Å"Black Africans and Native Americans†, Jack Forbes explores the disconnect between racial labels and the consciousness of the bodies behind them using Native Americans and Africans as examples by which â€Å"groups are forced into arbitrary categories render their ethnic heritage simple rather than complex†. As a result, hybridity calls into question the boundaries of racial consciousness as a hybrid consciousness defies the imposed limits of race. The management of these identities becomes its own sort of performance, as the body negotiates each consciousness in different spaces. Again, the ability to play multiple roles, to â€Å"pass† in different arenas, carries significant power. In embodying the inability to bind identities to race, racial hybridity both in the physical body and in consciousness offers a means of deconstructing the boundaries of dichotomous racial identities. In addition to race, language has long been bound in definitions as a symbol of nation and a mode of exclusion. As a means to connect with other social beings, communicating with language is a meaningful performance in that speaking requires two parties, one to perform language and an audience to observe and absorb language. During colonialism, as the colonizer’s language dominated national institutions, the sense of being outside and â€Å"othered† was instilled in the colonized as their language and means of communication was stripped away. Now in a time after colonialism, can the colonized ever reclaim a language long lost, or has the colonizer’s language become their own? Has ownership of the colonizer’s language expanded over time? Fanon’s theorizing addresses the power of language in the formation of identity as he says, â€Å"To speak . . . means above all to assume a culture, to support the weight of a civilization,†. He suggests that speaking the language of the colonizer stands in as acceptance or coercion into accepting a role in culture. Yet in accepting a role, whether by choice or force, the meaning of the culture shifts and evolves. No longer does it â€Å"belong† to the colonizer, as it relies upon the colonized to give it shape. Similarly, with the introduction of a new set of users performing a language, the language no longer exists as it was; it has shifted in meaning. Beyond the thematic implications of language, hybridity has inspired an immense movement in literary discourse and understandings of the very way language is managed and owned. Herskovits developed the notion of syncretism, a theory attempting to explain why certain cultural forms are carried and others lost. Similarly, Claude Levi-Strauss developed the term bricolage to describe mixed forms within narratives. Creolization describes the linguistic blending of dominant and subdominant cultures. These examples illustrate the broad realm of studies that have developed simply around the use of hybridized language. In an analysis of the rise of the â€Å"hybrid genre† in postmodern literature, Kapchan and Strong say, â€Å"Hybridization has become one such analytic allegory, defining lines of interest and affiliation among scholars of popular and literary culture, perhaps quite unintentionally. The extent to which these authors use the metaphor of hybridity consciously and concisely differs. That they use it, however, qualifies hybridity as one of several tropes, or forms of metaphoric predication, that most epitomize the scholarship of the last decade,† . Not only does this observation imply that the body of hybridized literature is growing, harkening to the rising voices and representations of the hybrid, but that hybridity is becoming normalized as an accepted form of literature and the purist notion of genre is diminishing. Furthermore, the use of a colonizer’s language by the colonized to speak of the crimes of colonialism is its own transgression and act of resistance. In taking ownership of the language, changing the way that it is used, the boundaries of language as belonging to a specific place or race are dissolved. Jahan Ramazani’s Hybrid Muse is an analytical review of the poetry that has arisen from the hybridization of the English muse with the long-resident muses of Africa, India, the Caribbean, and other decolonizing territories of the British Empire (2001). A hybrid himself, Ramazani suggests that the use of indigenous metaphors, rhythms, creoles, and genres has allowed a new form of poetry that not only speaks of the violence and displacement of colonialism, but embodies it in its very form. These hybrid poetries can be viewed as a gateway to understanding those once deemed unfamiliar, and hybridity of language becomes a way by which to deconstruct borders and relate to collectives across cultural boundaries. Further, hybridity must interrogate the notion that nationality is essential zed in a distinct culture that geographic borders somehow embody inherent knowledge or truth about the people they contain. Mamdani asks, â€Å"How do you tell who is indigenous to the country and who is not? Given a history of migration, what is the dividing line between the indigenous and the nonindigenous? . He addresses the nationalist concern over entitlement to nation, and the indigenous wish to lay claim to culture. I understood that theories of hybridity, in clarifying the shifting and indefinite nature of culture, can serve as a tool that complicate the nationalist exclusionary practice of determining who does and does not have claim to a nation. From health care to immigration, h is arguments resonate loudly with current events. Similarly, we must consider the ways in which the â€Å"things† that give culture meaning are unfixed and variable, negating essentialist arguments about inherent meanings of culture. In The Predicament of Culture, James Clifford (1988) analyzes sites including anthropology, museums, and travel writing to take a critical ethnography of the West and its shifting relationships with other societies. He demonstrates how â€Å"other† national cultures are in fact fictions and mythical narratives, and we must ask the question of representation and who has the authority to speak for a group’s identity. In his article â€Å"Diasporas†, he suggests that â€Å"The old localizing strategies by bounded community, by organic culture, by region, by center and periphery may obscure as much as they reveal†. Diaspora is defined as a history of dispersal, myths/memories of the homeland, alienation in the host country, desire for eventual return, ongoing support of the homeland, and a collective identity importantly defined by this relationship. In this consideration of culture, we understand the vast connotations of displacement, from asking which history the diasporic should identify with to asking if it is even possible to return to a homeland one never knew or left long ago. Second, in the representation of culture, be it by petrifying culture in a museum or nailing it to an anthropological account, the risk lies in taking these subjective moments as truths or knowledge. Furthermore, the far-reaching diasporic symbols and narratives that snowball into this thing we call national culture suggest that culture is itself a traveler collecting artifacts from various locations along the way, and its walls are too insubstantial to be used as a means of exclusion. Third and perhaps most significant, hybridity in a postcolonial world muddles the very definitions of culture by which nations define themselves. Given that nationalism is founded upon a collective consciousness from shared loyalty to a culture, one would assume this culture is well-defined. Yet the â€Å"solid† roots of historical and cultural narratives that nations rely upon are diasporic, with mottled points of entry at various points in time. An investigation of the roots of cultural symbols like folk stories, religion, and music would reveal sources varied and wide-ranging. Furthermore, culture is defined in relationship to other cultures. Edward Said’s Orientalism (1979) offers a strong description of the system by which nations appropriate from others to define themselves. He suggests Orientalism â€Å"has helped to define Europe as its contrasting image, idea, personality, experience†. Using a theoretical framework influenced by Gramsci’s notion of hegemonic culture and Foucault’s notion of discourse, Said draws significant attention to the intricate and complex process by which the West must use the East to construct itself, its culture, its meaning. In an illuminating excerpt describing the process of Orientalism, he writes: To formulate the Orient, to give it shape, identity, definition with full recognition of its place in memory, its importance to imperial strategy, and its ‘natural’ role as an appendage to Europe; to dignify all the knowledge collected during colonial occupation with the title ‘contribution to modern learning; when the natives had neither been consulted nor treated as anything except as pretexts for a text whose usefulness was not to the natives; to feel oneself as a European in command, almost at will, of Oriental history, time, and geography to make out of every observable detail a generalization and out of every generalization an immutable law about the Oriental nature, temperament, mentality, custom, or type; and, above all, to transmute living reality into the stuff of texts, to possess actuality mainly because nothing in the Orient seems to resist one’s powers. † In a st ream of fragments, Said shows the diverse processes by which dominant cultures are formed at the service of Others. Using words like â€Å"shape,† â€Å"definition,† and â€Å"transmute,† he describes the act of defining nation and the artificial nature of these boundaries. Said offers a theoretical means by which to reject nationalist divisions between an us and Them, a West and Other. This conceptualization of the ways in which nations determine not only their own national identities, but the identities of Other is powerful in revealing the inherently hybrid roots of national culture. Studies of national identity are thus essential in deconstructing xenophobic nationalist claims to nation and the resulting miscegenation of immigrant Others. CONCLUSION This discussion draws from the body of postcolonial literature to suggest that studies of cultural hybridity are powerful in probing the bounded labels of race, language, and nation that maintain social inequalities. By examining how the hybrid can deconstruct boundaries within race, language, and nation, I understood that hybridity has the ability to empower marginalized collectives and deconstruct bounded labels, which are used in the service of subordination. In essence, hybridity has the potential to allow once subjugated collectivities to reclaim a part of the cultural space in which they move. Hybridity can be seen not as a means of division or sorting out the various histories and diverse narratives to individualize identities, but rather a means of reimagining an interconnected collective. Like the skin on a living body, the collective body has a surface that also feels and â€Å"Borders materialize as an effect on intensifications of feeling and individual and collective bodies surface through the very orientations we take to objects and others,† In the description that Formations our orientations can be shifted, our feelings towards Others transformed, there is a possibility of redefining our exclusionary systems of labeling. Furthermore, breaking down immaterial borders through explorations of hybridity offers the possibility of more effective public policy, one that refers to the broad expanse of its diverse population. Frenkel and Shenhav did an illuminating study on the ways in which studies of hybridity have allowed management and organization studies to manage their longstanding western hegemonic practices and to incorporate postcolonial insights into the organizational literature revolving around the relationships between Orientalism and organizations. The willingness of institutions to reform their long held ideologies in light of a changing world, as well as to consider their work through alternative lenses, is an essential practice in deconstructing the bindings of narratives-as-knowledge. In the boundary-shifting process, there is power in the notion of deconstruction in the service of reconstruction, breaking down boundaries in order to form a more inclusive sense of the collectivity. Furthermore, hybridity asserts the notion that representations of collective identity must be analyzed contextually. When we examine a representation of culture, be it in a film, poem, or speech, we should ask: Who is doing the representing? What are the implications of the representation? Why are they engaging in the process of representation? What is the historical moment that informs the representation? How are they being represented? In addition to the questions explored in this paper, I would recommend applying theories of hybridity to a realm beyond race and nation, in order to consider alternative boundaries such as gender and sexuality. The work of hybrid theorists from Bhabha to Said suggests that there is a vast intellectual landscape for cultural inquiries like these. Our mission must be to continue this work and to delve deeper. Cultural studies have great potential to liberate us from the socially-given boundaries that so stubbornly limit our capacity for thought and discussion, but we must take time to join in a collective critique of the knowledge we ingest and disperse. After all, the greatest power lies in the heart of the collective.

Culture and Ethnicity Essay Example for Free

Culture and Ethnicity Essay Belarus has a diverse culture and ethnicity. Statistics from the 1989 population census revealed that the Belarusian in soviet union were majority making up over 77% of the total population, the Russians cover 13. 2%, the poles 4. 1% Ukrainians 2. 9% and others who include Tatars, Lithuanians and Latvians cover 2. 9%. I am a Belarusian, a community that makes up the large majority of the people (Mongabay 2009). The Belarusian language is east Slavic tongue which is intimately related to Ukrainian and Russian. The language is the soul of the nation and an important aspect of culture a part from being a means of communication. The Belarusian, have diverse religious affiliations. I am a Russian orthodox Christian though other religions also exist in the region; the Protestants, roman Catholics, Jewish and Muslims (Mongabay 2009). Family and community history describe the current multi-culture as a product of millennium development with several external influence like physical surroundings; merger of Slavic and Baltic natives, paganism, orthodox religion interaction with literary customs, lack of natural borders and a diversity of religions. Education in Belarus region is compulsory for all the age groups seven to seventeen years especially in the primary school and secondary school. During the communist reign, teaching was chiefly done in Russian with no Belarusian but this was changed in 1992 when Belarusian was made the national language and to be used in schools. The healthcare services have failed to meet the requirements of the large population, the staffs is poorly trained and substandard technology cannot conform to new changes (Mongabay 2009). The human service organizations have created some centers like the republic centre on AIDS to help manage the national problem. Reference Mongabay. com (2009) Belarus Society: Country Studies. Federal Research Division retrieved on 20th January 2009 from http://www. mongabay. com/reference/country_studies/belarus/SOCIETY. html

Analysing The Pardoner In Canterbury Tales

Analysing The Pardoner In Canterbury Tales The Pardoner in the Canterbury Tales is hypocritical, gluttenous, vindictive, and spiteful towards others; he is morally and spiritually corrupt in the extreme. He does, however, tell a tale that, as he promises it shall be in the section that precedes his prologue, a valid sermon against avarice and greed. When Harry Bailey speaks at the end of the Pardoners Tale, he does not reject the tale but the teller, the Pardoner. Chaucer the poet aptly presents the Pardoner as a skilled orator and conman and he deliberately illustrates that it is possible for a character far beyond redemption to tell a moral tale. The Pardoner tells a moral tale against avarice, gluttony, and the love of money. The latter is a theme that the Pardoner says is always central to his sermons, citing the Latin, the love of money is the root of all evil. The origin of the tale, which was part of common folklore in Chaucers day, is an Oriental myth. The three rioters who are central to the tale, damn themselves literally and metaphorically. They betray each other over gold and their desire for it. They also drink and gamble excessively. Upon learning that an old friend of theirs has died, they further damn themselves by going in search of death. The Pardoner tells a tale, however, that is both instructive and valid as a sermon because it is loaded with advice against drunkeness and gluttony. The Pardoner cites examples of stories from the Bible, too, to illustrate the dangers of drunkenness (Solomon and John the Baptist; Lot and his daughters) and gluttony (Adam and Eve). There can be no doubt that the tale is moral. The Pardoner professes himself that although he is a ful vicious man, he can still tell a moral tale. The Pardoner as a character, an individual, and a typification of a group of professional churchmen is entirely amoral and, despite telling a moral tale, Chaucer uses various markers to illustrate why he cannot be trusted or accepted on any level. One of the most telling qualities that Chaucer gives the character of the Pardoner is rhetorical skill. The characteristic essential for Chaucer to illustrate that the teller of the tale cannot be accepted is arrogance. The question of authority is central to the Pardoners tale and its significance both seperated fro and as part of The Canterbury Tales. As the Pardoner is such a skilled orator, Chaucer implies, using the Pardoner and also by selecting Harry Bailey, one of the most astue of the pilgrims and a conman himself, to expose him and silence him so he cannot speak a word more. Apparently deeply affected by the Physicians sad and gruesome tale of Virginia, the Host praises the Physician by using as many medical terms as he can muster. However, he rejects the Physicians moral to the tale and substitutes one of his own: Thus the gifts of fortune and nature are not always good (The gifts of Fortune and Nature have been the cause of the death of many a person). Thinking that the pilgrims need a merry tale to follow, the Host turns to the Pardoner. The more genteel members of the company, fearing that the Pardoner will tell a vulgar story, ask the Pardoner for a tale with a moral. The Pardoner then explains to the pilgrims the methods he uses in preaching. His text is always Radix malorum est cupidatis (Love of money is the root of all evil). Always employing an array of documents and objects, he constantly announces that he can do nothing for the really bad sinners and invites the good people forward to buy his relics and, thus, absolve themselves from sins. Then he stands in the pulpit and preaches very rapidly about the sin of avarice so as to intimidate the members into donating money. He repeats that his theme is always Money is the root of all evil because, with this text, he can denounce the very vice that he practices: greed. And even though he is guilty of the same sins he preaches against, he can still make other people repent. The Pardoner admits that he likes money, rich food, and fine living. And even if he is not a moral man, he can tell a good moral tale, which follows. In Flanders, at the height of a black plague, three young men sit in an inn, eating and drinking far beyond their power and swearing oaths that are worthy of damnation. The revelers mark the passing of a coffin and ask who has died., A servant tells them that the dead man was a friend who was stabbed in the back the night before by a thief called Death. The young revelers, thinking that Death might still be in the next town, decide to seek him out and slay him. On the way, the three men meet an old man who explains that he must wander the earth until he can find someone willing to exchange youth for old age. He says that not even Death will take his life. Hearing him speak of Death, the revelers ask where they can find Death, and the old man directs them to a tree at the end of the lane. The revelers rush to the tree and find eight bushels of gold coins, which they decide to keep. They decide to wait for night to move the gold and draw straws to see which one will go into town to get food and wine. The youngest of the three draws the shortest straw. When he leaves, the two others decide to kill him and divide his money. The youngest, however, wanting the treasure to himself, buys poison, which he adds to two of the bottles of wine he purchases. When the youngest reveler approaches the tree, the two others stab him and then sit down to drink the wine before they dispose of his body. Thus, all three indeed find Death. Commentary From the Pardoners perspective, the Physician told a cheaply pious story and the Host, a sanctimonious fool, reacts to the tale with what seems high praise. Then, after praising the Physician, the Host turns to the Pardoner and asks for a merry tale or jokes (som myrthe or japes), even though preaching is the Pardoners profession. The Pardoner agrees by mockingly echoing the same oath the Host has just used-By Saint Ronyon. The echo of the Host indicates, if anything at all, the Pardoners irritation at hearing the Physician praised as being like a Prelate (lyk a prelat). The Pardoner is further insulted when some members of the company cry with one voice, No, dont let him tell dirty jokes! (Nay, lat hym telle us of no ribaudye). The Pardoner will have his revenge on all the complacent, self-righteous critics, and he resolves to think his revenge out carefully. The ironic relationship between The Physicians Tale and The Pardoners Tale-and therefore the Physician and Pardoner-is that both men are self-loving dissemblers. However, one of the two, the Pardoner, possesses enough self-knowledge to know what he is; the other, the Physician, being self-satisfied and affected, does not. The function of a pardoner in Chaucers time was to collect moneys for charitable purposes and to be the Popes special agent in dispensing or rewarding contributors with certain pardons as a remission for sins. By canon law, a pardoner was required to remain in a certain area; within this area, he could visit churches, receive contributions, and, in the Popes name, dispense indulgences. An honest pardoner was entitled to a percentage of the take; however, most pardoners were dishonest and took much more than their share and, in many cases, would take all the contributions. Thus, as he boasts, Chaucers Pardoner belongs to the latter class-that is, he speaks of how much he collects by refusing to give indulgences to anyone except the very good people. In his prologue, the Pardoner frankly confesses that he is a fraud motivated by greed and avarice and that he is guilty of all seven sins. Even though he is essentially a hypocrite in his profession, he is at least being honest as he makes his confession. But then, ironically, at the end of his tale, he requests that the pilgrims make a contribution. Thus, for many reasons, the Pardoner is the most complex figure in the entire pilgrimage. He is certainly an intellectual figure; his references and knowledge demonstrated in the tale and his use of psychology in getting only the good people to come forward attest to his intellect. But in making his confessions to the pilgrims about his hypocrisy, he seems to be saying that he wishes he could be more sincere in his ways, except that he is too fond of money, good food and wine, and power. The Pardoner takes as his text that Love of money is the root of all evil, yet he emphasizes how each relic will bring the purchaser more money; in emphasizing this, he sells more and gains more money for himself. Thus, his text contains a double irony: His love for money is the root of his evil, yet his sales depend upon the purchasers love of money. Furthermore, his technique of relying upon basic psychology by selling only to the good people brings him more money. His sermon on avarice is given because the Pardoner is filled with avarice and this sermon fills his purse with money. Scholars, critics, and readers in general consider The Pardoners Tale to be one of the finest short stories ever written. Even though this is poetry, the narration fits all the qualifications of a perfect short story: brevity, a theme aptly illustrated, brief characterizations, the inclusion of the symbolic old man, rapid narration, and a quick twist of an ending. The entire tale is an exemplum, a story told to illustrate an intellectual point. The subject is Money (greed) is the root of all evil. The Pardoners Tale ends with the Pardoner trying to sell a relic to the Host and the Host attacking the Pardoner viciously. At this point, the Knight who, both by his character and the nature of the tale he told, stands as Chaucers symbol of natural balance and proportion, steps between the Host and the Pardoner and directs them to kiss and be reconciled. In the conflict between the Host and the Pardoner, the Pardoner-whose official role is to get men to call on God for forgiveness of their sins-is unmerciful in his wrath; that is, the Pardoner is unwilling to pardon, and the pardon is effected only when the noble Knight steps in. Glossary à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ relics objects esteemed and venerated because of association with a saint or martyr; here, the Pardoners relics are false. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Lot Lots daughters got their father drunk and then seduced him (from the Book of Genesis in the Bible); the Pardoners point is that Lot never would have committed incest if he had not been drunk. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Samson the biblical strong man. He revealed the secret of his strength to Solome, who then betrayed him to his enemies. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Lepe a town in Spain noted for its strong wines. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Cheapside and Fish Streets streets in London that were known for the sale of strong spirits. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Lemuel See Proverbs 31:4-7. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ King Demetrius The book that relates this and the previous incident is the Policraticus of twelfth-century writer John of Salisbury. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Avicenna an Arabian physician (980-1037) who wrote a work on medicines that includes a chapter on poisons. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ St. Helen the mother of Constantine the Great, believed to have found the True Cross The Pardoners Tale There once lived in Flanders a company of three rioters who did nothing but engage in irresponsible and sinful behavior. At this point, the narrator interrupts the tale itself to launch a lengthy diatribe against drunkenness mentioning Herod, Seneca, Adam, Sampson, Attila the Hun and St. Paul as either sources or famed drunkards. This in turn oddly becomes a diatribe against people whose stomachs are their gods (their end, we are told, is death), and then a diatribe against the stomach, called, at one point a stynkyng cod, fulfilled of dong and of corrupcioun (a stinking bag, full of dung and decayed matter). This distraction from the story itself ends with an attack on dice-playing (dice here called bicched bones, or cursed dice). The three drunkards were in a tavern one night, and, hearing a bell ring, looked outside to see men carrying a corpse to its grave. One of them called to his slave to go and ask who the corpse was: he was told by a boy that the corpse was an old fellow whose heart was smashed in two by a secret thief called Death. This drunkard agreed, and discussed with his companions how this Death had indeed slain many people, of all ranks, of both sexes, that very year. The three then made a vow (by Goddes digne bones) to find Death and slay him. When they had gone not even half a mile, they met an old, poor man at a style, who greeted them courteously. The proudest of the drunkards responded rudely, asking the man why he was still alive at such a ripe age. The old man answered that he was alive, because he could not find anyone who would exchange their youth for his age and, although he knocked on the ground, begging it to let him in, he still did not die. Moreover, the old man added, it was not courteous of the drunkards to speak so rudely to an old man. One of the other drunkards responded still more rudely that the old man was to tell them where Death was, or regret not telling them dearly. The old man, still polite, told the drunkards they could find Death up the crooked way and underneath an oak tree. The drunkards ran until they came to the tree, and, underneath it, they found eight bushels of gold coins. The worst one of them spoke first, arguing that Fortune had given them the treasure to live their life in happiness but realizing that they could not carry the gold home without people seeing them and thinking them thieves. Therefore, he suggested, they should draw lots, and one of them should run back to the town to fetch bread and wine, while the other two protected the treasure. Then, at night, they could agree where to take the treasure and carry it safety. This was agreed, and lots were drawn: the youngest of them was picked to go to the town. However, as soon as he had gone to the town, the two remaining drunkards plotted amongst themselves to stab him upon his return, and then split the gold between them. While he was in the town, the youngest thought of the beauty of the gold coins, and decided to buy some poison in order to kill the other two, keeping the gold for himself. Thus, he went to an apothecary, bought some strong and violent poison, poured it into two of three wine bottles (the third was for him to drink from), topped them up with wine, and returned to his fellows. Exactly as the other two had planned it, it befell. They killed him on his return, and sat down to enjoy the wine before burying his body and, as it happened, drank the poison and died. The tale ends with a short sermon against sin, asking God to forgive the trespass of good men, and warning them against the sin of avarice, before (this, we can presume narrated in the Pardoners voice) inviting the congregation to come up and offer their wool in return for pardons. The tale finished, the Pardoner suddenly remembers that he has forgotten one thing that he is carrying relics and pardons in his male (pouch, bag) and begins to invite the pilgrims forward to receive pardon, inciting the Host to be the first to receive his pardon. Unbokele anon thy purs, he says to the Host, who responds that the Pardoner is trying to make him kiss thyn old breech (your old pants), swearing it is a relic, when actually it is just painted with his shit. I wish, the Host says, I had your coillons (testicles) in my hand, to shrine them in a hogs turd. The Pardoner is so angry with this response, he cannot speak a word, and, just in time, the Knight steps in, bringing the Pardoner and the Host together and making them again friends. This done, the company continues on its way. Analysis The Pardoner has in recent years become one of the most critically discussed of the Canterbury pilgrims. His tale is in many ways the exemplar of the contradiction which the structure of the Tales themselves can so easily exploit, and a good touchstone for highlighting precisely how Chaucer can complicate an issue without ever giving his own opinion. Thus the Pardoner embodies precisely the textual conundrum of the Tales themselves he utters words which have absolutely no correlation with his actions. His voice, in other words, is entirely at odds with his behavior. The Pardoners voice, at the beginning of his tale, rings out as round as gooth a belle, summoning his congregation: and yet his church is one of extreme bad faith. There is a genuine issue here about whether the Pardoners tale, being told by the Pardoner, can actually be the moral (325) tale it claims to be. For, while the tale does indeed demonstrate that money is the root of all evil, does it still count when he is preaching agayn that same vice / Which that I use, and that is avarice (against the very vice I commit: avarice). How far, in other words, can the teller negate his own moral? Yet the real problem is that the Pardoner is a successful preacher, and his profits point to several people who do learn from his speeches and repent their sin. His Tale too is an accurate demonstration of the way greed and avarice lead to evil. Hollow execution nevertheless, the Pardoner is an excellent preacher against greed. His voice, in short, operates regardless of his actions. Hollow sentiments produce real results. This is also reflected in the imagery of the tale itself. The Pardoner hates full stomachs, preferring empty vessels, and, though his wallet may well be bretful of pardoun comen from Rome (687) but the moral worth of this paper is nil: the wallet, therefore, is full and empty at the same time exactly like the Pardoners sermon. In just the same way Chaucer himself in the Tales can ventriloquize the sentiments of the pilgrim the Reeve, the Pardoner, the Merchant and so on, without actually committing to it. Because the Tales themselves, in supposedly reproducing the telling of a certain pilgrim, actually do enact precisely the disembodied voice which the Pardoner represents. The moral paradox of the Pardoner himself is precisely the paradox of the Tales and their series of Chaucer-ventriloquized disembodied voices. There is a doubleness, a shifting evasiveness, about the Pardoners double audience: the imaginary congregation he describes, and the assembled company to whom he preaches, and tells his lewed tales, even calling them forth to pardon at the end. The point is clear: even though they know it is insincere, the Pardoners shtick might still work on the assembled company. The imagery of the Pardoners Tale also reflects this fundamental hollowness. The tale itself is strewn with bones, whether in the oath sworn by Goddes digne bones, whether in the word for cursed dice (bones) or whether in the bones which the Pardoner stuffs into his glass cases, pretending they are relics. The literary landscape is strewn with body parts, and missing, absent bodies: beginning with the anonymous corpse carried past at the beginning of his tale. Bones, stomachs, coillons words for body parts cover the page, almost as a grim reminder of the omnipresence of death in this tale. The General Prologue, suggesting that the Pardoner resembles a gelding or a mare, hints that the Pardoner may be a congenital eunuch or, taken less literally, a homosexual, and, as the Host seems to suggest at the end, might well be without his coillons, a Middle English word meaning both relics and testicles. All of the relics in this Tale, including the Pardoners, evade the grasp of the hand. The Pardoner thus can be categorized along with the other bizarrely feminized males in the Tales, including Absolon, Sir Thopas, and, if we believe the Host, Chaucer (the character). And of course, at the center of the tale, there is a search for somebody called Death which, naturally, does not find the person Death, but death itself. It is a successful but ultimately unsuccessful search. All that is left over at the center of the Tales is the bushels of gold, sitting under a tree unclaimed. The root of the tale, as its moral similarly suggests about the root of evil, is money: and money was, to a medieval reader, known to be a spiritual death. Notably, moreover, in the tale, both gold and death shift from metaphor to reality and back again; a neat reminder of the ability of the Tales to evade our grasp, raising difficult questions without ever answering them.

Renaisssance versus Baroque Periods Essay -- Comparison Contrast essay

The baroque and renaissance periods are two different periods. The renaissance period rolled into the baroque era. There were changes made over the years from the baroque to the renaissance period. Differences in style accumulated along with views of art and music. Baroque era covers the period between 1600 and 1750 beginning with Monte Verdi (birth of opera) and ended with deaths of Bach and Handel. The term baroque music is borrowed from the art history. It follows the Renaissance era (1400-1600). It was initially considered to be a corrupt way of Renaissance by conservatives. The dominant trends in Baroque music correspond to those in Baroque art and literature. Some features of Baroque art included a sense of movement, energy, and tension (whether real or implied). Strong contrasts of light and shadow enhance the effects of paintings and sculptures. Opera is one of the types of music in the Baroque era. It represented melodic freedom. Baroque era was usually referred to as the thorough-bass period. In early Baroque era no tonal direction existed, but experiments in pre-tonal harmony led to the creation of tonality. [1] Baroque genre included instrumental suite, ritornello, Concerto grosso and chant. There were important composers of the Bar oque period such as Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel, Antonio Vivaldi William Byrd Henry Purcell and George Phillip Telemann. Starting in northern Italy, the hierarchical state -- led by either the urban bourgeoisie or despotic nobles -- replaced the fluid and chaotic feudal system of the middle Ages. [2] For this reason, some historians refer to the Renaissance as the Early Modern Era. Sculptors, building on the techniques of artists such as Giovanni Bernini (1598-1680), found ways to create the illusion of energetic and even violent movement in their works. Painters created larger and more crowded canvases. Virtuosity was used in all the arts. The arts became an important measure of learning and culture. Music moved from the science of number to an expressive art viewed as an equal to rhetoric. The Renaissance means the rebirth of ancient learning. The renaissance can be divided into two parts Early Renaissance (1420-1500) and High Renaissance (1500-1520). The Renaissance era was one of the most productive time periods in history as far as the advancement of music goes. At first it was rigid, structu... ...ike today. The period between the baroque and renaissance paved a new way for not only music, but for art. The change that took place was gorgeous causing art to become so vivid and images are portrayed to be so real. I never was a fan of art nor music, but if one actually pays attention to the evolvement of it throughout time one would have great appreciation. References 1) Carter, Tim. Music in late Renaissance & early baroque Italy. Amadeus Press. 1992. 2) Bailey, Gauvin A. Between Renaissance and Baroque: Jesuit art in Rome 1565-1610. University of Toronto Press. 2003. 3) Huyghe, Rene. Larousse encyclopedia of Renaissance and Baroque Art. London, Hamlyen. 1967. 4) Mundy, James. Renaissance into Baroque. University Press. 1989. 5) Jaffe, Michael. Renaissance & Baroque drawings. Abrams Press.1995. Bibliographies Atlas, A.W. Renaissance Music: Music in Western Europe, 1400-1600. 1st ed. New York: Norton, 1998. Corrick, J.A. The Renaissance. San Diego: Lucent Brooks, 1998. Getzinger, Donna. Johnann Sebastian Bach and the art of baroque music. 1st ed. Greensboro: Morgan Reynolds, 2004 Lorenz, Hellmut. Baroque Art. New York: Plague, 1994. Renaisssance versus Baroque Periods Essay -- Comparison Contrast essay The baroque and renaissance periods are two different periods. The renaissance period rolled into the baroque era. There were changes made over the years from the baroque to the renaissance period. Differences in style accumulated along with views of art and music. Baroque era covers the period between 1600 and 1750 beginning with Monte Verdi (birth of opera) and ended with deaths of Bach and Handel. The term baroque music is borrowed from the art history. It follows the Renaissance era (1400-1600). It was initially considered to be a corrupt way of Renaissance by conservatives. The dominant trends in Baroque music correspond to those in Baroque art and literature. Some features of Baroque art included a sense of movement, energy, and tension (whether real or implied). Strong contrasts of light and shadow enhance the effects of paintings and sculptures. Opera is one of the types of music in the Baroque era. It represented melodic freedom. Baroque era was usually referred to as the thorough-bass period. In early Baroque era no tonal direction existed, but experiments in pre-tonal harmony led to the creation of tonality. [1] Baroque genre included instrumental suite, ritornello, Concerto grosso and chant. There were important composers of the Bar oque period such as Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel, Antonio Vivaldi William Byrd Henry Purcell and George Phillip Telemann. Starting in northern Italy, the hierarchical state -- led by either the urban bourgeoisie or despotic nobles -- replaced the fluid and chaotic feudal system of the middle Ages. [2] For this reason, some historians refer to the Renaissance as the Early Modern Era. Sculptors, building on the techniques of artists such as Giovanni Bernini (1598-1680), found ways to create the illusion of energetic and even violent movement in their works. Painters created larger and more crowded canvases. Virtuosity was used in all the arts. The arts became an important measure of learning and culture. Music moved from the science of number to an expressive art viewed as an equal to rhetoric. The Renaissance means the rebirth of ancient learning. The renaissance can be divided into two parts Early Renaissance (1420-1500) and High Renaissance (1500-1520). The Renaissance era was one of the most productive time periods in history as far as the advancement of music goes. At first it was rigid, structu... ...ike today. The period between the baroque and renaissance paved a new way for not only music, but for art. The change that took place was gorgeous causing art to become so vivid and images are portrayed to be so real. I never was a fan of art nor music, but if one actually pays attention to the evolvement of it throughout time one would have great appreciation. References 1) Carter, Tim. Music in late Renaissance & early baroque Italy. Amadeus Press. 1992. 2) Bailey, Gauvin A. Between Renaissance and Baroque: Jesuit art in Rome 1565-1610. University of Toronto Press. 2003. 3) Huyghe, Rene. Larousse encyclopedia of Renaissance and Baroque Art. London, Hamlyen. 1967. 4) Mundy, James. Renaissance into Baroque. University Press. 1989. 5) Jaffe, Michael. Renaissance & Baroque drawings. Abrams Press.1995. Bibliographies Atlas, A.W. Renaissance Music: Music in Western Europe, 1400-1600. 1st ed. New York: Norton, 1998. Corrick, J.A. The Renaissance. San Diego: Lucent Brooks, 1998. Getzinger, Donna. Johnann Sebastian Bach and the art of baroque music. 1st ed. Greensboro: Morgan Reynolds, 2004 Lorenz, Hellmut. Baroque Art. New York: Plague, 1994.

The Advancement of The Machine Gun Essay -- Warfare

War has been a recurring part of America’s history for the past hundreds of years. From the 1700s to the present, America has gotten into numerous situations and turmoil, which eventually lead to the wars we currently study and know about today. Technological advancements in warfare were necessary and a great obligation during times of war. This was pursued with drastic improvement. From the transformation of the use of smoothbore muskets during the Civil War to the industrial revolution leading to weaponry innovations post civil war, the nature of warfare dramatically changed. These developments proved to be proficient in battle. In the midst of these hundreds of years, while many technological advances demonstrated to be efficient in battle, the machine gun was one of the most significant advancements in technology that changed the face of warfare through its transformation of operations and strategy. During the civil war before the introduction of the machine guns, union soldiers predominantly used smoothbore muskets. â€Å"The rifle’s low muzzle velocity and consequent high parabolic trajectory made for difficult long-range shooting, especially since soldiers engaged in little target practice and received virtually no training in estimating distances or in using the adjustable sights to compensate for the bullet’s curved flight. The tangled terrain of most battlefields—and the black powder smoke that engulfed every battle—often rendered enemy soldiers invisible until they were within smoothbore range† (Hess 288). This was assumed to be the reason of why the war was prolonged, and the combat losses were higher during the smoothbore era. Also with an ability of only firing a â€Å"maximum of three rounds per minute† (Howey), this rat... ...smith, Dolf L., and R. Blake. Stevens. The Devil's Paintbrush: Sir Hiram Maxim’s Gun. Toronto: Collector Grade Publications, 1989. Print. 2. Hess, Earl J. The Rifle Musket in Civil War Combat: Reality and Myth. Lawrence, Kan: University Press of Kansas, 2008. Print. 3. Howey, Allan W. "Weaponry: The Rifle-Musket and the Minià © Ball  » History Net." History Net. Weider History Group, Oct. 1999. Web. 12 May 2012. . 4. Lee, Loyd E. World War II. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1999. Print. 5. Popenker, Max R. "Modern Firearms - MachineGuns." Max R. Popenker, 1999-2010. Web. 10 May 2012. . 6. Simkin, John. "Machine-Gun." Spartacus Educational - Home Page. John Simkin. Web. 10 May 2012. .

To Kill A Mocking Bird :: To Kill a Mockingbird Essays

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, The Twelve Angry men by Reginald Rose and The Scottsboro Trial are all about unfair trials containing discrimination towards different people and people being prejudice .The peoples action towards the defendants affected them for the rest of their life. Many of the people that came into the court brought in their own social problems and that influenced the verdict.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   To Kill The Mockingbird was about a black guy named Tom Robinson who was accused of raping a young women by the name of Mayella Ewell. In the court, significant evidence was presented to the juror's that would prove that Tom Robinson was innocent. The evidence showed that a left handed male must have beat Mayella because the bruises were on the right side of her and Tom Robinsons left arm was disabled. Robinson could not have beat Ms. Ewell. Tom Robinson was still convicted and later on was shot at a prison fence while he was trying to run away. The juror's discriminated Mr. Robinson and was prejudice towards him because all though evidence was presented to them that would prove Tom innocent they ignored it because the guy was black and in the 30's discriminating blacks were heavily favored. The Twelve Angry Men was about a boy who was accused of stabbing his father to death in a argument. In the beginning of the trial all twelve of the juror's voted guilty. Many of the juror's were mean and did not care about the boy's future they just wanted to get the trial over with so the juror's can do what they wanted to do. Later in the case one of the juror's realized they were messing with a boys life and his future was all up to them. So a juror realized that some of the information that a witness brought up had to be false. So they analyzed the information and came to the conclusion that the boy could not have stabbed his father the way he did because one of the juror's had seen many knife fight's in his backyard and you can not stab someone downward with a switchblade. Also another witness said that the knife that the kid had could be bought anywhere. The juror's discriminated the boy because he lived in the slums , he has a criminal record and he was always fighting with hi s dad so they just assumed he was the one that killed his dad.

Secrets of Finding and Keeping Good Employees

Lebanese American University Business Department Management Theory Secrets of Finding and Keeping Good Employees Presented to: Dr. N. Beyruti Presented by: Mahdi El Horchi Hussein Marmar Date: 02/10/2006 Introduction: In our days, employment became a hard process in which many managers are complaining about it. In addition, hiring good employees is essential to run a good business on a daily basis and for a long run. Thus, employees would be the heart and the soul of a business. On the other hand, Interviewing is an important process in the preselection of good employees and so opening a gate to have the right person in the right position. Interviewing is an art of gathering information and trying to learn about candidates before selection. Furthermore, Recruitment is a chain of events that could have sequential and disastrous consequences. Thus, designing a good interview should not address or talk about job requirements before the interview starts. On the other side, many savvy applicants could mask their true capabilities and thus inaccurate image could be drawn. Interview Requirements: The interview process should: – Define the position that the applicant is admitting for. – Address questions specific to the position and requires conscious behavior. Check or test the ability of interviewer to do the interview. – Be more scientific and less emotional – Check the steps that are taken for the final hiring process. – Avoid group interviewing that would become a â€Å"game of tag† Consequences of Bad Employment: Bad employees not only affect an employer by driving down sales, co sting the company unwanted expenses due to negligence or simple lack of motivation, but affect customer as well. In addition, wrong decisions and demotivated employees could lead to: – Heightened feelings of stress for the employee in his daily work. – A chain of disastrous events that does irreparable damage. An increase in absenteeism. – Frustrated and angry mangers that try to employ motivation techniques; KITA (kick-in-the-ankle) – A â€Å"lose-lose† situation for all company stakeholders. Hiring Strategies: Selecting and hiring candidates could take several forms: – Interviewing to check the background of the interviewer – Personality characteristics assessments. – Abilities assessments – Interest assessments – Integrated assessments. These assessments facilitate dramatically the hiring process by identifying the thinking styles, occupational interests and behavioral traits and allow the visualization of the â€Å"total person†. To complete the assessment process behavior tendencies play an important role in increasing individual productivity by identifying personal accommodation , assertiveness, attitudes, energy level, independence, objective judgment, sociability, manageability and decisiveness. Keeping and Maintaining Good Employees: As important as attracting good employees is, it is just as important to retain them. As always, benefit packages help to retain employees. After spending as much time as you should have in attracting good employees, it only makes sense that you would go to certain lengths to keep them. Essential tools in keeping and maintaining good employees: – Offer opportunities for personal growth. – Build an organization culture that appreciates personal achievement and performance. – Construct a newsletter that nominates the employee-of-the-month. – Sustain a comfortable environment that empowers employees. – Understand that many employees are motivated by their social networks at work. – Encourage team involvement. – Make benefits more accessible. – Create clear paths at the company. – Share challenges and successes. Hiring and retaining good employees goes hand in hand; and the assessment process should be tested for their ability and reliability to establish a â€Å"win-win† situation for people to be happier, produce more and experience less stress. In addition organizational culture should build into it an employer recognition and appreciation to look to their strengths over their weaknesses and their power over their problems. Finally, companies should be aware of matching the right person to the right job and secure its employees in a more convenient and comfortable environment.