Should Society and Parents control the diets of School Aged Kids?

â€Å"The percentage of overweight children in the United States is growing at an alarming rate with 1 out of 3 kids now considered overweight or obese† according to the article on Kids Health. org ( Overweight and Obesity). Over weight children tend to carry the unhealthy trait over into their adult years. The responsibility of healthy eating and physical activity begin with the parents at home. The parents/guardians are responsible for the well-being of the child. Parents are responsible in teaching their children good eating and excersise habits. Parents are suppose to teach their children portion control along with self control. Many parents don't demand physical activity from their children, which in turn leads to obesity most children today indulge in video games and highly saturated fatty foods. Society plays a part but it starts at home. The parents, are responsible for incorporating fruits and vegetables into ones diet. Children are a product of their environment are surroundings. If children are not taught at home, how can healthy choices be incorporated any where else. In order for a child to make wise descions it has to be taught from home. Obesity also leads to different types of health issues. The health of children today is gradually declining in rapid numbers. It's time for the parents to put healthy living in action starting with themselves. According to (Division of Adolescent and School health, National center for chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion) During the last 3 decades, the prevalence of obesity has tripled amoung persons aged 6-19 years. Multiple Chronic disease risk factors, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol levels are related to obesity. In today's society the disease that were was acquired in older adults, are in rapid rates being diagnosed by younger individuals due to obesity. Its time for a change people. In conclusion, as far as children goes it is the responsibility of the parents to make sure they are eating healthy, and are active physically daily. Parents must stress the importance of healthy eating and active lifestyles. In order for children to live healthy productive lifestyles, it must be practiced at home first. It's time to get fit. Today is the perfect day to start.

Bus303 Final Paper

Human Resources Management Reflective Paper BUS 303 Human Resource Management Reflective Paper In analyzing the concepts discussed in Human Resource Management, I have found an interesting mix of education and forethought into the role of a human resource manager. Many of the aspect of human resource management such as HR planning, recruitment and selection, as well as, human resources development and labor relations all play a significant role in the success of any organization.There are many benefits to the learning that has taken place in this course that has helped me better understand HRM and its roll that will shape not only my position in business now but for future positions in the years to come. The primary function of human resource management is to increase the effectiveness and contribution of employees in the attainment of organizational goals and objectives. For a human resource department to function correctly its many functions need to work together and it all starts with human resource planning.All businesses have a human resource planning process. Many times upper management teams work with human resource experts when it comes to human resource decisions. These HR decisions help to shape the overall strategic plan of an organization. Human Resource departments function at their best when they are viewed within an organization as a partner with upper management that will aid with the planning and administration of human resource decisions. The HR head is a centerpiece to the decision making process.HR managers often times evaluate the availability of talent, employee behavior and analyze current skills that are needed within the organization. Human resource planning is â€Å"the ongoing process of systematic planning to achieve optimum use of an organization's most valuable asset – its human resources. † (http://www. investopedia. com) The main goal of human resource planning is to make sure there is a functional and working conne ction between employees and the jobs in which they do. There has to be a balanced pproached for human resource managers because there is a fine line trying to avoid deficiencies and surpluses of labor within the organization. For HR managers the balance is kept by analyzing current labor demand verses future labor demand and balancing the supply and demand between the two. Often times HR planning has to be flexible so that organizations can adapt and keep up with the changing business environments in the markets in which they serve. Human resource planning is an ongoing task that must look at the long term and short-term goals of an organization.Without the flexibility and the ability to adapt to a changing business environment, organizations could be left behind in the competitive marketplace. Planning needs to take into account many factors such as recruiting, training, outsourcing, employee development, job analysis and others just to name a few. Ultimately, it is human resources responsibility to make sure that the organization has the right people in the right place in order to successfully navigate the organization to fulfill its strategic plan. When it comes to HR planning there are six specific factors for the HR planning process.They are environmental scanning, labor market analysis and forecast, internal analysis and forecast, gap analysis, developing HR plans and strategies, and HR strategy implementation and assessment. â€Å"HR planning and organizational strategic planning should not be treated as separate activities: they must have a mutual relationship for their integration to be valuable. Similarly, HR planning should be guided by organizational goals and strategies and should inform each and every one of those processes; the various HRM processes can then be conducted effectively. (Youssef, C. 2012) I believe that the HR planning process is the absolute most important part of an HR management team’s work. The reason is that there is s o much that goes into the planning that shapes the overall strategic plan of an organization. The many other factors that HR deals with are important, yet without an overall plan and vision, the overall long-term goals of the organization could not be reached in an efficient manner. For example, I had worked at a small local company that had started up about a year prior to my arrival.At the time that I had started it was ran by a husband and wife both of which did not have any HR experience. They had goals on what they wanted to do both long term and short term yet the organization was unable to reach many of those goals primarily because of the lack of an HR professional. In order to recruit new people the owners relied on referrals from other business owners in the area and ads that were posted in the local newspaper. They had no online presence and they were not able to keep up with the competition for qualified candidates.They were losing quality potential employees to their co mpetition because of a lack of planning and non-flexibility. After about a year of continuous struggles, they brought in an HR consultant that brought many good ideas and the owners fortunately embraced many of them. They had decided to recruit and bring on board a professional HR manager with many years of experience that helped the owners in an area that was one of their weaknesses, HR management. The new HR manager brought plenty of changes to the processes within the organization while keeping in mind the overall long-term goals of the owners.Many of the changes were to the recruitment process. She did things such as adding an â€Å"apply now† link on the company’s website and got the organization more of an online presence in on-line job boards within the area. Along with that, the interview process was more formal with the changes that she made. More of the work was done electronically such as applications, and resume submitting. The owners of the company also in vested with an organization that provided services for companies to give personality and aptitude assessments so that they could better understand a potential employee.Of course, this all happened over time and the organization became better at understanding what type of labor force they needed. This is exactly why the planning process is so important. It helps to organize and execute the overall strategic plan of an organization and that is the exact reason that HR exists, to increase the effectiveness and contribution of employees in the attainment of organizational goals and objectives. Culture, it comes down to organizational and employee behavior and HRM plays the biggest role. â€Å"There is no one omnipotent culture.What works this year may not work in the next†. (www. sjsu. edu) The culture of an organization is not automatic. It takes time and hard work for an organization to build and cultivate its own identity and culture within the workplace. Many times HR manager s forget the importance they have in shaping the culture of an organization. I have seen it before in companies in which I have worked. For instance, the organization that I currently work for had sort of a laid-back culture one in which it was ok for sales people to work in business casual clothes such as slacks and a polo shirt.A couple of years ago the CEO was replaced and when the new CEO came in, change came to the culture. No longer, was the sales team allowed to wear business casual, it was professional dress only and it made a big difference in the professionalism with the organization. It also made a difference with new hires and made the biggest impact with our customers. This is just one example of the how the culture changed within my organization but the important thing to note was that the new CEO led this change by example as he did with everything else.He would only wear suits and ties and never did we see him or any other person on the management team in business ca sual. It was just one-step but a very important one in changing the culture of the organization. The best way for HRM to shape organizational and employee behavior is to lead by example. There are other control methods to make sure individual employee behavior is kept in check, such as utilizing a corporate code of conduct that must be signed and followed by all of the employees.For this to work, an organization must have meaningful penalties when the code of conduct is violated, and it must make sure that those policies are enforced and that enforcement is structured and consistent. Overall, HR managers need to lead by example to create or maintain a positive culture within their workplace. It is critical that all managers are aware of their roles and responsibilities in upholding positive workplace environments that can increase employee satisfaction and it all starts with HRM. In conclusion, HRM plays one of the biggest and most important roles in the success or failure of an org anization.Without the right planning and having the right people in the right place, it is very hard for an organization to meet the overall goals in which they have set out to succeed. Looking at the learning that has taken place in this course, it has opened my eyes to the importance of a competent and structured HR department. The course has helped me to look at past experiences and better appreciate the HR directors that I have worked with in the past and it has helped me better understand HRM and its roll that will shape not only my osition in business now but for future positions in the years to come. References Youssef, C. (2012). Human resource management. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education http://www. investopedia. com/terms/h/human-resource-planning. asp#axzz2LJdsjswT (Retrieved from World Wide Web, February 16, 2013) http://www. sjsu. edu/people/phyllis. connolly/courses/c17/s1/kane_umanageroleorgcul200(Retrieved from the World Wide Web, February 18, 2013

Indian and English cultures Essay

A passage to India is mostly concerned with the relationships between Indian and English cultures, and the interaction and conflicts are the most important moments in the book. This is clearly explained when at the beginning of the book when Dr. Aziz rides on his bicycle to Hamidullah’s house and debates whether it is possible to be friends with an Englishman. Major Callendar, the Civil Surgeon at Chandrapore, and Aziz’s superior calls him away as he is visiting Hamidullah and then disappears before he gets their not even leaving a explanatory note. Establishing that the English are snobby and care nothing about Indians. For Major Callendar Called Aziz right in the middle of dinner and was not even there when he arrived, insinuating that the meeting between the two must have not been that important and could have waited. Adding insult in injury the women at Callendar’s house take his Tonga (a horse-drawn carriage) without even asking. you can assume from the events at the beginning that the English think of Indians as a lesser race and that they should be subservient to them. One of the major moments in the book is when Dr. Aziz meets for the first time Mrs. Moore which is the mother to the Indian Magistrate – Ronny Heaslop. Dr. Aziz thinking that most English, especially Englishwomen are snobby and insensitive to Indians, asks Mrs. Moore to take off her shoes with not even looking at her feet; thinking probably to himself (no Englishwomen would have the common decency or respect for the Indian culture to take off her shoes in the Mosque). After the initial chastising Aziz and Mrs. Moore begin to form a friendship. Aziz finding out that she is both kind and sympathetic After there time at the Mosque Aziz escorts Mrs. Moore to the near all-white Chandrapore Club which is where Mrs. Moore had initially wondered off from. At the Club there is a showing of Cousin Kate, which is the most thoroughly English play in existence, conveying the desire of the English to recreate England in India rather than adapt to their foreign environment. Mrs. Moore ignores the play totally and continues on to the billiard room where she meets up with Adela Quested her traveling companion and most likely will marry Ronny. For the most part Indians view the English with anger and cynicism but it is with the newcomers (Mrs. Moore and Adela Quested) that Aziz sees that they have a desire to see the real India, and are willing to look far beyond the narrow minded view of the other English people. After Adela sees how unconcerned Ronny is with the plight of the Indians she decides not to marry him. As they go for a car ride with Nawab Bahadur, which is the leading loyalist in Chandrapore, an slight accident occurs when they hit a animal and crash. They both get out and look for the injured animal but to no avail, showing Adela his kindness, Adela tells Ronny to forget what she had said and that she will marry him. In town, the Nawab Bahadur tells a group of Indians about his distress; he fears evil spirits, for when he fist bought the car, he ran over and killed a man. Dr. Aziz tells the Nawab Bahadur’s grandson that the younger generation must reject such superstitions. This is showing that what all the English have brought to India is not bad for an elite have been educated and understand how the world works better than they have ever before.

Self Reflection Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Self Reflection - Essay Example While it is a fact that men are physically stronger, this doesn't mean they are intellectually superior to women in any way, thus discrimination against women at workplace or other areas is totally unfair. Even in the fields where physical strength is required, it would be unjust not to give women a chance to prove their worth. But this has been happening for a long time in every society, discrimination against women is what resulted in women rights movement in different parts of the world. One wonders why there has never been a men's rights movement, it is because men do not need any such movement, rights are given to them on a silver platter by virtue of their gender. A movement for rights is always meant for the disadvantaged or underprivileged. Black rights movement took place because this community was denied their basic rights because of the color of their skin. In the same manner women had to fight for their rights because they were refused the same because of their supposedly weaker gender. While women in every part of the country have had to struggle for their rights and the battle is still on, the results of the movement vary from nation to nation.

Reading questions on environmental law article Essay

Reading questions on environmental law article - Essay Example People thought the animal would be made extinct unless the hunt was regulated. Many proponents of the idea of banning the whale hunt point out that the when the hunt was unregulated, several species of whales were made extinct by over-hunting. They say that we have forever lost a number of animals that were unique in their biodiversity. They point out the same thing would happen if the hunt was made legal in certain areas again. However, the damage done to whale stocks occurred almost entirely before the advent of the International Whaling Commission. That is to say, that whale stocks were depleted in the days before there was any real regulation whatsoever and that the current system is quite sustainable. Also very few of the species that animal-rights activists claim are endangered actually are. The numbers are very unclear. Few people no the real dimensions of the whale population today. There is no clear-cut evidence that a regulated return to the whale hunt by countries that currently ban it would have a devastating impact on whale stocks. And without thi s evidence it is hard to suggest that continuing the whale hunt would be a negative thing. Many of the other arguments made by whaling conservationists are similarly flimsy. While few would argue that the methods for hunting are especially humane—for example the use of the exploding harpoon is a bit cruel—these things can easily be improved and suffering can be reduced. Just as in Canada, Canadian sealers must use more humane methods, so can whalers stop exploding whales and instead start killing them more humanely. No one is arguing for a completely unregulated hunt—that is a red herring. The animal rights activists have created a false dichotomy. It is part of rhetoric trick on their part when they argue that to hunt whales means to have no rules whatsoever. A properly regulated hunt can reduce the suffering of whales and bring rogue, illegal hunters (who are inclined to use cruel

Describe the relationship between health care cost and quality Essay

Describe the relationship between health care cost and quality - Essay Example In health care, â€Å"cost† may be defined in different ways, depending on the individual’s perception. Two of these definitions are (1) when consumers and financiers pertain to the â€Å"price† of health care; and (2) when it is seen in a national perspective, referring to how much a nation spends on health care services (Shi & Singh, 2008, p. 484). Health care quality is said to be judged subjectively, according to the standards of an individual or an organization. Donabedian (n.d.) identified three determinants of the overall quality of health care: (1) structure of care, referring to the qualifications of health care providers and characteristics of facilities; (2) process of care, or the manner health care is provided; and (3) outcome of care, or effectiveness of the care provided (as cited in Wiest, 1988, p. 54). It is contended that without the existence of these three, it is not possible to achieve a high quality of health care. In health care, cost and quality possess a certain relationship, where cost does not always equate to quality (Marquis & Huston, 2009, p. 210). Considerably, O’Kane (2006) presents that â€Å"what higher spending often buys is unnecessary care, which...exposes patients to risk and wastes time, resources, and money, all of which could be put to better use† (as cited in Marquis & Huston , 2009, p. 210). In this light comes the concept of cost-effectivity, where the term â€Å"cost-effective† connotes that the product or service gained is adequate to the resources used and the finances spent. For instance, the purchase of a needed drug previously not in stock increases cost of care, but is expected to increase care quality as well. However, in the event that a wrong drug is purchased and neglectfully given, the cost increases with a lowered quality of care. Further, being cost-effective also suggests

How can interactive media encourage students from secondary schools to Dissertation - 1

How can interactive media encourage students from secondary schools to eat healthy and thus contribute to reducing the growing o - Dissertation Example The present time reflects examples of advertising that make use of the persuasive technology with advertisers using words like ‘free’ and ‘hurry’ offering them with bargains on different products and services, and attracting greater number of consumers. This is reflected in the world of internet advertising as well. With the use of different software and applications, behavior and attitude of people are being altered. Such apps include financial apps or healthcare apps as well, thereby strongly communicating their messages to the people, and proving that web sites have become the most influential persuasive technology of the present times (Tittel, 2013). Beyond the web there are other persuasive technologies that have developed and become highly effective in the present day world. This includes the use of the mobile phones that has been obtained to have significant positive effects on persuading people towards better healthcare. Over the past few years, mobi le devices have been largely used for persuasion along with bringing together government agencies, academics, as well as health care organizations belonging to the private sector, for persuading people towards better healthcare. SMS services are used for promotion of healthcare trying to persuade people to change their attitudes and behavior towards how they maintain their health. This is also possible through the use of other media like the television, radio, and other forms of communications that people in general follow in the present times (Mobile Health, 2010). Considering contemporary examples of persuasive technologies beyond the web, such as mobile devices and hence SMS services have been mentioned earlier, and other communications media like television and radio (Mobile Health, 2010), the expansion and use of the persuasive technologies have been found in marketing of businesses, in environment, in education, and in health care. Use of body-wearable sensors, technologies th at are aware of contexts and real time information exchange are what makes up the persuasive technologies of the recent times involving devices like the mobile phones and other communicative devices (Chatterjee, 2009). 2. Advantages of Persuasive Technology Over Traditional Media and People: The emergence of persuasive technologies through the use of computers, web, and other devices has offered certain advantages over the traditional media and people. These include that it is more persistent than the human beings. It offers significant ambiguity. It has the capability to manage huge amounts of information. It can make use of several modalities to influence people. It can scale with ease. Also, persuasive technologies can be taken to places where it is not possible for human beings to reach. For example, Amazon.com offers books to its customers and along with that it suggests its customers for books through different links thus allowing customers to know about books that they otherw ise never knew (Drew, 2011). The development of information and communications technology has led to greater advantages of persuasion than the traditional media and people, with such revised development being more and more demanded. The present day persuasive

Is weight discrimination present in the workplace Research Paper

Is weight discrimination present in the workplace - Research Paper Example In fact according to statistics taken by Centers for Disease Control in 2006, it has shown that thirty four percent of all the adults living in the U.S have a BMI (body Mass index) of not less than 30 which is considered to be obese. In addition to Americans getting heavier and heavier a survey taken by the Yale University, prove that weight discriminations are present in work places as well as in our day-to-day encounters. In fact, it has been voted to be more present than discrimination against gender or age with racism taking the highest rank. On the real reasons as to why Obese people are discriminated in the work place, majority of the people consider them as being lazy, lack of self-discipline, unsuccessful and unintelligent (Brownell et al, 2010) According to statistics that have been taken into account to demonstrate weight discrimination in work places, they display those employees who are seen as obese are at a higher percentage not to be hired. In addition to that, their chances of being promoted are minimal, and if given jobs, their payment is lower compared to their fellow thinner employees. To prove this, they usually have the same credentials, qualifications, job performance, and education. The discrimination increases, as the individual gets heavier. The heavier the individual, the more likely the chances of reporting weight discrimination will be heard (Cardain, 2011). The national Longitudinal Survey of Youth also participated in a survey that demonstrated how in work places, thinner people are paid more that obese individuals who are performing the same duty. The statistics continue to display that if a female white individuals living in the United States have a decrease in their salary by nine percent if they happen to gain more than 65 pounds of the average weight of an individual (Douglas, 2011). In comparison to their coworkers who are less heavy than them, taking the fact that they perform the same duties, it has been reported that

Critical Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 2

Critical Analysis - Essay Example Healthcare expenditure of the United States constituted almost 17% of the GDP. Healthcare costs rise at a rate faster than the income of the nation. Healthcare costs are expected to rise in future. A control in the rise is the need of the hour as healthcare costs are negatively affecting the growth and economic stability of the nation. Even though health care systems of America are benefited from the investments in healthcare, the heavy increase in healthcare costs, increasing federal deficit and the general economic slowdown are negatively affecting them. Medicare, Medicaid and other health-insurance coverage sponsored by employers are extremely burdened with increasing healthcare costs. Family premiums available for healthcare coverage sponsored by employees also increased, putting trouble on workers as well as employers. Income of workers is growing at a fast rate when healthcare costs are increasing at a fast rate. Medicare and Medicaid and other government systems contribute a b ig chunk of healthcare expenses. However, compared to private insurance government programs are increasing at a slow rate. Enrolment in government programs have increased significantly because of economic recession. Expenditures of government programs have increased considerably these days. The high spending figures is putting government programs under great pressure. Affordable Care Act or The Patient Protection Affordable Care Act signed by US president in 2010 is considered as a highly beneficial healthcare reform (Mantel 221). It is a far-reaching and useful healthcare reform. It is expected to bring good result like what Medicare did. This Act makes the Health and Human Services (HHS) department to offer essential health benefits to people. These benefits should be dispensed through health plans, covering the plans that include in the health insurance markets. However, this process that extends

How Will Repeated Oral Reading Practice Impact Reading Fluency Case Study

How Will Repeated Oral Reading Practice Impact Reading Fluency - Case Study Example I teach at an elementary school, J.B. Nachman, in Alexandria, Louisiana. The school starts at Pre-K and goes through to fifth grade. There are approximately 700 students in the school. Nachman is the solitary elementary school in the district that is not considered a Title One school. I teach third grade, and we are not currently departmentalized. There are 23 students in my class: eight African American students, thirteen white students and one Asian student. I have one child with an IEP, and he is with a resource teacher for a majority of the day. There are no other adults in my classroom. I have chosen a small group of students (eight children) for my project based on their most recent DIBELS scores. The children, under my watch, have scored well below benchmark and are likely to need intensive support with regard to oral reading fluency. These are children who enjoy reading and are not intimidated to read aloud, as much as they struggle with word recognition and fluency. Review of Literature Clearly, reading serves many purposes in our daily lives. We use it in our work and play. We use it to help us learn more about ourselves and about the world around us in addition to sharing information with others (Martin-Chang & Levy, 2005). The National Reading Panel Report (2000) contained conclusive research that indicated that reading fluency was an essential element of the entire reading process, and that it was crucial that it is taught to developing readers. â€Å"Just as children and adults love to watch favorite movies over and over, readers of all ages have books, or sections of books, that they enjoy reading and re-reading, time and time again† (Dowhower, 1994, p. 354). ... â€Å"Just as children and adults love to watch favorite movies over and over, readers of all ages have books, or sections of books, that they enjoy reading and re-reading, time and time again† (Dowhower, 1994, p. 354). Since the 1970s, researchers and scholars have collected data that supported the concept that multiple readings of connected text enhanced the reading skills of a regular student. Reading stories to young students, besides their personal rereading, at least three times proved to enrich reading development. This procedure of repeated readings was simple, yet extraordinarily powerful (Dowhower, 1994). Using the common round robin approach in the classroom, where students take turns reading a small portion of the story, substantially limited amount of practice each student received because no child was allowed to read for very long. In order for students to establish significant progress in reading, beyond the initial stages, they needed to be given sufficient opp ortunities to practice reading in a variety of text styles (Pikulski & Chard, 2003). Employing repeated reading on a regular basis in a variety of formats could impact word recognition, reading fluency and comprehension (Rasinski, 2003). There is much evidence to support claims that repeating reading instruction influenced fluency in a diverse array of students. The ultimate goal of repeated reading instruction was to then enable students to generalize fluency to new passages that were being read for the first time (Nanda & Frederick, 2007). According to Pikulski and Chard (2003), repeated oral reading is the most frequently documented approach to improving fluency, with improved outcomes for young students

Cognitive science Essay Example for Free

Cognitive science Essay Stylistics is the study and interpretation of texts from a linguistic perspective. As a discipline it links literary criticism and linguistics, but has no autonomous domain of its own. [1][2] The preferred object of stylistic studies is literature, but not exclusively high literature but also other forms of written texts such as text from the domains of advertising, pop culture, politics or religion. [3] Stylistics also attempts to establish principles capable of explaining the particular choices made by individuals and social groups in their use of language, such as socialisation, the production and reception of meaning, critical discourse analysis and literary criticism. Other features of stylistics include the use of dialogue, including regional accents and people’s dialects, descriptive language, the use of grammar, such as the active voice or passive voice, the distribution of sentence lengths, the use of particular language registers, etc. In addition, stylistics is a distinctive term that may be used to determine the connections between the form and effects within a particular variety of language. Therefore, stylistics looks at what is ‘going on’ within the language; what the linguistic associations are that the style of language reveals. * | Early twentieth century The analysis of literary style goes back to Classical rhetoric, but modern stylistics has its roots in Russian Formalism,[4] and the related Prague School, in the early twentieth century. In 1909, Charles Ballys Traite de stylistique francaise had proposed stylistics as a distinct academic discipline to complement Saussurean linguistics. For Bally, Saussures linguistics by itself couldnt fully describe the language of personal expression. [5] Ballys programme fitted well with the aims of the Prague School. [6] Building on the ideas of the Russian Formalists, the Prague School developed the concept of foregrounding, whereby poetic language stands out from the background of non-literary language by means of deviation (from the norms of everyday language) or parallelism. [7] According to the Prague School, the background language isnt fixed, and the relationship between poetic and everyday language is always shifting. [8] Late twentieth century Roman Jakobson had been an active member of the Russian Formalists and the Prague School, before emigrating to America in the 1940s. He brought together Russian Formalism and American New Criticism in his Closing Statement at a conference on stylistics at Indiana University in 1958. [9] Published as Linguistics and Poetics in 1960, Jakobsons lecture is often credited with being the first coherent formulation of stylistics, and his argument was that the study of poetic language should be a sub-branch of linguistics. [10] The poetic function was one of six general functions of language he described in the lecture. Michael Halliday is an important figure in the development of British stylistics. [11] His 1971 study Linguistic Function and Literary Style: An Inquiry into the Language of William Goldings The Inheritors is a key essay. [12] One of Hallidays contributions has been the use of the term register to explain the connections between language and its context. [13] For Halliday register is distinct from dialect. Dialect refers to the habitual language of a particular user in a specific geographical or social context. Register describes the choices made by the user,[14] choices which depend on three variables: field (what the participants are actually engaged in doing, for instance, discussing a specific subject or topic),[15] tenor (who is taking part in the exchange) and mode (the use to which the language is being put). Fowler comments that different fields produce different language, most obviously at the level of vocabulary (Fowler. 1996, 192) The linguist David Crystal points out that Halliday’s ‘tenor’ stands as a roughly equivalent term for ‘style’, which is a more specific alternative used by linguists to avoid ambiguity. (Crystal. 1985, 292) Halliday’s third category, mode, is what he refers to as the symbolic organisation of the situation. Downes recognises two distinct aspects within the category of mode and suggests that not only does it describe the relation to the medium: written, spoken, and so on, but also describes the genre of the text. (Downes. 1998, 316) Halliday refers to genre as pre-coded language, language that has not simply been used before, but that predetermines the selection of textual meanings. The linguist William Downes makes the point that the principal characteristic of register, no matter how peculiar or diverse, is that it is obvious and immediately recognisable. (Downes. 1998, 309) Literary stylistics In The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, Crystal observes that, in practice, most stylistic analysis has attempted to deal with the complex and ‘valued’ language within literature, i. e.  Ã¢â‚¬Ëœliterary stylistics’. He goes on to say that in such examination the scope is sometimes narrowed to concentrate on the more striking features of literary language, for instance, its ‘deviant’ and abnormal features, rather than the broader structures that are found in whole texts or discourses. For example, the compact language of poetry is more likely to reveal the secrets of its construction to the stylistician than is the language of plays and novels. (Crystal. 1987, 71). Poetry As well as conventional styles of language there are the unconventional – the most obvious of which is poetry. In Practical Stylistics, HG Widdowson examines the traditional form of the epitaph, as found on headstones in a cemetery. For example: His memory is dear today As in the hour he passed away. (Ernest C. Draper ‘Ern’. Died 4. 1. 38) (Widdowson. 1992, 6) Widdowson makes the point that such sentiments are usually not very interesting and suggests that they may even be dismissed as ‘crude verbal carvings’ and crude verbal disturbance (Widdowson, 3). Nevertheless, Widdowson recognises that they are a very real attempt to convey feelings of human loss and preserve affectionate recollections of a beloved friend or family member. However, what may be seen as poetic in this language is not so much in the formulaic phraseology but in where it appears. The verse may be given undue reverence precisely because of the sombre situation in which it is placed. Widdowson suggests that, unlike words set in stone in a graveyard, poetry is unorthodox language that vibrates with inter-textual implications. (Widdowson. 1992, 4) Two problems with a stylistic analysis of poetry are noted by PM Wetherill in Literary Text: An Examination of Critical Methods. The first is that there may be an over-preoccupation with one particular feature that may well minimise the significance of others that are equally important. (Wetherill. 1974, 133) The second is that any attempt to see a text as simply a collection of stylistic elements will tend to ignore other ways whereby meaning is produced. (Wetherill. 1974, 133) Implicature In ‘Poetic Effects’ from Literary Pragmatics, the linguist Adrian Pilkington analyses the idea of ‘implicature’, as instigated in the previous work of Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson. Implicature may be divided into two categories: ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ implicature, yet between the two extremes there are a variety of other alternatives. The strongest implicature is what is emphatically implied by the speaker or writer, while weaker implicatures are the wider possibilities of meaning that the hearer or reader may conclude. Pilkington’s ‘poetic effects’, as he terms the concept, are those that achieve most relevance through a wide array of weak implicatures and not those meanings that are simply ‘read in’ by the hearer or reader. Yet the distinguishing instant at which weak implicatures and the hearer or reader’s conjecture of meaning diverge remains highly subjective. As Pilkington says: ‘there is no clear cut-off point between assumptions which the speaker certainly endorses and assumptions derived purely on the hearer’s responsibility. ’ (Pilkington. 1991, 53) In addition, the stylistic qualities of poetry can be seen as an accompaniment to Pilkington’s poetic effects in understanding a poems meaning. Stylistics is a valuable if long-winded approach to criticism, and compels attention to the poems details. Two of the three simple exercises performed here show that the poem is deficient in structure, and needs to be radically recast. The third sheds light on its content. Introduction Stylistics applies linguistics to literature in the hope of arriving at analyses which are more broadly based, rigorous and objective. {1} The pioneers were the Prague and Russian schools, but their approaches have been appropriated and extended in recent years by radical theory. Stylistics can be evaluative (i. e.judge the literary worth on stylistic criteria), but more commonly attempts to simply analyze and describe the workings of texts which have already been selected as noteworthy on other grounds. Analyses can appear objective, detailed and technical, even requiring computer assistance, but some caution is needed. Linguistics is currently a battlefield of contending theories, with no settlement in sight. Many critics have no formal training in linguistics, or even proper reading, and are apt to build on theories (commonly those of Saussure or Jacobson) that are inappropriate and/or no longer accepted. Some of the commonest terms, e. g. deep structure, foregrounding, have little or no experimental support. {2} Linguistics has rather different objectives, moreover: to study languages in their entirety and generality, not their use in art forms. Stylistic excellence — intelligence, originality, density and variety of verbal devices — play their part in literature, but aesthetics has long recognized that other aspects are equally important: fidelity to experience, emotional shaping, significant content. Stylistics may well be popular because it regards literature as simply part of language and therefore (neglecting the aesthetic dimension) without a privileged status, which allows the literary canon to be replaced by one more politically or sociologically acceptable. {3} Why then employ stylistics at all? Because form is important in poetry, and stylistics has the largest armoury of analytical weapons. Moreover, stylistics need not be reductive and simplistic. There is no need to embrace Jacobsons theory that poetry is characterized by the projection of the paradigmatic axis onto the syntagmatic one. {4} Nor accept Bradfords theory of a double spiral: {5} literature has too richly varied a history to be fitted into such a straitjacket. Stylistics suggests why certain devices are effective, but does not offer recipes, any more than theories of musical harmony explains away the gifts of individual composers. Some stylistic analysis is to be found in most types of literary criticism, and differences between the traditional, New Criticism and Stylistics approaches are often matters of emphasis. Style is a term of approbation in everyday use (that woman has style, etc.), and may be so for traditional and New Criticism. But where the first would judge a poem by reference to typical work of the period (Jacobean, Romantic, Modernist, etc. ), or according to genre, the New Criticism would probably simply note the conventions, explain what was unclear to a modern audience, and then pass on to a detailed analysis in terms of verbal density, complexity, ambiguity, etc. To the Stylistic critic, however, style means simply how something is expressed, which can be studied in all language, aesthetic and non-aesthetic. {6} Stylistics is a  very technical subject, which hardly makes for engrossing, or indeed uncontentious, {7} reading. The treatment here is very simple: just the bare bones, with some references cited. Under various categories the poem is analyzed in a dry manner, the more salient indications noted, and some recommendations made in Conclusions. Published Examples of Stylistic Literary Criticism G. N. Leechs A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry (1969) Laura Browns Alexander Pope (1985) Roy Lewiss On Reading French Verse: A Study in Poetic Form (1982) George Wrights Shakespeares Metrical Art. (1988) Richard Bradfords A Linguistic History of English Poetry (1993) Poem The Architects But, as youd expect, they are very Impatient, the buildings, having much in them Of the heavy surf of the North Sea, flurrying The grit, lifting the pebbles, flinging them With a hoarse roar against the aggregate They are composed of — the cliffs higher of course, More burdensome, underwritten as It were with past days overcast And glinting, obdurate, part of the Silicate of tough lives, distant and intricate As the whirring bureaucrats let in And settled with coffee in the concrete pallets, Awaiting the post and the department meeting — Except that these do not know it, at least do not Seem to, being busy, generally. So perhaps it is only on those cloudless, almost Vacuumed afternoons with tier upon tier Of concrete like rib-bones packed above them, And they light-headed with the blue airiness Spinning around, and muzzy, a neuralgia Calling at random like frail relations, a phone Ringing in a distant office they cannot get to, That they become attentive, or we do — these Divisions persisting, indeed what we talk about, We, constructing these webs of buildings which, Caulked like great whales about us, are always. Aware that some trick of the light or weather Will dress them as friends, pleading and flailing — And fill with placid but unbearable melodies Us in deep hinterlands of incurved glass.  © C. John Holcombe 1997 Metre Though apparently iambic, with five stresses to the line, the metre shows many reversals and substitutions. Put at its simplest, with: / representing a strong stress \ representing a weak stress x representing no stress, and trying to fit lines into a pentameters, we have -| /| x| x| x| /| -| \| x| /| x| | But| as| youd| ex| pect| | they| are| ve| ry| x| /| x| x| /| x| /| x| \| x| x| Im| pat| ient| the| build| ings,| hav| ing| much| in| them| x| x| \| x| /| x| x| \| /| /| x x| Of| the| heav| y| surf| of| the| North| Sea,| flurr| ying| x| /| -| /| x| x| /| x| /| x| \| The| grit,| | lift| ing| the| pebbl| es,| fling| ing| them| \| x| /| -| /| x| \| x| /| x| \| With| a| hoarse| | roar| a| gainst| the| agg| re| gate| x| \| x| /| \| x| /| /| x| x| /| They| are| com| posed| of,| the| cliffs| high| er| of| course| \| /| x| \| -| /| x| / | x| \| | More| burd| en| some,| | un| der| writ| ten| as| | x| /| x| /| -| /| -| /| x| /| | It| were| with| past| | days| | o| ver| cast| | x| /| x| \| /| x| \| -| /| x| x| And | glit| ter| ing,| ob| du| rate,| | part| of| the| -| /| x x x| /| -| /| -| /| x x| /| x x| | Sil| icate of| tough| | lives| | dist| ant and| in| tricate| -| \| x| /| x| /| x| \| -| /| x| | As| the| whir| ring| bu| reau| crats| | let| in| x| /| x x| /| x| \| x| /| x| /| x| And | set| tled with| cof| fee| in| the| con| crete| pal| lets| x| /| x x| /| x| \| x| /| x| /| x| A| wait| ing the| post| and| the| de| part| ment| meet| ing| x| \| x| /| \ x | /| x| x| \| /| x| Ex| cept| that| these| do not| know| it, | at| least| do| not| -| /| x| /| x| /| x| /| x| \| x| | Seem| to| be| ing| bus| y| gen| ER| all| y| \| x| /| x x| /| x| \| x| /| x| /| x| So| per| haps| it is| on| ly| on| those| cloud| less| al| most| -| /| x| /| x| \| x| /| x x| \| /| x| | Vac| uumed| af| ter| noons| with| ti| ER u| pon| ti| ER| x| /| x| \| /| /| -| /| x| /| x| | Of| con| Crete| like| rib| bones| | packed| a| bove| them| | x| /| \| /| x| \| x| /| /| x| \| | And | they| light| head| ed,| with| the| blue| air| i| ness| | -| /| x x| /| x| /| x| \| x| /| x x| | | Spin| ning a| round| and| muz| zy,| a| neu| ral| gia| | -| /| x x| /| x x| /| x| /| x x| /| | | Cal| ling at| ran| dom like| frail| re| lat| ions a| phone| | -| /| x x x| /| x| /| x x| /| x| /| x| | Ring| ing in a| dist| ant| of| fice they| can| not| get| to| x| /| x| /| x| /| x x| /| /-| \| | That| they| be| come| at| ten| tive, or| we| do| these| | x| /| x x| /| x x| /| \| x| /| x| /| Di| vis| ions per| sist| ing, in| deed| what| we| talk| a| bout| -| /| x| /| x x| /| x| /| x| \| | | We,| con| struct| ing these| webs| of| build| ings| which| | -| /| x| /| \| /| x| /| x x| /| x| | Caulk| Ed | like| great| whales| a| bout| us are| al| ways| x| /| x x| /| x x| /| x| /| x| | | A| ware| that some| trick| of the| light| or| weath| ER| | | \| /| x x| /| -| /| x x| /| x| | | Will| dress| them as| friends| | plead| ing and| flail| ing| | | x| /| x| /| x| \| x| /| x x| /| x x| And| fill| with| plac| id| but | UN| bear| able | mel| odies| -| /| x| \| -| /| x x x| /| \| /| | | Us | in| deep| | hint| erlands of| in| curved| glass| | Poets learn to trust their senses, but even to the experienced writer these (tedious) exercises can pinpoint what the ear suspects is faulty, suggest where improvements lie, and show how the metre is making for variety, broad consistency, shaping of the argument and emotive appeal. Though other scansions are certainly possible in the lines above, the most striking feature will remain their irregularity. Many lines can only roughly be called pentameters; Lines 16 and 17 are strictly hexameters; and lines 27 and 28 are tetrameters. In fact, the lines do not read like blank verse. The rhythm is not iambic in many areas, but trochaic, and indeed insistently dactylic in lines 9 and 10, 21 and 22 and 28. Line 27 is predominantly anapaestic, and line 3 could (just) be scanned: x x| / x| /| x x \| /| | /| x x | Of the| heavy| surf| of the North| Sea| | flurr| ying| Reflective or meditative verse is generally written in the iambic pentameter, and for good reason — the benefit of past examples, readers expectations, and because the iambic is the closest to everyday speech: flexible, unemphatic, expressing a wide range of social registers. Blank verse for the stage may be very irregular but this, predominantly, is a quiet poem, with the falling rhythms inducing a mood of reflection if not melancholy. What is being attempted? Suppose we set out the argument (refer to rhetorical and other analyses), tabbing and reverse tabbing as the reflections as they seem more or less private: {8} 1. But, as youd expect, 2. they are very impatient, the buildings, 3. having much in them of the heavy surf of the North Sea, 4. flurrying the grit, 5. lifting the pebbles, 6. flinging them with a hoarse roar against the aggregate they are composed of — the 7. cliffs higher of course, more 8. burdensome, 9. underwritten as it were with past days 10. overcast and glinting, 11. obdurate, 12. part of the silicate of tough lives, 13. distant and intricate as 14. the whirring bureaucrats 15. let in and settled with coffee in the concrete pallets, awaiting the post and the department meeting — 16. except that these do not know it, 17. at least do not seem to, being busy, 18. generally. 19. So perhaps it is only on those cloudless, almost vacuumed afternoons with tier upon tier of concrete like rib — bones packed above them, and 20. they light-headed 21. with the blue airiness spinning around, and 22. muzzy, a 23. neuralgia calling at random like 24. frail relations, a 25. phone ringing in a distant office they cannot get to, that 26. They become attentive, 27. or we do — 28. these divisions persisting, 29. indeed what we talk about, 30. we, constructing these webs of buildings which 31. caulked like great whales about us, are 32. always aware that some trick of the light or weather will dress them as friends, 33. pleading and flailing — and 34. fill with placid but unbearable melodies 35. us in deep hinterlands of incurved glass. The structure should now be clear. Where Eliot created new forms by stringing together unremarkable pentameters, {8} this poem attempts the reverse: to recast an irregular ode-like structure as pentameters. And not over-successfully: many of the rhythms seemed unduly confined. But once returned to the form of an eighteenth century Pindaric ode, however unfashionable today, the lines regain a structure and integrity. Each starts with a marked stress and then tails away, a feature emphasized by the sound patterns. {9} Sound Patterning To these sound patterns we now turn, adapting the International Phonetic Alphabet to HTML restrictions: 1. But | as | youd | expect | u | a | U | e e | b t | z | y d | ksp kt | 2. They | are | very | impatient | the | buildings | A | a(r) | e E | i A e | e | i i | th | | v r | mp sh nt | th | b ld ngz | 3. Having | much | in | them | of | the | heavy | surf | of | the | North | Sea | a i | u | i | e | o | e | e | e(r) | o | e | aw | E | h v ng | m ch | n | th m | v | th | h v | s f | v | th | n th | s | 4. flurrying | the | grit | u E i | e | i | fl r ng | th | gr t | 5. lifting | the | pebbles | i i | e | e | l ft ng | th | p b lz | 6. flinging | them | with | a | hoarse | roar | against | the | aggregate | they | are | composed | of | i i | e | i | e | aw | aw | e A | e | a E A | A | a(r) | o O | o | fl ng ng | th m | w th | | h s | r | g nst | th | gr g t | th | | k MP zd | v | 7. the | cliffs | higher | of | course | more | e | i | I e | o | aw | aw | th | kl fs | h | v | s | m | 8. burdensome | u(r) e e | b d ns m | 9. underwritten | as | it | were | with | past | days | u e i e | a | i | (e)r | i | a(r) | A | nd r t n | z | t | w | w | p st | d z | 10. overcast | and | glinting | O e(r) a(r) | a | i i | v k St | nd | gl NT ng | 11. obdurate | o U A | bd r t | 12. part | of | the | silicate | of | tough | lives | (a)r | o | e | i i A | o | u | I | p t | f | th | s l k t | v | t f | l vz | 13. distant | and | intricate | i a | a | i i e | d St NT | nd | NT r k t | 14. as | the | whirring | bureaucrats | a | e | e(r) i | U O a | z | th | w r ng | b r kr ts | 15. let | in | and | settled | with | coffee | in | the | concrete | pallets | e | i | a | e ie | i | o E | i | e | o E | a e | l t | n | nd | s tl d | w th | k f | n | th | k Kr t | p l Ts | awaiting | the | post | and | the | department | meeting | e A i | e | O | a | e | E e | E i | w t ng | th | p St | nd | th | d p tm NT | m t ng | 16. except | that | these | do | not | know | it | e e | a | E | U | o | O | i | ks pt | th | th z | d | n t | n | t | 17. at | least | do | not | seem | to | being | busy | a | E | U | o | E | U | E i | i E | t | l St | d | n t | s m | t | b ng | b z /td | 18.generally | e e a E | j nr l | 19. so | perhaps | it | is | only | on | those | cloudless | almost | vacuumed | afternoons | O | e(r) a | i | i | O | o | O | ou e | aw O | a U | a(r) e oo | s | p h ps | t | z | nl | n | th z | kl dl s | lm St | v k md | ft n nz | with | tier | upon | tier | of | concrete | like | rib | bones | packed | above | them | and | i | E e(r) | e o | E e(r) | o | o E | I | i | O | a | e u | e | a | w th | t | p n | t | v | k nkr t | l k | r b | b nz | p Kt | b v | th m | nd | 20. they | light | headed | A | I | e e | th | l t | h d d | 21. with | the | blue | airiness | spinning | around | and | i | e | U | (A)r i e | i i | e ou | a | w th | th | bl | r n s | sp n ng | r nd | nd | 22. muzzy | a | u E | e | m z | | 23. neuralgia | calling | at | random | like | U a E a | aw i | a | a o | I | n r lj | k l ng | t | r nd m | l k | 24. frail | relations | a | A | e A e | e | fr l | r l zh nz | | 25. phone | ringing | in | a | distant | office | they | cannot | get | to | that | O | i i | i | e | i a | o i | A | a o | e | oo | a | | f n | r ng ng | n | | d St NT | f s | th | k n t | g t | t | th | | 26. they | become | attentive | A | E u | a e i | th | b k m | t NT v | 27. or | we | do | aw | E | oo | | w | d | 28. these | divisions | persisting | E | i i e | e(r) i i | th z | d v zh nz | p s St ng | 29. indeed | what | we | talk | about | i E | o | E | aw | e ou | in d | wh t | w | t k | b t | 30. we | constructing | these | webs | of | buildings | which | E | o u i | E | e | o | i i | i | w | k nz str Kt ng | th z | w bs | v | b ld ngz | wh Ch | 31. caulked | like | great | whales | about | us | are | aw | I | A | A | e ou | u | a(r) | k kd | l k | gr t | w lz | b t | s | | 32. always | aware | that | some | trick | of | the | light | or | weather | will | dress | them | as | friends | aw A | e (A)r | a | u | i | o | e | I | aw | e e(r) | i | e | e | a | e | lw z | w | th t | s m | tr k | v | th | l t | | w th | w l | dr s | th m | z | Fr ndz | 33. pleading | and | flailing | E i | a | A i | pl d ng | nd | fl l ng | 34. will | fill | with | placid | but | unbearable | melodies | i | i | i | a i | u | u A(r) a e | e O E | f l | w th | PL s d | b t | n b r b l | m l d z | | 35. us | in | deep | hinterlands | of | incurved | glass | u | i | E | i e a | o | i e(r) | a(r) | s | n | d p | h NT l ndz | v | nk v d | GL s | Sound in poetry is an immensely complicated and contentious subject. Of the seventeen different employments listed by Masson {10} we consider seven: 1. Structural emphasis All sections are structurally emphasized to some extent, but note the use (in decreasing hardness) of * plosive consonants in sections 1, 5, 6, 7, 10-13, 19, 28-50; 31 and 35. * fricative and aspirate consonants in sections 2, 3, 6, 7, 12, 19, 25, 28, 32, 35. * liquid and nasal consonants in sections 3, 4, 12, 15, 17, 18, 19, 21, 23, 31-35. Also: * predominance of front vowels — in all sections but 6, 7, 11, 16, 17, 19 and 31. * predominance of vowels in intermediate positions — only sections 16 and 17 having several high vowels and section 3 low vowels. 2. Tagging of sections Note sections 1, 7, 13 and 15. 3. Indirect support of argument by related echoes * Widely used, most obviously in sections 3-7, 12-13, and 15. 4. Illustrative mime: mouth movements apes expression * Sections 2, 6, 11-13, 19, 31 and 35. 5. Illustrative painting * Sections 3-6, 10-13, 15, 19 and 33. Most sections are closely patterned in consonants. Those which arent (and therefore need attention if consistency is to be maintained) are perhaps 8, 9, 14, 18, 20, 22, 24, 26 and 27. Originally the poem was cast in the form of irregular pentameters. But if this is set aside in favour of the 35 sections listed above, how are these sections to be linked in a self-evident and pleasing form? A little is accomplished by alliteration: * f in sections 3 to 7. * s and t in sections 12 to 15 * w in sections 29 to 32 And also by the predominance of front and intermediate level vowels, but these do not amount to much. Certainly we do not find that the overall shaping of the poem emphasizes the argument or content. Sociolinguistics Language is not a neutral medium but comes with the contexts, ideologies and social intentions of its speakers written in. Words are living entities, things which are constantly being employed and only half taken over: carrying opinions, assertions, beliefs, information, emotions and intentions of others, which we partially accept and modify. In this sense speech is dialogic, has an internal polemic, and Bakhtins insights into the multi-layered nature of language (heteroglossia) can be extended to poetry. {11} Much of Postmodernist writing tries to be very unliterary, incorporating the raw material of everyday speech and writing into its creations. This poem seems rather different, a somewhat remote tone and elevated diction applying throughout. Let us see whats achieved by grouping under the various inflections of the speaking voice. * urgently confidential But, as youd expect, cliffs higher, of course, that they become attentive or we do * obsessively repetitious flurrying the grit, lifting the pebbles, flinging them burdensome, underwritten overcast and glinting, obdurate * over-clever silicate of tough lives  distant and intricate constructing these webs of buildings distracted and/or light-headed except that these do not know it at least do not seem to with the blue airiness spinning around calling at random like frail relations * melancholic and/or reflective some trick of the light or weather will dress them as friends pleading and flailing and fill with placid but unbearable melodies. The exercise hardly provides revelation. Heteroglossia is an interweaving of voices, moreover, not shifts of tone or reference. And yet there is something very odd about the opening line. Why should we expect the buildings to be very impatient? This is more than the orators trick of attracting attention, since the animate nature of buildings and their constituents is referred to throughout the poem. To be more exact, the attitude of the inhabitants — observers, bureaucrats, architects — to the buildings is developed by the poem, and is paralleled by the tone. But why the confidential and repetitious attitude at the beginning. Why should we be buttonholed in this manner? Why the But, which seems to point to an earlier conversation, and the urgency with which that earlier conversation is being refuted or covered up? Because the blame for something is being shifted to the buildings. What error has been committed we do not know, but in mitigation we are shown the effect of the buildings on other inhabitants. Or perhaps we are. In fact the whirring bureaucrats seem to grow out of the fabric of buildings, and we do not really know if the we, constructing these webs of buildings is meant literally or metaphorically. The poems title suggests literally, but perhaps these constructions are only of the mind: sections 17, 20-29, 32 and 34 refer to attitudes rather than actions, and there is an ethereal or otherworldly atmosphere to the later section of the poem. So we return to heteroglossia, which is not simply borrowed voices, but involves an internal polemic, {12} that private dialogue we conduct between our private thoughts and their acceptable public expression. The dialogue is surely here between the brute physicality of a nature made overpoweringly real and the fail brevity of human lives. That physicality is threatening and unnerving. If the we of the later section of the poem is indeed architects then that physicality is harnessed to practical ends. If the constructing is purely mental then the treatment is through attitudes, mindsets, philosophies. But in neither case does it emasculate the energy of the physical world. Architects may leave monuments behind them, but they are also imprisoned in those monuments (us in deep hinterlands) and hearing all the time the homesick voice of their constituents. Conclusions: Suggested Improvements The greatest difficulty lies in the poems structure. An pentameter form has been used to give a superficial unity, but this wrenches the rhythm, obscures the sound patterns and does nothing for the argument. If recast in sections defined by rhythm and sound pattern the form is too irregular to have artistic autonomy. A return could be made to the eighteenth century Pindaric ode in strict metre and rhyme, but would require extensive and skilful rewriting, and probably appear artificial. A prose poem might be the answer, but the rhythms would need to be more fluid and subtly syncopated. Otherwise, blank verse should be attempted, and the metre adjusted accordingly. The internal polemic is a valuable dimension of the poem, but more could be done to make the voices distinct. http://www. textetc. com/criticism/stylistics. html1. On StylisticsIs cognitive stylistics the future of stylistics? To answer this question in the essay that follows, I will briefly discuss Elena Semino and Jonathan Culpeper’s Cognitive Stylistics (2003), Paul Simpson’s Stylistics (2004), and a recent essay by Michael Burke (2005). However, because questions are like trains – one may hide another – any discussion of the future of stylistics raises intractable questions about stylistics itself. French students of stylistics, for example, will come across definitions of the discipline like the following. According to Brigitte Buffard-Moret, â€Å"si les definitions de [la stylistique] – que certains refusent de considerer comme une scien

The price of gold has increased in the Indian markets Essay Example for Free

The price of gold has increased in the Indian markets Essay The gold prices have been constantly increasing in India due to the spot demand before the marriage season, currency movements and the traditional investment patterns. The constant depreciation in the Indian currency and a change in government policies are supporting a steady rise in the price of gold. Earlier, there was a flat rate of Rs. 300 for 10g on gold. But now, due to the change in the government policy on import duties, 2% is charged on 10g of gold. This change in the government policy will increase the import duties on the metal to nearly a double, increasing its prices. Gold is denominated in US Dollar; change in the value of US Dollar will hence reflect the price of gold. The steady depreciation in the value of US Dollar due to the ongoing recession has led to a weak trend in gold in the global markets. If the price of gold is valued higher in any other currency, it shows us that the demand for gold is high and hence increasing its value. The below graph shows the depreciating value of gold due to the depreciation of US Dollar. http://www.kitco.com/LFgif/au0365nyb.gif Even though there is a weak trend in global markets, the price of gold has increased in the Indian markets due to the high pick up on spot demand ahead of the marriage season. The price of gold has gained Rs. 25 from Rs. 28, 245 per 10 grams. ETF in India saw the highest net outflows in last 52 months. Investors observe recovery in stock markets which helped gold prices increasing. This high trend of gold in the Indian market can be explained as an exception to the law of demand i.e. the increase in the price of gold is increasing the demand for the metal. Indians are the biggest buyers of gold in the world. Gold imports reached 958 tons in 2010, and in 2011 gold imports were still high despite the increase in prices. Gold can hence be considered a Veblen good. A Veblen good is one whose demand continues to rise in spite of an increase in its price level. Therefore the normal law of demand is not applicable here. Such goods are known as goods of conspicuous1 consumption because people regard them as status symbols and there is an inherent passion towards this precious metal. A normal demand curve slopes left to right downwards. But as shown in the diagram above, the demand curve slopes upward, and when the price of increases from P to P1, the quantity demanded increases from QD to QD1. Hence, gold can be considered as a Veblen good. Although, the prices of silver is facing a weakening trend in both the Indian and the global markets due to the same ongoing recession. Silver has fallen by Rs. 800 from Rs. 57,700 per Kg in the Indian market and by USD 6.70 from USD 1704.60 in the global market. The below graph shows a fall in the prices of silver in the global market. In the Indian market, silver doesn’t have high value status as much as gold. This is because people do not have a high inherent passion towards silver. Almost all electronics are configured with silver. The precious metal is used in everything from automobiles to alternative energy needs. But due do the reduced off take by industrial units, silver is facing a fall in both demand and its prices. http://www.kitco.com/LFgif/ag0365nyb.gif Even though the weak trend in silver, the demand for silver coins has been the same as the people in India buy these coins for good luck and prosperity. In conclusion, gold and silver are both facing a weakening trend in the global market due to the world economic uncertainties. But, in the Indian Market, gold is having a high trend whereas silver has a weak trend. As gold is continued to be purchased high in India due to its snob value status. A Tighter Regulation 1. Gold and silver are the two most popular commodities traded on Indian commodity bourses. 2. FMC may ask exchange to tighten monitoring and receive weekly data on trade volume. 3. National commodity exchanges say such measures will help strengthen investor trust in the market. 4. The only downside of stricter regulation is that it may reduce bullion trading volumes.

Injuries Associated With Tenpin Bowling

Injuries Associated With Tenpin Bowling Tenpin bowling is an indoor sport in which a player scores points by striking down as many pins as possible with a bowling ball rolled along a wooden or polyurethane lane. According to an estimate, more individuals play bowling than any other sports; with the notable exception of football. Also, bowling is considered to have more registered players than any other competitive sport. The governing body for bowling, FIQ (Fà ©dà ©ration Internationale des Quilleurs) has been pushing for Olympic recognition for the game. Many theories abound regarding the origin of bowling. According to some, the beginning of bowling dates back millennia. In 1930, the British anthropologist, Sir Flinders Petrie, while excavating a grave in Egypt, found objects similar to bowling balls and bowling pins. Others are of the opinion that bowling originated in Germany about 1700 years ago. Kegal, as it was then called in Germany, was played using 9 pins as opposed to 10 pins used in the modern game. The first textual reference to bowling comes from Britain. King Edward III, in 1366, supposedly banned his soldiers from participating in the game since it proved to be a major source of distraction for their duties. Bowling in America was introduced by the Germans, the Dutch, and the English. The Germans were, however, mainly responsible for the rise in popularity of the sports in and around the American Civil War. The immediate post-Second World War era is considered to be the golden age of bowling. Immense rise in popularity was witnessed during these years. For the first time, the game came to be seen as one to be played and enjoyed by the masses. Introduction of technology in the form of semi and fully automatic pinspotters during this time was also a contributing factor. Introduction of television lead to increased popularity of all sports; bowling was no exception. In the 1980s, computerised systems made scoring simpler and the game more enjoyable. More recently, recognising the importance of family entertainment centres, bowling alleys are being constructed as parts of leisure centres and shopping malls. Electronic versions of the game including PlayStation, Jamdat, and Brunswick Circuit Pro, to name a few, are further adding to the popularity of the sport. Types of Injuries and the associated mechanisms Although, bowling is not a contact sport, it has its shares of injury risks. Injuries due to chronic repetitive stress as well as faulty techniques can cause injuries in bowling. Use of a ball which is too heavy can also, over time, cause injuries. Repetitive lateral flexion, twisting, extensions as well as tremendous ground reaction forces acting on the lower back and knee, in particular are causes of concern. Since, overuse injuries are more common in bowling, the number of times an individual bowls per week assumes significance. Keeping track of the work load can help competitive athletes peak at the right moments for an important tournament. Acute injuries like back, leg or arm injury due to a fall during approach, hand or parts of the body getting caught in the ball retriever, as well as wrist and finger dislocation or sprains due to fingers getting caught in the holes of the ball are quite common place. Anatomical Sites of Injury More often than not, injuries in bowling involve the upper extremity, chiefly fingers, wrists, elbow and shoulder. However, knee and lower back injuries are a common occurrence as well. Occasionally, injuries due to fall can occur, especially in novice players and involve a variety of anatomical sites. Upper Extremity Finger sprain These are caused due to damage to the ligaments due to movements in excess of that allowed at a particular joint. Symptoms involve swelling, pain during movement, restriction of movement and in severe cases, instability of the joint. Thumb sprain Similar to finger sprains, symptoms include pain and swelling over the base of the joint, pain on movement and in the webbing between the thumb and the forefinger. Severe cases are characterised by instability of joint. Treatment involves usual application of the RICE principle. Early mobilisation during rehab is usually warranted. Injuries with instability either occurring acutely or as a residual component require surgical intervention. Carpal tunnel syndrome Repetitive activity as well as trauma or fractures which reduce the space in the carpal tunnel formed by the wrist bones on beneath and a band of fibrous tissue over it can cause Carpal tunnel syndrome. Impingement of the median nerve is immediate cause of the syndrome. It is characterised by tingling numbness with weakness or pain over the hand or fingers. Some authorities suggest worsening of symptoms nocturnally. Diagnosis is usually clinical but an EMG study can confirm the diagnosis. Biceps tendinopathy Biceps tendinopathy is a general term used to describe a variety of injuries involving the tendon of origin of the biceps. As the names suggest, tendinitis and peritendinitis involves inflammation of the tendon or tendinous sheath. Chronic micro trauma due to repetitive nature of activity with minimal rest is mainly responsible. Degenerative change in the tendon is referred to as tendinosis whereas degenerative changed over a bony prominence due to repetitive movement of a tendon is called tenosynovistis. Pain over the bicipetal groove (front of the shoulder) radiating down to the elbow, which increases in intensity on shoulder flexion, elbow flexion or forearm supination (actions of biceps) is the hallmark of diagnosis of bicipetal tendinopathy. Seldom seen as a single entity, it usually accompanies injuries of the shoulder such as a rotator cuff tear. Modality of treatment specific to this type of injury involves scapular stabilisation. Strengthening of trapezius, serratus anterior muscle and latissimus dorsi is usually advocated. Correction of posture with conscious efforts of pinching the shoulder blades together as well as use of posture braces forms an important part of treatment. De Quervains tenosynovistis Pain over the thumb side of the wrist, with or without swelling, and presence of crepitus is diagnostic of the condition. Inflammation due to repetitive movement of tendons of two small muscles of the thumb, Abductor Pollicis Longus (APL) and Extensor Pollicis Brevis (EPB), over the lower part of radius bone leads to this condition. Holding the heavy ball, wringing as well as pinching, over a period of time, is thought to be the cause de Quervains tenosynovistis. Previous injury with subsequent scar tissue at the site as well as a generalised disease like arthritis also contributes to the aetiology of the condition. Along with routine treatment, use of a thumb spica splint is considered important in rehabilitation. Lower extremity Ankle sprains Sudden change of direction, twisting, improper landing and falls; with the ankle joint bearing most of the brunt causes ankle sprains. Pain, bruising swelling, bleeding into the joint and varying grades of rupture of the supporting ligaments can occur. In severe cases, bones may be involved. Most commonly, the lateral ligament (on the outer aspect of the joint) is injured. Inversion sprains are considered to be responsible. However, deltoid ligament sprains (on the inner side of the joint) can also occur. An important aspect of rehabilitation of ankle injury is the use of wobble boards or trampoline to improve balance and proprioception. Knee joint ligaments injuries Similar to the ankle joint, sudden change in direction, twisting and improper landing can lead to injuries to the knee joint. Most commonly involved structures are the ligaments of the knee joint, namely, the cruciates, the menisci or the collaterals. Pain, bruising, swelling and instability of the joint are the usual features. Depending on the grade of injury, healing may require between four to twelve weeks. Use of knee braces forms an important part of rehab of knee ligament injuries. Sever grades of injury may require surgical reconstruction of structures. Patello-femoral Syndrome During ball release, the body balances on the front leg with flexed knee. In addition, there is twisting of the trunk to the same side. At this moment tremendous ground reaction forces act on the front knee. Such stress over time can cause patello-femoral syndrome. Chronic bearing of body weight on a semi-flexed knee with resultant grinding of the patella over the femoral bone and subsequent inflammation is considered to cause the condition. Symptoms include gradually increasing pain in the front of the knee, typically felt while climbing a flight of stairs. Over period of time, simple activities like sitting in a chair, kneeling and jogging causes pain. Faulty foot structure as well as mal-alignment of the leg can also cause the syndrome. Important aspects of rehabilitation include VMO and glutes strengthening, use of braces to strengthen surrounding structures and orthotics to correct structural abnormalities, if any. Shoulder injuries The shoulder goes through various movements during different stages of bowling. In the cocking phase, before delivery of the ball, abduction, posterior flexion and external rotation occurs. During release, there is forceful adduction with forward flexion and internal rotation which is followed by sweeping of the arm across the chest during follow through. This multitude of actions can cause shoulder ligaments tears, impingement syndromes (involving tendons of the rotator cuff or biceps), etc. Lower back Injuries affecting the lower back in bowling can be due to muscle fatigue, undue and sudden stretching of stiffened muscles, improper techniques of bowling and repetitive trauma with minimal strengthening program and rest. In addition, muscle strains or spasms involving the quadriceps, hamstrings or the adductor group of muscles can also occur. Preventive Measure for Injuries in Bowling A general plan for staying free from injuries in bowling should involve: Use of proper technique: inputs from your coach to improve technique and reduce injury risks Designing and implementation of a fitness regimen: Strengthening of musculature and supporting structures forms the first line in the prevention of injuries. Particular emphasis on finger and wrist strength as well as muscles specific to bowling like quadriceps, hamstrings, and adductors is called for. Flexibility training for the back, legs, arms and wrists is as important, if not more, as resistance training. Additionally, cardiovascular fitness training is recommended for a minimum of 3 days a week Warm up: for up to 20 minutes, include cardio work or calisthenics (exercises using body weight). This gets the blood flowing, making the muscles warm and flexible Stretching: with specific emphasis on muscle used in bowling like quadriceps, hamstrings, shoulders, and lower back.

The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: The Formation of Ident

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave details the progression of a slave to a man, and thus, the formation of his identity. The narrative functions as a persuasive essay, written in the hopes that it would successfully lead to â€Å"hastening the glad day of deliverance to the millions of [his] brethren in bonds† (Douglass 331). As an institution, slavery endeavored to reduce the men, women, and children â€Å"in bonds† to a state less than human. The slave identity, according to the institution of slavery, was not to be that of a rational, self forming, equal human being, but rather, a human animal whose purpose is to work and obey the whims of their â€Å"master.† For these reasons, Douglass articulates a distinction between the terms ‘man’ and ‘slaves’ under the institution of slavery. In his narrative, Douglass describes the situations and conditions that portray the differences betwee n the two terms. Douglass also depicts the progression he makes from internalizing the slaveholder viewpoints about what his identity should be to creating an identity of his own making. Thus, Douglass’ narrative depicts not simply a search for freedom, but also a search for himself through the abandonment of the slave/animal identity forced upon him by the institution of slavery.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The reader is first introduced to the idea of Douglass’s formation of identity outside the constraints of slavery before he or she even begins reading the narrative. By viewing the title page and reading the words â€Å"The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, written by himself† the reader sees the advancement Douglass made from a dependent slave to an independent author (Stone 134). As a slave, he was forbidden a voice with which he might speak out against slavery. Furthermore, the traditional roles of slavery would have had him uneducated—unable to read and incapable of writing. However, by examining the full meaning of the title page, the reader is introduced to Douglass’s refusal to adhere to the slave role of uneducated and voiceless. Thus, even before reading the work, the reader knows that Douglass will show â€Å"how a slave was made a man† through â€Å"speaking out—the symbolic act of self-definition† (Stone 135).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In the first chapter of the narrative, Douglass introduces the comparison between slaves and animals, writing that â€Å"the larger... ...details the transformation of a slave to a man. The institution of slavery defined a slave as less than human, and in order to perpetuate that impression, slaveholders forbade slaves the luxury of self definition. Therefore, when Douglass finally rejects the notions about his identity forced on him by slavery, and embraces an identity of his own creation, he has completed his journey from slave to man. He no longer defines himself in terms of the institution of slavery, but by his own thoughts regarding what his identity is. Through the metamorphosis of his identity as â€Å"an animal† to an author who fights for the abolitionist movement, Douglass presents his narrative not simply as a search for freedom, but also a search for himself. â€Å"It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men." – Frederick Douglass Works Cited Douglass, Frederick. â€Å"The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass.† The Classic Slave Narratives. Ed. Henry Louis Gates Jr. New York: Penguin Group, 1987. Stone, Albert. â€Å"Identity and Art in Frederick Douglass’s ‘Narrative’.† Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism: Volume 7. Ed. Paula Kepos. Detroit: Gale Research Inc., 1990. 134-137.

Peer Pressure Speech -- Peer Pressure Speech

The first point I want to make in this speech is that peer pressure is NOT a bad thing. We all are influenced by our peers, both negatively and positively. It helps define who we are and how we feel about subjects in our lives. It is how we chose to react to peer pressure that defines who we are as an individual. Are we a leader or a follower? Both types of people are needed to make the world go round. Basically, the difference between negative and positive peer pressure is the outcome. The reverse of the situation above is negative peer pressure. The situation itself is positive peer pressure. Or is it? What if a teen really doesn't like sports, but pushes himself to do it to please his friends or to be accepted? Therefore, he probably doesn't do to well at it, and gets only jabs at hi...

Meta Tags and Meta Keywords :: Internet Technology Essays

Meta Tags and Meta Keywords Meta Tags are thought to be the be all-end all of search engine rankings. This is not true. Meta Tags are a necessary, but not a sufficient condition for high rankings. Meta tags are designed to provide basic information to the search engine about the site. Meta tags appear at the top of the HTML document within the <head></head> section of the document. In the following example, nine different types of Meta Tags are identified: Content-Type, Copyright, Resource-type, ObjectType, Author, Rating, Distribution, Description, and Keywords. The two meta tags of primary interest to search engines are the â€Å"Description† and â€Å"Keywords† tags. These tags describe the contents and key words for the search engine. <HTML> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <meta http-equiv="Copyright" content="1998, 1999 MotorCities.com, Inc."> <meta name="Resource-type" content="Document"> <meta name="ObjectType" content="Journal"> <meta name="Author" content="Car Pictures .com Webmaster"> <meta name="Rating" content="General"> <meta name="Distribution" content="Global"> <meta name="Description" content="Gallery of car pictures, car videos, car sounds, car photos, car photographs, automobile pictures, automobile videos, automobile sounds, automobile photos, automobile photographs, auto pictures, auto videos, auto sounds, auto photos, auto photographs, pictures of cars."> <meta name="Keywords" content="Gallery of car pictures, car videos, car sounds, car photos, car photographs, automobile pictures, automobile videos, automobile sounds, automobile photos, automobile photographs, auto pictures, auto videos, auto sounds, auto photos, auto photographs, pictures of cars, Porsche pictures, Ferrari pictures, Lamborghini pictures."> <title> Car Pictures .com -- Gallery of pictures (photos or photographs), video, sounds, wallpaper and specifications of all cars, motorcycles and all vehicles. </title> </HEAD> Several excellent sources that detail the use of the Meta Tag are: The Web Developer’s Virtual Library (http://wdvl.com/Authoring/HTML/Head/Meta/ ) Search Engine Watch (http://searchenginewatch.internet.com/webmasters/meta.html) Internet Marketing Chapter 13: Driving Traffic to Your Site: Understanding and Using Search Engines for Search and Site Optimization. Adding Keywords Using the META Tag Maximum -800 characters. Adding keywords simply requires editing the HTML code and adding the meta tags, as in the following example. The top of a web page source code on your site might look like: <HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>ACME Corporation Devices Information</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY> <H1>ACME Corporation Innovative Opening Devices Information</H1> Create a META tag with the following information: <META name="keywords" content="brochure"> TO ADD ADDITIONAL KEYWORDS <META name="keywords" content="brochure, widget, wholesale"> The top of your HTML document would then look like: <HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>ACME Corporation Devices Information</TITLE> <META name="keywords" content="brochure, widget, wholesale"> </HEAD> <BODY> <H1>ACME Corporation Innovative Devices Information</H1> QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS ABOUT META KEYWORDS Q) META keywords tag - should I use UPPERCASE, lowercase or a mixture, commas or spaces? A) Use lowercase, separated by commas, with a space after the comma.

Have North Americans Stopped Caring Essay

In Chapter 7 of Interest-Group Participation in American Democracy, an online source, an interest group is defined as an â€Å"organization or association of people with common interests that engages in politics on behalf of its members† (190). Since people cannot directly participate in governance, they associate themselves with groups that aim to change the political landscape. According to the same source, the rights of individuals to form such groups are protected by the Constitution (213). In spite of this, there seems to be a decline in participation of these groups. This paper aims to explain why. One of the factors that caused the said decline may be attributed to the dominance of the elite in political campaigns. In the past, citizens who share a common goal volunteered their time and energy to these endeavors. Today, campaigns require mammoth financial backing up to fund campaign activities opening doors for big corporations and the wealthy to make hefty contributions. The bottom line in the political industry is this: financial capital – the wherewithal for mass marketing – has steadily replaced social capital – that is, grassroots citizen networks – as the coin of the realm. † (Putnam, 39 – 40) An increase in cynicism is another cause for the decline in participation. According to Morris P. Firiona, people feel that only the â€Å"extreme voices† are heard leaving the â€Å"moderate middle† a couple of steps behind (395-425). Firiona also asserts that the transparency in the workings of the government showed people how messy policy making can get (Firiona, 395-425). However, it is important to note that the disillusionment is not completely depleting participation. Interest-Group Participation in American Democracy argues that the advancements in technology allow individuals to get involved without needing to go out to the streets to proclaim what they believe is right (204). With just a few clicks on the internet, current events unfold before the readers eyes. Discussion and blog sites are avenues which people take to express their thoughts and sentiments. These non-traditional means of participation are more convenient and less energy-consuming. These are popular especially among the youth who, according to Warren E. Miller and J. Merrill Shanks, have grown apathetic compared to previous generations (69). The dominance of certain groups such as the elite and the extremists, the increase in distrust in the government, and the waning of youth involvement are only some of the reasons why there is a decline in participation. This does not mean that citizens have stopped caring. As mentioned in the previous paragraph, non-traditional means of contribution is gaining momentum in this modern age.

Modern Political Theory

Freedom, one of our most common and powerful concepts, is used (and misused) with extraordinarily little appreciation of its significance. Not only is freedom poorly understood, but we are falsely confident that we do understand it (Dudley 24). One of my main goals in this paper, therefore, is to explain it. In order to do so, freedom ought to be understood or conceived by comparison.In preparation for these interpretations, the paper will consider very briefly the two most important conceptions of freedom on which Mill and Nietzsche build. The first and less comprehensive of these two is that of liberalism. The second, which is more comprehensive than that of liberalism, is that of Nietzsche. The purpose of this paper is to consider the relationships between the conceptions of freedom developed by Mill and Nietzsche. These conceptions, while undeniably different, are complementary.Nietzsche believed that freedom is one of the fundamental problems. But not freedom understood in conve ntional or political terms. Freedom for Nietzsche depends upon both moral virtue and intellectual virtue, yet it is neither exercised in or nor achieved through political life. That does not mean that Nietzsche's account of freedom is devoid of political implications. To the contrary, his peculiar identification of freedom with philosophy and mastery reflects a rank order of values in which political liberty and legal slavery are essentially indistinguishable—both, from the perspective afforded by the commanding heights above political life where the free spirit dwells, are equally forms of unfreedom.Addressing a â€Å"serious word† to â€Å"the most serious,† Nietzsche connects freedom to devotion to the truth (BGE 25). While he warns â€Å"philosophers and friends of knowledge† about the temptation to martyrdom involved in â€Å"suffering ‘for the truth's sake'!† (BGE 25), he nevertheless indicates that the truth is worth seeking for those fit for freedom and solitude. Whereas scientific knowledge serves life by fostering ignorance, philosophical knowledge seems to undermine life by estranging the knower from society.Whereas the scientist, a lover of ignorance from Nietzsche's perspective, is destined to a pleasant unfreedom, the philosopher, in Nietzsche's sense of the term a lover of truth, achieves an excruciating freedom through fidelity to his vocation. This fidelity consists in a measured skepticism directed toward all doctrines, accompanied by a prudent withdrawal from political life.The free spirit's knowledge and freedom are not the highest of which human beings are capable. The highest awaits the advent of a â€Å"new species of philosophers† (BGE 42-44). These future philosophers are especially characterized by the risky experiments they undertake. They probably will be â€Å"friends of ‘truth†Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ and very likely will love â€Å"their truths,† but, Nietzsche insists, they â₠¬Å"will certainly not be dogmatists† (BGE 43).By this he does not mean that the new philosophers will lack beliefs they hold to be true, but rather that they will refrain from insisting that what is true for them must be â€Å"a truth for everyman.† Yet so far from reflecting a leveling doctrine that celebrates the equality or dignity of all opinions, Nietzsche's understanding of dogmatism is rooted in the deeply aristocratic view that only the â€Å"higher type of man† is fit to hear, and to live in accordance with, the highest insights (BGE 30).While the free spirit remains the new philosopher's herald and precursor (BGE 44), there is a chasm on the opposite side between the freedom of the free spirit (der Freie Geist) and the freedom of the â€Å"falsely so-called ‘free spirits,†Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ that is, the freethinkers (Freidenker), the democrats, all the â€Å"goodly advocates of ‘modern ideas†Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ (BGE 44). Free thinkers reveal their un freedom in their â€Å"basic inclination† to see aristocratic political life as the root of all suffering and misfortune.Nietzsche discovers in the democratic interpretation of political life the same offense against truth that he claims Plato perpetrated, for it is â€Å"a way of standing truth happily up on her head† (BGE 44). Democratic freethinkers, wishing to spread material prosperity, guarantee comfort and security, establish universal equality, and most characteristically abolish suffering, are blind to the rank order of human types and hence enslaved to ignorance.What is so terrible from Nietzsche's point of view in the promotion of democratic, bourgeois notions of the good is not simply that the democratic interpretation of man is false but rather that, like Socrates' theoretical interpretation of reality and Christianity's religious interpretation of the world, the democratic interpretation cripples those of high rank by poisoning the air that free spirits b reathe.The free spirit is educated and elevated not by material prosperity but by deprivation, not by comfort and security but by fear and isolation, not by equality but by slavery, not by the abolition of suffering but by the release of â€Å"everything evil, terrible, tyrannical in man,† and not by happiness but by â€Å"malice against the lures of dependence that lie hidden in honors, or money, or offices, or enthusiasms of the senses† (BGE 44). Nietzsche knows of no interest that supersedes, recognizes no right that limits, and sees no good beside that of the higher type. This is not a matter of calculation but of principle.Embracing as his own the struggle to return truth to her feet and restore her dignity, Nietzsche defends truth's honor by challenging not only Plato but Christianity, the form in which Platonism has conquered Europe. The struggle against Christianity has opened up tremendous new possibilities; it â€Å"has created in Europe a magnificent tensio n of the spirit, the like of which has never yet existed on earth.†Note that Nietzsche not only makes philosophy, and its political reflection in Christianity, responsible for the worst, most durable, and most dangerous of all errors, but, in proclaiming that â€Å"with so tense a bow we can now shoot for the most distant goals,† he also finds in philosophy the source of his highest hope (Dudley 31). That most distant goal, which he speculates is only now coming into view for â€Å"good Europeans, and free, very free spirits,† among whom he classes himself, is a philosophy of the future.Platonism and Christianity granted human beings a sense of security as individuals. Christianity did this by promising a beatific afterlife as a reward for the proper conduct of this life. Platonism gave the individual the hope that individual limitations could be transcended by rational insight which, when fully developed, could transport the soul to an experience of the ultimate , atemporal reality. Christianity and Platonism offered the individual a sense that the activities of this life were meaningful by referring them to unchanging realities outside life.The Platonic-Christian interpretation of individual existence is, in a sense, already dead, according to Nietzsche. The members of the modern world do not really experience their lives as meaningful as a consequence of these traditions' extraworldly visions. But modern human beings who have come to believe that this world is the only world, this life the only life the individual will ever experience, are likely to be disturbed by this insight. Our Platonic and Christian background has given us the sense that our activities have meaning, yet the ground of that meaning no longer seems available.Nietzsche's version of this critique of liberalism is implicit in his discussions of decadence. For the decadent subject, it turns out, is precisely one whose will fails to be self-determining. Free willing is rese rved for, and is the determining characteristic of, the noble subject, with whom Nietzsche contrasts the decadent. Nietzsche's discussions of decadence and nobility can thus fruitfully be understood as addressing the question of the necessary requirements of a free will.Nietzsche also recognizes, like Mill, that even the most freely willing subject remains incompletely free, and that an adequate account of freedom must therefore discuss the activities that provide a liberation that willing cannot. Nietzsche's account of the limitations of willing is implicit in his critique of nobility. The noble subject manages to will freely, but nonetheless remains externally determined and so incompletely free.This incomplete freedom of nobility is overcome only by those individuals and communities able to develop the stance that Nietzsche characterizes as tragic. Nietzsche understands the development of the tragic stance required by freedom to depend upon philosophy. He thus agrees with Mill th at freedom is not only treated in philosophical works, but also produced through philosophical practice.Mill’s discussion of liberty focuses on when society may impose constraints on individuals, rather than on the nature of constraint. Accordingly, his discussion generally refers to intentional, rather than unintentional, constraints on individuals. Nevertheless, Mill believes that customs and traditions are constraining. To the extent that these are the unintentional results of human life, he is committed to the view that some constraint is unintentional.Mill has argued that the social tyranny of others which takes place in moral coercion, custom, and tradition is one of the most important constraints that people face today (Mill 1956: 7). For instance, if people express their views that homosexuality or polygamy ought to be allowed, but their neighbors and employers strongly disagree (even though the government does not), they may be constrained in their actions and lifest yles. Finding work may be more difficult; access to housing may be blocked. They may feel themselves compelled to move to other cities or countries to live. Thus, though early liberalism placed great emphasis on the limitation of freedom by physical constraint, it is false to maintain that it has only done this.Mill is simply much more sensitive than Nietzsche in recognizing that social pressure may be â€Å"more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself† (Mill 1956: 7). Further, Mill’s view has been dominant amongst liberals. Morality, custom, tradition, and the law are viewed as constraints on people’s freedom. One is less free to the extent that he or she is constrained by any of these institutions.The implication of the preceding expanded concept of constraint is that any n arrow or restricted model of liberal freedom can no longer be defended. Once the Pandora’s box of constraints is opened, the thrust and momentum of this view is not to be detoured. The burden will always be placed on the person who claims not to see an obstacle by those who claim to see the obstacle and claim that their activity is hindered, retarded, or impeded by that obstacle.Some liberals have tried to stem this tide, but they fight an overwhelming flood. The thrust of liberalism is such that if an obstacle can be humanly removed, then it will be seen as inhibiting someone’s freedom if it is not removed. The upshot is an enormous extension in the number and kinds of constraints to which people are thought to be subject. The implications of this are of the first importance.There remains one essential aspect of the liberal determination of when constraints may be imposed on other individuals. How directly or indirectly may individuals impose injuries on themselves or others without being legitimately subject to restraint in the name of freedom? To decide this issue is part and parcel of the liberal attempt to define a sphere of privacy as opposed to publicity – a private realm of freedom, in which people may act, think, and relate to consenting others without constraints imposed by others. In this private realm, and only in this private realm, may that ideal of complete freedom be most fully realized.Mill refers to such a sphere of personal, private life, where society may not legitimately interfere as â€Å"the appropriate region of human liberty† (Mill 1956: 16). In this realm, Mill says, â€Å"in the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his body and mind, the individual is sovereign† (Mill 1956: 13).Nietzsche's philosophical practice, however, is quite obviously not the same as Mill's. Mill’s philosophy is always systematic philosophy. Nietzschean philosop hy is resolutely unsystematic. And thus, although Mill and Nietzsche agree that philosophy has a role to play in our liberation, the liberating roles that they envision for philosophy, and consequently their conceptions of freedom itself, are significantly different.Works CitedBeyond Good and Evil, trans. Walter Kaufmann, New York: Vintage, 1966.Dudley, Will. Hegel, Nietzsche, and Philosophy: Thinking Freedom. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 2002.Mill, J. S. On Liberty, Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc, 1956.