Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Matthew Hale and the Creativity Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Matthew Hale and the Creativity - Research Paper Example Hale was only 2 years old when the Church of the Creator was founded. He was the youngest among 4 siblings composed of boys. At the early age of 11, Hale professed that â€Å"white people had been responsible for the vast majority of progress in the world, and as such, the idea that the races were 'equal' to one another seemed incorrect.† This was the year when the future Pontifex Maximus or highest priest of Creativity had his racial awakening. During his collegiate life, Hale wrote editorials for the university paper and there he supported and justified opinions towards White Separatism. The 80s was the era that should have started embracing equality and began to eliminate racism yet there are still people who did the opposite and further discriminate others who are not white.3 Klassen stated in his book that â€Å"the black man is without a doubt the most dangerous creature on the face of the earth to the further survival of the White Race. He is a danger that rivals that of the Jew himself, although for different reasons. Granted, the Jew is by far the greater overall danger in manipulating and destroying the White Race.†4 The founder of the WCOTC is one of the people who influenced the ideologies of Hale during his collegiate days. ... There were events that followed that Hitler and his other comrades did not approved of. Hitler and the others thought of the acts as a betrayal from the moralities that they were fighting for. This was the beginning of Hitler’s hatred towards other people who have opposing opinions towards his perspectives.5 Klassen considered Germany, Adolf Hitler and National Socialism as fighters for salvation. It was not just Hale who has been influenced by Hitler but also the founder of the WCOTC himself. It would not be a surprise as to why the Creativity Movement are full of anger and hatred not just to those who are not White but also to those who are White but Jews. Klassen even glorified Hitler’s inhumane actions by stating the following, â€Å"Well, he has done a great deal. For one thing he has bought us time. As we stated previously, undoubtedly by the end of the 1930's all of Europe and most likely the whole world would be lying crushed and gutted, cowering at the feet of the diabolical Jewish monster — communist Marxism. Adolf Hitler did not die in vain. He died for his beloved White Race, including you and me. He bought us at least 50 years of time in which we could rally ourselves and make a great Final effort to victoriously crush the monster that is now still clutching at our throat.†6 There are a couple of things that Klassen and Hitler believed in that complemented the thoughts and viewpoints of Hale; this would be hate and racism. Another thing in common between the 2 people who influenced Hale was both Klassen and Hitler committed suicide.7 8 When Hale was proclaimed as the Pontifex Maximus in 1996, he became the most prominent and most effective leader of the WCOTC. The World

English Only Policy in the Work Place Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

English Only Policy in the Work Place - Essay Example The recommendation mandating the exclusive use of English at all times in the workplace should not be made into a policy. The policy recommending for the exclusive use of the English language should not be adopted in the organization. Adoption of this policy will at a huge extent bring forth more negative outcomes than positive ones. This is considering the whole organization at large and the employees in more specific terms. Whereby an employee fails to perform their duties or tasks effectively due to their failure to speak English in the workplace or the case where they use a foreign language or an accent that affects their output. There in no problem whatsoever with employees speaking their native language in the work place as long as their conversation is not disturbing others who are unfamiliar with the language. Moreover, as long as the language is not offensive it should not be abolished. It is common place to find people from the same ethnic background speaking their native tongue in the work place or another setting where the rest are unfamiliar with it (Fink et. al.1996)iii. ... There in no problem whatsoever with employees speaking their native language in the work place as long as their conversation is not disturbing others who are unfamiliar with the language. Moreover, as long as the language is not offensive it should not be abolished. It is common place to find people from the same ethnic background speaking their native tongue in the work place or another setting where the rest are unfamiliar with it (Fink et. al.1996)iii. With this in mind if a policy of this nature is introduced the ones affected shall feel targeted and this shall create a tension-like environment which is by large against Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It will be taken to be a punishment to those speaking (in most cases) a foreign language. This phenomenon of having people from divergent origins should be taken as a source of a rich culture and in the organization that should be natured rather than abolished. Divergence in many instances f natural existence is a source of strength and not a weakness. The organisation should be quite keen in coming up with the 'English only policy'. Impacts of policy The organization to a great extent will stand to lose in case this policy is adopted. This is as a result of the ones who are affected feeling neglected and taking the management to be inconsiderate. It also makes them feel to be the minority especially where the language in question is foreign. With this kind of resentment the workers' productivity shall surely fall. On the other hand the English speaking workers will tend to take their bilingual coworkers as inferiors; a situation that will spark tensions based on ethnicity. The supervisors will start facing problems with uncooperative attitude from the bilingual workers as well as absenteeism which

Monday, October 28, 2019

Feasts of Israel - Redemption Celebrated Essay Example for Free

Feasts of Israel Redemption Celebrated Essay The Feasts of Israel written by Victor Buksbazen describes the reverent and celebratory tenets, which encompass the Jewish faith. A most interesting aspect of this book is how Buksbazen compares and contrasts Jewish feasts with Christianity. Not only does The Feasts of Israel describe the significance of each feast, it also proves the divinity of Christ in a plain comprehensible way. For example, in his introduction Mr. Bukzaben explains the logistical relationship between Christianity and Judaism in one sentence. When he said, Biblical Christianity is not a continuation of Judaism, but it is the logical outgrowth and consequence of adherence to Moses and the prophets (ii). Bukzabens first example of Christian / Judean reconciliation is apparent in his discussion of the Passover. Of course, many of us know what this feast symbolizes for the Jewish people, but how many of us realize the Christian aspect of it? To avoid the death angel, we know that the Israelites were told to prepare a lamb sacrifice, and then paint the doorposts and lentils with the blood. Those who followed this instruction are spared, their faith is proven, and they are worthy to be taken out from under the bondage of Egypt. Similarly, Christians are released from bondage and delivered to glory through faith in Jesus Christ the Lord. And, as the Lamb of God, Jesus blood pays the debt for those who believe in Him. Moreover, Bukzaben says, The deliverance of Israel from Egypt is the central point in Jewish history and worship, even as Calvary is the central point in the Christian faith (2). I found the Feast of Weeks especially interesting in how it is identified by differing titles and too, how each title was derived. Until reading this book, I didnt realize the significance of the Greek word Pentecost or that it meant fifty. According to Bukzaben, It was so designated because it was observed on the fiftieth day after the Passover Sabbath (14). Again, Bukzaben makes clear the relationship of Judaism and Christianity with this feast. This feast is also called Pentecost, because it was observed fifty days after the Passover. As Christians, we too celebrate the great feast of Pentecost, although, we can celebrate ours every Sunday. Pentecost for Christians began 50 days after Jesus resurrection, when God stamped his Commandments in the heart of each Christian with the power of His Holy Spirit. Jewish Pentecost celebrates the reception of Gods Law, and Christian Pentecost celebrates the provisional gift of knowing Jesus Christ. In short, Pentecost is the official beginning of the Church of Christ (Act.2, Joel 2:28-32, Jer.31: 33-34, Heb.8: 8-12). Therefore, as Christians, we too celebrate Pentecost; as believers we are baptized in the Holy Spirit, and it can speak to us directlyHe resides within us. Buksbazen makes further discovery of Pentecost in regard to the historical bond between Judaism and Christianity. With Ruth, he points out the ancestral connection she has to our Lord Jesus Christ. Moreover, Buksbazen explains just how reverently the Jewish people consider Ruth to be. On the Day of Pentecost the Jews even until the present day read the book of Ruth (18). Likewise, Christians love Ruth, her example of kindness, compassion, and love is a model of how we hope to fashion our lives. This mutual aspect is yet another binding feature between Jews and Christians. According to Buksbazen, They look to the day when Jew and Gentile shall worship God together through the kinsman Redeemer, Christ, typified by Boaz, the friend and husband of Ruth, his Gentile bride (19). As Christians we maintain hope that someday all of Gods children will come together as one to worship Him, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The book of Ruth and the example she shows to both Jews and Christians gives us this hope. Probably the most familiar of all Jewish feasts is Hanukkah. I have been aware of this Jewish feast for most of my life; however, not until reading Mr. Buksbazens commentary did I realize the richness of this tradition. The story behind this feast fascinated me, and praise God that the Israelites overcame their Greek attackers. For example, the candelabrum burning continuously for eight days, which may be regarded as a miracle, evidences God. More importantly, had the Greeks been allowed to defeat the Israelites, there wouldnt have been Jewish Apostles to bring the good news of our Messiah to us, the Gentiles. For that matter, we might not even have a New Testament or Christianity in the purest biblical sense of the word. Sure, the blessed traditions of Hanukkah and Christmas brighten our winter, but the significance is much greater than that. For me this feast represents the difference between life and death. Appropriately, Mr. Baksbazen titles the final topic with a discussion of Sabbath The Queen. For Christians, and Jews alike the Sabbath is probably the most comprehensive of all feasts. According to Buksbazen, The Sabbath is exclusively Israels heritage, given under the law to the people of the law (79). Moreover, a weekly Sabbath of worship is vital for both religions. Not only is Sabbath necessary for spiritual renewal, but it also lends to the survival of each respective religion. Mr. Baksbazen makes clear the distinctions between the Jewish Sabbath and the Lords day. For Jews the Sabbath is a memorial of their Exodus from Egypt. In general, Baksbazen explains that for Jews the observance of the Sabbath is law, but the Genesis story (Genesis 2:1-3) and the fourth commandment by God Himself (Exodus 20:11) show us that the Sabbath is a memorial to creation. Baksbazen summarizes the difference between these two religious aspects nicely. He states, The Sabbath is the crowning day of the week which rewards man for his toil. The Lords Day emphasizes what God has done for man through His only begotten Son (92). This means, if I accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior I most certainly would worship Him. However, just like accepting Him, worshiping Him is a choice I make voluntarily. In addressing the first Christians and the Sabbath question, Mr. Bukszaben explains what must have been heart wrenching for Jewish Christians back then. For that matter this situation exists even today. I see two tragedys occurring here, a split amongst one people, and a separation from God for non-believers. This is implied in Bukszabens introductory sentence, At first Jewish believers apparently continued for some time in the voluntary observance of the Sabbath, not because they felt their salvation rested upon this, but rather out of regard for the sensibilities of their own people (95). This practice during the early days of the church is evidenced in scripture (Acts 2:1; 3:1; 15:5; 21:20). I couldnt help but imagine the pain and sorrow new Jewish Christians must feel. Those who know the truth are torn between a steeped history of dogmatic law and worship toward the one true Lord. Mr. Bakszaben properly explains this situation, but it should be noted that Jesus himself did not break the Jewish Sabbath. Jesus activity may have broken Pharisaic rules, but not the law of God. Moreover, since Jesus was born under the law He lived under the old covenant requirements (Gal 4:4; Heb 4:15). In summary, the feasts are a representation of things to come, and Victor Buksbazens scriptural references provide the proof. I was enlightened, even surprised to see how the most important events in Jewish and Christian history commingled, and what the corresponding feast was originally a sign of. In addition, the way Buksbazen treated each topic (feast) with respect and contrasting each aspect with truth was refreshing. What I take away from this assignment is newfound knowledge and a better understanding of how Jewish people think. Finally, Buksbazen shows by example how we should be compassionate and loving toward nonbelievers. He treats each Jewish tradition with respect, but makes clear the true meaning of Salvation. We see this in the last few sentences of his book where Buksbazen writes, The Law of Moses has led us by the hand to Christ. Only one who has lived under the Law and has come to know the liberating power of grace, may sing (102).

A Midsummer Nights Dream Essay Example for Free

A Midsummer Nights Dream Essay Genre is a term that is used to classify or describe a type or form of literature. While this sounds like a simple concept, it in actuality is a very complicated classing system. The reason for the complication is that literature does not always follow the typical characteristics set up by that type of genre. For example, one of the characteristics in the genre of tragedy is that there is a tragic hero, who is in a position of power. In the classical tragedy this is true, as can be seen in Sophocles Oedipus Rex because the tragic hero is Oedipus, who is the king of Thebes. In the Renaissance tragedy this is not always the case such as in Shakespeares Hamlet, the tragic hero is only a prince. Where this characteristic is completely abandoned is in the modern tragedy by Eugene ONeill, Desire Under the Elms, where the character playing the tragic hero is a farmer and it is difficult to determine which character is the true tragic hero. Yet all these plays are tragedies, despite their variations . Another aspect of genre that makes the concept difficult to define is that there are parts of plays that fall into other genres. An example of this is seen in parts of Desire Under the Elms, such as the party scene at the Cabot home. Although this play is a tragedy, in this scene there is comedy occurring in the witty remarks from the partiers and in the silly jig Ephraim dances. As one can see the simple concept of genre poses many complications when utilized to define a piece of literature. Genre is divided into two categories, which are representational genre and narrative genre. The first category, representational genre, consist of the number and types of voices in the piece of literature. (handout) There are three types of representative genre. The first type is Narrator, which is when one speaker talks directly to the audience and that speaker is responsible for telling the whole story to the audience without the aid of other opinions or sides to the story of the other persons involved. An example of this is when a comedian is doing stand up. The audience gets to hear the funny story of lets say when the comedian learned to ride a bike and his father let go to soon and the comedian fell etc. The comedian has the responsibility of telling this story to the audience, but the audience only hears the comedians side of the story. Another type of representative genre is Dialogue, which consist of more than one character speaking with each other. In this form, the audience acts as a third party and only gets to overhear and not have someone speak to them directly. An example of this is in Desire Under the Elms because the characters just converse with each other. The final type is Narrator plus Dialogue and this is a combination of the first two. The characters speak to each other but there is one character who acts a narrator and tells the audience what is going on. This is exemplified in a new sitcom called Titus. In this sitcom the characters talk to each other, but the main character Titus has side conversations with the audience where he reflects on the events. The other category of genre is the narrative genre in which the type of plot is described. These can be combined as is shown in my earlier example of comedy showing up in tragedy or a romantic comedy. The categories of the narrative genre are tragedy, comedy, romance, and satire. The first category tragedy starts with a problem that the tragic hero must solve, be it revenge taken or the truth discovered, and ends with the resolution to the problem where the tragic hero is banished or killed. The purest example of a tragedy is Oedipus Rex because there is a problem that the hero must solve and he is banished in order to solve the problem. Another type is the comedy in which there is a less significant problem that the characters try to solve and the story ends happily with the characters uniting in a marriage or party. A Midsummer Nights Dream exemplifies this because there is a plague due to the fighting of Titania and Oberon and there are young lovers trying to overcome the attempt at separating each other. The characters try to solve these problems and at the end there is a marriage and a party. Romance is another form of narrative genre in which the all begins well the characters are separated but the solution is they reunite and live happily ever after. This can be seen in the young lovers mentioned in A Midsummer Nights Dream. Finally, Satire is a category in which an existing story is spoofed. An example of this is the movie Naked Gun which satirizes the old cop movies. In comparison to other types of literature courses, the study of genre has advantages in that it helps to classify literature in ways that make it easy to see the typical characteristics. This can aid in comparing different works of literature and provide a starting point in analyzing literature. The problem with studying genre is that because it is so vague and that the works do not purely follow the guidelines in the genres it is difficult to define genre. Also, it is difficult to define the works using genre because there are so many different types of genre that different parts of the works can fall into. Teahers Note: Youre welcome to your opinion, but this part would certainly be stronger with an upswing at the end, maybe reviewing some of the insights gained by what youve written here.

Saturday, October 26, 2019

Lorraine Hansberrys A Raisin In The Sun Essay -- essays research pap

I really enjoyed the movie A Raisin in the Sun. It follows a black family's struggle to reach their long anticipated dreams. These dreams, and the struggles necessary to attain them, is one of the main focuses of the movie. The movie began with a husband, Walter, and wife, Ruth, fighting over Walter's dream to make it in the business world by using an insurance check as a down payment on opening a liquor store. He believes that if someone in the family would just listen to him and put forth their trust, his dreams would become a success. This episode illustrates a major conflict throughout the story. As Walter dreams bigger and bigger he seems to leave the â€Å"smaller†' things, such as his family behind. This movement away from the family is against the advancement of the values and morals ...

Technology Is The Seed Of Our Destruction :: essays research papers

I agree and disagree with this statement. Technology has become very important in our society recently, and more people are getting involved with it, discovering new technology, and introducing it into society. The big question is whether or not society is ready for all the new techonological advancements. In some cases, the answer is yes. I am quite certain that people can handle TV, computers and radios fairly well. However, some technology would be way too advanced for us, such as a mind-reading room, perhaps? I think with the right knowledge and experience, individual people can handle any new technology that is introduced to them. People in large numbers tend to panic, and not deal with new things very well. It is my opinion that as a crowd of people grows larger, the collective intelligence of the crowd grows smaller. If advanced technology is introduced suddenly to a large number of people, then it will not work. If you introduce it slowly, it might work better. Some tehnology has helped us in many ways, such as: microscopes, electricity, and computers. Other technology has both helped and hindered us, such as the television and the car. Some technology has not helped at all, such as an electric fork or the electric car, the latter being too expensive for any normal person to run. Television is a big thing nowadays, and it has rotted the minds of children and adults alike. However, it has also improved communication, and if viewed in small time slots, it has enhanced some people’s intelligence. Some parents may sit their children in front of the television for hours while they go off somewhere to drink, etc. I don’t think this helps their children’s intelligence, and it eventually distances the children from the parents. For example, if you have children, and a television, what do you think would happen if you removed the TV from the house? The answer is simple: your kids would hate you for it. This is because they have grown accustomed to having the TV there as a distraction, or as entertainment. However, if you had never owned a TV, would your kids miss it? I think that, to a certain extent, technological advancement is a very good thing, because it can enhance and enrich our lives, but when it starts to take over the simple things in life and makes everything instant and electronic, technology can be bad.

Thursday, October 24, 2019

A History of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden :: Essays Papers

A History of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden Growing from its humble beginnings as an ash dump in the late 1800's, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden has come to represent today the very best in urban gardening and horticultural display. The Brooklyn Botanical Garden blooms in the middle of one of the largest cities in the world. Each year more than 750,000 people visit the well-manicured formal and informal gardens that are a testament to nature's vitality amidst urban brick and concrete. More than 12,000 kinds of plants from around the globe are displayed on 52 acres and in the acclaimed Steinhardt Conservatory. There's always something new to see. The Brooklyn Botanic Garden offers a variety of public programs all year long. Tours, concerts, dance performances and symposia are always on the roster, as well as special one-time events that feature elements of the Garden at their peak. Each spring the Brooklyn Botanic Garden celebrates the flowering of the Japanese Cherry Trees with our annual Sakura Matsuri (Cherry Blossom Festi val), and each fall is spiced up with our multicultural Chili Pepper FiestaA few of the "Many Gardens within a Garden" include the Children's Garden, tended each year by about 450 kids, ages 3 through 18; The Cranford Rose Garden, exhibiting more than 5,000 bushes of nearly 1,200 varieties; The Herb Garden, with more than 300 varieties -- "herbing" is apparently taking the country by storm as people rediscover medicinal, culinary, and other uses; and The Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden, a beautiful creation featuring a Viewing Pavilion, Waiting House, Torri, shrines, bridges, stone lanterns, waterfalls, pond, and miniaturized landscape. About half of the BBG's 52 acres is devoted to the Systematic Collections: trees, shrubs, and herbaceous plants arranged to show their evolutionary progression. Visitors will also enjoy the Conifer Collection, Daffodil Hill, Oriental Flowering Cherries, and other special collections. The Steinhardt Conservatory The Steinhardt Conservatory is a $25 million complex holding BBG's extensive indoor collection in realistic environments that simulate a range of global habitats. The Tropical Pavilion, 65 feet high, re-creates a rain forest complete with a waterfall and streams. Flora from the Amazon Basin, African Rain Forest, and tropical eastern Asia thrive here. The Helen Mattin Warm Temperate Pavilion houses plants from central China, the Mediterranean, Australasia, southern Africa, and the western U.

Drama and Theatre Studies structured records

‘Use of space' explored the broad topic of social and professional satisfaction and happiness. In order to highlight the universal implications of our piece, we decided that it was necessary to use diverse characters allowing the audience to identify with aspects of each persona's issues. Initially, we brainstormed several different problems that could affect an individual's happiness in the work place, and came up with the fundamentals for five characters. The original basis of my character came from my own anxieties towards life. During devising we were contemplating university choices and starting to arrange our lives after college. As a group we all felt anxious and many felt a lack of direction. This insecurity we felt towards leaving the secondary education system, led to the creation of Pamela (the character I played. ) After discussing Pamela's initial characteristics, focusing on her feelings of anxiety and confusion we had to decide her plot. Her lack of control and direction led us to create her objective to gain a secure role in the work place to solve her anxieties. After creating the fundamentals of each character we discussed as a group their characterisation. The role of Pamela primarily emerged through a series of role-plays. Firstly, I performed as her character in different situations allowing me to develop her personality. The remaining members contributed as supporting characters in the role play and often suggested ways to present her. I feel that my understanding of Pamela's persona emerged during the staging of her box monologue. Through this monologue we hoped to communicate to the audience Pamela's feelings of anxiety and confusion towards her professional future. As a group we felt the most effective way to portray this was through the use of physical theatre, therefore, the remaining members of the group adopted the role of a maze in which Pamela was metaphorically trapped. During the staging of this sequence I had to deliver my monologue whilst struggling through a figurative maze. As a performer I was sensitive to my characters claustrophobic feelings allowing me to successfully communicate her anxieties to the audience. Throughout the staging of this monologue the remaining group members concentrated on the performing space I was given. Although it was frustrating for me to be contained to a very small performing area, it allowed me to sympathise with my characters feelings of confinement and eventually resulted in a very successful portrayal of Pamela. During devising our characters, we were aware that each individual had to adopt a dream persona in the ‘fantasy' scenes. We hoped to communicate to the audience contrasting characteristics in these persona's, to highlight their desire to escape the frustration they feel towards reality. Whilst creating the character Angela's ‘fantasy' persona we analysed the reality Angela. Angela shows boredom towards her monotonous life. Through her character we hoped to communicate to the audience the necessity of having hobbies and dreams. The fantasy Angela emerged through the improvisation of a Latin American soap opera. We created the vivacious and dramatic character Maria who starkly contrasted Angela. As a group we agreed that the performance of Maria should be melodramatic and exaggerated to further contrast Angela's tedious reality. It was important to introduce a character for Maria to interact with to inject more energy into the scene. Through discussion we settled with a clichi love story and decided to introduce a male character who Maria is having an affair with. It was essential for this scene to maintain intense energy levels to contrast with the previous office scene. Firstly, we researched typical novella characters to influences our roles. I suggested that the group members in this scene (Helia and Payam) should highlight the sexual attraction between the characters. Initially this provoked awkwardness between Payam and Helia; therefore, we felt it was necessary to introduce an activity to make the two more comfortable with each other. We used several team building exercises to make Helia and Payam more physically comfortable with one another; the most successful was the leading the blind exercise. Through this exercise the participants were forced to be more sensitive towards each other, in partners one partner was chosen to lead the other blindly by the tip of the nose. Through constant contact and reliance this was very successful in making Payam and Helia more at ease. Similarly, it helped to distance the novella character to the actor. Through exaggerated physicality and melodramatic acting techniques the actor was dissociated with the character. Costumes successfully contributed to the portrayal of my character in the murder mystery fantasy. I played a stereotypical, stock detective character originally based on the Agatha Christie character Hercule Poirot. Initially I struggled to effectively portray this character because it was such a contrasting role to my reality. Physicality was a very important aspect of this character because of the desired effect we hoped to achieve. We had chosen to use melodrama and clichid anecdotes, therefore, it was important that the audience drew parallels between my character and Poirot for comedic effect. Through further independent research I discovered Poirot's defining feature was a French trench coat, and I decided to rehearse wearing this item. Surprisingly, the trench coat allowed me to connect with Poirot's physicality and personality, through wearing the coat my characterisation improved and allowed me to successfully perform as a response to Poirot. How the group planned for a range of responses from the audience. Initially we intended to present a serious production highlighting the importance of life satisfaction parodied through working life, based in an office. However, during the initial devising stages we decided to introduce fantasy scenes to contrast the monotonous office scenes and highlight the significance of dreams and ambition. As a group we showed interest towards comedic genres and felt that these would juxtapose the natural and static nature of the office scenes. However, although many of our fantasy scenes were intended for humorous effect a few were interpreted by the audience as humorous without intent. Fortunately, we decided to perform a dress rehearsal to a mock audience to gain an understanding of the successful aspects of humour the results were unexpected. Through devising the silent movie fantasy scene, we were expecting humorous results due to the slapstick nature of the comedy, however, we had to take into account the clichi and overexposed format of the silent movie. As a group we discussed the possibility that the audience would not react well to this scene due to the lack of originality. Throughout popular culture for the past fifty years in some opinions this genre has been exhausted, therefore we had to be prepared for an underwhelming reaction towards this particular scene. In order for the humorous response to be successful we decided that the content of our silent movie had to be obviously inspired by original content. As a group we decided that we were not going to aim to be original in this scene but aimed to create a polished and skilful tribute to silent films. It was important for us to consider different attitudes towards comedic genres. In particular silent films and slapstick comedy often generate various opinions. Through discussion we discovered that in our group of five alone there were several different opinions regarding slapstick comedy. Personally, I contributed an annoyance towards the genre explaining that I found it tedious, patronising and often crude. However, contrastingly, Payam presented his enthusiasm towards slapstick comedy and defended his fondness towards slapstick comedians such as Lee Evans and Charlie Chaplin. Therefore we were initially prepared for an audience varied responses to the slapstick moments throughout our piece. This discussion led us to consider our target audience. Due to the content of our play we discussed that it transcended a fixed target audience, any age group could respond to the implications and the messages we were hoping to portray. However, because of the universality of our play we discussed different attitudes towards aspects of the play. Firstly, we evaluated that a younger audience would react better towards the humorous aspects especially ages between 12 and 19, therefore we decided to target the humour to this age group. We initially decided to do this by exaggerating our humorous stereotypes and characters physicality to the extreme. However, during a viewed rehearsal run it became apparent that our characterisations needed to be exaggerated, especially in our silent movie scene. Through discussion we came to the conclusion that older audience members would react well to the stereotypes used in out murder mystery fantasy. In particular the detective stereotype took inspiration from the fictional character Poirot. Generationally, we were aware that a younger audience member would be alienated by the introduction of this stock character because they would not be able to identify with the original. The characterisation of the detective also played a large reliance on the audience members, creating a pantomime like effect. Whilst playing the detective character I often made eye contact with the audience and projected jokes to them, therefore their reactions were very important at these stages. We used lighting to gain more audience reaction during this scene by up lighting the audience subtly allowing the performers to see their reactions and in turn play off their reactions to the humour. During the novella fantasy scene, melodrama was employed. An argument between Carlos and Maria the Latin American characters led to Maria slapping Carlos around the face. This prompted a shocked reaction amongst the audience because they were not expecting it. Difficult reactions from the audience- racist generalising Latin American, stereotyping French maids, stereotyping in general we had to be sensitive towards the audience whilst approaching these scenes. Explore the impact of social, cultural and/or historical conditions on your devised piece. – Vicki Marks. Our devised piece ‘Use of Space' is socially and culturally influenced by traditional conventions of popular culture. Foremost, we decided to exploit the familiarity of these conventions to highlight social perils. Most poignantly we decided to highlight the implications of a female in the workplace and comment on the fact that women still earn substantially less from their employment than men. We chose to emphasize this by going against traditional clichis. Primarily, the character of Nicky symbolised an ambitious business women hoping to succeed in the workplace. To highlight her characters struggle to be successful we altered the traditional female clichi. We felt that typical stereotypes of women came from medieval genres; furthermore the clichid format was a damsel in distress being rescued by her knight in shining armour. For this social comment to be accessible to the audience we simply chose to invert the roles of the typical damsel in distress and knight in shining armour. This resulted in highlighting the fact that women are capable of metaphorically ‘rescuing' themselves, in turn reaching success without help, showing the capability of women and hopefully promoting sexual equality in the workplace. Additionally, through our research into the presentation of women in conventional medieval drama, we learnt the historical relevance of female roles. In a traditional damsel in distress story women are patronised and demeaned. To emphasise the inequality between the sexes we chose to use contrasting levels. For example we chose to place the damsel on higher levels than the knight; this allowed the damsel to take a more commanding role. However, throughout we made constant references to the traditional format through humour, by showing the characters awareness of the reversed roles. I feel that this was very effective because we were culturally aware that a modern day audience would be aware of the clichi allowing it to become humorous in itself. Whilst devising another characters fantasies we settled on the concept of a traditional Latin American soap opera. We chose to use this format to contrast the tedious nature of the characters work life. This idea initially was influenced by the popular television series ‘Ugly Betty' showing clips of traditional Latin American soap opera's or novellas. This genre was particularly useful because of the melodramatic acting techniques used, to give this scene authenticity we chose to have the characters speak a few words or phrases in Spanish and maintained a Spanish accent throughout. Surprisingly, the use of accents and clichid Spanish phrases created a comedic effect, the audience reacted well to this humour. To further the humorous effect we exaggerated the Spanish personalities getting inspiration from the Mexican cartoon character ‘Speedy Gonzales' which allegedly depicts a stereotypical Mexican. Through popular culture we were aware of many of the love clichis also apparent through this scene, in particular the over poetic declaration of love using the analogy of the ‘fake red rose. ‘ Initially, we wanted to explore the format of a silent film in order to highlight the importance of communication, but were anxious to use such a challenging convention on stage and were worried that the audience would become confused. However through research we were able to adopt this style very successfully. Silent movies were made before technical advances allowed an audience to view a film with both images and sound. We wanted to make our silent scene as authentic as possible therefore through our research into silent movies we noticed the projection speed and decided to significantly slow the scene down; some scenes were intentionally slowed down further in order to accelerate the action, particularly in the case of the slapstick moments. One of the main messages of our production was the importance of job satisfaction. There have been many recent surveys and articles surrounding job prospects and the amount of people dissatisfied in their current job placements. We therefore decided to show a group of characters that want to break free from the confinements of an unsatisfying job to highlight the importance of passion and dreams. We feel as young adults embarking on our working lives and starting to make important decisions that will shape our futures, it is very relevant that we have shown our anxieties towards working life. Work related stress is also socially rife especially in western culture therefore; through one of our characters we showed the importance of maintaining hobbies outside of a job to hopefully indicate that money is not the most important thing. Use of Space is an escapist piece; the fantasies represent each character hoping to escape the constraints of their tedious, impassionate lives. Dream worlds are a commonly used plot device in fictional works, most notably in science fiction and fantasy fiction. The use of a dream world creates a situation whereby a character (or group of characters) is placed in a marvelous and unpredictable environment and must overcome several personal problems to leave it. The dream world also commonly serves to teach some moral or religious lessons to the character experiencing it a lesson that the other characters will be unaware of, but one that will influence decisions made regarding them. When the character is reintroduced into the real world (usually when they wake up), the question arises as to what exactly constitutes reality due to the vivid recollection and experiences of the dream world. How acting techniques or design elements and the use of dramatic form were consciously employed to achieve intended effect. The dramatic form of ‘use of space' was inspired by abstract theatre. Our devised piece does not follow a typical chronological time sequence; it has a warped sense of time due to our introduction of ‘fantasy' scenes. Dreams allow the repressed parts of the mind to be satisfied through fantasy and let the mind express things that would normally be suppressed in the waking world. Dreams may also offer a view at how future events might proceed; this is similar to running future events through the mind, for instance a work presentation or a job interview. As a group we identified dreams as an interaction between the unconscious and the conscious. Therefore we wanted to highlight the contrast between reality and fantasy. To begin with we discussed using contrasting lighting effects to show an obvious transaction between reality and fantasy. To express the abstract, fantasy scenes we felt the audience would react well to pink colour fill lighting. This was successful because, the unnatural pink lighting allowed the audience to be aware of the abstract format of the scene. We also relied on the audience's familiarity with clichi dream scenes shown in popular culture. Dream worlds are a commonly used plot device in fictional works, most notably in science fiction and fantasy fiction. Lighting is often used similarly when representing a dream, often flashing lighting is used and mists to show the audience the unreality. As a group we took this into account and decided to use soft lighting throughout the ‘fantasy' scenes by using a flood effect to fill the whole stage. Flash lighting was also used subtly during the transaction from a reality scene to a fantasy scene. We decided as a group to only use subtle flash lighting during the transition because we did not want to reproduce the clichi formats of a dream sequence, we felt that this would undermine the intended serious messages we were trying to relay to the audience. Firstly each fantasy scene is triggered by an action and a simple freeze frame to link the office reality to the dreams. This use of gestus was an acting technique developed by Bertolt Brecht which reflects the characters emotional conflict through a brief frozen action. Gestus was employed during the transaction from my characters monologue to her fantasy scene. As a group we discussed our desired effect of the gestus and decided to show an obvious link between the character's emotional conflict and the freeze frame, for the audience's accessibility. We therefore decided to each come up with a simple freeze frame highlighting the principal emotions of my character, due to the lack of direction my character was feeling we chose to physically interpret the emotion confusion. Coincidentally, each member of the group similarly replicated a curled up freeze frame with their hands clasping their heads. As a group we decided that this composition showed the audience the characters basic feelings of confusion. Sound plays a big part in our production. Our opening scene begins with a metronome to highlight the artificial nature of the office scene and the rhythm of a monotonous life. We decided to open with a metronome to cause a feeling of anticipation through the audience; the ticking rhythm exaggerates and builds tension therefore immediately engaging with the audience before the action begins. The metronome rhythm also acted as a beat to keep our opening routine in time. The beat and the routine showed the audience the typical rhythm of an unsatisfying job. Due to the intimacy of our staged environment we decided not to use microphones because we wanted the sound to be raw and natural even in the fantasy scenes to accentuate the fine line between dreams and reality. This also made the audience feel close to the actors and therefore able to relate to the performers more easily. However to contrast this effect we chose to show all costume changed on stage employing the popular Brechtian technique Verfremdungseffekt through using this we hoped to communicate that the audience's reality was, in fact a construction. During the silent movie scene we used clichi silent movie music. We wanted to stay authentic to a conventional silent film therefore we had a pianist. This music contributed to the atmosphere and gave the audience vital emotional cues. Silence is also an important tool in our production because it is in contrast to the loud interludes of music for example in the silent movie fantasy. Silence was often used after intense sections of dialogue or monologue. For example during my characters monologue the volume levels of my voice were used to create intensity building up to a climax. The silence during my characters gestus freeze frame is poignant because when the sound is taken away the audience begins to focus more on the movement and the emotion of the character, the silence intrigued them. There are many different characters and settings in our play; therefore we decided that our set should remain very neutral. We designed our set in a deliberately ambiguous way, so we could move easily between fantasy and office scenes. We decided that altering the layout of the stage and the set between each scene would prove noisy and would distract the audience's attention. We were however very aware that a permanent set would become boring and the audience would lose interest, nevertheless we decided through rehearsals and a practice production that the intensity of the action made up for the lack of set changes. We used two black oblong boxes as the fundamentals of each scene, occasionally changing the positioning of them to create a different atmosphere. We chose not to have a specific setting contributing to the representation of free-flowing images within the characters mind. However, we decided to introduce an element of decaying society preoccupied by work ambitions and promotions through the use of broken computer monitors, keyboards, mice, and disks positioned around the stage. This gave the stage an overall look of disarray and immediately introduced the audience to the conflict within the characters in the production. How research material was gathered and used within the process. – Vicki Marks To begin the devising process our group was presented with five quotes that took inspiration from different aspects of life, this supplied us with an excellent starting point for developing a challenging piece of theatre, however our initial responses to the stimuli shaped our early work and many aspects were later changed as the piece matured. Firstly each member of the group decided separately which quote inspired them and worked towards abstractly analyse the meaning of these quotes. As a group we were drawn towards the quote â€Å"fear is a dark room where negatives are developed. † We felt that this quote gave us enough scope to produce a brainstorm surrounding the analysis of it. After analysing the quote through a brainstorm we decided to focus on the idea of fear. These fear aspects of the quote lead our group to research and gain an interest surrounding common phobias. As an initial response to phobias we decided to explore phobias that restrain and dominate everyday life. As a group we were interested in the psychological effects of irrational fears, through discussion, we realised one of our member's arachnophobia and decided to research real life stories showing the influences of phobias. We began to gain an understanding of the psychological effects of living with an irrational fear, this allowed us to contemplate the way a person living with a phobia views the world. This topic particularly appealed to our group because three of the members were studying a course in psychology and took a specific interest in phobias. Through research we were drawn to highlighting different perceptions of the world, this is initially why we decided to show a dream or fantasy of each character. I was currently studying Margret Atwood's dystopian novel â€Å"A Handmaid's Tale. † And inferred parallels between dystopian societies and living with a life altering phobia. As a group this led us to discuss the concepts of normality and initially directed us to create a dystopian society to base our phobic characters in. However, we felt that through creating a dystopian society we were overcomplicating the piece and decided in order to create an accessible message we would have to simplify the plot. Many of our responses to the quote were detached and impersonal; therefore we decided to take a more personal approach to the analysing the quote. We wanted to create a more abstract approach to analysing, consequently, rather than brainstorming we played a word association game. Our earlier research indicated to us the potential of exploring fear; for that reason we opened by associating responses to the word ‘fear'. This resulted in a discussion of our apprehension and anxiety towards our futures, each member of the group was in the process of applying to university and planning the next step of their lives. It was important for us to follow our dreams and mistakes in choices at this stage worried us and we were sensitive to the idea of being stuck doing something we were not passionate about. This discussion allowed us to infer parallels between our fears towards losing our passion and job satisfaction in the work place. This led us to create a work place scenario, highlighting different characters problems with the way their lives have transpired. Although we had created an initial scenario we had to decide how to highlight the importance of job satisfaction and dreams. This is where our ideas surrounding an exploration of dreams and fantasies linked in with our running idea. How group skills contributed to the development of the drama. – Vicki Marks As an ensemble, we had many different approaches to the production of our devised piece. Firstly, after the initial discussions of the basic structure of ‘use of space' we decided that each member should separately prepare an initial suggestion for a fantasy scene. Subsequently as an ensemble we modified each member's idea to fit the characters objectives incorporating each group member's requirements. Two of the four fantasy scenes required only two characters, therefore allowing the two remaining members to direct. This particularly put pressure on the team and initially certain members of the group did not respond well to being directed, however, we had to be flexible whilst blocking a scene and be open to criticism and changes. Considering the ensemble approach to devising we wanted each member to experience directing each scene, this also allowed us to incorporate more than one member's objective for a particular scene. Therefore, we often resorted to switching roles mid scene to appreciate the way each member would perform certain characters and situations. I feel that this successfully allowed us to create two dimensional characters and by including aspects of everyone's ideas created an overall satisfaction towards each scene. Each member of the group had a monologue allowing the audience to understand each individual characters state of mind. The preparation of a monologue is often very personal, initially, Helia and I scripted each monologue, but we worked as a group throughout the blocking and performing, however, this proved difficult. Due to the individual approaches of a monologue, taking control of scripting them was ineffective. This approach resulted in confusion and the monologues were less emotionally effective, because members struggled to connect with them on a personal level. Therefore, firstly, we each took our monologues separately and worked on the content through closely analysing our characters objectives and intentions. After we were happy with the essential content of our monologues we worked as a group to develop them. Group timing was essential during the silent movie fantasy, due to a lack of dialogue the scene required carefully choreographed action, which required the group to work carefully in relation to one another. At one stage of this scene, Helia was required to jump on Payam's back and knocked to the ground. In order to prevent any injuries we applied a partnering system, involving a free member of the group shadowing Helia, providing support during the initial stages of rehearsals. During the later stages of devising the murder mystery scene we became uninspired with the outcome An evaluation of the ways in which ideas were communicated to the audience. – Vicki Marks Throughout the devising process we focused predominantly on comedic genres, to allow the audience to access the central messages through humour. Although we were aware of the comedic value of each scene it was difficult to predict the audience's reactions, therefore we decided to perform it to a small audience during our rehearsal to evaluate which areas of humour were successful and which were less effective. Consequently, we realised that many of the melodramatic fantasies such as the silent movie were physically being underplayed resulting in a misrepresentation of our desired style. This resulted in a member of our group to employ a technique that we had used on a physical theatre work shop. Performing our characters physicality on levels from one to ten, ten being the most physically expressive allowed us to evaluate which level of physicality was successful. As a group we decided that the audience reacted best towards the silent movie scene when we employed a physicality level of ten. Due to lack of dialogue, physicality and expression allowed the audience to follow the storyline whilst also creating humour. As a result of working with a limited number of actors it was necessary to multi-role; however, through multi-rolling it is often easy to confuse an audience. We therefore decided to employ the Brechtian technique of changing our signifying costumes on stage. This allowed the audience to understand the style of our piece, and the abstract nature of the fantasy scenes. We also decided to place each change of costume on stage from the opening scene to intrigue the audience and allow them to become more involved in the action. We also had to take into account the wide range of characters we used. For example in one fantasy scene Payam took on the role of a Spanish soap character and during the next fantasy scene his character changed to a medieval knight. As a group we realised that a change of costume would not be sufficient to demonstrate to the audience a change in character, therefore we had to ensure that each actor varied their physicality according the role they were playing. As a group we consciously casted many of the characters as stock characters and stereotypes, allowing us to successfully communicate to the audience a significant change in role. Naturalistically it was difficult to vary each member's character therefore by using melodramatic genres we were able to separate each members character. Originally, we intended to highlight the importance of job satisfaction through juxtaposing the office scenes with the fantasy scenes. We hoped to communicate to the audience the monotonous routine of being unsatisfied in a job. In order to convey this to an audience we decided to use opposing theatrical styles for the fantasy and office scenes. We decided on a naturalistic approach for the office scenes to highlight the dissatisfaction of the characters, similarly we decided to use abstract and melodramatic genres for the fantasy scenes to show the positivity. The accessibility of the humour in our piece relied on the audience's knowledge of the common clichis we drew inspiration from. I feel we did not fully take into account the age range of our audience and miscalculated the universality of the clichis. After discussing with our audience their reactions towards our piece many of the younger members did not understand the humorous aspects on every level. For example in our murder mystery fantasy we took inspiration from the popular detective character Poirot, however many of the younger To open our piece we decided to have each character on stage the composition involved my character facing the audience frozen in a spotlight and a visible shadow of the four other characters in the background, to show individual stories and the universal message that applied to each character. t. How rehearsal and the production process contributed to the final performance. – Vicki Marks During the rehearsal process, we encountered many difficulties with the staging of certain idea's and aspects. Initially we had decided to each perform a separate monologue as our office characters to highlight the objectives of each individual, we felt that it was important to portray to the audience an interesting insight into the characters feelings and wanted each monologue to project different forms. After the initial scripting of the monologues, we brainstormed the different approaches to staging them. Fortunately, each monologue adapted distinctive structures which allowed us to manipulate and create visually appealing scenes. During the staging of Payam's monologue initially aimed to block the physical placement, this required him to be free to travel across the stage, and therefore, a remaining member of the group read his monologue whilst he attempted to block it. Surprisingly, this created an interesting effect of daydreaming; therefore we decided to continue having his monologue projected from off stage. At one stage during our rehearsals we were challenged to find an original and inspiring way to present our idea. We had already decided that we wanted to contrast reality and fantasy. We had devised the fundamentals of ‘office scenes' created to depict our original character Dylan's disconnection with a dystopian society. Because we had created a leading character we struggled to introduce equal roles. Therefore, we decided to create a structured brainstorm addressing our themes and the ideas we hoped to communicate. Through this we discovered a situation where Dylan's disconnection with society linked to a modern day scenario. Dylan's alienation towards an unfamiliar society was transformed into a group of office workers unsatisfied with their situations. Luckily, through former improvised scenes we had created characters which fitted this scenario. Throughout the devising process we were interested in developing an interpretation of parallel universes. We were initially drawn to this idea through different interpretations of phobia's and the way an individual interprets fears. This idea led one member of the group to compare parallel universes to dreams, and fantasies. As a group we decided that we were interested in highlighting the importance of following your dreams, therefore began to research different fantasies and dream scenarios. We began to discuss different genres and settled initially on medieval clichis drawing on the typical female fantasy of being rescued by a knight in shining armour. As a group we decided that our acting techniques should mirror this genre therefore we settled on melodrama. Previously, we had only attempted naturalistic acting techniques, and as a group we were aware of the contrast between naturalism and melodrama. In order to familiarise ourselves with this acting technique we attended a physical theatre workshop, it was apparent to us that in order to effectively portray a melodramatic genre we would have to introduce exaggerated physicality. Initially this felt unnatural to most of the group members due to our back ground in naturalism, therefore, the support we received from the workshops group leader was very helpful. We benefited from the group leader knowledge surrounding physical theatre and he introduced us to a technique which allowed us to exaggerate the physicality during rehearsals. How the influence of ideas of other playwrights and/ or directors, designers and performers have been used. Originally, we hoped to achieve a depressing and desolate office scene highlighting the impassionate emotions of the characters. We initially decided that the characters would remain deadpan to express their negative attitudes towards their work environment; however, we wanted to employ a more exciting abstract format to express this further. We therefore turned to ‘Machinal' by Sophie Treadwell which one of our group members had previously studied. The opening scene to Machinal is a powerful expression of a monotonous office scene. Treadwell uses an expressionist form employing repetitive dialogue and action and harsh audio effects to create a tedious and mechanical impression. Inspired by Treadwell's use of repeated dialogue and action we began to improvise scenes using similar techniques. Firstly, we chose words and phrases linked to an office environment and repeated them, overlapping each other and increasing in volume throughout to create an intense atmosphere. Unfortunately, due to the small group, this did not achieve our desired effect. This then lead us towards a more physical representation, as an alternative to repeated dialogue we chose to highlight the routine of the office through repeating typical office actions. The use of stylised actions reminded a member of the group of a performance of ‘absolute beginners' through which the director had expressed the rigidity of the office through women typing in unison creating a routine effect. Considering the size of the group we were not enthusiastic to have each character simultaneously performing one action, we therefore, took inspiration from the over exaggerated nature of each movement. Instead of using a routine we highlighted a sense of artificiality by introducing a metronome to emphasise the mechanical and artificial nature of the scene. Characterization was very important to the success of our performance. Because we had chosen to show many stark and stereotyped characters throughout it was important to exaggerate the physicality of the characters in certain places. Physicality was expressed most poignantly through the silent film fantasy. Because this was such a challenging format to express due to the lack of dialogue it relied fully on each actor's physical representation of the character. Inspiration was originally taken from Charlie Chaplin. Through research we learnt that as a Silent film actor he emphasized his body language and facial expression so that the audience could better understand what his character was feeling and portraying on screen. However, simply watching and attempting to replicate Chaplin's style was not enough. As a group we decided to participate in a ‘Jet' physical theatre company workshop. This not only allowed us to work on our physicality as performers in general but gave us excellent scope to improve our silent film scene. Costumes were not hugely significant in our performance. We did not want to over complicate things and circumstantially our performance consisted of many short scenes and an array of different characters, similar to the conventions of epic theatre employed notably by Bertolt Brecht we decided to do all of the costume changes on stage. These changes only consisted of small variations to costumes such a hats a jackets that symbolised each character Brecht employed the use of techniques that remind the spectator that the play is a representation of reality and not reality itself, which he called the Verfremdungseffekt. Such techniques included changing costumes on stage. Through this Brecht hoped to communicate that the audience's reality was, in fact a construction and, as such, was changeable. Another Brechtian technique used in our performance was the use of song. We decided that this allowed the audience to distance themselves from the action hopefully making the social comments throughout more accessible and setting the abstract theme from the beginning notably the entire performance was strictly episodic and many scenes were in isolation from each other. Each fantasy scene is triggered by an action and a simple freeze frame to link the office reality to the dreams. This use of gestus was also an acting technique developed by Bertolt Brecht which reflects the characters emotional conflict through a brief frozen action. Gestus was employed during the transaction from my characters monologue to her fantasy scene. As a group we discussed our desired effect of the gestus and decided to show an obvious link between the character's emotional conflict and the freeze frame, for the audience's accessibility. We therefore decided to each come up with a simple freeze frame highlighting the principal emotions the character. The initial idea to dress each character in their own variation of full black was inspired by a performance of ‘attempts on her life' at the national. The director Martin Crimp chose to dress each character in their own interpretation of completely black. We adapted this idea to our performance because it allowed each character to show their own individuality whilst still highlighting the monotony and dull nature of the office and their negative emotions towards their situations. We took a large amount of inspiration from the melodramatic acting techniques employed by soup opera's. We particularly focused on the style of acting used in traditional Novella's or Latin American soups. Whilst approaching this style we researched the soup opera ‘Days of our lives. ‘ To help us adopt similar persona's. How the stimulus material was developed through the drama process. To begin the devising process our group was presented with five quotes that took inspiration from different aspects of life, this supplied us with an excellent starting point for developing a challenging piece of theatre, however our initial responses to the stimuli shaped our early work and many aspects were later changed as the piece matured. Firstly each member of the group decided separately which quote inspired them and worked towards abstractly analyse the meaning of these quotes. As a group we were drawn towards the quote â€Å"fear is a dark room where negatives are developed. † We felt that this quote gave us enough scope to produce a brainstorm surrounding the analysis of it. After analysing the quote through a brainstorm we decided to focus on the idea of fear. These fear aspects of the quote lead our group to research and gain an interest surrounding common phobias. As an initial response to phobia we decided to explore phobias that restrain and dominate everyday life. As a group we were interested in the psychological effects of irrational fears, through discussion, we realised one of our member's arachnophobia and decided to research real life stories showing the influences of phobias. We began to gain an understanding of the psychological effects of living with an irrational fear, this allowed us to contemplate the way a person living with a phobia views the world. This inspired us to contemplate feelings and emotions surrounding living in a different mindset to the norm. We therefore decided to create five different freeze frames, abstractly exploring the physicality of emotions.

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

Intermediate Sanctions

Intermediate sanctions are the sanctions that are more restrictive than the probation and less restrictive than imprisonment. It is also intended to relieve the pressure on the over crowed facilities that deal with the corrections and the probation departments that are understaffed. The purpose for the intermediate sanction in the criminal justice process is that it helps with any of the concerns from the facilities being packed and over crowed. Jails and the prisons are packed more this century then the last century. It also helps with the short staff that is in the offices and the probation officers short staffed. The government should take it under consideration that the criminal justice system needs the staff and the money to make the criminal justice organization work together. There are two functions as a sentencing alternative in the intermediate sanction. They are to divert the offenders from the overcrowded jails or prisons. The second one is to place the different offenders under the higher levels of the control. It is the risk that the community poses to. * I believe that the intermediate sanctions are not an appropriate punishment. People should not have to serve their time behind bars because they prisons and jail cells are over packed and crowded. The government should put in more funds so that if people do the crime, then they should do the time. Also, probation is an advantage and that people should not be misused. * In conclusion, I believe that the intermediate sanction can work out if people do not take advantage of the probation punishment. This punishment should only be used if there is no room in the jail cell or the prisons. I believe that once someone does a crime, that that person may do it again.

Educational Philosophy Essay

Human nature is the product of one’s environment. Change the environment to change the behavior. Reinforce good behavior, punish bad behavior Conservation of cultural heritage preserves the wisdom of the achievements of humankind. Behavior evolves within the conditioning influence of the institutional system, tradition is the repository of a collective social intelligence. Constructivism is an educational methodology which asserts that learners should be taught in a way that allows them to construct their own understandings about a subject. The purpose of the teacher is not to cover material but to help the child â€Å"uncover† the facts and ideas in a subject area. Essentialists believe that children should learn traditional basic subjects. (Reading, Writing, Literature, Foreign Languages, History, Math, Science, Art, and Music. ) Generally teaches children progressively, from less complex skills to more complex. Schools should transmit the traditional moral values and intellectual knowledge that students need to become model citizens. Focus is on basic skills. Existentialism rejects the existence of any source of objective, authoritative truth about metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. Do not accept any predetermined creed or philosophical system and from that try to define who we are. Aim for the progressing of humanity. Use independent thinking. It engages the student in central questions of defiming life and who we are. Answers imposed from the outside may not be real answers. The only real answers are the ones that come from inside each person, that are authentically his or her own. For the existentialist, there exists no universal form of human nature; each of us has the free will to develop as we see fit. â€Å"Stimulate learners to achieve a more vital and fuller identification with the Absolute Mind or the Macrocosm†¦ Students come into a gradually expanding mental awareness that leads to self-definition based on a comprehensive understanding or perspective of the universe. † (Gutek, p21) Liberalism focuses on the individual. Ideas come from experience. Sensation and reflection create learning. Behavior Modification Conserve/preserve heritage. Constructivism Essentialism Willaim C. Bagley Arthur Bestor Existentialism Idealism Plato Liberalism John Locke Marxism Karl Marx Marxism promotes socialism, as opposed to capitalism where one class oppresses another. Education is use d to change society. Naturalism Rousseau The child should develop in the natural way s/he is designed, guiding the process Perennialism Perennialism Robert M. Hutchins Perennialists believe that one should teach the things of everlasting importance to all people everywhere. They believe that the most important topics develop a person. Philosophy is improtant to study. Studens should learn principles, not facts, teach scientific reasoning, not facts. Teach first about humans, not machines or techniques.. Perennialism focuses first on personal development. Prepared for ED828 Educational Philosophies and Change Jean Marrapodi †¢ Capella University †¢ September 2003 Construct new ideas Back to the Basics What is real? Striving for the ideal Blank slate of individual experience All for all Natural development of the child Like perennial flowers, great principles repeat Educational Philosophies. Philosophy Pragmatism Philosophers Beliefs Key Thought John Dewey Scientific problem solving, experiential learning Progressivism William Kilpatrick Realism Aristotle â€Å"Ideas were to be judged by their consequences when acted on; truth was a warranted assertion, a tentative statement based on the application of hypotheses to solving problems; logic, following the scientific method was experimental; values were experienced within the context of ethical and aesthetic problems and issues charged by the unique features of particular situations. † Gutek, p 77. Progressivists believe that education must be based on the fact that humans are social animals who learn best in real-life activities with other people. Teachers provide not just reading and drill, but also real-world experiences and activities that center around the real life of the students. Discovery follows the scientific method: 1. Become aware of the problem. 2. Define the problem. 3. Propose hypotheses to solve it. 4. Test the consequences of the hypotheses from one’s past experience. 5. Test the most likely solution. â€Å"Cultivate human rationality, the human’s highest power, through the study of organized bodies of knowledge†¦encourage human beings to define themselves by framing their choices rationally, to realize themselves by exercising their potentiality for excellence to the fullest, and to integrate themselves by ordering the various roles and claims of life according to a rational an hierarchical order. † Gutek, p 41 Education should examine, define the problems and change the social structure of society. Rebuilding Society George S. Counts Social Reconstructionism. â€Å"Learn by Doing! † Rationally real Theistic Realism Thomas Aquinas Similar to realism, but God is central God in the core Totalitarianism Adolph Hitler Totalitarianism is a political system in which a citizen is totally subject to state authority in all aspects of day-to-day life. Government controls education. Total dependence on government Utopianism Robert Owen A perfect society can be achieved through the education of the young. Perfect society through education Prepared for ED828 Educational Philosophies and Change Jean Marrapodi †¢ Capella University †¢ September 2003.

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Sex and the City essays

Sex and the City essays In his day and age we are faced with threats no longer from armies and nations willing to take us over, now we face am enemy with no allegiance to the rules of warfare, with no remorse in taking innocent lives, these vile enemies are known as terrorists they will do anything to justify their cause. Terrorism seems to be increasing in number and in violence, no longer is political facilities at risk but also schools, public buildings etc, anything to bring attention to their cause. Due to all this the world needs some one to put a stop to this madness and thats how Rainbow Six was born. Rainbow Six was a new multi-national, anti-terrorist group set up by a coalition of governments to fight against the threat of international terrorism. The name of this group was chosen by John Clark the head of the organization, due to its international nature. Rainbow was a 'black' organization, meaning it officially did not exist, the controlling governments would deny any knowledge of it. Rainbow was formed to deal with the ever-increasing threat of terrorism. Formed from the top anti-terrorist operatives from the different organizations around the world, making an elite unit now known as Rainbow. Rainbow was based in Hereford, England, the home of the British Army's 22nd Special Air Service Regiment. ...

Equity theory Essay Example

Equity theory Essay Example Equity theory Paper Equity theory Paper The study carried by J, Stacy Adams called the ‘Equity theory’ also gave his viewpoint and research related to the process motivation theories concerning ‘why’ and ‘how’ people choose this action instead of another in the workplace. According to French et al’ definition, â€Å"equity theory is based on the phenomenon of social comparison and posits that because people gauge the fairness of their work outcomes compared with others, any felt inequity will result in an unpleasant feeling which the individual will be driven to remove through a variety†. This theory mentions two factors: ‘felt negative inequity’ and ‘felt positive equity’. ‘Felt negative inequity’ concerns the employment’s ‘envious’ feeling whilst they receive less than others do in proportion to work inputs. On the contrary, ‘felt positive inequity’ following the study of French et al was defined as the feeling existed when individuals have received relatively more than others have. People are oriented to be less comfortable when they are under-rewarded than when they are over-rewarded (French et al, p.172). However, in working conditions, managers cannot assume to give the fair reward for all employees in a work group. They contributed their attempts for teamwork; however, we have no direct and correct measurement for capacity of our labour. Applied this theory in the cross culture working condition all over the world, managing to have fair reward as motivation for the employment at work is becoming more complex. Therefore, money can encourage the employment to work harder and more competitive in the workplace. However, according to the ‘expectancy theory’ of Victor Vroom, he assumes the work motivation not only depend on reward provided the individuals but also determined by every employee’s beliefs about ‘effort-performance relationships and the desirability of various work outcomes from different performance levels’ (French et al, p.175). The theory emphasizes individual’s goal to achieve the highest performance at work and then the employment believes that the best performance at work can lead to the higher promotion. Therefore, if they want to have promotional opportunities or enhance their working status, they will have to work harder, reaching their goal. Conversely, there are a variety of argument and continuous controversy about the importance of money in motivating the individual’s working performance. All the theories above were thoroughly carried out and had some particular perspectives on the questions â€Å"Is money considered as a motivator for the employment in the workplace?† In fact, One experimental study shows that in England, 83% of human resources directors claims that the British youth all are significantly motivated by flexible working hours and career development progress rather than money or the bonus or reward at work while in the Far and Middle, the young employment was motivated to perform well by money and extrinsic reward at work (French et al, counterpoint, p.186). No one can deny the important role of money in our life: the main means for us to meet all our daily needs: food, water, clothes, entertainment and other higher level of needs. We absolutely deserve a bonus payment give as an extrinsic reward for our best performance at work. However, under some circumstance, the continuous desire for money and salary appraisal at work can diminish the work ethic and materialize the meaning of working. The manager makes advantage of money and bonus payment to control the employment’s behavior, putting pressure on them and forcing them to give the best performance. Working extra time for bonus or having no break during the working time makes the employment to lose the authentic value of life, which still concludes the family, relationships, entertainment, hobbies and enjoying their lives. Money can be considered as a motivator at work, bringing us pride, competition at work and even society position and fulfilling our satisfaction in the workplace. However, money cannot be the only motivation in our working achievement. A variety of employees enjoy their jobs and want to reach the best performance just because they love what they do, even that work did not give them extra bonus or reasonable salary. Succeeding in understanding about the efficiency of money to motivate the employment at work is very crucial for any managers. A successful employer should perceive the meaning of paying and have suitable strategy to give necessary and reasonable reward for their workers to enhance their capacity. With the understanding about these, manager can create a strong belief among their worker that the way to achieve a high salary is to give the highest performance. Furthermore, the implementation of payment and bonus support also help the organization to discriminate between the high and low performers to have suitable managing strategy to encourage their working ability. Reference 1. A Dictionary of Business and Management. Ed. Jonathan Law. Oxford University Press, 2009. Oxford Reference Online. Oxford University Press. Aston University. 7 January 2012 2. American Society for Training and Development. â€Å"Companies won’t boost performance by offering rewards, says Author†, National Report on Human Resources, 1994, p. 3) 3. Dawson, P.P., Fundamentals of Organizational Behavior: An Experiential Approach, Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1985 4. Ephraim R. McLean, Stanley J.Smits, John R. Tanner., â€Å"The importance of salary on job and career attitudes of information systems professionals† ., Information Management 30 (1996) P. 291 – 299. 5. Herzberg, F. Mausner, B., and Snyderman, B.B., The Motivation to Work, 2nd edition., Wiley, New York, N.Y., 1959 6. Christine Lundberg., Anna Gudmundsion., Tommy D. Anderson., Herzberg’s Two – Factor Theory of work motivation tested empirically on seasonal workers in hospitality and tourism., Tourism Management 30 (2009)., P. 890 – 899. 7. Pinder, C. C. (1998). Work motivation in organizational behavior. USA: Prentice Hall

Monday, October 21, 2019

Whats coming in 2013 The Essay Experts New Years Ressaylutions

Whats coming in 2013 The Essay Experts New Years Ressaylutions The Essay Expert’s New Year’s Ressaylutions for 2013 Making New Year’s resolutions can be a great way to get things done. As you may have read in my August blog, New Year’s Resolutions in August , I completed my 2012 list of 6 resolutions even faster than expected: The Essay Expert’s website was updated (I still have an overhaul on my wish list). Processes for keeping in touch with clients have been streamlined with autoresponders and e-lists. We conducted our promised survey regarding The Essay Expert’s USP (Unique Selling Proposition). How to Write a KILLER LinkedIn Profile was published on Kindle and is now coming up on its 5th edition. I haven’t missed a week in sending out either a blog article or a newsletter. Phew!! The one area where I didn’t completely meet my goal was in producing 212 success stories. We did have 114 successes reported though! Here’s what I’m creating for 2013: 1. Publish a Spanish-language version of How to Write a KILLER LinkedIn Profile. I have a meeting with some translators from a translators’ cooperative here in Madison next week and am excited to get this project on the road! 2. Publish a 50 Resume Tips book The book is currently under construction. There will be one version for job seekers and one version for resume writers. 3. Obtain a Master Resume Writer certification (CMRW) from Career Directors International. There are only 19 CMRWs in the US and a total of 27 worldwide. 4. Increase the college essay / personal statement portion of my business to 25% of total business. I love working with college and graduate school applicants on their admissions essays, and the name of my company is, after all, The Essay Expert. You can help by sending people you know in our direction! 5. Start a training for resume writers. I see this training as a way to up my game and also to train writers who can be on The Essay Expert’s team! 6. Create 213 success stories! If you have a story you haven’t yet shared please do! As The Essay Expert grows, so will the number of people who get interviews, job offers and offers of admission using resumes and essays crafted with the support of our writers. I look forward to sharing my successes and challenges with you over the next year. What are you creating for 2013? Category:Life and LeadershipBy Brenda BernsteinJanuary 7, 2013

Frankenstein and The Hound of the Baskerville Essay Example

Frankenstein and The Hound of the Baskerville Essay Example Frankenstein and The Hound of the Baskerville Essay Frankenstein and The Hound of the Baskerville Essay Essay Topic: Literature This essay will be comparing and contrasting the opening scenes of Frankenstein and The Hound of the Baskerville paying particular attention to the film techniques used to capture the audiences attention. the techniques I will be focusing on particularly are lighting, sound, camera movement, edition and mise en scene. The film Frankenstein is based on Mary Shellys story, Frankenstein which tells the story of a man named Victor Frankenstein, a young doctor who is upset by the death of his mother during child birth, and becomes obsessed with bringing the dead back to life. Victor Frankenstein creates a creature from various body parts. Its not long before Frankenstein regrets his creatures actions. In contrast, The Hound of the Baskerville is of a completely different genre, one of mystery. The Hound of the Baskerville grabs the viewer by the throat from its opening scene; Sir Charles Baskerville lies dead on the moors of his family estate. With the look of fear on his face and the presence of animal foot prints around his corpse suggest the impossible, that a large hound, long feared by the Baskerville family is responsible for his death, as the next heir of the Baskerville family, Sir Henry Baskerville takes up residence at the family estate, legendary detective Sherlock Holmes and his trusted assistant Dr. Watson arrive to investigate the mystery. Although film makers use the same techniques they use them to make different effects as I will explain. The director of Frankenstein seems to use high key lighting throughout the whole of the beginning of the film. : High key lighting means that the picture is overall more realistic, also while Victor and the Crew Captain were talking you can see that the candle is glowing and flickering is trying to build up some sort of suspense. The director of Hound of the Baskerville seems to use lighting in a different way like in the scene where you see the corpse on the dissection table seems to be very bright I think the reason for the light being so bright while the camera is focused on the corpse is because in real life the corpse would have to be brightly lit so the dissectors can see the parts of the corpse clearly. At the beginning of Frankenstein where a women is speaking and seems to be reading out of a book, this is non-diegetic sound because if the scene was in real life you wouldnt hear her speaking because she is not there but if she was sitting there reading it out then this would be diegetic. But in Hound of the Baskerville I cannot find any non-diegetic sounds other than the background music which is used for quite a lot of the way through it. In Frankenstein there is a large amount of diegetic sound, sound that belongs in the scene. Here are a few examples of diegetic sound I found in Frankenstein; after the opening scene where the woman is speaking, you see lots of men on a ship and the sound of the waves hitting the ship and the lightning and all the crew yelling this is all diegetic sound. Later on once the ship gets stuck in the ice berg, the crew are trying to release the boat by hitting the ice with axes the sound of the axes hitting the ice is diegetic. Also another good example of diegetic sound in Frankenstein would be when the dogs are barking and then the chain snaps. In Hound of the Baskerville there are many good examples of diegetic sound my favourite one has got to be when the papers are flying out of the room when the escaped convict is on the loose, I also like the diegetic sound of when the officers are drowning in the quick-mud. I personally think that Frankenstein has better uses of sound than Hound of the Baskerville. The main ingredient in a good film has got to be good editing and I think both of these films have good editing but I personally think that Hound of the Baskerville has a lot better editing than Frankenstein. Here are some examples; in Frankenstein it is mostly straight cuts, the beginning is also very slow as the name of the film slowly gets closer and then speeds up at the end to get your attention. Similarly Hound of the Baskerville uses mainly straight cuts as well but Hound of the Baskerville uses them a lot more cleverly like for example the editor keeps making quick flashes of the body as if it is a bad memory in the doctors head, this is trying to grab your attention or in some cases scare you. The camera movements in both films are quite similar in some ways for example in Frankenstein there are lots of fast moving camera movements when the crew are on the ship and its very choppy on the sea this is similar to in Hound of the Baskerville were the prisoner is running away it was as though the camera man was running with the prisoner I think that it was a great use of camera movement. But the fast moving camera movements in Frankenstein are a bit to all over the place because you cant often see what is actually happening in that scene. Mise en scene is used to describe many different aspects of the film production like the clothing, make-up, settings and props. I think the makeup in Frankenstein was a lot better than the makeup in Hound of the Baskerville. For example when the camera zooms into the faces of the crew of the ship there faces are white and have ice on them to signify that it is really cold. But in Hound of the Baskerville the corpse is excellent the corpse is shaped as though it was scared to death and is as white as the crew in Frankenstein. In conclusion I think that Hounds of the Baskerville is better for suspense and has better editing, but Frankenstein has better Makeup. But the camera movements are better in Hounds of the Baskerville. Personally the beginning of Hounds of the Baskerville would make me continue to want to watch it.

Sunday, October 20, 2019

Natural Disasters in the Caribbean Essay Example

Natural Disasters in the Caribbean Essay Example Natural Disasters in the Caribbean Paper Natural Disasters in the Caribbean Paper The natural disasters that are typically experienced in the Caribbean can have catastrophic and devastating impacts on the environment, economic development and social structure of these islands. Severe damage to the built infrastructure that has supported communities on Caribbean islands for decades can place a huge strain on economic activity. The social impacts that are experienced following natural disasters consist of homelessness, injury, suffering, sickness, disease, and even death. This paper will introduce the ajar natural disasters that have affected life in the Caribbean and they include hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, flooding and tsunamis. Other than Barbados, all Windward Islands of the Caribbean are of volcanic origin. Volcanoes are ruptures in the earths surface that allow for the escape of lava and gas. The two types of volcanic eruptions, explosive and effusive, can both have devastating consequences on the environment and the Caribbean inhabitants. Although not a common occurrence, several volcanic eruptions have take place on Caribbean islands. For example, an eruption on SST. Vincent in 1979 left economic losses of 1 billion dollars, but fortunately no casualties. Flooding is another very impact natural disaster that is one of the more common types of natural disasters to greatly affect CAROM countries. Sometimes called the silent killer, flooding can greatly affect socio-economic development. Whether it is coastal or river flooding, it has the ability to greatly damage the agricultural landscape as well as introduce water-borne disease that can lead to death in local inhabitants. There is a disproportionate vulnerability of CAROM countries to natural disaster demonstrated by the numerous events that have occurred over the last few hundred years. The intrinsic vulnerability is due to the small size of Caribbean islands, their insularity and remoteness, and the economic, environmental and demographic factors that are associated with these islands. Furthermore, there is limited hazard forecasting ability for several CAROM countries. The CAROM countries are geographically set in a location that makes them vulnerable to natural disasters. The Caribbean climate is tropical and temperatures range between approximately ICC and ICC throughout all islands as a whole. The prevailing trade winds along with year round sunny skies set a warm climate for CAROM countries with both dry and wet season. Precipitation depends on the elevation of the island and is also effected by water currents. The environmental impacts of Caribbean natural disasters are correlated with the large coastal zones on the numerous islands and the damage can vary from affecting the entire landscape or the falling on one tree. It was noted that from 1960-1989, hurricanes in the Greater Caribbean Basin resulted in the deaths of 28,000 people, disrupted the lives of 6 million people and destroyed property worth U. S. $16 billion. All the Caribbean nations that have already faced the fury of the hurricane Sandy and have had to fight back by burying the dead, finding shelter for the homeless and counting the economic losses. Sandy moved northwards with gusts in over 1 10 MPH destroying homes, crops and roads on its way. More than 69 people were killed in six countries.

Biography of Gabriel Garcia Moreno - Gabriel Garcia Moreno Profile

Biography of Gabriel Garcia Moreno - Gabriel Garcia Moreno Profile Gabriel Garcia Moreno, President of Ecuador 1860-1865, 1869-1875: Gabriel Garcà ­a Moreno (1821-1875) was an Ecuadorian lawyer and politician who served as President of Ecuador from 1860 to 1865 and again from 1869 to 1875. In between, he ruled through puppet administrations. He was a staunch conservative and Catholic who believed that Ecuador would only prosper when it had strong and direct ties to the Vatican. He was assassinated in Quito during his second term. Early Life of Gabriel Garcia Moreno: Garcà ­a was born in Guayaquil but moved to Quito at a young age, studying law and theology at Quito’s Central University. By the 1840’s he was making a name for himself as an intelligent, eloquent conservative who railed against the liberalism that was sweeping South America. He almost entered the priesthood, but was talked out of it by his friends. He took a trip to Europe in the late 1840’s, which served to further convince him that Ecuador needed to resist all liberal ideas in order to prosper. He returned to Ecuador in 1850 and attacked the ruling liberals with more invective than ever. Early Political Career: By then, he was a well known speaker and writer for the conservative cause. He was exiled to Europe, but returned and was elected Mayor of Quito and appointed Rector of the Central University. He also served in the senate, where he became the leading conservative in the nation. In 1860, with the help of Independence veteran Juan Josà © Flores, Garcà ­a Moreno seized the presidency. This was ironic, as he had been a supporter of Flores’ political enemy Vicente Rocafuerte. Garcà ­a Moreno quickly pushed through a new constitution in 1861 which legitimized his rule and allowed him to start working on his pro-Catholic agenda. Garcà ­a Moreno’s Unflagging Catholicism: Garcà ­a Moreno believed that only by establishing very close ties to the church and the Vatican would Ecuador progress. Since the collapse of the Spanish colonial system, liberal politicians in Ecuador and elsewhere in South America had severely curtailed church power, taking away land and buildings, making the state responsible for education and in some cases evicting priests. Garcà ­a Moreno set out to reverse all of it: he invited Jesuits to Ecuador, put the church in charge of all education and restored ecclesiastical courts. Naturally, the 1861 constitution declared Roman Catholicism the official state religion. A Step Too Far: Had Garcà ­a Moreno stopped with a few reforms, his legacy may have been different. His religious fervor knew no bounds, however, and he did not stop there. His goal was a near-theocratic state ruled indirectly by the Vatican. He declared that only Roman Catholics were full citizens: everyone else had their rights stripped away. In 1873, he had the congress dedicate the Republic of Ecuador to â€Å"The Sacred Heart of Jesus.† He convinced Congress to send state money to the Vatican. He felt that there was a direct link between civilization and Catholicism and intended to enforce that link in his home nation. Gabriel Garcia Moreno, Dictator of Ecuador: Garcà ­a Moreno was certainly a dictator, although one whose type had been unknown in Latin America before. He severely limited free speech and the press and wrote his constitutions to suit his agenda (and he ignored their restrictions when he wished). Congress was there only to approve his edicts. His staunchest critics left the country. Still, he was atypical in that he felt that he was acting for the best of his people and taking his cues from a higher power. His personal life was austere and he was a great foe of corruption. Accomplishments of President Morenos Administration: Garcà ­a Moreno’s many accomplishments are often overshadowed by his religious fervor. He stabilized the economy by establishing an efficient treasury, introducing a new currency and improving Ecuador’s international credit. Foreign investment was encouraged. He provided good, low cost education by bringing in Jesuits. He modernized agriculture and built roads, including a decent wagon track from Quito to Guayaquil. He also added universities and increased student enrollment in higher education. Foreign Affairs: Garcà ­a Moreno was famous for meddling in the affairs of neighboring nations, with the goal of bringing them back to the church just as he had done with Ecuador. He twice went to war with neighboring Colombia, where President Toms Cipriano de Mosquera had been curtailing church privileges. Both interventions ended in failure. He was outspoken in his support of Austrian transplant Emperor Maximilian of Mexico. Death and Legacy of Gabriel Garcà ­a Moreno: In spite of his accomplishments, the liberals (most of them in exile) loathed Garcà ­a Moreno with a passion. From safety in Colombia, his harshest critic, Juan Montalvo, wrote his famous tract â€Å"The Perpetual Dictatorship† attacking Garcà ­a Moreno. When Garcà ­a Moreno declared that he would not relinquish his office after his term expired in 1875, he began to get serious death threats. Among his enemies were the Freemasons, dedicated to ending any connection between church and state. On August 6, 1875, he was killed by a small group of assassins wielding knives, machetes and revolvers. He died near the Presidential Palace in Quito: a marker can still be seen there. Upon learning the news, Pope Pius IX ordered a mass said in his memory. Garcà ­a Moreno did not have an heir who could match his intelligence, skill and fervent conservative beliefs, and the government of Ecuador fell apart for a while as a series of short-lived dictators took charge. The people of Ecuador didn’t really want to live in a religious theocracy and in the chaotic years that followed Garcà ­a Morenos death all of his favors to the church were taken away once again. When liberal firebrand Eloy Alfaro took office in 1895, he made sure to remove any and all vestiges of Garcà ­a Moreno’s administration. Modern Ecuadorians consider Garcà ­a Moreno a fascinating and important historical figure. The religious man who accepted assassination as martyrdom today continues to be a popular topic for biographers and novelists: the latest literary work on his life is Sà © que vienen a matarme (â€Å"I know they are coming to kill me†) a work that is half-biography and half-fiction written by acclaimed Ecuadorian writer Alicia Yaà ±ez Cossio. Source: Herring, Hubert. A History of Latin America From the Beginnings to the Present. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1962.