Case Study on Teamwork Problem

Case Study Summary Mike Garcia and Jill Hendrickson have been butting heads for months at work. Mike is a manufacturing manager at Auto Safety Products, which is a firm in the Midwest that designs and produces automobile seat belts and infant and child safety seats. Jill is a design engineer for the same firm. Top management at their work instituted concurrent engineering, a team-based system that integrates manufacturing and design processes. Concurrent engineering is intended to eliminate the problems that often occur in industry when designers are unaware of the needs of manufacturing.Through concurrent engineering, management hoped to improve attention to all elements of the product life cycle and manufacture a quality, low-cost product that will meet user needs. The company was also hoping to decrease the amount of time it takes to move from initial conceptual design to actual production. Both Mike and Jill are on the team working on toddler booster seats. This is an important p roduct for Auto Safety Products, as research has indicated that parents do not use safety seats once children reach toddler age. The reason for this is because they are difficult to use in cars and uncomfortable for the children.Thus the team at Auto Safety Products worked to make the seats easier for parents to use by making them more comfortable, more portable, and more compatible with a range of automobiles from small sports cars to sedans to minivans to SUVs. Mike is 55-years-old and has worked in manufacturing for most of his life. He has spent the past 22 years working at Auto Safety Products. Mike has always felt some animosity toward the design side of the firm. He found the engineers unwilling to listen to the problems faced in manufacturing.He often complained that the design department generates projects that run into all sorts of problems once they hit manufacturing. He approached the new concurrent engineering program at his work. Jill is 25-years-old and is a mechanica l engineer who has been with Auto Safety Products since her college graduation. Jill is assertive and strong-minded; she believes she has to be effective in the male-dominated world of engineering. She learned about the concurrent engineering concept when she was in school and she believes it can greatly improve the effectiveness of design and manufacturing.Unfortunately, it has not worked at Auto Safety Products. The manufacturing side has not really bought into the process, and management did not take the time to introduce the team management system properly and train people to work together. Jill has a hard time with Mike Garcia, who is the lead manufacturing representative on her team. Jill and Mike had to work together frequently on a booster seat design in a variety of vans. Their inability to work together has gotten so bad that their supervisor had to set up a meeting to help them deal with the problem.Adam Shapiro is the project supervisor at Auto Safety Products. He oversa w the booster seat project team that Mike and Jill worked on. Adam knows the two of them have not hit it off on the concurrent engineering team and had decided that the conflict had gotten to the point where he must step in and help them settle it. He brought them in individually and asked them about the problem and what the problem was. Jill was the first person Adam talked to. According to Jill the problem is that Mike would not listen to her ideas and downplays the contributions that design can make to concurrent engineering.On the other hand she sees design as the most important part of the concurrent engineering process. Jill suspects that Mike has problems with her because she is young and a woman, and this has made her push even harder for her point of view on project disagreements. After Jill discussed the problem with Adam, Mike was the next person to discuss the problem with Adam. Mike thinks the concurrent engineering system and the booster seat team in particular is a jo ke. He says that the design engineers are still trying to push their ideas down the manufacturing’s throat and he’s tired of it.Also Mike would like to go back to doing things the old way. However, if he is forced to continue with the concurrent engineering system, he refuses to give in to every one of Jill’s ideas. Case Analysis Questions 1a. What kind of predispositions are Mike and Jill taking into this conflict situation? Mike believes that engineers are â€Å"uppity† and unwilling to listen to the problems dealing with manufacturing. As a female engineer Jill feels as though she needs to be effective in the male-dominated world of engineering 1b.How might these predispositions influence the way the frame the conflict and the way they approach each other? These predispositions are definitely negatively influencing the way Mike and Jill approach each other. Obviously they are going to automatically approach each other negatively because of their opinio ns. 2a. If Mike and Jill were to attempt to deal with this conflict on their own, what conflict style would you recommend? If Mike and Jill were to attempt to deal with this conflict on their own I would recommend that they use the compromising conflict style.Compromising will allow you to achieve both of your goals, resulting in a â€Å"win-win† situation instead of a â€Å"win-lose† situation. 2b. Given what you know about Jill and Mike, do you think they would use an effective conflict resolution style? No, because when the problem first arose they had a hard time coming to a common ground resolution. I believe if it wasn’t for Adam they would have never resolved the problem. 3a. If you were Adam, how would you approach this conflict? If I was Adam, I would sit them both down together and have them write down the benefits that each of them bring to the company. b. What strategies should you use to help Mike and Jill deal with their ongoing problems? A strateg y that I l would use is integrative bargaining. In integrative bargaining, the conflicting parties are trying to maximize gains for both parties (Miller, 2012). The bargainers discuss issues that could lead to a more creative solution to the problem at hand. Outcomes of integrative bargaining are often solution that allow both parties to benefit, and communication tends to be marked by open disclosure, careful listening and multiple communication channels.I believe this is the perfect strategy to use because with both Mike and Jill having problems with each other and the way they do things, if Adam uses this strategy I think you would solve problems for both people. 3c. Would you consider bringing in a mediator to help them work through their issues? I think there should be a mediator in the meeting as well, just in case things would get intense and they could not come up with a fair compromise. 4a. How would a feminist approach to conflict see this situation? They would see this si tuation that Mike is wrong and Jill is right.They would see it this way because a feminist approach would say that men don’t listen to women and they don’t take them as serious as other men especially in the workforce. 4b. Is it possible to use an alternative model that would recast this situation in a more productive frame? No because I think Adam handled this situation the right way by bringing Mike and Jill in and have them discuss the problem. This way is more productive because they can express themselves without knowing what the other person said. You can cover more ground by one-on-one problem solving.Effective Student Teams: A Faux Hiring and Peer Evaluation Process Student team projects provide benefits to the education process and provide experience that is valued by some employers. But team projects can be a source of conflict. Due to free-riding, scheduling problems and differing goals, there are fertile grounds for team conflicts. Therefore, there needs to be a better method of forming teams and a process to assure shared goals by team members (Lane 2011). The author Michelle Lane discussed the Faux Hiring Team Selection Process. In this process there are six steps to form and select a team.Step one is the selection of interviewers. Step two is posting interviewee’s applications for review by classmates and interviewers. The third step is to hold a â€Å"Job Fair† where a faux interview process occurs. The fourth step is the selection of personal top choices by both interviewers and interviewees. The next step is the instructor team assignment. Finally the forming and the signing of the team contract is the last step. Results In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the faux hiring process, two classes of 40 students each were studied in the fall semester 2009.Independent T-Tests showed no statistical difference between the two classes in terms of age and GPA. In the first class the teams were assigned randomly by the instructor and in the second class the job fair approach was used. The teams were used for two projects that took place over the semester. One project involved the use of the CAPSIM simulation. The second project was a business study requiring research, an interview and a class presentation of their findings. Each project was worth 20% of their course grade. (Lane 2011) The effectiveness of the faux hiring team assignment was assessed in two ways.The first way was the total team points earned from the simulation and the business projects were compared using a t-test of mean group differences. The results were significant with the faux hiring teams scoring higher than the randomly assigned teams. The second assessment was at the end of the semester, students were asked to fill out an anonymous online survey about their team experience. There were 43 respondents to this survey. 19 were from the instructor assigned teams and the remaining 24 were from the faux hiring teams. The results show that the faux hiring teams had stronger scores on shared goals, and had fewer conflicts.This article relates to our case study because it is an example of a way to prevent teamwork problems. This article basically says to go through an interview process to find a good team that has common goals and would get along to avoid conflicts. Whereas the case study does not use a process like this and Mike and Jill have a problem and are unable to resolve it. What is Expected from Supervisors This article was about how the past 10 years that team members enter the workforce as well as management or leadership emphasis influences different images of supervisors.There were certain features of management discussion during the past decades that are used as instruments in addressing the contributing research question: What is still expected from management and leadership? Liisa Huusko found that team member who are not the same age have different images of supervisors. Thus they wait partly for different actions within team organization. Human Resource Management issues seem to be included in supervisors’ duties in every decade. For example, encouraging and career-development matters do not appear until the 1980s.Furthermore, different kinds of computer-aided control systems are not able to respond to quick changes and uncommon situations relating to everyday duties. The image of supervisors that workers take for granted must be taken into consideration during the changes and shifts between responsible actors. This article relates to our case study because it shows that age does have an effect on teamwork. Age makes a difference because the older people want to do it the way they have been used to all their life and not want to change with younger generation as well as the technology that is changing.Some older generation refuse to update their technology and it is having an effect with teamwork. Finally, this goes with the case study because this article prese nts a male-female problem, where the male refuses to listen to the female’s idea. NBA Lockout: Can Both Sides Agree on Basketball-Related Income? I obtained this article from the Los Angeles Times Newspaper. The article was written and published on October 28, 2011. It talks about the National Basketball Association (NBA) lockout and how the players union and the owners are struggling to agree on terms for salary cap and other issues.This is an example of teamwork and the problems with teamwork. For example, the NBA deputy commissioner Adam Silver and Spurs owner Peter Hold said the players union offered a decrease from 53% to 52. 5% but wouldn’t discuss anything further if owners wouldn’t offer more than 50% (Medina, 2011). With the two sides going back and forth and unable to come up with a number they could agree they have brought in a mediator to help with negotiations. But even with the mediator the two sides still have not agree on terms. Thus, the NBA sea son is in jeopardy. NBA Commissioner David Stern has already cancelled all games through November.

Broadening Your Perspective Essay

In this paper the Broadening Your Perspective Exercise 18.1 is completed. The exercise is about Martinez Company that has decided to introduce a new product to its product line (John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2011). Two methods are evaluated to determine what is the best method to use either capital-intensive or labor-intensive method. Exercise 18-1 A In this part of the exercise the break-even point in annual unit sales of the new product is calculated for the capital intensive manufacturing method and labor-intensive manufacturing method (John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2011). To calculate the break-even point the total fixed cost has to be computed first. For the capital-intensive method the total fixed cost is fixed Manufacturing cost-2508000 plus incremental selling expenses of 502000 equaling 3010000. The next step is to find the contribution margin per unit. For the capital-intensive method the contribution margin per unit is calculated by the selling price of 30.00 minus the variable cost of direct materials-5, direct labor-6, variable overhead-3, annual expense-2, thus equaling $14.00. Then the break-even point in unit sales for the capital-intensive method is calculated by the total fixed cost-3010000 divided by the contribution margin per unit of 14, thus equally the break-even point in unit sales for the capital-intensive meth od is 215000 units. Next we calculate the labor-intensive method. To calculate the break-even point the total fixed cost has to be computed first. For the labor-intensive method the total fixed cost is fixed manufacturing cost-1538000 plus incremental selling expenses of 502000 equaling 2040000. The next step is to find the contribution margin per unit. For the labor-intensive method the contribution margin per unit is calculated by the  selling price of 30.00 minus the variable cost of direct materials-5.50, direct labor-8.00, variable overhead-4.50, annual expense-2, thus equaling $10.00. Then the break-even point in unit sales for the labor-intensive method is the total fixed cost-2040000 divided by the contribution margin per unit of 10, thus equally the break-even point in unit sales for the labor-intensive method is 204000 units. Exercise 18-1 B In the next part of the exercise it states to determine the annual unit sales volume at which Martinez Company would be indifferent between the two manufacturing methods (John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2011). To determine the indifference point of the annual unit sales of the capital-intensive and labor-intensive method the total fixed cost and contribution is used. This is calculated by capital-intensive total fixed cost of 3010000 minus labor-intensive total fixed cost of 2040000 divided by the difference of the contribution margins of capital-intensive-14 and labor intensive-10. Thus totaling 242500 units as the indifference point of the two manufacturing methods. Exercise 18-1 C The last question to complete the exercise states, Explain the circumstance under which Martinez should employ each of the two manufacturing methods (John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2011). Depending on the goal or forecast of how much sales are to be reached determines the manufacturing method that should be used. If the business expects to reach sales beyond the indifference point of 242500 units then the capital-intensive method would be the best manufacturing method to be used. If sales are forecasted to be below 242500 then the labor intensive method should be used. Thus the ationale to choose the manufacturing method depending on sales of units assures that the higher profit margin is obtained. References John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (2011). Accounting, 4E, Exercise 18-1. Retrieved from: www.ecampus.phoenix.edu/wileyassignment

A Critical Analysis Of Itc Distribution Channel Marketing Essay

A Critical Analysis Of Itc Distribution Channel Marketing Essay Abstract Distribution channel is having an important role in positioning of the product because we know that distribution channel is tool by which we can make reach our product to the final consumers. That’s why selecting a distribution channel is an important aspect of building a competitive advantage for businesses of every size. Distribution channels include your own direct sales force, retailers, distributors and the Internet. The right distribution channel ensures that customers in different locations around the country, or around the world, can buy your products and get the right level of service from your company. To select the right distribution channel for your business, you need to consider what a channel can offer, including location and reach, skills and resources, management costs and degree of control. This is a project to study, analyze and report the distribution channel of the FMCG giant ITC. The project would take help of various sources of secondary data ab out the organization; it’s functioning in terms of distribution channels it employs and the management of these channels in order to stay competitive and ubiquitous against competition. For that we have reviewed the organization and its product lines on a macro level and critical analysis of distribution channel for a specific product line. In that way we would be able to ascertain what are strength and weaknesses of the given distributions channel. We have also drawn out certain similarities and contrasts between ITC’s and other FMCG’s distributions channel to help us add some recommendations at the end of the report on how the potential of the distribution channel and its efficiency can be improved. Contents Introduction – ITC ITC was incorporated on August 24, 1910 under the name Imperial Tobacco Company of India Limited. As the Company’s ownership progressively Indianised, the name of the Company was changed from Imperial Tobacco Company of Ind ia Limited to India Tobacco Company Limited in 1970 and then to I.T.C. Limited in 1974. In recognition of the Company’s multi-business portfolio encompassing a wide range of businesses – Fast Moving Consumer Goods comprising Foods, Personal Care, Cigarettes and Cigars, Branded Apparel, Education and Stationery Products, Incense Sticks and Safety Matches, Hotels, Paperboards & Specialty Papers, Packaging, Agri-Business and Information Technology – the full stops in the Company’s name were removed effective September 18, 2001. The Company now stands rechristened ‘ITC Limited’. Though the first six decades of the Company’s existence were primarily devoted to the growth and consolidation of the Cigarettes and Leaf Tobacco businesses, the Seventies witnessed the beginnings of a corporate transformation that would usher in momentous changes in the life of the Company. Key landmarks in history of ITC limited 1925 – Packaging & Printing Business was set up as a strategic backward integration for ITC’s Cigarettes business 1975 -Launch of Hotels business with the acquisition of a hotel in Chennai which was rechristened ‘ITC-Welcomgroup Hotel Chola’ 1979 – ITC entered the  Paperboards business  by promoting ITC Bhadrachalam Paperboards Limited 1985 – Surya Tobacco Co. set up in Nepal as an Indo-Nepal and British joint venture.

Australian Health I ssue Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Australian Health I ssue - Essay Example Despite this fact, however, problems in workforce shortages threaten to compromise the delivery of adequate health care in the country. The mounting problems in this sector have recently sought to be addressed by the National Health Reform Agreement arrived at by the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) in April 2010, the latest in a series of health care reforms pursued in the country over the decades. The agreement guarantees provision by the Commonwealth of no less than $16.3 billion in additional growth funding to the States and Territories, within the period 2014 to 2020 (AHMC, 2011). The principal directions are provided by the eight streams identified in the COAG agreement, and this paper shall treat on the sixth stream concerning the health care workforce. While this discussion on the health care providers is relevant across disciplines, the focal point shall be on the nursing profession, inasmuch as nurses and midwives comprise 55% of the entire health workforce in Austr alia (Bryce, 2009). The Sixth Stream – Workforce The best-laid plans, though well-funded and sufficiently provided with the necessary logistics, could not hope to attain success if the available manpower pool is inadequate or lacking in the necessary skills. Workforce shortages have plagued the Australian health care system in the last decade, for which reason the development of a skilled and adequate workforce has been specified as the Stream 6 in the Health Care Reform plan presented by the COAG agreement. The stated stream purpose is â€Å"to improve Australians’ access to health and aged care services by expanding the health care workforce and providing health professionals with the skills and training opportunities necessary to delivery Australia’s future care benefits† (NHHN, 2010, p. 40). According to the Agreement, substantial resources are to be provided by the Commonwealth in the realisation of the objective of this Stream. In the plan, the Comm onwealth has committed to invest over the next four years a total sum of $1.2 billion, for the purpose of providing training to general practitioners and specialists; for supporting nurses working in the areas of general practice, care for the aged, and those working in rural areas; and for providing assistance and support to other professionals in allied fields rendering service in rural communities (NHHN, 2010). In the plan, the Commonwealth commits to fund 60% of costs of staff training in public hospitals, for which the following targets have been articulated (NHHN, 2010, p. 42): 1. Delivery of 5,500 new general practitioners (GPs) throughout the coming decade, amounting to a total of $345 million for the first four years; the target calls for 1,375 additional GPs who are either practicing or in training as of 2013; 2. Designation of 975 places annually as training ground for future physicians in their postgraduate training period, to experience how it feels to have a possible c areer in general practice; this requires $150 million as of 2012; 3. Provision of 680 additional specialist doctors spread throughout the coming ten years, for which an estimated $145 million shall be provided for the first four years; 4. Creation of a comprehensive and integrated package of programs in order to provide greater support to health profession

Formal Language Tests. The Comprehensive Assessment of Spoken Language Essay

Formal Language Tests. The Comprehensive Assessment of Spoken Language - Essay Example The CASL can be used on children as old as 3 and adults up to the ages of 21. It is mostly through the use of CASL that you get a clear picture of an individual’s language processing skills and his structural understanding thereby proving to be a useful tool for documenting development of an individual from a very early age all the way to his post secondary years. It also applies to a person with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA) set up guidelines used for recognizing language impairment mostly because the CASL functions solely on age-based norms. The CASL consists of 15 tests all of which aim to effectively measure one’s language processing skills; these focusing primarily on comprehension, expression and retrieval. The structure is measured by division into four language categories; these being†Semantic or Lexical, Syntactic, Superliguistic and Pragmatic† (Carrow-Woolfolk, 1999).... is such that the most representative aspects of the language categories fall into the core measures whereas the supplementary aspect concentrates on providing additional information that aids in quantitative and qualitative evaluation. Also it is imperative to mention that for most CASL tests there are Descriptive Analysis Worksheets provided which enable an individual to focus on specific skill aspects for intervention. The Test Books that are provided are not only easy to use but aid the administration by serving as a fast and simple reference. The initial part of the book focuses on providing administration guidelines whereas the rest of it focuses on convenient record forms, which are for a range of ages (3-6 and 7–21). The sole purpose of the book is to provide ample room for an analysis for profiling, responses towards items, different scores and behavioral observations. The Oral and Written Language Scales (OWLS; Carrow-Woolfolk, 1996) is different from a CASL in the wa y it is a theoretically based measure which is applied individually and aims to measure receptive and expressive language for little children as well as adults. It is a test that is administered using oral as well as written components for ages 3 to 21 years, however the written expression is mainly for ages 5 to 21. The test takes about 20 minutes to administer, and along with its overall score, the OWLS Written Expression gives percentages for nine special skills areas that are divided into three main planes; ‘Listening Comprehension ( LC), Oral Expression (OE), and Written Expression (WE)† (Carrow-Woolfolk, 1996, p. 33). While these scales are developed and form a part of the same evaluation, the oral language component, that is LC and OE, are put together in the same manual while the

Bioacoustics Monitoring Contributes to an Understanding of Climate Essay

Bioacoustics Monitoring Contributes to an Understanding of Climate Change - Essay Example The high levels of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) yielded from the continuous combustion of fossil fuels is considered one of the major impacts of climate change on ocean acidification. This huge change contributes to diminishing the absorption of sound. Since half of the total percentage of CO2 caused by the consumption is absorbed by oceans, the percentage of acid in the ocean has increased causing the pH level of oceans to drop (Orr et al., 2005). According to the authors, the diminishing of sound absorption has impact on underwater animals’ behavior and will lead to some of these animals adapting new behaviors. However, these adjustments can be harmful to some and beneficial to others. According to the others, the reduction of sound absorption leads to sound travelling longer distances, which can result to a noisy environment for underwater species. This can lead to the extinction of some species which cannot obtain food in the noisy environment. Also, marine animals such as wheels will have to adjust their frequency, take more time and use more sound to communicate with each other. On the other hand, it would be beneficial for wheel to maintain communication with each other in further distance since sound travels faster and further. However, other studies disagree that the increasing in ocean acidification will cause measurable changes in underwater animals’ behaviors, claiming that these studies need to be tested. Unlike oceans, the impact of climate change on freshwater cannot be easily predicated for many reasons. One of these reason is that fishes in freshwater are ectotherms. Hence, the effect of climate change can vary between species. Another reason according to Hobday and Lough is that freshwater systems, unlike oceans, do not follow under the Global Climate Models because of their small sizes. Animals have established ways of

HOW WE CAN HELP NATIVE AMERICANS AND THEIR FIGHT WITH ALCOHOLISM IN Research Paper

HOW WE CAN HELP NATIVE AMERICANS AND THEIR FIGHT WITH ALCOHOLISM IN THE NATIVE AMERICAN FAMILY ON A FEDERAL LEVEL - Research Paper Example Booker T. Washington in terms of overcoming addiction says, â€Å"Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life, as by the obstacles one has overcome trying to succeed.† Therefore, Native Americans who are no doubt facing obstacles but they should get rid of their addiction with alcoholism by overcoming the obstacles. In America, Native Americans have been known to over-indulge in drinking more than any other ethnic groups in the country. As a result of this, statistics indicate that nearly 12% of all deaths among the Native Americans are a result of using alcohol (Schinke et al 319). Most cases of traffic accidents, liver and heart problems, and cases of homicide and suicide are related to alcohol use and to some extent other substance abuse by the ethnic group. The legacy of manifest destiny contributed to the high rates of alcoholism in Native Americans by forcing the Native Americans to highly secluded lands that limited their political voice as intended by the federal government; in totality creating a snowball effect that would lead the Native Americans to decades of self-destruction related to alcoholism. The federal government is now focusing on ways that it can reverse this effect on the Native Americans and see the society to a reformation. Alcohol was a medium of exchange for Native American goods by European settlers during the pre-independence period in America. Because of the easy availability, Native Americans got accustomed to using the drink quite freely. The European traders often tricked the Native Americans into over-indulging in the drink so that they could get unfair trade with them. The effects of the drink were new and widely acclaimed in America so that a number of Native Americans found it fashionable to drink. The trend, however, continued past American independence to date (Sherman 45). Scientists studying these phenomenological high drinking rates have linked the use of alcohol to genetics . Studies have shown that some individuals experience gene mutation, which cause significant reactions to over-drinking alcohol. Those who posses this gene suffer worse side effects when they drink such as nausea, increased heartbeats, headache, and extreme drowsiness. This gene is common among the Chinese and Japanese, explaining their less indulgence in the drink (Young 112). Other groups, such as the Native Americans, however, do not possess this gene that mutates, therefore, do not experience adverse effects associated with drinking. Besides this genetic point of view, the environment and cultural tendencies of the Native Americans have played a great role in making it appropriate for them to indulge. When the European settler moved in to America and took over their land, Native Americans became an oppressed group. The European culture clashed heavily with that of Native Americans, creating a major conflict and depression on the side of the Native Americans. The native culture w as presumed to be inferior to that of the dominant European group, and the Native Americans lost pride in their existence and developed a lack of will to protect their culture (Schinke et al 134). The

Existentialism and Art Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Existentialism and Art - Essay Example A look into these various concepts proves that Leo Tolstoy comes up with the best explanation regarding art. According to him, art is a form of communication that can take various forms. If it succeeds in developing an emotion, it is an art. Aristotle and Art According to the Aristotelian view, art is an imitation of life. He starts his theory of art with the claim that humans have the urge to imitate, and this tendency to imitate is the very basis of human learning. It is this tendency that makes humans delight in works of imitation. Thus, according to the scholar’s opinion, various people imitate using various medium ranging from color and voice. As Butcher (1951, p. 116) says, this concept contains three elements of imitation. They are rhythm, language, and harmony. Here, Aristotle brings in the concept of virtue in art. To illustrate, the factor that decides whether a particular artwork is a comedy or a tragedy is the object that is imitated in the work. Though the art for m used is the same, the emotions it creates will be quite opposite in both the cases. Thus, when one follows the Aristotle's point of view, one gets a chance to evaluate the quality of art and the element of virtue in it. This becomes possible because the artist is supposed only to imitate, not to create. Evidently, there are a number of pitfalls in the Aristotelian view. ... For example, if the quality is assessed from the perfection in imitation, people from other geographical areas will not be able to assess the quality of any art. In other words, an art form will be highly limited to people in that geographical area or who are familiar with the item being imitated. Another issue arises that the concept does not take into account the authenticity of abstract works. To illustrate, it forgets the quality of Cubism and Pop as art forms, though they are not realistic reflections of nature. Thus, it becomes evident that though Aristotle managed to present the human characteristic of imitation, he failed to develop a flawless theory of art out of it. Plato and Art One can see that Plato too shows a tendency to consider art as an imitation though he develops a bit on the concept; but to the wrong side. In The Republic, Plato claims that art is an imitation of the things and events that one encounters in everyday life (p. 69). However, admittedly, Platoâ€℠¢s theory goes astray when things like music are considered. For example, even though Plato claims that music represents natural sounds and emotions, one can easily find that there is no imitation of anything natural other than emotion. However, Plato’s effort to show how complicated art can be in imitating things deserves appreciation. To illustrate, in The Allegory of the Cave, Plato describes the example of some prisoners chained to a bench, facing the wall of a deep cave. Behind them, artists are performing puppet play, and the prisoners could only see the shadows what they perceive as reality. However, as one prisoner gets released, he sees the puppets that produced the shadows (The allegory of the cave, 2011). Thus, one sees that, though Plato considers art

Final Personal Journal Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Final Personal Journal - Assignment Example course has given me a chance to think in line with coming up with a small business in the hospitality industry and try to implement all that I acquired during the period that I took to complete my hospitality studies. My opinions and insight have really changed this semester since I have learnt the art of saving and ethics when it comes to the industry of hospitality. At the moment I believe that it can only be smooth and enjoyable for one to work well in the industry if they consider all ethical considerations in the hospitality field. The course has also enhanced the manner in which I consider my entrepreneurship plans after graduating from campus. Since I studied this course of Hospitality Business Entrepreneurship, I plan to start a small resort by the side of the lake that will create good scenery for customers who will pay a visit there. The resort will be one of its kinds since my town has a number of them but what matters is ensuring that I install proper management and make better what the competing resorts make wrong. I will incorporate my knowledge on hospitality to design a garden on the same ground with the resort, where couples can have ample time chatting and having soft drinks that will be served on request. The skills I acquired in entrepreneurship will help me make a perfect plan and strategize on how well I can run the resort without experiencing many loses or rather avoiding all instances of loss. Market research will be my first move before I install the resort on the shores of the lake. The most important issue I will consider is the availability of the market and the aspects that the other hotels in the surrounding are not doing right. My knowledge will enable me come up with a blue ocean strategy which I will embrace to the favor of the success of my resort. Before embarking on any serious business, I will make sure that members of staff recruited to work in my premises have adequate hospitality and catering knowledge in order to be sure

Motorcycle industry analysis Essay Example for Free

Motorcycle industry analysis Essay Definition Motorcycles fall into the category called Recreational Vehicle, Motorcycle and Boat Retail Industry. These are companies that retail recreational vehicles, boats, motorcycles, jet skis, and/or related accessories. In Hoover’s classification, based on the North American Industry Classifications System (NAICS) and the older U. S. Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) system, motorcycles fall under a smaller subcategory called Motorcycle, ATV, and Personal Watercraft Dealers Industry. This U. S.industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in retailing new and/or used motorcycles, motor scooters, motorbikes, mopeds, off-road all-terrain vehicles, and personal watercraft, or retailing these new vehicles in combination with repair services and selling replacement parts or accessories. Statistics In terms of looking at the whole industry, motorcycle dealers make up a majority of the industry when compared with ATVs and personal watercraft dealers. The chart below shows statistics from 2002 comparing the motorcycle dealers with all other motor vehicle dealers in the industry. As the charts illustrates, motorcycle dealers made up 91. 5% of sales in this industry, while ATVs and personal watercraft dealers only contributed to 8. 5% of sales. Year 2002 Motorcycle DealersAll other motor vehicle dealers (ATV personal watercraft dealers) Total Establishments4,3845144,898 Sales ($1,000)14,636,299 (91. 5%)1,353,829 (8. 5%)15,990,128 (100%) Annual Payroll1,429,316106,6811,535,997 Paid Employees46,0374,18850,225 www. industries. hoovers. com Analyzing data for motorcycle dealers between the years of 1997 and 2002 reveals some important information. The results show the growth and percent changes in certain categories pertaining specifically to the motorcycle dealer industry. While the number of establishments only increased approximately 21 percent, the amount of sales increased almost 99 percent. The annual payroll (excluded from the graph) increased 100 percent and the paid employees rose by 59 percent. These figures, illustrated through a bar graph below, indicate a growing industry especially for those companies already in the business with establishments formed. Motorcycle Dealers. Although there are many nonfranchised retailers in the industry, 80 percent of the industry’s business is made up of franchised outlets. The average franchised motorcycle outlet generates sales and services almost six times that of nonfranchised outlets. In addition to selling motorcycles, dealers make up almost half of their business through sales of parts, accessories, and apparel. In 1997 approximately 6. 5 million motorcycles were owned in the United States, with California having almost two times more retail outlets than any other state. In terms of rider distribution, California, Texas, New York, Florida, and Ohio accounted for more than one-third of all motorcycle ownership in the U. S. In terms of a target market there seems to be no specific or clear differentiation. Below are some statistics that allow one to make judgments based on the Harley Davidson demographic profile. Gender20002001200220032004 Male91%91%91%90%90% Female9%9%10%10%10% Purchasers (2004) †¢ 42% Owned Harley-Davidson ® motorcycle previously †¢ 31% Coming off of competitive motorcycle †¢ 27% New to motorcycling or havent owned a motorcycle Background and Competition. â€Å"The earliest motorcycles were basically bicycles powered by small engines, and the motorcycle was considered a relatively cheap alternative to the more expensive, early automobiles. Many U. S. manufacturers produced motorcycles before World War I, contributing to a dynamic, if not booming, domestic market. Harley Davidson, Orient, Henderson, Cyclone, and Indian were the primary competitors at that time. Henry Fords affordable Model-T, however, doomed many motorcycle manufacturers. In fact, by the end of the Great Depression, the only remaining manufacturers and sellers of motorcycles were Indian and Harley-Davidson. Indian closed down production and distribution in 1953. The late 1950s and early 1960s saw the first influx of low-priced, smaller Japanese motorcycles and scooters into the United States. Honda began U. S. distribution of its products in 1959, with the slogan, You meet the nicest people on a Honda, to combat the negative image associated with the sport. Yamaha starting selling motorcycles in the United States during 1960; Suzuki followed in 1963; and Kawasakii joined the competition in 1967. BMW opened a U. S. distribution arm in 1975, incorporating in New Jersey. Harley-Davidson ended years of private ownership in 1965 with a public offering of its stock, and eventually merged with industrial giant AMF in 1969. The oil crisis in the 1970s prompted the popularity of the smaller motorcycles, mopeds, and scooters that were made primarily by Japanese manufacturers. Dealers sold vehicles to those interested in conserving gas and finding cheap transportation. Harley-Davidsons market share, already dropping, was further threatened by Hondas 1969 entrance into the heavy and super heavyweight segment of the market. By the late 1970s Harley-Davidson faced severe production quality problems in addition to stiff competition. A management buyout in early 1981 set the course for the companys revitalization. It was protection under higher tariffs however, recommended by the International Trade Commission that helped shut Honda out of Harley-Davidsons key market. In response, Japanese manufacturers evaded the tariffs by setting up assembly plants in the United States. Harley-Davidsons resurrection and Hondas sagging sales worked to even the motorcycle market by the early 1990s. † (www. answers.com/topic/motorcycle-dealers) Below is a pie chart that shows the motorcycle industry major players and their market share relative to one another. â€Å" The Big 4 Japanese have 70% of the capital dollars in the motorcycle industry. BMW and H-D combine for another 26%. Everyone else is pretty much a rounding error. At least by this measure these six companies (the Big 4 Japs, BMW, and H-D) utterly dominate the motorcycle market in every way that really matters. † http://www. muddywatersmx. net Industry Trends and Current Events â€Å"Motorcycling remains one of Americas most popular forms of recreation and transportation. The number of people who enjoy motorcycle activities is comparable to the number of people who engage in fishing, golfing, and camping. Because there are many sizes of vehicles available, motorcycling has become a family recreational activity. In addition to providing enjoyment, motorcycles, scooters, and all-terrain vehicles are used in industry in various ways. † (www. answers. com/topic/motorcycle-dealers) â€Å"The retail motorcycle, moped, and all-terrain industry is strongly affected by national economic trends. Recessionary and expansionary trends essentially dictate the retail consumption levels of vehicles. † According to Irwin Broh Associates’s 1998 survey, the average motorcycle rider was a 38-year-old married male with a college education earning $44,250 per year. â€Å"These older, more affluent riders of 1998 could afford heavier, more comfortable, more expensive motorcycles. Also, the ranks of women motorcyclists continued to grow in the 1990s, rising from 6. 4 percent of riders in 1990 to 8. 2 percent in 1998. † (www. answers. com/topic/motorcycle-dealers) â€Å"The growth from exports became a major player for the motorcycle industry in 2000. † The demand by the foreign market was expected to grow well into 2007. The chart below shows the Top Destinations for U. S Motorcycles and Parts Exports by country for 2002 to 2003. The top two major players are Canada and Japan. â€Å"On December 23, 2003, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) enacted the newest set of emission standards for highway motorcycles†¦Beginning in 2006, motorcycle manufacturers would have to reduce emissions of HC and oxides of nitrogen by 60 percent. (www. answers. com/topic/motorcycle-dealers).

Review And Determine The Mcdonalds Strategic Marketing Essay

Review And Determine The Mcdonalds Strategic Marketing Essay LO1) Review and Determine the McDonalds Strategic Aims and Objectives McDonalds is one of the leading global fast food service retailers, with about more than 32,000 restaurants serving more than 60 million people in more than 117 countries each day. McDonalds is well known for some of its much desired food like; Chicken McNuggets, Big Mac and Egg McMuffins all around the globe. McDonalds 75% of its chains are owned and operated by the franchisees all over the world and only 25% of its chains are owned by the company. In 1967 McDonald opened its first international outlet in Canada. Most of the McDonalds outlets are free standing units, other than that it also has many units located at airports and in other retail areas. Since the opening of McDonalds first international outlet in Canada it is known for providing the outstanding quality, quick service, cleanliness and value to its customers (McDonalds, 2011). Current Strategic Aims and Objectives of McDonalds McDonalds has clearly defined its strategic aims and objectives; the vision of McDonalds is to be the leading, quick and the best fast food service provider all over the world. Other objectives of McDonalds are; to maintain and develop the best quality food products in the quick service restaurant market, McDonalds also wants to lead the quick service restaurant market by attracting new customers, opening more profitable restaurants, increasing its sales through promotion that enable them to continue their program of expansion. The McDonalds goal is to maximize its profits, maintain its competitive advantage by constantly creating new products to add onto its menu, which will help to attract new customers and satisfy their existing customers that gives customers a reason to visit McDonalds often (McDonalds, 2011). McDonalds main objective is to be the worlds best quick service restaurant ever experience and for this McDonalds provide outstanding service, quality, cleanliness and value to its customers all around the globe. McDonalds also aim to grasp every opportunity to innovate and lead the industry on behalf of the customers, they also have a passion and feel committed to go beyond their customers expectations every time in every restaurant in order to enhance and protect the McDonalds brand all over the world (McDonalds 2011). An Evaluation of the Component Parts of a Strategic Plan Strategic planning is a very important business activity and it is used to achieve certain goals and objectives. An organization sometimes summarizes its goals and objectives into a mission statement and a vision statement. Vision is basically a long-term view, which outlines what an organization wants to be in the future and also describe how the organization wants the world in which it operates. Vision basically concentrates on the future and provides the decision making criteria to the organization. Whereas mission defines the basic purpose of the existence of an organization, the mission also defines about the desired level of performance needed in order to achieve the organizational aims and objectives (Kotler, 1986). The Vision of McDonalds is to be the best and the leading fast food provider all over the world (McDonalds, 2011). There are five different ways of judging the suitability of an organizational vision; the first one is the foresight which tells whether the vision of an organization is strong enough and realistic and when the vision of McDonalds is evaluated it is clear that it is strong enough as well as realistic. The second way to judge the vision of an organization is the breadth, which tells does the vision of an organization fully cover likely changes in the market place and McDonalds has a capability to change with the environment and make sure that in every country of the world its customers must always get quality products, in quick time, in a clean and pleasant environment and at a reasonable price. Another way to judge the vision is the uniqueness that an organization can capitalize on and surprise its competitors and the uniqueness in the vision of McDonalds is that the tas te and the size of its burgers are same in each outlet all around the globe where it provides its products and services. The fourth way to judge the vision is through consensus, which tells that an organization should have only one vision and the McDonalds has only one and clear vision and that is to be the best and the leading fast food provider all over the world. Lastly through action-ability a vision can be judge which tells whether the vision is ready for implementation or does the organization have core competences. The vision of McDonalds is ready for the implementation and the core competency of McDonalds is providing convenience to its customers when they want to eat fast food at the prices that are competitive and provide best value for the customers money (Hamel and Prahalad, 1994). The mission statement of McDonalds is to be our customers favorite place and way to eat. Their main focus is on being the best fast food provider and for this their worldwide operations has been aligned around a global strategy called a Plan to Win based on the five factors of an exceptional customer experience; People, Product, Price, Place and Promotion (McDonalds, 2011). Just like the vision statement the mission statement of McDonalds can be judge by seeing how far it meets the certain formulations. Firstly McDonalds should have a clear idea in what business they are in and should also do a thorough market research before introducing any new product. Secondly the mission statement should be made from a customer perspective and the mission of McDonalds is clearly defining that they have made their mission statement while keeping their targeted customers in mind. Thirdly an organization must make sure that its mission statement reflects the core values and beliefs of an organizatio n and the McDonalds mission statement is clearly defining that it provides convenience when people need and want to eat good quality fast food at reasonable price in a pleasant environment. The fourth way to assess the mission statement of an organization is to define what sustainable competitive advantage an organization has over its competitors and one of the McDonalds competitive advantages is it focuses on the consistency of the quality, the use of raw materials and the production of food all around the world. Lastly an organization should summarize the strategic approach they would use in order to achieve the strategic aims and objectives of an organization. McDonalds has design certain strategic approaches to achieve its aims and objectives like the utilization of technology, the defined work routines and maintaining the competitive advantage (Lynch, 2006). Factors Affecting the Strategic Plan There are certain factors that affect the McDonalds corporation so much that their role in shaping the strategies cannot be ignored and these factors are; political, economical and social factors. The political factors affect the organization in different ways like the international operations of McDonalds are highly influenced by the individual state policies enforced by each government. For instance different countries focus on different areas of concern like; the worker protection, health and the environment. All these elements are in the control of government and considers when giving a license of the restaurant in different countries (Bateman and Scott, 2004). Different organizations in the fast food industry have their individual concerns involving economic factors. The different branches and the franchises of McDonalds have the tendency to experience difficulties where the economy of certain countries hit by the inflation and the changes in the exchange rate. Therefore, if a franchise operates in a particularly economically weak country, then these franchises must make certain adjustments in their strategies to maintain the economies of scale (Sustar and Sustar, 2005). The social factors also affect the strategies of an organization. McDonalds cater variety of customers with different types of personalities in different countries. McDonalds uses different concepts of consumer behavior like product personality and purchasing decisions of consumers to make proper strategies, so that it can attract new customers and satisfy their existing customers in order to achieve its aims and objectives efficiently (Bateman and Snell, 2004). LO2) Evaluate the Alternative Strategies to meet the desired Future Strategic Position 2.1) A Range of Strategic Analysis tools to Audit Progress towards strategic Aims and Objectives   The marketing audit is very essential for an organization as it provides the backbone strategic analysis that supports corporate decision making process and it also tells the current position of an organization. The SWOT analysis is one of the auditing tools that are use to analyze the internal as well as the external factors of an organization that are favorable and unfavorable to achieve the objectives of an organization (Aaker, 1997). The biggest strength of McDonalds is its large market share, strong brand image and reputation, strong financial performance and position in the food industry, friendly environment for customers and the practice of going green has made it possible for McDonalds to gain more fame all around the world. The weaknesses of McDonalds are it had to face certain legal action because of using trans-fat and beef oil that can negatively affect its brand image, other weaknesses of McDonalds are it offers the variety of junk food which is considered as a very unhealthy food among people and it is also losing its customers due to the increase competition (Peter and Donnelly, 2007). There are certain opportunities as well for McDonalds like; through globalization open more profitable restaurants, it could also make itself more innovative by offering deals that appeal to new customers, and other opportunity is that in the last few decades there is a huge growth in the fast food industry has been observed. Like some opportunities there are certain threats as well that McDonalds faces like; the health professionals accuses McDonalds because of increasing health issues of diabetes, high cholesterol heart attacks and obesity. Another threat for McDonalds is the competitors market share of the company both internationally and domestically (Peter and Donnelly, 2007). 2.2) The Expectations of major Stockholders and their Influence upon the Organizational Strategy The major stockholders like; the top management, customers and suppliers influence the organizational strategies in different ways. So for this the top management should establish a superior strategic decision process throughout the company so that the strategies can evolve and flourish consistently over time. All the strategic preferences that increase the value for both the customers and the share holders are highly desirable and should increase the growth of any organization. For instance, McDonalds rapid withdrawal of its fifty-five cent hamburger campaign, which separated franchises without creating much new customer loyalty or demand, was a costly but necessary decision to avoid further damage to share holder value (Hill and Jones, 2009) The conflict arises when the manager face choices that involve real trade-offs between the customer and the share holder value. Let say if a proposal to increase customers or customer value will reduce the shareholder value, then it should be rejected. For example with increasing awareness about the food and the importance of the balanced diet, if McDonalds would start encouraging people to opt for low calorie food with high fiber content then people might appreciate McDonalds for giving this awareness and people will might change their eating patterns and spend less on fast food. This would be beneficial for customers but not for the shareholders and this would gives rise to conflict that would harm the organizational strategy (Hill and Jones, 2009). Suppliers play a vital role in achieving the organizations aims and objectives and also influence the strategy of an organization and it is believed that suppliers success is an integral to an organizations success (Webster, 2002). So an organization should remember that suppliers cannot be expected to support their plan with an organizations plan unless organizations have shared its strategic plans with suppliers. 2.3) Analyze, Interpret and Produce a Structured Evaluation of the Organizational Strategic Position The challenges that McDonalds faces are; as the food industry is continuously growing the competitors are entering into the market with competitive prices not only internationally but domestically also and due to this McDonalds can lose its customers as well as its market share. The other difficulty that McDonalds is facing is the increasing awareness about the food and the importance of the balanced diet nowadays people are opting for low calorie food and changing their eating patterns by consuming less fast food and this is because there are competitors that provide the low calorie food at the prices almost the same as McDonalds and due to this McDonalds can lose its customers (Freidman, 1999). McDonalds can achieve competitive advantage by using three generic strategies of cost leadership, differentiation and focus. The competitive advantage can be achieved by differentiating the products from those of competitors and McDonalds is differentiated by its brand name and brand images of Big Mac and Ronald McDonald. Another way to achieve competitive advantage from those of competitors is through low costs and McDonalds provides substantial entry barriers from economies of scale and cost advantages which clearly define that McDonalds follow the cost leadership strategy. Organizations can achieve competitive advantage through targeting their products by a broad target, thereby covering most of the market place, or they can focus on a narrow target in the market. McDonalds target market is broad almost covering the most of the market and not focusing a particular market (Porter, 1998) PEST/EL is an analysis of the external macro environment in which a business operates. The operations of McDonalds in each country are highly influenced by the individual country policies enforced by each government and every country has its own political affects on the organization and its operations. The economic factors are also different in different countries that affect the organizations strategies like the different franchises of McDonalds in different countries have to face different problems due to the change in economic environment (McDonalds, 2011). McDonalds run its operations in more than 100 countries which mean it serves variety of consumers with different cultures and personalities. So McDonalds cannot use only one strategy for all its food chains, the strategy might not be completely different but differs with respect to the social environment. The technology has greatly helped McDonalds in providing quick service to its customers. The incorporation of technology in the operations of McDonalds tends to add value to their products. The social responsibilities of McDonalds on the country are influential to the operations of the company and these involve allegations of environmental damage with such claims like the using non-biodegradable substances for their drinks glasses and the Styrofoam coffers for the meals. McDonalds also had to face certain legal actions because of using trans-fat and beef oil and this could easily harm the reputation of the McDonalds all over the world (McDonalds, 2011). LO3) Decide the Strategy and Justify the Selection to meet the Required Future Strategic Position 3.1) Develop a Range of Alternative Strategic Options to meet Strategic Aims and Objectives The fast food industry is often criticized because of its role in creating numerous health problems like obesity, cholesterol and diabetes and was thought to be the driving force for the unhealthy eating disorders. These days customers are becoming more aware of the nutritional values and the health benefits of the products they are consuming. So in order to achieve strategic aims and objectives McDonalds should come up with greater variations in its menu and offer healthier food like sandwiches and salad and innovative fresh juices for the health conscious people. There are many competitors in the industry because of the rapid growth of the fast food industry all over the world and these competitors are offering almost the similar products and services at almost similar prices. So if McDonalds wants to achieve its strategic aims and objectives and wants to attract new customers as well as retain the existing customers then it need to focus more on the strategies that attract more children to their restaurants by offering toys that are most desired among children with a happy meal because this would help them in retaining their customers. McDonalds should also see what similar products the other competitors are offering and try to offer something very innovative product that no other competitor is providing or as well as that attract the customers. McDonalds should also start separate McCafes for teenagers and college going students and the ambience of that cafà © should reflect the different colors of youth. McDonalds should also introduce more variety in the existing range of milk shakes and smoothies and also introduce a variety in coffee and offer innovative high quality and refreshing products at a reasonable price that attracts the young people. 3.2) Determine and Justify the Strategic Option that meets the Revised Strategic Position Among the four strategic options that were given above the first option and that is McDonalds should offer healthier food like sandwiches and salad and innovative fresh juices is the best option for McDonalds to achieve the strategic aims and objectives in the food industry because of the increasing health problems like heart attack, obesity, cholesterol and diabetes. As the awareness about the nutritional values, health benefits and the benefits of low calorie food with high fiber content has increased among people and due to this people have started changing their eating patterns and spend less on junk food that the fast food chains are providing. McDonalds need to introduce a healthier menu that emphasize the healthy side of McDonalds and should also introduce the low calorie variations of all its burgers and make its fries healthier by using the right kind of oil, then do the aggressive promotion of the new menu variety in order to cope with the health concerns related with its products. This would help McDonalds to achieve its strategic aims and objectives efficiently as well as it would proof that McDonalds has the capability to change with the environment and the consumers preferences and lastly this would also enhance the brand image of the McDonalds in the consumers mind.

The Childs Upbringing in Superman and New Snowsuit :: Superman Paula Brown Literature Essays

The Child's Upbringing in Superman and New Snowsuit Narrator aged about ten (5th grade). American. Father seems to be dead (Otto). Uncle Frank a father figure -talks to her in a friendly, understanding way. Family seem comfortably off (linen table cloth, silver). Home a warm, friendly, secure place - goes to it to escape the other children. But war is beginning, so an unsettling time for a child, particularly one whose father is dead and whose uncle (whom she admires and likes - identifies him with Superman) is being drafted into the forces. Mother keeps quite a close eye on her - checks on what the film is that the children are going to see (Snow White) before allowing girl to go. Child imaginative and sensitive - plays imaginative games, vomits after seeing film about Japanese at war and has nightmares afterwards. Seems something of a loner - does not join in games played by big groups at school - instead plays with one 'bookish' boy and another who is an outsider. Invited to Paula's party only because 'it was for all the children in the block'. Paula invites her to play tag only because 'we need someone else' Paula picks on her quite unfairly because she wants someone to blame for her spoilt snowsuit. The other children join in, so girl feels isolated. Feels safe at home but when Mr. Sterling comes to tell about the damage, her mother says, 'Why didn't you tell me that you pushed Paula in the mud?' The girl is not asked what happened first, so feels that her mother is believing the lie without hearing her side of the story. Uncle Frank comes to her room in a friendly, understanding way, but by then the girl is feeling miserable and is unable to say what happened in a natural way. When Uncle Frank says they will pay for a new suit anyway, she probably feels that even he does not believe her. This episode, plus the war and probably her father's death, changed the girl's life for ever - she grew up and the world seemed a gloomier place (final paragraph). Kiss Miss Carol =============== Joli is completely different to the girl in the first story. Although he was born in England, his family are immigrants from Bangladesh. His father does not really fit in - he speaks Bengali to the boy, wears traditional clothing (unlike the children even of some other immigrant families). He has his own religion and village life at home is still so important to him that he sends his elder son home to sort out a dispute. The Child's Upbringing in Superman and New Snowsuit :: Superman Paula Brown Literature Essays The Child's Upbringing in Superman and New Snowsuit Narrator aged about ten (5th grade). American. Father seems to be dead (Otto). Uncle Frank a father figure -talks to her in a friendly, understanding way. Family seem comfortably off (linen table cloth, silver). Home a warm, friendly, secure place - goes to it to escape the other children. But war is beginning, so an unsettling time for a child, particularly one whose father is dead and whose uncle (whom she admires and likes - identifies him with Superman) is being drafted into the forces. Mother keeps quite a close eye on her - checks on what the film is that the children are going to see (Snow White) before allowing girl to go. Child imaginative and sensitive - plays imaginative games, vomits after seeing film about Japanese at war and has nightmares afterwards. Seems something of a loner - does not join in games played by big groups at school - instead plays with one 'bookish' boy and another who is an outsider. Invited to Paula's party only because 'it was for all the children in the block'. Paula invites her to play tag only because 'we need someone else' Paula picks on her quite unfairly because she wants someone to blame for her spoilt snowsuit. The other children join in, so girl feels isolated. Feels safe at home but when Mr. Sterling comes to tell about the damage, her mother says, 'Why didn't you tell me that you pushed Paula in the mud?' The girl is not asked what happened first, so feels that her mother is believing the lie without hearing her side of the story. Uncle Frank comes to her room in a friendly, understanding way, but by then the girl is feeling miserable and is unable to say what happened in a natural way. When Uncle Frank says they will pay for a new suit anyway, she probably feels that even he does not believe her. This episode, plus the war and probably her father's death, changed the girl's life for ever - she grew up and the world seemed a gloomier place (final paragraph). Kiss Miss Carol =============== Joli is completely different to the girl in the first story. Although he was born in England, his family are immigrants from Bangladesh. His father does not really fit in - he speaks Bengali to the boy, wears traditional clothing (unlike the children even of some other immigrant families). He has his own religion and village life at home is still so important to him that he sends his elder son home to sort out a dispute.

Jeanette Wintersons Written on the Body and Caryl Churchills Cloud Ni

Jeanette Winterson's Written on the Body and Caryl Churchill's Cloud Nine In Jeanette Winterson’s Written on the Body and Caryl Churchill’s Cloud Nine differences between male and female roles in society become distinct. Through these differences, an intricate web of male and female characters seems to be woven, and we can see the clarity between gender roles. With the support of Churchill’s Cloud Nine by Jeffrey Barber, â€Å"You see, I am no stranger to love†: Jeanette Winterson and the Extasy of the Word by Celia Shiffer, and â€Å"Body Languages: Scientific and Aesthetic Discourses in Jeanette Winterson’s Written on the Body,† the idea of love and gender roles present in Jeanette Winterson’s Written on the Body and Caryl Churchill’s Cloud Nine become alive, and we see how these characters both form to and break from their assigned roles. The roles of the characters are exemplified by distinct differences between the genders through the presence of love and gender stereotypes, the dominant idea of nature, and the struggle between male and female characters with specific reference to sexual relationships and marriage. Gender stereotypes seem characteristic in both Written on the Body and Cloud Nine. Clearly the women are expected to be submissive, while the men are to be assertive. The first time we see the idea of these gender stereotypes in Cloud Nine is with Edward and his sister Victoria’s doll. Dolls are clearly not toys for boys; they are only for little girls. And so, when Edward is caught playing with the doll, his father and mother show disappointment in him because it is not proper for a boy to play with a doll. Edward gives the doll up unwillingly. The second time Edward is caught playing with the doll Betty says ... ...tinguishable, often seems figures as a condition of being human rather than coded with female specificity† (Shiffer 33). Schiffer draws our attention to a very important concept brought about throughout the two novels; the concept of loss. Love can only be measured by loss, and in Written on the Body the narrator realizes the importance of Louise and the impact she had on her life only after she is gone. However, when Betty leaves Clive in Cloud Nine she realizes all that she can do for herself, which furthermore signifies Clive’s irrelevance to her life. Both of these works explicitly work for and against one another both forming to and breaking from very intricate connections. Through both texts, we can see how each of the characters wants to conform to certain stereotypes, and how ultimately, many of the characters end up breaking from the stereotypes set forth.

Impact of Christianity On The Roman Culture :: essays research papers

Christianity came into the world approximately two thousand years ago. It was persecuted at first, but atually became the offical religion in 381 A.D. "It is the spiritual force that conquered the Roman Empire; one of the decisive elements in the growth of Western civiliztion (Bunson 9). Throughout history Christianity has played a major role in changing our society into what it is today. "Christianity won the professed allegiance of the overwhelming majority of the population of the Roman Empire and even the support of the Roman State (Latourette 65). Not only did Christianity thrive, but it also succeeded in changing the face of Roman culture. Consider the gladiatorial fights. "The huge Coliseum at Rome seated 50 thousand people and was the scene of many bloody gladiatorial combats and even mock naval battles" (Schoder 108). "Hundreds of thousands of slaves shed their blood in the arena in Rome year after year to satisfy the perverted lust of the Roman mob" (Kennedy 148). "Although many Romans descried these blook-letting contests, there persisted a streak of cruelty in Roman public amusements which can scarcely be comprehended, far less condoned, today (81). The message of Christianity helped changed this aspect of Roman life because it gave worth and significance every life (Kennedy 149). Jesus told the multitudes to "love your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10:27) He also told the story of the good summaritan to illistrate that any person he came in contact with was his good neighbor (Luke 10:30-37). Christianities message contains the golden rule "do to others as you you have them do to you" (Luke 6-3)."The child of today is loved and adored. But it was not so in pre-Christian times. The Roman father’s power of his child was absolute. "He could expose it to death; he could scourge it, mutilate it, marry it, divorce it, see it as a slave, or kill it to satisfy his own blood lust." Quintillion, a roman writer, said that to kill a man was often held to be a crime, but to kill one’s own children was sometimes considered a beautiful action (Kennedy 149). The message of Christianity gave value to children. Jeasus said "who ever humbles himself like this child is greatest in my kingdom. If anyone causes these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone around his neck and be drowned in the Sea (Matt 18:4-6).

Similarities and Dissimilarities Between Shelley and Keats

Similarities and dissimilarities Though P. B. Shelley and John Keats were mutual friends, but they have possessed the diversified qualities in their creativity. These two are the great contributors of English Literature, though their lifecycle were very short. Their comparison are also little with each other, while each are very much similar in thoughts, imagination, creation and also their lifetime. 01)  Attitude towards the Nature P. B. Shelley: Whereas older Romantic poets looked at nature as a realm of communion with pure existence and with a truth preceding human experience, the later Romantics looked at nature primarily as a realm of overwhelming beauty and aesthetic pleasure. While Wordsworth and Coleridge often write about nature in itself, Shelley tends to invoke nature as a sort of supreme metaphor for beauty, creativity, and expression. This means that most of Shelley's poems about art rely on metaphors of nature as their means of expression: the West Wind in â€Å"Ode to the West Wind† becomes a symbol of the poetic faculty spreading Shelley's words like leaves among mankind, and the skylark in â€Å"To a Skylark† becomes a symbol of the purest, most joyful, and most inspired creative impulse. The skylark is not a bird, it is a â€Å"poet hidden. † John Keats: Keats’s sentiment of Nature is simpler than that of other romantics. He remains absolutely influenced by the Pantheism of Wordsworth and P. B. Shelley. It was his instinct to love and interpret Nature more for her own sake, and less for the sake of the sympathy which the human mind can read into her with its own workings and aspirations. Keats is the poet of senses, and he loves Nature because of her sensual appeal, her appeal to the sense of sight, the sense of hearing, the sense of smell, the sense of touch. Both men were great lovers of nature, and an abundance of their poetry is filled with  nature  and the mysterious magnificence it holds. Their attitudes towards the Nature are slightly difference. P. B. Shelley treats the natural bjects as the supreme elements of inspiring him. Natural elements are successfully glorified by Shelley. He worships Nature and wants some of power from nature to enrich his poetical power to transmit his message to the people in this older world. On the other hand Keats treats nature as an observer, as a traveler. He finds interest to appreciate the physical beauty of Nature. Both writers happene d to compose poems concerning autumn in the year of 1819, and although the two pieces contain similar traits of the Romantic period, they differ from each other in several ways as well. Keats' poem â€Å"To Autumn† and Shelley's poem â€Å"Ode to the West Wind† both contain potent and  vivacious  words about the season and both include similar metaphors involving autumn. However, the feelings each writer express in their pieces vary greatly from each other, and Keats and Shelley address nature in their poems with  different  intentions as well. Shelley and Keats  exhibit  their genius for rich energized word use within these two poems wonderfully. Also, interesting similarities between the two pieces are some of the metaphors the poets  implement. Hair  is a subject both writers explored as ametaphor  for nature. Shelley, in â€Å"Ode to the West Wind,† claims the wind is â€Å"like the bright hair uplifted from the head/ Of some fierce  Maenad,† while Keats views autumn as â€Å"sitting careless on a granary  floor,/ Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind. † Hair, often used in poetry metaphorically, tends to symbolize feminine beauty and strength; in this case, both poets make use of thesubject  of hair when describing certain aspects of nature. The speakers in these two poems also express their thoughts on theportent  of the coming spring. In the final couplet of Shelley's poem, the speaker asks, â€Å"Oh wind,/ if Winter comes, can Spring be far behind? † The speaker in Keats' poem inquires, â€Å"Where are the songs of spring? Ay, where are they? † Both poets look upon autumn as an  indication  of the coming season which is opposite of autumn. The subjects of seeds and budding plants are also touched upon within the two pieces. Autumn is when, as Shelley writes, â€Å"the winged seeds† are placed in their â€Å"dark wintry bed† and â€Å"lie cold and low. And Keats writes that autumn is the time when the hazel shells are â€Å"plump  with a sweet  kernel; to set budding more. † These similarities between the two pieces are interesting; however there are many differences in the poems as well. Keats and Shelley express different emotions about the fallseason. Shelley looks at autumn as being wild and fierce while Keats has a more gentle view of the season. Shelley perceives a utumn as an annual death, calling it â€Å"Thou  dirge/Of the dying year,† and he uses words such as â€Å"corpse† and  sepulchre† in the poem. He also employs words such as â€Å"hectic† and â€Å"tameless†, and looks upon the autumn horizon as being â€Å"the locks of the approaching  storm. † Also, he claims the autumn winds are where â€Å"black rain and fire and hail will  burst. † Lines such as this reveal the speaker's attitude that autumn is a ferocious and reckless season bearing  morbid  portence of the coming winter. On the other hand, Keats fills his poem with lighter words such as â€Å"mellow,† â€Å"sweet,† â€Å"patient,† and â€Å"soft. The speaker of this poem looks out upon the landscape and hears the â€Å"full-grown lambs loudbleat  from hilly bourn,† and listens as the â€Å"gathering swallows twitter in the skies. † These lines indicate a much softer and moreamiable  emotion felt by the speaker; sentiments quite opposite to those felt in â€Å"Ode to the West Wind. † Another great difference in these poems is the intenti ons of the poets themselves. Shelley, in his thirst for being known, wants to attain power like the wind has. He asks of the wind, â€Å"Be thou, Spirit  fierce,/ My spirit! Be thou me,  impetuous  one! He pleads for it to move his thoughts â€Å"over the universe/ Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth,† and to â€Å"scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth/ Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind. † Shelley's more  ambitiousapproach to the weather differs from Keats, who merely enjoys the season for what it holds and asks nothing from it. Keats thoroughly enjoys the â€Å"stubble-plains with rosy hue,† and listening as â€Å"the red-breast whistles from a garden-croft. † Although both writers examine the autumn season, each express different intentions in the poems they have written. Shelley's â€Å"Ode to the West Wind† and Keats' â€Å"To Autumn† have striking similarities when it comes to their rich metaphors; however, the poems differ in almost every other sense. Shelley holds a much more  savagenotion about the season, while Keats looks upon autumn as being soft and  gentle. Shelley's ambitions are expressed in his piece, while Keats only reflects the beauty of what he sees. Both writers display their own unique talent as poets,  deserving  their titles as being two of the greatest Romantic writers of the period. 02)  Imagination Imagination is one of the striking characteristics of Romantic Poets. P. B. Shelley's poem â€Å"To a Skylark† and John Keats's poem â€Å"Ode to a Nightingale† are both centered on nature in the form of birds. Both poems are classified as Romantic and have certain poetic elements in common, but in addition both poems have differences in style and in theme that differentiate them clearly. Both poets are spurred to react and to write because of their encounter with a bird. Shelley is addressing the bird that excites his interest more directly, while Keats turns to reverie because of the song of the nightingale more than the nightingale itself. In the latter case, the song of the poet has a different tone from the song of the bird–the joy of the bird becomes a contemplative song for the poet. Each poet begins with the reality of the bird or its song and then uses that as a beginning point for aesthetic and philosophic speculation. P. B. Shelley: If the West Wind was Shelley's first convincing attempt to articulate an aesthetic philosophy through metaphors of nature, the skylark is his greatest natural metaphor for pure poetic expression, the â€Å"harmonious madness† of pure inspiration. The skylark's song issues from a state of purified existence, a Wordsworthian notion of complete unity with Heaven through nature; its song is motivated by the joy of that uncomplicated purity of being, and is unmixed with any hint of melancholy or of the bittersweet, as human joy so often is. The skylark's unimpeded song rains down upon the world, surpassing every other beauty, inspiring metaphor and making the speaker believe that the bird is not a mortal bird at all, but a â€Å"Spirit,† a â€Å"sprite,† a â€Å"poet hidden / In the light of thought. â€Å" In that sense, the skylark is almost an exact twin of the bird in Keats's â€Å"Ode to a Nightingale†; both represent pure expression through their songs, and like the skylark, the nightingale â€Å"wast not born for death. † But while the nightingale is a bird of darkness, invisible in the shadowy forest glades, the skylark is a bird of daylight, invisible in the deep bright blue of the sky. The nightingale inspires Keats to feel â€Å"a drowsy numbness† of happiness that is also like pain, and that makes him think of death; the skylark inspires Shelley to feel a frantic, rapturous joy that has no part of pain. To Keats, human joy and sadness are inextricably linked, as he explains at length in the final stanza of the â€Å"Ode on Melancholy. † But the skylark sings free of all human error and complexity, and while listening to his song, the poet feels free of those things, too. Structurally and linguistically, this poem is almost unique among Shelley's works; its strange form of stanza, with four compact lines and one very long line, and its lilting, songlike diction (â€Å"profuse strains of unpremeditated art†) work to create the effect of spontaneous poetic expression flowing musically and naturally from the poet's mind. Structurally, each stanza tends to make a single, quick point about the skylark, or to look at it in a sudden, brief new light; still, the poem does flow, and gradually advances the mini-narrative of the speaker watching the skylark flying higher and higher into the sky, and envying its untrammeled inspiration–which, if he were to capture it in words, would cause the world to listen. John Keats: With â€Å"Ode to a Nightingale,† Keats's speaker begins his fullest and deepest exploration of the themes of creative expression and the mortality of human life. In this ode, the transience of life and the tragedy of old age (â€Å"where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, / Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies†) is set against the eternal renewal of the nightingale's fluid music (â€Å"Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird! â€Å"). The speaker reprises the â€Å"drowsy numbness† he experienced in â€Å"Ode on Indolence,† but where in â€Å"Indolence† that numbness was a sign of disconnection from experience, in â€Å"Nightingale† it is a sign of too full a connection: â€Å"being too happy in thine happiness,† as the speaker tells the nightingale. Hearing the song of the nightingale, the speaker longs to flee the human world and join the bird. His first thought is to reach the bird's state through alcohol–in the second stanza, he longs for a â€Å"draught of vintage† to transport him out of himself. But after his meditation in the third stanza on the transience of life, he rejects the idea of being â€Å"charioted by Bacchus and his pards† (Bacchus was the Roman god of wine and was supposed to have been carried by a chariot pulled by leopards) and chooses instead to embrace, for the first time since he refused to follow the figures in â€Å"Indolence,† â€Å"the viewless wings of Poesy. The rapture of poetic inspiration matches the endless creative rapture of the nightingale's music and lets the speaker, in stanzas five through seven, imagine himself with the bird in the darkened forest. The ecstatic music even encourages the speaker to embrace the idea of dying, of painlessly succumbing to death w hile enraptured by the nightingale's music and never experiencing any further pain or disappointment. But when his meditation causes him to utter the word â€Å"forlorn,† he comes back to himself, recognizing his fancy for what it is–an imagined escape from the inescapable (â€Å"Adieu! he fancy cannot cheat so well / As she is fam'd to do, deceiving elf†). As the nightingale flies away, the intensity of the speaker's experience has left him shaken, unable to remember whether he is awake or asleep. In â€Å"Indolence,† the speaker rejected all artistic effort. In â€Å"Psyche,† he was willing to embrace the creative imagination, but only for its own internal pleasures. But in the nightingale's song, he finds a form of outward expression that translates the work of the imagination into the outside world, and this is the discovery that compels him to embrace Poesy's â€Å"viewless wings† at last. The â€Å"art† of the nightingale is endlessly changeable and renewable; it is music without record, existing only in a perpetual present. As befits his celebration of music, the speaker's language, sensually rich though it is, serves to suppress the sense of sight in favor of the other senses. He can imagine the light of the moon, â€Å"But here there is no light†; he knows he is surrounded by flowers, but he â€Å"cannot see what flowers† are at his feet. This suppression will find its match in â€Å"Ode on a Grecian Urn,† which is in many ways a companion poem to â€Å"Ode to a Nightingale. In the later poem, the speaker will finally confront a created art-object not subject to any of the limitations of time; in â€Å"Nightingale,† he has achieved creative expression and has placed his faith in it, but that expression–the nightingale's song–is spontaneous and without physical manifestation. 03)  Idealism Idealism is the very much common characteristics especially in second generation Romantic Poets. Romantic idealism favored this hermeneutic and phenomenological outlook on life. At this juncture, we want here to address and emphasize the question of the poem’s inspiration by the natural phenomenon, the luminous star. P. B. Shelley: Among the great Romantics whose poetry, in the early nineteenth century, forms one of the most glorious chapters in the whole of English Literature, no one perhaps was inspired by a purer and loftier idealism than P. B. Shelley. Shelley’s is divided by three sub categories:  · Revolutionary Idealism  · Religious Idealism  · Erotic Idealism â€Å"Penetrates and clasps and fills the world† —Epipsychidion â€Å"That Beauty in which all things work and move† —Adonais John Keats: â€Å"The hush of natural objects opens quite To the core: and every secret essence there Reveals the elements of good and fair Making him see, where Learning hath no light. † With regard to Romantic idealism, there are undoubtedly elements here that show Keats’s enthusiasm for nature. Even if Keats’s conception of nature has affinities with spirituality as discerned in the works of Romantics like William Wordsworth (1770–1850), Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) and Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822), the intention of this write-up is not primarily the fullness of spiritual experience in nature. Nature plays a vital role in the understanding of his aesthetic ambitions and achievements. Though there are a number of characteristic features in Keats’s poetry which affiliate with Coleridge and Wordsworth, his nature-consciousness will be seen to take a slightly different turn. Keats’s poetry and prose show proof of certain monistic traits common in the two elder poets, justifying the assertion that he can be discussed within the mainstream of Romantic idealism with regard to nature, even if he does not handle the matter in a like manner. It can be argued equally that his poetry lends credence to apprehend nature from an organics viewpoint. Yet, his eco-poetics, as we intend to analyze, does not place priority on the visionary and transcendental and, therefore, the dominant spiritual dimension of nature is not like that of his elder colleagues, for it tends to reduce nature primarily within the confines of his aesthetic quest rather than brood over it fundamentally as a universal force or the basis of his spiritual longings. 04)  Revolution M. H. Abrams wrote, â€Å"The Romantic period was eminently an age obsessed with fact of violent change†. Especially the second generations Romantic Poets are the pioneer to revolt against society, religion and state. P. B. Shelley: Shelley resembles Byron in his thorough-going revolt against society, but he is totally unlike Byron in several important respects. His first impulse was an unselfish love for his fellow-men, with an aggressive eagerness for martyrdom in their behalf; his nature was unusually, even abnormally, fine and sensitive; and his poetic quality was a delicate and ethereal lyricism unsurpassed in the literature of the world. In both his life and his poetry his visionary reforming zeal and his superb lyric instinct are inextricably intertwined. Shelley was the most politically active of the Romantic poets. While attempting to instigate reform in Ireland in 1812-13, he wrote to William Godwin, author of Political Justice. (Note also Godwin's connections with Wordsworth and Coleridge. ) Shelley's pure idealism led him to take extreme positions, which hurt the feasibility of his attempts at reform. By 1816 he had mostly given up these politics in favor of the study and writing of poetry; his Queen Mab later became popular among the Chartists. The longest-lasting effects of his extreme views were the fact that he met and eloped with William Godwin's brilliant daughter Mary, abandoned his wife, and was eventually forced to leave England. Even far away in Italy, however, he was incensed by the Peterloo massacre and wrote The Mask of Anarchy in response to it. He also turned into an attack on George IV his translation of Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus; or Swellfoot the Tyrant. John Keats: Keats was neither rebel nor Utopian dreamer. As the modern seemed to him to be hard, cold, and prosaic, he habitually sought an imaginative escape from it. Not like Shelley into the future land of promise, but into the past of Greek mythology, as in Endymion, Lamia, and the fragmentary Hyperion. 5)  Symbolism P. B. Shelley: Shelley uses symbolism successfully in his famous sonnet Ozymandias. Nothing, in this world is immortal. Even things that are cast in stone, can be one day undone; that things may fall and crumble there; forgotten one by one. It has been said time after time for as long as most anyone can recall, a small saying that says nothing is cast in stone. This poem is just another example that unlike something cast in stone, nature will always conquer over all despite the way that mankind may think. The poet Percy Bysshe Shelley tells us the same thing in the poem ‘Ozymandias' through both exquisite wording and beautiful imagery. The poem is a genius work about strength and the fall of false greatness, told from the eyes of a traveler who encounters an elderly stranger. In the poem the stranger tells him about the fall of a great kingdom that had thought itself unbeatable by even time. The author uses the image of a statue as a symbol for this kingdom. The image of a broken stone man, which has been beaten down by nature and time plays as an example for many things. The reader learned throughout the poem that not only did time and nature beat this great kingdom, but also they themselves did it during their struggle to be great. The image of two trunkless legs still planted and slowly being covered by the sand is, in a way, exposing how mankind thinks. Men often believe they are unstoppable even by nature and time, often comparing the elements to other men, believing that the best surpasses even their power. In another line the writer refers to the face of the statue, left fallen in the sand, its lips curled in a look of cold and cruel command. This is a play on the way that mankind is by nature. Mankind is a race that spends all it's time rushing about, using commands and war to strive for survival. It is a common belief that he who is strongest will outlive them all. In this poem the writer shows that this is almost always outlived. Weather they are beaten by time, the elements, or themselves, the strongest kingdom will always crumble. The words written on the statues base are said in a beautiful passionate queue, â€Å"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair! In this passage the writer says that the sculptor of this piece knew all to well, that even the strongest army will fall with time, look and despair that man is not eternal. The sculptor leaves a morbid example to all who would wander upon his works to look around and see what has become of greatness. It is, in a way, telling the reader that greatness is short lived, and that nothing is forever. The last lines are a beautiful expression of the fallen city, which lie in the sand about the pieces of the broken statue. Crumbled and dead, the sands stretch on still, holding the vast proof that forever is not so long a time in the eyes of the world and that life will continue on even after the walls have crumbled. It is this poem that sets a perfect example that mankind does not give credit to the strength that comes with time and the forces of nature, and will often put so much time into becoming the best and most powerful that they lose sight on life, becoming nothing more than a fallen king. Perhaps the writer hoped to express a greater understanding of the tragedy of greatness, or even express the value of life over the conquest of power. John Keats: In ‘Ode to a Nightingale’ one can discern the consciousness of the use of nature, symbolized in the bird and its melodious song, not only for poetic composition, but also for advancing the poet’s philosophical speculations. Both bird and song represent natural beauty, the poetic expression of the non-verbal song signaling the harmony of nature. Apart from the ecstasy that the bird’s song generates, the unseen but vivid pictorial description of the surrounding landscape adds to the bliss and serenity of the atmosphere: I cannot see what flowers are at my feet, Nor what soft incense hangs upon the bough, But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet Wherewith the seasonable month endows The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild; White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine; Fast fading violets cover’d up in leaves; And mid-May’s eldest child, The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine, The murmurous haunt of lies on summer eves. (Stanza V, L. 41 – 50) These lines express the splendor of spring while foreshadowing the approach of summer, which will have its own store of nature beauty and luxury. As earlier said, nature here seems to be a springboard for intense speculations in the face of the impermanence and mutability of life which strongly preoccupies the poet. To put it in other words, the song seems to engender a phenomenological process of self-transformation or a psychological metamorphosis that enhances a deep desire for the eternal and unalterable through death. Yet the poet submits to a stoical fortitude, apparently emphasizing the material and sensuous realm of existence rather than the struggle to maintain a permanent and idealistic state. This has often been problematical as imaginative failure, or as a characteristic Keatsian trademark of ambivalence between reality and imaginative illusion. 06)  Melancholy Second generations Romantic Poets were Melancholic according to the bad effect of French Revolution. Their desires did not come true and their endeavor to the Ideal world remained in their dream. So they were very much frustrated and possessed agony to the real world order. P. B. Shelley: He is one of the greatest, successful Melancholic in his age. It is this unsatisfied desire, this almost painful yearning with its recurring disappointment and disillusionment, which is at the root of Shelley’s melancholy. His most famous and powerful lines, reveals the melancholy, are in Ode to the West Wind: Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud! I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud. His melancholy is thus vital to his poetry. It may be said that his music is the product of his genius and his melancholy. His melancholy is what the world seems to like best as: â€Å"Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thoughts. † John Keats: In the poem â€Å"Ode on Melancholy,† Keats takes a sinister look at the human condition. The idea that all human pleasures are susceptible to pain, or do inevitably lead to pain, is a disturbing thought. Keats comments on the miserable power of melancholy, especially how it thrives on what is beatiful and desirable and turns it into its opposite. She dwells with Beauty — Beauty that must die; And joy, whose hand is ever at his lips Bidding adeiu; and aching Pleasure nigh, Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips: Ay, in the very temple of Delight Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine, Though seen of none save him whose strenuous tongue Can burst Joy's grape against his palate fine; His soul shall taste the sadness of her might, And be among her cloudy trophies hung. (ll. 21-30) In this passage, there seems to be an emphasis on lost hope. There seems to be this idea that true happiness is either ephemeral or unreachable. For example, Keats writes above about â€Å"Joy†¦ Bidding adeui† and Pleasure Turning to poison. Keats seems to be saying that happiness is a temptation which people are tragically prone to dream about, an illusion upon which is unrealistic. 07)  Hellenism & Platonism From the Renaissance to the nineteenth century Greece was a primary object of myth-makers' attentions, its history as well as its mythology fodder for the imagination. These two poets were deeply influenced by the Greek literature. Shelley wrote ‘Hellas’, which is the ancient name of Greece. Keats was also influenced by Hellenism, while P. B. Shelley was influenced by Platonism. John Keats: Shelley expressed the opinion that â€Å"Keats was a Greek†. Indeed, Keats was unmistakably a representative of Greek thought, in a sense in which Wordsworth and Coleridge and even Shelley were not. The Greek spirit came to Keats through literature, through sculpture, and through an innate tendency, and it is under Hellenic influence as a rule that he gives of his best. Keats has â€Å"contrived to talk about the gods much as they might have been supposed to speak†. The world of Greek paganism lives again in his verse, with all its frank sensuousness and joy of life, and with all its mysticism. Keats looks back and lives again in the time: When holy were the haunted forest boughs, Holy the air, the water, and the fire. —Ode to Psyche P. B. Shelley: Shelley's Platonic leanings are well known. Plato thought that the supreme power in the universe was the Spirit of beauty. Shelley borrowed this conception from Plato and developed it in his metaphysical poem: Hymn to Intellectual Beauty. Intellectual Beauty is omni potent and man must worship it. The favorite Greek conceit of pre-existence in many earlier lives may frequently be found in other poems besides the â€Å"Prometheus Unbound† quoted in part II of our series. The last stanza of â€Å"†The Cloud,† is Shelly's Platonic symbol of human life: I am the daughter of earth and water And the nursling of the sky I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores I change, but I cannot die. For after the rain when with never a stain The pavilion of heaven is bare And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams Build up the blue dome of air I silently laugh at my own cenotaph And out of the caverns of rain Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again. 08)  Love & Beauty John Keats: Keats is called the poet of beauty or some critics address him as ‘the worshiper of beauty’. Keats’s notion of beauty and truth is highly inclusive. That is, it blends all life’s experiences or apprehensions, negative or positive, into a holistic vision. Art and nature, therefore, are seen as therapeutic in function. Keats was considerably influenced by Spenser and was, like the latter, a passionate lover of beauty in all its forms and manifestation. This passion for beauty constitutes his aestheticism. Beauty, indeed, was his pole-star, beauty in Nature, in woman, and in art. He writes and defines beauty: â€Å"A think of beauty is joy for ever† In John Keats, we have a remarkable contrast both with Byron and Shelley. He knows nothing of Byron’s stormy spirit of antagonism to the existing order of things and he had no sympathy with Shelley’s humanitarian real and passion for reforming the world. But Keats likes and worships beauty. In his Ode on a Grecian Urn, he expresses some powerful lines about his thoughts of beauty. This ode contains the most discussed two lines in all of Keats's poetry: â€Å"Beauty is truth, truth beauty,† – that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. † The exact meaning of those lines is disputed by everyone; no less a critic than TS Eliot considered them a blight upon an otherwise beautiful poem. Scholars have been unable to agree to whom the last thirteen lines of the poem are addressed. Arguments can be made for any of the four most obvious possibilities, -poet to reader, urn to reader, poet to urn, poet to figures on the urn. The issue is further confused by the change in quotation marks between the original manuscript copy of the ode and the 1820 published edition. P. B. Shelley: Shelley expresses love as one of the God-like phenomena in human life and beauty is the intellectual beauty to him. We find the clear idea of Shelley’s love and beauty through Hymn to the Intellectual Beauty. The poem's process is doubly figurative or associative, in that, once the poet abstracts the metaphor of the Spirit from the particulars of natural beauty, he then explains the workings of this Spirit by comparing it back to the very particulars of natural beauty from which it was abstracted in the first place: â€Å"Thy light alone, like mist o'er mountains driven†; â€Å"Love, Hope, and Self-esteem, like clouds depart†¦ This is an inspired technique, for it enables Shelley to illustrate the stunning experience of natural beauty time and again as the poem progresses, but to push the particulars into the background, so that the focus of the poem is always on the Spirit, the abstract intellectual ideal that the speaker claims to serve. Of course Shelley's athe ism is a famous part of his philosophical stance, so it may seem strange that he has written a hymn of any kind. He addresses that strangeness in the third stanza, when he declares that names such as â€Å"Demon, Ghost, and Heaven† are merely the record of attempts by sages to explain the effect of the Spirit of Beauty–but that the effect has never been explained by any â€Å"voice from some sublimer world. † The Spirit of Beauty that the poet worships is not supernatural; it is a part of the world. It is not an independent entity; it is a responsive capability within the poet's own mind. If the â€Å"Hymn to Intellectual Beauty† is not among Shelley's very greatest poems, it is only because its project falls short of the poet's extraordinary powers; simply drawing the abstract ideal of his own experience of beauty and declaring his fidelity to that ideal seems too simple a task for Shelley. His most important statements on natural beauty and on aesthetics will take into account a more complicated idea of his own connection to nature as an expressive artist and a poet, as we shall see in â€Å"To a Skylark† and â€Å"Ode to the West Wind. Nevertheless, the â€Å"Hymn† remains an important poem from the early period of Shelley's maturity. It shows him working to incorporate Wordsworthian ideas of nature, in some ways the most important theme of early Romanticism, into his own poetic project, and, by connecting his idea of beauty to his idea of human religion, making that theme explicitly his own. 09) Diction One of the most distinct attributes of the  Romantic  writers  Percy Bysshe Shelley  and  John Keats  is their gift of using both  lush  and tactile words within their poetry. P. B. Shelley: Shelley uses terza rima in his Ode to the West Wind. Terza rima utilizes three-line stanzas, which combine iambic meter with a propulsive rhyme scheme. Within each stanza, the first and third lines rhyme, the middle line having a different end sound; the end sound of this middle line then rhymes with the first and third lines of the next stanza. The rhyme scheme thus runs aba bcb cdc ded efe, and so forth. Shelley's â€Å"Ode to the West Wind† (1820) instances one of the finest uses of terza rima in an English-language poem: O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou, Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed Each of the seven long stanzas of the â€Å"Hymn to Intellectual Beauty† follows the same, highly regular scheme. Each line has an iambic rhythm; the first four lines of each stanza are written in pentameter, the fifth line in hexameter, the sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, and eleventh lines in tetrameter, and the twelfth line in pentameter. (The syllable pattern for each stanza, then, is 555564444445. Each stanza is rhymed ABBAACCBDDEE. John Keats: Influenced by Greek literature, he applied those Classical characteristics of his poetry; Keats is one of the great word painters in English Literature. â€Å"Ode on a Grecian Urn† follows the same ode-stanza structure as the â€Å"Ode on Melancholy,† though it varies more the rhyme scheme of the last three lines of each stanza. Each of th e five stanzas in â€Å"Grecian Urn† is ten lines long, metered in a relatively precise iambic pentameter, and divided into a two part rhyme scheme, the last three lines of which are variable. The first seven lines of each stanza follow an ABABCDE rhyme scheme, but the second occurrences of the CDE sounds do not follow the same order. In stanza one, lines seven through ten are rhymed DCE; in stanza two, CED; in stanzas three and four, CDE; and in stanza five, DCE, just as in stanza one. As in other odes (especially â€Å"Autumn† and â€Å"Melancholy†), the two-part rhyme scheme (the first part made of AB rhymes, the second of CDE rhymes) creates the sense of a two-part thematic structure as well. The first four lines of each stanza roughly define the subject of the stanza, and the last six roughly explicate or develop it. (As in other odes, this is only a general rule, true of some stanzas more than others; stanzas such as the fifth do not connect rhyme scheme and thematic structure closely at all. ). 10) Their Odes John Keats: The odes explore and develop the same themes, partake of many of the same approaches and images, and, ordered in a certain way, exhibit an unmistakable psychological development. This is not to say that the poems do not stand on their own–they do, magnificently; one of the greatest felicities of the sequence is that it can be entered at any point, viewed wholly or partially from any perspective, and still proves moving and rewarding to read. There has been a great deal of critical debate over how to treat the voices that speak the poems–are they meant to be read as though a single person speaks them all, or did Keats invent a different persona for each ode? There is no right answer to the question, but it is possible that the question itself is wrong: The consciousness at work in each of the odes is unmistakably Keats's own. Of course, the poems are not explicitly autobiographical (it is unlikely that all the events really happened to Keats), but given their sincerity and their shared frame of thematic reference, there is no reason to think that they do not come from the same part of Keats's mind–that is to say, that they are not all told by the same part of Keats's reflected self. In that sense, there is no harm in treating the odes a sequence of utterances told in the same voice. The psychological progress from â€Å"Ode on Indolence† to â€Å"To Autumn† is intimately personal, and a great deal of that intimacy is lost if one begins to imagine that the odes are spoken by a sequence of fictional characters. When you think of â€Å"the speaker† of these poems, think of Keats as he would have imagined himself while writing them. As you trace the speaker's trajectory from the numb drowsiness of â€Å"Indolence† to the quiet wisdom of â€Å"Autumn,† try to hear the voice develop and change under the guidance of Keats's extraordinary language. P. B. Shelley: The wispy, fluid terza rima of â€Å"Ode to the West Wind† finds Shelley taking a long thematic leap beyond the scope of â€Å"Hymn to Intellectual Beauty,† and incorporating his own art into his meditation on beauty and the natural world. Shelley invokes the wind magically, describing its power and its role as both â€Å"destroyer and preserver,† and asks the wind to sweep him out of his torpor â€Å"as a wave, a leaf, a cloud! † In the fifth section, the poet then takes a remarkable turn, transforming the wind into a metaphor for his own art, the expressive capacity that drives â€Å"dead thoughts† like â€Å"withered leaves† over the universe, to â€Å"quicken a new birth†Ã¢â‚¬â€œthat is, to quicken the coming of the spring. Here the spring season is a metaphor for a â€Å"spring† of human consciousness, imagination, liberty, or morality–all the things Shelley hoped his art could help to bring about in the human mind. Shelley asks the wind to be his spirit, and in the same movement he makes it his metaphorical spirit, his poetic faculty, which will play him like a musical instrument, the way the wind strums the leaves of the trees. The thematic implication is significant: whereas the older generation of Romantic poets viewed nature as a source of truth and authentic experience, the younger generation largely viewed nature as a source of beauty and aesthetic experience. In this poem, Shelley explicitly links nature with art by finding powerful natural metaphors with which to express his ideas about the power, import, quality, and ultimate effect of aesthetic expression. Conclusion To an extent, the intensity of feeling emphasized by Romanticism meant that the movement was always associated with youth, and because Byron, Keats, and Shelley died young (and never had the opportunity to sink into conservatism and complacency as Wordsworth did), they have attained iconic status as the representative tragic Romantic artists. Shelley's life and his poetry certainly support such an understanding, but it is important not to indulge in stereotypes to the extent that they obscure a poet's individual character. Shelley's joy, his magnanimity, his faith in humanity, and his optimism are unique among the Romantics; his expression of those feelings makes him one of the early nineteenth century's most significant writers in English. Shelley is regarded as a major English Romantic poet. His foremost works, including Prometheus Unbound, Adonais, The Revolt of Islam, and The Triumph of Life, are recognized as leading expressions of radical thought written during the Romantic age, while his odes and shorter lyrics are often considered among the greatest in the English language. In addition, his essay A Defence of Poetry is highly valued as a statement on the moral importance of poetry and of poets, whom he calls â€Å"the unacknowledged legislators of the world. † While Shelley's significance to English literature is today widely acknowledged, he was one of the most controversial literary figures of the early nineteenth century. Keats was one of the most important figures of early nineteenth-century Romanticism, a movement that espoused the sanctity of emotion and imagination, and privileged the beauty of the natural world. Many of the ideas and themes evident in Keats's great odes are quintessentially Romantic concerns: the beauty of nature, the relation between imagination and creativity, the response of the passions to beauty and suffering, and the transience of human life in time. The sumptuous sensory language in which the odes are written, their idealistic concern for beauty and truth, and their expressive agony in the face of death are all Romantic preoccupations–though at the same time, they are all uniquely Keats's.