Racial Diversity in Society Worksheet Essay Example for Free

Racial Diversity in Society Worksheet Essay Complete the following using the MySocLab Social Explorer Map: Income Inequality by Race (located on the student website) as a reference: †¢Select 1 racial group from the list below: African American Asian American Arab American Hispanic American/Latino White/Caucasian †¢Write a 150- to 300-word summary of the economic, social, and political standings of that group. Use additional resources if necessary, from the University Library or your textbooks. Provide citations for all the sources you use. Hispanic Americans or Latinos in America descend from many different countries such as Mexico, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and The Dominican Republic. They come to the United States as immigrants for a variety of different reasons, but the most common is that they come here in search of the American Dream. From an economic point of view Hispanics remain at the bottom of the job ladders due to the fact that many of them are not educationally equipped and are not fluent in English which are both necessities when it comes to the jobs in demand. Their lack of formal education is what is keeping them down in our nation’s technology run job market. Studies show that less and less Hispanic Americans are finishing high school, and without the skills that education will teach them they will continue to flounder in todays economy. When it comes to social statistics it is overwhelmingly clear that faith and family have and continue to be the cornerstone of the Hispanic American Family values and a huge part of their religious based culture. Politically, due to the fact that the majority of  Hispanic Americans are lower or middle cla ss, they tend to agree with the democratic views when it comes to politics. Part II Answer the following in 50 to 150 words each. Provide citations for all the sources you use. †¢What is racism? In what ways does racism affect diversity? Racism can be defined as the belief that a specific racial group is superior or inferior to another and that there is nothing that any individual who belongs to that racial group does (economically, socially, politically) can change it. Racism affects diversity through outlets such as discrimination and prejudice that we hold against one another due to the fact that our skin is not all the same color. Today, we hear words like that (prejudice and discrimination) and we are quick to object to the accusation that we can still, after all we as a nation have overcome when it comes to touchy subjects like this, be guilty of such negative ways of thinking. However, it is clear that some things clearly have not changed when we look at statistics that show that in American society whites are still hired for high paying jobs in greater numbers than minorities with the same credentials or that minorities still seem to make up the majority of inmate populations in todays prisons. †¢How do racial groups interact in contemporary America? Are interactions positive, negative, or neutral? Support your response using proper citations. Today, it is not uncommon for racial groups to interact with each other in a mostly positive way due to the fact that in most communities we are not separated based on our racial background when it comes to things such as the schools we attend and jobs that we are allowed to hold like we have been in the past. This is thanks to desegregation and affirmative action laws that have been put into action over the past several years. However, even with these laws we are not a perfect nation and there is still cases where social  inequities can allow discrimination and prejudices to rear their ugly heads in today’s society. Social inequities can affect a particular races basic human rights such as the right to live in a certain area, be hired for a certain job, be able to travel freely, acceptance into schools or colleges, and even the right to vote. †¢Are there existing social inequities based on race? Why or why not? Social inequities is one of those touchy subjects that some people say still exist and some people say does not. Like many subjects similar to this one (racism in general, prejudice, and discrimination) people’s views on it can differ tremendously. Some speak from experience and some speak on it based on facts that they are taught. I’ll touch on an example that I previously mentioned to support the argument that yes, social inequities are existent in today’s society. When you look at prisons today, it is clear that minorities make up a much larger chunk of the inmate population than whites. People who argue that social inequities are the cause of this say that this is a result if whites having always been a more protected race in the US and because of this so called protection, they are favored in the justice system and are given more access to better attorneys. People who support the idea that social inequities don’t exist can of course use the argument t hat the reason that minorities make up most of the inmate population is simply because they are the ones who are responsible for committing the crimes that get them in trouble in the first place. †¢What do you believe to be the causes of racial prejudice and discrimination in today’s society? Looking back at our Nation’s history, it’s clear that racism has and continues to be a problem here. However, it’s also clear that he have taken huge steps, which include legal actions, in order to eliminate it. Unfortunately it is not something that can be completely abolished overnight, and we have to have patience in order to keep the movement pressing forward. The awareness that courses such as this one provides are also great tools when it comes to educating more people on the issue, the  causes, and what can be done to keep it from spreading. I believe that the main cause of racial prejudices is the fact that although as a nation (united) we are against it there are still individual people and families amongst us who refuse to stop it in their personal lives and who continue to teach it to their children generation after generation. Racism is something that is taught, as there is now way for it to be passed genetically or inherently. References Braubach, M. (2010, January 4). Social inequities in environmental risks associated with housing and residential location—a review of evidence. Oxford Journals. Retrieved from http://eurpub.oxfordjournals.org/content/20/1/36.abstract?sid=4aa802c1-b338-41e1-b724-eef7ecee7791 Huffman, A. (2012, November 15). How Hispanics Impact Political, Social and Economic Climate. Charisma News. Retrieved from http://www.charismanews.com/us/34581-how-hispanics-impact-political-social-and-economic-climate Schaefer, R. T. (2012). Racial and Ethnic Groups (13th ed.). : Merrill Prentice Hall.

Waste Materials In Construction Sites

Waste Materials In Construction Sites Malaysian construction industry still faces increasing in the generation of construction waste materials and for sure they face problems in the removal of this waste. In the last two decades, huge construction building and infrastructure development projects have led to raise the production of construction waste material. The construction waste has a significant impact on the environment, and its environmental effects are in direct relation to the quality and quantity of the waste it generates. (Begum RA, Siwar C, Pereira JJ, Jaafar AH) In Malaysia, The construction industry generates a lot of waste material that can be reused and recycled. Most of the waste materials go into landfill which is both direct cost to construction, and workers productivity and also has wider environmental implication. Moreover, Malaysia have little reliable statistic of construction and demolition that shows the rate of waste generation, type of waste, method of handling process of wastage, and the quantity of materials wastage minimized at source, reused or recycled on-site or off-site in a specific type of construction such as residential construction. (Haliza B.M 2010) According to (Hassan et al. 1998) which shows that on average, the generation of waste can be breakdown into 36.73% from household waste, 28.34% from industrial and construction waste while other sources (market and commercial waste, institutional waste, landscaping waste and street sweeping waste) account for the remaining 34.93% in the Central and Southern region of Malaysia as shown in Figure 1.1. This figure shows that the waste generated from construction plays a significant role in contributing to the disposed in the landfills. PROBLEM STATEMENT The construction fields produce huge amounts of waste by consuming natural resources (Poon, 2007). Waste in the construction industry includes such delays as time, cost, lack of safety, rework, unnecessary transportation journeys, long distances, improper choice or management of programme or equipments and poor constructability.(Lee. et al.,1999) Wastages affect not only on environment its also bring extra project costs to the contractors and developers. Many countries especially the developed countries have started to aggressively recycle the construction materials due to its many benefits. In Malaysia, there is a huge potential in recycling of construction waste and if implemented correctly; will only bring about a construction resurgence. (Wong X. W. 2010) It is then obvious that waste management should be implemented. Reducing, reusing and recycling appear to be profitable alternatives that will increase the lifetime of landfills and reduce exploration of natural resources. (Woolley, 2000) Most importantly, our environment will not face more deterioration. In addition to the environmental benefits in reducing the demand on land for disposing the waste, the recycling of construction wastes, can also help to conserve natural materials and to reduce the cost of waste treatment prior to disposal (Poon, 2002). Despite the efficiency and expertise of the builders in the use of the material there is an increase in the cost of disposal of demolition waste, which requires the need to develop an effective plan for waste management options using the reduction and recycling. Contractors, developers, architects and engineers should have knowledge about how to deal with construction waste materials by reducing, reusing and recycling. Also the governmental authority must play a role by introducing suitable legislation to implement the law and follow up on all offenders who do not follow the laws. With the expansion of urban areas, all relevant parties must make sure that waste materials are minimized and there is a full execution of recycling, waste materials to guide the construction industry in the right direction. (Mohd.N. 2010) OBJECTIVE OF RESEARCH To identify the types of waste materials in construction site To determine approach being use at construction site to reduce waste materials. To give recommendation on reduce, reuse, and recycle of construction waste materials. SCOPE OF STUDY The study covers area of Selangor at Malaysia. SIGNIFICANT OF STUDY Construction industry has an important impact on the environmental in term of unbalanced ecology, change of living environment, potential sewage, and depletion of natural resources, energy usage and production of waste. This study will generally talk about reduction materials wastage issues in construction field. Reduce the material wastage in construction is approved in applying reuse, recycling and reduce the building materials in construction activities. This thesis reviews the technology on construction waste recycling and their viability. CHAPTER II LITRATURE REVIEW INRODUCTION On this chapter, definition, classifications, advantages of reduce waste construction materials and reasons that lead to waste the materials. Investigate or study the related information about this case in from literature information will be definitely implemented in the Methodology. Literature reviews is very important in the research works and consider as foundation for any study which depend on the information of previous researches that has been carried out on the related subject. It provides further knowledge about the scope of research. DEFINITION Construction waste material can be defined as the difference between the value of materials delivered and accepted on site and those properly used as specified and accurately measured in the work, after deducting the cost saving of substituted materials transferred elsewhere, in which unnecessary cost and time may be incurred by materials wastage. Construction waste is any material where there holder has an intention to discard the material as no longer part of the normal commercial cycle or chain of utility. (Ferguson, 1995). According to The environmental protection Act 1990 (EPA 90) Section 75 defines waste as any materials which formalizes remains substances or streaming or other unnecessary surplus substance coming from the application of any process: and any material which involves to be disposed of as being damaged, run down, spoiled, or contaminated, but does not contain any material that is an explosive within the meaning of the explosives Act 1875; or Any substances that are unwanted and ignored or on other hand deal with as if the materials were waste shall be supposed to be waste unless the contrary is proved. (PING, OMRAN, PAKIR, 2009) The waste building materials, packaging, and rubble resulting from construction, remodelling, repair, and demolition operations on pavements, houses, commercial buildings, and other structures. (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) Waste is defined as the by-product generated and removed from construction, renovation and demolition workplaces or sites of building and civil engineering structure. (Cheung, 1993) Waste is defined as any material by-product of human and industry activity has no residual value. (Serpell and Alarcon, 1998) Construction materials wastage is unused materials (such as blocks, bricks, concrete, glass, plastics, steel, wood and soil generated by new building construction, renovation, or pulling down of existing construction. The World Book Dictionary defines waste as useless or worthless material; stuff to be thrown away. MAJOR TYPES OF WASTE MATERIALS According to the Environment Protection Department (EPD) (Chung, 2000) .The additional wastages require more time and extra resources for removal which might delay the building operations. The most important sources of construction material waste containing such as: 1. Concrete/cement. 2. Steel/reinforcement. 3. Brick/block. 4. Plastic/PVC 5. Glass 5. Timber/formwork. 6. Screw/bolt/nail. 7. Tile, ceramic tile 8. Non-ferrous metal aluminium CONCRETE Generally, the usage of concrete is mostly for substructure and superstructure of buildings wastage is largely caused from the mismatch between the amount of concrete required and that ordered from suppliers in the case of ready mix concrete supply. The service provider might not be familiar with the exact quantity due to improper management planning, leading to over-ordering. Wastage is also happened because the delays and needless waste handling processes. STEEL REINFORCEMENT As known steel bars are considered one of the most materials being used in construction site. Wastage of steel mainly resulted from cutting. Also wastage might be happen due to damages during storage and rusting. Pre-bending in the manufacturing works can eliminate cutting waste. TIMBER While timber is one of the main materials using for formwork wastage usually happen because the continuous or bad usage and as well as the over cutting. Timber usually dumped after use to do form work. Timber cannot resist termites and can easily break. So it is not suitable for long-term usage. Old timber also usually ends up in the trash and cannot be recycled. BRICK AND BLOCK Because the common usage of bricks and blocks in construction as walling and for partition. Wastage usually caused due to the improper cutting and careless of handling material. Improper handling might raise wastage of brick and blocks damage because of the breakable nature of the materials. Bricks remained on site without usage will end up in the trash skip in the end. PLASTIC/PVC Plastic wastage normally resulted from the cutting during piping work. Also plastic wastes happen due the inappropriate storage which throws it on site without considering its bad weakness and durability. PVC or plastic will melt if it direct contact with heat. Plastic also cannot resist chemical reactions. SCREW/BOLT/NAIL/ TILE The usage of those items usually being as connection. For sure they are used with large quantity which easily damaged due to the carelessness of the workers. Throwing screws or nails by workers lead to increase the wastage of them. Also wastage of tiles commonly happens during cutting. BENEFITS OF CONSTRUCTION WASTE REDUCTION Minimizing the total costs of the project throughout avoided removal costs, averted buying new materials, and revenue profit from materials sale due to reusing of materials onsite. Helps societies, construction companies, and construction owners comply with state and local policies, such as disposal bans and recycling goals. Promote general image of construction companies which minimize waste disposal. (Zhang, 2008) Reduce the environmental impact of the waste. Cleaner and safer construction site. Conserves space in existing landfills. Additional costs are avoided by diverting waste from landfills. CAUSES OF WASTE MATERIALS GENERATION According to Ekanayake who has discuss the causes of construction waste material he said that there are many factors lead to construction waste at site and he specified that the most important are ordered the common sources of construction waste under six categories: (1) design; (2) procurement; (3) handling of materials; (4) operation; (5) residual related; and (6) others. Furthermore those sources of waste materials probably happen during main phases of the project life cycle, (1) design, (2) operational, (3) material handling and, (4) procurement. (Ekanayake) Design Carelessness to dimension skills of some materials Design changes during construction progress. Lack of experience of designers and project managers in scheduling works. Lack of attention paid to standard sizes available on the market Designers familiarity with alternative products Complication of reading drawings details Lack of information in the drawings Errors in contract documents No completed contract documents at the beginning of project low quality materials selection Procurement Suppliers and workers errors Accidents coming from carelessness of labors Damage to work done caused by subsequent trades Use of wrong materials, which need replacement Failure to reach the required quantity before work from quantity surveyors. Late passing of information to responsible person on types and sizes of materials to be used Equipment broken and rainy weather Handling materials Damage happens due to the transportation process Unsuitable storage for materials caused damages to them Materials supplied in loose form Bad construction site layout where materials close to working place Misunderstanding between teamwork and workers Theft Operations Ordering errors Lack of possibilities to order small quantities Buy materials which can not be comply with specification CONSTRUCTION WASTE REDUCTION Construction Waste Reduction has been defined by the UK Environment Agency (1997) as reducing construction waste by protective measures (prevent, reduce at source, and reuse of wasted materials) and waste management measures (quality improvement, and recycling). Similarly, Envirowise (1998) defined Construction Waste Reduction as the process of systematic waste reduction at source, by preventing and reducing waste before its physical generation, and encouraging reuse, recycling and recovery. Therefore, according to (Riemer and Kristoffersen 1999) reducing waste materials is a process of avoidance, eliminate or decrease the waste on sources or allow reuse and recycling process of waste materials for such purposes in construction field. Waste reduction hierarchy has been addressing (reduce) as one of the highest main concern for decreasing the amounts of waste. The crucial objective of the strategy of waste reduction is to avoid or eliminate it from the outset, at the beginning stage phase of the project. (Andy, Andrew and Simon) Waste reduction is achieved through the application of a Waste Reduction Hierarchy which is applied from design through to disposal, as detailed below:- 1. Reduce. Avoidance of unnecessary consumption of materials at the concept and design stage of procurement; 2. Reuse. Reuse requires the design and utilization of re-useable containers and materials without subjecting the item to a manufacturing process that changes its original configuration and composition (e.g. reusable packaging and pallets for storage); 3. Recycle. Product recycling requires the raw material to be recovered and used to manufacture another product; 4. Disposal. Disposal of waste to landfill is the least acceptable form of waste management, and is to be regarded as the option of last resort. REDUCE In the past, waste reduction strategies have taken many forms, but the main purpose has remained the cornerstone of most waste reduction strategies which is to find out the maximum practical benefits from waste materials and to produce the minimum amount of waste. The understanding of what construction materials need to buy is the most first and important part in waste reduction, then monitoring materials usage, and after that find ways to avoidance, reduce, reuse, then recycle the wasted materials. A good strategy is to target the major component in the waste material stream, and put into practice the easy waste reduction steps first. Below are some ideas to help you identify waste reduction opportunities:- Buy pre-cut materials like foam boards and floor trusses to minimize waste. Re-utilize wasted substances like siding, inside trim, door, and framework for wood, hardwood floors, and bath fitting. Planning for usage 4 x 8 panels and standard timber lengths; plan to create functional usage of standard lengths of heating tube material, metal pipes, wiring, siding, and gutters. Find out new developed methods that can decrease and make usage of materials more economically and efficiently. Consult trade publication, construction companies, and local organizations for information on resource efficient building designs and techniques. Choose design which allow and give opportunity to dismantling all parts of the structure as an alternative choice instead of the demolition, which might save building materials for recover them to be useful source of materials for volunteer organizations. Work with famous designers, contractors, and suppliers those who have good characters in usage of resource-efficient design and building. Select to expand long period of new or existing buildings. Choosing the best quality, more durable substances extend the life of the building structure and giving easier remodelling, protection, or renovation. Usage of elegant design characteristics from architect and designers might be useful for minimization of building wastage and enhance the productivity due to the genius designation like multi-purpose rooms, encouraging smaller footprints, and choosing construction materials which friendly to environment and energy efficient. Construction companies also might use cutting and advanced framing techniques to minimize building wastage, this method may produce few waste, and holding over surplus to the next construction site or donating by them to the volunteer organization. REUSE Separation of the materials is the most important thing in reuse wasted materials also separation should be separated in good condition to keep materials durability. A majority of these materials are durable and therefore, have a high potential of reuse. It would, however, be desirable to have quality standards for the recycled materials. There are many materials might recovered from construction sites waste and they can be sold, donated, stored for later use, or reused on the current project. Some materials are convenient for reuse such as doors, cabinets, windows, carpet, brick, light fixtures, ceiling and floor tiles, wood, HVAC equipment, and decorative items (including fireplaces and stonework). Construction waste can be used in the following manner: Reuse on site of blocks, stone slabs, timber, piping railings etc. Sale material that cant used again on site through design restraint or design changes. Recycle materials such as plastics, broken glass, scrap metal etc. Use materials like broken block or brick, plaster concrete pieces etc. in other application at the construction. For ex. levelling, cavity under coat of paths where the passage not required of heavy moving loads. Big pieces and unused parts can be sent to lower areas to fill them. Soft materials might be used as can be used as cover material over sanitary landfill, like sand, dust etc. RECYCLING There are some materials can be directly recycled onsite into new construction or offsite at a construction and demolition processor. Typical materials recycled from construction sites contain metal, timber, asphalt, pavement, and concrete pieces, roof materials, corrugated cardboard and wallboard. Most of the construction wastages throw out to landfill. There are many opportunities for the construction companies to reduce that in order to extend the life period of landfill sites, decrease transportation requirements and reduce the primary resource requirements. DISPOSAL Landfilling is the main method of disposal of all solid wastes including the construction waste materials in most of countries. Landfilling is not capital intensive and does not require skilled labour unlike compositing or incineration. MATERIALS CAN BE RECYCLING Recycling of construction materials has been recommended from many researchers in their studies and companies work in that field but the factual administering of construction and demolition waste recycling is limited to a few types of solid wastes. According to (Mindess et al., 2003): who thought that economy, compatibility with other materials and material properties should be taken into account when considering recycle materials. He justified that recycling can be only useful when the recycled product is economical compared to the natural resource in cost and quality. He added recycled materials will be preferable in areas where less raw materials and land filling sites exists. It investigates the technology on construction waste recycling and their viability. In addition, (Mindess, 2003) has been mentioned to materials recycling practice had been studies such as concrete, plastic, brick, ferrous and non-ferrous metal, masonry, glass and timber. CONCRETE In fact, concrete is the most materials being wasted during construction and demolition. According to (Emily, 2010), manufacturers produce more the 25 billion tonnes of concrete per year. Large quantities of concrete waste during tear down/building new construction therefore concrete need to recycle. It is an easy way to recycle concrete. The most important thing is to sort concrete and remove the steel rebar then after sorting concrete go through out crush machine to grind them forming very small pieces as sand or aggregates. Crushing can be made on site to reuse at the same time. BRICK Bricks wastage coming from construction site might be polluted with mortar, rendering and plaster, and usually they being blinded with another materials such as wood and concrete. But there are difficulties being faced in the separation of bricks which usually need to be separated and sorting by hand. There are small percentage around 10 to 15% of bricks from damaged buildings are facing bricks, therefore they need manpower and it might be expensive to sort and clean bricks. Therefore contaminated bricks are not economical to be used because that will be more costing than natural bricks. In 2004, Japanese building site had been burning the destroyed bricks into slime burnt ash. And, in recent year, bricks are commonly be crushed to form filling materials and hardcore in Hong Kong. STEEL Preferably, it is better to reuse steel wastage directly on site. If the direct usage is not possible, then it can be fuse to manufacture new steel. According to (Coventry, 1999) there is more than 80% of the steel wastage coming from construction fields being recycled into new materials in the Netherlands, despite the fact that almost 100% may be claimed to be recyclable. Steel organization reports that roughly 100% steel reinforcement is made from recycled scrap and 25% steel sections are made from recycled scrap. Scrap steel is almost completely recycled and allowed repeated recycling. Also in Japan, they recycles construction steel such as steel reinforcement and rebar due to fabricated steel or cut to resize off-site with the cutting waste, 100% of steel waste might be recycled to keep away from wastage at construction site. GLASS According to (Coventry, 1999), in UK, 425,000 tonnes of glass has been recycled. However, the recycling rate is fairly low in Hong Kong 1% comparing with countries such as USA, Japan and Germany which their rates are 20, 78 and 85%, respectively. Glass can be reused in the construction industry for a number of applications: (i) Window: (Coventry, 1999) thought that window glass might be reusing on construction that will be depend on how they deal with glass handling, storage, transportation from/to construction site, and the quality. (ii) Glass fibre: for material properties improvement, glass can be recycled in the manufacture of glass fibre using long easy process starting from collecting the waste to recycle pin then transported to treatment plant, the glass then should be sorted according to its colour and type and washed to clean it from any impurities after that glass crushed and melted then moulded into new product. Glass can be used in thermal and acoustic insulations, which can be mixed with strengthen cement, gypsum or resin products. (iii) Filling material: they had practiced recycling for glass in UK as a fine material for cement replacement called ConGlassCrete that support the strength of concrete. (iv) Tile: in US 100% replacement of recycled glass that gives good-looking reflective appearance on the exterior after burnishing. (v) Paving block: in United State they created aggregate from recycled glass by crushing. Also in Hong Kong, they are developing this recycling technology, which can produce advantages such as promote good-looking reflective appearance on the exterior after burnishing, minimize water absorption of concrete block and provide good compressive strength. However, the problems on instability, sharpness of aggregate and alkali-silica reaction expansion need to be resolved. By adopting pulverized fly ash for depressant in alkali-silica reaction and reduce the impurities are necessary in improving the quality of paving block adopting recycled glass aggregate. (vi) Asphalt in road: 15% of old glass had been recycled forming asphalt in Taiwan. Furthermore glass needed to grind to very soft materials replacing asphalt (vii) Aggregate in road: also in US material called glassphalt has been made from crushed glass and used as an aggregate in bituminous concrete pavement. (viii) Man-made soil: Japan practices adopted waste glass as ultra-fine particles at high temperature. MASONRY Masonry waste usually crushing as recycled to become masonry aggregate. So after grinding till become masonry aggregate will be such thermal insulating for concrete. it can also help concrete to be more strength with comfortable thermal insulation, masonry waste can be used after recycled for traditional clay bricks (i) Crushing recycle masonry aggregate till be as ash then will be replacement for clay in brick including sand sodium silicate brick. (ii) Using masonry aggregate in traditional clay brick in this case it prefers to avoid any contain of any element that will prevent effects on durability and strength of clay brick. (iii) In case of sing masonry in sodium silicate brick it might contains some of elements like lime but have to be under pressure of 15 bars to create sodium silicate bricks. NON-FERROUS METAL The major non-ferrous metal materials gathered from construction sites are aluminium, copper, lead and zinc (Coventry, 1999). Furthermore after separations and sorting of those materials, they can be sold directly to the scrap metal traders for recycling or directly to end-user by melting. In UK, the usage of aluminium is up to 95,000 tonnes with about 70% recycled in 1997,recycling of copper is up to 119,000 tonnes out of a national market of 262,000 tonnes used (100% recycling rate can be achieved). While paper and cardboard form approximately 37% of construction wastes by volume (EPD, 2002). Recycling companies usually reprocess them as paper product by purification. PLASTIC In fact, it is very hard to recycle plastics wastages if they are blended with other plastic or impure materials but according to (Hendriks and Pietersen, 2000) great possibility to reuse materials such as polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), polystyrene (PS) and Polyvinylchloride (PVC) especially if they being gathered properly segregate and spotless. Because of the damages in some of the characteristic of the old plastic the possibilities of high level recycle will be definitely restricted. Virgin material should include in recycling. The recycled materials are utilized for the manufacturing of new plastic includes 70% recycled material; 30% virgin material is utilized for securing sufficient ultra violet (UV) resistance in the Netherlands. Furthermore it might be probable to develop this substitute ratio up to 80 or 90% in the coming years. According to (Coventry, 1999) there are many major chances to address when considering the recycling of plastic such as:- (i) Panel: in 1992 roofing panels have been started due to the recycling of diaphanous PVC. Because of the impurity and the consolidation, the recycling materials have less quality than new roofing component, so that should be applied for only the inferior face. This panel must be transformed to powder using cryogenic milling. Then powder should mingle with plasticizers and also mix up with other materials to produce new panel. (ii) Plastic might be street furniture, roof and floor, piling, PVC window, noise barrier, cable ducting and pipe, cladding and insulation foam through recycling and redesign for usage. (iii) there are new methods has been developed to allow construction materials to be with time infused with recycled plastic ingredient in order to increase strength, durability and impact resistance, and improve appearance. TIMBER The wastage of wood from building site operations is generated in huge amount all over the world. According to (Coventry, 1999) he mentioned to that the wastage of timber generated in UK is more than 2.5 tonnes per year. For sure, wastage of wood has possibilities to be recycled after collection for some purpose such as: (i) Timber wastage coming from building activity might be utilized directly for reusing in any applications in construction projects but before reusing need to clean the from nails and resize the them to the proper way. Furthermore unspoiled timber should be reused as board, beams, doors, floorboard, roof beam, balcony ramparts, partitions, and pile. In Japan they already developed wood waste into new technology turning them to furniture, shoring wooden pile for relocate pine trees, wood bench and timber stair. (ii) A special lightweight concrete might be formed from aggregate made from recycled small wooden pieces. (iii) According to (Hendriks and Pietersen, 2000) in Japan wood waste might be recycled as energy sources, for Ex. fuel, charcoal for power generation. Also there are more than 400,000 tonnes of wood from building activities are produced in Netherland. (iv) wood pieces wastage throwing from building activities might be recycled and reused as new building materials as partitions, board for roof, ceiling and floor, cladding in agricultural building, advertisement panels, a packaging substitute, wall and sound barrier. (v) Paper, In Japan, they recycled timber producing board and mulching. Besides that wastage of wood might be mixed with topsoil to improve soil texture and coated with plastic to produce material called plastic lumber. (vi) Clipped timber is recycled by spraying them onto sloped soil surface in Japan, which is called geofibre. (vii) Timber waste can be recycled to create insulation board, kitchen tool and furniture from the chipped timber under pressure at around 180 Ã ¢-Â ¦C for 40 min with

Importance Of Sound In Movies Film Studies Essay

Importance Of Sound In Movies Film Studies Essay As we know, the film sound design is divided into two main categories. The first is sound effects design, mostly non-musicals. The second is film scores composing, in other words, the background music that is written specifically along with a film, mostly musicals. Film score ought to contain cue tracks. Each track is an individual piece, which will typically be a composition from instruments. Nowadays, a growing number of film scores include a mixture of orchestral and electronic instruments. The notion of a point of audition can have two meanings: 1. A spatial sense: from where do I hear, from what point in the space represented on the screen or on the soundtrack? 2. A subjective sense: which character, at a given moment of the story, is hearing what I hear? (Chion, 1994) Sound is indexical in our natural way of listening. Sound conveys time information more accurately than visuals. When sound occurs, an event of material interaction is taking place. Sound fertilises and enhances the visual landscape, makes us able to make an outline of information about the source as well as the cause. In short words, sound reflects the physical reality of the scene, immerses the listener into the world, which makes the environment comes alive. What is important to the audience is to know what produces the sound and where it comes from. Diegetic sound is sound whose apparent source is in the space-time continuum of the scene onscreen. Diegetic sound is sound that the film leads us to believe the characters can hear. (Chion, 2009) For indicating the materiality of the sound source more accurately, the dimensions and distances more precisely, sound effects design has more to be considered. While some sound effects are recorded while they are produced, most of them are added or created afterwards. Production mixers normally ask that all action cease for a few moments on each location so that they may record the continuous background ambient sound in that space, such as water lapping on shore. Editors will later have to reinsert ambience under dialogue and effects created during postproduction for continuity with production sound. Sounds from disparate sources must be adjusted with tools like equalisers and filters to match and flow seamlessly. Choices of characteristics imparted to the sound in reverberation, pacing, timbre, volume, and mixing of sounds with each other may not only decide our sense of the physical reality of the space, but also suggest a number of feelings, such as loneliness, joys, paranoia and so on. Reverberation is an essential tool for placing a sound in a space to indicate how far we are from a sounds source. You can clarify an element of the plot with sound, or you can make things more ambiguous, which is often what you want to do. In such close-ups of sound we must be careful, however, to bear in mind the specific nature of sound which never permits sound to be isolated from its acoustic environment as a close-up shot can be isolated from its surroundings. Music played in a restaurant cannot be completely cut out if a special close-up of say two people softly talking together in a corner is to be shown. The band may not always be seen in the picture, but it will always be heard. The close- ­up will contain the whole acoustic atmosphere of the restaurant space. Thus we will hear not only the people talking, we will also hear in what relation their talking is to the sounds all round them. We will be able to place it in its acoustic environment. (Weis, 1985) Sound can heighten realism or it can diminish it. Sound can draw attention to a detail or draw attention away from it. (Sider, 2003) The microphone is not as selective. The sound designers have to eliminate that unintended cacophony from global for audience. The camera shoots directly at a ticking clock, we may hear the ticking. But a few seconds after the character looks away, the ticking will be gradually dropped out. Inception is a film that tells a story about inception of idea in dream. The movie itself is a mind altering brainstorm and an intelligent experience. It implants much plot clue using a very good sound design. In fact, it is also a successful aural inception. This is a going through of all the interesting technical points in this film. The thing that differs Inception from the other film is the simultaneous hierarchy architecture. It is common in this film that multilayers of sound happen at the same time in the movie. And in different levels of dream, the audience get different pace of sound. You can tell somebody what part of the world they are in, depending on what kinds of sound you play. The basic timeline and plot are based on dream within a dream. Even if the characters are in dreams, we expect them to follow the laws of physics. The very use of sound in this film is that the sound is used for connecting the different layers of dreaming. The song used for the musical countdown to make the dreaming characters aware of the impending kick is Non, Je ne Regrette Rien by Edith Piaf. There are 3 versions of Non, Je ne Regrette Rien, which are the original, the slowed version and the super-slowed version. When time is shifting between the dreams, the original Non, Je ne Regrette Rien is slowing down and being cross-faded with Zimmers score. When the musical countdown is heard down a level from its origin, its slowed down by 300%, and when it passes down another level, it slows by 300% again. By slowing down Non, Je ne Regrette Rien by 300%, the sound becomes very similar to the slow horns in Half Remembered Dream at the beginning of the film. When Cobb and Ariadne descend into limbo, without any headphones on to re-adjust the tempo of the music, that same score is heard slowed down by 300%. As Cobb and Ariadne wash up on the shores of Cobbs subconscious, the loudest and most drawn-out horn section of the entire soundtrack takes place in the end of the score 528491. The audience is not the only part involved hearing the slowed score, but so are the characters in the film. Many different films have made use of first person perspectives. It is just like experiencing life from the  first  person  point of view of  Malkovich in the movie Being John Malkovich  (1999). The first-person aural perspective has an immense impact on viewing film. The first person perspectives will surely make the audience feel in the characters way. The audience hears what exactly the characters hear. Since the characters can hear the music with us, the score itself is a hint at what layer of a dream we are viewing. Knowing this, it becomes possible to distinguish between dream and reality by merely hearing the music. The fact that score never dips into the slow droning in the reality level is a pretty good proof that the top level in the movie is indeed reality. The better-defined film sound became in the high frequency range, the more it induced a rapid perception of what was onscreen. This film has a very good dynamic frequency range. As for low frequency, there is the shaking of the building and the thunder sound. As for high frequency, there is water lapping and the gun shot recording. Mysterious electronic sound at the beginning implies that it is going to be a very unusual film. The water lapping and waves sound on shore goes from right to left according to the water flowing on screen. It can be a live record, but more probably is reinserted when post production. We Built Our Own World begins when Cobb is lying on the shore. It provides a strong sense of desolation when Cobb is looking at his children, which means he is not in the reality. The sound of spinning top is much louder than it should be because the filmmaker wants us to focus on the spinning top but not anything else. Then the spinning sound gradually fades out after switching views. Recording the background voices in a restaurant where Cobb was having a meal with Saito was a clever way of delivering the idea that they were in a very big building. We can hear low-frequency noise which sounds like the ground that is shaking at the same time. And then it gets louder and louder. All the above information that sound conveys is a clue that they are actually in dreams and lay the groundwork for the building collapse soon after that. Later the audience can hear the shaking sound of the tables and the glasses very clearly. Then the ticking sound of the clock goes faster and faster, which means we are travelling from dream to reality. Without sound, the audience do not even know what is going on. Sound inevitably carries much useful information in this collapsing scene indeed. The audience can hear background riot voices when there is only inside-house shots taking on, which means these background voices come from the riot people outside. Then we hear a simulated explosion sound which makes us feel we are in the scene. When Cobb is talking with Mal, we can hear ambience sound of water lapping sound again while we cannot see the shore, which means the shore is right beside the building. One Simple Idea takes place when Cobb is trying to steal an idea from Saito in dream. That is obviously a working theme that calms the audience down and tells the audience that Cobb is in the process of doing something important. Sound designer should record the building collapsing sound or simulate it in post-production in order to immense the audience into a surround atmosphere of danger. The background music Dream Is Collapsing is a magnificent piece that we can feel the dream is in the process of collapsing. In the gun shot scene, we cannot see the bullet or the fire light but we can hear very loud gunshot so that we know they are firing at each other. When Cobb is falling into water, it seems that we can hear what Cobb is hearing. Because Cobb is dreaming, so actually he is in two layers of world. In the upper layer dream, we here the water bubble sound when Cobb is drowning into water and water is running into his ears, thus causing a reverberation. But in the dream within a dream, the water is crushing into the building from everywhere, and then we should hear a sound like massive water drop on the ground, which is very similar to waterfall sound. When the scene goes back to drowning Cobb, we hear a pulse with its frequency getting faster and faster, which means he is crossing one dream layer up. We can hear the sound of a moving train when we see the characters are sleeping and dreaming together, which means in reality they are actually dreaming in a moving train. The sound designer perfectly builds up three layers of world using sound as a clue to the audience, but it is hard for the audience to notice these little clues. Anyway the sound clue will become clear when the audience watch the film a second time. When the dreaming character listens to the music on headphone, the audiences hear Non, Je ne Regrette Rien as if they are the dreaming character. Again there are two layers of sound at the same time. In the dream layer, the character can only hear a highly filtered version of Non, Je ne Regrette Rien in a low voice as if someone is whispering beside the ears. Sound images are often used in the film for the purpose of creating an atmosphere. Just as the film can show visual landscapes, so it can show acoustic landscapes. (Weis, 1985) Sound can describe an acoustic space. (Sider, 2003) Sometimes sound is simple enough to tell the audience what is happening, we do not need an extra visual image showing the detail. When Cobb drags Saito to the ground, there is no image showing Cobb has loaded the gun, but the audience hear a bullet loaded sound, which means Cobb is threatening Saito and probably he is going to kill Saito if Saito does not tell the secret of his company. That same thing happens again in the scene when Cobb is about to kill himself in dream. When Cobb is playing the spinning top, we hear the familiar Old Souls again. Every time when Cobb is not sure if he is in dream, the theme Old Souls will appear. It feels like a looping paradox. We can never make it right; we can never go out of the paradox. That is what Zimmer tries to convey to the audience through Old Souls. When Cobb is having conversation through telephone, we hear Cobb is speaking normally, but obviously reverberation is added to the voices come from the other end and these voices are so clear as if we are hearing it from Cobbs first person perspective. The sound designer has to make it clear so as the audience will not miss any information or emotion that Cobb receives from the telephone. When they mention Mal in the telephone, the background music suddenly changes into a soft and sad piece. That means Mals dead is really a nightmare for Cobb. He cannot stop his endless grieve about Mal. The microphone is placed in two places to record the speech in a big concert room between Cobb and his architect teacher. At first it is a close-up record. When the scene changes into a wide shot, the audience can hear a distant record version with more echoes which makes the ambience sounds more realistic than before. And that truly helps push the audience into the world. During the conversation, the background music Old Souls comes up again because they are talking about the idea of designing dream. One Simple Idea is a good choice of background music when Cobb is teaching Ariadne how to design a dream world like maze. That music simply draws the audiences attention to difficult staff they are going through but not itself. That is to say, when background music goes off or goes down without any supporting emotion, it leaves the space for the audience to stay in the visual and the profound idea naturally. To make the story more logical and each plot scene connected better, a good, logical and complicated sound design is required. Even if it is in dreams, the ambience sound goes like it is in reality. When Cobb is talking with Ariadne, the voices of the other people around are still available. In order to surprise the audience with a later explosion scene, the designer would rather let the audience believe this is a reality scene at first. So everything sounds as normal as daily life at the beginning. In fact few people can notice that the Non, Je ne Regrette Rien is fading in in the explosion scene when the dream is collapsing, which means the headphone on Ariadnes ear is playing to wake her up. A ground moving sound is simulated in the scene that Ariadne is folding the ground upside down in her dream. Everybody knows there is no way to record this sound in real life, we have to record the other sound, such as rock moving on the ground, to replace the imagined sound in the scene to make it sounds like what it should be. Radical Notion is on the way when Ariadne makes everything functioning radical and unbelievable in her experimental dream. The two gradually switching chords make us feel the way like How could it be like that? What an amazing thing! If the scene has a big change, it is a good practice to insert a background music which is in completely different style from the music in the scene before. Actually the Mombasa theme has already begun long before the chasing takes place, but again it is a gradually fading in, which means something excited should be just around the corner. We can hear sound similar to helicopter and also the sound of wind when Mal is sitting on the window. The moment when she jumps out, the background music suddenly changes into a sad tune. That seems to say it is not in dream but in reality. So it deserves to be a tragedy definitely. And this theme lasts until Cobbs narration is over. When they are taking action to hijack the son of the companys head, the music becomes very intense from that time. When Arthur is having gun fire, we hear the sound from his angel but not enemies angel because we only need a first person record. The sound the enemies are hearing is not that important to the plot. We can notice that whenever the speech between the characters is over, the background music will soon get louder. The sound designer does not want the background music cover our semantic listening. It is always a serious headache to record the sound when several driving cars are firing at each other, because there is often fast switching shot. In the film, the car braking sound, the gun fire sound, the braking glass sound because of the gun shot and the water lapping sound, every sound mix with each other at exactly the same time. So post production edit for the recorded sound is obviously needed at this specific moment. Some part of the sound is reinforced while some is reduced or diminished. It is the way to select useful sound information for the audience. When we see a close-up shot of a glass of water is shaking, we get a glass shaking sound. After the shot switches to peoples face, we still get that glass shaking sound. This time we know what it is the glass that is generating the sound. And also we can judge the shaking intensity simply by the acquiring the volume of the glass shaking sound. When the glass hits the table and breaks, we hear a sound which is similar to metal ringing and the ringing keeps lasting for a long time. And that is the time when Cobbs attention is extracted by his subconscious. That ringing is a clue that he may lose himself in thinking about Mal and his children. He simply cannot run away from the idea. The sound designer has to think of a best way to deliver the sound in a virtual environment. When the scene is switching between two levels of dream, especially at the conjunction point, sound effects do not necessary have to complete a sudden change. Sometimes for the consideration for continuity the sound from the upper level will pass on to the next level. The wind blowing sound and water lapping sound from the upper level become the thunder sound causing by the strange weather in the next level. This is a very good example of designing sound according to the requirement of plot and environment. I have to say that this is really a very smart sound design. A close-up shot on Robert Fischers face with a thunder sound above makes the whole scenery more nervous. Robert Fischer definitely feels anxious about being in dream with a strange continuing thunder sound above. The very clear fast breathing sound of Robert Fischer also reveals his anxiety. We can hear almost all the detail from Robert Fischers mouth so clear that it sounds like the microphone is just around the mouth of Robert Fischer. Thus it has to be a later recorded version of syncing facial expression with a close-up recorded sound. The messy footsteps sound is a good way to show a chaotic scene, thus reflects peoples tension. When Robert Fischer is escaping with Cobb from the men who were sent to abduct Robert Fischer, the sound of footstep is getting louder and quicker. At the best part of the film when five levels of dream are interacting and the shots keep switching between these five levels every few seconds, there is no speech, only the sound effects with magnificent background music which sounds like orchestra march. That particular background piece makes up the best part of the film, telling the audience this should be a spectacular moment that they would never see in any other film. In a word this piece stirs the emotion to the climax of the whole film. When the characters on the third and fourth level of the dream put on headphone on the second level, they hear a distorted version of Non, Je ne Regrette Rien. All the perception on the upper level has a reflection effects on the deeper level. In here, the music reflection effect is distortion music sound. The music at the shore of Cobbs subconscious is a woozy piece. It makes us dont know where we are. In fact it is the fifth level of dream. It is also desolation piece that few people can enter this level of dream so far. It becomes a strong kick with a long horn when the music Non, Je ne Regrette Rien is on. This time it is not a distorted version, it is a new recorded slow version of Non, Je ne Regrette Rien. Let us take a look at the film score part of sound design. What can film score does to the film? The obvious first thing to say: It makes you feel a certain way. It adds emotion, it evokes feelings, and it creates a mood. They can establish the pace of a scene. Directors are constantly asking composers to write a piece of music which will make the scene seem to go faster, or slower, than it goes. (Sider, 2003) A good film score will push the audience into the movies plot. It should reach the perfect interaction point between audio and visuals. Usually the composer is shown an unpolished rough cut of the film, and talks to the director about what music styles should be followed. Once a composer has the film, they will then work on composing the score. Some composers prefer to work with traditional paper scores, but if it comes to score like Inception that contains odd ambient and electronic noises, it has to be written in a computer-based environment. In some instances, film composers may be asked by the director to imitate a specific style. As seen in many film DVDs, the orchestra performs in front of a large screen depicting the movie, assisting the conductor to synchronize the music with the film. Films often have different themes for important characters, events, ideas or objects. So we divide the whole soundtrack into pieces of scores. By convention, the film soundtrack is constructed so as not to draw the audiences attention to itself but to accompany the film unless it is part of the plot. The director, composer, and music editor will have a spotting session, running through and agreeing on where and what kind of music is needed. The composer of the Inception scores is Hans Zimmer, whose music is characterized by high audible. Because Inception is based on the practice of entering dreams and planting an idea in someones head, the soundtracks to Inception should be designed as dream-like and create a complete sonic world to immerse the audience into each layers of the dreams. The original soundtrack album is largely an atmospheric album. The soundtrack has to be composed in ways that are quite unrealistic so that the audience will not notice the background music. Listening to this soundtrack really guide me to recall most of the main plot, at the same time music is the perfect embodiment of the films theme. It is an aural journey into ones imagination which creates images and story lines in my mind. It is a soundtrack to the imagination, or perhaps, dreams. In viewing period, the film score will never grab the limelight of the film itself, but to help the audience build up the courage of the dream and promote the development of the plot. Inception movie scores rely more on real live instruments rather than digital audio samples. The whole soundtrack is a combination of electronic and classical. Traditional orchestra can be heard here and there in each track. Some cues even play with electric guitar, odd ambient and electronic noises. Dream Is Collapsing is one of the most powerful tracks in the score. It is seen as perfectly rational that all characters in this scene keep calm and behave naturally with having a house collapse. This technique increases the contrast of the characters rational behaviour against the powerful background score which tells the audience that it deserves to be a nervous scene. Dream is Collapsing is very well done and incredibly addictive. Dream is Collapsing is the most memorable song. Radical Notion begins with heart beat which makes the audience lulled into a false sense of security. Those low chords that switch up and down before lie underneath strings as if a beast is softly breathing, or perhaps, it implies that it is the dreamer who is breathing, and always with a slowed down version. Recurring figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a composition Radical Notion is a track that walks in familiar territory in terms of the string ostinatos. It is a motif which is persistently repeated in the same musical voice. It is a succession of equal sounds, wherein each note always has the same weight or stress. The repeated idea may be a rhythmic pattern in itself. Starts off playing the main motif rather dramatically then dips into some too cool for school stuff before playing around with the little motif some more. The last moments of the track gets aggressive. Old Souls reflects Mals anxious about living in dreams. It makes the audience puzzled, wondering if they are living in dreams. And the vibrating electronic underscoring is used in such a special way. It is a long and effective track that continues the atmospheric feelings of the album. Old Souls is a cue that leads us into the conversation between Cobb and Mal and make every audience puzzled with what they are doing and why they are acting like that. Most of the original background cues have something in common, but some of cues have slight differences. Mombasa is the only percussion in the score, which has distinctive flavour from the rest of the score. What is occurring on screen is a chasing scene which lasts about 4 minutes. Thus the accompanying soundtrack should be a very fast on-going rhythm in order to provoke audiences emotions. The Hi Octane element provides intense personal experience and delivers a paranoid sense of being chased when Cobb is running to get out of the chasers. It has a fairly light start, but it soon explodes into an action cue. Dream within a Dream brings back the motif heard in Dream is Collapsing but adds some too cool for school percussion. Waiting for a Train is the longest cue of all, which feels very mysterious and nostalgic when there are too many musical elements and emotion changing blended in. Around 3 minutes, it changes the feeling completely and the atmosphere becomes a little darker in nature. At around 5:30, it gets more dramatic as there are almost only synths left. In stark contrast, Edith Piaf is in there at around 7:04. Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien is a classic, but it still sounded strange there. The female voice wakes up the dreamers. All of these form 9 minutes and 29 seconds of continuous wonderfulness. Great inspirational scores and soundtracks should all have the quality of independence from their intended film. Time may be one of the most beautiful epic songs in the soundtrack that can be appreciated independently from Inception. It gives a sense of closure by building up an emotional thread from beginning to end. There is no doubt that Time should be the main title in this original soundtrack album. The piano gets the view feeling sentimental, which brings tears to the eyes, especially at the very end after the audience has experienced all the dreams in the film. This is probably the one that most people will truly love and listen to a thousand times without being tired of. What Time did was no pure sensationalism, the fate of a sense of desolation in which the melody is along with the spinning top, so that we cannot distinguish if it is a dream or not. It is not just orchestral music, but every form of music because you never know when you might need to use some electric guitars. Great composers adapt to the story and to their directors vision. It can be said that sounds greatest influence on the film is manifested at the heart of the image itself. (Chion, 1994)

A Comparison of Shelleys Frankenstein and Rifkins Biotech Century Ess

Shelley's Frankenstein and Rifkin's Biotech Century   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Human beings are created by God, who intends that they reproduce and flourish amongst themselves.   However, with the accomplishments of science, ideas that were thought to be impossible are becoming possible inside experiment labs; for example, scientists have found a way of creating life without requiring sexual reproduction.   Further more, scientists are now experimenting with cloning other living things.   Jeremy Rifkin explains in "Biotech Century [ . . .]" that science offers "a door to a new era of history where the genetic blueprints of evolution itself become subject to human authorship" (245).   One may argue that scientists are now assuming the role of God by manipulating science and leading humankind to a biotech century.   While this may seem to be a success to most scientists, they must be aware of the harm they can cause human life and be prepared to take responsibility; unlike Victor Frankenstein, in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, who "uses his knowledge to assemble a grotesque manlike creature [. . .] horrified by what he has done, abandons it the moment he brings it to life" (Ruszkiewicz 231).   Because he sees his creation as a failure and refuses to accept responsibility for his actions, the monster turns destructive, killing people close to Frankenstein.  Ã‚   Although both Rifkin and Shelley's writings stress similar concerns, they differ in certain aspects.  Ã‚  Ã‚        Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   One difference between Rifkin and Shelley, is that Rifkin looks at science as being partly a positive contribution to society, involving huge amounts of money (246).   He also believes that scientists can continue to use science for a more positive way, if and when... ... Dolly."   CNN.com.   9 Dec.   CNN Health.     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   <http://www.cnn.com/NATURE/9905/26/dolly.clone.02/index.html> . Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.   A play by Nick DiMartino, Direct.   Moses Goldberg.   Narr.   Professor McNamer.   Global Stage Production.   WLIW21 Presentation.   Class Movie. ZRB 1201.   Fall Semester, November 25, 2002. Kahn, Jeffrey P.   "Choosing Our Children's Future or Choosing Our Future Children?"   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   CNN.com.   25 Nov.   CNN Health.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   <http://www.cnn.com/2002/HEALTH/03/04/ethics.matters/index.html> . Rifkin, Jeremy.   "Biotech Century." The Presence of Others. 3rd ed. Ed. Andrea A.    Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz. New York: St. Martin's, 2000.   244-245 Shelley, Mary.   "Frankenstein." The Presence of Others. 3rd ed. Ed. Andrea A.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz. New York: St. Martin's, 2000.   231-232   

The Speeches of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Declaration of Sentiments, Solitude of Self, and Home Life :: the women’s movement

The Speeches of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, â€Å"Declaration of Sentiments†, â€Å"Solitude of Self†, and â€Å" Home Life† Not long ago, in the nineteenth century, the words that our forefathers wrote in the Declaration of Independence, â€Å"that all men were created equal,† held little value. Human equality was far from a reality. If you were not born a white male, then that phrase did not apply to you. During this period many great leaders and reformers emerged, fighting both for the rights of African Americans and for the rights of women. One of these great leaders was Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Stanton dedicated her entire life to the women’s movement, despite the opposition she received, from both her family and friends. In the course of this paper, I will be taking a critical look at three of Stanton’s most acclaimed speeches â€Å"Declaration of Sentiments†, â€Å"Solitude of Self†, and â€Å" Home Life†, and develop a claim that the rhetoric in these speeches was an effective tool in advancing the movement as a whole. Elizabeth Cady Stanton was born November 12, 1815, in Johnstown, New York. She was born unto a conservative, Presbyterian family of considerable social standing. Her father, Judge Daniel Cady, was considered to be both a wealthy landowner and a prominent citizen with great political status (Banner 3). Stanton was one of seven children, 6 of which were girls, to be born to Daniel and Margaret. Growing up in the period that she did, Elizabeth was very fortunate to receive the outstanding education that she did since it was not as important to educate daughters as it was sons. She overcame that boundary when she began attending Johnstown Academy. She was the only girl in most of her classes, which was unheard of in those days. Even when females did attend schools, they were learning about â€Å"womanly† things, like how to run a household, not advanced math and science courses, like she was in. She then went on to further her education at a very prominent educational institu tion, Emma Willard’s Troy Seminary. After that she studied law with her father, who was a New York Supreme Court Judge. It is through this training that her awareness was raised about the discrimination that women were subjected to. In 1840, Elizabeth married an abolitionist organizer named Henry Stanton, much to her family’s dismay.

A Literature Review Identifying Group of Learners Within Society and Providing Reasons for Their Possible Underachievement Essay

Those could include students who do not perform well in a specific subject area, do not show interest in gaining qualifications or perhaps are limited by poor language skills or culture from doing well academically at school. There have been many explanations for low attainment and some of them include: * Natural differences between sexes, * Natural intelligence, * Home background, * Type of schooling, * Different teaching styles (stereotyping by teachers), * Material factors (Hammersley-Fletcher, Lowe & Pugh, 2006). Halsey performed a survey of the working class and found that material factors were central to whether learners stayed at school beyond the age of 16 (Halsley cited in Hammersley-Fletcher, Lowe & Pugh, 2006). Department for Education also states that the gap between the best and worst performers in our system actually widens as they go through education; and it is both significantly wider and more closely related to socio-economic status in this country than anywhere else (DFES, 2004). In education, the relationship between schools and social inequality is often explored by looking at the test and examination scores achieved by different groups of children and young people, and other monitoring data. According to Molly Warrington by the age of 11, girls in many primary schools are performing better than boys, particularly in English, and this pattern of differential achievement is sustained and exacerbated throughout secondary education (Warrington and Younger, 2006). This is a particular concern for white working class boys which is the reason why we should evaluate it further trying to establish possible reasons for their underachievement. BBC reported that government figures from January 2008 show only 15% of white working class boys in England getting five good GCSEs including maths and English. (BBC News, 2008). Above view is also supported by the chief inspector of schools who stated that white boys from poor families were worst affected and achieved the worst results aged 16 at school. White British boys who qualify for free school meals achieve the worst results of any apart from gypsy and traveller children – with just 29 per cent getting good marks. (Daily Mail, 2012) Why is this happening then in a modern world where we seem to have unlimited access to books, resources and other forms of help towards achievement? There is no doubt that to be able to achieve we must have the desire to learn and aspirations to perform well academically. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs outlines the necessity of satisfying the basic physiological and safety needs before the ones on upper levels like achievement, understanding and approval make students realise their potential. Unfortunately white working class households often undermine the values of schooling, academic achievement and aspirations. Boys from very early age associate manual labour with ‘masculinity and toughness’ therefore do not find academic learning relevant to them as it is not based on what they have been told or taught at home. Department for Education confirms that ‘schools where socio-cultural strategies were most transformative were those where head teachers recognised that there were sometimes conflicts between the cultural contexts of home and school, and that such conflicts might lead to disengagement and potential underachievement’ (DfES, 2005) Paul Willis performed a case study through a detailed ethnographic account of school lives of white working class boys who were ‘destined’ for labour. Boys showed lack of commitment to schoolwork and an acceptance of the authority of the teacher at the same time associating manual labour with ‘masculinity and toughness’. Willis argued that the boys were drawing upon cultural constructions of masculinity which idealised manual workers strength, so becoming a source of higher self-esteem. The ‘lads’ asserted their masculinity in the stories they told about resisting mental work (Willis, 1977). Most schools in Britain are dominated by the anti-education and anti-aspiration culture which has much more pronounced effects on boys. They believe that it is not ‘cool’ to learn, that real men work with their hands, not their minds, and that school does not matter (Telegraph, 2011). All of the above are deeply ingrained in our culture therefore boys like acting tough or hard, for example, by fighting or publicly denying adult authority; using humour and wit, sometimes as a confrontational device against teachers; wearing fashionable clothes and trainers or possessing culturally acclaimed knowledge, for example, being able to talk knowledgeably about the latest computer game (Swain, 2003, 2004). There are many reasons for this behaviour but Connell claims that working class communities in some parts of England are those most affected by the collapse of the traditional local manufacturing industry base and deindustrialization. These working-class boys can no longer rely on work for their traditional status of power and see little point in gaining qualifications, therefore are more likely to reject values that are conducive to academic success such as work ethic or punctuality. For the same reason they do not value academic success and admire peers challenging school’s authority (Connell cited in Younger, 2005). How do we change that? What do schools need to provide the best possible progress and the highest attainment for all pupils? Practical suggestions for educational organisations to better meet the needs of these pupils. Given the amount of literature talking about the underachievement of working class white boys, it appears that the reading material available, suggesting solution to the growing problem is limited. The suggestions on how to better meet the needs of these boys have been based on the literature review. Main points however, have been developed through discussions with school staff, parents and pupils from a local primary school where most pupils are White British with a few from minority ethnic groups. The proportion of pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities and with a statement of special educational needs is below that found in most schools. Those discussions gave an insight into successful practices that minimise the impact of barriers to achievement for white working class boys. After careful consideration of the subject, improving achievement of boys appears to be a very complex process linked to many factors playing important parts. They include factors like leadership and vision, the curriculum and language support, behaviour management, parental engagement, targeted support including the role of the learning mentor in supporting white working class pupils. Successful transition to Year 7 from Year 6 has proven to also have a positive impact on white working class pupils. ‘These factors are significant in all schools, whether mixed or single-sex, maintained or independent. Senior managers play a crucial role in determining the most appropriate strategy for school improvement, based on close examination of the school situation and identification of the barriers to improving boys achievement’ (OFSTED, 2003). The quality of management and leadership within the schools plays a major part in developing successful strategies. Head teachers who keep their students at the heart of the school’s ethos and everything they do, find it easier to engage staff and parents. Strong leadership can be the driving force behind change, new expectations and inspirational success. They should: * Create a culture of achievement with a positive can do attitude. * Have high expectations and the provision of intensive support should be expected of all * Allocate a lot of time to being in the classroom with teachers and pupils * Make sure that diversity of pupil’s backgrounds and circumstances are celebrated. * Make sure that all children are encouraged to achieve their potential and stereotypical expectations are not made. * Make sure that books used, displays and worksheets avoid stereotypical images, sexist language and represent our multicultural society. The curriculum and language support also plays a major part in tackling underachievement. The Guardian (2013) agrees that barriers to learning faced by white working class boys are mostly concerned with language and literacy: ‘Many of these young people have a limited vocabulary and grasp of standard English and have a limited higher order reading skills such as skimming, scanning, synthesis, and empathy. Pupils with low levels of literacy rarely read at home, and their development in this area stalls when they get into their teens’. Our school believes that the curriculum should be accessible to all children whatever their age, race, gender, ability or social background. The use of appropriate reading materials gives the teachers the ideal opportunity for tackling stereotypical views, as well as widens their knowledge and understanding of things that middle class pupils already know and understand. Considering the above it was interesting to find that Schools and Communities Research Review (2010) suggests, it is unlikely that changing textbooks or curriculum content will in itself lead to improved outcomes in reading or mathematics. It is believed that professional development and coaching in effective teaching strategies make much more of a difference. Continuing, extensive professional development to teachers is likely to improve academic attainment for poor pupils therefore teachers need extensive, engaging workshops to learn new strategies and then coaching to be able to successfully implement and maintain them in their classrooms. Behaviour management also plays a major part in raising achievement of working class boys, and involves using successful strategy which requires a planned approach and subsequently dedication from all parties involved specially educators, pupils and parents. Ofsted reinforces this view by stating that behaviour is significantly better in settings which have a strong sense of community and work closely with parents and carers. In these settings learners feel safe and are confident that issues such as bullying are dealt with swiftly and fairly (Ofsted, 2005). Involvements of parents in the school life of their children, and their aspirations for them, have been also acknowledged as some of the most important factors associated with lower educational achievement. This appears to be particularly relevant to children from low-income families as parental aspirations and attitudes towards education vary significantly according to socio-economic status (Goodman and Gregg 2010). Young working class boys lack self believe and aspirations which results in having difficulties in understanding its importance and relevance. A lot of working class parents have had poor experience of education and believe that there is nothing to be gained from it as their children are likely to end up unemployed, or perhaps have achieved a lot in life through hard work despite having no formal qualifications. In both cases parents do not believe in education therefore pass that view and lack of aspirations onto their children (The Guardian, 2013). The head teacher of the local school reported that the white working class families were the hardest to engage within the life of the school and their children’s learning. School staff expressed frustration at the mismatch between the high aspirations of the school and low aspirations of the parents for their children’s learning, and therefore have to work hard on strategies to engage white parents with a view to raising achievement. School staff are aware that they have to draw parents in for positive reasons as a counter balance for the negative experiences that many had at school themselves. Younger ;amp; Warrington (2005) suggested that a combination of a strong learning ethos in school and increased involvement of parents in their children’s education could raise aspirations and achievement. There are number of reasons why white working class pupils should be able to do well academically despite challenging socio-economic circumstances in the areas served by schools. The evidence presented by the teachers from our local school mentioned earlier, enables the conclusion to be drawn that this school demonstrates the many ways in which they work to support pupils through a wide range of imaginative and inclusive strategies. Their success in raising the achievement of their pupils is a tribute to their vision, and to the very hard work that is needed to make it a reality. WORD COUNT: 2028 References BBC News Channel. (2008). White working class boys failing. Available: http://news. bbc. co. uk/1/hi/education/7220683. stm. Last accessed 28th Feb 2013 Centre for Excellence and Outcomes in Children and Young People’s Services . (2011). Effective classroom strategies for closing the gap in educational achievement for children and young people living in poverty, including white working-class boys. Available: http://www. c4eo. org. uk/themes/schools/classroomstrategies/files/classroom_strategies_research_review. pdf. Last accessed 3th March 2013. Daily Mail. (2012). White working-class boys are consigned to education scrapheap, Ofsted warns. Available: http://www. dailymail. co. uk/news/article-2159616/The-anti-school-culture-condemns-white-boys-failure. tml. Last accessed 28th Feb 2013. Department for Education and Skills. (2004). Five Year Strategy for Children and Learning. Putting people at the heart of public services. Available:https://www. education. gov. uk/publications/eOrderingDownload/DfES-5%20Year%20Plan. pdf. Last accessed 21st February 2013. Department for Education and Skills. (2005). Raising Boys’ Achievement. Available: https://www. education. gov. uk/publications/eOrderingDownload/RR636. pdf. Last accessed 28th Feb 2013. Goodman, A. , Gregg, P. (2010). POORER CHILDREN’S EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT: HOW IMPORTANT ARE ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIOUR?. Available: http://www. jrf. org. uk/publications/educational-attainment-poor-children. Last accessed 3th March 2013. Hammersley-Fletcher, L. , Lowe, M. and Pugh, J. (2006) The Teaching Assistant’s Guide, an essential textbook for foundation degree students. Oxton, Routledge. OFSTED. (2003). Boys’ achievement in secondary schools. Available: http://www. ofsted. gov. uk/resources/boys-achievement-secondary-schools. Last accessed 28th February 2013. OFSTED. (2005) Managing challenging behaviour. Available: http://www. ofsted. gov. uk/resources/managing-challenging-behaviour. Last accessed 15th February 2013. Swain, J. (2003). How young schoolboys become somebody: the role of the body in the construction of masculinity. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 24: 299-314. Swain, J. (2004). The resources and strategies that 10-11-year-old boys use to construct masculinities in the school setting. British Educational Research Journal, 20: 167-85. The Guardian. (2013). Working class boys: schools must work with parents to raise their attainment. Available: http://www. guardian. co. uk/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2013/jan/17/working-class-boys-raise-attainment. Last accessed 3th March 2013. The Telegraph. (2011). Why are poor white boys doing so badly at school? It’s about culture, and we’ve got to change it. Available: http://blogs. telegraph. co. uk/news/neilobrien1/100102225/why-are-poor-white-boys-doing-so-badly-at-school-its-about-culture-and-weve-got-to-change-it/. Last accessed 28th Feb 2013. Warrington, M. , Younger, M. (2006) Raising Boys’ Achievement in Primary Schools. Berkshire, McGraw-Hill Professional Publishing. Willis, P. (1977). Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. Aldershot: Saxon House. Younger, M. , McLellan, R. , Warrington, M. (2005). Raising Boys’ Achievement in Secondary Schools. Birkshire: McGraw-Hill Professional Publishing.

A Successful College Student Essay

Successful means accomplishing or achieving an aim or a goal, a purpose. A College is an educational institution which can gain knowledge by students. Student can further their education at college after graduated from high school or secondary school. Student is the one who is studying at a school or a college, and student can also defined as a learner. College student can take any courses that they are interested in a college or university. Students who choose to further their study in college is the most important steps to being success, and successful college student is start from choosing the correct subject, which is the student wanted or interested in the subject. But a lot of the students are studying the subject that their parents want them to study, but not the subject that they want. Choose the correct subject is the first steps of being success, so you must fight for it, because you are allowed to decide your future. There are a lot of types of student in the college, different types of student have different kind of goal or aim. But most of the students’ goal is to be a successful college student. To be a successful college student is not that easy, some of the students think that get well result in their academic is consider a successful student. , but this idea is definitely wrong. A successful college student does not mean the smartest in the class, the best result in academic student, the word â€Å"success† means success in various aspects. A successful student must set realistic goals and targets to motivate themselves. Although goals must be challenging but must be realistic, do not set the goals which are impossible to achieve. Goals should be measurable and specific, better to include a deadline for accomplishment. Short-term goals or small goals is easily to complete and can be accomplished quickly. Short-term goals can be set by monthly, weekly, or even tough daily, such as hand in assignment on time, do extra exercise, or master in a new chapter and etc. However, a student must have the act and behavior like a student in the college. At college, some of the students attend to class late or refuse to attend class, especially the subject which cannot forbid student to the final exam. The successful student must attend every class on time, unless have forgivable reason. Next, good student should be sit in front of the class, listen every word from lecturer and try to understand it. Students should not be afraid to ask when don’t understand on something, if student is having difficulty on study can always take advantage of the tutoring session, it is useful and beneficial to student. Besides, prepare before the class started and take the note down when the lecturer is explaining, then review after class, do more than just listened is one of the tips to become successful. Spend around 30-45minutes to review all the notes which have been taken in the class, and try to understand concepts instead of memorize all the details, use the shortcut learning skill in study, because successful student must work smart but not work hard. And then, hand in all the work that given by the lecturer on time, because successful student will take responsibility for their education. They don’t even waste a minute with doing nothing. To become a successful college student must learn on time management. Properly manage the time between study and also fun time. Set a weekly schedule which contains study time, fun time, sport time, and also family time. Although sometime we have not enough time for us to do what we want to do, but we must give a little time for our family, even though a period of dinner time. Study is very important to a student, but the over study will lead to the worse situation. In fact, don’t forget to relax from the challenging study, take a short break between study sections, and have a good rest for further journey. Furthermore, good looking is not the must, but good dressing is the must. Student must have the look of student, not to wear like a hoodlum, they should always keep ourselves neat and clean. Have at least one time bath everyday to keep ourselves clean, and wash and change the clothes everyday, do not wear same cloth in two days. Otherwise, keep ourselves health is also one of the steps to be a successful college student. Successful student should always keep their energy in high level, for instance, have 8 hours sleeping time for everyday, keep doing exercise everyday or at least 4 days in a week. Don’t always skip meal with the reason busy or no time to eat, eat three meals a day is the must and eat well with healthy food but not fast foods. To maintain a healthy lifestyle, a successful student should always have the positive mind thinking and stay free from drugs and also alcohol. Drugs and alcohol will affect our brain and slowed our reaction, in long-term, our brain will damaged. Communication skill is the worse skills of student nowadays, student do not know how to communicate with each other, they communicate well with using online chatting, email or sms, but not proper speaking with each other. Successful student must be good in communication and socialize skills. To improve the skills, involve yourself in different kind of activities, such as become member in a club, join community, and etc. Moreover, involve yourself in the camp can train your leadership, leadership is very important, because he or she carries the risk of whole group. Besides that, friendship can also be create on the camp activities, all of the student will work together and help out each other to complete a mission that given by tutor. While they are completing the mission, the solving skill of student has been trained. Communication and participation skills will be improved when accomplishing a mission or an activity, because they will discuss to solve the problem that face by them together. Camping really brings a lot of advantages and it helps students to gain extra skills, create a large social network, which might lead student to become successful. The good activities are good for us but must not involve yourself in illegal activities such as gambling, fighting, stealing and etc, it might get you in to trouble. Study is good but not just concentrate on it only, try to have fun during college, but fun time and serious time must manage wisely, not too concentrate on study and left out community and time for fun. A suitable reward for the hard work of many nights are needed to a student to relax our stress and refresh our messy mind. Conclusion, tips to become successful college student have been mentioned on above. Although no one is perfect, but every students have to try their best to achieve their goal, which is to became a successful student. Finally, a successful college student must have a good behavior, even you are a talent, good behavior is very important, because how you treat people, is the same way how people treat you back. The last tip for student is learn how to learn, because a great education is one of the most important things in our life.