Iraq Power Company Business Plan Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Iraq Power Company Business Plan - Assignment Example We will provide electricity to all the localities including industries, hospitals, parks, houses etc. Our distribution would be as follows Our mission is to provide customers highest quality electrical services; our focus is on personalized services by offering convenient and rapid services. We have strong vendor relationship with most service conscious vendors, capable of shipping major parts rapidly (overnight too) minimizing the system downtime for the premiere electric customers. Iraq is an oil producing country situated in the Middle East, with the population of 28,945,657 (July 2009.est).the population growth rate is 2.507%. Its economy is mainly dominated by the oil sector, which provides 90% of foreign exchange earnings. Total government revenues have benefited from high oil prices in recent years; however, revenues have declined significantly since the oil price drop in fall 2008. Iraq is making some progress in building the institutions needed to implement economic policy. In March 2009 Iraq concluded a Stand-By Arrangement (SBA) with the IMF that details economic reforms. Its GDP per capita is $4000. Its composition by sector is Nowadays the electric shortage in Iraq has become a problem and there are frequent blackouts. Due to the war there is much loss done and many of the power generation cables have been cut down posing a problem for the people. It needs new industries to be set up in various areas to solve the problem. At present electricity is provided only 8 hours a day at free of charge. The energy needs of Kurdish region have been ignored; it is working independently to electrical energy output through foreign assistance and private investment projects. The minister expects that by 2009 the region will produce enough energy to keep the lights on 24 hours a day. Vision Statement In 5 years it will become the major company generating electrical power to the country and establish its name in the whole of Middle East Mission Statement Earn people trust, be honest and lighten up Iraq. Engineering plan We will deal with generation, transmission and distribution of electric power as well as electrical devices connected to the system including generator, motors and transformers. Different forms of energies are converted to electrical energy. The transmission subsystem transmits the electricity to the load centers. The distribution subsystem continues to transmit the power

Intercontinental Railway System - Amrak Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Intercontinental Railway System - Amrak - Essay Example As an intercontinental railway system, it serves New York, Washington, Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles, Boston, Sacramento, Baltimore, Albany-Rensselaer, San Diego, New Haven, Wilmington, Nelwark, Seattle, Portland, Irvine, BWI Airport, Providence, Milwaukee, Emeryville, Harrisburg, Lancaster, Boston, and Bakersfield. Thus, it caters the needs of 30.2 million people in America. Owing the expediency and high demand of its services, the company invested for projects to enhance their services and sustain the railway network (Vromans, Dekker, & Kroon, 2006). With the magnitude of services accorded to the public, it facilitated the interconnection of cities populated with diverse and multicultural communities. Amrak became instrumental too in cultural exchanges, in bridging people-to-people relations and intercultural immersion via travels, tourism, migration, and opportunities in other states which drive the influx of people from one place to another point of destination (Gapinski & T uckman, 1978). Experts opined that the contribution of this railway in shaping socio-cultural development and economic expansion in North America is more appreciable than in Europe. The railway was partly author of industrialization as this was the major transportation of business sector to-and-fro the mainland. This compelled the company to coordinate with all states served for its security as a matter of policy and as measures for public welfare. Legal coordination and networking to all states was an indispensable corporate strategy to accord passenger’s security. As a business, the railway is also one of the leading companies that are dependent on the consumption of energy and thus, also confront the challenges in the utilization of oil and gas amid call for ecological protection and regulation of pollution emission. Although it contributed much for economic advancement because it raked high revenue but there is a need to reevaluate and optimize the company’s expend itures because it has oddly spent $ 3.95 billion in 2011 when it only earned $ 2.71 billion in its operation (Dunn et, al., 1997). Cash flows need to be regulated in such measure that will not devalue the services and sacrifice its operations amid escalating cost in the market. With these stark realities, the company remained subject to the corporation, transportation, insurance, and security policies of the states served and by United States of America. If the policies are not liberally construed to also assist the condition of the company, then unsupportive policies will negatively impact to Amtrak’s operational activities, thus, may constrain its business relations with its passengers and cargo customers. Perl and Dunn (1997) pointed that Amtrak, as a quasi-public and profit –oriented corporation had some internal flaws since it dissociated itself from America's private railroads and from trust-fund financial scheme that could subsidize public transport. Perl and Du nn (1997) criticized its over dependency on political patrons and labor union for protection against executive budget cuts, thus, bleeding its operational cost too much by running the railway system with expensive contracts and services against its revenue. Although the company has undertaken serious

Effect of Parents with PTSD on Children

Effect of Parents with PTSD on Children Dushica Djurovic Does Transmission of Trauma Influence Children of Parents with PTSD? War veterans may experience traumatic events that may influence their lives after the military; moreover, such traumatic experiences may affect lives of the veterans’ family members. One of these people who experience a trauma during military service is my uncle who went to the army when he was very young. There is not anything that can be the same again for my uncle. Although he was a smiling and pretty talkative person before he went to the army, six months after he became reticent and aloof. Family members who have known him since he was born were worried about his mood and behavior, and they wondered what happened to him. When his parents and a sister heard that his best friend, Mark, was shot right in front of my uncle while Mark and he were running into a bunker, they have realized the cause of his depressive behavior. The bloody picture of his friend shot in the back of head has been flowing in my uncle’s mind for a long time, and that picture became both his dai ly struggle and a night mere. He was diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder which is caused by the traumatic event he has experienced during the military combat. There are many ex-combatants who have experienced traumas during wars like my uncle, and such traumas may affect veterans’ family relationships (Bathory, page 71). Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder may affect both a relationship with combat veterans’ children and relationships with their partners. According to Medscape Medical News that published the article about the high rate of PTSD in returning Iraq war veterans, the estimate rate of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among veterans returning from Iraq embraces the range from 12% to 20% (Roehr). Individuals with PTSD tend to have a high level of anxiety and arousal, which manifests itself as difficult sleeping, impaired concentration, and the fear of being easily startled (Price). My uncle had difficulties such as sleeplessness and anxiety. Even though he had psychotherapy treatment for a few years after he returned home from the military service, his recovery was slow because of specific PTSD symptoms such as apathy and insomnia. As a result, his five-year-old son was not able to understand why his father was often pensive when he asked him for something. PTSD symptoms may be frightening for both parents and their kids. Children may also worry that their parent cannot properly care for them (Price). That is why children may be afraid of having a close relationship with their parents who are depressed or anxious, dealing with PTSD symptoms. Furthermore, such children may even become unhappy or reluctant to trust others, including their parents, because they do not feel loved and cared for their family members. Combat veterans may struggle trying to maintain relationships with their partners because people with PTSD may feel anxious talking with their wives and husbands about their traumatic experience. According to the American National Center for PTSD, the partners of the Vietnam Veterans with PTSD reported some effects of the veterans’ mental health problems such as lower levels of happiness, less satisfaction in their lives, and more demoralization that is manifested as the lack of hope, courage, and confidence (Stevens). If people who experience traumatic events do not use psychotherapy treatments, their intense emotions of guilt, grief, or fear may escalate. That may happen because they may not be able to handle their burden of war. As a result, war veterans may become physically and verbally aggressive to their partners, which may lead to divorce. The rates of divorce for Veterans with PTSD were about twice as great as for Veterans without PTSD (Kulka). Suffering from the effe cts of PTSD such as aggression, irritability, or anger, people may deal with certain relationship problems. Both parts, Maus I and Maus II emphasize two stories in which PTSD was transmitted from parents to their child. While one story is focused on Vladek Spiegelman’s survival of the Holocaust, another is focused on the relationship between Vladek and his son Artie. There is a strong bond that connects both stories. The clue lies in the different kinds of guilt that both of them feel, and such kind of guilty triggered PTSD in them. While Vladek, as a Holocaust victim, struggles when he realizes his luck by surviving from Nazi terror during the war, Artie struggles because he was lucky to be born after the war and avoid the suffering in Auschwitz that his family experienced. Furthermore, both of them have an open wound in their hearts: Vladek lost his wife and Artie his mother when she had a breakdown after the many hardships she endured through. Not only Holocaust survivors, but also their children suffer from their families experience. The main question that echoes in Vladek’s head is, â€Å"Why did he survive the Holocaust and not somebody else.† He feels guilty because he was lucky to survive the war which was responsible for millions of deaths. Vladek thinks that instead of him, somebody more worthy deserves to be alive. In order to avoid that feeling, he wants to turn his back on the painful past. He always avoids talking about it with Artie who becomes angry every time he tries to get information about his family. During my reading, I figured out that Vladek even pretends that he does not realize his son’s frustration and gets angry when Artie insists on getting the information. Instead of that, he behaves like everything between them is fine, ignoring any tension. Vladek’s experience at Auschwitz is a burden that flows in his mind, however, he desperately wants to live in the present and so he avoids talking about it. On the other hand, Artie constantly insists on hearing more info rmation about what his family experienced during the war. While he is irritated and often angry with Vladek’s behavior and cannot even imagine living with him under the same roof, his father wants to fix their relationship by spending time together. Vladek misses his wife, Anja, who had cared for him and for this reason he needs his son even more. For instance, he calls his son early in the morning to tell him that he needs his help fixing the drainpipe. Vladek tells him that he needs help by emphasizing the fact that he is an old, vulnerable man but actually it is about more than a drainpipe. He desperately needs his son’s love and attention. While he wants to enjoy spending time with his son and talking about the present, Artie wants to hear everything about the past. The more Vladek struggles with PTSD symptoms and wants to turn his back on the past, the more Artie insists on talking about it in order to get more information. That is why their relationship is broken and full of tension and misunderstanding. Every time Vladek talks about such a brutal experience that his family had, he digs deep into his heart, and becomes upset and more depressed. Not only people who experienced the Holocaust are its victims, but also their children who are born after the war as Artie was. Although he was born after the war, Artie also suffers from his parents painful memories. That memories caused PTSD and both parents as well as his son suffered from the same traumatic disorders. As the only member of his family who does not have a traumatic past, Artie struggles because he feels less worthy as somebody who did not suffer at Auschwitz. Moreover, he feels a burden because he did not do anything to deserve the comfortable life that he has. On the contrary, his family had to survive terrible suffering during the war to be still alive. Unfortunately, the majority of their relatives were not as a lucky as Vladek and Anja. Artie’s brother Richie did not survive the war. When the Germans started to take children from Srodula, Anja and Vladek, were living in the ghetto and in order to save their son’s life they sent Richie to Zawiercie with his aunt Tosha and her children, Bibi and Lonia. Unexpectedly, the Germans came a few months later to evacuate Zawiercie a nd send the rest of the Jewish population to Auschwitz. In order to avoid being sent with the children to Nazi gas chambers, Tosha decided to kill not just herself but also her children and Richie with poison. She chose the lesser of two evils. That tragedy left a deep scar on Anja and Vladek’s hearts. That scar even intensified their PTSDs. Richie was still their beautiful and intelligent baby. Even though they had Artie after the war, they are desperately trying to see their first baby in Artie’s eyes. This causes Artie to feel neglected. He would have never been able to be replaced with his brother, and that is why he feels less worthy than Richie. He feels guilty because of his inability to replace his brother for their parents, and the parents’ sorrow was transmitted to their sun making him a new PTSD sufferer. As we see from this story, Artie becomes a new Holocaust victim even though the event itself was in the past, before he was born. Another thread that connects both stories, Vladek’s escape from the Holocaust and the relationship between his son and him, is Anja’s death. Vladek, as her husband, blames himself for not having been able to save her. Artie blames his father because he destroyed Anja’s diaries which were his only reminder of his mother. After the war, Vladek did not pay enough attention to her and was not as kind as he had been before they were forced to go to the concentration camp, for this reason she became even more depressed and committed suicide. After her death, he wanted to destroy everything which reminded him of her. Furthermore, he became very depressed and cried when he read the comic called â€Å"The prisoner on the hell planet† that Artie published about his mother years ago. This is the only time readers of †Maus† are faced with Anja’s personality as a Holocaust victim. She felt alone and became more depressed after her son answered by say ing just â€Å"sure† and did not even looked at her when she asked him if he still loved her. From Artie’s comic strip about his mother, I realized that Artie’s cold reaction was not just one more thing for an already very depressed woman, a small step which pushed her over the edge. She already felt unloved and Vladek did not support and care about her. Artie called his father a murder when Vladek told him that he had destroyed her diaries. In my opinion, Vladek destroyed them in order to hide not just from his conscience but also from Artie the fact that he, as her husband, was guilty for the suicide his wife committed. Once again, the past influences Artie’s life and he is suffering because of the PTSD consequences his father and mother experienced after being in Auschwitz. Both stories, Vladek’s survival of the Holocaust and the broken relationship between Artie and him, are interlinked with the guilt they feel. Vladek feels survivor’s guilt, and although his son insists on it, he avoids talking about the past. Although he was not a victim of Auschwitz, Artie indirectly suffers from his parents PTSD and feels inadequate for having an easy life, while his parent’s had been put under so much thread. Moreover, Anja’s death forever left a deep scar on their souls, which intensified painful memories in Vladek and triggered PTSD in Artie. For this reason both, the father and son would have never been able to step completely into the present. Part of both of them would have always been in the past. This book teaches us that the more people tend to ignore their past, the more it holds onto them and their past experience, good and bad, can be passed from one generation to the next, and that is how PTSD transmission becomes intergener ational illness. Analyzing the literature, researchers found that in most studies, the children whose father were diagnosed with PTSD participating in combat, were more likely to suffer from distress than those children whose fathers did not participate in combat but experienced PTSD. However, there were a few clinical cases in which the number of fathers with PTSD but who did not participated in military was larger than the number of those fathers with PTSD but who experienced their traumas in military. Additionally, there is not clear definition of traumatic status that is still an ambiguous and inconsistent term (Kallerman, 2007). Davidson, Smith, and Kundler analyzed 108 outpatient veterans with PTSD, including 24 major depressives and 15 alcoholics, and reported the higher rate of psychiatric treatment among children of PTSD sufferers (Davidson, Smith, Kundler, 1989). Furthermore, PTSD were found in 6 families of PTSD, but none in the control group. Similarly, Parsons, Kehle, and Owen observed cases that were consisted 45 children of veterans, and 47 children of nonveterans, when they found that PTSD sufferers perceived children as having more dysfunctional social and emotional behavior, and difficulties in establishing and maintaining friendships. In these cases the types of behaviors were function of child’s gender and age (Persons, Kehle, Owen, 1990). In both of described studies, the fathers had status of those who were diagnosed with PTSD but the second study also included those fathers who were without PTSD. The target groups in both studies were consisted of Americans who participated in the Vietnam War or the World War II. Furthermore, Jordan et al. reported that veterans with PTSD showed markedly elevated levels of severe and diffuse problems in marital and family adjustment, parenting skills, and violent behavior. In his research the author was focused on 1,200 Vietnam veterans and 376 spouses or coresident partners of the veterans. Ruscio, Weathers, and King found that emotional numbing was the only aspects of PTSD uniquely associated with veterans’ perceived relationships with their children. The group included 66 male Vietnam veterans, and all of them had one or more children (Ruscio, Weathers, King, 2002). There is another research, done by Westerink and Giarratano, and such study consisted 22 children of veterans over the age of 15 years, and their fathers had the status of veterans with PTSD. The findings show that children of veterans reported higher levels of conflict in their families; there were no significant differences on measures of psychological distress and self-esteem from control groups (Westerink, Giarratano, 1999). In the case of my uncle who was diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder which is caused by the traumatic event he has experienced during the military combat, I realized that his son is more likely to become a new PTSD sufferer. That is because of the bloody picture of my uncle’s friend who was shot in the back of head, and such a bloody picture has been flowing in my uncle’s mind for a long time affecting even the behavior of his son. According to Maus, the book about the lives of Holocaust survivors after the Auschwitz, I realized that they transmitted their PTSDs to their son Artie. That caused many struggles in their relationships. I got sense that the clue lies in the different kinds of guilt that both of them feel. While Vladek, as a Holocaust victim and PTSD sufferer, struggles when he realizes his luck by surviving from Nazi terror during the war. On the other hand, Artie struggles because he was lucky to be born after the war and avoid the suffering in Aus chwitz that his family experienced. However, their parents’ PTSDs made him a new PTSD sufferer. According to studies I was reading, the results about transmission of PTSD from father to child show a various range of different findings. While some researchers reported that the children of fathers with PTSDs that were caused by military traumas, are more likely to suffer from the same, numerous others think that military traumas of ex-combatants cannot directly affect their children. To conclude, there are many researchers who are trying to narrow the scope of findings about PTSD transmission from father to child, however, a large range of multiple different results show that this area is much deeper and ambiguous than scholars expected. Works Cited Dekel, Rachel, and Hadass Goldblatt. Is There Intergenerational Transmission Of Trauma? The Case Of Combat Veterans Children. N.p., 2015. Web. 7 May 2015. Kellerman, N. (2007). Ha’avara shel traumat hasho’ah [Transmission of the Holocaust trauma]. In Z. Solomon J. Chaitin (Eds.), Yaldut betzel hasho’ah: Yeladim nitzolim ve’dor sheni [Childhood in the shadow of the Holocaust–survived children and second generation] (pp. 286 –303). Davidson, J., Smith, R., Kudler, H. (1989). Familial psychiatric illness in chronic posttraumatic stress disorder. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 30, 339 –345. Parsons, J., Kehle, T. J., Owen, S. V. (1990). Incidence of behavior problems among children of Vietnam veterans. School Psychology International, 11, 253–259. Ruscio, A. M., Weathers, F. W., King, L. A., King, D. W. (2002). Male war-zone veterans’ perceived relationships with their children: The importance of emotional numbing. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 15, 351–357. Westerink, J., Giarratano, L. (1999). The impact of posttraumatic stress disorder on partners and children of Australian Vietnam veterans. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 33, 841– 847. Spiegelman, Art. Maus. New York: Pantheon Books, 1986 Kulka, Richard A. Partners Of Veterans With PTSD: Research Findings PTSD: National Center For PTSD. Ptsd.va.gov. N.p., 2015. Web. 25 Feb. 2015. Bathory, Dalia. History Of Communism In Europe: Vol. 4 / 2013. Google Books. N.p., 2015. Web. 16 Mar. 2015. Roehr, Bob. High Rate Of PTSD In Returning Iraq War Veterans. Medscape.com. N.p., 2015. Web. 17 Mar. 2015. Price, Jennifer L. Children Of Veterans And Adults With PTSD. Aaets.org. N.p., 2015. Web. 25 Feb. 2015. Stevens, Susan P. Partners Of Veterans With PTSD: Common Problems PTSD: National Center For PTSD. Ptsd.va.gov. N.p., 2015. Web. 25 Feb. 2015.

Analysis of Cousin Kate by Christina Rossetti Essay -- English Literat

Analysis of Cousin Kate by Christina Rossetti 'Cousin Kate' by Christina Rossetti describes a cottage maiden who was seduced and used by the lord of the estate for which she worked. She was surprised and taken a back by the fact that someone so great and powerful could be slightly interested in her, and so she automatically fell in love with him. It wasn't until after he had slept with her that he left her for her cousin, Kate. The cottage maiden was devastated that he had done that to her. She felt unclean and unwanted. The lord asked for Kate's hand in marriage and she accepted. The cottage maid thought that he married Kate because she was innocent and pure, 'Because you were so good and pure/He bound you with his ring' - the cottage maiden is in complete contrast to her cousin. The only good thing that came out of this was the cottage maiden had a child, 'Yet I've a gift you have not got...' and 'my fair-haired son'. The lord had seduced the cottage maiden and used her like a 'silken knot'. This basically means that the lord used the cottage maiden as a trophy and used her when he wanted to. This is a poem based and written in the 19th century. There are three main characters in the story. Cousin Kate, the cottage maiden and the Lord. The title of this poem is self-explanatory. The poem is based on a character called Cousin Kate. As she is the main character in the poem, the whole poem revolves around her. The poem basically tells us about 19th century life and people's attitudes towards unlawful relationships. The poem tells us about a cottage maiden who had an affair with a Lord. She loses her virginity to him, and then regrets the whole ordeal. In the 19th century, if you were not known as pure ... ... but further on she's not able to contain this calmness anymore and has an outburst of hatred towards the Lord - something that she's been trying to cover. The last stanza of the poem becomes more of revenge than hatred. She feels she's had revenge over the Lord and Kate by having a child - something that they're not likely to get. She sounds very self-satisfied. Christina Rossetti has written a very good portrayal of life in early times. It shows how society rejected woman who had unlawful sex in earlier times; women were judges and disowned by all people who knew them. Society has now changed. Women are no longer judged or even looked down on by anyone. It has become a way of life that in earlier times may have been considered as dirty and unlawful, people's attitudes have changes and it is no longer as big a deal as it was in the early 19th century.

Culture and Globalization Essay

INTRODUCTION Identity is a question that may be expressed by an anxiety and a hope at the same time. The anxiety lies in the sense of the existence of our Moroccan identity in all its dimensions, Arabo-berber, Muslim negro-African and modern. It also lies in our existence in the world in different parts of the planet where we have decided, voluntarily or not, to assert our existence; a planet that has become a finished space, a global village, surrounded by all kinds of flows, economic, human, electronic, and cultural, which are aspects of globalization; a globalization that could not only be a kind of interdependence among the national spaces which existence is still alive but also an internal phenomenon in these spaces. The advantages and disadvantages of this multiform process can diverge from one partisan to another. Some see in it the chance of a new world and others see in it the risk of an incomparable oppression. The problem of the Arabo Islamic identity or Arab identity occupies the front of the scene. The Islamic world has never been so active in the sense of the expression of identity, maybe because of the more and more enigmatic character of this identity because as Dryush Shayagan reminds, more than the ethnic and the religious identities, we find a third one in addition that emerges from modernity. He adds that the three identities fit one into the other, create more and more complex fields of interference, and exploit territories that remain most of the time incompatible with each other. He goes on declaring that today, these identical cultures are situated between the â€Å"not yet† and the â€Å"never ever†: not yet modern and never ever traditional. These identities that live henceforth, in â€Å"between the two† are totally burst according to Dryush.[1] At first glance, this triple identity raises obstacles to communication, but on the condition of succeeding in fitting out their respective spaces, it offers on the other hand, new possibilities of communication. The assertion of a reactive and massive Arabian Islamic identity was the adequate answer to the colonial dominion. Today, however, the reflection has to fit and adapt itself to the requirements of a situation namely, globalization, that orders that identity becomes seen as open, diverse and it has to be attentive to pluralism in the internal as well as the external places. We can think that the new network of information and communication will favour the emergence of new forms of citizenship susceptible to fill the current democratic deficit. Media permanently present information in the different parts of the world. With the means of information which the internet network prefigures today, the individual can have a more active role in the search for information. One can also contact a multitude of people of different nationalities, discuss problems of public interest, and express his/her opinions in public forums. GLOBALIZATION, CULTURE, AND THE MOROCCAN IDENTITY It is crucial to see globalization from an academic point of view as there is a strong link bounding globalization and culture. The global culture belongs to what Simon During calls â€Å"transnationalization.†[2] This latter is the process by which cultural products extend their actual space to emerge in a global area. Cultural studies are a kind of reaction to this process. Going deeper in this perspective, we come across many points that may link globalization to culture if we consider that culture is a local issue that may be influenced by the global market, the global sight, or may itself influence the global sphere if it is considered as a tradition or a way of life. Culture, from another view, maybe considered as the basis of the construction of one’s identity but once influences by globalization, the identity may change and we may adopt some practices and beliefs that may be no more appropriate to the local culture. Education is another point where globalization and culture meet. Students nowaydays, are no more interested by some issues tackling family or social events, but rather opt to get aware of the global economic and capitalistic changes that the actual world witnesses. Culture is a part of our identity. If we change culture, we change our identity. Stewart Hall argues that in a changing history, identity should remain the same though it is far from being the case of the modern world we’re living in and where identities are in a permanent process of change and transformation and this is the result of globalization. Always according to Hall, the construction of identity is made by the sight of the other. In other words, the negative view on the other makes of our identity a positive one. The process of constructing identity then is based on opposition. If the sight of the other makes of us who we really are, we are then no more free to chose according to our own tastes but rather chose according to others’ reactions[3]. This may seem ambiguous in a sense and annoying in another. How can globalization affect our own sense of belonging? Belonging to a particular nation and adopting a specific culture is not a matter of choice, it is because we belong to a certain ethnic group that has its own tradition, culture and religion. Once we find ourselves involved in a pre-created world, the acceptance becomes an automatic reaction, but when our sense of belonging to a cultural space or another becomes guided by the global pressures, our identity gets hurt and our mind fragmented and confused between what is ours and what is theirs (what is local and what is global). â€Å"The global popular† is the means of communication that occupies an important place in the projection of visual images to spread information (TV, satellite, internet†¦). If I insist on citing the global popular as one of the links between globalization and culture, it is because I judge it of a high importance and necessity to remind the idea that Simon During came with and which expresses the impossibility to separate the global popular from the global culture. He kept arguing that the reason was not only that both of them belong to a single globalizing system but also because the relation between various forms of cultural products are changing and transacting.[4] Similarly, Arjun Appadurai cited in his essay â€Å"Modernity at Large† one of the most important means of the circulating forms which is the â€Å"mediascape†. Like the global popular, mediascapes allow any information to become local through all kinds of the modern media. By this way the local culture may be adopted by different societies and consequently be global.[5] GLOBALIZATION AND MEDIA Today globalization arouses number of controversies. The term by itself condenses anxieties: it evokes, quite at the same time, the shrinkage of the planet bound to technological innovations and the massive impact of the triumphant capitalism that imposes its extreme dominance. Appadurai approaches, in a frontal way, the question of globalization. He put in the centre of his analysis the notion of flows. For him, what defines the contemporary world is much more circulation than structures and stable organizations. The proof is quite clear when we see people constantly moving from one place to another and the extraordinary development of mass communication with images transited throughout the planet. Until then, the individual lived and conceived himself in certain limits. From a simple geopolitical point of view, the nation state was considered as a stable referent: within it, the dimension of the local used to have a great importance conferring to each individual in a given society their privileged points of anchoring. In this context, the identical constructions occur in a permanent game of opposition between the self and the other, between the inside and the outside. But migrations on the one hand, and the media flows on the other hand, disrupted the spreading order until then. What interests Appadurai is the way this situation not only alters the material life of people but also tends to give an incomparable role to imagination. This does not mean that previously societies have not abundantly, neither in their mythological, literary nor artistic productions, appealed to this faculty. Henceforth, imagination is no more limited in some specific domains of expression, but it changes the daily practices, notably the migratory situations where migrants find themselves obliged to create in their exile a world of them by using all the images that media allow them to receive.[6] The technological progress: Internet The cable and internet offer multiple means to reconstitute communities including migrants and those who stayed in their countries. When we come across globalization of communication we inevitably think of internet. Internet is considered to be the symbol of and at the same time, a vehicle for the development of the future mediatic landscape. As a polymorphic tool spread everywhere, internet is actually inescapable in the study of the actual communication processes. If we consider internet as a media, we automatically notice that it is a quite particular one. Among modern mass media, internet is characterized by a potentially or at least virtually wide broadcasting. It is one of the facets of the internet ideology: everybody can have access to messages, everywhere and so to speak with no constraints, and at the same time, internet presents specific characteristics that make of it an exceptional media. Unlike press or radio-television that necessitate material and financial means, licenses, and a diffusion and distribution network, by internet everything is easier. Everybody can be a transmitter and everybody is potentially provider of contents but not everybody can create his/her own television station contrary to internet by which each one –or almost– can create a web site with only an online computer. All this is almost free more than the accommodating of private individuals that is also, more or less, free. If we consider internet as a media, it is then the time in the history of mass communication when each citizen and each association has the ability to play in the same ground as that of the wide mediatic groups or the big companies. Yve Thiran states that from this point of view, internet is a means of communication par excellence and it is not surprising that the excluded traditional media were the first to use it.[7] What seems to be new in the case of internet is not really the fact that it facilitates the emergence of multiple forms of sites and more or less alternative means of information, but rather the fact that the local structuralizations have voluntarily or not, reached the world as a whole. The neighbouring radio station’s diffusion is limited in the neighbourhood, while the expression on the Net may give the impression to address the whole planet. A neighbouring radio station, once installed in the web, can be heard by the whole world. Contrary to the press of radio-television, internet still looks for its place in the media landscape[8] grouping sites together, contents, services and very (too) diverse possibilities to aspire to a real unit of speech (but it is not probably the purpose of internet neither), in a social gratitude other than the connotations that can be socially planed on the new technologies of information and communication in general. In other words, as we find everything on internet, it is still its strict technical dimension that allows an observer to apprehend it, to seize it mentally and conceptually and to succeed in defining it differently. What is internet then? It is a media, a commercial space, a means of information, a shop window, and a place for exchange and expression; that is to say, so many activities where the interlocutors position themselves differently. The telephone is not a newspaper; nevertheless, internet can be at the same time a telephone and a newspaper, an advertisement hoarding and a room of debate. CONCLUSION Born Jamaican, the English cultural theorist Stuart Hall argued that identity must be understood in terms of politics of localization, of location and statement –not as a process of discovery of lost roots but as the construction of a new or emergent shape of ourselves, linked at the same time to the actual social relations and to the contemporary power relations–. While most of us clearly wish to respect most of the aspects of our tradition and history, Hall suggests that we also need, for speaking, to understand languages which we were not taught. We need to understand and revalue the traditions and inheritances of cultural expressions in a new and creative way as the context in which they are produced evolves constantly.[9] ———————– [1] Shayagan Dryush,  « La Lumià ¨re vient de l’Occident,  » Paris : l’Aube, 2001, Entretiens du XXI Sià ¨cle,  « Oà ¹ Vont les Valeurs,  » UNESCO, Abbin Michel, Paris, 2004. [2] Simon During,  « Postcolonialism and Globalization,  » Culture, Globalization and the World System, ed., Anthony King, Dinghamton, 1991. [3] Stuart Hall,  « Old and New Identities, Old and New Ethnicities,  » Culture, Globalization and the World System, Current Debates in Art History 3, State of New York: Bihghamton, 1991, pp. 41-68. [4] Arif Dirlik,  « The Local in the Global,  » Global/Local: Cultural Production and the Transnational Imaginary, eds., Rob Wilson and William Dissanayake, Durham: Duke UP, 1996. [5] Arjun Appadurai,  « Modernity at Large,  » Cultural Dimensions of Globalization, Public Worlds, Vol. 1, London: University of Minnesota Press, 1996. [6] Arjun Appadurai, Aprà ¨s le Colonialisme, Paris : Payot, 2001. [7] Yve Thiran, Sexes, Monsenges et Internet, Bruxelles : Castells-Labor, Coll.  « quartier Libre,  » 2000, p. 42. [8] Yve Thiran shows that the internet needs traditional media such as television to be able to claim the impact that it had notably during the Clinton-Lewinsky affaire. (Thiran, p. 43) [9] Stuart Hall,  « Old and New Identities, Old and New Ethnicities,  » Culture, Globalization and the World System, Current Debates in Art History 3, State of New York: Bihghamton, 1991, pp. 41-68.

Gender Equality and Islam Essay

Islam believes that a woman is not merely subject to man rather she has her own separate and complete entity in all respects. She has an equal right to that of a man to nourish her religions faculties, serve her faith, acquire education, get a job, do business, own something and benefit herself from it and prove her creativity in an enterprise. She is master of herself in all respects. The religious aspect of this fact is described in the Quran as under: â€Å"For muslim men and women, for believing men and women; for devout men and women; for men and women who are patient, for men and women who humble themselves; for men and women who give charity’ for men and women who fast; for men and women who guard their chastity, and for men and women who remember Allah much- for them all has God prepared forgiveness and a great reward† (Al – Ahzab 33, verse 55) The characteristics mentioned in the above Quranic Verse are ten in number. These characteristics cover all aspe cts of Islam, Islamic conduct and behaviorism related to the rights of God and of human beings too. The above verse makes it clear that there is no distinction between a man and a woman in terms of worships of God, obedience to Him and the place in the life after death. In fact there is no distinction on the basis of gender. The Quran has laid down the following principle in connection with acquisition of wealth â€Å"For men is a portion of what they earn and for women is a portion of what they earn â€Å"(Al-Nisa 4, Verse32) The Sura â€Å"Al-Nisa† basically deals with matters relating to money and other issues that emerge out of the relationship of man and woman in different capacities in a family; Immediately after the above quoted verse an article from the law of legacy has been described and next comes the instructions about the mutual contacts of a husband and a wife. Hence the context makes it clear that the above mentioned verse is related to the worldly life and that a woman has equal rights to that of a man like acquiring education, doing job or a business, deal of a property and even develop her personality. There are several other Quranic verses which make it clear that there is no distinction between man and a woman on any grounds except in the bearing of a responsibility (the detail would come in later pages). Both are human beings and both have rights and privileges. God says: â€Å"I will deny no man or woman among you the rewards of their labours. You are the offspring of one another† (Al-Imran 3: Verse: 195) Through Sura Al-Tawba, God has declared all Muslim men and women as friends, companions and helpers of each other. Thus women are, in no way inferior to men rather they are friends of men and are equal to them. (However, in terms of responsibilities there can be classification, like a doctor and a teacher, under special circumstances): â€Å"The true believers, both men and women, are equal friends to each other. They enjoin what is just and forbid what is evil; they attend to their prayers and pay the Zakat and obey Allah and His Apostle. On these Allah will have merc y. He is Mighty, Wise.†(Al-Tawba 9, verse71) This is why during the prophetic period women used to acquire both religious and worldly education, do farming, take part in trade and industry and manage their wealth and property; About Aisha, the wife of the Holy Prophet, everyone knows that she has related and confirmed 2210 Hadiths (Prophet’s sayings) (Sadarat-ul-Zahab: vol.1) The books based on the compilations of the history of the days of the companions of the Apostle reveal the stories of innumerable females who had mastery over different fields of the religious knowledge rather several eminent scholars attained the knowledge of Islam from them. It was a general practice during those days people used to seek guidance from the wives of the Apostle in the matters of religion. There were besides the wives of the Apostle, certain other women too who earned repute in this field. Rabi-Bint-I-Mauz was one such famous scholar and the outstanding scholars of Islam like Abdullah-b in-Abass and Abdullah Bin Umar had been her students. Several people have related certain Hadiths through her reference. These include Salman Bin Yasir, Abad Bin walid and Nafei-Bin-Umar etc. Fatima Bint-I-Qais had been the tutor of the prominent scholars like Ibn-e-Maseeb, Urwa Bin Zubair and Shabi. (Al-Astaayab-fil-Asam-ul-Sahab) Ayesha the daughter of Saad Bin Abi-Waqas was remarkable scholar and had educated Imam Malik, Ayub Sakhtiami and Hakam Bin Ataiba. (Tazeeb-ul-tazeeb Vol. 12) Imam Shafi, the eminent jurist learnt the knowledge of Hadith from the Syeda Nafisa, the grand daughter of Hasan, the grand son of the Apostle. (Wafyat-ul-Aayam-al-Ibn-khalkan Vol 2) Same was the case of the worldly knowledge and wisdom. For example among the female companions of the Apostle several were poetess like Khansa, Saudah, Safia, Atika, Muridya, Umm-I-Aiman and several others. In the field of medicine and surgery, Rafaza Aslamia, Umm-I-Mutea, umm-I-Kabsa, Hamne Bint-I- Jahsh, Ummi-I-Athiya, Ummai Saleem and several other women won repute. (Tabqat-Ibne-Saeed, Asaba) It was a usual practice among women to get wo rldly knowledge during those days. If their number is not remarkable, it was due to lack of resources. Some ordinary women knew how to read and write and even could manage small accounts. (Tabqat Ibn-e-Saad Vol-8). Some wrote and reply letters. (Al-Adab-ul Musfi) During those days the women used to do farming and looked after their fields. In Bokhari (the collection of Hadith) Sahl Bin Sasd relates the story of a female companion of the Apostle who owned fields and gardens. She cultivated a vegetable named â€Å"Salq† near the bank of a stream and used to serve Sahl Bin Saad and others with Salq and Maize when they visited every Friday. (Bokhari) The most authenticated books on Hadith like Bokhari, Muslim, Abu-Daud and Ibni Mauja quote the statement of Jabir Bin Abdullah who narrates about her maternal aunt. She was divorced and was going through Iddat (the three months waiting period after divorce during which a woman can’t marry). She desired to sell out the fruit of her garden for her living. She consulted the Apostle who advised her to do so as in that case she would be able to give charity and do something for her redemption. This makes clear that the women, during the prophetic perod used to do farming and trade. According to Bokhari, Asma, the daughter of Abu Bakar, the first pious Caliph and the wife of Zubair used to assist her husband in farming on the fields almost two miles far from her home. Those days the women could freely take part in the trade and business activities. The most respectable woman in Muslim Ummah Khadija was a trader. Many female companions of the Apostle like Khaula. Al-khamia, Saqafia and Bint-I-Mukarrama used to trade in perfume. (Asaba-Fi-Tameez-ul-Sahaba Vol-4) Several event related in ‘Tabqat Ibn-I-Saad’ exhibit the fact muslim women during the Prophetic period used to take part in agriculture, trade and industry even without the assistance of their husbands. The wife of Abdullah Bin Masud was a good craftswoman. Once she told the Apostle that she was adept in different crafts and sold out her prepared goods. She inquired if she could spend her money on her husband and children as they have no other source of income. The Apostle told her that she would get a reward from God if she did that. It is also quoted in Al-Asaba Fil Tameez-al Sahabe Vol4) Once a woman named Khaula Bint-e-Saalba had a dispute with her husband. Both of them presented their case before the Apostle who advised the husband to keep himself away from her until the revelation of an instruction from God. At this Khula told the Prophet of God that her husband would’t be able to survive in that case as he was dependent upon her for his living. A woman named Qaila told the Apostle that she was a trader and sought his guidance in the trade matters. Another woman, Amira narrates that once she went to the market along with her maid servant and bought a fish. Ali, the fourth Caliph of Islam was also there who bought that fish from her. There are many such incidents related in ‘Tabqat Ibn-I-Saad Vol 8. The most authentic book on this subject. Souda, the Prophet’s wife was adept in the art of tanning. It is quoted in Bukhari that once her sheep died, she put its skin off, got it tanned and softened it with dates. During that period women performed several tasks collectively as well. The Bokhari kitab-ul-istehsan unfolds that once many women visited the Apostle and requested him to allocate one day in a week for their religious training. The Prophet thus accepted their request. Asma Bint-I-Zahid was good at rhetoric. Once women designated her their representative and sent to the Apostle to make some queries (Al-istaab Fi-Al-Sahab) Women were entrusted with certain responsible positions as well and they proved their worth. For example Umar, the second Caliph of Islam appointed Shafa Bint-e- Abdullah as the Price control officer.