Taking a Look at Sports Psychology - 1561 Words

Don’t think of a pink elephant. Come on – don’t let the picture creep into your mind. Stop thinking of that†¦ Pink Elephant (Gardner). It has been proven that putting a â€Å"don’t† or a â€Å"not† into a statement can cause the brain to have difficulties in interpreting the statement. In sports, players tend to tell themselves â€Å"not† to do something. In soccer, a goalie might tell him/herself to not let the other team score a goal, and then the team does. Or in tennis, players tell themselves not to serve the ball into the net, and then they do just that. Sometimes they tell themselves to â€Å"do† something, and that athlete might end up doing the unthinkable. With three seconds left in the game, a basketball player might take the three-point shot and win the game, even though they have never been able to make that shot before. These types of scenario tend to happen all the time. 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Barrack Obama’s Speeches Free Essays

ISSN 1798-4769 Journal of Language Teaching and Research, Vol. 1, No. 3, pp. We will write a custom essay sample on Barrack Obama’s Speeches or any similar topic only for you Order Now 254-261, May 2010  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER Manufactured in Finland. doi:10. 4304/jltr. 1. 3. 254-261 A Critical Discourse Analysis of Barack Obama? s Speeches Junling Wang School of Foreign Languages, Northwest Normal University, Lanzhou, China Email: wangjl36@163. com Abstract—The Critical Discourse Analysis is often applied to analyze political discourse including the public speech, in which the speaker wins favorite response from the audience. This paper, based on Critical Discourse Analysis theory and Systematic Functional Linguistics, analyzes Barack Obama’s presidential speeches mainly from the point of transitivity and modality, in which we can learn the language how to serve the ideology and power. Moreover, we can have a better understanding of the political purpose of these speeches. Index Terms— Critical Discourse Analysis, transitivity, modalit y I. INTRODUCTION Critical linguistic is also called Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). It first originated in Britain in 1980s when the work Language and Control was published. Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) is a type of discourse a nalytical research that primarily studies the way social power abuse, dominance, and inequality are enacted, reproduced, and resisted by text and talk in the social and political context. With such dissident research, critical discourse analysts take explicit position, and thus want to understand, expose, and ultimately resist social equality (Van Dijk, 1985). Michael Alexander Kirkwood Halliday (often M. A. K. Halliday), an Australian linguist, developed an internationally influential grammar model-the Systemic Functional Grammar (also called Systemic Functional Linguistics). It is the main foundation of Critical Discourse Analysis as well as other theories in pragmatics. The object of CDA is public speech, such as advertisement, newspaper, politic al propagandas, official documents, laws and regulations and so on. Its aim is to explore the relationships among language ,ideology and power. In the past twenty years, Critical Discourse Analysis developed quickly in aboard and had achieved great achievements. A large number of scholars have made contribution in the fields of critical analysis of political discourse. However, Critical Discourse Analysis is, comparatively speaking, a kind of new study in China. Only a few researchers work in this field. Since 90s of the last century, some articles about the basic theories and principles of Critical Discourse Analysis have just appeared in linguistic journals. Chen Zhongzhu, a professor in Beijing University, was the first person who introduced Critical Discourse Analysis to China. He made a review of critical linguistics and introduced its philosophical and theoretical foundations to Chinese linguists. Xin Bin is another prominent and productive scholar of Critical Discourse Analysis in China. From 1996 to 2 002, he published many articles to further the study of Critical Discourse Analysis, in which he discussed the birth, development and methods of critical linguistics (Xu Xiaoxia, 2008). Since more and more Chinese-foreign academic exchanges in the 21st century, the development of Critical Discourse Analysis has come to a new stage. We can see more and more articles about Critical Discourse Analysis appeared in academic journals. We know that every four years, hundreds of thousands of Americans will welcome the glory moment of electing a new president. They will canvass for their favorite candidates willingly. And every candidate will apply his or her rich language expressions, impassioned speeches and wholehearted attitudes to try to win more votes. The stud y of presidential addresses has not only attracted the interests of political scientists and historians, but also attained the attention of linguists. This year, Barack Obama, the first African -American president in American history, captured the world? s attention. In this thesis, the author will apply Halliday? s Systemic Functional Grammar, in terms of the three meta -functions: ideational function,interpersonal function and textual function, to find out the formal features of Barack Obama? s speeches. Its aim is to explore the relationships among language ,ideology and power and to find out how to use the power of speeches to persuade the public to accept and support his policies. II. THEORETICAL BASES M. A. K. Halliday? s Systemic Functional Grammar is usually considered the main foundation of Critical Discourse Analysis as well as other theories in pragmatics. Systemic Functional Grammar has two components: SYSTEMIC GRAMMAR and FUNCTIONAL GTAMMAR.  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEACHING AND RESEARCH 55 They are two inseparable parts for an integral framework of linguistic theory. â€Å"Systemic grammar aims to explain the internal relations in language as a system network, or meaning potential. And this network consists of subsystems from which language users make choices. Functional grammar aims to reveal that language is a means of social interaction, based on the position that language system and the forms that make it up are inescapably determined by the us es or functions which they serve† (Hu Zhuanglin, 1988: 307). Halliday thinks the procedure of stylistic analysis can be divided into three logically ordered phrases: Analysis, Interpretation and Evaluation. The limitless practical functions can be generalized into a set of highly coded and abstract functions—meta-functions, which are inherent in every language. His idea of meta -function includes the ideational function, the interpersonal function and the textual function. A. Ideational Function The first function Halliday points out is the ideational functi on. What is ideational function? It is through this function that the speaker or writer embodies in language his experience of the phenomena of the real world; and this includes his experience of the internal world of his own consciousness: his reactions, cognitions, and perceptions, and also his linguistic acts of speaking and understanding (Halliday, 1971: 332) In other words, this function is to convey new information, to communicate a content that is unknown to the hearer. It reflects the events and experience in both objective and subjective worlds. The ideational function mainly consists of â€Å"transitivity† and â€Å"voice†. Hu Zhuanglin, a Chinese linguist, point out: â€Å"This function not only specifies the available options in meaning but also determines the nature of their structural realizations† (Hu Zhuanglin, 1988: 312). For Example, Kitty flies a kite can be analyzed as: the Actor is Kitty, the process is Material and the Goal is a kite. The Actor, Process, Goal, and their subcategories reflect our understanding of phenomena that come within our experience. The ideational function is mainly represented by the transitivity system in grammar. In this system,the meaningful grammatical unit is clause,which expresses what? s happening,what? s being done,what? s felt and what the state is and so on (Cheng Yumin, 2007). The transitivity system includes six processes: material proces s,mental process,relational process,behavioral process, verbal process and existential process. Material processes are those in which something is done. These processes are expressed by an action verb (e. g. eat, go, give), an Actor (logical subject) and the Goal of the action (logical direct object, usually a noun or a pronoun). Hu Zhuanglin,1988) e. g. Marry is eating a banana. Mental processes express such mental phenomena as â€Å"perception† (see, look), â€Å"reaction† (like, please) and â€Å"cognition† (know, believe, convince). A mental process involves two participants, Senser and Phenomenon. (Hu Zhuanglin, 1988) e. g. Tom likes chocolate. Relational processes can be classified into two types: Attributive and Identify ing. The former expresses what attributes a certain object has, or what type it belongs to, for example, The temperature is high. The latter expresses the identical properties of two entities. For example, Lily is a girl; The girl is Lily. (Hu Zhuanglin, 1988) Verbal processes are those of exchanging information. Commonly used verbs are say, tell, talk, praise, boast, describe, etc. In these processes the main participants are Sayer, Receiver and Verbiage. Behavioral processes refer to physiological and psychological behavior such as breathing, coughing, smiling, laughing, crying, staring, and dreaming, etc. Generally there is only one participant—Behaver, which is often a human. This kind of processes is much like the mental process. Behavioral process may sometimes be hardly distinguished from a material process that has only one participant. This depends on whether the activity concerned is physiological or psychological. When Behavioral process has two participants, we may take it as material process, for example, His father beat the disobedient boy. (Hu Zhuanglin, 1988) Existential processes represent that something exists or happens. In every existential process, there is an Existent. For Example, There is a girl in the garden. Does ghost exist on earth? Here comes a bus. B. Interpersonal Function In the second place, language serves as interpersonal function. As Halliday observed, The speaker is using language as the means of his own intrusion into the speech event: the expression of his comments, attitudes and evaluations, and also of the relationship that he sets up between himself and the listener —in particular, the communication role that he adopts of informing, questioning, greeting, persuading, and the like. (Halliday, 1971:333) Hu Zhuanglin (1988:313) points out: â€Å"The interpersonal function embodies all uses of language to express social and personal relations. This includes the various ways the speaker enters a speech situation and performs a speech act. † Modality and Mood are often used to express the interpersonal function. Mood shows what role the speaker selects in the speech situation and what role he assigns to the addressee. If the speaker selects the imperative mood, he assumes the role of one giving commands and puts the addressee in the role of one expected to obey orders. For exampl e, Pass  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER 256 JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEACHING AND RESEARCH me the book. (Hu Zhuanglin, 1988) Modality refers to the intermediate ranges between the extreme positive and the extreme negative. It is one of the most important systems in social communication. On the one hand, it can objectively express the spe aker? s judgment toward the topic. On the other hand, it can show the social role relationship, scale of formality and power relationship. In English, except modal verbs, modal adverbs, adjectives, there are also personal pronouns, notional verbs, tense, direct and indirect speeches to express the modalization. C. Textual Function The third role of language is called textual function. Halliday described, â€Å"Language makes links between itself and the situation; and discourse becomes possible because the speaker or writer can produce a text and the listener or reader can recognize one† (Halliday, 1971:334). According to Hu Zhanglin, The textual function refers to the fact that language has mechanisms to make any stretch of spoken or written discourse into a coherent and unified text and make a living passage different from a random list of sentences. Although two sentences may have exactly the same ideational and interpersonal functions, they may be different in terms of textual coherence. Hu Zhuanglin, 1988: 315) The textual function fulfils the requirement that language should be operationally relevant, having texture in a real context of situation that distinguishes a living passage from a mere entry in a grammar book or a dictionary. It provides the remaining strands of meaning potential to be woven into the fabric of linguistic structure. Information can be clearly expressed in a discourse. It can also be implicated between the lines. Therefore, all discourses are unities of explicit and implicit message. (Halliday, 1971) Because language serves as a generalized ideational function, we are able to use it for all the specific purposes and types of context which involve the communication of experience. Because it serves a generalized interpersonal function, we are able to use it for the specific forms of personal expression and social interaction. And a prerequisite to its effective operation under both these headings what we have referred to as the textual function, whereby language becomes text, is related to itself and to its contexts of use. Without the textual component of meaning, we should be unable to make any use of language at all (Hu Zhuanglin, 1988). III. INTRODUCTION OF SAMPLE SPEECHES A. The Introduction of Barack Obama Barack Obama, a first-term senator from Illinois, becomes the first African -American president of the United States. He was born on August 4, 1961, in Hawaii and has lived in many places, including Indonesia. His mother was from Kansas and his father from Kenya. Obama attended Columbia University in New York and earned a law degree at Harvard University in Massachusetts. He and his wife, Michelle Obama, who also worked as a lawyer and later for the University of Chicago, have two young daughters, Sasha and Malia. Serving in the Senate since 2004, Obama introduced bipartisan legislation which allows Americans to learn online how their tax dollars are spent. He also serves on the Veterans? Affairs Committee, which helps oversee the care of soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. So his approval rate on the internet is high. The most supporters of Obama are young people, African-American, poor citizens and the people who want to change. Facing with the economic crisis, two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Obama gave hi s campaign slogan â€Å"change has come† and hoped to rebuilt the confidence and believe of Americans. In last August, Barack Obama defeated Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady, and became the presidential candidate of the Democratic Party. And during the following months in 2008, he defeated McCain, the Republican Party? s presidential candidate, and won the all three television debates held in Oxford (Mississippi), Nashville (Tennessee) and Hempstead (New York). And finally he relying on 333 electoral votes won the final success and became the 44th American president and the first African-American president in American history. Barack Obama has written two books: The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream (2006) and Dreams from my Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (1995). B. Speeches for Analysis Sample Speech 1. Obama? s Victory Speech On November 4, 2008, Barack Obama gave a victory speech in Grant Park of Chicago to appreciate his supporters and celebrated the success of elections. About 400,000 Americans got here and witnessed the happy moment. Sample Speech 2. Obama? s Inaugural Address On January 20, 2009, the new American president Barack Obama gave his inaugural address before the Capital Rotunda in Washington. According to the official reports, population of the attendance reached about 2 ,000,000. IV. DETAIL STUDY ON SAMPLE SPEECHES From table 1, we can have a general view of the two speeches. We can see the total words of sample 1 are 2057,  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEACHING AND RESEARCH 257 including 110 sentences. The average length of words is 4. 247 and sentence mean length is 18. 7. Sample 2 is as the same, the total words are 2396, with an average length of 4. 458. And the number of sentence is 112 with an average length of 21. 39. So here, we can find that the two sample speeches mainly use simple words and short sentences. The language is easy and colloquial. The audience of the speeches is usually various, including the rich, the poor, the black, the white and so on. In order to shorten the distance between the president and the audience, we can find Obama used a lot of spoken English. Moreover, the subject of the two speeches is extensive, which isn? t on account of one or two concrete issue. That is because the presidential speeches usually reflect the political platforms of the candidate, so the field is large, such as American history, present crisis, global issues and so on. TABLE 1 STATISTIC OF SAMPLE SPEECHES Statistical Item Statistic Words (Tokens) Words (Types) Tokens/Types Word Classification Sentences Paragraphs Characters Sentence Mean Length Word Mean Length Sample 1 2057 690 2. 981 1687_114_†¦ 110 63 8736 18. 700 4. 247 Sample 2 2396 894 2. 680 1969_123_†¦ 112 35 10681 21. 393 4. 458 A. Transitivity Analysis The ideational function is represented in text by transitivity. It is a basic semantic system, which construes the world of experience into a manageable set of process types. Halliday divides these processes into six types: material process , mental process,relational process,behavioral process, verbal process and existential process. TABLE 2 OVERVIEW OF PROCESS TYPES (PENG PINGPING, 2007) Core meaning Participants „doing? , „happening? Actor, Goal „sensing? Sensor, phenomenon „being? „saying? Sayer, Receiver, Verbiage „behaving? Behaver „existing? Existent Process types Material Mental Relational Verbal Behavioral Existential Sample Speech 1 NO. Total Number 212 % 2 NO. Material Processes 123 TABLE 3 TRANSITIVITY IN THE SAMPLE SPEECHES Metal Relational Behavioral Processes Processes Processes 18 48 8 Verbal Processes 12 Existential processes 3 58 227 % 8 23 4 6 1 141 14 52 6 10 4 62 6 23 2 4 2 From table 2 and 3, we can see that material processes are used most in the speeches with a percentage of 58% and 62%. Relational process ranks the second and then is followed by mental process. So here, the author will mainly analyze the first three ones. 1 Material process Material process is a process of â€Å"doing†. The process is usually indicated by a verb expressing an action, either concrete or abstract. There are usually two participants in the process: Actor and Goal. Actor is comparable to the Subject and Goal is comparable to the Object and both of them are usually realized by noun phrases. When the participants both exist, the clause can be either in active voice or in passive voice.  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER 258 JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEACHING AND RESEARCH ACTOT I We/Americans/each of us/all /our TABLE 4 TRANSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF SAMPLE SPEECHES (MATERIAL PROCESS) PROCESS GOAL receive, congratulate, make, need, thank call, partner, voice, help achieve, start, get, face, share, seek, refuse, choose, money, the challenges, values, change, choice, vital reject, carry, understand, use, build, meet, restore, rust, hope, journey, gift, greatness, energy, roads transform, taste, consume, send, volunteer, support, and bridge, reality, science, schools and colleges, new threats, the bitter swill, new way, world? s resource , message, From the above table (Table 4), we can see the Actors of the two sample speeches are I and we /Americans/each of us/all. Material process, as a process of doing, is a good choice in the address to demonstrate what the government has achieved, what t hey are doing and what they will do in different aspects of affairs, home or abroad . And it can also arouse the American people? s confidence toward the president and his government and to get their support in policies or measures in the following four years. For example, We (Actor) will begin to responsibly leave (Material Process) Iraq (Goal) to its people, and forge (Material Process) a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan (Goal). With old friends and former foes, we (Actor) will work tirelessly to lessen (Material Process) the nuclear threat (Goal), and roll back (Material Process) the specter of a warming planet (Goal). We (Actor) will not apologize(Material Process) for our way of life (Goal), nor will we (Actor) waver in its defense (Goal) , and for those who (Actor) seek to advance (Material Process) their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents (Goal), we (Actor) say(Material Process) to you (Goal) now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken (Material Process); you (Actor) cannot outlast(Material Process) us, and we (Actor) will defeat(Material Process) you (Goal). 2 Relational process Relational process is a process of being. It can be divided into two modes: attributive relation and identifying relation. The first means what properties an object possesses or what category it can be put into. And the other means that an entity and another is uniform. It is used widely in describing people and objects. Look at the following table: TABLE 5 Attributive The dream of our founders is alive. Our challenges may be new. Identifying America is a friend of each nation. A friend of each nation is America. America is a place where all things are possible. A place where all things are possible is America. Relational process, as a process of being, is appropriate to explain the complex relationships between some abstract items because it sounds definite. As a result, the process accounts for a large proportion in these addresses to elaborate the relationship between traditional ideals and their beliefs. Such an elaboration can reach the President? s aim of making the reasoning naturally and unconsciously accepted and making the required sacrifice in the speech willingly taken by the audience. (Cheng Yumin, 2007) 3 Mental process Mental process is a process of feeling, thinking and seeing. Actor is not the real subject of doing, but the feeling. It represents inner experience, such as â€Å"perception†, â€Å"reaction† and â€Å"cognition†. We call the two participants are Senser and phenomenon. For example, (1) In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we (Senser) understand (Mental Process) that greatness is never a given. (2) As we (Senser) consider (Mental Process) the road that unfolds before us, we (Senser) remember (Mental Process) with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. 3) And we (Senser) know (Mental Process) the government can’t solve every problem. From above examples, we can see that mental process, as a process of sensing, appeals to the audience? s inner heart to connect the political beliefs, ambitions with their expectation, hope in a c lear and emphasized way. In this way, the audience? s emotion of promotion and willingness to devotion is aroused an d strengthened. Halliday declared that material, relational and mental processes are three primary ones in language use since the three add up to about 90%. As an inaugural address for a newly elected American President, it must fulfill the traditionally and ritually required functions: to state facts of the domestic or worldwide situations or problems objectively and the relevant policies forcefully, to conduct reasoning related to the relationship between traditional beliefs such as freedom, democracy, justice, equality, principles, union, happiness and American dreams and citizens? participation, responsibilities, sacrifice and the needed reforms in economy, Medicare, or other fields. (Cheng Yumin, 2007) For example, 1) There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after the children fall asleep and wonder how they’ll make the mortgage or pay their doctors’ bills or save enough for their c hild’s college education. (2) Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our ad versaries and threaten our plan et. The above two sentence are examples of showing the fact that the situation in American is not good. The economic  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEACHING AND RESEARCH 59 crisis leaded many people lost their jobs. It is hard for them to pay the housing fee, tuitions Medicare and other heavy pays. (3) There’s new energy to harness, new jobs to be created, new schools to build, and threats to meet, alliances to repair. (4) So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism, of responsibility, where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves but each other. These two examples reveal that the government hopes the Americans can join together and rebuild their confidence and believes to defeat all the bad things. B. Modality Analysis Modality refers to a speaker? s attitudes towards or opinion about the truth of a proposition expressed by a sentence. It also extends to their attitude towards the situation or event described by a sentence. 1 Modal verbs Positive Negative TABLE 6 MODAL VERBS (ZHANG GUOLING, 2006) Low politeness Median politeness Can, may, could, might, dare Will, would, should, shall Needn? t, doesn? t/didn? t , +need to, Won? t, wouldn? t, have to shouldn? t, isn? t/wasn? t to High politeness Must, ought to, need, has/had to Mustn? t, oughtn? t to, can? couldn? t, mayn? t, mightn? t, hasn? t/hadn? t to TABLE 7 MODALITY ANALYSIS OF SAMPLE SPEECHES (MODAL VERBS) Total Number Low politeness Median politeness No. % No. % 2057 23 1. 12 23 1. 12 2396 29 1. 12 28 1. 12 Sample Speeches 1 2 High politeness No. % 3 0. 15 9 0. 38 According to the statistics, it is obvious that modal verbs are used to convey the addresser? s attitudes and judgment, with an average of 0. 8% in the whole sp eeches. The high percentage of the use of modal verbs is appropriate to the speaking since the addresses are delivered in spoken form. Compared with other verbs, modal verbs are more easily identified and understood and then accepted because at the time of listening to the speeches, there is no time for the audience to reflect. For Example, (1) †¦because they believed that this time must be different, that their voices could be that difference. (2) The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even in one term. But, America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. (3) And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn, I may not have won your vote tonight, but I hear your voices. I need your help. And I will be your president, too. (4) We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. All this we will do. 2 Tense Tense is the time of a clause. Halliday (1994) points out that primary t ense means past, present or future at the moment of speaking; it is the time relative to â€Å"now†. Sample Speeches 1 NO. Total Numbers 110 % 2 NO. % TABLE 8 TENSE OF SENTENCES Present Simple Perfect 72 8 Simple Past Simple Future 21 10 65. 5 112 7. 2 19. 1 9. 1 71 13 12 14 63. 4 11. 6 10. 7 12. 5 On the basis of the statistics of tenses, we can see that the tense of simple present is most frequently used in the speeches, the average percentage being 64. 45%. Simple past ranks second with an average percentage of 14. 9% and is followed by simple future with an average percentage of 10. %. The use of present perfect is slightly less than simple future and ranks the fourth. It is natural that simple present tense ranks with top priority since the addresses are to present the domestic and world wide situations ranging from political, economic and cultural fields at present. The use  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER 260 JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEAC HING AND RESEARCH of the tense facilitates the creation of a close relationship between the president and his audience and the easy identification and acceptation of the validity of the assertions contained in the speaking. Simple future tense is primarily used to show the planned or expected things in the future. The tense helps the president to lay out his or his government? s following reforms or steps taken in his term to foster the buildup of the country and the corresponding change or results of these measures in the futu re. In this way, the government? s objectives are shown and at the same time, the audience? s confidence is built by the prospect of the beauty and prosperity of the future life. It will be a natural result that the American pe ople will follow the government? direction and guidance in the next four years and thus the addresses? goal of seeking support is achieved. Simple past and present perfect tenses are used to refer to the actions or things in the past. Their function lies in that the newly elected presidents usually state the achievements in the founding of the country or in the last term or recall the positive or negative experiences in the past as basis or incentive of hi s following actions. By this means, his respect for the past is displayed and it can also make his plans reasoning and fully grounded. Cheng Yumin, 2007) 3 Personal Pronouns TABLE 9 PERSONAL PRONOUNS Personal Pronoun First person I (me) We (us) Second person You (you) Third person He (him) She (her) It (it) They (them) Possecive pronoun My (mine) Our(ours) Your(yours) His (his) Her(hers) Its (its) Their (theirs) Obama? s victory speech 35 60 20 4 8 14 8 Obama? s victory speech 12 26 6 1 6 0 11 Sample Speeches Obama? s Inaugural Address 3 85 14 1 0 0 4 Obama? s Inaugural Address 2 69 3 0 0 0 0 From table 9, we can find out that the first person is used most. For example, the use of the first person pronoun â€Å"we† is to shorten the distance between the speaker and the audience, regardless of their disparity in age, social status and professions etc. it may include both the speaker and the listener into the same arena, and thus make the audience feel close to the speaker and his points. C. Textual Analysis The textual function refers to the fact that language has mechanisms to make any stretch of spoken or written discourse into a coherent and unified text and make a living passage different from a random list of sentences. Here, we take Sample 2 as an example. Obama? s inaugural address is the first time for him to give a formal speech as a president and also an optimal time to show himself a qualified president. As a result, to fulfill the aim of convincing the American people and the whole world that he and his team are capable of leadership, with vigor and with vision, he must illustrate the planned policies, both domestic and foreign, in a formal, convincing and forceful way. It often contains the following information: (Cheng Yumin, 2007) 1) Salutation ) The expression of gratitude and honor 3) A review of the American history and achievement in the past 4) An analysis of the contemporary situation, at home and in the world 5) A displaying and explanation of domestic policies and/or foreign policies of the new government 6) Hopes for the beautiful and prosperous future of the country 7) Resort to God for help and blessing The whole text is coherent, organized, accurate and logical. So it can help to persuade the public to accept and support his policies. Meanwhile, we can find the strong religious content in his speech. Look at the following examples: (1) †¦the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness. (2) This is the source of our confidence — the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny. (3)†¦with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations. (4) Thank you. God bless you. And God bless the United States of America.  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEACHING AND RESEARCH 261 We know most Western people are godly Christian. These prayers, direct and indirect speeches from Bible and the Christian stories can all help the speaker to win the sympathy and supporting of audience. They make the speech full of charisma. V. CONCLUSION On the basis of the above discussion, we may come to the conclusion. According to Halliday? s Systemic Functional Grammar, we can summarize the features of Barack Obama? s speeches as follow. First, he used more simple words and short sentences instead of difficult ones. His language is easy and colloquial. Thus, it can easily shorten the distance between him and the audience . Second, from transitivity analysis, we can see material process, a process of doing, has been used most in his speeches. From this process, Obama showed us what the government has achieved, what they are doing and what they will do. And also we can see t hat with applying transitivity, his speeches are trying to arouse the American people? s confidence toward the president and his government in the following four years. Third, modality refers to a speaker? s attitudes towards or opinion about the truth of a proposition expressed by a sentence. Through the analysis of modality, we can find that Obama made his audience more easily to understand and accept his political speeches by means of modal verbs, tense and first person pronouns. He used simple present tense to present the domestic and world wide situations ranging from political, economic and cultural fields at present. And then depending on simple future tense, he laid out his following reforms and steps taken in his term. In this way, the government? s ob jectives are shown and at the same time, the audience? s confidence is built. Moreover, by using first person pronouns and religious belief , he successfully shortened the distance between him and the audience. So it can help him persuade the public to accept and support his policies. Critical Discourse Analysis can explore the relationships among language, ideology and power. It provides a new idea and method to analyze public addresses. So it is worth for us to pay more attention. REFERENCES Halliday, M. A. K. ( 1979). Linguistic function and literary style: an inquiry into the language of William Golding? s The Inheritors. In Linguistic Studies of Text and Discourse. ed. Jonathan J. Webster. 88-125. Peking: Peking University Press. [2] Van Dijk, (1985). A Handbook of Discourse Analysis London Academic Press Limited. Volumn 4. [3] Cheng Yumin. (2007). An Analysis of Style Features of Inaugural Speeches Given by American Presidents Based on the Functional Theory of Han Lide. From the thesis of a master. Tai Yuan science University. [4] Dai Weihua, Gao Jun. (2002). A Critical Discourse Analysis: Theory Comment and Examples Analysis. Foreign Language Issue 6. P 85-88. [5] Hu Zhuanglin. (1988). A Course of Linguistics. Peking: Peking University Press. [6] Lin Wei,Yang Yuchen. (2007). English Discourse Analysis. Shanghai:Fu Dan University Press. [7] Luo Li. (2007). A Critical Discourse Analysis of a Political Speech. Science and Education Collection P193-194? [8] Wei Fang. (2005). Language Feature Analysis and Translation Method of Political Speeches. Journal of Peking Printing College Volumn13, issue 4. P75-78. [9] Xiong Li. (2004). A Study of Kennedy? s Writing Style from Words of His Inaugural Speech. Journal of Southwest National University, Issue 6. P 407-410. [10] Xu Xiaoxia. (2008). A Critical Discourse Analysis of Sino-American Political News Report. From the thesis of a master. Shan Dong Normal University. [1] Junling Wang was born in Lanzhou City, Gansu Province, China in 1963. She received her M. A degree in English language and literature from Foreign Languages Department of Northwest Normal University in Lanzhou, China in 1989. Now she is an associate professor in Northwest Normal University. Her research interests include English teaching and translation practice.  © 2010 ACADEMY PUBLISHER How to cite Barrack Obama’s Speeches, Papers

Essay about Foundations of Contract Law

Question 1: Jamie is retiring from the catering business. His neighbours daughter Sonia has just finished college and is about to open up a restaurant. Last Monday Jamie told Sonia he was selling his catering equipment and was prepared to let her have everything for 5,000 but that he wanted an answer by Friday as one of his friends was also interested. On Wednesday Sonia telephoned Jamie to ask whether she could have 2 months to pay. Jamie was not in so she left a message on his answer machine asking for 2 months to pay. On Wednesday, Jamie posted a letter to Sonia saying he had sold the equipment to his friend. He did not pick up his answer machine messages. As Sonia had heard nothing and was unable to get hold of Jamie on the phone, she wrote out a cheque for 5,000 and put it in an envelope with a note saying, Here is 5,000 for the catering equipment and put it in the post on Thursday. On Friday Sonia saw Jamies wife and Sonia asked if her letter and cheque had arrived. Jamies wife said no a nd hadnt she received Jamies letter saying had already sold the equipment to his friend. The letter from Jamie did not arrive until Saturday. Advise Sonia as to whether she has a contract with Jamie for the equipment. Answer1: The issue that needs to be decided in the present case is that an offer was made by Jamie to his neighbor's daughter Sonia to sell all his catering equipment for $5000. Jamie also told Sonia that she should reply to is offered by Friday because one of his friends was also interested in purchasing the catering equipment from him. On Wednesday, Sonia made a telephone call to Jamie in order to ask if she could have two months to pay the amount. Due to the reason that Jamie was not them, Sonia left a message on Jamie's answering machine. For the other hand, Jamie posted a letter to Sonia on Wednesday in which he informed Sonia that he has sold the catering equipment to his friend. By this time, Jamie had not picked up the messages on his answering machine. On the other hand, when Sonia did not hear from Jamie, she wrote a cheque for $5000 and put the same in post on Thursday. Therefore, the issue that needs to be decided in the present case is if there is a contract between Sonia and Jam ie for the sale of catering equipment. In order to constitute a valid acceptance, there should be an offer and the acceptance should be in response to such an offer. According to this principle, not only should an offer be made but the offer should be in existence at the time when the same has been accepted by the other party. On the other hand, an offer may come to an end in many different ways like revocation, rejection, termination, death and a condition which brings the offer to an end. In this regard, the law provides that the original offer is terminated by a counteroffer made by the other party. Therefore if the party to whom the original offer has been made response by putting forward an alternative proposal, in such a case, it can be considered as a counter offer and the effect of such an offer is that the original offer is terminated. Traditionally, a contractual agreement is analyzed in terms of offer and acceptance. In such a case, an offer is made by one party known as the offeror and the other party, known as the offeree accepts the same and it results in the creation of a legally binding contract. It also needs to be noted in this regard that an offer has to be distinguished from an invitation to treat. At the same time, it is also significant to make a distinction between bilateral and unilateral contracts. The leading case in this regard is that of Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball Co. At the same time, in order to amount to an offer, it is required to be shown that the party making the offer had the intention to be bound by such an offer (Harvey v Facey, 1893). As mentioned above, and offered also needs to be distinguished from an invitation to treat. That main difference between the two is that while on acceptance, an offer results in the creation of a legally binding contract, an invitation to trade cannot b e accepted by the other party to create a contract as it is only an invitation for offers by the other party. In this regard, the law provides that the goods on display in shops are generally not offers but they only amount to an invitation to treat. In such a case, an offer is made by the customer to purchase the goods. It is for the trader to decide whether to accept the offer or not (Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain v Boots, 1953). In the same way, generally advertisements are also considered as invitations to treat (Partridge v Crittenden (1968) 2 All ER 425). However, it needs to be noted that in some cases, an advertisement may also amount to an offer. An example in this regard can be given of the case of Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball co (1893). An offer can be terminated by the death of the party making the offer or by the death of the party to whom the offer has been made. Similarly, an offer is also terminated by lapse of time. When no time has been prescribed in the offer, the offer terminates after the lapse of reasonable time. However, in what amounts to a reasonable time depends on the circumstances of each case (Ramsgate Victoria Hotel v Montefiore, 1866). In the same way, the law provides that the party making the offer can evoke the same at any time before the offer has been accepted by the other party (Dickinson v Dodds, 1876). In Dickinson v Dodds (1876), a house was offered for sale by Dodds to Dickinson and while making the offer, it was stated that the offer will remain open until 12 June, 9 AM. It was decided by Dickinson to accept the offer on 11 June but Dodds was not informed immediately. Later on, a third-party informed Dickinson that the house has already been sold to someone else. Thereafter, Dickinson tried to accept the offer however Dodds replied that the house has been sold and therefore it was too late. On the other hand, Dickinson claimed that there was a legally binding contract between them as the offer has been accepted by him. In this regard, the court stated that no particular form of revocation is required. The only thing that is required in such a case is that the offeror should convey to the offeree, directly or indirectly, that the offeror had changed his or her mind regarding the offer. Therefore, the court stated that there is no doubt that the same thing has happened in this cas e and Dickinson was aware that Dodds was no longer ready to sell the house. The court also stated that the promised to keep the offer open for a particular period was not supported by any consideration therefore it was not binding on the party making the offer to keep it open for that particular period. However in this regard it needs to be noted that this provision does not apply to the cases involving unilateral offers where the acceptance of the offer needs full performance (Errington v Errington Wood (1952). At the same time, it also needs to be noted that the original offer is terminated when the other party makes a counter offer. A counter offer takes place when the party to whom the offer has been made response by making an offer but on different terms. This results in destroying the original offer and as a result, the party to whom the offer has been made can no longer accept the original offer (Hyde v Wrench, 1840). On the other hand, once valid acceptance has taken place, there is a legally binding contract between the parties. As a result, it is significant to know what constitutes a wedding except in so that it can be established if the parties are bound by the agreement or not. There are three main rules related with acceptance. These rules of acceptance provided that (i) the acceptance should be communicated to the offeree (ii) the terms of acceptance should match exactly with the terms of the original offer and (iii) the agreement should be certain. At the same time, the law related with the communication of acceptance provides the general rule that the party making the offer should receive acceptance before it is effective (Entorres v Miles Far East, 1955). At the same time, the law also provides that the silence of the party cannot amount to acceptance of the offer. This rule has been provided by the court in case titled Felthouse v Bindley (1862). However, it has also been provided by t he court in Brogden v. Metropolitan Railway Co. (1877) 2 App. Cas. 666 that acceptance can take place to conduct of the party (Butler Machine Tool v Ex-cell-o Corporation [1979] 1 WLR 401). The facts of the present case are also somewhat similar to that of Dickinson v Dodds (1876). In this case also, the party making the offer had agreed to keep the offer open for a particular number of days. This so-called agreement was nothing more than an offer. It was heard by Dickinson from a third party that Dodds was going to sell the house to someone else and therefore, Dickinson tried to give notice to Dodds regarding his acceptance of the offer. Therefore, it was held by the court that so long as the buyer is aware that the other party wanted to deal somewhere else, the offer has to be considered as revoked. In this regard, it does not matter if the buyer had heard regarding it from the offeror himself or from someone else. At the same time, it was also stated by the court that unless the promise to keep the offer open for a particular period is supported by consideration, the same cannot be considered as binding. On the other hand, if the promise and is supported by considera tion, it is a valid option. When it has been agreed by the parties that post will be used as a means of communication, the postal acceptance rule applies in such a case. According to the postal rule, where a letter has been addressed and stamped properly, the acceptance is purported to have taken place when the letter containing the acceptance has been placed in the post box. This rule was provided by the court in Adams v Lindsell (1818). In the present case, Jamie made an offer to Sonia to sell the catering equipment and at the same time, Jamie also agreed to keep the offer open till Friday. However, instead of accepting the offer straight away, Sonia made the phone call to Jamie in order to ask if she could have two months to pay. As Jamie was not in, Sonia left a message on the answering machine on Wednesday. On the same day, a letter was posted by Jamie in which the informed Sonia that he had sold the catering equipment to his friend. Jamie had not listened to the message left by Sonia on his answering machine. On the other hand, when Sonia did not hear from Jamie, she wrote a letter to Jamie accepting the offer made by him and also sends a check of $5000. The letter was posted by Sonia on Thursday. On Friday, Sonia came to know from Jimmy's wife that the catering equipment had been sold and Jamie had not received the letter containing the acceptance. On the basis of the above mentioned discussion, it can be said in the present case that first of all by making a counteroffer, the original offer made by Jamie has been terminated and it is no longer possible for Sonia to accept the original offer made by Jamie. At the same time, although the postal role provides that the acceptance is considered to have taken place when the letter containing the acceptance has been placed in the post box, however in the present case, the letter along with the object was placed in the post box by Sonia on Thursday while Jamie had already sold the catering equipment to his friend on Wednesday. So far as the promise made by Jamie to keep the offer open till Friday is concerned, this promise was not supported by consideration and therefore was not binding. As a result, it can be set in the present case that Sonia does not have a legally binding contract with Jamie for the sale of catering equipment as Jamie was not bound by the promise to keep the offer open because it was not supported by consideration and at the same time, due to the reason that a counteroffer has been made by Sonia. Therefore, as the equipment was already sold by Jamie on Wednesday, Sonia cannot accept the offer made by Jamie on Thursday. Question2: Write a brief analysis reflecting on how preparing and completing this assignment has contributed to the development of your skills as a learner. Answer2: While preparing and completing this assignment, I was able to develop my skills as a learner as this assignment helped me increase my knowledge regarding the various aspects of the law of contract, particularly offer and acceptance, the postal acceptance rule, and what the law provides regarding the promise made by the offeror to keep the offer open for a particular time. At the same time, this assignment also increased my analytical skills and allowed me to apply knowledge to the facts of the given case. References Adams v Lindsell (1818) 106 ER 250 Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball co [1893] 1 QB 256 Dickinson v Dodds (1876) 2 Ch. D. 463 Entorres v Miles Far East [1955] 2 QB 327 Errington v Errington Wood [1952] 1 KB 290 Felthouse v Bindley [1862] EWHC CP J35 Harvey v Facey [1893] UKPC 1 Hyde v Wrench (1840) 49 ER 132 Ramsgate Victoria Hotel v Montefiore (1866) LR 1 Ex 109

Six Strategies for Successful marketing free essay sample

Six Strategies for Successful Niche Marketing Arun Kaile Long tail marketing is a method to grow sales while reducing the cost per sale by targeted approach, optimizing product supply chain to niche markets. This approach allows them to sidestep the competition in huge open markets. Offering products as per the customer’s preference within their disposal through appropriate distribution will reduce marketing costs and increase sales margin. The following six strategies can be implemented by a company to gain good profits for sales of their products and services Target Carefully: Identifying markets where there is a distress about the existing products or the consumers are in need of a new product for their own purposes. Such a market acts as good target, and the product that would be offered as a substitute to existing product or new product should be better in terms of consumer’s preferences and performance. It is not easy to find target markets, but they can be found through good research and study to fulfill the customers liking. We will write a custom essay sample on Six Strategies for Successful marketing or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Listen to you Customers: There are lot products that are not advertised, but the consumers know about these products. How? It is through online rating and mouth publicity about the products. A company should always listen to what their customers have to say about their product and act immediately to make it better. The advantage of online ratings and comments is that consumer’s state their likes and dislikes about the product and that feedback will help the producer to act and make the product better as consumers liking. The great American beer festivals in which, the small brewers participate every year to approach the professional critics and passionate beer drinkers. Control Production Costs: A company might offer a wide range of products and variations within a product. But it is not must for the company to have inventory of all the combinations, variations offered in the catalogue of the product. When a customer places an order for what he desires for with including variations, the production line can then react to the order by assembling everything. Hence by optimizing the production line, process production costs can be reduced and customer can be offered what he wants. Ray-Ban offers a variety of sunglasses in shapes, colors and lenses. It need not manufacture all combinations and have an inventory, but can make it when a customer orders for it. Control Distribution Costs: Distribution costs should also be controlled. It is hard to forecast the demand for product which ordered wanted by customers in limited quantity. But the company can react to customers demand when it is ordered. Flexible inventory allocation is another way to keep distribution costs under control. Shared distribution and selling products online are also other ways to control the distribution costs, given the availability of product as customers need is properly regulated. Some Apparent Losers are Worth Keeping: With the advancement of technology and changes in trending markets, many products that were good till last year might become obsolete and not required any more. But eliminating such products out of the offerings is not a good idea. It is ok to retain them for a certain period of time, because they might contribute to the tagline of â€Å"A-Z services†, or â€Å"we have everything†. Amazon retains a lot of old books are rarely ordered or not ordered anymore, but Amazon now acts as a centralized location for all books and someone down the line might need those books someday. Prune your Portfolio Ruthlessly: A company might have started with many variations and offerings of its product. But some of those variations within the product are not in demand at all due to change in trends and times. So a company should be able identify that there is no more demand for that product variation and stop its production. Computer mouse manufactures should now focus on producing optical mouse (cheaper and easy to use) than producing the old style roller ball mouse. By carefully harnessing and implementing these above mentioned six strategies, the company can generate good amount of products with lower production and distribution costs. Consumers of today have more knowledge about various products and are careful in choosing the right product for their needs with the available options and various brands in market. So a company should really act as per the consumers/customers choice and fulfill their requisites. Example: Netflix opened up a website that has a large stream of movies with different genres and many titles. Buy having everything online and unlimited access, it eliminated the distribution (delivery) costs to customer, makes suggestions to audience based on their interests(targeting customers), receives feedbacks through reviews, suggestions and adds new titles like Foreign movies and ESPN sports documentaries, TV shows etc. It retains even the least watched/searched titles, just to add to its collection and  reputation of the firm and it can act as a centralized location for all movies one day. Before there was this manual process where the customer has to go to a store and pick the DVD or movie they liked and had to return it back within a timeframe to avoid extra charges, but with entry of Netflix it has eliminated all these steps with the help of technology and relieved people of their movie watching woes. Netflix now has to focus on only adding more titles to it movies collection and maintaining its servers.

Free Essays on Driving in the Snow

Thesis: Although it can be done, driving in the snow is a dangerous and difficult process. Driving during sever winter weather conditions can be demanding. And how you handle your vehicle in those conditions could be the difference between a safe trip and serious trouble. Not all cars are alike. To become familiar with your vehicle’s winter weather operating characteristics, it is recommended that practicing slow-speed maneuvers on an empty snow or ice-covered parking lot. It is also suggested that the owner should read the owners manual for information on equipment and handling characteristics. The following are things to consider while driving in winter weather conditions. Front, rear, four or all-wheel drive Become familiar with what wheels are given power in your vehicle. Front-wheel-drive vehicles generally handle better than rear-wheel-drive vehicles on slippery roads because the weight of the engine is on the drive wheels. The back end of rear-wheel-drive cars tends to lose traction and slide side-to-side during turns on icy roads because there is little weight on the drive wheels. Many vehicles today are equipped with four, or all-wheel drive, which helps maintain traction in difficult conditions. However, drivers of four-wheel drive vehicles should avoid becoming over confident. Four-wheel-drive does not make the car brake any better. Braking A vehicle’s braking system also determines how motorists should operate their cars in winter weather. Anti-lock braking systems (ABS) provide significant stopping advantages on slick roads, but are only effective if properly used. When stopping a vehicle with ABS in slippery conditions, motorists should apply steady pressure to the brake pedal. The ABS automatically pumps the brakes to keep the wheels from locking up, preventing skids and loss of control. Do not take your foot off the brake pedal if you hear or feel chatter. This means the ABS system is working properly... Free Essays on Driving in the Snow Free Essays on Driving in the Snow Thesis: Although it can be done, driving in the snow is a dangerous and difficult process. Driving during sever winter weather conditions can be demanding. And how you handle your vehicle in those conditions could be the difference between a safe trip and serious trouble. Not all cars are alike. To become familiar with your vehicle’s winter weather operating characteristics, it is recommended that practicing slow-speed maneuvers on an empty snow or ice-covered parking lot. It is also suggested that the owner should read the owners manual for information on equipment and handling characteristics. The following are things to consider while driving in winter weather conditions. Front, rear, four or all-wheel drive Become familiar with what wheels are given power in your vehicle. Front-wheel-drive vehicles generally handle better than rear-wheel-drive vehicles on slippery roads because the weight of the engine is on the drive wheels. The back end of rear-wheel-drive cars tends to lose traction and slide side-to-side during turns on icy roads because there is little weight on the drive wheels. Many vehicles today are equipped with four, or all-wheel drive, which helps maintain traction in difficult conditions. However, drivers of four-wheel drive vehicles should avoid becoming over confident. Four-wheel-drive does not make the car brake any better. Braking A vehicle’s braking system also determines how motorists should operate their cars in winter weather. Anti-lock braking systems (ABS) provide significant stopping advantages on slick roads, but are only effective if properly used. When stopping a vehicle with ABS in slippery conditions, motorists should apply steady pressure to the brake pedal. The ABS automatically pumps the brakes to keep the wheels from locking up, preventing skids and loss of control. Do not take your foot off the brake pedal if you hear or feel chatter. This means the ABS system is working properly...

Using Epanorthosis in Rhetoric

Using Epanorthosis in Rhetoric A figure of speech in which a speaker corrects or comments on something he or she has just said. A retraction (or pseudo-retraction) is a type of epanorthosis. Adjective: epanorthotic.Epanorthosis is also known as correctio or self-correction. The etymology is from the Greek, setting straight again. Examples and Observations Maybe there is a beast. . . . What I mean is . . . maybe its only us. (Simon in Lord of the Flies by William Golding, 1954)​With a heave of his chest, Croker rose and came walkingor, rather, limpingtoward him. (Tom Wolfe, A Man in Full, 1998)​[A] good heart, Kate, is the sun and the moon; or, rather, the sun, and not the moon; for it shines bright and never changes, but keeps his course truly. (King Henry V in Act V, scene two of Henry V by William Shakespeare, 1600)​I dont like the majority of what I do. I shouldnt say I dont like it, but Im not satisfied with almost everything that I do. (Paul Simon)​You dont think were being . . . I dont want to say sleazy, because thats not the right word, but a little irresponsible, maybe? (Owen Wilson as John Beckwith, The Wedding Crashers, 2005)​Epanorthosis, or Correction, is a figure by which we retract or recall what we have spoken, for the sake of substituting something stronger or more suitable in its pl ace... The use of this figure lies in the unexpected interruption it gives to the current of our discourse, by turning the stream as it were back upon itself, and then returning it upon the auditor with redoubled force and precision. The nature of this figure dictates its pronunciation; it is somewhat akin to the parenthesis. What we correct should be so pronounced as to seem the immediate effusion of the moment; for which purpose it does not only require a separation from the rest of the sentence, by an alteration of the voice into a lower tone, but an abrupt discontinuance of the member immediately preceding. (John Walker, A Rhetorical Grammar, 1822)​ He has lately been at work telling again, as they call it, a most gratuitous piece of mischief, and has caused a coolness betwixt me and (not a friend exactly, but) an intimate acquaintance. (Charles Lamb, letter to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Jan. 10, 1820)​Thence have I followed it(Or it hath drawn me, rather) but tis gone. (Ferdinand in The Tempest by William Shakespeare)​In epanorthosis, or setting right, one thinks better of what one has said and qualifies it or even takes it back, as in Augustines classic Give me chastity and continencebut not yet (Confessions 8.7). Epanorthosis is particularly revealing of the character of the speaker, in this case, of an untrustworthy soul divided against itself and given more to self-deception than to deception of others. (P. Christopher Smith, The Hermeneutics of Original Argument: Demonstration, Dialectic, Rhetoric. Northwestern Univ. Press, 1998)​They have a right to more comfort than they at present enjoy; and more comf ort might be afforded them, without encroaching on the pleasures of the rich: not now waiting to enquire whether the rich have any right to exclusive pleasures. What do I say?encroaching! No; if an intercourse were established between them, it would impart the only true pleasure that can be snatched in this land of shadows, this hard school of moral discipline. (Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Men, 1790)​ I should probably have said at the outset Im noted for having something of a sense of humour, although I have kept myself very much to myself over the last two years notwithstanding, as it were, and its only as comparatively recently that I began to realizewell, er, perhaps realize is not the correct word, er, imagine, imagine that I was not the only thing in her life. (Michael Palin in episode two of Monty Pythons Flying Circus, 1969)

The Function of Seduction in Maupassants novels Bel-Ami, Pierre et Essay

The Function of Seduction in Maupassants novels Bel-Ami, Pierre et Jean and Une vie - Essay Example First, the male characters in Bel-Ami and Pierre et Jean use seduction appealing to women in order to be accepted by them because perhaps they do not accept themselves the way they are. George Duroy (Bel-Ami) seduces all the women in the novel because he does not have what Roy (Engendrement du Romanesque) calls the â€Å"ideal self†. It is this lack of self-confidence, the weakness of his ego, that pushes him to seduce. Duroy comes from a modest family which he wants to change by becoming wealthy. Second, male protagonists often use seduction to change their identity, to take one some other identity. . In Bel-Ami, Duroy is frustrated of being part of the lower social rank, so he always tries to dissimulate his poverty from others. For example, when Duroy invites Mme de Marelle to his place, he changes the decor of his â€Å"shabby apartment† in order to hide his poverty. Also, in order to hide his peasant background, Duroy â€Å"forgets† to invite his parents to his wedding with Madeleine Forestier. Similarly in ‘Une vie’, Julien de Lamare disconcerts us by his successive metamorphoses all along the novel. The narrator portrays Julien as a handsome man, a seductor and as someone full of disguise and dissimulation. In fact, we realize that Julien is just a fortune hunter who knows how to play his physical appeal for seducing. Once he marries Jeanne, he drops his mask and reveals his true personality. Third, men use seduction to reach wealth and power. Indeed, in Une Vie, Julien de Lamare comes from a ruined family and that had a great impact on him. Julien will do anything to seduce and marry a rich commoner (Jeanne) in order to regain legitimacy and the glamour of his name (Ball 56). In Bel-Ami, on Madeleine Forestier’s recommendations, Duroy seduces Mme de Marelle and then Mme Walter. One provides him with housing and money while the other makes him chief editor. After Mme de Marelle remark about Mme

Effects of Malnourishment on Children when they Age Term Paper

Effects of Malnourishment on Children when they Age - Term Paper Example It is not starvation or poverty as such. It has got wider meaning than just poverty or starvation. In some occasions, malnutrition also means excess of afore said vitamins and minerals adversely affecting the good health of a person. However, it is the problem of under nutrition that most nations are concerned with. It is the children who mostly fall victims to under nutrition. These children may get food to satisfy their hunger but not inevitably the nutrients and minerals that are necessary for the proper development. It is estimated that more than fifty percent of the child deaths in the developing countries are due to malnutrition. Those who survive end up with life time problems. Similarly, it is wrong to assume that an overweight child is healthy. The fatty foods and chocolate bars one consumes will surely bring him into troubles such as fatness and cholesterol. Children being the future human resource reservoirs of a nation, any government neglecting attention to this, are com promising its own human resource needs of future. For the proper development and functioning of the human body vitamins and minerals are a must. They are unavoidable in the case of children as the momentum of growth is augmented at this age. The deficiency of minerals like calcium, phosphorous, magnesium, potassium, zinc and vitamins have their effects always on a growing child. As Scrimshaw (n.d.) points out, calcium is one of the major minerals lacked by children of under developed countries in their diet. It has a good involvement in the healthy development of bones and teeth of young people. The hardness of the bones is due to the presence of adequate calcium elements in the body. Due to the deficiency of calcium a lot of problems may occur to children. The most important among the bone disease caused by calcium deficiency is Osteoporosis that causes fractures in weak bones and makes bones easier to break. When children grow up, they deficiency they had in the childhood will hav e its effects and their bones will likely to be broken at the slightest collision or clash. At the growing age, children are expected to be exuberant and rushing everywhere causing little damage to their own bodies. However, children who suffer from Osteoporosis are not likely to be active and vibrant like normal children and are about to badly harm them if they try to behave like normal children. Another effect of malnourishment on children is their paled color. This paled color of the skin is caused by anemia. Iron deficiency is a major cause of this illness. It is the presence of iron that ensures sufficient number of red blood cells in the human body (Iron-Deficiency Anaemia). The anemia infected children will be fatigue and usually inactive. There may not be sufficient blood circulation in their body to make them energetic. It may also pave way to poisoning and infections and losing immunity power of body or may even cause behavioral problems among children. Children who did no t get adequate magnesium content diet may fall victims to problems like tingling, numbing and hallucination. Being frozen and indulge in day dreaming causing behavioral problems such as being introvert and sensitive. The symptoms of the deficiency of this mineral are fatigue, drowsiness and weakness. Absence of minerals like potassium elements in blood leads to a number of common diseases such as hypertension, osteoporosis and kidney stone. It is potassium that works to regulate blood pressure and muscle contraction. Increasing blood pressure is a sign of lack of potassium in blood.

Igor Stravinsky Essay Example for Free

Igor Stravinsky Essay Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky was born on June 17th, 1882 in Oranienbaum, Russia. He was one of four to his polish parents, Anna nà ©e Kholodovsky and Fyodor Stravinsky. Igor Stravinsky’s first exposer to music was from his father, who was a bass singer at the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg. His father helped him learn the love of music. His first musical education began at the age of nine with piano lessons, studying music theory, and attempting composition. By fifteen, he had mastered Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto in G Minor and finished a piano reduction of a string quartet by Glazunov. That same year, Stravinsky rebelled against the Russian Orthodox Church and abandoned it. Even though he excelled in music, his parents still wanted him to become a lawyer. In 1901, Stravinsky enrolls at the University of Saint Petersburg; however he never attends many of his classes during the four years of school. When it came time to take final examinations in 1905, the school was closed for two months because of Bloody Sunday. He then later received a half course diploma in April 1906. In 1902, Stravinsky began receiving private lessons from Nikolai Rimsky- Korsakov, the leading Russian composer at that time. That very same year Stravinsky’s father dies from cancer. In 1905 Igor Stravinsky proposes to his first cousin Catherin Nossenko. Even though the Orthodox Church opposes marriage of first cousins, they got married on January 23rd, 1906. The same of his marriage, Stravinsky’s creates first important composition Symphony in E Flat. The following year they have their first child Theodore and then the next year they have their second child Ludmila. The same year as Ludmila’s birth, Rimsky, Stravinsky’s father like figure, dies. In 1909, Stravinsky’s compositions, Scherzo fatastique and Feu d’artifice (Fireworks) where performed at a concert in St. Petersburg. In that very audience Serge Diaghilev, founder of the Ballets Russes, was extremely impressed. He was so impressed that he chooses Stravinsky to carry out orchestrations and to compose a full length ballet, The Firebird. In 1910 Stravinsky travels Paris for the premier of The Firebird. At this performance he meets Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel, and many other important musicians. Towards the end of the ballet season, his family moves to Switzerland with him and, Catherine expecting her third child. In Lausanne, Switzerland in September 1910, Sviatoslav Soulima their third son was born. In 1911, Stravinsky completes another successful ballet, Petrushka. Three years later, Stravinsky composes the two part ballet Le Sacre du Primtemps (The Rite of Spring). This ballet marked the coming of modernism in music and was met with astonishment and hostility. The riot that followed was the most notorious event in music history. Right after the performance, he developed typhoid fever, which took six weeks to recover from. Around the same time, Catherina and Ludmila were found to have tuberculosis. A year later Ludmila did and after giving birth to their fourth child Maria Milena, Catherina also died. Three months after that his mother died also. After all these deaths in his life, Stravinsky also diagnosed with tuberculosis. He spent five months recovering with his newest daughter Milena; she took six years to recover. Stravinsky met Vera de Bosset in Paris in February 1921, his new wife to be. At the time when they first met Vera was still married to the painter and stage designer Serge Sudeikin. They began an affair which led Vera to leave her husband. During his last years in Paris, Stravinsky made professional connections with people in the U.S.

Child Abuse in America :: Violence Against Children

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The effects of child abuse can be long lasting or maybe even fatal. â€Å"The National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect estimates that 2.9 million children are abused or neglected by parents or caretakers each year† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). This fact is very disturbing to the many of us that don’t know child abuse was this common in the U.S. There are various types of child abuse. Physical abuse, which is deliberate acts of violence that injure or may even kill a child. Sexual abuse occurs when adults use children for their sexual gratification. Emotional abuse is mostly verbal abuse. When the adult puts the children down by calling them names or just screaming at the child for no apparent reason. Another form of child abuse is Physical neglect. This type of abuse involves the parents’ failure to provide for the child’s needs. â€Å" Among the cases of abuse reported, 52 percent involved physical abuse or emotional neglect, 24.5 percent involved physical abuse, 12.6 percent involved sexual abuse, 4.5 percent involved emotional abuse, and 17.3 percent involved other abuses, such as educational neglect or abandonment† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). Many people have difficulty understanding why any person would want to hurt a child. â€Å"The public often assumes that the people that abuse their children suffer from a mental illness but fewer than 10 percent of abusers have mental illnesses† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). There is more room for abuse in a family when the parents or caretakers are of a young age or just have very little patients. Mature adults that are raising kids tend not to abuse their children because they are able to cope with the demands of their children and the other stresses around them. â€Å"Child abuse results from a complex combination on personal, social, and cultural factors. These may be grouped into four primary categories: (1) intergenerational transmission of violence, (2) social stress, (3) social isolation and low community involvement, and (4) family structure† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). Interim transmission of violence is displayed when the abused children become abusive parents. â€Å"Some studies have shown that 30 percent of abused children become abusive themselves and others show that most of the abused do not become abusive adults† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Britannica). Social stress is a common cause of child abuse in a family. The conditions of social stress include unemployment, illness, poor housing conditions, a large family, death of a family member or close friend, or maybe even the presence of a new baby or a disabled person in the home. Child Abuse in America :: Violence Against Children   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The effects of child abuse can be long lasting or maybe even fatal. â€Å"The National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect estimates that 2.9 million children are abused or neglected by parents or caretakers each year† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). This fact is very disturbing to the many of us that don’t know child abuse was this common in the U.S. There are various types of child abuse. Physical abuse, which is deliberate acts of violence that injure or may even kill a child. Sexual abuse occurs when adults use children for their sexual gratification. Emotional abuse is mostly verbal abuse. When the adult puts the children down by calling them names or just screaming at the child for no apparent reason. Another form of child abuse is Physical neglect. This type of abuse involves the parents’ failure to provide for the child’s needs. â€Å" Among the cases of abuse reported, 52 percent involved physical abuse or emotional neglect, 24.5 percent involved physical abuse, 12.6 percent involved sexual abuse, 4.5 percent involved emotional abuse, and 17.3 percent involved other abuses, such as educational neglect or abandonment† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). Many people have difficulty understanding why any person would want to hurt a child. â€Å"The public often assumes that the people that abuse their children suffer from a mental illness but fewer than 10 percent of abusers have mental illnesses† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). There is more room for abuse in a family when the parents or caretakers are of a young age or just have very little patients. Mature adults that are raising kids tend not to abuse their children because they are able to cope with the demands of their children and the other stresses around them. â€Å"Child abuse results from a complex combination on personal, social, and cultural factors. These may be grouped into four primary categories: (1) intergenerational transmission of violence, (2) social stress, (3) social isolation and low community involvement, and (4) family structure† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Encarta). Interim transmission of violence is displayed when the abused children become abusive parents. â€Å"Some studies have shown that 30 percent of abused children become abusive themselves and others show that most of the abused do not become abusive adults† (â€Å"Child Abuse† Britannica). Social stress is a common cause of child abuse in a family. The conditions of social stress include unemployment, illness, poor housing conditions, a large family, death of a family member or close friend, or maybe even the presence of a new baby or a disabled person in the home.

Internet and Children Essay

Nowadays, in the world in which we live, violence is reported everywhere. It makes parents became worried. So, they try to protect their children from the adverse impacts in society. But although society has taught us that violence is not accepted, in the essay â€Å"Violent Media is Good for Kids,† Gerard Jones tries to convince people, especially the kids’ parents, that violent media is good or furthermore, it is essential for the development of children. He uses his own childhood as an example of how media or The Hulk helped him switch to â€Å"more sophisticated heroes† (Jones 195), and â€Å"finally found my own lead along a twisting path to a career and an identity† (Jones 196). Afterwards, his son was afraid to climb a tree, so Jones read the stories of Tarzan to his son. Then later, his son was climbing trees. He also gives other examples of how violent media helped children to overcome their stressful and hurtful lives. A healthy child must grow b oth physically and mentally. Especially, mental illness in children can be hard for parents to identify. Gerard Jones admitted that he grew up too passive because he was sheltered from the media. In recent years, there has been dispute about whether or not children should view, or listen to violent media. In â€Å"Violent Media is Good for Kids† Gerard Jones says that we should. He noticed that â€Å"people pulling themselves out of emotional traps by immersing themselves in violent stories. People integrating the scariest, most fervently denied fragments of their psyches into fuller senses of selfhood through fantasies of superhuman combat and destruction.† (Jones 196) .Each person’s childhood is often associated with something, for example, Donald Duck, Superman, or Barbie doll, Batman, etc†¦ Those characters sometimes play an important role in the formation of their life. After finding his favorite character, The Hulk, Jones â€Å"finally found my own lead along a twisting path to a career and an identity† (Jones 196). Jones’s son, perhaps, admires Tarzan, who was told by his father to support him to climb a tree. To Jones, a super hero model can give kids strength and make them brave. Children need a way to express their natural rage and by allowing them to read these stories or play battle just for fun with their friends helps them develop into kids that will interact with each other. All kids feel rage, so if they let it out in a safe way, they can use it to combat challenges in life. Thus, violent media helps them develop into people who are not afraid to stand up and take charge. Jones tries to prove that violent media can help kids if it is used in the right way. He writes a quote from Melanie Moore, Ph.D., a psychologist who works with urban teens, t o support his argument. He does however include examples as to why he believes that violent media is good for children. But he does not include statistics to back-up his arguments and this is a weakness of Jones’s essay. His examples might not be credible because he presents himself as one of the evidences and each child develops differently. We can see every child takes a different way to explore the world. Many children will grow up like Jones. They will find themselves in the real world and know who they are if they were allowed access to the media. He states â€Å"When we try to protect our children from their own feelings and fantasies, we shelter them not against violence but against power and selfhood.† (Jones 197) .Parents cannot ban their kids playing video games or watching violent cartoons but as adults, they must know which one is good, which one is bad for our kids. When parents try to protect their children from the influence of violence, they need to rem ember that although comics and video games are full of violence and fighting, they also have messages and some good lessons. Parents always loves their children, so Jones uses the phrase â€Å"when we tries to protect our children† to let the parents know that he sympathized with their concerns. But then he says: â€Å"we shelter them not against violence but against power and selfhood.† The word â€Å"shelter† means to protect from something harmful. He emphasizes that the harmful thing is not violence but it is harmful to children losing their power and selfhood. However, some children might take the message of the stories the wrong way, putting themselves too deep into a story. They may hurt themselves or the others because they thought that they were strong like their favorite hero. As increasing violence in the media would be certainly dangerous for society and corrupt a child’s thoughts and imagination through blood, knives and guns, those were called â€Å"a tool to master their rage† (Jones 196). â€Å"I’m not going to argue that violent entertainment is harmless. I think it has helped inspire some people to real-life violence. I am going to argue that it’s helped hundreds of people for everyone it’s hurt, and that it can help far more if we learn to use it well.† (Jones 197) .Jones admits that violent media is n’t harmless and that it does drag some children to doing real life violence, but he does not say specifically what should be done about this issue. He goes on to say that it has helped more than it has harmed. There is much research on whether children should or should not access to violent media. By giving some evidence as well as using quote authority to support his thesis, Gerard Jones made a good essay to persuade that violent media is one of the factors that children need to develop. The title â€Å"Violent Media is Good for Kids† is also impressive. It makes the readers curious because â€Å"violent† and â€Å"good† may sound contradictory. However, his essay is interesting but not enough to convince. A good way to protect the children is to give them the right tools in life, and teach them how to make it a responsible choice and how to protect themselves from bad temptations. â€Å"All violence is the result of people tricking themselves into believing that their pain derives from other people and that consequently those people deserve to be punished.† (Rosenberg) Works Cited Jones, Gerard. â€Å"Violent Media Is Good for Kids.† Critical Thinking, Reading and Writing. Ed. Sylvan Barnet and Hugo Bedau. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 195-197. Print. Rosenberg, Marshall B. Nonviolent Communication: A language of life. California: PuddleDancer Press, 2003. Print.

Critical Thinking Question Essay

1. Explain the differences between bacterial meningitis, aseptic meningitis, fungal meningitis, and tubercular meningitis. Bacterial meningitis is a primary infection of the pia mater, arachnoid and subarachnoid space, ventricular system and the CSF of the brain. The subarachnoid space is accessed either by a systemic, bloodstream or direct extension infection. Common causes of bacterial meningitis after the neonatal period are Meningococcus (Neisseria meningitidis) and pneumococcus (Streptococcus pneumonia). For neonates, pneumococcus and gram-negative enteric bacilli are common agents. Aseptic meningitis (viral meningitis, nonpurulent meningitis, lymphocytic meningitis) is an inflammation which is thought to be localized to the meninges. The population at risk depends of the virus. A variety of symptoms are caused by a plethora of viruses such as enteroviral (most common), mumps, herpes simplex types 1 and 2,, St. Lus encephalitis virus, West Nile virus, California encephalitis virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, Colorado tick fever, lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus, Epstein-Barr virus, and influenza virus types A and B. Fungal meningitis is a chronic, much less common condition than bacterial or viral meningitis. It most frequently occurs in persons with impaired immune systems or those with altered normal flora. Development is insidious and usually occurs over days to weeks. Also associated with chronic meningitis are syphilis, tuberculosis and Lyme disease. Tubercular meningitis is the most common and most serious form of CNS tuberculosis, and is found mostly in those with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Miliary tubercules form in the brain and meninges, later eroding in the pia mater with mycobacteria entering in the CSF producing a hypersensitivity reaction which causes purulent exudate to the basal meninges, cerebrum and spinal nerves. Vasculitis occurs causing cerebral ischemia and infarction. Symptoms include headache, low-grade fever, stiff neck, nausea and vomiting, irritability, difficulty sleeping and fatigue. These signs and symptoms lead to increase to confusion, stiff neck, significant behavioral changes, and seizures. Additionally, hydrocephalus and cranial nerve palsies or cerebral infarcts may occur. Early diagnosis and treatment with proper antituberculosis may cause a 90% recovery rate. 2. A neonate has a harsh, loud, systolic murmur shortly after birth. This is best heard at the left lower sternal border. The neonate is acyanotic and has no other symptoms. What type of congenital heart disorder does this infant have? Explain why the neonate is not cyanotic. When could the infant become cyanotic? These symptoms describe a ventricular septal defect (VSD). This type of defect is a left to right shunt of blood flow through the septum of the heart and symptoms depend on the size of the shunt. Because of the increase in blood from the right ventricle (RV) into the pulmonary artery (PA), the PA, left atrium (LA) and left ventricle (LV) become enlarged. A large VSD causes a large amount of pulmonary volume. Over time, the smooth muscle layer of the arteriolar wall thickens and a decrease in diameter of the pulmonary vessels occurs which causes resistance to the new blood flow. An increase in pulmonary vascular resistance causes a reverse shunting through the VSD causing cyanosis from deoxygenated blood flowing through systemic circulation. This phenomenon is termed Eisenmenger syndrome. 3. How does defective gastric secretion of intrinsic factor (IF) cause anemia? What is this type of anemia called, and how does a person get it? Intrinsic factor (IF) is a mucoprotein that is produced by the parietal cells. It is responsible for absorption of vitamin B12 in the ileum. Decreased amounts of IF causes a lack of absorption of B12 resulting in pernicious anemia. IF deficiency may be congenital or from adult onset gastric mucosal atrophy and parietal cell destruction. In older adults, failure to absorb IF is the cause of almost all vitamin B12 deficiencies. Congenital IF disorder is caused by an autosomal recessive inheritance pattern which is a genetic disorder. Gastric atrophy may be autoimmune and occurs along with type A chronic gastritis. 4. Discuss the pathophysiologic relationship between cirrhosis and portal hypertension. Cirrhosis is an inflammatory disease of the liver that disrupts its structure and function. Fibrous bands are formed causing nodular regeneration giving the liver a bumpy appearance. The liver is smaller or larger than normal and is hard when palpated. Parenchyma of the liver becomes distorted and the biliary channels become obstructed causing jaundice. Shunting is formed in new vascular channels bypassing blood from the liver. Obstruction in the portal veins also causes abnormal high blood pressure in the system from resistance of the blood flow from the obstruction. This is termed portal hypertension. Cirrhosis of the liver is the most common cause of portal hypertension.

A Plan to Win essays

A Plan to Win essays The Iowa Democratic caucuses were the first test for the contenders, and their organizations, in the race to become the Democratic Partys nomination as its candidate for the 2004 presidential election. This years Iowa caucuses can help develop a plan to win for the 2008 caucuses by learning from Deans mistakes and Kerrys winning strategies. Deans organization was filed with inexperienced, ill trained campaign workers, who did not know how to categorize voters, often having low standards for Ones. They lacked discipline and structure and conflicted with Deans senior staff. As shown in Kerrys organization, relationships play a key role in how successful the candidate is. Dean did not have a partnership with his campaign manager, Joe Trippi. I was said, in the article Turning Point in the July 19th issue of U.S. News dysfunctional and that Trippi often refused to take call from Dean on the road. Not only did Dean not build relationships with his organization, more importantly he didnt build one with voters. Unlike the rest of the contenders Howard dean did not give something for the voters to identify with. He admitted his failure to make a more human connection with voters hurt him. However this wasnt Deans only failure, Dean and his campaign were full of mistakes, blunders, and confusion. Dean told U.S. News that the three things I wanted to do are change the Democratic party, change the country and become president of the United States... in that order. That raised the question: Did Dean really want this? If you were to ask that question about Kerry the answer wouldve been absolutely Yes. The statement Dean made did not give the people confidence that he could take on Bush. John Kerry on the other hand had faithful people that were working hard for him. Kerr...

The Ultimate AP Psychology Review Guide 5-Step Prep Plan

The Ultimate AP Psychology Review Guide 5-Step Prep Plan SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips Preparing for the AP Psychology exam shouldn't cause you to lose your sanity (pun intended). Some of the material is challenging, but overall it's not that scary compared to other AP tests. If you stay focused during your studying and are familiar with the format of the test, you'll have a good chance of acing it! In this article, I'll provide specific details on the structure and content of the exam and tell you how you can make the best use your AP Psychology review time to end up with a great score. What’s the AP Psychology Exam Like? The AP Psychology exam is one of the shorter AP tests, clocking in at just two hours total. You’ll have an hour and ten minutes to complete 100 multiple-choice questions and the remaining 50 minutes to complete two open response questions. Overall, I’d say it’s one of the easiest AP tests based on its length and the complexity of its content. Since you only have 70 minutes for 100 multiple choice questions, you’ll need to make sure you’re keeping track of time. It’s important to move relatively quickly because you have less than a minute for each question! Try not to spend more than 30 seconds on a question; you can always come back to the question later. There is no guessing penalty on multiple choice (as for all AP exams now) so incorrect answers won’t hurt you any more than leaving questions blank. The open response questions shouldn’t give you much trouble in terms of time. There are only two of them (much fewer than most other AP tests), and they’re usually very straightforward. In many cases, they will just ask you to explain how terms you’ve learned in AP Psychology relate to a specific situation. You’ll also need some knowledge of the scientific method for certain open response questions that ask about the methodology of a psychological study. I'll give you examples of AP Psychology multiple-choice and free response questions in the next section. No penalties for incorrect answers! Finally, the College Board can lay off all those referees and free up some room in the budget. What’s on the AP Psychology Exam? Here’s an example of a multiple choice question you might see on the test: This question is kind of wordy, and it may seem like you need to know a lot to figure it out, but you could actually get the answer without much psychology knowledge at all (though it’s less confusing with some background information). The baby monkeys preferred the soft cloth surrogate mother over the wire surrogate with food, indicating that the comfort of the cloth was more important to them than the food when they were scared. The answer is B! Most multiple choice questions will involve either simple logic, like this one, or basic memorization of the content in the course. Here’s an example of an open response question that was on the 2015 exam: Here, it’s easy to see how the points for the question are earned. The seven bullet points correspond to the seven possible points you can get from answering the question. This question is dependent on a comprehensive knowledge of specific terms and concepts from the AP Psychology curriculum. The College Board provides a breakdown of the different topics on the AP Psychology exam by percentage of questions. Here are the topics you’ll see on the exam (from most to least common): Topic Percentage of Questions Research Methods 8-10 Biological Bases of Behavior 8-10 Social Psychology 8-10 Cognition 8-10 Learning 7-9 Developmental Psychology 7-9 Abnormal Psychology 7-9 Sensation and Perception 6-8 Motivation and Emotion 6-8 Personality 5-7 Testing and Individual Differences 5-7 Treatment of Psychological Disorders 5-7 States of Consciousness 2-4 History and Approaches 2-4 This might inform how much of your AP Psychology review time you spend studying each topic, but it’s probably more important to pay attention to where you struggle the most on an individual level. For example, if you know all there is to know about Research Methods but don’t remember much about Treatment of Psychological Disorders, you should spend more time reviewing the second topic even though it relates to fewer questions. In the next section, I’ll give more specific guidance on how to review for the exam. Preliminary AP Psychology Study Tips Here are some tips to keep in mind before you start your AP Psychology exam review! They'll help you stay on the right track and make the most of your time. Tip 1: Plan Out Your Time How much time do you have before the test? You'll need to take this into account when formulating your study plan. Think about how much time you can afford to spend studying for AP Psychology while considering the amount of other schoolwork you have. For example, if you think you have about 10 hours to study, your plan might look something like this: Take and score a practice test (2.5 hours) Go over your mistakes (1 hour) Review weak content areas and update test-taking strategies (2 hours) Take and score another practice test (2.5 hours) Final review (2 hours) If you have longer, you might be able to go more in-depth with your mistakes on the second practice test and even take a third or fourth test. Overall, your time should be split relatively evenly between taking practice tests and reviewing the material. Your plan could change depending on your initial scores and how much you’re looking to improve. I would say that you don't need to spend more than 20 hours total studying for AP Psychology. The amount of material isn't overwhelming, and it's not an especially difficult test. I’ll get more specific on how to use practice tests effectively in the next section. Tip 2: Choose Review Materials Wisely You’ll need reliable review materials to ensure that you’re getting the most out of your study sessions. I’d recommend buying a review book (5 Steps to a 5 and Cracking the AP Psychology Exam are the ones I like best). Review books cover just the information that you’ll need for the exam, so they’re going to be less overwhelming to study than your textbook or notes from class. That being said, don’t totally ignore the resources you’ve accumulated in your AP Psychology class. Your notes might include unique methods for remembering concepts and terms which can be useful as an alternative to the information in a review book. Your textbook could be useful as well because it might have diagrams that are better than the ones in review books. I think it’s just nice to have a review book as a backup so that you stay focused on your studying and don’t spend time on topics that are less relevant for the exam. This wise owl says "hoo hooo hoooooo," which translates to "Choose your review materials wisely like I would!" Either that or "They're coming. Tonight." Tip 3: Focus on Memorizing Terms The AP Psychology exam is centered around psychological terms and theories. Some of these can be confusing and hard to tell apart (or not what they sound like intuitively). It's really important to have a solid grasp on all the terms that you learned in the course for both multiple choice and free response questions. Free response questions will often ask you to relate an obscure psychology term to a certain hypothetical scenario, and it's impossible to get points if you aren't completely confident about the meaning of the term. Flashcards are helpful for this type of memorization. If you have time, you can make flashcards for all the important terms in the class or even just a few terms that always trip you up. These can be physical flashcards, or if that's too old-fashioned, you can use Quizlet to study virtual flashcards (in this case you won't even need to make your own; there are already a ton of user-created study sets). I find that writing down the definitions of terms yourself will drill their meanings into your brain more effectively, so I prefer making my own cards, but you can do whatever works best for your schedule and learning style. To put a fun spin on studying and ensure that you never forget terms, you can send flashcards that describe psychological disorders to people who seem to have them based on your expert diagnosis. They'll be sure to thank you later (disclaimer: if you do this you are probably a sociopath). Tip 4: Go Over Testing Strategies Before you take a practice test, you should be aware of the testing pitfalls that may impact your score. Don't sacrifice points on practice tests (or the real test!) due to factors unrelated to your knowledge of the material. Here are some strategies for different types of test questions: Multiple Choice Questions As I mentioned earlier in this article, the exam doesn’t give you a ton of time for each multiple choice question. If you have a tendency to get stuck on difficult questions, you’ll need to keep this in mind during the AP Psychology test. Try to avoid spending more than 30 seconds on each question, and don't worry too much about skipping a few. It's possible to get a 5 on the test even if you miss 20-30 multiple choice questions. I'm not advocating skipping questions at random, but you should know that it's not the end of the world if you can't answer every single one. It’s also important not to overthink multiple choice questions. The questions can sound and look complex, but most of the time they’re not overly difficult if you know the material. Underline the parts of the question that are most important so that you don’t get distracted or start to second-guess yourself. If one of the answers seems like it doesn’t make sense, eliminate it. Free Response Questions On free response questions, remember that this isn’t an English test! There’s no need to write an introduction and conclusion; go straight for the answer to the question. That being said, you should still write in complete sentences with correct grammar. Make it as easy as possible for the graders to find your answers and give you points. Underline verbs like â€Å"describe† or â€Å"define† in the question to keep yourself focused on the task at hand. If the free response question is something like the example I provided in the previous section, it can be easier to work backward by putting yourself in the position of one of the people in the hypothetical scenario. You might say, "if I was looking to purchase a new house, what thoughts would cross my mind and why?" After thinking this through a little bit, you could look at the first term and make a connection. The prefrontal cortex is involved in planning and decision-making, so it would be used extensively in the process of committing to the purchase of a new house. This is the only house that would be in my price range right now. Jim doesn't know how good he has it. Your AP Psychology Review Plan in Action Here’s a basic outline of the steps you should take once you’ve prepared your materials and made a rough study plan for AP Psychology. Step 1: Take and Score a Practice Test The first thing you should do is take an initial practice test to see how high you’re currently scoring. You can find practice tests for AP Psychology in review books and online. If you don’t have a review book, Googling â€Å"AP Psychology practice exam pdf† will yield many results. Use tests that were created as recently as possible (ideally within the last 5 years) to ensure that they are relatively similar to the test you’ll be taking. Here’s a conversion table that shows you how raw composite scores from practice tests translate to the AP scale: Composite Score AP Score 113-150 5 93-112 4 77-92 3 65-76 2 0-64 1 To calculate your composite score, add up the number of multiple choice questions you answered correctly. Then, consult the scoring rubric for the free response questions to calculate the number of points you would earn on each question. Convert the number of points you earned on the free response questions to a value out of 50 (for example, if you got 8 out of 15 points on the two free response questions, you would convert that to about 27 out of 50). Then, add the raw score numbers from the multiple choice and free response sections together. If you earned 75 points (75 questions correct) on the multiple choice section and 27 points on the free response section, your composite score would be a 102, making your official AP Score a 4. See this article for more information on calculating your score. Once you’ve scored your practice test, you can set a future score goal. This is pretty simple for AP tests because the score range is just 1-5. There’s no reason not to aim for a 5 on the test, especially in the case of the AP Psychology exam. Since it’s one of the less difficult AP tests, a 5 should be achievable for you if you put some effort into studying. If you’re scoring very low right now, you could think about aiming for a 3 or 4 and increasing your goal if you reach it before the test. Even if you’re already in the 5 range, you should still consider doing a bit of studying if you have time. It's important to feel as comfortable as possible on the real test! You want the AP Psychology test to be like an old friend that you still pretend to like out of pity. Step 2: Analyze Your Mistakes Look at the questions you got wrong or had to guess on, and try to figure out why you struggled. Did you forget a term or concept? Were you not sure what the question was asking? Did you make a careless error? Did you run out of time? Which of these issues was most prevalent? Did you notice a certain type of question that you tended to get wrong? Record your findings on the nature of your mistakes so that you can correct them in your studying. This guide will help you with reviewing your mistakes (I know it’s for SAT/ACT practice tests, but the same principles apply here). Step 3: Review Weak Content Areas If you made a lot of mistakes related to content or question misunderstandings, you should try to figure out which areas caused you the most trouble. Then, you can consult your notes or a review book to brush up on terms and concepts that you’ve forgotten. AP Psychology involves quite a bit of memorization, so there’s bound to be at least a few areas where you weren’t sure of the meaning of a term or couldn’t remember what a specific psychologist did. Stay focused on your weak areas, and pay special attention to weak areas that are also big parts of the exam. For example, if questions about cognition give you trouble, but you also struggle with the history and approaches category, put more effort into studying cognition. A knowledge deficit in this area will cost you more points in the end. Make sure you fix any weak links in your psychology knowledge chain before the exam. Step 4: Revise Your Test-Taking Strategies If your mistakes fell heavily on the side of time issues and careless errors, you should think more about how you can change your approach to the test. Remember to avoid getting stuck on difficult questions if you’re running out of time. Consider slowing down a bit and reading questions more carefully if you suffer from careless errors. Step 5: Rinse and Repeat! After you’ve revised your strategies and brushed up on your content knowledge, you should take another practice test to assess your progress. Then, you can go through the review process again and take steps to improve further. You can do this as many times as it takes for you to feel comfortable with the test and reach your score goal. Conclusion When reviewing for the AP Psychology exam, it's important to pay attention to the format of the test so that you know what to expect. You should also devote special attention to topic areas that are the most difficult for you. Both strong content knowledge and smart testing strategies are important if you want to earn a high score. Practice tests are the most valuable tools in your arsenal for checking on your progress as you review the material. Keep revising your strategies and closing any gaps in your content knowledge until you get to a score that makes you happy! What's Next? Want to learn more about specific AP Psychology topics? Start with our discussion of Stockholm Syndrome here. What does a good score on the AP Psychology mean for you in college? Learn more about how AP credit works at colleges. AP tests and SAT subject tests can both be important components of your college application. Find out the difference between the two and which type of test is more important. Are you taking AP US History along with AP Psychology? Read this article for some helpful AP US History study resources. 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