Censorship of the Press essays

Censorship of the Press essays The First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States reads, Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances and yet, over the last two centuries, congress has attempted to do all of the above on many occasions. It seems almost barbaric in this day and age to imagine our government still attempting to abridge the freedoms put forth by the Constitution, but it does indeed still happen. It would take several volumes to detail every occurrence in the history of our Constitution, so for the sake of brevity, this essay will focus on the government attempts to abridge the freedom of the press in the last dozen years. In 1991, the United States entered into a military conflict with Iraq after their leader, Saddam Hussein, invaded Kuwait. During the weeks that followed, I could not turn on my television without seeing some form of media coverage about the war, be it personal stories of soldiers and their family, close up footage of our missiles pummeling their buildings, or late night television hosts cracking jokes about Saddam Hussein. As an average viewer, I did not think for a moment that the press was leaving information out of the extensive broadcasts. However, behind the scenes, there was more going on. Much more than the press was allowed to report on. On February 14, 1991 the Pentagon laid down specific guidelines telling the media what they were and were not allowed to disclose. Included among these guidelines were: Any information that reveals details of future plans, operations, or strikes, including postponed or canceled operations; Information on intelligence collection activities, including targets, methods and results; and ten other rules that were most li...

Understanding Specially Designed Instruction

Understanding Specially Designed Instruction The Specially Designed Instruction (SDI) section of the Individual Education Plan (IEP) is one of the most important parts of this important document. The special education teacher, along with the IEP team, determines what accommodations and modifications the student will be receiving. As a legal document, the IEP not only binds the special educator but the whole school population, as every member of the community must deal with this child. Extended test time, frequent bathroom breaks, whatever SDIs are written into the IEP must be provided by the principal, the librarian, the gym teacher, the lunchroom monitor, and the general education teacher, as well as the special education teacher. Failure to provide those accommodations and modifications can create serious legal jeopardy for the members of the school community who ignore them. What Are SDIs? SDIs fall into two categories: accommodations and modifications. Some people use the terms interchangeably, but legally they are not the same. Children with 504 plans will have accommodations but not modifications in their plans. Children with IEPs can have both. Accommodations are changes in the way in which the child is treated in order to best accommodate the childs physical, cognitive, or emotional challenges. They might include: Extended time for tests (the standard is one and a half times as long as allowed, but in most general education classrooms unlimited time is not uncommon)Frequent test breaksThe ability to move around the classroom (especially kids with ADHD)Bathroom breaks when neededSpecial seating (for example, in front of the class or separated from peers)A water bottle at the students desk (some medications create dry mouth) Modifications change the academic or curricular demands made of a child to better fit the childs ability. Modifications might include the following: Modified homework10 words or less on spelling testsScribing (the teacher or an aide writes the responses, as dictated by a child)Separate, modified tests in content areasAlternate forms of assessment, such as dictating, oral retelling, and portfolios Individual Education Plan Its good to have a conversation with other teachers as you are preparing the IEP, especially if you need to prepare that teacher to deal with Accommodations they are not going to like (such as bathroom breaks without requests). Some children have medications that make them need to urinate frequently. Once an IEP is signed, and the IEP meeting is over, be sure every teacher who sees the child gets a copy of the IEP. It is also important that you go over the Specially Designed Instructions and discuss how they are going to be carried out. This is one place a general educator can cause him or herself some serious grief with parents. This is also a place where that same teacher can earn the trust and support of those parents.

Policy Innovation Application Paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Policy Innovation Application Paper - Essay Example who took a more aggressive and innovative policy in implementing greenhouse emission controls. As an example we will take the case of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and the California vehicle emission standards. The California vehicle emission standards require a limitation on the amount of pollutants that an automobile releases in the atmosphere. This also applied to other powered vehicles that include industry, small equipments (such as lawn mowers and diesel generators) and power plants where their greenhouse emission is also strictly regulated. The Federal Government of the United States regulates the emission standards of all carbon emitting motors through its agency named Environmental Protection Agency. The state of California however has a permission to implement a more stringent regulatory emission standards compared to the Federal Government’s regulatory standard. The regulatory rules are crafted by the California Air Reserve Board or â€Å"CARB†. ... It was a four year court challenge that â€Å"resulted from the California’s South Coast Air Quality Management District’s (SCAQMD) Fleet rules that required various public and private operators of fleets of 15 or more vehicles in the SCAQMD basin (Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Orange and Riverside) to purchase alternative fuel vehicles or certain cleaner fuel vehicles authorized under the California’s emission standards program (Osenga, 2004). The RGCI or the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative is an initiative by the states in Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic part of the United States (includes Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont) who committed to reduce carbon emissions from the power sector by capping it to 10 percent by 2010. It is a carbon cap and trade program whose proceeds from its emission permit auctioning will be used to promote energy conservation and use of renewable progra m (Anon., 2007). II. Which policy is more effective? The California vehicle emission standards whose rule and regulations are set by the California Air Reserve Board or â€Å"CARB† is more effective and responsive to pressing issues of pollution and climate change in the short term. The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative however is more effective for a longer term solution of the Greenhouse problem as it caps emission and has a component of raising funds to increase the use of renewable energy which intends to replace the carbon emitting power plants. For a more effective policy implementation of addressing the carbon emission and climate change, the combination of the two is more

Unpaid internship argument essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Unpaid internship argument - Essay Example spending efficient summer vacation becomes a duty for students. Many companies required high expectation of specifications from students. To fill out owns resume blanks, students need to invest their vacation for their future. Commonly, they are looking for volunteer jobs or internships. Especially, internship is a very attractive title for one’s resume and career experience. However, unfortunately, in this tough reality, the purpose of internship has been changed. Many companies and institutions offer unpaid internships for photocopying or making coffee. It is hard to expect real tasks as an intern. Moreover, through unpaid internship, it would bring many economic problems on individual interns to our society. Unpaid internship is just a way for companies to have free workforces. Companies and institutions use student’s future to satisfy their own profits and it will hurt economy and education markets in our society. Unpaid internship realistically is not designed for common students who have loans and debts. In NYC, a city that offers many unpaid internships but also one of high inflation cities in America, many unpaid interns are suffering because of this unrealistic opportunity. However, there are some students who are really suitable for unpaid internships. Their common factor is rich. For example, to do unpaid internship at the White House, a student is required to get financial support from the home front. Living in Washington, one of expensive cites in America, is not easy for common students; if they are not living in Washington, the costs are increased because they need to pay for a rent, transportation, and food, etc. However, the rich students don’t even consider this inquires. This gap between these students are called â€Å"blatant class discrimination†.(Lind) In reality, college tuition has been increased with the percentage of student’s loans. Moreover, to get a fine job, students unavoidably

Thomas Merton Essay Example for Free

Thomas Merton Essay Thomas Merton is a spiritual writer who has come up with different works on faith and religion. One of his works The True Self talks about humility and its association with meditation. Merton writes that humility is not assuming another character that someone is not as this only reflects your insistence that a person knows better than God with regards to his personality. This is basically true because in meditation an individual reflects on his own life and reflects on how he is created by God into the person that he is. In meditation, a person does not pretend and does not try to assume another role or another characteristic. Merton presents that there is the resistance to the temptation of being lost among the false masks of other people. Meditation helps us to humbly accept who we are and how God has created us. Humility is realizing that our current selves are special and any chance for improvement should be utilized for the better and not for the purpose of shifting into another personality very far from our own.Moral action is the voluntary effort of a man in response to a particular event based on his moral beliefs of whether the event is right or wrong. Human dignity is very much related to morality in that any offense to the former is a reflection on morality. In this regard, insults in human dignity such as murder, sexual offence, slavery, abuse, or any other form of annihilation of human rights is subject to moral action. Because these acts clearly offend morality, a person is bound to carry out his moral action depending on his beliefs and judgment. If a person believes that an act like euthanasia is not morally wrong then this would determine his moral action regarding a possible threat to human dignity. Reference: Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the modern world. December 7, 1965.

Grapes Of Wrath In Times Of De :: essays research papers

“The Grapes of Wrath: In Times of Despair';   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  If one was to examine the three characters, Tom, Ma, and Pa Joad from John Steinback’s The Grapes of Wrath. How would we figure out what astrological signs they were born under, as taken from their actions and attitudes in the novel? What certain qualities do they possess, that make them fit there Zodiac sign?   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Tom Joad, a hard stubborn man, who has served time in prison for murder. He has come back home to find his family falling apart. At the head there is Pa Joad, who has been trying to keep the family stable. He is failing fast. There seems to be no answer to the drought which has killed the land they farm. So they take to the road. Hoping there will be a new life and work in the west. The whole faimly packs their belongings, and leaves the place they have called home, behind them. Along the way to the west, they have many misfortunes. They still had more to come. Just one of the many families, caught in times of despair. They are held together by, Tom the Lion, Ma the bull, andPa who holds the scales of balance.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I chose Leo, the lion for Tom. The lion is an icon of strength. I think his character represents the strength and knowledge. Shown through his psyichal fights and hard crop work in the novel. Also because he had the strength to push on for his family. To keep goin through the hardest times, and overcome his obstacles. He also represents knowledge from his experiences with fixing the truck, and keeping things under control at the government camps. Another example of personal and mental strength, as well as knowledge is the courage it took to leave his family behind at the boxcar farm. He knew he had to leave his family behind for the better of the whole group.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ma Joad represents Taurus, the bull. The bull symbolizes stability. As shown through Ma’s actions and involvment in the novel. There comes a time when, Pa Joad falls into the hopelessness of the whole situtation. At that time Ma steps into the breach and takes over. She must assume the posistion of head, and keep her family going. Keep it together. She takes on the responsibility of running the family, feeding the family, working in the fields for money, and keeping it stable.

Term paper of Bill of rights

Two further constitutions were drafted and adopted during wo short-lived war-time governments, by the revolutionary forces during the Philippine Revolution with Emilio Aguinaldo as President and by the occupation forces during the Japanese Occupation of the Philippines during World War II with Jos © P. Laurel as President. Article Ill – Bill of Rights consists of 22 Sections. The objective of this paper is to determine the significance of having this Bill of Rights to our country and to identify by the people the importance of knowing the Bill of Rights in each of everyone surrounded by this law.A bill of rights is a list of the most important rights to the citizens of a country. The purpose of these bills is to protect those rights against infringement. The term â€Å"bill of rights† originates from england . The purpose of a Bill of Rights is to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. The Bill of Rights ? How many rights do you have?You should check, because it might not be as many today as it was a few years ago, or even a few months ago. Some people I talk to are not concerned that police will execute a search warrant without nocking or that they set up roadblocks and stop and interrogate innocent citizens. They do not regard these as great infringements on their rights. But when you put current events together, there is information that may be surprising to people who have not yet been concerned: The amount of the Bill of Rights that is under attack is alarming. What about the meaning of Rights ? re legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom orentitlement ; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people, according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory. Rights are of essential importance in such disci plines as law and ethics , especially theories of Justice and deontology. Rights are often considered fundamental to civilization, being regarded as established pillars of society andculture and the history of social conflicts can be found in the history of each right and its development.According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, â€Å"rights structure the form of governments, the content of laws, and the shape of morality as it is currently perceived. † The connection between rights they are fought for and claimed, and the essence of struggles past and ancient are ncoded in the spirit of current concepts of rights and their modern formulation. Filipino Citizen must know the things they could legally do and the limitation on their acts. It is also themselves who will benefit if they would know their own rights and privilages .The importance of the study is to tell the purpose of the article 3 of the Philippine Constitution which is the bill of rights . The study ai ms to give you imformation from the section under bill of rights. The Study focuses on the Freedom and Protection that the government offers to the citizen and the benefits they would get with respect to the bill of rights and its ection. Article Ill. Bill of Rights Section 1 . No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, nor shall any person be denied the equal protection of the laws.Section 2. The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures of whatever nature and for any purpose shall be inviolable, and no search warrant or warrant of arrest shall issue except upon probable cause to be determined personally by the Judge after examination under oath or affirmation of the complainant and the witnesses he may roduce, and particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized. Section 3. 1) The privacy of communication and corresponden ce shall be inviolable except upon lawful order of the court, or when public safety or order requires otherwise as prescribed by law. (2) Any evidence obtained in violation of this or the preceding section shall be inadmissible for any purpose in any proceeding. Section 4. No law shall be passed abridging the freedom of speech, of expression, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances. Section 5.No law shall be made respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. The free exercise and enjoyment of religious profession and worship, without discrimination or preference, shall forever be allowed. No religious test shall be required for the exercise of civil or political rights. Section 6. The liberty of abode and of changing the same within the limits prescribed by law shall not be impaired except upon lawful order of the court. Neither shall the right to travel be impaired e xcept in the interest of national security, public safety, or ublic health, as may be provided by law.Section 7. The right of the people to information on matters of public concern shall official acts, transactions, or decisions, as well as to government research data used as basis for policy development, shall be afforded the citizen, subject to such limitations as may be provided by law. Section 8. The right of the people, including those employed in the public and private sectors, to form unions, associations, or societies for purposes not contrary to law shall not be abridged. Section 9. Private property shall not be taken for public use without Just compensation. Section 10.No law impairing the obligation of contracts shall be passed. Section 1 1 . Free access to the courts and quasi-Judicial bodies and adequate legal assistance shall not be denied to any person by reason of poverty. Section 12. (1) Any person under investigation for the commission of an offense shall have the right to be informed of his right to remain silent and to have competent and independent counsel preferably of his own choice. If the person cannot afford the services of counsel, he must be provided with one. These rights cannot be waived except in writing and in the presence of counsel. ) No torture, force, violence, threat, intimidation, or any other means which vitiate the free will shall be used against him. Secret detention places, solitary, incommunicado, or other similar forms of detention are prohibited. (3) Any confession or admission obtained in violation of this or Section 17 hereof shall be inadmissible in evidence against him. (4) The law shall provide for penal and civil sanctions for violations of this section as well as compensation to the rehabilitation of victims of torture or similar practices, and their families.

Digital Rights Management

Technological innovation is drastically taking place in almost every field. Experts and engineers put their extraordinary effort to develop software or products that requires some kind of security to protect it from misuse. Digital Rights Management is the one which is used for technologies that controls the use of digital content. With the advancement of Internet and development of digital content, content owners are being impelled into a new arena where they can enhance their rights by using DRM technologies as a way to control the use of their content.The present paper focuses on DRM, argumentative views of various experts on it and effectiveness of DRM in radically changing Hi- tech world. Digital Rights Management (DRM) facilitates copyright holders to achieve value for their works. DRM is used variably in literature. According to Electronic Frontier Foundation, â€Å"Digital rights management technologies are aimed at increasing the kinds and/or scope of control that rights-ho lders can assert over their intellectual property assets.†DRM allows the copyright holder to control the ways consumer’s access and use the holder's work once the work is made available in a digital format. By controlling the access, a right holder is capable to offers an exclusively competent business model and his work will be protected from infringing uses. It is not possible for DRM at its own level to realize these aims because it is susceptible to the hackers, which is able to avoid DRM safeguards. That’s why, law enforcement is required to avert from hackers.These steps will strengthen DRM technology (Christopher D. Kruger, pg: 281). The focus of the first generation of Digital Rights Management (DRM) was mainly on security and encryption as a way of working out the problem of unauthorized copying of the content. It was performed by locking the content and to limit its distribution to only those who make payment. In the second-generation of DRM, major step s to cover the description, identification, trading, protection, monitoring and tracking of all forms of rights procedures over both tangible and intangible assets.DRM deals with all rights and not only the rights applicable to permissions over digital content. There are two significant architectures which must reflect on while designing and implementing DRM systems. The Functional Architecture is the first. This covers the high-level modules or components of the DRM system that together provide a management of rights till the end user. The Information Architecture is the second critical architecture. This covers the modeling of the entities within a DRM system as well as their relationships.In digital rights management, the licensing authority issues to the DRM licensee a certificate and a public/private key pair for use in service. The client will sign the certificate with the licensing authority private key and send it to the content server along with the public key. The content server then verifies the certificate and thereby authenticates the client. The server also checks the certificate with the list of revocation and if so, the client will not be able to receive or decrypt content. There are two algorithms used in signing.The Windows DRM for Network Devices and HDMI and the Open Mobile Alliance use the RSA algorithm. An Elliptic Curve algorithm being much lighter, are used in Windows DRM for Mobile Devices and DTCP. There are number of companies holding patents, which cause some concern for adopters and have delayed the introduction of ECC to wider use in DRM. Once the authentication of a device is complete and it is determined that it has the valid license authority certificate, then in a DRM design, the last step is to decrypt content – the symmetric cipher key. This is obviously very important.Consumers just can not break their head to manage a key for every song or video that they have licensed under a DRM scheme, nor would the owner of a br and new product wish to enter 40 hex digits into the new console before using it. It is to be noted that one tremendously imperative feature of DRM security design is the processes by which secret DRM values are stored. While these consumer electronic products can be accessed by consumers, hackers will pry the design looking for susceptibilities. It is better to use the key storage on chip non-volatile memory.The major problems with this approach are NVM memory is not available in every process, especially the advanced technology nodes, the license fees for NVM are fairly high and last of all the programming of the secret values in off-shore ODMs may encounter a security issue as the secret values are in plaintext (Al Hawtin, Embedded Technology Journal). DRM has many advantages such as one can make more investment in digital content. Digital copies are perfect no matter how many copies are to be made. Large corporations are not the only creators of content.The Internet provides low -cost distribution network globally from which thousands of software producers get advantage. Strong DRM ensures a revenue stream at lower rate. Furthermore, good DRM means more legal free media, and lower prices. (John Carroll, 2002ZDNet). Even though DRM has many positive aspects and it is legally protected, it is always a matter of argument. Debate over the issues of fair use and DRM at the 12th annual Computers, Freedom and Privacy (CFP) conference in San Francisco summarizes that it is too early in this period of technological modernization to begin locking down digital content.Peter Jaszi, law professor at American University's Washington College of Law referred to copyright holders' attempts to keep tight control over their digital content, such as some record companies' moves to distribute DRM-protected CDs that cannot be played on more than one device. But even more threatening to fair-use advocates is proposed legislation introduced by Senator Ernest â€Å"Fritz† Ho llings, which aims to incorporate a built-in copyright protection measure in all consumer digital devices. Most speakers at CFP established that DRM was not the solution to the copyright difficulty.Many of the advocates agreed that DRM would be more successful in harmonizing the rights of user and copyright holders than would be legislation. Stefan Bechtold, a Stanford Law School fellow and author of a book on digital rights management, argued that even though DRM can slow down fair use and free speech, the technology is more progressive than law. It develops speedily and can be installed on an international level. According to Microsoft Security Architect Barbara Fox, DRM technologies make easy to secure the content and setting rules for consumer use but it is much more intricate to guarantee that users have fair use of that content.Further he noted that copyright law is vague when it comes to fair-use rights and DRM would be incapable to settle on whether a user should be able to use content under certain state of affairs (CNN). Even so many controversies, various industries like the entertainment industry, led primarily by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), are dynamically chasing DRM-friendly policy initiatives through federal legislation and regulations, the courts and standards organizations.Music and movies have grabbed most of the headlines around digital rights management (DRM). The â€Å"killer app† for enterprise DRM is document management, primarily for purposes of regulatory compliance. The relevant regulations include the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOA). These laws require that the confidentiality and/or integrity of certain types of documents be protected (E.John Sebes, Mark Stamp, Pg: 52). DRM is computer code that can be embedded in music and video files to dictate how th ese files are used. The best-known example is the music Apple Computer sells at its iTunes Music Store. Using a DRM system it invented called FairPlay, Apple has engineered its songs, at the insistence of the record companies, so that they can be played only on a maximum of five computers, which means that one can burn only seven CDs containing the same play list of purchased tracks.In fact, obtaining relatively liberal DRM rules from the labels was the key to Apple's success in selling music. But some other uses of DRM technology are not so benevolent. Some CD buyers are discovering to their dismay that new releases from certain record companies contain DRM code that makes it difficult to copy the songs to their computers, where millions prefer to keep their music.People who buy online music in Microsoft's Windows Media format too often run into the DRM error message â€Å"unable to obtain license† when try to transfer the songs to a music player. The theft of intellectual p roperty on the Internet is a real problem. Millions of copies of songs, TV shows and movies are being distributed over the Internet by people who have no legal right to do so, robbing media companies and artists of rightful compensation for their work (WALTER S.MOSSBERG, 2005). The premier provider of smart mobile content retailing solutions, announced the U. S. Patents and Trademarks Office has issued the company a patent in the area of mobile content and applications Digital Rights Management (DRM). To sum up, DRM standardization is now taking place in a number of open businesses. Digital Rights Management is rising as an alarming new confronts, and it is necessary for DRM systems to provide interoperable services.

Reasons to Be Pretty, a Play by Neil LaBute

Reasons to Be Pretty, a Play by Neil LaBute Reasons to Be Pretty is a hard-edged comedy written by Neil LaBute. It is the third and final installment of a trilogy (The Shape of Things, Fat Pig, and Reasons to Be Pretty). The trio of plays are connected not by characters or plot but by the recurring theme of body image within American society. Reasons to Be Pretty premiered on Broadway in 2008. It was nominated for three Tony Awards (Best Play, Best Leading Actress, and Best Leading Actor). Meet the Characters Steph is the central argument of the play. Throughout the story, she is furious. She feels emotionally wounded by her boyfriend- who believes that her face is regular (which she views as a way of saying that she is not beautiful). Greg, the protagonist, spends most of his life trying to explain his misunderstood intentions to others. Like other leading men in Neil LaBute plays, he is far more affable than the male supporting characters (who are always foul-mouthed jerks). In spite of his low-key, eager-to-remain-calm personality, Greg somehow evokes anger from the rest of the characters. Kent is the obnoxious jerk character we were just talking about. He is crude, down-to-earth, and believes that his life is better than perfect. He not only has a good-looking wife, but hes also tangled in a work-related affair. Carly is the wife of Kent and the best friend of Stephanie. She sets the conflict in motion, spreading gossip about Gregs supposedly true feelings. Reasons to Be Pretty Plot Summary of Act One Scene One In Scene One, Steph is very angry because her boyfriend Greg supposedly said something derogatory about her physical appearance. After a heated argument, Greg explains he and his friend Kent had a conversation in Kents garage. Kent had mentioned that the newly hired woman at their workplace was hot. According to Greg, he replied: Maybe Steph hasnt got a face like that girls. Maybe Stephs face is just regular. But I wouldnt trade her for a million bucks. After his admission, Steph storms out of the room. Scene Two Greg hangs out with Kent, recounting his fight with Stephanie. During their conversation, Kent chastises him about eating an energy bar directly after a meal, claiming that Greg will get fat. Kent goes into the bathroom. Kents wife Carly arrives. Carly is in law enforcement. She is the one who gossiped to Steph about Gregs conversation, regarding her regular face. Carly harshly criticizes Greg, detailing how upset Steph has become, reacting to his insensitive words. Greg argues that he was trying to say something complimentary about Steph. Carly states that his communication skills suck. When Kent finally returns from the bathroom, he defuses the argument, kisses Carly, and advises Greg to treat women nicely to keep the relationship happy. Ironically, whenever Carly is not around, Kent is far more demeaning and derogatory than Greg. Scene Three Steph meets Greg in neutral territory: a restaurant at lunchtime. He has brought her flowers, but she remains intent on moving out and ending their four-year relationship. She wants to be with someone who sees her as beautiful. After unleashing more of her anger and rebuking Gregs attempts at reconciliation, Steph demands the keys so she can remove all of her items from their home. Greg finally fights back (verbally) and says that he doesnt want to see her stupid face anymore. That makes Stephanie snap! Steph makes him sit back down at the table. She then pulls out a letter from her purse. She has written down everything about Greg that she dislikes. Her letter is a vicious (yet amusing) tirade, detailing all of his physical and sexual flaws, from head to toe. After reading the hateful letter, she admits that she wrote all of those things to hurt him. However, she says that his comment about her face represents his true beliefs, and can therefore never be forgotten or taken back. Scene Four Kent and Carly sit together, complaining about work and money. Carly criticizes her husbands lack of maturity. Just as they start to makeup, Greg arrives to hang out and read a book. Carly leaves, annoyed because she blames Greg for making Steph move away. Kent reluctantly confides in Greg, admitting that he is having an affair with the hot girl at work. He goes through a long list of positive details about her physique. (In many ways it is the opposite of Stephs angry letter monologue.) At the end of the scene, Kent makes Greg promise not to reveal the affair to anyone (especially Steph or Carly). Kent claims that men must stick together because they are like buffalo. Act One of Reasons to Be Pretty concludes with Gregs realization that his relationship is not the only one that has fallen apart.

Song Lyrics and Standard English

Song Lyrics and Standard English Song Lyrics and Standard English Song Lyrics and Standard English By Maeve Maddox According to a story in the NY Times, researchers from the University of Pittsburgh studied the 279 most popular songs from 2005 looking for references to drugs and alcohol. I’d like to see a study that tracks the repetition rate of nonstandard English in popular music. The Pennsylvania study found that some genres mention drugs and alcohol more than others. From my own cursory and unscientific survey, I conclude that nonstandard English is well represented across genres. (My observations are based on lyrics from songs mentioned in lists like the Top 40. There may be some better ones somewhere.) Song lyrics have more power to influence the language of young people now than they did in earlier generations. When I was growing up, I listened to songs on the radio at home, not while I was at school or walking around town. I had a record player and a small collection of records. My total listening time probably didn’t amount to more than two or three hours a week. Today’s adolescents spend an average of 16 hours a week listening to music. Nine out of ten in this age group have an MP3 player or a CD player in their rooms, and I’d guess that a great many younger children have them as well. Most American high schools operate on a 36-week schedule. Class sessions vary in length from 45 to 55 minutes. At best, a student never absent will receive about four and a half hours of English instruction a week for 36 weeks of the year; compare that to 16 hours of music consumption a week every week of the year: English instruction = 162 hours per year Music listening = 832 hours per year During those 832 hours, young music fans hear thousands upon thousands of repetitions of such constructions as: I feel the magic between you and I. –Eric Carmen When you cheated girl, my heart bleeded girl. – Justin Timberlake Can we conversate? –Young Rant/Shorty B. Can You handle me the way I are? –Timbaland Far too many stars have fell on me. –Dan Fogelberg As time goes by, you will get to know me a little more better. –Backstreet Boys The way my body feel/When you’re laying right beside me. –Sevyn Streeter Me and you are supose to be together. –Ashley Tisdale A blogger at the music site Hooks Harmony gives the crown for bad grammar to Beyoncà ©. Peter Lee’s article about â€Å"Get Me Bodied,† together with his translation of the song into standard English, is one of the funniest language laments I’ve ever read. The poor man gives it his best shot, but finally gives up: â€Å"I can’t finish this. I feel like I just translated the last half of Flowers for Algernon.† No one expects popular song lyrics to be written in formal English. The golden oldies had their share of gonnas, wannas, ain’ts and double negatives. But none of the songs from the 1940s, 1950s, or 1960s that I browsed while writing this post exhibit the vulgarity and verbal poverty of the lyrics of recent popular music. Efforts at school reform notwithstanding, the most competent English teachers in the world cannot compete with the steady indoctrination in vacuous and nonstandard English that goes on outside the classroom. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Writing Basics category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Avoid Beginning a Sentence with â€Å"With†Grammar Quiz #21: Restrictive and Nonrestrictive ClausesHow Do You Pronounce "Mozart"?

Origins of the Fortune Cookie Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Origins of the Fortune Cookie - Essay Example Increasingly, fortune cookies have been understood as having been introduced by the Japanese, made popular by the Chinese but enjoyed largely by the Americans in the numerous Chinese restaurants in the U.S. all over the world, the cookies are known by their English term â€Å"fortune cookies†.However, there is no consensus on any particular Chinese name for the cookies since the Chinese merely have several literary transitions of the English â€Å"fortune cookie† such as â€Å"good luck lot cookie† or â€Å"fortune words cookie†. Fortune cookies are a major cultural symbol in the American society, inspiring several other products such as fortune-cookie-shaped jewelry and the fortune-cookie-shaped magic 8 ball among others.There are nearly 3 billion fortune cookies manufactured each year, many of which are consumed in the U.S. and the leading manufacturers of the cookies are the Brooklyn-based firm Wonton Food Inc.It is an indubitable fact that America has more Chinese restaurants than McDonald's, Burger King, and Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets, in Lee’s words, which shares insights on the history of Chinese cuisines in the country. In her book, Lee advances the argument that despite popular belief, a vast proportion of what is commonly known as Chinese food is all American and little is known about them back in China.In that respect, it logically follows that common cuisines such as beef with broccoli (an Italian vegetable), egg rolls, General Tso’s chicken, chop suey, and fortune cookies are all American foods.