Should the Government Pass a Fat Tax Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Should the Government Pass a Fat Tax - Article Example The underlining belief is that in increasing the cost of these products, individuals will be more motivated to pursue a healthy lifestyle. Still, some health activists counter that such a tax is wrong-headed in that rather than imbuing individuals with a sense of personal responsibility, it attempts to arbitrarily enforce healthy living. This essay considers the nature of the fat tax, arguing that in terms of the current social climate such a tax is justified.   In considering the nature of a fat tax it’s necessary to consider whether there is a legitimate connection between increased food costs and their reduced consumption. A recent research article conducted by the University of Minnesota titled ‘Pricing Effects on Food Choices’ investigated this connection (French 2003). This report indicated that there was a significant connection between increased food prices and the reduced consumption of these foods. Consider French (2003) when she writes,   Compared w ith usual price conditions, price reductions resulted in a four-fold increase in fresh fruit sales and a two-fold increase in baby carrot sales. Both studies demonstrate that price reductions are an effective strategy to increase the purchase of more healthful foods in community-based settings such as work sites and schools.In these regards, the study indicates that in increasing the cost of high-calorie food there was a corresponding increase in the purchase of healthier food options.

Infectious Disease Research Paper Anthrax Essay Example for Free

Infectious Disease Research Paper Anthrax Essay Typically spread from humans to livestock and can be transmitted via air, soil, animal hides, and food. The dormant spores of Anthrax can live in soil and animal products, such as hides (leather) for years and it is not easy to kill by heat or cold. Once spores are eaten by livestock, they are activated very quickly, and the bacteria then reproduces. The animal typically dies and the bacteria is returned to the soil and water as spores. Diagnosis typically requires the element of suspicion for a physician to diagnose anthrax. Diagnosis begins with culturing the bacterium and performing a gram stain. A motility test and the lack of hemolysis on blood agar can also be used to diagnose anthrax. The main virulence factors are it’s polypeptide capsule and what is referred to as a tripartite toxin which is composed of three separate proteins. One protein is called edema factor the second protein is protective antigen, and the third is lethal factor which causes massive inflammation and shock. There is a vaccine that contains live spores and a toxoid prepared from a special strain of B anthracis used to protect livestock in areas of high anthrax cases. There is also a purified toxoid that is recommended for humans that have frequent contact with livestock or animal products that could potentially carry the bacteria. The preferred treatment for anthrax is antibiotics such as penicillin, doxycycline, or ciproflaxin. Anthrax has become one of the popular choices for use as a biological warfare agent. Reasons for this would be because the spores of Bacillus anthracis can remain dangerous for many decades. Other than the use of anthrax in bioterrorism, the occurrence of anthrax is rare and occurs most frequently in developing countries with high agriculture concentration and without veterinary public health programs. Works Cited Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Department of Health and Human

Where we Stand by Hooks :: Free Essay Writer

Where we Stand by Hooks In our current society, it is acceptable to talk about race or gender. However, when it comes to the subject of class, people tend to tense, and are uncertain as to where they stand. At one time in history money afforded prestige and power, however now, money is a large part of our society and tends to rule many peoples lives. In the book Where We Stand: Class Matters, by bell hooks, she describes a life growing up in a family who had nothing, to now becoming one of America’s most admired writers. She wrote this book because she wanted to write about her journey from a working class world to class-consciousness, and how we are challenged everyday with the widening gap between the rich and the poor. In her book, hook’s describes a life dominated by the haunting issues of money, race, and class. Looking at this from the different perspectives of a functionalist, symbolic interactionist, and conflict helps to show other points of view. If you were to look at this book from a functionalist’s perspective you would be looking at it from an extremely greedy aspect. A functionalist would say that their parents and society told them that only people with money were good and successful. Thus, causing you to feel like â€Å"trash† or class if you did not make a huge salary, and live a wealthy life. A symbolic interactionist would tell you that they grew up where all of their peers drove nice cars, and had large homes, so to fit in, you need to be able to buy those things. However, a person with a conflict point of view would say that it was her ongoing struggle with society, and having to defend her class, that has made her who she is today. There are many ‘norms’ and values expressed throughout hook’s writing. In the early part of the twentieth century survival belonged to the fittest. Not necessarily meaning fittest as ‘strongest,’ but able to produce, work hard, and make a secure life for yourself and family. On the other hand, in today’s society the message is that survival belongs only to the greedy. Also many young kids have the notion that in order to ’live the good life’ you must be wealthy of material possessions. Younger kids have to deal a lot more with the pressures associated with wealth.

Motivation To International Business

Domestic market: VOSCO will still be the biggest shipping company especially in bulk and dry bulk cargo transportation while continuing to develop oil and container shipping International market: VOSCO tend to be more active and concentrate on seaborne trade within Asian Region (such as Korea, China, Indonesia†¦) as well as furthering other freight routes all over the world (Africa, Europe and America). Motivation why VOSCO want to expand their market to foreign market because Currently the demand of shipping in Vietnam is limited and just holds a minor part.So VOSCO certainly will need to enter foreign markets to get more profit and customers (sources of cargo-supply in long term) and utilize the fleet capacity (bulk, tanker and container ships) as well as reduce the inventory cost and promote economies of scale. In the near future demand for import-export from regional countries and the amount of cargo in international shipping expects to rise tremendously in the near future.A ccording to UNDESA 2012, worldwide commercial good transported by sea will increase by 36% in 2020 and double the gross tonnage by 2033, especially bulk cargo still remain as the major – which is also the strength of VOSCO fleet. The barriers to entrance foreign market are reduced or eliminated when Vietnam joined ASEAN and WTO recently: VN has been a member of WTO since 2007, commercial relations with over 220 countries and territories, sign 88 bilateral trade agreements, establish 7 FTA with 15 countries.So removes significantly trade barriers and is good condition for Vietnamese companies, specifically VOSCO to enter foreign markets. VOSCO has a lot of good competitive advantages to develop further like: low-cost and skilled crew (seafarers), good related and supporting system such as shipbuilding industry, ports†¦ (VOSCO is a member of VINALINE)†¦ Moreover the company can manage and exploit their own fleets therefore positively seek to customers and participate in international market without dependence on other partners.In addition, VOSCO officially takes part in foreign market also means the company have to deal with a lot of threat. The biggest one is the competition from much bigger rivals around us such as COSCO, Hanjin†¦ in both price and quality wars, then other threats emerging from the host country like culture, policy and currency. Now move to factors this company should consider in shaping their strategies to compete in foreign market.We did mention that China and Indonesia can be potential foreign market so let’s take a look at some external environmental analysis of them: Political Factor: both Indonesia and China are considered as stable political environment, unlikely the high political risk in Africa. Tariffs are high but on decreasing slope. The recent dispute on The East Sea between China and some countries including Vietnam may not affect too much on trade between countries. Economic Factor: both countries ar e in trillion dollar GDP club. Currently China’s economy is the second biggest economy in the world and Indonesia ranks 15th.Especially FDI plays a vital role in China and Indonesia growth rate. Trade between these two countries with other all over the world continues to rise significantly regardless of the bad impact of public debt in Europe economy. Socio-cultural Factor: Population in Indonesia and China is extremely high not only in Asia but in the world. However there’s a big difference between these culture, especially in religion(major religion in China is Buddhism but Indonesia is Muslim) Technological Factor: Transport system and Communication System in these countries are effective and highly developed compared with other in region.From this analysis we can see that the company should choose a proper method to access the market. We think the way of merger and acquisition or integration with a local freight forwarder would be efficient because setting up a new affiliate is risky (postponement). Nevertheless setting up subsidiary or using will help the firm take the initiative in linking with local customers. Beside that VOSCO should focus on its own strength in shaping other strategies.Generic competitive strategies: Focus on market niche will be a good choice because VOSCO now take advantage in dry and bulk cargo transportation. It also means mineral, grain and other agricultural product will be the major commodity. In shaping the production strategy, there are two main factors: fleet and logistics service. Like we said before, VOSCO should renew and upgrade regularly their quality and functionality fleet to meet the international transport demand. For example:Firstly, technical improvement in ship sizes and draft is required (international coal shipping require 30,000 – 70,000 DWT vessels; demand for regional rice shipping currently concentrate on under 10,000 DWT vessels but in the near future it will increase to 20,000  œ 30,000 DWT) Secondly, standardization factor (the problem of registry – Vietnamese registered vessel may satisfy the operation standard but in fact it is unfavorable in international transport because standards by VR may not strict enough). The factor of logistics activities in both home and host country is very important.Investing in logistics infrastructure such as warehouse, inland transportation†¦ in China or Indonesia should be a long-term objective. Initially it should be integration with local providers. Expanding business in foreign market certainly need to consider factors in human resources. Integration can be seen as the first step before M&A process. Initially local shipping agent and logistics provider will run totally by local employees (inpatriate) then gradually replaced by our expatriates especially the top position. Therefore selection, training and development those expatriates will play an important role (Ex: Culture: China – Indonesia).Secon dly VOSCO must set up a competitive compensation package to motivate them and finally a proper relocation policy. Move to financial issues, initially the company should not consider the financial objective as the most important. Instead, the outcome better focus on (which is reflected by customer satisfaction). Another factor is the source of fund for the subsidiary. Depend on the (high) IR and exchange rate in both China and Indonesia, it’ll be better if the fund depends on both parent company and local borrowing and they uses the most common method: dividend remittance to pay back the parent firm.Finally regular financial report to the VOSCO headquarter is necessary in order to hedge the risk and develop their own financial strategy. The last but not least is containerization. Expand the business focusing on dry and bulk cargo market doesn’t mean we skip the container market. Like I said, this is a long-term objective because the current inefficiency of VOSCO contain er vessels. Therefore, profit from bulk cargo shipping can be reinvested in developing container lines services in the future.

Effects of Music on the Unborn Child

Music can be used to influence people’s mood and has been used to attempt to affect the brain of a child in its mother’s womb. Some people think that having an unborn child listen to different types of music will have different effects on how the child will grow. Some people believe that music has no influence while others believe that if they introduce their unborn child to classical music the baby will grow up to be smarter than the kid who either listened to other types of music or no music while in the womb. Studies have been done on how music can affect an unborn, and many different results have come from these studies. Not only can the unborn child actually hear the music, but the child will remember the song even after they are born. ?Music affects attitudes as well as thoughts. According to the book titled What to Listen for in Music by Aaron Copland, there are four elements of music: rhythm, melody, harmony, and tone color. Each of these elements are not heard by themselves but are heard together as one sound. Each part of music has a special and unique way wherewith we interpret and react to it. Rhythm comes first in the musical elements because many historians say that music started with a beating of a rhythm. Whether it was the cavemen with branches or another group rhythm was the first element of music found (Copland, 33). The second element, melody, is second because rhythm is more of a physical motion and so melody is experienced as a mental emotion. The melody is the most crucial part of the music. It is the only subjective portion of music that the audience rejects or accepts by itself (Copland, 49). Harmony, the third element, is the most sophisticated. The harmony was the most recently discovered and has been greatly appreciated (Copland, 61). The last element, tone color, is the quality of sound produced by a particular musical instrument (Copland, 78). Aaron Copland later goes on to explain the difference of how we listen to music now compared to how we listened when we were in the womb. We have little to no say in what we listen to when we were in the womb; we can only enjoy it or kick relentlessly hoping that it will change. ?Some studies have been done by David Tame in his book The Secret Power of Music. In it he says â€Å"music has been found to affect the body in two distinct ways, directly on the cells and organs and indirectly by affecting the emotions, which, in turn, influence numerous bodily processes. Sounds projected into liquid media have coagulated proteins. So teenagers have brought soft eggs to rock concerts, hich became hard-boiled — wonder what happens in our own bodies† (Tame, 173) After reading this, it does make one wonder why we listen to something that can have such a negative effect and be so bad. Most people chose music their parents raised them on or something completely different. Tame later says in his book that people who listen to rock music have led lives that were much more destructive to themselves and to others than people who had listened to classical music. David Tame also did studies on plants and animals and how they respond to the different music. In a study performed classical music had appeared to bring more produce and better looking flowers than rock music (Tame, 196). ?According to BBC, Dr. Lamont did a study where the same song was played for the last three months of the pregnancy and then was played again after the child was born, even after they were a year old they recognized the song (BBC, Womb Music: How Will Music Affect oner Unborn Child? ). Another study done by Dr. Lamont concluded that â€Å"that there was no evidence that playing classical music to babies helps to make their brains develop. Dr. Lamont has done many studies for this topic and could be considered an expert. She has discovered much information for example: babies can hear just twenty weeks after conception and can remember a song for at least twelve months, and that babies cannot only remember the songs but they prefer these songs (BBC, Babies Remember womb music). ?Another study was done at the Education Oasis on how music affects babies in the womb, and they said that music does not make a baby smarter but it does prepare it for particular ways of thinking. The effect the music has does not last long but can be used to do tasks more quickly (Bales). They figured out, through many experiments, that although music did not make the babies smarter it did make their brains ready to learn and grow. The babies who listened to classical music were more ready to learn than the babies, who had listened to country, rock, folk, dance, or nothing at all (Bales). ?Although there is still controversy on whether or not music can make the brain smarter or not, more research has been done to observe the effects of music on newborns. Researchers from Brigham Oneng University studied the effects of music on thirty-three premature infants in the neonatal intensive care unit at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo. Cassette players piped voices of men and women singing lullabies into each baby’s ears for forty minutes a day for four days. When doctors examined the babies on the fourth day, they found that babies who had been exposed to music gained more weight, and had lower blood pressure and a stronger heartbeat than the other (Robledo). Their research shows that music can help strengthen premature babies; however, these researchers still have yet to figure out if music can improve a child’s intellect. It is hard to study the intelligence level of babies when they cannot talk or write. When studying three and four year olds these researchers have found out that if the child plays an instrument that the child is better at math and special thinking (Robledo). â€Å"Oner goal should be to cultivate a love for music in oner child, not to create the next Mozart. It should be about having fun and exposing oner child to new sounds and rhythms† (Robledo). My mother listened to two genres of music when I was in her womb: eighties rock and R&B. I would kick and dance for her when she played the rock music and she used R&B to put me to sleep. It worked as a oneng child too; my mother has videos of me kicking and screaming for joy when she played AC/DC, Bon Jovi, the Beastie Boys, Duran Duran, Journey, Whitesnake, and U2. Whenever either of my parents wanted to put me to sleep, they would play Prince, Stevie Wonder, Al B. Sure, Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross, Soul II Soul, or Earth, Wind, and Fire. These genres have had an impact on my upbringing. Like most children I stuck to what I knew when it came for me to buy my first compact disk. The quote â€Å"The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree† applies very much so to me as it does to most children when they pick what they like and what they do not; I chose a nineties rock and alternative. I liked bands that were like the bands that I listened to in my mother’s womb, but I also liked having my own music to like. The music I chose sounds similar to the music my mother would have me listen to, but it was something my dad would not sing every word to, so I liked it. My dad is not the best singer, so if I can only get a hum then my music is more enjoyable. ?A year or two later, my mother was pregnant again. This time she was told by the doctors that her baby was to be born with many brain defects. She looked for many ways to keep her unborn baby from being born with the brain deficiencies. She had watched on the local news that babies were being born with an unbelievable intelligence from their mothers playing classical music while the unborn baby was still in the womb. There was another mother whom had said that the doctors had told her that her baby was supposed to be born with brain efects but her baby was born with no defects at all and she thanked her lucky stars on classical music. My mother thought it was worth a try since music was not thought of to hurt a baby’s brain. While she had classical music on headphone around her womb, she had rock music on a second pair for her and me to enjoy. My brother was born with some brain deficiencies; he is a slow school learner but is extremely fast at learning musical instruments. If one gives him an instrument in five minutes he will learn how to compose sound, in fifteen he knows notes, and in thirty he can play a song from memory. In everything else my brother is slow at learning and is slightly dyslexic. My mother thought the classical music had helped, so when she was pregnant again she had the new unborn baby listen to classical music as well. This one was born with terrible eye sight, deaf in one ear, dyslexic, and on the verge of being mentally handicapped. Classical music through a personal study has shown to have no intellectual effect on the unborn child. Every now and again a â€Å"musical genius† is born. These children are extremely gifted in music and can play, compose and understand music with an unimaginable capacity. Although, some may imagine that we cannot measure musical greatness or potential in children before they discover it themselves. There is a way. In the book titled Musical Ability in Children by Arnold Bentley, he describes ways that we can test the musical ability and potential in children. After all, he says â€Å"musical ability is primarily a mental ability. † He goes on to tell how to test children, but he says that this can be a difficult task especially if the children are not old enough to handle the challenge of the tests (Bentley). According to these studies, there are too many variables to consider when having a child and exposing them to the different array of music that we have today. For example, the child may be born already a genius and the classical music could impair his way of thinking, there are also some disabilities a child can be born with that music just will not be the fix, the baby may reject the music altogether because the baby still remembers what has happened before in the premortal life and knows that he should be listening to a different type or knows a better type for him to listen to. Music is a stimulant. We listen to it in hard times either to make us feel better or to truly understand what the artists are saying because now we understand what they mean. We try to understand everything that we listen to, but it is sometime hard to pick up the message the artists wanted to get out in the way they present it. Music is a powerful thing that should not be taken lightly it can create emotions and pictures in our mind. Music is not something that goes away either. Once one hears a song it can be stuck in one’s mind for a very long time. Even after many years of not hearing the song it can still come back to the front of one’s mind, much faster than a memory. Music is power, and to play it to unborn children increases the parent’s power over the child by what the parents choose which music to produce for the child.

History of Newspapers In America

History of Newspapers In America The rise of newspapers in America accelerated enormously throughout the 19th century. When the century began, newspapers, generally in the larger cities and towns, tended to be affiliated with political factions or particular politicians. And while newspapers had influence, the reach of the press was fairly narrow. By the 1830s the newspaper business began to expand rapidly. Advances in printing technology meant newspapers could reach more people, and the introduction of the penny press meant that just about anyone, including newly arrived immigrants, could buy and read the news. By the 1850s the American newspaper industry came to be dominated by legendary editors, including Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune, James Gordon Bennett of the New York Herald, and Henry J. Raymond, of the upstart New York Times. Major cities, and many large towns, began to boast high-quality newspapers. By the time of the Civil War, the publics appetite for news was enormous. And newspaper publishers responded by sending war correspondents to the battlefronts. Extensive news would fill newspaper pages after major battles, and many worried families came to rely on newspapers for casualty lists. By the end of the 19th century, after a period of slow yet steady growth, the newspaper industry was suddenly energized by the tactics of two dueling editors, Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst. The two men, engaging in what became known as Yellow Journalism, fought a circulation war that made newspapers a vital part of everyday American life. As the 20th century dawned, newspapers were read in nearly all American homes, and, without the competition from radio and television, enjoyed a period of great business success. The Partisan Era, 1790s-1830s In the early years of the United States, newspapers tended to have small circulation for several reasons. Printing was slow and tedious, so for technical reasons no one publisher could generate enormous numbers of issues. The price of newspapers tended to exclude many common people. And while Americans tended to be literate, there simply werent the large number of readers that would come later in the century. Despite all that, newspapers were felt to have profound influence on the early years of the federal government. The main reason was that newspapers were often the organs of political factions, with articles and essays essentially making the cases for political action. Some politicians were known to be connected with specific newspapers. For instance, Alexander Hamilton was a founder of the New York Post (which still exists today, after changing ownership and direction many times during more than two centuries). In 1783, eight years before Hamilton founded the Post, Noah Webster, who would later publish the first American dictionary, began publishing the first daily newspaper in New York City, the American Minerva. Websters newspaper was essentially an organ of the Federalist Party. The Minerva only operated for a few years, but it was influential and inspired other newspapers that followed. Up through the 1820s the publication of newspapers generally had some political affiliation. The newspaper was the way politicians communicated with constituents and voters. And while the newspapers carried accounts of newsworthy events, the pages were often filled with letters expressing opinions. Its worth noting that newspapers circulated widely across early America, and it was common for publishers to reprint stories which had been published in distant cities and towns. It was also common for newspapers to publish letters from travelers who had just arrived from Europe and who could relate the foreign news. The highly partisan era of newspapers continued well into the 1820s, when campaigns waged by candidates John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, and Andrew Jackson played out on the pages of newspapers. Vicious attacks, such as in the controversial elections of 1824 and 1828, were carried in newspapers which were essentially controlled by candidates. The Rise of City Newspapers, 1830s-1850s In the 1830s newspapers transformed into publications devoted more to news of current events than outright partisanship. As printing technology allowed faster printing, newspapers could expand beyond the traditional four-page folio. And to fill the newer eight-page newspapers, content expanded beyond letters from travelers and political essays to more reporting (and the hiring of writers whose job was to go about the city and report on the news). A major innovation of the 1830s was simply lowering the price of a newspaper: when most daily newspapers cost a few cents, working people and especially new immigrants tended not to buy them. But an enterprising New York City printer, Benjamin Day, began publishing a newspaper, The Sun, for a penny. Suddenly anyone could afford a newspaper, and reading the paper every morning became a routine in many parts of America. And the newspaper industry got a huge boost from technology when the telegraph began to be used in the mid-1840s. Era of Great Editors, the 1850s Two major editors, Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune, and James Gordon Bennett of the New York Herald, began competing in the 1830s. Both editors were known for strong personalities and controversial opinions, and their newspapers reflected that. At the same time, William Cullen Bryant, who first came to public attention as a poet, was editing the New York Evening Post. In 1851, an editor who had worked for Greeley, Henry J. Raymond, began publishing the New York Times, which was seen as an upstart without any strong political direction.   The 1850s was a critical decade in American history. The split over slavery was about to tear the country apart. And the Whig Party, which had been the breeding ground of editors such as Greeley and Raymond, disintegrated over the slavery issue. The great national debates were, of course, followed close, and also influenced, by powerful editors such as Bennett and Greeley. A rising politician, Abraham Lincoln, recognized the value of newspapers. When he came to New York City to deliver his address at Cooper Union in early 1860, he knew the speech could put him on the road to the White House. And he made sure that his words got into the newspapers, even reportedly visiting the office of the New York Tribune after delivering his speech. The Civil War When the Civil War erupted the newspapers, especially in the North, responded quickly. Writers were hired to follow the Union troops, following a precedent set in the Crimean War by a British citizen considered the first war correspondent, William Howard Russell. The pages of newspapers soon filled up with news from Washington as the government prepared for war. And during the Battle of Bull Run, in the summer of 1861, a number of correspondents accompanied the Union Army. When the battle turned against the federal forces, the newspapermen were among those who hurried back to Washington in a chaotic retreat. As the war continued, the coverage of news became professionalized. Correspondents followed the armies and wrote very detailed accounts of battles which were widely read. For instance, following the Battle of Antietam, the pages of Northern newspapers carried lengthy accounts which often contained vivid details of the fighting. A staple of Civil War era newspapers, and perhaps the most vital public service, was the publication of casualty lists. After every major action newspapers would publish many columns listing the soldiers who had been killed or wounded. In one famous instance, the poet Walt Whitman saw his brothers name on a casualty list published in a New York newspapers following the Battle of Fredericksburg. Whitman hurried to Virginia to find his brother, who turned out to be only slightly wounded. The experience of being in the army camps led Whitman to become a volunteer nurse in Washington, D.C., and to write occasional newspaper dispatches on war news. The Calm Following the Civil War The decades following the Civil War were relatively calm for the newspaper business. The great editors of earlier eras, Greeley, Bennett, Bryant, and Raymond passed away. The new crop of editors tended to be very professional, but they did not generate the fireworks that earlier newspaper reader had come to expect. Technological changes, especially the Linotype machine, meant that newspapers could publish larger editions with more pages. The popularity of athletics in the late 1800s meant newspapers began having pages devoted to sports coverage. And the laying of undersea telegraph cables meant that news from very distant places could be seen by newspaper readers with shocking speed. For instance, when the distant volcanic island of Krakatoa exploded in 1883, news traveled by undersea cable to the Asian mainland, then to Europe, and then via transatlantic cable to New York City. Readers of New Yorks newspapers were seeing reports of the massive disaster with a day, and even more detailed reports of the devastation appeared in the following days. The Arrival of the Linotype Ottmar Mergenthaler was the German-born inventor of the linotype, an innovative printing system that revolutionized the newspaper industry in the late 19th century. Before Mergenthalers invention, printers had to set type one character at a time in a laborious and time-consuming process. The linotype, so called because it set a line of type at once, greatly sped up the printing process. Though Mergenthalers mechanical genius greatly changed 19th century newspapers, he had a number of problems in business. Within a few years of linotype machines becoming standard equipment at major American newspapers, Mergenthaler resigned from the company that made them. Though he was ultimately embittered, there is no doubt that his innovative technology changed the news business. Before the linotype, daily newspapers were restricted in how many changes they could make if they published more than one edition in a day. And simply because of the labor intensive nature of setting type, daily newspapers seldom extended beyond eight pages. Mergenthalers machine made multiple editions easier to routinely produce editions of 12 or 16 pages. With extra space available in daily editions, innovative publishers could pack their papers with large amounts of news which previously may have gone unreported. The Great Circulation Wars In the late 1880s the newspaper business received a jolt when Joseph Pulitzer, who had been publishing a successful newspaper in St. Louis, bought a paper in New York City. Pulitzer suddenly transformed the news business by focusing on news that he thought would appeal to common people. Crime stories and other sensational subjects were the focus of his New York World. And vivid headlines, written by a staff of specialized editors, pulled in readers. Pulitzers newspaper was a great success in New York. And in the mid-1890s he suddenly got a competitor when William Randolph Hearst, who had spent money from his familys mining fortune on a San Francisco newspaper a few years earlier, moved to New York City and bought the New York Journal. A spectacular circulation war broke out between Pulitzer and Hearst. There had been competitive publishers before, of course, but nothing like this. The sensationalism of the competition became known as Yellow Journalism. The high point of Yellow Journalism became the headlines and exaggerated stories which encouraged the American public to support the Spanish-American War. At Centurys End As the 19th century ended, the newspaper business had grown enormously since the days when one-man newspapers printed hundreds, or at most thousands, of issues. Americans became a nation addicted to newspapers, and in the era before broadcast journalism, newspapers were a considerable force in public life.

Meanings of Santo in Spanish

Meanings of Santo in Spanish Catholicism has always been the dominant religion in countries where Spanish is dominant. So it shouldnt come as any surprise that some words related to the religion have come to have broad meanings. One such word is santo, which is most commonly translated as saint as a noun, holy as an adjective. (Like the English words saint and sanctify, santo comes from the Latin word sanctus, meaning holy.) According to the Diccionario de la lengua espaà ±ola, santo has no less than 16 meanings. Among them: Perfect and free of sin.A person declared as such by the Church.A virtuous person.Said of something that is dedicated to God or a holy service.Said of something that is generated.Describing a religious festival.Sacred.Holy.Said of something that brings good luck.Characteristic of the Catholic church.A persons saints day or name day.A spouse.A picture of a saint.A type of portrait in a book. In many cases, holy is a good translation of santo  as an adjective, even when it isnt to be understood literally. For example, No sabà ­amos que estbamos en suelo santo could be translated as We didnt know we were on holy ground. Santo also is used in a variety of idioms and phrases. Here are some of them:  ¿A santo de quà ©?: Why in the world?Llegar y besar el santo: to succeed at something immediately or on the first try. (Su sustituto, Juanjo, llegà ³ y besà ³ el santo: gol en su primer partido. His substitute, Juanjo, pulled it off right away: a goal in the first period.)Campo santo: cemetery.Espà ­ritu Santo: Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost.Guerra santa: holy war.Hierba santa or hoja santa: a type of tropical herb.Hora santa: prayer is given before the Eucharist, or in commemoration of the suffering of Jesus.Hueso de santo: a type of almond pastry in the shape of a bone.Lengua santa: the Hebrew language.Mano de santo: fast and complete cure for an ailment or problem.Quedarse para vestir santos: to remain unmarried (said of a woman).Santa Faz: an image of the face of Jesus.Santa Sede: Holy See.Santo de cara: good luck. (Cierto es que no todo el mundo tiene el santo de cara. Its certain that not everyone has good luck.)Santo de espaldas: bad luck. (Los habitantes de El à dolo descri ben a 1998 con una frase: Tuvimos al santo de espaldas. The residents of El Idolo describe 1998 with the phrase: We had bad luck.) Santo de pajares: a person whose sainthood cant be trusted.Santo y seà ±a: military password.Semana Santa: Holy Week (the week preceding Easter, including Good Friday).Tierra Santa: Holy Land. Santo can function as either a noun or adjective. As such it is frequently used in additional forms santa, santos and santas. Of course, Santo and its variations also have been used as a title of sorts before the names of Saints: San Josà © (St. Joseph), Santa Teresa (St. Teresa). Sample Sentences Showing Uses of Santo Jerusalà ©n, Santiago de Compostela y Roma son las principales ciudades santas del cristianismo. (Jerusalem, Santiago de Compostela, and Rome are the main holy cities of Christianity.) El Estado Islmico instà ³ a los musulmanes a lanzar una guerra santa contra los rusos y los estadounidenses. (The Islamic State urged Muslims to launch a holy war against the Russians and the Americans.) Mi santo y yo somos incompatibles en gustos cinematogrficos. My husband and I are incompatible in which movies we like. El Jueves Santo es el momento central de la Semana Santa y del aà ±o lità ºrgico. Maundy Thursday is the climax of Holy Week and of the liturgical year. El jazz no es santo de mi devocià ³n. Jazz isnt my cup of tea.

Brief Biography of Sharpshooter Annie Oakley

Brief Biography of Sharpshooter Annie Oakley Blessed with a natural talent for sharp-shooting, Annie Oakley proved herself dominant in a sport that was long considered a mans domain. Oakley was a gifted entertainer as well; her performances with Buffalo Bill Codys Wild West Show brought international fame, making her one of the most celebrated female performers of her time. Annie Oakleys unique and adventurous life has inspired numerous books and films as well as a popular musical. Annie Oakley was born Phoebe Ann Moses on August 13, 1860 in rural Darke County, Ohio, the fifth daughter of Jacob and Susan Moses. The Moses family had moved to Ohio from Pennsylvania after their business- a small inn- had burned to the ground in 1855. The family lived in a one-room log cabin, surviving on game they caught and crops they grew. Another daughter and a son were born after Phoebe. Annie, as Phoebe was called, was a tomboy who preferred spending time outdoors with her father over household chores and playing with dolls. When Annie was only five, her father died of pneumonia after being caught in a blizzard. Susan Moses struggled to keep her family fed. Annie supplemented their food supply with squirrels and birds that she trapped. At the age of eight, Annie began sneaking out with her fathers old rifle to practice shooting in the woods. She quickly became skilled at killing prey with one shot. By the time Annie was ten, her mother could no longer support the children. Some were sent to neighbors farms; Annie was sent to work at the county poor house. Soon afterward, a family hired her as live-in help in exchange for wages as well as room and board. But the family, who Annie later described as wolves, treated Annie as a slave. They refused to pay her wages and beat her, leaving scars on her back for life. After nearly two years, Annie was able to escape to the nearest train station. A generous stranger paid her train fare home. Annie was reunited with her mother, but only briefly. Because of her dire financial situation, Susan Moses was forced to send Annie back to the county poor house. Making a Living Annie worked at the county poor house for three more years; she then returned to her mothers home at the age of 15. Annie could now resume her favorite pastime- hunting. Some of the game she shot was used to feed her family, but the surplus was sold to general stores and restaurants. Many customers specifically requested Annie’s game because she shot so cleanly (through the head), which eliminated the problem of having to clean buckshot out of the meat. With money coming in regularly, Annie helped her mother pay off the mortgage on their house. For the rest of her life, Annie Oakley made her living with a gun. By the 1870s, target shooting had become a popular sport in the United States. Spectators attended competitions in which shooters fired at live birds, glass balls, or clay disks. Trick shooting, also popular, was usually performed in theaters and involved the risky practice of shooting items out of a colleagues hand or off the top of their head. In rural areas such as where Annie lived, game-shooting competitions were a common form of entertainment. Annie participated in some local turkey shoots but was eventually banned because she always won. Annie entered a pigeon-shooting match in 1881 against a single opponent, unaware that soon her life would change forever. Butler and Oakley Annies opponent in the match was Frank Butler, a sharp-shooter in the circus. He made the 80-mile trek from Cincinnati to rural Greenville, Ohio in the hopes of winning the $100 prize. Frank had been told only that he would be up against a local crack shot. Assuming that his competitor would be a farm boy, Frank was shocked to see the petite, attractive 20-year old Annie Moses. He was even more surprised that she beat him in the match. Frank, ten years older than Annie, was captivated by the quiet young woman. He returned to his tour and the two corresponded by mail for several months. They were married sometime in 1882, but the exact date has never been verified. Once married, Annie traveled with Frank on tour. One evening, Franks partner became ill and Annie took over for him at an indoor theater shoot. The audience loved watching the five-foot-tall woman who easily and expertly handled a heavy rifle. Annie and Frank became partners on the touring circuit, billed as Butler and Oakley. It is not known why Annie picked the name Oakley; possibly it came from the name of a neighborhood in Cincinnati. Annie Meets Sitting Bull Following a performance in St. Paul, Minnesota in March 1894, Annie met Sitting Bull who had been in the audience. The Lakota Sioux Indian chief was infamous as the warrior who had led his men into battle at Little Bighorn at Custers Last Stand in 1876. Although officially a prisoner of the U.S. government, Sitting Bull was allowed to travel and make appearances for money. Once reviled as a savage, he had become the object of fascination. Sitting Bull was impressed by Annies shooting skills, which included shooting the cork off a bottle and hitting the cigar her husband held in his mouth. When the chief met Annie, he reportedly asked if he could adopt her as his daughter. The adoption was not official, but the two became lifelong friends. It was Sitting Bull who bestowed upon Annie the Lakota name Watanya Cicilia, or Little Sure Shot. Buffalo Bill Cody and The Wild West Show In December 1884, Annie and Frank traveled with the circus to New Orleans. An unusually rainy winter forced the circus to close down until summer, leaving Annie and Frank in need of jobs. They approached Buffalo Bill Cody, whose Wild West Show (a combination of rodeo acts and western skits) was also in town. At first, Cody turned them down because he already had several shooting acts and most of them were more famous than Oakley and Butler. In March of 1885, Cody decided to give Annie a chance after his star shooter, world champion Adam Bogardus, quit the show. Cody would hire Annie on a trial basis following an audition in Louisville, Kentucky. Codys business manager arrived early at the park where Annie was practicing prior to the audition. He watched her from afar and was so impressed, he signed her on even before Cody showed up. Annie soon became a featured performer in a solo act. Frank, well aware that Annie was the star in the family, stepped aside and took on a managerial role in her career. Annie dazzled the audience, shooting with speed and precision at moving targets, often while riding a horse. For one of her most impressive stunts, Annie fired backward over her shoulder, using only a table knife to view the reflection of her target. In what became a trademark move, Annie skipped offstage at the end of each performance, ending with a little kick in the air. In 1885, Annies friend Sitting Bull joined the Wild West Show. He would stay one year. The Wild West Tours England In spring of 1887, the Wild West performers- along with horses, buffalo, and elk- set sail for London, England to participate in the celebration of Queen Victorias Golden Jubilee (the fiftieth anniversary of her coronation). The show was immensely popular, prompting even the reclusive queen to attend a special performance. Over a six-month period, the Wild West Show drew more than 2.5 million people to the London appearance alone; thousands more attended in cities outside of London. Annie was adored by the British public, who found her modest demeanor charming. She was showered with gifts- and even proposals- and was the guest of honor at parties and balls. True to her homespun values, Annie refused to wear ball gowns, preferring instead her homemade dresses. Leaving the Show In the meantime, Annies relationship with Cody was becoming increasingly strained, in part because Cody had hired Lillian Smith, a teenaged female sharpshooter. Without giving any explanation, Frank and Annie quit the Wild West Show and returned to New York in December 1887. Annie made a living by competing in shooting competitions, then later joined a newly-formed wild west show, the Pawnee Bill Show. The show was a scaled-down version of Codys show, but Frank and Annie werent happy there. They negotiated a deal with Cody to return to the Wild West Show, which no longer included Annies rival Lillian Smith. Cody’s show returned to Europe in 1889, this time for a three-year tour of France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. During this trip, Annie was troubled by the poverty she saw in each country. It was the beginning of her lifelong commitment to donating money to charities and orphanages. Settling Down After years of living out of trunks, Frank and Annie were ready to settle down in a real home during the shows off-season (November through mid-March). They built a house in Nutley, New Jersey and moved into it in December 1893. The couple never had children, but it is unknown whether or not this was by choice. During the winter months, Frank and Annie took vacations in the southern states, where they usually did a lot of hunting. In 1894 Annie was invited by inventor Thomas Edison of nearby West Orange, New Jersey, to be filmed on his new invention, the kinetoscope (a forerunner of the movie camera). The brief film shows Annie Oakley expertly shooting out glass balls mounted on a board, then hitting coins thrown up in the air by her husband. In October 1901, as the Wild West train cars traveled through rural Virginia, troupe members were awakened by a sudden, violent crash. Their train had been hit head-on by another train. Miraculously, none of the people were killed, but about 100 of the shows horses died on impact. Annies hair turned white following the accident, reportedly from the shock. Annie and Frank decided it was time to leave the show. Scandal for Annie Oakley Annie and Frank found work after leaving the Wild West show. Annie, sporting a brown wig to cover her white hair, starred in a play written just for her. The Western Girl played in New Jersey and was well-received but never made it to Broadway. Frank became a salesman for an ammunition company. They were content in their new lives. Everything changed on August 11, 1903, when the Chicago Examiner printed a scandalous story about Annie. According to the story, Annie Oakley had been arrested for stealing to support a cocaine habit. Within days, the story had spread to other newspapers around the country. It was, in fact, a case of mistaken identity. The woman arrested was a performer who had gone by the stage name Any Oakley in a burlesque Wild West show. Anyone familiar with the real Annie Oakley knew that the stories were false, but Annie couldnt let it go. Her reputation had been tarnished. Annie demanded that each and every newspaper print a retraction; some of them did. But that wasnt enough. For the next six years, Annie testified at one trial after another as she sued 55 newspapers for libel. In the end, she won about $800,000, less than she had paid in legal expenses. The entire experience aged Annie greatly, but she felt vindicated. Final Years Annie and Frank kept busy, traveling together to advertise for Franks employer, a cartridge company. Annie participated in exhibitions and shooting tournaments and received offers to join several western shows. She re-entered show business in 1911, joining the Young Buffalo Wild West Show. Even in her 50s, Annie could still draw a crowd. She finally retired from show business for good in 1913. Annie and Frank bought a house in Maryland and spent winters in Pinehurst, North Carolina, where Annie gave free shooting lessons to local women. She also donated her time to raising funds for various charities and hospitals. In November 1922, Annie and Frank were involved in a car accident in which the car flipped over, landing on Annie and fracturing her hip and ankle. She never fully recovered from her injuries, which compelled her to use a cane and a leg brace. In 1924, Annie was diagnosed with pernicious anemia and became increasingly weak and frail. She died on November 3, 1926, at the age of 66. Some have suggested that Annie died from lead poisoning after years of handling lead bullets. Frank Butler, who had also been in poor health, died 18 days later.

Why the Rich Are Getting Richer and the Poor Poorer Research Paper

Why the Rich Are Getting Richer and the Poor Poorer - Research Paper Example This research will begin with the statement that in the olden days, there were rich and there were poor, in the modern world we see people have different classes like rich and poor. But today the majority of the human race is facing a difficult time. This paper illustrates that the main reason of the difficulty is created by the man himself. Then we must have known what makes the two classes different from each other. Technology, homes, cars, etc are the dependable and viable commodities that are responsible to alter the class of a person. However, today, it is a commonly known fact that it is impossible for the poor to make steps towards changing their class, middle-class people are having difficulty in maintaining their economic position and rich are becoming richer. The present research has identified that most of the middle class is associated with the jobs and some researchers have the view that as the middle and lower level management are becoming less in number, more and more middle-class men are becoming jobless, that is becoming a huge reason of the degradation in the living standard of the middle-class persons. The author has rightly presented that the high-level jobs like assistant directors, assistant managers, etc lost them too. The similar case is with the low-level jobs like production jobs, the wages for such employs in underdeveloped to developed countries now a day is much lower as compared to the decline in the value of money. The production jobs are much valuable for the persons who have to work at extreme low wages when they have no job. In 1960, the low level employs are the member of a union that responsible for maintaining wages for the works but at the end of the year 1989 the union has only 17 percent members from the total production workers. The whole scenario has no or little impact on the large technology distributors and manufacturers, like Sony, Toyota, etc. These factories kept to produce the products according to their plans an d routine. Technology is also responsible for making the people poorer and rich richer, as if we consider a motor industry, during 1970, a Japanese based motor company required a time span of 24 hours to produce a vehicle (car) but now a day it takes not more the eight hours to produce a car by utilizing the robots instead of human workers. The robots replace the human workers and the persons who program and run the robots are quite less and no other person is thus required to performs the work like that of the robot. The economic condition of the middle class family is lowering day by day as the prices for the little luxuries like fuel, cost of food and medicine are rising, although technology is becoming cheaper but the cost of basic necessities are becoming higher. In this case it has become difficult for a middle class person to afford the luxuries without extra effort. According to sociologists unequal distribution of wealth has become a biggest reason of this sustainability. L ike the high level salaries of superstars, musicians, athletics, management payment and the rapid progress of financial sector etc. The taxes which are taken from high earners are very low and they are earning lot of money and paying a very small amount of tax. The departments which have already mentioned above are becoming rich with the passage of time. In the contrast the middle class people, who are doing common jobs, are giving high amount of tax of their salary as compared to the ratio of elite class.

Chipotle in China Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Chipotle in China - Essay Example Emerging markets like China with more than one billion consumers give the western restaurant chains a great opportunity to expand their foot prints. In this paper, we are going to address the possible negotiation and ethical challenges that the food chain Chipotle is going to face as they start business in China. Chipotle Business Model Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc. runs restaurants in the United States. The company also has international presence through restaurants in Toronto and London. Currently as of the end of 2011, the number of stores stands at 1,230. It also owns one ShopHouse Southeast Asian Kitchen. The company tries to find the best class of ingredients for making great tasting foods. Chipotle has shown very quick growth over the last half decades. The company plans to introduce around 155 to 165 new restaurants in 2012 (Annual Report 2011, 3). Chipotle restaurants’ list of options has only a few items like, ‘burritos, burrito bowls, tacos and salads’. But customers have the liberty to decide from ‘four different meats, two types of beans and a variety of extras such as salsas, guacamole, cheese and lettuce’. So, there are in fact adequate varieties. Chipotle restaurants draw a lot of consumers. So the outlets frequently have lines. But it has been capable to serve more than 300 buyers an hour at some places (Annual Report 2011, 3-4). Chipotle’s cooking techniques are traditional in nature. They marinate and grill meats, hand-cut produce and herbs, make fresh salsa and guacamole, and cook rice in small lots all over the day. The kitchen’s planning more closely is similar to the design of high-end restaurants. Every Chipotle restaurant has a â€Å"restaurant manager, an apprentice manager, one or two hourly service managers, one or two hourly kitchen managers and an average of 20 full and part-time crew members† (Annual Report 2011, 4-5). Certain key ingredients (‘beef, pork, chicken, beans, rice, sour cream, and tortillas’) are purchased from a small number of suppliers. Chipotle does not buy raw materials straight from cultivators or other suppliers. It has selected and endorsed all of the suppliers from whom ingredients are purchased. Chipotle owns and operates 22 regional distribution centers. The necessary commodities are sent to the restaurants from these distribution centers (Annual Report 2011, 6). Chipotle’s profitability varies from quarter to quarter due to seasonal factors. The average restaurant sales and profits touch the bottom in the first and fourth quarters. The biggest challenges for Chipotle are staffing new restaurants and finding sites for new restaurant (Annual Report 2011, 6-8). Recently the news has emerged that Chipotle may include some Asian cuisine into their menu. It intends to do so through ShopHouse Southeast Asian Kitchen. The cuisine will include not just Chinese or Japanese, but also Thai, Malaysian and Vietnamese (Steinmetz). Chain Restaurants Industry in China and Chipotle The Chinese consumer food services market has grown from US$133.6 billion in 2004 to US$ 294.4 billion in 2009. As a result the market has grown at a CAGR of 12.5% over the five year period. The market is expected to grow to $449.3 billion in 2014. The factors effecting this growth are strong economic growth of China with rapid urbanization and increasing disposable income that changed lifestyle and consumption patterns. There is a general tendency among the urban population that they tend to spend time at work and in social activities. So they save time by avoiding the meal preparation task (My Decker Capital, 3). The fast food market is a very important segment of the consumer food market. This segment has grown to a US$69.4 billion market in 2009 and is expected to grow to US$113.1 billion in 2014. The growth of the fast food industry is mainly driven by the increasing working population. The key characteristic of the fast food service restaurants are their low cost. This factor also serves as a key competitive advantage (My Decker Capita

Hasbro Inc. Marketing Plan for new Service Research Proposal

Hasbro Inc. Marketing Plan for new Service - Research Proposal Example In order for the services to be rolled out successfully, it is imperative that a market research be conducted to establish the marketing plan of the services. Hasbro relies on the 7 Ps of marketing to reduce the customer gap and increase customer satisfaction. In this paper, the main competitors, current and future, the marketing mix plan, the customer expectations and explicit recommendations are prominent. Hasbro is one of the largest toy and games manufacturers in the world. Over the past three decades the toy and games industry has experienced increased competition which has necessitated the industry players to diversify their products in order to survive the cut-throat competition and stay relevant (Betz, 2014). Hasbro has been on the forefront in diversification, both vertical and horizontal. Rapid diversification has enabled Hasbro to shrug off competition from other toy manufacturers and increase its market share in the US market. Currently, it is the second largest toy manufacturer in the US after Mattel in terms of revenues and number of employees (Naylor, 2014). Hasbro has, for instance, produced many internationally recognized brands such as G. I. Joe, the Transformers and many Marvel toys. It is also renowned for its board games like Monopoly and Scrabble and a host of video games too. Of late, Hasbro has been producing films, adding it to its ever widening portfolio. The f ilms are both live action and animated. In line with the diversification policies, Hasbro has decided to include service provision in its portfolio. The services will involve setting up game rental kiosks for rental services and party planning services. This paper investigates then proposes a viable marketing plan for the new services the enterprise plans to introduce. The paper conducts a SWOT analysis of the company, compares it against its present and future competitors, explores the service programs to be rolled out and, lastly, explicates the

Homeless Veterans Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Homeless Veterans - Essay Example To save the veteran homelessness, everybody has to join hands. Being in the army is no easy job, and everybody of us knows the implications of such a dangerous profession. Dealing with stressful situations on the battle field and experiencing one of the worst kinds of human slaughter, the thought of war brings with it grisly images for the veterans even when they have returned home. Almost every one of the army men faces extreme depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) once their numbness begins to lift. For some war veterans it has even taken a decade before the effects of the war have emerged plunging them into complete darkness. This is helped by little or no support from the government which even though has made independent organizations such as the U.S. Department of the Veteran Affairs (VA) but no real improvements can be observed on ground. This fact is further supported by the figures given by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that on a single n ight in the United States at least 62,619 war veterans are homeless and living on streets or in shelters (National Coalition for Homeless Veterans). Another 1.4 million veterans are suspected on the verge of homelessness due to various reasons. Is that how we return our services to people who had once served us? If the issue of fixing homelessness for war veterans is not treated as a grave emergency, things can be safely assumed as getting out of control. Though the VA argues on successfully providing shelter, medication and other services to the war veterans, which is even true to some extent, but the number of veterans still homeless indicates huge loopholes. Once the US troops in Afghanistan start returning home, will they as well be welcomed by similar homelessness? Taken the fact that the VA could not get the 62,619 war veterans off the road, little hope can we have for the 63,000 troops. The matter to address veteran homelessness is also barred by political circumstances. Some of the confidential Pentagon reports have suggested that the United States has no intention of evacuating all of its troops from Afghanistan as soon as 2014; it intends to stay much longer. However, even if we expect a fourth section of soldiers from our army, they easily exceed the number that is already homeless. Thus solutions covering a much wider ground are needed to not just home the existing war veterans but any of the future ones as well. To reduce veteran homelessness an array of measures will have to be taken. An organization or two supported by another few cannot alone fight the consequences of such a grave matter. Veterans do not just need shelter but immense psychological and physical support, taken their horrendous experiences at the battlefield. Most of these men have faced extremely unpleasant situations – after all a war has nothing pleasant to it – and as a result they are at a very high risk of developing psychological disorders. Though people argue that families should be responsible for the health of the veterans once they return, they fail to recognize the fact that many of these ex-soldiers have severed ties with their families after the long time-period spent abroad. We have clear evidences of wives leaving their veteran husbands for other guys since their husbands could not provide for them. As veterans find it difficult to acquire jobs after their services in the army,

Derrick Bell - the Founder of Critical Race Theory Case Study

Derrick Bell - the Founder of Critical Race Theory - Case Study Example The objective of this paper is to extensively examine the life and revolutionary work of Derrick Bell. Derrick had success at law school just like a number of his white colleagues at a time when a race was still a fundamental issue in the United States. Still, he was not able to find a job at any of those big firms in the country due to his race. This never deterred derrick who immediately embarked on a different path. This formed the commencement of a life of service to people who underwent tough social times due to their lives as minority groups and for those who believed in liberty and social justice (Bell 1). Years down the line, beneficiaries of this path that he took today are countless and continue to enjoy these liberties in an environment where those who were considered minorities can now prosper (Bell). As one of those who led the way as civil rights lawyers operating on the vanguard of Civil Rights Movement, this exceptional man oversaw more than three hundred school desegregation cases. At this point, he was also working together with the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund. While flourishing in these previous services to the people, he realized his true calling teaching law. Described by many as their mentor and best professor including the current President of America, President Barrack Obama, it is essential also to mention that he was the first Harvard Law School Professor of the African-American origin. In this part of his career, he also made history by renouncing this position in protest of the institution’s resistance to absorb women of colour. He argued that the need for faculty diversity was essential without discrimination of any single group (Dewart 2). He also briefly served at the Oregon Law School that was dominated by white staff. Here, he became the firs t person of colour to hold a deanship position in the history of America. At this institution too, he bowed out of his position after an incident where the institution exhibited reluctance to hire an exceedingly competent Asian-American woman (Dewart 2).  

Homeless Veterans Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Homeless Veterans - Essay Example To save the veteran homelessness, everybody has to join hands. Being in the army is no easy job, and everybody of us knows the implications of such a dangerous profession. Dealing with stressful situations on the battle field and experiencing one of the worst kinds of human slaughter, the thought of war brings with it grisly images for the veterans even when they have returned home. Almost every one of the army men faces extreme depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) once their numbness begins to lift. For some war veterans it has even taken a decade before the effects of the war have emerged plunging them into complete darkness. This is helped by little or no support from the government which even though has made independent organizations such as the U.S. Department of the Veteran Affairs (VA) but no real improvements can be observed on ground. This fact is further supported by the figures given by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that on a single n ight in the United States at least 62,619 war veterans are homeless and living on streets or in shelters (National Coalition for Homeless Veterans). Another 1.4 million veterans are suspected on the verge of homelessness due to various reasons. Is that how we return our services to people who had once served us? If the issue of fixing homelessness for war veterans is not treated as a grave emergency, things can be safely assumed as getting out of control. Though the VA argues on successfully providing shelter, medication and other services to the war veterans, which is even true to some extent, but the number of veterans still homeless indicates huge loopholes. Once the US troops in Afghanistan start returning home, will they as well be welcomed by similar homelessness? Taken the fact that the VA could not get the 62,619 war veterans off the road, little hope can we have for the 63,000 troops. The matter to address veteran homelessness is also barred by political circumstances. Some of the confidential Pentagon reports have suggested that the United States has no intention of evacuating all of its troops from Afghanistan as soon as 2014; it intends to stay much longer. However, even if we expect a fourth section of soldiers from our army, they easily exceed the number that is already homeless. Thus solutions covering a much wider ground are needed to not just home the existing war veterans but any of the future ones as well. To reduce veteran homelessness an array of measures will have to be taken. An organization or two supported by another few cannot alone fight the consequences of such a grave matter. Veterans do not just need shelter but immense psychological and physical support, taken their horrendous experiences at the battlefield. Most of these men have faced extremely unpleasant situations – after all a war has nothing pleasant to it – and as a result they are at a very high risk of developing psychological disorders. Though people argue that families should be responsible for the health of the veterans once they return, they fail to recognize the fact that many of these ex-soldiers have severed ties with their families after the long time-period spent abroad. We have clear evidences of wives leaving their veteran husbands for other guys since their husbands could not provide for them. As veterans find it difficult to acquire jobs after their services in the army,

Adverse Occurrence Root Cause Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Adverse Occurrence Root Cause Analysis - Essay Example At the same time, it communicates the lessons learned from the problem solving activities (Decision Systems, 2012). REASON integrates the need to perform RCA on both sentinel events and the routine analysis of everyday counter-quality problems for ongoing activities. This cuts down on the amount of time needed for  scheduling, required number of personnel as well as training (Decision Systems, 2012). It does this by providing a scalable process that matches the analysis time and effort to the weight of the crisis. They are summarized as REASON  FrontLine  for small issues, REASON  Express  for significant issues, and REASON  Pro  for serious and sentinel event issues (Decision Systems, 2012). These steps are simplified further by a wizard that asks the attendant to name the problem, the causes, and a business process that will rectify it.   This will focus on describing what is seen happening. It will lay down the symptoms observed in the patient. The problem is defined factually including the qualitative and quantitative properties of the dangerous outcomes. It additionally includes detailing the nature, the degree, the locations, and the timings of the occurrence. This stage will avail proof of existence of the problem. It will also specify the period the problem has existed up to the final crisis, including the impact it has had on the patient. For each behavior, situation, action, or inaction it will be specified what should have been and how it differs from the actual one observed (Andersen & Fagerhaug, 2006). The best suited tool here is the CATWOE. It involves using different perspectives to view the same situation. In it are the customers (patients), the actors who implement the solutions, the transformation process which is affected, and the world’s view, the owner of the process and finally environmental limitations (Hardy, 2010). This stage examines the sequence of events that led to the problem, and

Martin Luther King Memorial in Yerba Buena Gardens Essay Example for Free

Martin Luther King Memorial in Yerba Buena Gardens Essay Situated on the corner of 4th St. and Mission St., in downtown San Francisco is Yerba Buena Gardens. Sounds from the hustle and bustle of cars driving and people walking permeate Yerba Buena Gardens, except in one particular location. In one corner of the gardens stands a Martin Luther King Jr. memorial. The memorial is breathtakingly beautiful with a fifty foot high and twenty foot wide waterfall that falls over Sierra granite. In the Memorial’s hallway, visitors read quotes from Dr. King himself that are engraved on glass panels and set in granite. The physical beauty of the memorial is undeniable, however many people are not aware of the symbolism lying beneath the memorial’s surface. The memorial’s waterfall symbolizes the realization of Dr. King’s dreams the realization of Dr. Kings dream, the tears shed by millions and of the voices of African Americas The memorial also reminds us of the oppressed African Americans whose voices were drowned out ignored; yet, it is apparent that society was pushed backwards in the race to equality with the mandatory evacuation of thousands of people due to the development of the Yerba Buena Gardens. King Jr. dreamt that all human beings, regardless of skin color, will one day be able to live in a completely free, just, and non-discriminatory society. It was his dream of an equal society that pushed Martin Luther King Jr. to become an advocate for universal suffrage. Even though the United States already had universal suffrage, unfair literacy tests and poll taxes plagued the voting process and disqualified nearly all impoverished African Americans from voting 1. King wanted a colorblind society; a society where all human beings are treated equally and respectfully and given the same personal liberties and political freedom. Martin Luther King argued, in his â€Å"I Have a Dream† speech, that â€Å"we are not satisfied until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream† 2. This quote from Dr. King’s speech is inscribed on the right end wall of the memorial. After reading the final inscribed quote, it is apparent that the purpose of the waterfall is to signify the realization of Martin Luther King’s dream of a just society. Justice , The United States Martin Luther King’s dream of justice in today’s society; a monumental victory of justice over prejudice. It is so easy to forget about what it took for America to become a truly free and nondiscriminatory nation. The mists are a necessary reminder for people in today’s society that personal liberty and political freedom should never be taken for granted. Though Yerba Buena Gardens is situated in downtown San Francisco, a busy city filled with loud noises, the memorial itself is peculiarly quiet and calm. The memorial’s serenity is due to the overpowering, yet surprisingly tranquil sound of the rushing water from the waterfall. The power of the waterfall to drown out all exterior noise is phenomenal. It is impossible to even hear what someone is saying when they are right next to you. Visitors try to overcome the sound of the rushing water by screaming or whistling, but are unsuccessful. Independent from life’s distractions, visitors are given the opportunity to absorb all that the memorial and Dr. King’s words have to offer. Visitors can take this time to self-reflect and to appreciate the efforts of earlier generations fighting for equality during our nation’s infancy. The undeniable strength of the waterfall’s sound to obscure all external noise makes Being incapable of expressing feelings or thou ghts leaves an unfamiliar and dreadful sensation. People living in today’s society are usually ignorant to this unfamiliar, almost claustrophobic feeling of screaming at the top of your lungs without a single person acknowledging your frustrations. During our nation’s history, however, nearly all African Americans struggled with this same frustration. Helpless against the white minority, blacks throughout history struggled to get their concerns addressed and their votes counted. The visitor’s inability to communicate vocally is short-lived and fortunately, only lasts as long as it takes for the person to walk through the memorial. African Americans, however, were plagued with powerlessness for hundreds of years. Martin Luther King Jr. felt obliged to provide a voice for all African Americans stripped of the right to do so on their own. Due to the hard work of Martin Luther King, civil rights leaders and activists, and President Johnson, on August 6, 1965 the Voting Rights Act was signed into law, which banned the use of literacy tests and also required stricter monitoring of the use of poll taxes in state and local elections† 3. Finally, the time had come when African Americans could voice their opinions and have them be heard, and vote for the political constituent whom carried similar beliefs and morals. The development of the Yerba Buena Gardens, as part of the â€Å"Urban Renewal Project† was not always considered to be something positive and beneficial. During the 1950’s, city planners forced thousands of people living in the South of Market area out of their homes, arguing that the area was â€Å"dangerous ‘Skid Row’ ripe for redevelopment, populated by â€Å"bums† and â€Å"transients† whose fate mattered little† 4. City planners left out the important fact that many people who lived in this area were elderly and poor and had â€Å"little defense against the federal bulldozer† 5. The city did try and relocate as many people as possible, but only had 276 units of new housing to replace thousands of demolished units. Thousands were left homeless and kicked out of possibly the only home they have ever known and will ever know, due to lack of job skills needed to find employment. The irony of placing a Martin Luther King Jr. memorial, a man who advocated for equality and justice until his assassination, on land where thousands of impoverished people were evicted just a couple years earli er, is almost too horrific to comprehend. The hypocrisy in the decision to place this memorial at the Yerba Buena Gardens is undeniable and unforgiveable. The memorial’s waterfall is a reminder of the relentless adversity that plagued millions of blacks for thousands of years and the tears they shed. The waterfall also symbolizes the realization of Dr. King’s dream. The eviction methods used during the Urban Renewal period to obtain the land where the memorial sits were ethically questionable, however it is still important to visit this monument from time to time. The memorial stands there in the middle of Yerba Buena Gardens, in the middle of downtown San Francisco, as a silent, yet constant reminder to never take anything for granted and to always remember the blood, sweat, and tears shed by millions in order for people today to enjoy and exercise the complete personal liberty and political freedom that we are so fortunately blessed with.

Handedness and Lateralization

Handedness and Lateralization Handedness and Lateralization Cortical Organisation and Lateralization Of The Brain In Handedness And Dominance According to Annett most people in our society define handedness as the hand that you use for writing (1970). Researchers define handedness as the hand that performs faster or specifically on physical tests. Paul Broca (1979), suggested that a persons handedness was opposite from that specialised hemisphere (so a right-handed person probably has a left-hemispheric language specialization). However, a majority of left-hemispheric brain specialise for language abilities. Many researchers have try to this correlation between handedness and brain lateralisation. The key reason that hand-brain link is important and is an accepted methodology is that clinicians use handedness as a marker for brain lateralization. Language is a distributed cerebral network with differences in area involvement that relate to specific language functions (Frith et al., 1991). Vital regions in network lateralize to one hemisphere and determine lesion (Ojemann, 1991). In most people this lateralization is to the left. The only consistent information on the variability of hemispheric control between individuals are aphasias following a stroke or hemispheric inactivation by procedure in patients with brain lesions (Wada and Rasmussen, 1960). Pertaining to the unevenness of language control there is a chance of functional hemispheric reform (Rasmussen and Milner, 1977). It assumes that variation from left hemisphere language power is related to a difference like left-handedness. In right-handed subjects there is puzzling correlation of verbal language and hand dominance, both confines to a small area to the left hemisphere (Mayeux and Kandel, 1991). The actual variability of language lateralization in the general popu lation is practically unknown. Evaluations in a representative number of healthy subjects do not exist because, in the past, no technique was available to determine language lateralization effectively and non-invasively. This lack of information has hampered the assessment of language disturbances. There is an ongoing debate on the role of the right hemisphere in recovery from aphasia after left hemispheric strokes (Weiller et al., 1993Go; Heiss et al., 1997Go; Mimura et al., 1998Go). Particularly, in retrospective evaluations it would be important to know how many patients with left hemispheric strokes and transient disturbance of language can be expected to have been right hemisphere language dominant and to have suffered speech impairment due to other, more unspecific causes like decreased vigilance. Moreover, knowledge concerning the exact incidence of right hemisphere language dominance in healthy righthanders would be important for functional neuroimaging studies. Here, due to lack of information, researchers often need to rely on the assumption that restricting examinations to healthy right-handers will control for a possible variability in hemispheric dominance. Recently, a simplified functional imaging technique, functional transcranial Doppler-ultrasonography (fTCD) has become available (Aaslid, 1987Go; Hartje et al., 1994Go; Silvestrini et al., 1994Go; Rihs et al., 1995Go). It allows determination of hemispheric dominance in individual subjects in an effective, reliable and non-invasive way (Deppe et al., 1997Go; Knecht et al., 1998). This technique has now made it possible to establish the variability in the side and degree of language dominance in a representative number of healthy subjects. fTCD measures cerebral perfusion changes related to neuronal activation in a way comparable to functional MRI (fMRI) and 15O-PET (Kuschinsky, 1991Go; Jueptner and Weiller, 1995Go; Deppe et al., 1997Go, 1998Go). fTCD makes it possible to compare perfusion changes (by measuring blood flow velocities) within the territories of the two middle cerebral arteries (MCAs), which comprise the potential language areas (van der Zwan and Hillen, 1991Go). It thus provides an operational index of laterality which, in many respects, resembles the one obtained by the intracarotid amobarbital procedure (Wada test) (Wada and Rasmussen, 1960Go). Determination of language lateralization by fTCD matches precisely both the results of fMRI and the Wada test with concordance in every single case (Deppe et al., 1998Go; Knecht et al., 1998aGo). As in many previous studies of this kind, word generation was chosen as an activation paradigm because it is one of the most effective measures of language production (Neils-Strunjas, 1998Go). On this basis language dominance was determined in a total of 188 healthy subjects. Left-handers were excluded from the study because of possible confounding effects of handedness on hemispheric dominance (Kimura, 1983Go). A careful history for brain damage in the prenatal period or in infancy was taken in order to exclude subjects with possible plastic reorganization of hemispheric dominance after brain lesions (Rasmussen and Milner, 1977Go). The work was part of the Munster functional imaging study on the variability of hemispheric specialization in health and disease (Deppe et al., 1997Go; Knecht et al., 1998aGo, bGo). Hemispheric language dominance was assessed in 188 healthy volunteers with 111 females (mean age 26  ± 5.5 years, range 17-50 years) and 77 males (mean age 27  ± 3.7 years, range 21-40 years). Subjects were excluded if, on a standardized questionnaire, they reported delayed or disturbed language development or a history of other neurological disorders, particularly perinatal asphyxia or kernicterus, head trauma, loss of consciousness, epileptic seizures, meningitis or encephalitis. They were further required to have successfully completed the equivalent of high school (`Realschule or `Gymnasium). Right-handedness was assessed by a handedness index in the Edinburgh Inventory of greater than 30% (Oldfield, 1971Go). Left-handers were excluded from the study, as were right-handers with a score for right-h andedness lower than 30%, because, due to the small number of these subjects, an adequate evaluation of the effect of handedness on language lateralization would not have been possible. Approximately 75% of the subjects recruited had an index of more than 80% right-handedness. All subjects gave informed consent to participate in this study, which was approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of Mà ¼nster. Assessment of hemispheric language dominance was performed by a standardized fTCD technique (used in a number of previous studies) and a word generation task, validated by direct comparison with the intracarotid amobarbital injection and fMRI (Knecht et al., 1996Go, 1997Go, 1998aGo, bGo; Deppe et al., 1997Go, 1998Go). Briefly, subjects were presented with a letter on a computer screen 2.5 s after a cueing tone. Silently they had to find as many words as possible starting with the displayed letter. For fTCD an activation paradigm strongly based on verbal fluency was used, corresponding to the fields of reported female superiority (Basso et al., 1982Go; Pizzamiglio et al., 1985Go). Task performance was controlled by instructing the subjects to report the words after a second auditory signal following 15 s after presentation of the letter. All words had to be reported within a 5-s time period. The next letter was presented in the same way after a relaxation period of 60 s. Letters were presented in random order and no letter was displayed more than once. `Q, `X and `Y were excluded because very few words have these as initial letters. Changes in the cerebral blood flow velocity (CBFV) in the basal arteries were measured as an indicator of the downstream increase of the regional metabolic activity during the language task. Dual fTCD of the MCAs was performed with two 2 MHz transducer probes attached to a headband and placed bilaterally at the temporal skull windows (1Go). Details of the insonation technique, particularly the correct identification of the MCA, have been published elsewhere (Ringelstein et al., 1990Go). The spectral envelope curves of the Doppler signal were analysed off-line with the fTCD software AVERAGE developed by one of the authors (M.D.) (Deppe et al., 1997Go). 1 Schematic diagram of the way language lateralization was determined. Perfusion increases and therefore neuronal activation during word generation were assessed in the vascular territories of the left (marked in red) and right (marked in green) MCAs, which comprise the language areas. This was achieved by fTCD measurements of the CBFV changes in these arteries. Systemic effects were eliminated by calculating the differences in perfusion changes between sides. Averaging the responses over 20 repetitions (on average) in each individual made the results highly reliable. (For details, see Deppe et al., 1997.) After automated artefact rejection, data were integrated over the corresponding cardiac cycles, segmented into epochs which related to the cueing tone and then averaged. The epochs were set to begin 15 s before and to end 35 s after the cueing tone. The mean velocity in the 15-s pre-cueing interval (Vpre.mean) was taken as the base-line value. The relative CBFV changes (dV) during cerebral activation were calculated using the formula: dV = [V(t) Vpre.mean] x 100 / Vpre.mean where V(t) is the CBFV over time. Relative CBFV changes from repeated presentations of letters (on average 20 runs) were averaged time-locked to the cueing tone. The number of repetitions was less than 22, because no letter was presented more than once during the word generation task. A functional TCD laterality index LIfTCDwas calculated using the formula: Statistics The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test was used to assess the hypothesis that laterality indices in males and females were drawn from different populations. Unlike the parametric t-test for independent samples or the Mann-Whitney U test, which tests for differences in the location of two samples (differences in means, differences in average ranks, respectively), the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test is sensitive to differences in the general shapes of the distributions in the two samples, i.e. to differences in dispersion and skewness (Spence et al., 1990Go). The Mann-Whitney test for equivalence (Wellek, 1996Go) was employed to confirm equivalence of laterality indices in men and women. A significant result in this test provides a strong positive measure for a lack of gender differences in laterality indices. We tested the null hypothesis H0: |P[LImale > LIfemale] 1/2| >={varepsilon}versus the alternative hypothesis of equivalence H1: |P[LImale > LIfemale] 1/2| In six of the 194 right-handed subjects determination of language lateralization was not possible due to lack of a temporal bone window, i.e. inadequate ultrasonographic penetration of the skull by the ultrasound beam. In the remaining 188 subjects (59% females, 41% males) the overall distribution of language lateralization was bimodal with 7.5% being right hemisphere and 92.5% left hemisphere language dominant (2Go). The distribution of language lateralization was equivalent in men and women (3Go). The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test did not detect any significant differences between females and males in the overall distribution (P > 0.05). In the subgroup of left hemisphere language dominant subjects, the Mann-Whitney test for equivalence showed equivalence with P The average number of words found during the activation task per letter presented was not statistically different between men and women (Mann-Whitney U test, P = 0.81) or subjects with left or right hemisphere language dominance (Mann-Whitney U test, P = 0.26). It was also independent of the index of lateralization (correlation coefficient r = 0.027). These are the first data on the natural distribution of language dominance in a large series of healthy right-handed subjects. They demonstrate equivalence of language lateralization for word generation in males and females, and they suggest that 1 in 13 healthy right-handed subjects is right hemisphere dominant for language. Methodology There is debate whether language can be treated as a separate mental faculty or should be approached as part of a more general cognitive system (Fodor, 1983Go). Moreover, language comprises receptive and expressive aspects and is intertwined with prosody, memory and attention (Knecht et al., 1996Go; Binder et al., 1997Go). Therefore, the assessment of language lateralization based on a single activation task provides just one index of the interindividual variability in language processing. This approach can nevertheless serve as a first step in elucidating the factors underlying the diversity of large scale neural language organization. fTCD lends itself to determination of hemispheric language dominance. The index of lateralization obtained by fTCD based on word generation is very reliable and closely corresponds to (i) the outcome of the intracarotid amobarbital procedure and (ii) the index of lateralization obtained by fMRI (Deppe et al., 1998Go; Knecht et al., 1998aGo). Other techniques like head turning, event-related potentials, transcranial high frequency magnetic stimulation or the dichotic listening test used for the evaluation of language dominance have so far failed to provide results that are reproducible and in sufficient concordance with the intracarotid amobarbital procedure (Bryden and Allard, 1981Go; Jancke et al., 1992Go; Jennum et al., 1994Go; Segalowitz and Berge, 1995Go; OLeary et al., 1996Go; Hugdahl et al., 1997Go). Unlike the intracarotid amobarbital procedure and as opposed to brain lesions, functional imaging techniques including fTCD assess brain activation and not inactivation. They are set to determine the location and relative amount of the maximal activation while diffuse or bilateral activations are cancelled out. Thus, fTCD is insensitive to a lesser activation in the contralateral hemisphere. Moreover, fTCD cannot determine whether an activated region during a task is a critical region that, when damaged, will result in a loss of that particular function. This shortcoming holds for all functional imaging techniques. However, the fact that determination of language lateralization by fMRI and fTCD correspond closely to that determined by the intracarotid amobarbital inactivation suggests that activated regions match critical regions and therefore provide essential information on the risk for language loss (Desmond et al., 1995Go; Binder et al., 1996Go; Knecht et al., 1998aGo). Sex Fuelled by the general interest in `la petite diffà ©rence, the lack of information about the natural distribution of language dominance has led to far-reaching speculations about possible differences in language lateralizations between the sexes. This discussion has been characterized by a high acceptance for positive results. Thus, despite considerable data to the contrary, there is a strong belief that language in women, on average, is less lateralized than in men (Bakan and Putnam, 1974Go; Levy and Reid, 1976Go; McGlone, 1980Go; McKeever et al., 1983Go; Hough et al., 1994Go; Rugg, 1995Go). The idea of an increased bilaterality in women has received support by a recent fMRI study in 19 males and 19 females (Shaywitz et al., 1995Go) in which activation related to a rhyming task was found to be more bilateral in women than in men. It has been conjectured that an increased bilaterality of language in women would lead to a decreased susceptibility to unilateral infarctions explaining a greater male than female proportion of aphasics (McGlone, 1980Go). Kertesz and Sheppard then showed that aphasias were as frequent in males as in females, as long as sex differences in the incidence of infarcts were taken into account (Kertesz and Sheppard, 1981Go). Similar results were obtained in a more recent epidemiological study (Pedersen et al., 1995Go). Recently, using fMRI, Frost and colleagues found no differences between sexes during a language comprehension task when group averages were compared (Frost et al., 1999Go). Our data provide the first direct evidence that language lateralization during word generation in men and women is also equivalent in variablity. In fact, they not only show a lack of significant differences but they positively demonstrate significance of equivalence in healthy subjects even though this finding is based on a word generation task, i.e. a field of reported female superiority (Kimura and Harshman, 1984Go). Equivalence of hemispheric lateralization between sexes during word generation does not exclude gender di fferences in subfunctions of language like rhyming, which we did not investigate. As was pointed out before, such a difference has been reported by Shaywitz and colleagues in a small series of subjects examined by fMRI (Shaywitz et al., 1995Go). However, in line with our results, these researchers did not find gender differences in other language tasks. Right hemisphere language dominance The predominance of right-handedness and left hemisphere language lateralization has led some theorists to suggest that a gestural system of communication with dominance of the right hand provided the neural architecture for vocal articulation in human evolution (Hewes, 1973Go; Kimura, 1987Go). If indeed handedness and language were coupled because they share the same neural resources, then any deviation from this pattern would have to be pathological. Right hemisphere language dominance in right-handers or left hemisphere language dominance in left-handers reported from the intracarotid amobarbital procedure does not challenge this view, because this procedure is only performed in patients with brain pathology. However, the present findings in healthy subjects indicate that even under natural conditions the association between handedness and language dominance is not an absolute one. Because 75% of subjects were strongly right-handed (>80%) and the remaining had handedness indices o f >30%, the effect of the degree of handedness on language lateralization could not be evaluated in the present study. Comparison of left- and right-handers will be necessary to test whether a relative association between handedness and language dominance exists in healthy subjects. The extreme argument could be put forward that all of our presumed healthy subjects with right hemisphere dominance must have suffered covert brain damage resulting in a shift of language into the right hemisphere. A similar argument has been made to explain left-handedness in healthy subjects (Coren, 1990Go). We believe that covert brain damage was unlikely. The medical history in all subjects was unrevealing and the scholastic achievement was similar. The average number of words produced during the task did not differ between subjects with left or right hemisphere language dominance and the pattern of language lateralization variability was bimodal with maxima for left- and right-hemisphere dominance (2Go). If there had been subclinical damage to language relevant areas in the left hemisphere resulting in a shift to the right, one would have expected impaired word fluency and more cases with little lateralization because of a bilateral representation of language functions. This was not the case. We therefore suggest that right hemisphere language dominance is not a pathological but a natural phenomenon. Previous estimates of `atypical right hemisphere language dominance were either based on the results from the intracarotid amobarbital test in patients evaluated for resective neurosurgery or on the occurrence of `crossed aphasia, i.e. aphasias after right hemispheric lesions. In patients with epilepsy submitted to the intracarotid amobarbital test the number of right-handers with right hemisphere language dominance was 4% in a large series and rose to 12% when a left hemisphere lesion was defined (Rasmussen and Milner, 1977Go). Because the Wada test is only performed in patients with brain lesions, which are often associated with a secondary transfer of cortical functions from the damaged to the intact hemisphere, these numbers cannot be extrapolated to healthy subjects (Helmstaedter et al., 1994Go). By evaluation of stroke-patients with crossed aphasia, the incidence of right hemisphere language dominance in right-handers has been inferred to be between 1 and 2% in the majority of series (Gloning, 1977Go; Borod et al., 1985Go; Kertesz, 1985Go). On the one hand, this low estimate of right hemisphere language dominance in previously healthy subjects made aphasias in right-handers after right-sided lesions seem an exceptional event and has resulted in almost 100 reports on `crossed aphasia in the last 30 years. On the other hand, difficulties in the assessment of language performance due to physical exhaustion and deficits in sustained attention in the early stages after stroke and reorganizational restitution in the later stages may have facilitated an underdiagnosis of aphasia in right hemispheric stroke patients in many studies. Not every patient with a cerebral infarction in the respective language dominant hemisphere will suffer damage of the language areas and become aphasic. The overall rate of aphasia due to stroke has been found to be 38% in the acute state and 18% at discharge from the hospital (Pedersen et al., 1995Go). Reasoning from the effects of brain activation to the effects of brain lesions is problematic but results from activation studies may be conceptually useful to the understanding of lesion-deficit variability in the clinical context (Willmes and Poeck, 1993Go). In a single recent study on 880 stroke patients it was reported, in passing, that of right-handed aphasics 9% had right hemispheric lesions (Pedersen et al., 1995Go). In a study on language deficits in servicemen who had suffered penetrating brain wounds, 18% of the aphasics had suffered right hemispheric lesions (Mohr et al., 1980Go). However, here the possible effects of diffuse brain damage by the impact of a bullet and the effect of variable handedness pose methodological limitations. Our cohort was similar in age to these soldiers. We found an incidence of 7.5% of right hemisphere dominance in our activation study of healthy subjects. This combined evidence suggests that about 1 in 13 previously healthy right-handed patients with a right hemispheric infarction could be at risk of suffering language impairments becaus e this is the hemisphere dominant for word generation. Conversely, after left hemispheric infarctions right-handed patients, who in retrospective evaluations seem to have recovered well from language disturbances, and on fMRI or PET may even show language related activation in the right hemisphere, may do so because they had been right hemisphere language dominant to begin with. Presently, we do not know the relevance of the extent of language lateralization by fTCD. Low indices of lateralization indicate that there is a bihemispheric activation during word generation. Although reported in studies based on the Wada test, bilateral language representation in stroke patients has probably been neglected because persistent aphasia in these subjects may only occur after bilateral damage (Benbadis et al., 1995Go). This is very rare and patients rarely survive. However, subjects with low indices of lateralization may be the ones who, after unilateral damage of traditional language regions, do not show marked aphasia and recover well by further recruitment of the intact hemisphere. Aaslid R. Visually evoked dynamic blood flow response of the human cerebral circulation. Stroke 1987; 18: 771-5.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Bakan P, Putnam W. Right-left discrimination and brain lateralization. Sex differences. Arch Neurol 1974; 30: 334-5.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Basso A, Capitani E, Moraschini S. Sex differences in recovery from aphasia. Cortex 1982; 18: 469-75.[Web of Science][Medline] Benbadis SR, Dinner DS, Chelune GJ, Piedmonte M, Là ¼ders HO. Autonomous versus dependent: a classification of bilateral language representation by intracarotid amobarbital procedure. J Epilepsy 1995; 8: 255-63.[Web of Science] Binder JR, Swanson SJ, Hammeke TA, Morris GL, Mueller WM, Fischer M, et al. Determination of language dominance using functional MRI: a comparison with the Wada test. Neurology 1996; 46: 978-84.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Binder JR, Frost JA, Hammeke TA, Cox RW, Rao SM, Prieto T. Human brain language areas identified by functional magnetic resonance imaging. J Neurosci 1997; 17: 353-62.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Borod JC, Carper M, Naeser M, Goodglass H. Left-handed and right-handed aphasics with left hemisphere lesions compared on nonverbal performance measures. Cortex 1985; 21: 81-90.[Web of Science][Medline] Bryden MD, Allard FA. Do auditory perceptual asymmetries develop? Cortex 1981; 17: 313-8.[Web of Science][Medline] Coren S. Left-handedness in offspring as a function of maternal age at parturition [letter]. N Engl J Med 1990; 322: 1673.[Web of Science][Medline] Deppe M, Knecht S, Henningsen H, Ringelstein E-B. AVERAGE: a Windows program for automated analysis of event related cerebral blood flow. J Neurosci Methods 1997; 75: 147-54.[Web of Science][Medline] Deppe M, Knecht S, Papke K, Fleischer H, Ringelstein EB, Henningsen H. Correlation of cerebral blood flow velocity and regional cerebral blood flow during word generation. Neuroimage 1998; 7(4 Pt 2): S448. Desmond JE, Sum JM, Wagner AD, Demb JB, Shear PK, Glover GH, et al. Functional MRI measurement of language lateralization in Wada-tested patients. Brain 1995; 118: 1411-9.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Fodor JA. The modularity of mind. Cambridge (MA): MIT Press; 1983. Frith CD, Friston KJ, Liddle PF, Frackowiak RS. A PET study of word finding. Neuropsychologia 1991; 29: 1137-48.[Web of Science][Medline] Frost JA, Binder JR, Springer JA, Hammeke TA, Bellgowan PS, Rao SM, et al. Language processing is strongly left lateralized in both sexes. Evidence from functional MRI. Brain 1999; 122: 199-208.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Gloning K. Handedness and aphasia. Neuropsychologia 1977; 15: 355-8.[Web of Science][Medline] Hartje W, Ringelstein EB, Kistinger B, Fabianek D, Willmes K. Transcranial Doppler ultrasonic assessment of middle cerebral artery blood flow velocity changes during verbal and visuospatial cognitive tasks. Neuropsychologia 1994; 32: 1443-52.[Web of Science][Medline] Heiss WD, Karbe H, Weber-Luxenburger G, Herholz K, Kessler J, Pietrzyk U, et al. Speech-induced cerebral metabolic activation reflects recovery from aphasia. J Neurol Sci 1997; 145: 213-7.[Web of Science][Medline] Helmstaedter C, Kurthen M, Linke DB, Elger CE. Right hemisphere restitution of language and memory functions in right hemisphere language-dominant patients with left temporal lobe epilepsy. Brain 1994; 117: 729-37.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Hewes GW. Primate communication and the gestural origin of language. Curr Anthropol 1973; 14: 5-32. Hough MS, Daniel HJ, Snow MA, OBrien KF, Hume WG. Gender differences in laterality patterns for speaking and singing. Neuropsychologia 1994; 32: 1067-78.[Web of Science][Medline] Hugdahl K, Carlsson G, Uvebrant P, Lundervold AJ. Dichotic-listening performance and intracarotid injections of amobarbital in children and adolescents. Arch Neurol 1997; 54: 1494-500.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Jancke L, Steinmetz H, Volkmann J. Dichotic listening: what does it measure? Neuropsychologia 1992; 30: 941-50.[Web of Science][Medline] Jennum P, Friberg L, Fuglsang-Frederiksen A, Dam M. Speech localization using repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation. Neurology 1994; 44: 269-73.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Jueptner M, Weiller C. Review: does measurement of regional cerebral blood flow reflect synaptic activity? Implications for PET and fMRI. Neuroimage 1995; 2: 148-56.[Web of Science][Medline] Kertesz A. Aphasia. In: Vinken PJ, Bruyn GW, Klawans HL, editors. Handbook of clinical neurology, Vol. 45. Amsterdam: Elsevier; 1985. p. 287-331. Kertesz A, Sheppard A. The epidemiology of aphasic and cognitive impairment in stroke: age, sex, aphasia type and laterality differences. Brain 1981; 104: 117-28.[FreeFullText] Kimura D. Speech representation in an unbiased sample of left-handers. Hum Neurobiol 1983; 2: 147-54.[Medline] Kimura D. The origin of human communication. In: Robson J, editor. Origin and evolution of the universe: evidence for design? Montreal: McGill-Queens Press; 1987. p. 227-46. Kimura D, Harshman RA. Sex differences in brain organization for verbal and non-verbal functions. [Review]. Prog Brain Res 1984; 61: 423-41.[Web of Science][Medline] Knecht S, Henningsen H, Deppe M, Huber T, Ebner A, Ringelstein E-B. Successive activation of both cerebral hemispheres during cued word generation. Neuroreport 1996; 7: 820-4.[Web of Science][Medline] Knecht S, Deppe M, Bà ¤cker M, Ringelstein E-B, Henningsen H. Regional cerebral blood flow increases during preparation for and processing of sensory stimuli. Exp Brain Res 1997; 116: 309-14.[Web of Science][Medline] Knecht S, Deppe M, Ebner A, Henningsen H, Huber T, Jokeit H, et al. Noninvasive determination of language lateralization by functional transcranial Doppler sonography: a comparison with the Wada test. Stroke 1998a; 29: 82-6.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Knecht S, Deppe M, Ringelstein E-B, Wirtz M, Lohmann H, Drà ¤ger B, et al. Reproducibility of functional transcranial Doppler sonography in determining hemispheric language lateralization. Stroke 1998b; 29: 1155-9.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Kuschinsky W. Coupling of function, metabolism, and blood flow in the brain. [Review]. Neurosurg Rev 1991; 14: 163-8.[Web of Science][Medline] Levy J, Reid M. Variations in writing posture and cerebral organization. Science 1976; 194: 337-9.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Mayeux R, Kandel ER. Disorders of language: the aphasias. In: Kandel ER, Schwartz JH, Jessell TM, editors. Principle of neural science. 3rd ed. London: Prentice Hall; 1991. p. 839-51. McGlone J. Sex differences in human brain asymmetry: a critical survey. Behav Brain Sci 1980; 5: 215-64. McKeever WF, Seitz KS, Hoff AL, Marino MF, Diehl JA. Interacting sex and familial sinistrality characteristics influence both language lateralization and spatial ability in right handers. Neuropsychologia 1983; 21: 661-8.[Web of Science][Medline] Mimura M, Kato M, Sano Y, Kojima T, Naeser M, Kashima H. Prospective and retrospective studies of recovery in aphasia. Changes in cerebral blood flow and language functions. Brain 1998; 121: 2083-94.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Mohr JP, Weiss GH, Caveness WF, Dillon JD, Kistler JP, Meirowsky AM, et al. Language and motor disorders after penetrating head injury in Vietnam. Neurology 1980; 30: 1273-9.[Abstract/FreeFullText] Neil