Neoplatonism Essay Example For Students

Neoplatonism Essay The Neoplatonic DoctrineAs characterized by Funk and Wagnals, Neoplatonism is a kind of hopeful monism wherein a definitive truth of the universe is held to be an unbounded, mysterious, flawless One. From this one radiates nous (unadulterated insight), whence thusly is determined the world soul, the innovative action of which incites the lesser spirits of individuals. The world soul is considered as a picture of the nous, even as the nous is a picture of the One; both the nous and the world soul, in spite of their separation, are consequently consubstantial with the One. The world soul, be that as it may, on the grounds that it is middle of the road between the nous and the material world, has the alternative both of safeguarding its respectability and imaged flawlessness or of getting through and through erotic and degenerate. A similar decision is available to every one of the lesser spirits. When, through numbness of its actual nature and personality, the human spirit encounters a misguided feeling of separateness and autonomy, it turns out to be pompously self-emphatic and falls into arousing and debased propensities. Salvation for such a spirit is as yet conceivable, the Neoplatonist keeps up, by goodness of the very opportunity of will that empowered it to pick its evil course. The spirit must converse that course, following the other way the progressive strides of its degeneration, until it is again joined with the source of its being. The real get-together is cultivated through a magical involvement with which the spirit knows an all-infestin g happiness. Doctrinally, Neoplatonism is portrayed by an unmitigated resistance between the otherworldly and the fleshly, expounded from Platos dualism of Idea and Matter; by the magical theory of intervening organizations, the nous and the world soul, which transmit the celestial force from the One to the many; by an antipathy for the universe of sense; and by the need of freedom from an existence of sense through a thorough austere control. (Funk and Wagnalls) History of NeoplatonismNeoplatonism started in Alexandra, Egypt, in the third century AD. Plotinus was the author of Neoplatonsim and was conceived in Egypt. He learned at Alexandra with the savant Ammonium Saccus. Alongside 224 others he helped convey the Neoplatonic principle to Rome, where he built up a school. Other significant Neoplatonic masterminds were the Syrian-Greek researchers, Porphyry and Lablichus. The Syrian, Athenian, and Alexandrian SchoolsNeoplatonism was the remainder of the incredible schools of old style agnostic wa y of thinking. Platonism, just as Aristotlism, Stoicism, and Pythagoreanism, all gave a clumsy comprehension of old style Greek agnosticism. It joined way of thinking, magic, and theosophy. For three centuries it filled in as a last bastion of agnostic astuteness and obscure way of thinking in an undeniably threatening Christian commanded empire.The school of Alexandra was not equivalent to the institute under Ammonius. It appears to go back to the late fourth and early fifth hundreds of years, spoke to by the mathematician Theon and his girl Hypatia, who was martyred by a Christian horde under the prompting of the notorious church pioneer Cyril. Abuse appears to have been normal. Hierocles was flagellated by the experts in Constantinople, regardless of the way that his lessons were more monotheistic than those of other agnostic Neoplatonists. It was uniquely with Heimonius and his child Ammonius that an unmistakable progression can be followed at Alexandra. Olympiodorus, the Platon ic reporter, was the last agnostic leader of the school. After his demise it went into Christian hands under the Aristotlean observers Elias and David.The schools last head, Stephanus, moved to and became leader of an institute in Constantinople in 610. In 641 the Arabs caught the Alexandrian school. It subsequently had a significant influence in the transmission of Neoplatonic thought to both the Byzantine and Islamic civic establishments. ConclusionProcluss works applied an extraordinary impact on the following thousand years. They not just shaped one of the scaffolds by which medieval masterminds rediscovered Plato and Aristotle, yet additionally decided logical technique up until the sixteenth century, and through Pseudo-Dionysius offered ascend to and sustained the Christian supernatural quality of the medieval times. In 529, Justinian shut the school of Athens. Damascius, the Aristotlean pundit Simplicius, and five different Neoplatonists set out for Persia, trusting they woul d have the option to educate and proceed there under Chosroes I. Be that as it may, conditions were ominous, and they were permitted to come back to Athens. Neoplatonism was the remainder of the incomparable Hellenistic frameworks of thought to fall. However a considerable amount of it survived in Christian and Islamic structure. In the West, Christian neoplatonism applied a solid impact on theory and philosophy at any rate until the ascent of logical realism in the seventeenth and eighteenth hundreds of years. Neoplatonismhad a significant impact on medieval Christian and Islamic mysterious idea and on Jewish Kabbalah, Renaissance Hermeticism, the Cambridge Platonism of the eighteenth century, and nineteenth century Theosophy.In the more philosophical Islamic circles it is as yet going solid, showing up in progress of present day Islamic logicians such asFritj of Schuon and Sayyed Hossien Nasr.And through Theosophy its follows can be found in the current New Age developments, and t hrough Islam and Sufism (for example advanced journalists like Fritjof Schuon) it advanced into the New Paradigm and transpersonal brain research field. (Neoplatonism) Works CitedAdolph Harnack and John Malcolm Mitchell, Neoplatonism, in Encyclopedia Brittanica, vol XIX, p.376, (Eleventh Edition, 1911); R. T. Wallis, Neoplatonism, p.94Neoplatonism. 18 October 1998. http://www.kheper.auz.com/themes/Neoplatonism/Neoplatonism.htmR. T. Wallis, Neoplatonism (1972); R. Baine Harris, second ed. .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 , .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 .postImageUrl , .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 .focused content zone { min-tallness: 80px; position: relative; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 , .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550:hover , .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550:visited , .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550:active { border:0!important; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 .clearfix:after { content: ; show: table; clear: both; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 { show: square; progress: foundation shading 250ms; webkit-change: foundation shading 250ms; width: 100%; mistiness: 1; change: haziness 250ms; webkit-change: obscurity 250ms; foundation shading: #95A5A6; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550:active , .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550:hover { darkness: 1; change: murkiness 250ms; webkit-progress: haziness 250ms; foundation shading: #2C3E50; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 .focused content region { width: 100%; position: relative; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 .ctaText { outskirt base: 0 strong #fff; shading: #2980B9; text dimension: 16px; textual style weight: intense; edge: 0; cushioning: 0; text-embellishment: underline; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 .postTitle { shading: #FFFFFF; text dimension: 16px; textual style weight: 600; edge: 0; cushioning: 0; width: 100%; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550 .ctaButton { foundation shading: #7F8C8D!important; shading: #2980B9; fringe: none; outskirt sweep: 3px; box-shadow: none; text dimension: 14px; textual style weight: striking; line-stature: 26px; moz-outskirt span: 3px; text-adjust: focus; text-adornment: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-stature: 80px; foundation: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/modules/intelly-related-posts/resources/pictures/basic arrow.png)no-rehash; position: supreme; right: 0; top: 0; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550:hover .ctaButton { foundation shading: #34495E!important; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e 03ac550 .focused content { show: table; stature: 80px; cushioning left: 18px; top: 0; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550-content { show: table-cell; edge: 0; cushioning: 0; cushioning right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-adjust: center; width: 100%; } .u6ef4c5ac53d8b308b60c71f2e03ac550:after { content: ; show: square; clear: both; } READ: Odysseus2 EssayThe Neoplatonic Doctrine. 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Bosnian Refugee Life in America Essay

A huge number of outcasts from Bosnia-Herzegovina have fled to the United States to look for assurance from the ethnoreligious clashes of the district. To best help these families, specialist organizations must comprehend their wartime and relocation encounters and their way of life. The reason for this article is to survey the writing pertinent to working with Bosnian Muslim displaced people just as to comprehend the uruque issues confronting this populace. The authors’ enthusiasm for Bosnian Muslim displaced people is an individual one. Somewhere in the range of 1992 and 2001, almost 3,500 Bosnian displaced people getting away from ethnic purging and war moved to Bowling Green, a little city of 50,000 in rustic southcentral Kentucky. The Bowling Green International Center has been a piece of the neighborhood network since 1979 and effectively works with the United States Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI). For over 25 years, the inside has helped a large number of displaced people of numerous nationalities in their movement to the United States and the nearby network. As indicated by the center’s executive, Marty Deputy, Bosnians make up the biggest level of exiles that have migrated to Bowling Green (individual correspondence, February 3, 2005). Representative likewise demonstrated that while Bosnian outcasts have adjusted well to the nearby network, they despite everything face numerous difficulties in view of their encounters in Bosnia notwithstanding their joining into another culture. One of the issues that keep on frequenting numerous Bosnian displaced people is post-horrible stressâ€a aftereffect of war and slaughter. Post-horrible pressure is especially an issue for the grown-up ladies, who encountered the injury of assault and rape just as seeing the homicide of their youngsters and life partners. As per Deputy (individual correspondence, February 3, 2005), social specialists should move toward Bosnian families and youngsters with social ability. On the off chance that meeting a Bosnian home, for instance, taking off one’s shoes when entering is a presentation of regard and affectability. An eagerness to drink a solid cup of Bosnian espresso is likewise valued. Social specialists likewise should be delicate about non-verbal communication and discourse tone. It is likewise significant not to accept that all Bosnians are similar. Similarly as with all societies, there is gigantic variety in the Bosnian culture, alongside singular contrasts in character and natural encounters. Bosnian Muslim Experiences in the War The 1991 registration for Bosnia-Herzegovina shows that Muslims made up 43. 7% of the all out populace of 4. 3 million individuals. Serbs represented 31. 3% and Croats 17. 3% (Bringa, 1995). Serbs distinguished the Muslims’ larger part populace base in Bosnia-Herzegovina as its key quality (Cigar, 1995). In 1992, accordingly, the Serbs announced war and started a crusade of ethnic purging to kill non-Serbs. The term â€Å"ethnic cleansing† represents the approach of freeing a zone of an unwanted national gathering to make a homogenous area; it speaks to a sort of annihilation that is intended to spread dread (Friedman, 1996; Weine and Laub, 1995). Serbia’s beginning basis for its arrangement was proclaimed by the conviction that the recently framed province of Bosnia-Herzegovina would make national minorities of the Serb populace and in the end annihilate the Serb masses as a discrete and extraordinary country (Friedman, 1996). The possibility of obtaining material merchandise from the Muslimsâ€land, domesticated animals, houses, vehicles, and cashâ€apparently was an extra amazing motivator for some Serbs (Cigar, 1995; Sells, 1998). The indigenous Bosnian Serb populace was brought into a fear battle of slaughtering and anarchy so the non-Serbian populaces could stay away forever. This mistreatment at last prompted more than one million Balkan displaced people relocating to the United States and different nations. The kinds of encounters they suffered in their country before emigrating significantly impacted their underlying adjustment to these new conditions. Resettlement and Adaptation Issues As troublesome as the war-related encounters were, relocation to resettlement nations flagged a progress to new kinds of battles for Bosnian displaced people. Not at all like workers who leave their homes for an assortment of reasons, displaced people leave so as to endure, and they face another domain of stressors as they endeavor to modify their lives estranged abroad (Keyes, 2000; Worthington, 2001). Such stressors incorporate troublesome travel encounters; culture stun; alteration issues identified with language and word related change; and disturbance in their feeling of self, family, and network (Lipson, 1993; Worthington, 2001). Moreover, outcasts leaving Bosnia-Herzegovina frequently have endured different misfortunes, for example, severance from loved ones who have been deserted or slaughtered, relocation from their homes and networks, social disconnection, and the unexpected passing of their youngsters. Such a collection of misfortune can leave a feeling of uncertain distress that can essentially affect psychological well-being and future working limit (Akhtar, 1992; Fullilove, 1996; Sundquist and Johansson, 1996; Worthington, 2001). At the point when exiles cross national limits looking for refuge, they normally end up in an outsider social condition with standards that challenge their customary examples of family cooperation (Mayadas and Segal, 2000). Most Bosnian displaced people have a various leveled familial force structure and clear job definitions; in the country, authority was ordinarily sexual orientation based, with guys keeping up instrumental jobs and females satisfying supporting duties. A conventional Bosnian woman’s pledge to her family incorporates watching severe codes of protection and open quiet on any issue that may welcome disgrace on the family, for example, family dissension. For some ladies, this security order hinders them from revealing insights regarding conjugal difficulty or youngster abuse by companions to untouchables, for example, work associates, network individuals, and psychological wellness experts. Thusly, Bosnian female evacuees keep on being gotten between customary good examples pervasive all through the previous Yugoslavia’s man centric culture in the twentieth Century and the desires for their new culture. The Bosnian family’s male centric examples of conduct will in general be tested on appearance in the United States, especially around business related issues. Ladies are more probable than men to secure positions in the low-wage work advertise, and in turning into the providers presented to the outside world, they hazard upsetting a family harmony dependent on male power (Mayadas and Segal, 2000). For Bosnian men, key ethnic and social limit markers of their lives had vanished; as a result of their sadness over this, many appeared to be incapacitated in their endeavor to push ahead in their new life. Bosnian exile kids additionally face monstrous cultural assimilation pressures (Mayadas and Segal, 2000). They frequently are conflicted between the convictions, customs, and qualities learned in their local culture and the regularly unreasonable desires for the enhanced one. The strain to absorb the social standards of their new nation can be extraordinary and incredibly unpleasant. Their folks frequently do not have the material assets and emotionally supportive networks to satisfactorily help them in exploring the mind boggling territory of outside educational systems, unavoidable bigotry, and prejudice (Mayadas and Segal, 2000). Subsequently, many feel as though they are distant from everyone else in a remote, once in a while unforgiving new social milieu. To additionally confound the circumstance, family jobs frequently converse as youngsters normally become progressively familiar with English quicker and adjust all the more rapidly to the traditions of the new nation (Potocky, 1996). Since kids are pushed into the job of filling in as the mediators and arbitrators of social standards for their folks, regard for the authority of seniors is frequently sabotaged (Carlin, 1990; Drachman; 1992). Despite the fact that most young people in the United States feel a specific measure of intergenerational strain, the teenagers of exiles frequently experience the draw of two incomprehensibly various universes: those of their American friends and their folks (Mayadas and Segal, 2000). They additionally feel exposed to the xenophobia of their American companions, who frequently criticize other people who they mark as â€Å"different. † Immigration to the United States has furnished Bosnian Muslim outcast families with numerous difficulties as they battle to adjust to their new lives. From the outset, their encounters might be like that of different settlers, bringing up the recognizable issues about how to sustain the confidence of their ancestors among their posterity or how to best save valued social practices (Yazbeck-Haddad and Esposito, 2000). In any case, there are some genuine contrasts. With the assaults on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, DC, the potential for a xenophobic gathering of Muslim foreigners and outcasts by Americans has strengthened. For instance, arguments about the structure of mosques speak to a key wellspring of erosion for most Westerners (Pipes and Duran, 1993). While Bosnian Muslim families may experience similar issues prior ages of outsiders confronted, they additionally are troubled with the subject of whether their kids will be acknowledged in the United States, and whether Islam can ever be perceived as a positive power that adds to a pluralistic, multicultural country (Yazbeck-Haddad and Esposito, 2000). Socially Competent Practice with Bosnian Muslims When working with Bosnian Muslim evacuees, specialist co-ops need to learn however much as could be expected about their way of life, especially given the crucial job that ethnoreligious personality has played in their war-related encounters (Witmer and Culver, 2001). Bosnian people will in general stick to customary sex jobs; associated with this issue is the extraordinary disgrace connected to the sexual infringement of ladies. This disgrace every now and again drove ladies to abstain from uncovering war assaults to their families (Witmer and Cul

Essay on Economic Globalization

Essay on Economic Globalization Economic Globalization Dec 20, 2018 in Economics Economic Globalization and its Human Impacts Do larger states mean that the income inequality between the rich and poor are wider? It can be assumed that larger and affluent governments have larger and better welfare systems for their underprivileged citizens, thereby reducing the income inequality among its residents. However, in the paper written by Andreas Bergh titled Do liberalization and globalization increase income inequality?, it is revealed that the chief beneficiaries of the welfare systems of large governments are the bourgeoisie or the citizens in the class category. This suggests that the income distribution is compressed (Bergh Nilsson, 2008). Can it be expected that the higher the globalization progress rate of a country comes with higher income inequality rate? Globalization and economic freedom are associated to economic growth but its relation to income distribution remains in need of deeper research, mainly because there are many levels of economic progress and types of economic freedom (Bergh Nilsson, 2008). One dimension may have a different effect to income distribution, as compared to another type of liberalization.

Dyson Case Study Essay

Dyson Case Study Essay Introduction In Inside Dyson: a distinctive company?, Shepherd et al. (2011) gives details of the secret of Dysons success the company specializing in innovative, design-heavy vacuum cleaners and other household appliances. The successes and failures of Dysons design efforts (from their successful vacuums to the 3-in-1 vacuums that did not test well with customers) are explored, as well as their unique perspective on business, which puts quality and innovation above anything else. 1. Using frameworks from the chapter, analyze the strategic capabilities of Dyson. The strategic capabilities of Dyson revolve primarily around a resource-based view of the strategy with a heavy focus on engineering design; they spend a tremendous amount of time developing and engineering prototypes for household products that seek to provide a twist to the typical device (e.g., vacuum cleaners that provide smooth turning around the corners, oscillating fans that multiply air, etc.) This creates a niche in what can be an overly-saturated market. Providing a unique spin of this sort on a product can offer tremendous advantages. Combine this with state-of-the-art, sleek design elements and bright, colorful exteriors, and Dyson creates a number of high-end, well-sought-after appliances. Dyson invests heavily in Chinese and Asian manufacturing in order to make their products cheaper, so that they can maintain profit margin benchmarks. This emphasis on design in their organizational planning means not as many products being manufactured. But what they do sell they sell to a target market at higher prices. Given the innovation that is present in Dysons business strategy, it is quite clear that their strategic capability is high, even though the risks can be high as well due to the experimental and out there nature of their products which may be too daunting for normal consumers. 2. To what extent do you think any of the capabilities can be imitated by competitors? The primary niche that Dyson follows is superior design. As a result, it can be quite difficult to replicate the specific strategic capabilities. Their focus on innovation revolves around them being the only ones around to actually try to change the way the vacuum or other appliance is designed. The level of specialization is what attracts customers to them. In order to provide legitimate competition to Dyson, superior engineering designers would have to be hired, and a much greater focus on innovation would have to be attempted. Otherwise, Dysons dominance in the high-end, experimental house-ware market remains unchecked by competitors. Competitors are already trying to imitate their products with the USA Wind Tunnel vacuums and Mjele swivel-head vacuums. Yet the patents Dyson has placed on their product prevents other companies from outright stealing of their ideas. 3. Which of Dysons distinctive capabilities may become threshold capabilities over time? The existence of high-value specialties will likely become a threshold capability for Dyson as the time goes on. Threshold capabilities are what is required to remain in the market. Currently, what is allowing Dyson to maintain its high prices is the high quality of the design and engineering present in their products. Compared to other consumer-level appliances of this kind, Dyson stands out as a distinctive product from a marketing standpoint. Emphasizing the new and innovative stuff allows the consumer to feel as though they are receiving a brand new, insightful product, leagues ahead of the competition. For Dyson to change its business model in any way towards increasing volumes of standard products would be to tarnish its image, nearly irreparably. What is maintaining Dysons primary conceit is the design innovation, which is a clear threshold capability. 4. Bearing in mind your answers to questions 1 and 2, how crucial is Sir James Dyson to the future of the company? What might be the effect of his resignation or the sale of the company? Given the importance of James Dyson, it would certainly be a blow if he were to leave or sell the company. James Dyson is a prominent public figure and the best spokesperson in commercials Dyson company could have.

Effect Of Therapy On Mainstream Schools Children With...

The article is a study performed by Catherine Adams and Julianne Lloyd on the effects of therapy on mainstream school children with pragmatic language impairment, often abbreviated PLI. Pragmatics is the social language skills used in daily communications with others which include; what is said, how it is said, and with body language. The study was done on six male children with a mean age 7; 12 years (range = 5; 11 to 9; 9). The study aimed to determine the effects of intervention through a set of tests, some standardized, on mainstream school children with PLI and see the effects. Teachers and parent’s perspectives were given after the tests to review the effectiveness of the interventions. The study was performed in England where children with speech and language impairments represent significant proportions of the children with special needs with 46.3% with statements of special educational needs having identified speech and language problems. There is very little quality research regarding effectiveness of interventions on children with speech and language impairments. The study is focused on mainstream primary school setting on children with pragmatic language impairment. These children provide great challenges to speech and language therapists as well as their teachers. A study nationwide in England conducted that there is very little intervention for children in secondary to be utilized due to local policy, funding, and retention of staff. It has not beenShow MoreRelatedTeaching New Skills For Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder989 Words   |  4 Pagesbehavior, and teaching new skills for children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. IBI uses Applied Behavioural An alysis (ABA) techniques to improve behaviour where there are impairments in socialization and communication. 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Children with autism have impairments in cognition, language delays, and lack of or poor social interactionsRead MoreA Critical Review of a Senco Essay4380 Words   |  18 PagesBDA Dyslexia Friendly Schools Pack for Teachers (2009) provides an overall guide of what dyslexia is and how a dyslexia friendly school should be delivering education to the dyslexic learner. The writers begin with a definition of dyslexia stating that â€Å"dyslexia is a learning difference, a combination of strengths and weaknesses†. This is an informative definition as opposed to the recommendation of Norwich et al (2005) that exemplary schools should promote an inclusive school system whereby dyslexia

Khan Academy Free Essays

With the Khan-Academy systematics, I feel that it is actually a tool that helps many others like myself who may be attending math classes in school. As a child in elementary school, the Internet program helped me start filling the â€Å"Swiss cheese† gaps Khan talked about. The â€Å"Swiss cheese† gaps, are the things people didn’t learn while they were in math classes, where the teacher simply did not go into great detail of explaining. We will write a custom essay sample on Khan Academy or any similar topic only for you Order Now The way the gaps began to be filled, was that it actually challenged me to a greater potential that I thought could not be achieved. In fact many others in my class treated the program as a game in a good way, as on the Internet program one wins a copious amount of prizes in which we used to brag to each other on. To win prizes they may consist of answering a specific amount of questions or becoming persistent at working with Khan-Academy. Something the program has definitely made up is the intolerable position in which unfit teachers put there students into. The math teachers usually do not help enough or teach only one way, and this is the full reason on why some student actually end up failing their classes. With Khan-Academy some how the student that ended up failing their math classes, now have grades like the visually impaired gifted ones, which also may show how poorly the teachers may have taught their students. Another good point Khan made happen to be the interactions that started to make place amongst the student of classes, in which the ones that did not understand the lessons could know get taught by other students that may have had a full understanding of whatever the problem or problems were. A way the Khan-Academy is assuring that the help that is given is accurate, is that within the program itself it has a way a keeping track who is excelling, and who may not be. Either way one may take the program, it benefits everyone in a various amount of ways and has been a major help in classes across America by helping student who did not excel in math class before. How to cite Khan Academy, Essay examples

Health Economics Evaluate the Effectiveness

Question: Why it is difficult to evaluate the effectiveness and cost effectiveness of complex public health interventions in the community? Answer: Introduction A branch of economics which is concerned with the problems related to effectiveness, value, behavior and efficiency in the consumption and production of health care. Talking in broader terms, the health economists are the ones that study the operation of the health care systems also the botched habits that are harmful for the health like smoking. (Waters et. al., 2006) What is health economics? Economics is the science of insufficiency. The use of health economics emulates a universal wish to get the maximum possible worth of money only by ensuring the clinical influence, along with the cost-effectiveness of the provision of the healthcare. (Better Evaluation, 2004) Cost-effectiveness Dominated by a simple and direct theoretical and economical concept; cost-effectiveness, health economics becomes a major economic theory. What we mean here by value of money is either a wish to obtain a predetermined goal at the least possible cost or a desire to enhance the benefit to the community of patients and also maximize it from a limited or scarce amount of resources. For this, it is required that the services are tested for the cost-effectiveness. Efficiency Along with effectiveness, there is another related field which is efficiency. Efficiency measures how good the scarce resources are used for the purpose of achieving a desired outcome (Mara et. al., 2010). Health economics can help us in informing and improving the decision-making through the objective and systematic application of something called the applied common sense. Such an ACS, which balances the benefits and the costs symmetrically, represents a mode of thought for the decision-makers, which is more valuable and pragmatic, irrespective of how formal or informal economic evaluation be undertaken. Defining health outcomes Measuring and defining the health outcomes is equipped with a lot of difficulties, but these measures are very essential base of the health-economic evaluations/. While addressing these outcomes, what the economists talk is in terms of the utility, something that measures the strength of the individuals preferences for particular objective outcomes. Outcomes are then assessed all in terms of the increased and enhanced survival which means adding years to the life and the better quality of life which is adding life to the years. (WHO, 2015) Defining cost It is very important to make a distinction between the economic and the financial concepts of cost. What the financial concepts relate to is mostly the monetary payments or the payments in made in cash, cheque, other means, etc. (Better Evaluation, 2004). these are generally associated with the price of the service or the good which is traded in the place of the market. On the other hand, the economic costs are something that have a much wider scope of the resource consumption, which is irrespective of the fact that whether these resources are traded in the a network of buyers and sellers or not. The economic concept is based on awareness that as and when the resources are consumed in certain order or way, all those same resources then become scanty or unavailable for the use in developing other services. In such a case, the benefits that would have arisen hence have to be foregone (Business Dictionary, n.d.). Evaluating the effectiveness of the public health interventions The public health funders, decision makers, the public and the practitioners, are very much interested in the proofs that determines the public health and the decision making. The decisions in the public health cover a very wide range of different kind of activities. There is an ever increasing trend of the global volume of the primary knowledge, changes and the research of all the available research which is very much relevant to specific practices or the policy decisions which are an effective method to utilize or synthesize the research efforts. (Better Evaluation, 2004). The collaboration called the Cochrane collaboration includes a very well organized entity which has an objective to enhance the quantity or the quality of the public health analytical reviews through all the range of required activities. Cochrane reviews have very largely and widely paid botched attention to the problems related to the intervention inequalities and equities (Smith, 2010). The members of the colla boration involved in the child health, public health and the review groups with the particular skill in the research of the inequalities have had very different effects on the interventions in which there are particular methodological growths that are warranted. This would also include the growth and the development of abetment to synthesize and extract the primary data which helps reducing the population inequalities by describing the ability of the interventions. (Heyne, 2009). Evaluating structural interventions in the public health: the options, global best practice and the challenges The structural interventions pose a lot of difficult challenges in public health for the evaluation. They work through several indirect ways which are often cross-sectoral and very complex. They require programs further requiring the extended duration horizons so that the health effects can be well observed (Ross, Simkhada Smith, n.d.). These also require the delivery at the zone of institutions, populations and the communities that carry large implications or effects for the purpose of sampling. Also, the issues that relate to fields like logistics, political feasibility and ethics may reduce the range or the limit of opportunities for the random assignment that inculcate the use of differentiated experimental designs. (Philips, 2009) Nevertheless, the evaluation is really important for both the strengthening of the link or the relation between the sound policy and the valuable science, along with making sure of the public confidence as to how limitedly the resources are all deployed (Pronyk, Schaefer, Somers Heise, 2012). It is important to define the structural interventions in the public health sphere as these interventions which attempt to engage in the complexities of the social, political and the economic determinants of public health s a way of influencing many more outcomes. These kind of interventions work at the level of the populations or the groups and they generally attempt to figure out the risk of the disease of an individual through various indirect procedures or mechanisms. The diseases in the population is more of a kind of reflection of a certain level of risk in that community or society, instead of simply an object of cumulative, individual and independent choices. Such structural interventions try to influence such a level of risk by prepossessing the up-stream conditions and dynamics, with a very clear objective of figuring out or shaping up the norms, values, health outcomes and the behaviors of a large population at one single time. (Waters et. al., 2006) Why is it important to evaluate? He demand for the accountability and the decision making which is evident in the public health sphere is ever increasing and vital. The fact that the structural interventions in the past have been very poorly reckoned only in retrospect or not evaluated at all is very unfortunate. The paltriness of the evaluation literature, specifically and especially for very complex like interventions, means that the policy makers can be persuaded in the vacuum to make important decisions, not passing to make benefits from the learnt lessons of the successful interventions and also risking the repeated mistakes of the foregone. (Smith, 2010) Hence it is clear that there is an extremely important need to improve concepts like the evidence base which is required for the structural interventions in the public health zone. What make the evaluation difficult? The program managers and the policy makers or the decision makers in the public health sphere are habitual of weighing, applying, and synthesizing new kinds of evidences in relatively consistent methods. These ways are then very heavily influenced by the interpretations of the technical, downstream and very discrete interventions. Although, for several reasons, the weighing evidence, the ones from the structural interventions can be very different. This is due to such high standard evaluations very often are not correct or even unavailable. (Haycoz, 2009). Evaluation in the twenty-first century The public health has a very distinguished and extended record in preventing the fatal diseases and also shielding the health of the individuals. Certain practices are very fundamental for the improvements in the health of the globe (Ross, Simkhada Smith, n.d.). These include improvements in clean drinking water and other sanitation facilities, measures to immune the containment, also eradication of the fatal diseases, the growth and development in the well understanding of the etiology of infectious diseases. The record has continued till today, for example, the mouth and the foot disease, influenza and the sudden respiratory syndromes. Although, the contemporary health agendas continue the recent deviations from the focus on the fatal infectious diseases, and also into environmental, socio economic and the behavioral factors that influence the health conditions of the individuals. As an example we may say that the evaluation and the analysis of the health related influences and th e interventions related to the urban environments and transport (Johns, n.d.). They call upon much differentiated forms of various interventions, although they are inevitably very vital determinants of the individuals health. The critical factor in enhancing of the public health in this vogue, far away from the fatal diseases and into further determinants of health conditions, has been the major kind of interpretation of the term called public. And, in the public health sphere, this is very often termed as population. References Haycox A. (2009). What is health economics? [Online] p. 1-8. Johns Hopkins. (n.d.) What is health economics? [Online] Available from: https://www.jhsph.edu/departments/international-health/global-health-masters-degrees/master-of-health-science-in-health-economics/what-is-health-economics.html. [Accessed: 12th June, 2015]. Smith R.D. (2010) Public health evaluation in the twenty-first century: time to see the wood as well as the trees. Volume (32). p. 2-7. Ross J., Simkhada P. Smith W.C.S. (2005) Evaluating effectiveness of complex interventions aimed at reducing maternal mortality in developing countries. Volume (27). p. 331-337. Waters E., Doyle J., Jackson N., Howes F., Brunton G. Oakley A. (2006) Evaluating the effectiveness of public health interventions: the role and activities of the Cochrane Collaboration. [Online] Volume (60-4). p. 285-289. Pronyk P., Schaefer J., Somers M.A. Heise L. (2012) Evaluating structural interventions in public health: Challenges, options and global best-practice. [Online] Available from: https://www.millenniumvillages.org/uploads/ReportPaper/Pronyk-et-al-Evaluating-structural-interventions-in-public-health-2012.pdf. [Accessed: 12th June, 2015]. Philips C. (2009) What is cost-effectiveness? p. 1-8. Better evaluation. (2004) Cost Effectiveness Analysis. [Online] Available from: https://betterevaluation.org/evaluation-options/CostEffectivenessAnalysis. [Accessed: 12th June, 2015]. Business Dictionary. (n.d.) Efficiency. [Online] Available from: https://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/efficiency.html. [Accessed: 12th June, 2015]. Heyne P. (n.d.) Efficiency. [Online] Available from: https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Efficiency.html. [Accessed: 12th June, 2015]. World Health Organization. (2015) Water Sanitation Health. [Online] Available from: https://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/en/. [Accessed: 12th June, 2015]. Mara D., Lane J., Scott B. Trouba D. (2010) Sanitation and Health. [Online] Available from: https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1000363. [Accessed: 12th June, 2015].

Revelation Essays - Revelation, Turpin, Flash Cartoons, Claud

Revelation The story opens with Ruby Turpin entering a doctor's waiting room with her husband Claud who has been kicked by a cow. As she and Claud wait, she takes hard stock of the other people in the room. There was some white-trash, a "red- headed youngish woman" who was not white-trash, just common, a well-dressed, pleasant looking lady, and her daughter, an ill-mannered ugly girl in Girl Scout shoes with heavy socks who was reading a book titled Human Development. Listening to the Gospel song playing on the radio in the background, Mrs. Turpin's "heart rose. [Jesus] had not made her a nigger or white-trash or ugly! He had made her herself and given her a little of everything. Jesus, thank you! she said. Thank you thank you thank you!" A few moments later, agreeing with the pleasant lady in regard to her ugly tempered daughter that "'It never hurt anyone to smile,'" Mrs. Turpin notes, "If it's one thing I am, . . .it's grateful. When I think who all I could have been beside myself and what all I got, a little of everything, and a good disposition besides, I just feel like shouting, 'Thank you, Jesus, for making everything the way it is!' . . .'Oh thank you, Jesus, Jesus, thank you!' she cried aloud." Suddenly the book Human Development "struck her directly over her left eye." Nurse, doctor, and mother scramble to subdue the ugly girl. Transfixed by the girl's eyes focused on her, Mrs. Turpin asks "'What you got to say to me?'" waiting, as O'Connor says "as for a revelation." "Go back to hell where you came from, you old wart hog" [the girl] whispered." Haunted by this command, Ruby Turpin spends the rest of the day in puzzlement and concentration. Finally, while hosing down the hog pen that evening she whispers to God in a fierce voice, "What do you send me a message like that for?" "How am I a hog and me both? How am I saved and from hell too?" If students can understand the answer to this question, they can understand the medieval notion of Original Sin. Struggling against the recognition that she shares in the common legacy of humanity, Ruby Turpin wants to know how she is like a hog, and why with plenty of white-trash around the message had to come to her. Challenging God to go on and call her a wart hog from hell, to put the top rung on the bottom, she yells out "There'll still be a top and a bottom!" Shaking with fury, she demands of God, "Who do you think you are?" In a final vision, something akin to the great medieval leveling of death and damnation and salvation forces itself upon her. With an ironic humor reminiscent of Chaucer and beatific purification echoing Dante, O'Connor writes A visionary lights settled in her eyes. She saw the streak [of the setting sun] as a vast swinging bridge extending upward from the earth through a field of living fire. Upon it a horde of souls were rumbling toward heaven. There were whole companies of white-trash, clean for the first time in their lives, and bands of black niggers in white robes, and battalions of freaks and lunatics shouting and clapping and leaping like frogs. And bringing up the end of the procession was a tribe of people whom she recognized at once as those who, like herself and Claud, had always had a little of everything and the God-given wit to use it right. She leaned forward to observe them closer. They were marching behind the others with great dignity, accountable as they had always been for good order and common sense and respectable behavior. They alone were on key. Yet she could see by their shocked and altered faces that even their virtues were being burned away. In painful clarity, Ruby Turpin recognizes, as one critic put it, "the inadequacy of her respectability and the shallowness of her values" (Pepin 26). The vision shows her how--considered by God no more worthy than white-trash, or niggers, or freaks--she can be both a wart hog before the judgment seat of God and saved, too. If "Revelation" can help students understand the nature of Original Sin and the inscrutable nature of God's wisdom, the "A Good Man is Hard to Find" can certainly help them see both the frailty of human will and the kindred nature of human existence. Like Ruby Turpin, the grandmother of "A Good Man Is Hard to

Free Essays on Death Process

1.) Explain how the answers to the self-inventories in the text concerning facts, attitudes, beliefs and feelings about death reflect our societal understanding or lack of understanding of death. I think that the self- inventory question reflected on both our understanding and lack of understanding about death related topics. Some of the answers to the questions on the inventory I knew without look at the answers, but some of the answers actually surprised me. The question about the death certificate was one of the questions that actually surprised me. I assumed before I did the inventory that every death certificate had a specific cause of death that was given on the certificate. Another answer that surprised me was that measles kill more people in third world countries than AIDS. The inventory actually made you think about all aspects of death. Differentiate between attitudes, experiences, beliefs, and feelings about death related topics. Attitudes refer to our action tendencies. B eliefs refer to our relatively stable and broad interpretations of the world and our place in it. Feelings provide us with qualitative information on our total sense of being. Experiences are the things that we go through in life that help form our attitudes, beliefs, and feelings. Each one is important in developing, but each one is also different. Attitude is how we react, or maybe it is the way we do not react. Your attitude can change every five minutes. Beliefs are the things that help us know who we are your beliefs do not change like your attitude. Most people feel more passionate about their beliefs. Our feelings let us know hurt, and happens. Our feelings help us develop our beliefs and attitude. Give an example of how your own experiences may have impacted upon your feelings and beliefs about death. When my grandmother died I felt terrible, I had never felt that way before. It is hard to explain the way I actually felt. I remember that I stayed to ... Free Essays on Death Process Free Essays on Death Process 1.) Explain how the answers to the self-inventories in the text concerning facts, attitudes, beliefs and feelings about death reflect our societal understanding or lack of understanding of death. I think that the self- inventory question reflected on both our understanding and lack of understanding about death related topics. Some of the answers to the questions on the inventory I knew without look at the answers, but some of the answers actually surprised me. The question about the death certificate was one of the questions that actually surprised me. I assumed before I did the inventory that every death certificate had a specific cause of death that was given on the certificate. Another answer that surprised me was that measles kill more people in third world countries than AIDS. The inventory actually made you think about all aspects of death. Differentiate between attitudes, experiences, beliefs, and feelings about death related topics. Attitudes refer to our action tendencies. B eliefs refer to our relatively stable and broad interpretations of the world and our place in it. Feelings provide us with qualitative information on our total sense of being. Experiences are the things that we go through in life that help form our attitudes, beliefs, and feelings. Each one is important in developing, but each one is also different. Attitude is how we react, or maybe it is the way we do not react. Your attitude can change every five minutes. Beliefs are the things that help us know who we are your beliefs do not change like your attitude. Most people feel more passionate about their beliefs. Our feelings let us know hurt, and happens. Our feelings help us develop our beliefs and attitude. Give an example of how your own experiences may have impacted upon your feelings and beliefs about death. When my grandmother died I felt terrible, I had never felt that way before. It is hard to explain the way I actually felt. I remember that I stayed to ...

Racial tension Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Racial tension - Essay Example (US Census 2003-7).In colleges Africans Americans are half the rate of the whites, they are about 14% while the whites are about 24%.The improving Educational standards have promoted the improvement of race relations with in the African American and the white population.(Jackson 2008).Ever since the modern African American population has started to take more interest in education and more and more African Americans are graduating from the different universities through out America, and the percentage increase in African American literacy has gone up as well.(Jackson 2008). If we look at the history of race relations in America in the educational context the Afro American minority was largely suppressed in terms of education and learning opportunities. Racist attitudes locked the doors of opportunities for these enslaved people and even after they gained freedom the minority ignored education as a tool for survival. (Jackson 2008).They lacked the right of suffrage until the advent of the democratic trend of Civil rights and liberties and initiatives like the American Creed during the early 1940’s by Gunnar Myrdal. It was indeed Myrdal who wrote in his book famously (quoted in Jackson 2008) The ideals of the essential dignity of the individual human being, of fundamental equality of all men, and of certain inalienable rights to freedom, justice, and a fair opportunity represent to the American people the essential meaning of the nation’s early struggle for independence. . . . These tenets were written into the Declaration of Independence, the Preamble of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and into the Constitutions of the several states. . (p. 4) These movements and initiatives were aimed at resolving their problems and to ensure equality and justice amongst all races. (Jackson 2008).A key role was played by Martin Luther king who was one of the pivotal leaders of the American civil rights movement. One of the landmark decisions/events in the

History of Lichtenstein Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

History of Lichtenstein - Research Paper Example The second fact is that the largest city within the country is known as Schaan located in the north of the capital city. It covers an area of 10.3 square miles and it is located in an area covered by mountains and forest. Its population is estimated to be 5, 806. The third fact is that the country covers an estimated area of about sixty two square miles, and is the sixth smallest independent country in the world. The total population of the country,   according to the census of 2010 is 36,010. The fourth fact is that the ethnic group of the constituting the country is majorly Alemannic Germans, but there are also other small ethnic groups like the Turks and Italians. The fifth fact is that the administrative division of the country is divided into eleven communes who are composed of single villages or towns. The sixth fact about the country is that energy production in the country is 145 million kWh whereas its electricity consumption is 1.36 billion kWh. The last fact about the co untry is that its national day is celebrated on August 15 as a commemoration of its independence from Germany (Claitor's Law Books and Publishing Division., 2014). The country Lichtenstein has a had an extensive past as their sovereignty has been changed a number of times. The country’s history is traced back to the year 1866. Different scholars have discovered forms of human existence in the country during the Neolithic age. Forms of colonization started in the areas as early as 800BC by the group known as the Rhaetians. Later during the 15BC, the country was colonized by the Romans and set up the castle known as Schaan castle to protect their territory in the region from the tribe was known as the Germanic people (Newsnet. "History of Liechtenstein.", 1996).  

Talisman Energy

Talisman Energy 1.0 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The following report outline research that will evaluate the goals and objective within organization. In doing so a series of interview with the relevant personal of Talisman (M) Sdn Bhd is done. Talisman Energy (Talisman) is an independent international upstream oil and gas company undertaking exploration, development, production, transportation, and marketing of crude oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids (NGLs). Talisman was establish in 1992. The company primarily operates in North America, the North Sea, and Southeast Asia. It is headquartered in Alberta, Canada and employs over 2,600 people. The Malaysia branch is located at Menara Citibank Kuala Lumpur. Refer to appendix 1 for location and subsidiaries. Talisman is listed on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges under the symbol TLM. Talisman is also part of the SP/TSX 60 Index. At year end, the company value was over $16 billion with 1,1019 million shares outstanding 2.0 INTRODUCTION The history of Talisman Energy (Talisman) dates back to 1953, when the company was established as BP Canada. It later became an independent company, in 1992. In the same year, Talisman Energy discontinued its mining operations in order to focus on its core areas. Talisman Energy (Talisman) is one of the largest independent oil and gas producers in Canada. Its main business activities include exploration, development, production, transportation, and marketing of crude oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids (NGLs). It has about seven operating subsidiaries. Talisman has ongoing production, development, and exploration operations in North America, the North Sea, Southeast Asia and Australia, North Africa, and Trinidad and Tobago. Talismans operations are conducted principally in five geographic segments: North America, UK, Scandinavia, Southeast Asia, and other. The company produced over 430,000 boe/d in 2008, approximately 50% oil and 50% natural gas. The North America segment includes operations in Canada and the US. The UK segment includes operations in the UK and the Netherlands. The Scandinavia segment includes operations in Norway and Denmark. The Southeast Asia segment includes operations in Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Australia, and Papua New Guinea. The other segment includes operations in North Africa, Trinidad and Tobago, Colombia, Peru, and Qatar as well as other international exploration areas. 3.0 ANALYSIS AND FINDING OF THE SUMMARY SCENARIO 3.1 Company Goal and objective In any planning process, objectives and goals must be carefully established. Starting from the proposed objectives and goals, the strategies to reach them will be outlined The lack of clarity of the proposed objectives can compromise the whole sequence. According to Oliveira (2002), the objectives serve the following company purposes: 1. provide to people the feeling of a specific and adequate role in the company 2. give consistency to decision making among a large number of different executives; 3. encourage dedication and fulfillment based on expected results; and 4. supply a base for corrective actions and control. In charting direction of the company Talisman Energy (Talisman) has set three priorities objectives. Refer Table 1 Developing long-term growth opportunities Building high impact exploration Continue focusing on current portfolio Table 1 Goal Strategy The main elements of Talismans objective are: †¢ To establish sustainable, profitable growth from its unconventional gas business in North America, as well as Southeast Asia, and Norway. †¢ To create an exploration portfolio, which contributes to renewal by finding material hydrocarbons over time. †¢ And to underpin this with sustainable sources of cash from mature areas, as well as focusing the portfolio. Two main reasons the objective was introduced were to lower finding and development (FD) costs, and to increase the reserve life index over time. FD costs will be bought down in several ways: †¢ The unconventional business model has structurally lower FD costs than the conventional gas business model. †¢ Talisman is looking to expand activity in Southeast Asia, where FD costs are generally lower. †¢ If the exploration shift to larger prospects is successful, FD costs will fall. 3.2 SWOT Analysis Strengths Weaknesses Strong market position Diversified geographical presence Lack of scale High debt Opportunities Threats Acquisitions and agreements New oil and gas production Economic slowdown in the US and Euro zone Environmental regulations Saturation of resources Table 2 Swot Analysis Table Strengths Strong market position Talisman Energy is an independent, international upstream oil and gas company whose main business activities include exploration, development, production, transportation, and marketing of crude oil, natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGLs). The companys three core areas are North America, the North Sea, and Southeast Asia. In North America, Talisman is a leading deep gas explorer and has significant unconventional natural gas potential. In the North Sea, the company operates more than 40 oilfields and has extensive exploration acreage in Norway. In Southeast Asia, Talisman has substantial long-life natural gas reserves and highly prospective exploration acreage. Opportunity : A strong market position helps the company to leverage its market share. Diversified geographical presence Talisman Energy has ongoing production, development, and exploration operations in North America, the North Sea, Southeast Asia and Australia, North Africa, and Trinidad and Tobago. The companys operations are conducted principally in five geographic segments: North America, UK, Scandinavia, Southeast Asia, and others (comprising North Africa, Trinidad and Tobago, Colombia, Peru, and Qatar). Talismans aggregate production for the year ended December 31, 2008 was approximately 452,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe/d), consisting of approximately 189,000 boe/d from North America, 117,000 boe/d from the UK segment, 33,000 boe/d from the Scandinavia segment, 92,000 boe/d from Southeast Asia, and 21,000 boe/d from the rest of the world. Opportunity : A diversified geographical presence enables the company to reduce business risks arising in a particular geography. Weaknesses Lack of scale The company lacks the desired scale to compete with large players in the industry. Many of the companys competitors are much larger in size in terms of revenue generated, number of employees, and their presence in Europe and other developing market. One of its key competitors, British Petroleum (BP), generated revenues of about $288,951 million and employed about 97,600 people worldwide for the financial year ended December 2007 (FY2007). Another key competitor of the company Exxon Mobil Corporation (Exxon Mobil) generated revenues of about $390,328 million and employed 81,000 people as on FY2007. However, Talisman generated revenues of about C$7,919 million during the FY2008, and employed about 2,600 people worldwide as of FY2008. Problem : Owing to its relatively small scale of operations, the company could find it difficult to face competition. High debt The company has a significant amount of debt. For the FY2008, the company has an outstanding debt of C$3,949 million. Even though it is a decrease of 9% from FY2007 which stood at CAD$4,341 million, this figure is still high especially during the credit crunch. The companys substantial debt could limit its ability to obtain additional financing to operate its business. Further, it would make it difficult for the company to satisfy its obligations including making interest payments on debt obligations. Opportunities Acquisitions and agreements The company has been expanding its geographic reach through acquisitions and agreements. In January 2008, Talisman announced that one of its subsidiaries have acquired all the shares of CNOOC Wiriagar Overseas from a subsidiary of CNOOC for a consideration of $212.5 million. CNOOC Wiriagar Overseas holds a 3.06% interest in the Tangguh LNG Project. The Tangguh LNG Project, located in West Papua, Indonesia, consists of a number of offshore gas wells, production facilities, pipelines, and LNG plant facilities with a nameplate capacity of 7.6 million tons per year. In June 2008, two wholly-owned subsidiaries of Talisman Energy entered into agreements with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) within Iraq for interests in Blocks K44 and K39 respectively. In the same month, Talisman Energy announced that its wholly-owned limited partnership FEI Shale (Fortuna) reached agreement to earn up to a one-third working interest in US properties owned by Hallwood Energy (Hallwood). Upon completion of the capital program, Fortuna will have earned a one-third interest in substantially all of Hallwoods assets, including properties in Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana, for a total of 108,000 acres (net to Fortuna). These agreements and acquisitions would provide Talisman with growth opportunities and drive its revenue growth. New oil and gas production New oil and gas production Talisman Energy has considerably increased its oil and gas production in recent times. In December 2008, Talisman (Vietnam 46/02), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Talisman, announced first oil production from the Song Doc field in Block 46/02 offshore Vietnam. Gross production from five pre-drilled wells is expected to reach approximately 25,000 bbls/d by early 2009. An additional three development wells are currently being drilled. Talismans share of proved and probable reserves in the Song Doc field is estimated at six million barrels (mmbbls), with proved reserves of three mmbbls. Talisman Energy announced first gas production from the Rev Field in Norway, in January 2009. The field is expected to produce at a plateau rate of 100 mmcf/d of gas and 6,000 bbls/d of condensate and natural gas liquids from two subsea wells. A third producer, the Rev East well, is expected to be brought on-stream later in 2009. Talismans share of proved and probable reserves in the Rev Field at year end 2007 is estimated at 26 million boe, with proved reserves of 16 million boe.Talisman Energy Norge, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Talisman, has a 70% interest in the Field, with Petoro holding the remaining 30%. Production is transported via a nine kilometer pipeline to the Armada platform in the UK, operated by BG International (CNS), for processing and final export to the UK. The new oil and gas production would increase the companys output which in turn increases its revenues. Threats Economic slowdown in the US and Eurozone The US and European Union are the two key markets for Talisman. According to International Monetary Funds (IMF) World Economic Outlook, January 2009, the US and Eurozone economies could face slowdown in 2009. The GDP growth rate in the US has decreased from 2% in 2007 to 1.1% in 2008 and is projected to record a negative growth of 1.6% in 2009. The GDP growth rate in the Eurozone has declined from 2.6% in 2007 to 1% in 2008 and is projected to record a negative growth of 2% in 2009. A weak economic outlook for Eurozone and the US would put pressure on the revenues of the company. Economic slow down in the US and Eurozone could impact industrial development, which could adversely affect demand for Talismans products. Environmental regulations As a result of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 and the worldwide Port State Control initiative, stringent new regulations have been enacted. These regulations pose the possibility of unlimited financial liability for pollution damages. Companies operating in the oil and gas industry are subject to strict environmental regulations. Distribution and storage houses need to strictly comply with environmental regulations which keep changing frequently. Compliance with these regulations forces distributors, such as Talisman, to incur high costs. These factors can have a potential negative impact on the companys margins. Saturation of resources The maturity of the North America basin reserve continues to give rise to increases in both replacement costs and operating costs. Larger companies are finding it increasingly difficult to increase their North American production as conventional production is declining in these more mature basins. Furthermore, output from proven natural gas reserves in Canada has been declining significantly. Although the development of Mackenzie Valley reserves would boost gas reserves to some extent, decreasing output is a long-term threat for Canadian oil and gas companies such as Talisman. In addition, offshore exploration space and the existing reserves are maturing and are slowly being saturated. There has been a succession of dry holes being drilled in the region in the last two years. The saturation of reserves in North America would severely impact the companys operations. 3.3 Current Year Performance Talisman generated a record $3.5 billion in net income in 2008, benefiting from high commodity prices during the year. Net income included a $1.7 billion recorded gain on held-for-trading financial instruments, primarily commodity contracts. Talisman entered into these contracts to protect 2009 cash flow and their capital program against a significant drop in prices. They also set a new record for cash flow of $6.2 billion, an increase of 42% over the previous year. Production from continuing operations averaged 419,000 boe/d for the year, 3% above 2007. Including non-core assets that were sold or are scheduled for sale, production was down 4%. Talisman used this record cash flow to strengthen the balance sheet, reducing long-term net debt to $3.9 billion, down from $4.3 billion a year earlier. In total, they paid down approximately $900 million in debt. The Company also spent a record $5.1 billion on exploration and development. North America accounted for 48% of spending, North Sea development projects 25%, Southeast Asia development 9% and international exploration 17%. Talisman replaced 75% of its production with proved reserves from drilling and non-price revisions in 2008. Refer to table 3 for further details (millions of C$ unless otherwise stated) 2008 2007 2006 Cash flow1 6,163 4,327 4,748 Net income 3,519 2,078 2,005 Earnings from continuing operations1,2 2,544 952 1,424 Per common share Cash flow ($)1 6.06 4.19 4.35 Net income ($) 3.46 2.01 1.84 Earnings from continuing operations ($)1,2 2.5 0.92 1.3 Oil production (mbbls/d) 3 224 241 262 Gas production (mmcf/d) 3 1,247 1,265 1,342 Total production (mboe/d) 3,4 432 452 485 Total production from continuing operations (mboe/d) 2,4 419 405 410 Average sales price ($/boe) 76.03 59.57 57.45 Exploration and development spending 5,106 4,449 4,578 Net debt1 3,949 4,341 4,496 Table 3 Current Year Performance 3.4 Recommended Strategies From the SWOT we found a few problems arising from the analysis below are the few strategies recommended in order to ensure the efficiency of the performance Weakness High Debt In order to reduce the high debt the company should emphasize on the strategic areas and exiting the non strategic areas. By selling of the non strategic area could increase the cash flow and therefore the company could drastically reduce greater amount of debt. Lack of scale In order to gain competitive advantages against the large scale companies such as BP (British Petroleum). The company should using the differentiate strategy. According to Micheal Porter differentiation advantage occurs when a firm delivers greater services for the same price of its competitors. They are collectively known as positional advantages because they denote the firms position in its industry as a leader in either superior services or cost. A firm possesses a sustainable competitive advantage when its value-creating processes and position have not been able to be duplicated or imitated by other firms Threat Economic slowdown in the US and Euro zone -This issue based on global issue the best way to mitigate the impact of economic slowdown is by improving the efficiency. During economic crisis the company must focus on their bottom line. Productivity, energy usage, etc. all must be made more effective. Environmental regulations Due to stringent and frequently change of oil pollution act the company might incurred high cost on compliance to the act. The best strategy for the company is to setup a team on monitoring closely on the compliance process. This is to avoid sudden change or adhoc changing process. Any sudden changes without a proper planning definitely incurred a very high cost. Saturation of resources Saturation of resources could have an impact on the company operation. The best way to deal with it is through Focusing on portfolio strategy. By focusing on high impact exploration area and exiting on depleting area or countries 3.4 Action programme The following action programme express on how Talisman could aligns with the goals and objectives of many diverse sites 1. Focus the Portfolio (core asset) Exit non strategic areas †¢ Potential non-core asset sales of 35,000-45,000 boe/d, with expected proceeds of $1.5-2.0 billion by the end of 2009. †¢ Exit some countries (i.e., the Netherlands, Denmark, Trinidad Tobago). †¢ Additional non-core asset sales in the UK and North America. 2. Grow Existing Base Maintain existing assets as firm base †¢ Size the UK to produce 80,000-100,000 boe/d through at least 2013 from existing assets. †¢ Continue to invest in core conventional North America natural gas areas with a view to keeping conventional production relatively flat. †¢ Southeast Asia production has doubled in the past five years and has the potential to double again in the next five (e.g. increasing Corridor volumes, Northern Fields development, Song Doc). 3. Findings on new Growth Opportunities Determine unconventional potential †¢ Talisman has built a large (2.5 million net acre) unconventional land base. †¢ The Company plans to spend $800-900 million on unconventional development projects over the next 18 months. †¢ An additional $300-400 million is planned for unconventional pilots over the same period. †¢ A total of 240-290 wells could be drilled as part of these program. Potential Future Growth in North Africa, South America †¢ Talisman has been active in Algeria since 1994. This is a very prolific hydrocarbon basin. †¢ The Company plans to drill up to eight exploration wells in Colombia and Peru through the end of 2009. 4. Optimize Global Exploration Support core area growth in the short term †¢ The Company will maintain active exploration programs in its core areas. †¢ Exploration spending is expected to average $700 million per year through 2010. Increase focus toward larger pool sizes †¢ Future focus areas include the Barents Sea (Norway), the central North Sea (UK), Colombia and Peru. †¢ The Company plans to drill up to 28 key exploration wells over the next 18 months. 3.4 Implementation Control Developing an effective company goals and objective is only half the battle. Getting it implemented is the other, and generally it is the tougher half. The most important part of implementation is monitoring taking a periodic look at how its going. Monitoring the implementation of objective is important for a number of reasons. First, it helps to assure that the efforts conform to the plan. Meaning the company is on track. Second, to make sure the results achieved align with objectives. Monitoring allows for corrective action and making the necessary changes along the way. To fine tune, not only strategies, but planning process as well. And since monitoring is part of a control process, it encourages improved performance. Knowing theyll be measured stimulates employees to do a better job. Finally, and most importantly, monitoring provides the essential link between the written plan and the day-to-day operation of your business. It demonstrates to all that the company are really managing the business according to plan. A significant benefit of the monitoring process is that it serves as your early warning system. It gives Talisman the opportunity to communicate how they are doing. For example, In Focus the Portfolio action program, the company may run into a technical problem such as delay on bidding process and slip its schedule by six weeks. The management needs to know about it. Through such feedback, the company can improve the implementation and reinforce the spirit of cooperation within organization. But lets be realistic. The company will run into implementation problems. Every company does. Some of the strategies may prove ineffective or strategies wont work as intended. The company can take one of four corrective actions. First, the company can change the schedule slipping in due date. Second, they can change the tactics in performing to implement the strategy. Third, by changing the strategy. Finally, as a last resort, the organisation can compromise the objective. Each of these corrective actions is applicable under specific circumstances 4.0 Conclusion Goals serve as a stimulus for effort by giving company something to strive for, the most important things must know where they are heading so they can effectively plan to get there. Goal setting, when supported by careful planning, provides a sense of direction to keep company focused on the most important activities. For Talisman they emphasize on three main objectives which are developing long-term growth opportunities, building high impact exploration and continue focusing on current portfolio. From the research we can conclude that goals serve as filters to eliminate extraneous demands. Over a period time, goals can bring to life order, meaning, and purpose that will sustain interest of stakeholder and motivation. By setting goals, an individual expresses their desire to achieve, to improve life, and to be more effective, more productive, and more successful tomorrow than today. Being a successful organization does not come by accident. It depends on following a practice of goal-setting and continuous growth (kaizen), as well as seeking predetermined goals. We could say then Success is the progressive realization of worthwhile, predetermined goals. Abbreviation Definitions bbl barrel bbls/d barrels per day bcfe/d billion cubic feet of gas equivalent per day boe barrels of oil equivalent boe/d barrels of oil equivalent per day C$ Canadian dollar LNG Liquefied Natural Gas mbbls/d thousand barrels per day mboe/d thousand barrels of oil equivalent per day mcf thousand cubic feet mcfe/d thousands of cubic feet of gas equivalent per day mmboe million barrels of oil equivalent mmcf/d million cubic feet per day mmcfe/d million cubic feet of gas equivalent per day Reference and Bibliography Goh Ing King, Lecturer Notes Purchasing Management Azlina Ghazaly, Senior Buyer Talisman Malaysia Sdn Bhd Menara Citibank CIPS Course Book. Level 5 study guide Management in the Purchasing Function Micheal E. Porter, From Competitive Advantage to Corporate Strategy Talisman Energy Inc. http://www.talisman-energy.com Appendix Appendix 1 : Location and Subsidiaries

Practical Demonkeeping Chapter 10-11

10 AUGUSTUS BRINE Augustus Brine sat in one of his high-backed leather chairs massaging his temples, trying to formulate a plan of action. Rather than answers, the question, Why me? repeated in his mind like a perplexing mantra. Despite his size, strength, and a lifetime of learning, Augustus Brine felt small, weak, and stupid. Why me? A few minutes before, Gian Hen Gian had rushed into the house babbling in Arabic like a madman. When Brine finally calmed him down, the genie had told him he had found the demon. â€Å"You must find the dark one. He must have the Seal of Solomon. You must find him!† Now the genie was sitting in the chair across from Brine, munching potato chips and watching a videotape of a Marx Brothers movie. The genie insisted that Brine take some sort of action, but he had no suggestions on how to proceed. Brine examined the options and found them wanting. He could call the police, tell them that a genie had told him that an invisible man-eating demon had invaded Pine Cove, and spend the rest of his life under sedation: not good. Or, he could find the dark one, insist that he send the demon back to hell, and be eaten by the demon: not good. Or he could find the dark one, sneak around hoping that he wasn't noticed by an invisible demon that could be anywhere, steal the seal, and send the demon back to hell himself, but probably get eaten in the process: also, not good. Of course he could deny that he believed the story, deny that he had seen Gian Hen Gian drink enough saltwater to kill a battalion, deny the existence of the supernatural altogether, open an impudent little bottle of merlot, and sit by his fireplace drinking wine while a demon from hell ate his neighbors. But he did believ e it, and that option, too, was not good. For now he decided to rub his temples and think, Why me? The genie would be no help at all. Without a master he was as powerless as Brine himself. Without the seal and invocation, he could have no master. Brine had run through the more obvious courses of action with Gian Hen Gian to have each doomed in succession. No, he could not kill the demon: he was immortal. No, he could not kill the dark one: he was under the protection of the demon, and killing him, if it were possible, might release the demon to his own will. To attempt an exorcism would be silly, the genie reasoned; would some mingy prelate be able to override the power of Solomon? Perhaps they could separate the demon from his keeper – somehow force the dark one to send the demon back. Brine started to ask Gian Hen Gian if it was feasible but stopped himself. Tears were coursing down the genie's face. â€Å"What's the matter?† Brine asked. Gian Hen Gian kept his eyes trained on the television screen, where Harpo Marx was pulling a collection of objects from his coat, objects obviously too large to be stored there. â€Å"It has been so long since I have seen one of my own kind. This one who does not speak, I do not recognize him, but he is Djinn. What magic!† Brine considered for a moment the possibility that Harpo Marx might have been one of the Djinn, then berated himself for even thinking about it. Too much had happened today that was outside the frame of his experience and it had opened him up to thinking that anything was possible. If he weren't careful, he would lose his sense of judgment completely. â€Å"You've been here a thousand years and you've never seen a movie before?† Brine asked. â€Å"What is a movie?† Slowly and gently, Augustus Brine explained to the king of the Djinn about the illusion created by motion pictures. When he finished, he felt like he had just raped the tooth fairy in front of a class of kindergartners. â€Å"Then I am alone still?† the genie said. â€Å"Not completely.† â€Å"Yes,† the genie said, eager to leave the moment behind, â€Å"but what are you going to do about Catch, Augustus Brine?† 11 EFFROM Effrom Elliot awoke that morning eagerly anticipating his nap. He'd been dreaming about women, about a time when he had hair and choices. He hadn't slept well. Some barking dogs had awakened him during the night, and he wished he could sleep in, but as soon as the sun broke through his bedroom window, he was wide awake, without a hope of getting back to sleep and recapturing his dream until nap time. It had been that way since he had retired, twenty-five years ago. As soon as his life had eased so that he might sleep in, his body would not let him. He crept from bed and dressed in the half-light of the bedroom, putting on corduroys and a wool flannel shirt the wife had laid out for him. He put on his slippers and tiptoed out of the bedroom, palming the door shut so as not to wake the wife. Then he remembered that the wife was gone to Monterey, or was it Santa Barbara? Anyway, she wasn't home. Still, he continued his morning routine with the usual stealth. In the kitchen he put on the water for his morning cup of decaf. Outside the kitchen window the hummingbirds were already hovering up to the feeder, stopping for drinks of red sugar water on their route through the wife's fuchias and honeysuckle. He thought of the hummingbirds as the wife's pets. They moved too fast for his tastes. He had seen a nature show on television that said that their metabolism was so fast that they might not even be able to see humans. The whole world had gone the way of the hummingbirds as far as Effrom was concerned. Everything and everybody was too fast, and sometimes he felt invisible. He couldn't drive anymore. The last time he had tried, the police had stopped him for obstructing traffic. He had told the cop to stop and smell the flowers. He told the cop that he had been driving since before the cop was a glimmer in his daddy's eye. It had been the wrong approach. The policeman took his license. The wife did all the driving now. Imagine it – when he had taught her to drive, he had to keep grabbing the wheel to keep her from putting the Model T into the ditch. What would the snot-nosed cop say about that? The water was beginning to boil on the stove. Effrom rummaged through the old tin bread box and found the package of chocolate-covered graham crackers the wife had left for him. In the cupboard the jar of Sanka sat next to the real coffee. Why not? The wife was gone, why not live a little? He took the regular coffee from the shelf and set about finding the filters and filter holder. He hadn't the slightest idea where they were kept. The wife took care of that sort of thing. He finally found the filters, the holder, and the serving carafe on the shelf below. He poured some coffee into the filter, eyeballed it, and poured in some more. Then he poured the water over the grounds. The coffee came through strong and black as the kaiser's heart. He poured himself a cup and there was still a little left in the carafe. No sense wasting it. He opened the kitchen window, and after fumbling with the lid for a moment, poured the remaining coffee into the hummingbird feeder. â€Å"Live a little, boys.† He wondered if the coffee might not speed them up to the point where they just burnt up in the atmosphere. He toyed with the idea of watching for a while, then he remembered that his exercise show was about to start. He picked up his graham crackers and coffee and headed for the living room and his big easy chair in front of the RCA. He made sure the sound was turned down, then turned on the old console set. When the picture came on, a young blond woman in iridescent tights was leading three other young women through a series of stretches. Effrom guessed that there was music playing from the way they moved, but he always watched with the sound turned off so as not to wake the wife. Since he had discovered his exercise program, the women in his dreams all wore iridescent tights. The girls were all on their backs now, waving their legs in the air. Effrom munched his graham crackers and watched in fascination. Time was when a man had to spend the better part of a week's pay to see a show like that. Now you could get it on cable for only†¦. Well, the wife took care of the cable bill, but he guessed that it was pretty cheap. Life was grand. Effrom considered going out to his workshop and getting his cigarettes. A smoke would go good right now. After all, the wife was gone. Why should he sneak around in his own house? No, the wife would know. And when she confronted him, she wouldn't yell, she would just look at him. She would get that sad look in her blue eyes and she would say, â€Å"Oh, Effrom.† That's all, â€Å"Oh, Effrom.† And he would feel as if he had betrayed her. Nope, he could wait until his show was over and go smoke in his workshop, where the wife would never dare to set foot. Suddenly the house felt very empty. It was like a great vacant warehouse where the slightest noise rattles in the rafters. A presence was missing. He never saw the wife until she knocked on his workshop door at noon to call him to lunch, but somehow he felt her absence, as if the insulation had been ripped from around him, leaving him raw to the elements. For the first time in a long time Effrom felt afraid. The wife was coming back, but maybe someday she would be gone forever. Someday he would really be alone. He wished for a moment that he would die first, then thinking of the wife alone, knocking on the workshop door from which he would never emerge, made him feel selfish and ashamed. He tried to concentrate on the exercise show but found no solace in spandex tights. He rose and turned off the TV. He went to the kitchen and put his coffee in the sink. Outside the window the hummingbirds went about their business, shimmering in the morning sun. A sense of urgency came over him. It became suddenly very important to get to his workshop and finish his latest carving. Time seemed as fleeting and fragile as the little birds. In his younger days he might have met the feeling with a naive denial of his own mortality. Age had given him a different defense, and his thoughts returned to the image of he and the wife going to bed together and never waking, their lives and memories going out all at once. This too, he knew, was a naive fantasy. When the wife got home he was going to give her hell for going away, he knew that for sure. Before unlocking his workshop he set the alarm on his watch to go off at lunchtime. If he worked through lunch he might miss his nap. There was no sense in wasting the day just because the wife was out of town. When the knock came on his workshop door, Effrom thought at first that the wife had come home early to surprise him with lunch. He ground out his cigarette in an empty toolbox that he kept for that purpose. He blew the last lungful of smoke into the exhaust fan he had installed â€Å"to take out the sawdust.† â€Å"Coming. Just a minute,† he said. He revved up one of his high-speed polishing tools for effect. The knocking continued and Effrom realized that it was not coming from the inside door that the wife usually knocked on, but from the one leading out into the front yard. Probably Jehovah's Witnesses. He climbed down from his stool, checked the pockets of his corduroys for quarters, and found one. If you bought a Watchtower from them, they would go away, but if they caught you without spare change, they would be on you like soul-saving terriers. Effrom threw the door open and the young man outside jumped back. He was dressed in a black sweatshirt and jeans – rather casual, Effrom thought, for someone carrying the formal invitation to the end of the world. â€Å"Are you Effrom Elliot?† he asked. â€Å"I am.† Effrom said. He held out his quarter. â€Å"Thanks for stopping by, but I'm busy, so you can just give me my Watchtower and I'll read it later.† â€Å"Mr. Elliot, I'm not a Jehovah's Witness.† â€Å"Well, I have all the insurance I can afford, but if you leave me your card, I'll give it to the wife.† â€Å"Is your wife still alive, Mr. Elliot?† â€Å"Of course she's alive. What did you think? I was going to tape your business card to her tombstone? Son, you're not cut out to be a salesman. You should get an honest job.† â€Å"I'm not a salesman, Mr. Elliot. I'm an old friend of your wife's. I need to talk to her. It's very important.† â€Å"She ain't home.† â€Å"Your wife's name is Amanda, right?† â€Å"That's right. But don't you try any of your sneaky tricks. You ain't no friend of the wife or I'd know you. And we got a vacuum cleaner that'd suck the hide off a bear, so go away.† Effrom started to close the door. â€Å"No, please, Mr. Elliot. I really need to speak to your wife.† â€Å"She ain't home.† â€Å"When will she be home?† â€Å"She's coming home tomorrow. But I'm warning you, son, she's even tougher than I am on flimflam men. Mean as a snake. You'd be best to just pack up your carpetbag and go look for honest work.† â€Å"You were a World War One veteran, weren't you?† â€Å"I was. What of it?† â€Å"Thank you, Mr. Elliot. I'll be back tomorrow.† â€Å"Don't bother.† â€Å"Thank you, Mr. Elliot.† Effrom slammed the door. His angina wrenched his chest like a scaly talon. He tried to breathe deeply while he fingered a nitroglycerin pill from his shirt pocket. He popped it into his mouth, and it dissolved on his tongue immediately. In a few seconds the pain in his chest subsided. Maybe he would skip lunch today, go right to his nap. Why the wife kept sending in those cards about insurance was beyond him. Didn't she know that â€Å"no salesman will call† was one of the three great lies? He resolved again to give her hell when she got home. When Travis got back into the car, he tried to hide his excitement from the demon. He fought the urge to shout â€Å"Eureka!† to pound on the steering wheel, to sing hallelujah at the top of his lungs. It might finally be coming to an end. He wouldn't let himself think about it. It was only a long shot, but he felt closer than he ever had to being free of the demon. â€Å"So, how's your old friend?† Catch said sarcastically. They had played this scene literally thousands of times. Travis tried to assume the same attitude he always had when faced with those failures. â€Å"He's fine,† Travis said. â€Å"He asked about you.† He started the car and pulled away from the curb slowly. The old Chevy's engine sputtered and tried to die, then caught. â€Å"He did?† â€Å"Yeah, he couldn't understand why your mother didn't eat her young.† â€Å"I didn't have a mother.† â€Å"Do you think she'd claim you?† Catch grinned. â€Å"Your mother wet herself before I finished her.† The anger came sliding back over the years. Travis shut off the engine. â€Å"Get out and push,† he said. Then he waited. Sometimes the demon would do exactly what he said, and other times Catch laughed at him. Travis had never been able to figure out the inconsistency. â€Å"No,† Catch said. â€Å"Do it.† The demon opened the car door. â€Å"Lovely girl you're going out with tonight, Travis.† â€Å"Don't even think about it.† The demon licked his chops. â€Å"Think what?† â€Å"Get out.† Catch got out. Travis left the Chevy in drive. When the car started moving, Travis could hear the demon's clawed feet cutting furrows in the asphalt. Just one more day. Maybe. He tried to think of the girl, Jenny, and it occurred to him that he was the only man he had ever heard of who had waited until he was in his nineties before going on his first date. He didn't have the slightest idea why he had asked her out. Something about her eyes. There was something there that reminded him of happiness, his own happiness. Travis smiled.

Fairytales May Convey a Hidden Message

As innocent as they seem, from the cute fairytales of Cinderella and her submissive character to the passionate story of Beauty and the Beast, a maiden who falls in love with a beast, the true meaning that lies beneath the pretty shell delivers a different message to children. The idea of the â€Å"traditional† role of women is constantly portrayed in many fairytales. Fairytales, although fantasy-like, still resemble aspects of the world and throughout history, women were considered inferior to men. †¦it is a fair assumption that in a world dominated by men, the fairy tale reflects the world as defined and organized by men†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Oliver 86). Stories such as The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Anderson, Cinderella and Snow White by the Grimm’s Brothers, and Beauty and the Beast (La Belle et la Bete) by Madame Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbet de Villeneuve, emphasize the different inequalities between men and women. â€Å"Girls in Fairyland do not triumph over male s; they obey. † (Oliver 86). An envious step-mother, a mistreated heroine, and a granted wish to go to the ball may not be the only meanings presented in the fairytale of Cinderella. A dangerous message sent to children, especially for young girls, is to be passive till a rescuer (in this case, Cinderella’s mother) to arrive and grant their wishes. Although obedience is a valuable lesson to be learned, Cinderella continues to be submissive to the extent which she is relentlessly abused by her step- mother. Yet, eventually, her passive role is rewarded and as a result, she lives happily ever after with her noble prince. †¦toying with the Cinderella motif, Gardner explodes the notion that every woman is simply waiting for a prince to come along and save her. † (Zipes A32). However, this message taught can be subconsciously embedded into children’s minds and during the periods of maturation, children will have the thought that suffering quietly will ultimately be rewarded. â€Å"While it m ay be true that fairytales offer metaphors for the unconscious (an argument as difficult to prove as to disprove) it is clear that they can affect cognition and belief. As the child absorbs environmental data, learns language, and develops cognition, she begins to say something to herself and about the world and her place in it. † (Oliver 86). Cinderella not only presents the idea of passiveness and femininity, but a message that step – mothers are evil. Throughout many fairytales, step – mothers, old, wise women are wicked and are meant to be overthrown or be rid of. â€Å"â€Å"Cinderella† is the supreme statement of the devastating nature of a parent’s [mother’s] unresolved and destructively acted out oedipal jealousy of a child. (Bettelheim 307). The oedipal mother acts out to destroy the daughter, but later, the daughter is rescued by a man from the evil. Everywhere in â€Å"Fairyland†, the domineering mother is set out to demolish the offspring. Eventually, the step-mother loses her power when trying to intimidate and becomes â€Å"silly†. (Bettelheim 307). Although many fairytales, inclu ding Cinderella, portray the mother in charge as tyrannical, it’s also common to see children having good relationships with their fathers as in Beauty and the Beast. Belle, the main character, has a close bond with her father unlike Cinderella, who poses as a threat to her step-mother. Not only does Belle share a good relationship with her father, but there is no mother figure in the fairytale. (Bettelheim 307). â€Å"†¦the girl’s oedipal father is the gentle, protective, loving man who hands her over to an acceptable suitor at the appropriate time. † (Oliver 87). Many fairytales other than Beauty and the Beast show the father as a caring man, while, on the other hand, mothers tend to have jealous, destructive feelings towards their children. Oliver 87). With the â€Å"loving father† and the â€Å"envious mother†, the message sent to children can be misleading and one-sided. Another example of the â€Å"wicked step-mother† is illustrated in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The innocent beauty, Snow White, and her feminine charms are similar to the common house wife by doing chores around the house while mai ntaining a certain image of perfection and beauty. Her step-mother is in â€Å"competition† with Snow White; activeness and power versus submissiveness and obedience. The competition between Snow white and the queen turns into a struggle for survival between two halves of a single personality: passivity and tractability as opposed to inventive and subversive activism. † (Barzilai 520). Once again, another fairytale shows the rivalry which the mother figure is set to destroy the daughter. The over-assertive woman (in this case, the queen) is represented as an envious monster. â€Å"The queen is characterized throughout in unremittingly negative terms: she is most often deemed â€Å"wicked†, but she is also proud, overbearing, and envious. (Barzilai 520). There are many examples in â€Å"Fairyland† which give a bad reputation towards the step-mother or the mother figure. Beauty and the Beast is a popular fairytale about a girl who falls in love with a beast and in return the beast becomes her prince. Luckily, for Belle, the beast’s true nature was a compassionate, kind- hearted man. However, it may not be the situation in the average lives of women who are constantly abused by their spouses. Young girls receive from this romantic love story that love will eventually change their partners. (Mangan 10). Beauty and the Beast, for example, is said to foster the notion that love can alter the nature of a man and make early absorbers of the information more inclined to stay with a violent partner in the hope that she can change his behaviour. † (Mangan 10). Fairytales deliver unrealistic ideas to young children, which send false hopes that can be hazardous. Little Mermaid, a young mermaid who risks all for her prince but suffers tragically in the end, conveys a message to young girls that in order to gain the love of a prince, one must sacrifice all and expect love in return. Still, any cursory sweep through childhood stories w ill reveal further examples of submissive women who were implicitly or explicitly offered up as role models during our formative years†¦The little mermaid who sacrifices her home, family and fishy tail for a crack at the oxygen-breathing prince. † (Mangan 10). In the fairytale, the young mermaid’s tail was traded for a pair of legs, but whenever she would walk, it struck her pain. She suffers throughout the story whenever she was asked to dance for the prince. Although the prince did not love her in return, the little mermaid continued to love him and was granted a soul. However, consequently, she became one with the sea or sea foam as punishment for not wedding the prince on time. Another example of inequality between the genders, why must the heroine suffer for the one she loves. There are many examples in â€Å"Fairyland† that convey the inequalities between genders. The step – mothers and the old witches are viewed as evil, overly- jealous women seeking destruction while the fathers and wise men are caring and compassionate. Cinderella, Snow White and Beauty and the Beast illustrate the different relationships between the heroine and her parents. Not only were women â€Å"evil† but the good ones were meant to be submissive and obedient. Cinderella’s passive example is later on rewarded which can deliver a misleading message to young girls. The Little Mermaid clearly points that she had to sacrifice all for her love. Beauty and the Beast is very dangerous for young girls that love will change their spouses. The innocent story which children for ages grew up to may not be innocent after all. Works Cited Barzilai, Shuli. Reading â€Å"Snow White†: The Mother’s Story. † Signs 15. 3 (1977): 274-300. Bettelheim, Bruno. The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales. New York: Random House, Inc. 1976. Mangan, Lucy. â€Å"G2: Women: Happily never after: Comatose princesses, submissive floor-scrubbers and evil stepmothers may not be the best of role models. à ¢â‚¬  The Guardian 2 May 2005: 10. Oliver, Rose. â€Å"Whatever Became of Goldilocks? † Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 2. 3 (1977): 85-93. Zipes, Jack. â€Å"Children’s Books; Kissing Off Snow White. † The New York Times 22 Mar. 1987: A32. ———————– 1 2