An essay on the novel Frankenstein Essay Example for Free

An essay on the novel Frankenstein Essay The novel Frankenstein is as relevant and terrifying today as it was when it was first published At the time that Mary Shelly wrote the book Frankenstein the idea of creating and bringing people back to life using electricity was a prominent idea in science. She was also reading Emile by a famous French philosopher Rousseau where he argues that mans nature is harmless but is made evil by society. These ideas help to influence her novel and contribute to the key themes. When Mary Shelly was young her mother died and this ties in with the character of Victor whose mother also dies from giving birth to his brother William, who is later murdered by the creature, (Mary Shelly also had a son called William who died at the age of 3). Mary Shellys first child died twelve days after she was born, she had a dream that her child had come back to life she wrote Dream that my little baby came to life again that it had only been cold and that we rubbed it by the fire and it lived I awake and find no baby I think about the little thing all day this tragedy is reflected in Frankenstein with the idea of bringing the dead back to life. Mary Shellys own childhood seems to have been brought up in the character of the creature, the creature was abandoned by Victor and Mary Shelly seems to feel that her mother abandoned her because she died when Shelly was only a baby. The book Frankenstein has three different narrators though out the novel; Robert Walton, the captain of a ship heading for the North Pole. Victor Frankenstein the creator of the creature and finally the creature itself, although Victor and the creatures stories are embedded in Waltons narrative. Mary Shelly uses Waltons letters to his sister to tell the story from his point of view and that of Victor and the creature. The book starts with Walton writing letters to his sister. Walton then encounters Victor Frankenstein when his ship can go no further north because it is stuck in the ice; Victor Frankenstein has been traveling across the ice following the creature and is ill because of the cold. Robert Walton takes him aboard his ship where Victor Frankenstein tells him the story of creating the creature. Victor tells him about his childhood in Geneva which he spent with his cousin Elizabeth. Victor went to the University of Ingolstadt. While he was there he became obsessed with the idea of bringing people back to life. Victor thinks he has found the secret of life and puts together a human being from bits of other dead people. It was a dreary night in November when he finally brings the creature to life. He looks at the repulsive thing that he has created and it horrifies him. He tries to sleep but is disturbed by dreams of his mother and Elizabeth I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms, he wakes up to see the creature standing over him. Mary Shelly is increasing the tension and making the reader more involved. He escaped into the streets of Igolstadt and runs into his friend Clerval, who had come to study at the university. Victor takes his friend back to his apartment, but he finds that the creature is no longer there. He then becomes ill from a fever; the sickness is a sign that he has realized the horror of what he has done. Before he returns to Geneva he receives a letter from his father telling him his brother William has been murdered. Victor hurries home and when he was passing through the woods where William was murdered, he catches sight of the creature and is convinced the creature killed him, Mary Shelly is increasing the horror with each event as the story unfolds. Victor took a holiday in the mountains to try and ease his grief for his brother. While he is alone one day, crossing a glacier, the creature approaches him. The creature then tells Victor what has happened to him he describes running away from Igolstadt after he was assaulted by the towns people, and how he hid away in forests where he discovered fire. He discovers a small shed where he spends some time as he is sheltered from the rain; there is a small peep hole where he can look in to a family house this is where he learns to speak as there is a foreigner in the house who the family is teaching to speak their language. The creature asks Victor to create another creature for him to be his companion. Victor agrees but later after he has started he destroys the second creature so the creature tells him he will be there on Victors wedding night. On his return to Geneva Victor marries Elizabeth. He fears what the creature said to him and that he will kill him. To be careful he sends Elizabeth away to wait for him. While he waits for the creature, he hears Elizabeth scream and Victor realizes that the creature had been hinting at killing his new wife. Victor returns home and his father dies of sorrow shortly after. Victor says that he will devote the rest of his life to finding the creature and getting his revenge. Victor tracks the creature northwards and it becomes icy. Victor almost catches up with the creature, but the ice breaks and Victor cannot reach the creature. Victor dies shortly after he finishes telling his story. Walton then tells the remainder of the story in letters written to his sister. When Walton returns, several days later, to the room in which the body lies he is shocked to see the creature weeping over Victor. The creature tells Walton about his suffering. He then says that now his creator has died he can end his own torment. The creature then walks off for the northernmost ice to die. In chapter 5 Shelly describes how the monster comes to life and how Frankenstein has a nervous breakdown. He had spent two years working on the creature and it turned out to be an abomination in his eyes. Shelly tries to terrify the reader by using some very strong emotive words with an anxiety that almost lead to agony, she makes the creature look as grotesque as possible His yellow skin barely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath she also writes his watery eyes, that seemed almost the same as the dun white sockets. Victor never refers to the creature as a human; he refers to it as a wretch, monster, creature and demonical corpse, this helps to show how Victor rejects the creature as soon as he has brought it to life just because of the way it looks, this is how the creature is treated by society through out the rest of the novel, he is seen as a monster and is rejected by society. These make the creature seem repulsive and grotesque, the thoughts of this creature would have terrified readers when it was first published but I do not think that it has the same effect on readers today. Far worse things are viewed in many places for example on the internet, television or in newspapers although something which had an appearance like the creature would probably still be rejected by society today and would still be considered horrifying.

Women and Islam Essay -- Islamic Females Islam Essays

Women in Islam   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Religious institution has a profound impact on any and every society. Social norms, mores, and expectations are mostly defined by our belief systems, even if we ourselves don’t practice a religion. Government too is always based on common agreement upon what is right and wrong, and who is to rule. A society can experience violent opposition and revolutions because of radical religious groups. There’s no doubt about it. In any society, small or large, primitive or modern, religious institution plays a leading role. Islam is no exception. This paper will explore three critical aspects of Islamic society. The first is Democracy. Just how incompatible is an Islamic society with democracy? Secondly, how are women treated by Islamic society? Are they treated as equal to men, and why? Lastly, is Islam conducive to human rights? Is this reflected by Islamic governments? All of these questions and more will be considered in the following. It’s definitely not the first time it’s been asked. Can Democracy really function in an Islamic society? Some say yes, some say no. But the answer doesn’t seem to be quite so black and white. The Muslim countries in the world today are all different, and all have or have had different relationships with democracy. In order to better understand the answer to this question, we must look at some of the factors that influence the relationship between Islam and Democracy. According to Daniel E. Price, there are seven major categories of influences on the relationship between Islam and Democracy. These are historical influences, regime strength, regime strategy for dealing with political Islam, Islamic political groups, modernization/economics/demographics, politicized sectarian, ethnic, linguistic, or class cleavages, and minority religious groups. In history, there have been several notable aspects of society that have influence on Muslim countries. Colonialism has obviously induced a sort of backfiring from Radical Islam, and it is for this reason that most Muslim Countries that have had a history of Colonialism have a stronger presence of Radical Islam. These countries include Algeria, Syria, and Egypt. There is a stronger lingering hostility toward ideas attributed to the West (liberalism and democracy) and Westernized classes because of their association with the former colonial overlords. (Price, ... ...rn ideology. There is nothing in the Qur’an or Sharia that actually directly confirms that these three aspects of Islamic society are exactly as we in the West perceive. The problem is that the way that Muslims interpret their scriptures is contrary and even offensive to the West and its common ideologies. Lastly, the criticism and influence from the West toward Islamic culture, in addition to historical colonialization, only intensifies their rejection of the West and its criticism, and actually seems to make the problems concerning Democracy, women, and human rights even worse. Bibliography Esposito, John L. 1980 Islam and Development: Religioni and Sociopolitical Change   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Syracuse University Press: Syracuse. Macionis, John J. 1992 Society: The Basics   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Lehigh Press, Inc.: New Jersey. Price, Daniel E. 1999 Islamic Political Culture, Democracy, and Human Rights: A Comparative Study   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Praeger Publishers: Connecticut. Spellberg, D.A. 1994 Politics, Gender, and the Islamic Past: The Legacy of A’isha Bint Abi Bakr   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Columbia University Press: New York. Turner, Bryan S. 1974 Weber and Islam   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Western Printing Services Ltd: Great Britain.

Managing in Hospitality Organizations

IntroductionThe role of management in an organization, especially employee management, is crucial and determines the performance and success of the organization. It is thus essential to measure and address employee apprehension towards any change of scenario within the organization. This paper addresses employee management methods to bring about a change in their perception of a new scenarios as desirable and motivating. This involves bringing a strong shift from an intuitive stance of opposing change that stems for inertial comfort in the current setup.This paper is centered on the decision of a hotel owner to change the target clientele of the hotel from international tourists to the high-end market. The five star hotel ‘Walkerhill’ is located in the suburbs, quite far from the International airport and has this disadvantage over its competitors in terms of location. However this change would possibly be met with resistance from employees and managers, many of whom hav e worked for about 10 years. This paper puts forth approaches and methods to amiably change the perception of employees and managers at two levels – the group level and at an individual level. The objective is to convince them to adopt the changes in full trust and enthusiasm and make the new setup a successful and high-performance driven one.The next two sections discuss methods that can be employed at a group level. The first section concentrates on interpersonal behavior in the organization. It suggests how manager and employee groups can be amiably convinced about the necessity for change by acquiring their trust and involving them in the decision making process, while keeping the change in place.The second section emphasizes on the importance of a good team and processes that help in bringing about the change productively. The third section addresses coping up with organizational change at the individual level. It describes how the owner and management can communicate wi th the employees to reduce apprehensions and stress about the impending change and make them comfortable.The fourth and last section describes the role motivation plays in bringing about a positive change and high performance within an organization. Organizational changes if implemented as a drive to seek higher goals that require increased challenges, positive change in atmosphere and a renewed recognition of individual performance and achievement, can transform the common apprehension into an openly received change.Group level Interpersonal Behavior in the Workplace To convince the management, the owner must be able to communicate his ideas, logic and perceptions clearly. The owner might face some difficulty in bringing this change, since the managers have been around for long, and probably know their trade well as much as hold a strong affinity for their experience in the setup. However, there is an amicable possibility for this change.One of the things that the owner can do is g ain the trust of his managers. However, it cannot be a calculus-based approach to trust or an identification-based approach – it has to be brought through organizational citizenship behavior. Specifically, the owner has to make sure that each member of the management is treated fairly. For instance, with this issue he must give each and every one a chance to voice out his/her opinion regarding upgrading the hotel and explain why he or she is against it. This will let them know that even though the owner’s ideas may be in conflict with those of the management, the owner still values their knowledge and respects their position as managers.Once they all get their chance to share their thoughts, the owner should then explain his side, but without apparently competing with his managers about the better plan, as this will only create friction, in the form of substantive conflict and it will be even more difficult to convince the management to upgrade the hotel. Instead, the party should negotiate or bargain, and try to find a common ground. Since everyone has had his/her side heard under this approach, they can address the questions surrounding the issue of why upgrading to a 5-star hotel might be a bad idea, and what can be done to turn this around, to compensate for or resolve it.Lastly, the owner should try to control his emotions when explaining his side. No matter how harsh or how blunt the management may be, regarding his decisions as â€Å"unnecessary†, the owner must remain emotionally stable. The same goes for the management—if one of them suddenly starts raising his voice, he should be calmed down before proceeding with the meeting. They should also be reminded of their positions—they are managers, not owners—and should respect the owner’s authority over them. The owner himself should not push his weight around.Group Processes and Work Teams At Walkerhill, we value good teamwork, since good teams are more pr oductive.   To accomplish this, most productive teams must be assembled to maximize the value of their productivity.A highly productive team must be assembled that offers maximum productivity. There are no absolute set of rules to follow in assembling a good team, since every situation is different and no two minds think alike.   However, through case studies we will show guidelines in building a good team.A way to build a good team here is to incorporate healthy acceptance of changes required for a new setup that caters to a different clientele, that is, the shift from serving tourists to a high-end market.   We must incorporate this attitude into the leaders of the hotel, which means this kind of training must start with the managers.   We believe change of attitude is infectious, so changing a negative minded manager into one with a positive mindset towards the hotel’s changes isn’t just adding a positive mind but eliminating one negative mind and adding a p ositive mind.An example we would like to use is to convince the managers that instead of changing our clientele from tourists to the high-end market, we are adding or broadening our market to increase/diversify our target market.   This approach may also assure the employees that we are not abandoning our tourist market.   A positive manager is far more impactful than a positive employee.However, the manager of the team can’t influence the team much if the managers and the employees are not close.   The levels of bonds between the team members are called group cohesiveness.   To strengthen the level of group cohesiveness, we like to use two determinants of cohesiveness: group size and history of success.   We like to minimize the size of each team so the teams can work to their full potential.We can’t put a specific number of individuals per team because the need of minimum number of individuals is different for each department.   Of course, we would not be hesitant to add more individuals to a team if needed.   By minimizing the number of members needed to perform at a high grade, we can cut the labor cost and limit the level of social loafing because smaller groups eliminate social loafing.We also believe that competitiveness is good to have within the organization.   To promote this, we would have a chart indicating which teams had the best performance compared to ones in similar departments.   In addition, the winners would be rewarded for their hard work.   The reward system would reward monthly/annually and individuals/teams.   A 360 degrees approach would be applied to the feedback collection system in order to incorporate feedback at all levels within the organization to help it run more efficiently.Coping with Organizational Life: Stress and Careers In the hotel’s situation, we can raise the issue about the stress in terms of individual level. Usually, people do not like change. Some people feel scared when t hey face some change in their life. In the hotel’s case, the managers and employees were being asked for a big change by the owner of the hotel. As is the common psychology, the managers and employees did not like the change. They wanted to keep the same conditions in the hotel’s operation.In this situation, we can suppose that the managers and employees would have got some psychological pressures such as fear, uncertainty, overload, and heavy responsibility from the sudden request. We can also suppose that they would have suffered from a lot of stress by the pressures. We recognize that the owner should deal with the issue about the managers and employees’ psychological pressures and stress. In short, the owner should consider how he can relieve the managers and employees from the psychological pressures and stress, so for them to accept the new change without any resistance.As a key solution of the situation, we can think of the owner’s effective commun ications skills. The effective communications skills should include the following key points: a reasonable basis for the change, a positive and successful prospect from the change, and vast benefits for managers and employees.As the reasonable basis for the change, the owner can suggest a few examples such as decrease of the foreign tourists, or increase of the demand of the domestic high –end market. In the respect of the positive and successful prospect from the change, the owner can also represent several examples such as upgraded brand image of the hotel, more effectiveness in hotel’s operation, and increase of the profits.   In the respect of the benefit for managers and employees, the owner can suggest a few promises such as more improved work environment, higher valued position for the managers and employees, and wage raise.Through those effective communications skills, the owner would indicate the positive aspects for the change, and, through those positive a spects, he would gradually relieve the psychological pressures and stress existing within the managers and employees. As the result, we can expect that the mangers and employees would accept the change without any resistance.Motivating People to Work Towards a Change One consequential factor in making the employees of an organization accept a change and increase performance in the new scenario is motivation. Once the managers are open to the change, the next step is to cascade the motivation, benefits and ownership of the change down to the employees. This can be done at various levels through a combination of different approaches.The first step towards motivating employees to perform at a maximum level of creativity and be a valuable asset to an organization is to ensure that their basic needs are being met. The change should be perceived as enhancing the facilities that meet their lower and rudimentary needs, like good salary for personal needs, an environment that is physically a nd psychologically safe to work in and is conductive to social affiliation and professional bonding. Once an employee finds that these things are in place, and a change will only enhance these factors, maximized performance, desire for success and recognition of accomplishments come naturally.Another step that motivates people is the urge to fill the gap between differences of outcomes and efforts in a job and turn relationships into equitable ones where ratios of outcome/input are similar between their colleagues and co-workers. This factor can be employed to increase motivation at two levels. One is by showing that the change put the employees at par in benefits with employees of other luxury hotels, who may be enjoying more remuneration for the similar responsibilities. The second approach is to introduce transparency in the organization so that employees are aware of roles that are fulfilled responsibly and achieve a good outcome/input ratio, thus stimulating them to model it.Th e hotel should have a very transparent scenario for rewarding and growth that makes the employees aware that a good performance is visible and appreciated at the top-most organizational level. The employees feel motivated to increase effort to enhance performance and are confident of being recognized and rewarded. This also recursively adds to the atmosphere of the organization and keeps people happy, which in turn also enhances motivation and appreciation of a conductive setup.One important approach to making employees work towards a new scenario is setting new goals and making them recognize the challenges of a higher goal level. Combined with a reassurance in the possibility of attaining the feasible yet possibly difficult end, goal setting enhances performance strongly by inducing a desire to reach a goal and feel competent while realizing self-efficacy. Difficult tasks and high goal commitment together maximize performance as opposed to low commitment. To achieve this specific, high performance goals need to be defined. Goals should be difficult yet feasible. This should be combined with feedback, which facilitates in gauging goal attainment. And lastly, this should be allowed time as it takes some time to reach and sustain performance at the new level.A new scenario brings about new job responsibilities. Jobs should be designed as to increase the motivation and performance of the employees. Each role should be designed as to appear inherently appealing. Jobs can include more number of tasks at the same level of responsibility and skills (horizontal loading) or with higher levels of skills and responsibilities (vertical loading). The new role should make people feel that they are doing meaningful and valuable work.Meaningfulness of a work is impacted by skills variety, degree to which a task requires responsibility from beginning to end (task identity) and task significance , as to the impact it has on others. Responsibility for outcome of work is determi ned by autonomy the employees have in determining their own task plan, schedule, etc. Knowledge of the actual result of activities is driven by feedback. This gives the employees a measure of their growth and development. All these together result in employee motivation, performance and satisfaction.ConclusionAn organization operates successfully as a function of the employees’ motivation, committed performance, sense of ownership, growth and satisfaction. While any organization constantly changes and evolves during its life, a sharp change almost always accompanies with employee insecurity and apprehension. Thus it requires foresight, planned and calculated effort to assuage the employee mindset and make it welcome the changed scenario as positive. This requires employing various methods at group and individual levels to make the benefits of change apparent.It is important to involve the employee as a part owner of the change and be a proactive participant in the action plan for the change. This also helps the top decision-makers and owners see details that may have been overlooked in planning the strategy to meet change.The organizational modifications can be brought about successfully through adopting productive processes and forming productive teams. Good teams come with a good degree group cohesiveness and healthy competition.Changes come with employee stress and insecurity, which need to be specifically addressed by the top-level management. An organization needs to show the employee it cares, and the key to this is effective communication. Measures need to be taken to overcome individual stress.Lastly, a positive atmosphere is a predecessor of good performance. The rudimentary needs like comfort and security of employees should be enhanced so that they can concentrate on achieving success and maximizing their level of creativity. Awareness of the organizational roles and at par rival-organization roles gives employees impetus to fill the gap in t he ratio of outcome versus input. A positive variation inspires positive traversal.An organization that is transparent and rewarding inspires employees to expect reward for personal effort and makes them go that extra mile. Well defined, challenging yet achievable goals ensure high employee commitment. In addition job roles defined to increase the skills levels used, ownership of a task life and marked by impactful tasks augment the meaningfulness of the work. Autonomy in choosing the action plan for task enhances sense of responsibility. Additionally, feedback enhances measure of goal attainment thus resulting in an employee’s professional growth. All of this together contribute to the performance, satisfaction and motivation of the employees and result in low absenteeism and turnover.

My Capstone Project Is A Set Of Five Free Verse Poems

My Capstone project is a set of five free-verse poems that include one of my own experiences as an Asian immigrant. Poems are a way to express and convey a thought or belief into short, original, and creative literature. In my DOC capstone, I chose to write a couple free-verse poems from different point of views and of different racial views. Using five different races, I depicted the hardships of the time in order to display a creative point of view of the minority groups in the United States. Utilizing DOC terms, there will be deep analyses of intersectionality, dominant ideology, racial formation, emergent ideologies, and residual ideologies. The main purpose of my project is to provide the true hardships many races suffer due to the emergent, dominant and residual ideologies of white supremacy, struggles of immigration, and the struggles of racial formation. In the first verse, I convey to the readers that when hegemonic ideals, what people consider common sense on how to act or think towards a certain idea, become negative and violent, such as white supremacy, towards a race, it becomes extremely threatening and disturbing. Throughout United States’ history, the violence and struggles the African Americans experience are universally known. In the first verse of the poem, I put the point of view as an African American child. In the United States, there have been many forms of racial violence and hatred, especially with the United States being a strongly white