An Overview of Music Censorship essays

An Overview of Music Censorship essays Because the First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech, some opponents of music censorship believe that the courts can force a store to sell albums its management deems objectionable or forbid groups from burning records. The Supreme Court, however, can only step in if someone appeals a government decision, rather than a community one, to censor music; such appeals rarely reach the highest court in the land, since individual state governments can devise their own obscenity laws and penalties for violating them. Fighting censorship thus poses a catch-22, as musicians and concerned citizens can't deny a school's right to ban a concert on its premises and would face an uphill battle overturning a state's mandates on decency. Music censorship first reared its head in the 1950s, when rock and roll's growing influence threatened white, middle-class values. The 1960s saw the FBI's involvement in musician's personal and political lives, as officials began keeping tabs on Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, and John Lennon. Song references to sex and drugs tormented censors throughout the '60s and '70s, eventually giving way to hysteria over lyrics promoting suicide and devil worship in the 1980s. In 1985, the Parents Music Resource Center, led by a cadre of politicians' wives, called for the recording industry to place Parental Advisory stickers on potentially offensive albums. Instead of quelling concerns, the stickers unleashed a barrage of state laws that required retailers to regulate distribution or pay the price (a hefty fee or even jail time). In the meantime, the banned albums benefited from the notoriety. Ultimately, community and federal censors have threatened civil liberties while entangling their organizations in a costly fight to maintain an ambiguous definition of decency. Albums with explicit lyrics or content started having black and white parental advisories on them in 1994 (riaa.org/Parents-Advisory-4.cfm). Are t...

Samuel Slater and the Textile Revolution

Samuel Slater and the Textile Revolution Samuel Slater is an American inventor who was born on June 9, 1768.  He built several successful cotton mills in New England and established the town of Slatersville, Rhode Island.  His accomplishments have led many to consider him to be the Father of American Industry and the Founder of the American Industrial Revolution.   Coming to America During the United States early years,  Benjamin Franklin and the Pennsylvania Society for the Encouragement of Manufactures and Useful Arts offered cash prizes for any inventions that improved the textile industry in America. At the time, Slater was a young man living In Milford, England who heard that inventive genius was rewarded in America and decided to emigrate. At the age of 14, he had been an apprentice to Jedediah Strutt, a partner of Richard Arkwright  and  was employed in the counting-house and the textile mill, where he learned a lot about the textile business. Slater defied the British law against the emigration of textile workers in order to seek his fortune in America. He arrived in New York in 1789  and wrote to Moses Brown of Pawtucket to offer his services as a textile expert. Brown invited Slater to Pawtucket to see whether he could run the spindles that Brown had bought from the men of Providence. If thou canst do what thou sayest, wrote Brown, I invite thee to come to Rhode Island. Arriving in Pawtucket in 1790, Slater declared the machines worthless and convinced Almy and Brown that he knew the textile business enough to him a partner. Without drawings or models of any English textile machinery, he proceeded to build machines himself. On December 20, 1790, Slater had built carding, drawing, roving machines and two seventy-two spindled spinning frames. A water-wheel taken from an old mill furnished the power. Slaters new machinery worked and worked well. Spinning Mills and the Textile Revolution This was the birth of the spinning industry in the United States. The new textile mill dubbed the Old Factory was built at Pawtucket in 1793. Five years later, Slater and others built a second mill. And in 1806, after Slater was joined by his brother, he built another. Workmen came to work for Slater solely to learn about his machines and then left him to set up textile mills for themselves. Mills were built not only in New England but in other States. By 1809, there were 62 spinning mills in operation in the country, with thirty-one thousand spindles and twenty-five more mills being built or in the planning stages. Soon enough, the industry was firmly established in the United States. The yarn was sold to housewives for domestic use or  to professional weavers who made cloth for sale. This industry continued for years. Not only in New England, but also in those other parts of the country where spinning machinery had been introduced. In 1791, Slater married  Hannah Wilkinson, who would go on to invent two-ply thread and become the first American woman to receive a patent.​ ​Slater and Hannah had 10 children together, although four died during infancy. Hannah Slater died in 1812 from complications of childbirth, leaving her husband with six young children to raise. Slater would marry for a second time in 1817 to a widow named Esther Parkinson.

Management Analysis Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Management Analysis - Coursework Example The managing director, however, does not participate in preparing financial statements because the report is considered supplementary information (Finkler et al., 2013, p.477). However, compiling financial statements requires the assistance of managing directors in compliance with GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) outlined in GASB policies on management discussions and analysis. Guidelines on management discussions and analysis require managing directors to access readable documents for government enquiry on financial services based on relevant facts, conditions and decisions. It involves comparisons of different years based on the government’s gathered information on financial issues (Finkler et al., 2013, p.476). Furthermore, discussions must include the government’s general economic positions with outcomes of operations to assist the public in assessing financial positions and improvement of altered results on the year’s activities. Accountants and managing directors should include graphs, tables and charts appropriately in their financial reports to assist other managers in further analysis of information presented. Such information help in keeping relevant information and achieving goals set without following a rigid format that omits some valuable

Human Sexuality and Proponents of the Religious Viewpoint Essay

Human Sexuality and Proponents of the Religious Viewpoint - Essay Example By discriminating against homosexual, society becomes oblivious to the different factors that result in sexual attraction. Furthermore, the United States has one of the most elaborate bills of rights, one emulated by several democracies all over the world. It, therefore, becomes redundant for such a country to formulate and implement policies that stifle the very human rights that its bill of rights seek to defend. The proponents of the abolition of gay marriages are often religious leaders who continue to teach their followers that homosexuality is a sin and therefore not acceptable. They consist of both a section of Christians and their Muslim counterparts. While Christians continue to face division on the issue with several clerics already endorsing the gay marriages, their Muslim counterparts continue to maintain a more stringent view to the issue of homosexuality. Most Islamic states outlaw such acts thereby denying their population the freedom of choice. However, those in Ameri can society enjoy the liberal human rights that safeguard the interest of every human (Shanty and Patit 22). Religion is an important aspect of human life. Religion one of the most essential social pillars that hold the social fabric in societies together, it provides a benchmark with which people assess their behaviours thereby resulting in a cohesive society in which everyone enjoys equality. The American constitution safeguards the freedom of religion and worship thereby allowing the population to own different religions and viewpoints on their social life.

Rebeccas Structure Essay Example for Free

Rebeccas Structure Essay Explain the effectiveness of the structure of the text, Rebecca Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca is structured in a circular form, which is effective in displaying elements of the gothic genre and producing a sense of mystery and ambiguity. The fact that details are revealed gradually creates tension, and a desire to know, so that by the end of the novel the audience is satisfied with the complete story, despite the horrific truth regarding Rebecca’s murder. The text virtually revolves around a murder By using a BAB form, with a reference to the ending at the beginning of the novel, a sense of confusion and abstruseness is evoked among readers. The first chapter, in which the narrator supernaturally returns to Manderley, relives her experiences and mourns for the loss of such an exquisite property, is perplexing for the reader as the scene, characters and setting have not been established. This causes the audience to disregard the first chapter, as the second chapter begins with an entirely different setting and mood. Upon reaching the end of the novel, the reader grasps the meaning of the dream sequence, and the forgotten abstruseness is resolved. The audience is left content with all details of the story revealed, but, like most gothic tales, also chilled and unsettled with the shocking conclusion. Rebecca shows elements of the horror genre through the structure, in which the details are revealed throughout the story, by being analogous to many crime shows of today. In television programs such as CSI, a section of the fictional offense is shown, after which the team investigates the murder or other wrongdoing, and eventually discovers the callous yet complete truth. This order of events matches exactly with those in Rebecca, and it has the effect that we have an idea of the story, but become alarmed yet intrigued as more shocking details are revealed. The text is structured in a way that the scene is set and elaborated on throughout the book as the story and events take place, which causes the reader to experience confusion and a sense of incompetence. The fact that we are put in the place of the speaker allows us to experience everything she feels, knows and says. The narrator’s lack of knowledge concerning Rebecca’s death and murder is unnerving, as it makes us feel just as naive and oblivious as Mrs. de Winter. This is relevant to the gothic genre as it plays on the idea of being put in someone else’s place, which seems supernatural and ghost-like, as if the murder is something we can only learn about through the narrator, as everyone else is already in the know. This idea is further explored when Mrs. de Winter goes to live at Manderley, and unintentionally takes Rebecca’s place. The ingenuousness of the narrator, and how she gradually learns the truth about the murder, allows us to relate, and displays the ghost-like element of the gothic genre. In conclusion, the structure of Rebecca is effective in exemplifying the gothic genre because it references the end of the book at the beginning which creates confusion and mystery. Its effect on the readers is significant because it follows the structure of many crime shows, and makes us feel clueless, like the narrator.

Grade Retention Essay example -- essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Grade retention, better known as â€Å"staying back†, â€Å"being held back† or â€Å"repeating†, has been the topic of much debate within the educational system. The controversy which surrounds this long-standing issue has been reinforced by such topics as the recent endorsement of academic standards. Research indicates that â€Å"the rate of retention has increased by approximately 40% in the last 20 years with as many as 15% of all American students held back each year and 30-50% held back at least once before ninth grade† (Dawson, 1998). These discouraging statistics pose copious problems within a school system. The difficulties can be appreciated at the organizational level, as well as inside the classroom and, most troubling, within the individual students. The consequences, both positive and negative, reverberate throughout the school system. Grades retention is an issue which requires a prodigious amount of examination and shou ld be considered carefully and thoroughly.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Formally, grade retention is defined as the practice of requiring a student who has been in a given grade level for a full school year to return at that level for a subsequent year (Jackson, 1975). Unofficially, the practice is employed as a tool to enhance the academic or developmental growth for students who are unable to meet the curriculum requirements due to a variety of reasons. These reasons can include decreased cognitive functioning, physical immaturity, social-emotional difficulties and failure to pass standardized assessments. A child may be considered for retention if he has poor academic skills, is small in stature, is the youngest in the class, has moved frequently, has been absent repeatedly, does poorly on prescreening assessments or has limited English-language skills (Robertson, 1997). Additionally, the typical profile of a retained child is more likely to reveal an elementary school-aged student who is a black or Hispanic male with a late birthd ay, developmental delay, attentional problems, low socioeconomic status, single-parent household with a parent who either does not or cannot intervene on behalf of the child (Robertson, 1997; Mattison, 2000). Also seen in retained children are the predictive health factors of hearing and speech impairments, low birth weight, enuresis and exposure to cigarette smoke within the home (Byrd... ...ommended, what should parents do? ERIC Clearinghouse on Elementary and Early Childhood Education. Champaign, IL. Parker, Dennis R. (2001). Social promotion or retention? Leadership, 30 (4),12-16. Jackson, G. (1975). The research evidence on the effects of grade retention. Review of Educational Research, 45, 613-635. Holmes, C. T. (1989). Synthesis of recent research on nonpromotion: A five-year follow-up. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American education research Association, San Francisco, CA. Natale, J. A. (1991). Rethinking grade retention. Educational Digest, 56 (9), 30-34. Slavin, Robert E., Karweit, N., & Wasik, B. Preventing early school failure: What works? Educational Leadership, 50 (4). Darling-Hammond, Linda. (1998). Avoiding both grade retention and social promotion. The School Administrator, 48-53. Byrd, Robert S., & Weitzman, Michael L. (1994). Predictors of early grade retention among children in the United States. Pediatrics, 93 (3), 481-488. Mattison, Richard E. (2000). School Consultation: A review of research on issues unique to the school environment. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolscent Psychiatry,

Strategic Drift

Identify four organisations that, in your view, are in the different phases of strategic drift (see Exhibit 5. 2). Justify your selection. Strategic drift, as defined by Gerry Johnson in Exploring Corporate Strategy, is the tendency to develop strategies incrementally on the basis of historical and cultural influences, while failing to keep pace with a changing environment. In such circumstances the strategy of the organization gradually drifts away from the realities of its environment and towards an internally determined view of the world of management. Strategic drift occurs when a company, especially one that has enjoyed considerable success, responds far too slowly to changes in the external environment and continues with the strategy that once served it very well. There are four phases in strategic drift; incremental change (phase 1), strategic drift (phase 2), flux (phase 3) and transformational change or death (phase 4). Phase 1 is characterized by relatively long periods during which strategies are either unchanged or change incrementally. This change is generally in keeping with the environment or may have slight variations around a successful theme as the company avoids drifting too far from some past successes. In phase 2 the environment grows at a faster rate than the firm’s strategies. This may occur for several reasons, that is ; while one may be aware that changes are happening, the extent may not be so easily appreciated except in hindsight or as reflected through the financials; it could also be that while the changes are observed they are interpreted in terms of the familiar thus resulting in the wrong conclusion being drawn. There is also the situation where although the firm may see the environmental drift, it refuses to align as it binds itself to the successful strategies of the past. These strategies become the company’s core around which it revolves and has its competitive advantage. Another contributory factor can also be unwillingness of the firm to alter the current relationships with suppliers, customer base or the internal skills to align with the market. Phase 3 may be a period of flux as management pressured to alter the firm’s strategies in response to downturn in profit does so but not in any clear direction. Internal rivalry may be high as solutions are sought to determine which strategy to follow. There may also be loss of confidence in the company resulting in lowering share prices. As the situation worsens there are three options in phase 4. The firm can die, be taken over by another organization or simply go through a period of transformational change. Motorola found itself in phase 4 of the strategic drift in the late 90’s as in response to depressed profits it was forced to conduct a series of layoffs, restructures and restrategising before transforming. According to Sydney Finkelstein article on â€Å"Why smart executives fail†, Motorola which was founded in 1928 has had a long tradition of technological innovations. It solidified its reputation as a world leader in this area through innovation with the television, pager, microprocessor, analogue phone among other things. Motorola’s first cellular system began commercial operation in 1983 with them becoming the world top cellular phone supplier shortly thereafter. They claimed 60 per cent of the US mobile market, revenues growing at an average of 27 percent to $27 billion in 1994, while net income surged 58 per cent a year to $1. billion. During this period, although digital mobile technology was introduced, it was not embraced by Motorola even after receiving several signals from the market. The market signals included – direct prodding by their customers requesting that they provide the new technology especially based on the benefits offered; increase in royal ty income from digital patent it licensed to Nokia and Erikson and finally the falling market shares and profit. Motorola’s shares dip to 34 percent in the early 1998’s, while Nokia’s share went from 11 per cent to 34 per cent during the same time period. That same year Motorola laid off 20,000 employees. Motorola was fully poised with the potential to maintaining their position as market leader using digital technology however they chose to rely on internal forecasting models that predicted carriers would be better off with analogue phones rather than digital. Sony whose mission statement was ‘a clever company that would make new high technology products in ingenious ways’ aggressively marketed its hardware entering the big league when it formed a joint venture with CBS Records in 1975 with the launch of the new technology – the Betamax home videocassette recorder. Within two years a new videocassette recorder (VCR) made by it arch-rival Matsushita using the VHS standard became the product of choice for consumers. This happened as Sony was too busy defending the hardware than marketing and creating customers. Matsushita, on the other hand, aggressively aligned electronics firms to their brand so that when motion picture studios began to release a larger number of their library titles VHS was the format of choice. ‘We didn’t put enough effort into making a family. The other side, coming later, made a family’, founder Akio Morita later stated. Sony also concluded that the compelling reason for the purchase of hardware is software. Resulting from lessons learnt from competition with arch rival Matsushita, Sony adjusted their strategy. Consequently, convinced that its record library had helped guarantee the success of the Compact Disc, Sony looked to CBS Records to provide the software necessary to ensure the success of its new Digital Audio Tape. In the years that followed Sony acquired expensive movie studios to showcase their impressive arsenal of hardware. As much attention was not paid to the American management team and the lavish spending spree on renovation production, management, and television ballooned. Overheads increased by 50 per cent to $300 million by 1991, some $60 million greater than other major studios, and its $700 million production budget were nearly twice that of its competitors. The average Sony motion picture cost $40 million versus the industry average of $28 million. In November 1994 Sony announced a $3. 2 billion write-off related to Columbia Pictures which wiped out nearly 25 per cent of Sony’s shareholders’ equity. It was not until Sony found itself here in phase 3 of the strategic, drift having major decline in shareholder values, that it restructured its management team and strategies. Wang Labs based on strategies created in an attempt to avoid the mistakes of the past found itself in phase 4 of the strategic drift as it filed for bankruptcy in 1992. An Wang, an inventor and innovator, sold several of his creations to companies who used them to make products for commercial uses. Resulting from one such deal with IBM in 1956, Wang’s feeling of being cheated by the computer giant biased his future decisions towards them. Starting from the late 80’s Wang Labs lost out when the world shifted from using word processors to PC, however they were blinded by their love for the word processors and made major losses as IBM took the PC to the market. Wang could have raise capital by issuing shares however because he felt that he had given up too much of the company in a similar past transaction he refused and instead opted to seek loans According to Paul Golding, prior to 1999 the Jamaican telecommunications sector was dominated by Cable and Wireless Jamaica (C&WJ), which changed its name in 2008 to LIME (Landline Internet Mobile, Entertainment). In 1988 the company was granted five exclusive licenses each for 25 years, which would be valid until 2013, with options for extensions for a further 25 years. The licenses made C&WJ the sole provider of the island’s domestic and international telephone service and guaranteed an after-tax rate of return of 17. 5% – 20%. C&WJ was quite comfortable with the strategies they employed especially as they were a monopoly in these early years. This resulted in the organization being stuck in phase 1 as they became complacent, relying on the same old strategies as technology boomed globally. They were â€Å"out of touch† with customer demand and the untapped potential of the market. Liberalization of the telecommunications market commenced with the granting of two new carrier licenses for the provision of domestic mobile voice, data, and information services. In April 2001 Digicel launched its mobile telecommunication company in Jamaica. Rates rose from 4 per cent in 2001 (Digicel’s launch year) to close to 100 per cent today – making it one of the most highly penetrated countries in the world and driving a grassroots level ICT development across Jamaica. Of the less than 2. million local population, Digicel Jamaica has 2 million customers, representing a 75% market share. Additionally, scores of small entrepreneurs owe their successes to a reliance on their Digicel phones, especially in areas where there were no previous mobile signals by the competition. On October 27th, Digicel announced its intention to move its Jamaica and Group offices to a bra nd new facility on the waterfront in downtown Kingston, demonstrating its commitment to spearhead the rejuvenation of this area of the capital city of the first country in which Digicel launched back in 2001. In April 2001, when Digicel launched its GSM mobile service in Jamaica, the company anticipated reaching the 100,000 customer plateau by the end of its first year in operation. Instead, it hit the 100,000 mark a mere 100 days after launch. Never before in the country’s history of mobile telecommunications had such tremendous growth been seen in a network, as Digicel broke record after record on its way to surpassing its major competitor as the mobile provider with the largest customer base in the island. It took LIME, its major competitor approximately 10 years to reach the 400,000 customer mark. In comparison, it took Digicel about 13 months to reach the same figure. Digicel's customer base in 2010 was over 2. 1 million customers in a population of 2. 8 million. Digicel raised the bar where an acceptable level of network coverage was concerned. Jamaicans living in rural parishes finally had a genuine option for mobile communications. With an island-wide network of over 1,000 cellular towers spread across all 14 parishes, Digicel firmly established itself as the mobile provider with the premier network coverage across the country. Digicel currently appears to be in Phase 2 of the strategic drift as its strategy of providing islandwide service has materialised and it continues to be poised towards supplying any further required hardware. However there is growing concern that Digicel needs to review its customer service as well as its rates. If you really want to understand a company, you need to understand its history and culture. In analyzing an organization one of the most common flaws is to disregard the past in trying to make sense of the present. Culture is also a major component of history, as is highlighted with Motorola that is known as an engineering-driven company. It is likened in its mindset to an ‘internal think-tank’, focused on the market while customers are secondary. Digicel is also similar in this regards as its main focus appears to be on the hardware and to a lesser extent the customer. Motorola’s had an insular culture where its workforce had a ‘fortress mentality, cut off from reality, in-bred, with tremendous self-confidence, and a lack of concern with the outside world’. One former CEO stated, ‘every time we stumble significantly it is because we have been so successful in one generation of the technology that we don’t focus on replacing ourselves with the next technology quick enough’ People make sense of new issues in the context of past issues; they are likely to address a problem in much the same way as they dealt with a previous similar one. Moreover, they are likely to search for evidence that supports those inclinations. So some data will be seen as more important than other data, and some may not be taken on board at all. The important points are: * The interpretation of events and issues in terms of prior experience is inevitable. The idea that managers approach strategic problems and issues entirely dispassionately and objectively is unrealistic. * Such interpretation and bias arise from experience of the past, not least with regard to what is seen to have worked or given rise to problems. So the future is likely to be made sense of in terms of the past. As with individuals, so also with groups – managers do not operate purely as individuals; they work and interact with others, and at the collective level, too, there are reasons to expect experience to count. This is reflected in the taken-for-granted assumptions and ingrained organizational routines that are collectively referred to as ‘organizational culture’. Such taken-for-granted assumptions and routines can be especially important as an influence on the development of organizational strategy. For a group or organization to operate effectively, there has to be a generally accepted set of assumptions which in effect, represents the collective experience without which people would have to ‘reinvent their world’ for different circumstances. As with individual experience, this shared understanding allows the collective experience gathered over years to be brought to bear to make sense of a given situation, to inform a likely course of action, and to gauge the likelihood of the latter’s success. Such collective thinking typically stretches even beyond the organization. Managers may assume that they can manage the environment, but the evidence is that the environment largely determines managerial action. If managers sensitize themselves to the influence of the history of their organisation they stand a better chance of better appreciating their current strategy and may be able to detect and avoid strategic drift. Managers would more likely to be able to question the extent to which the strategy they are seeking to develop is usefully informed by that history as distinct from being driven or captured by it.