Mid-Term Break Essay

‘Mid-term Break’ was written in 1966 by Seamus Heaney. This poem is autobiographical as it was written about a real event of Heaney’s life. It is about him and his family grieving from the death of his four year old brother. When the tragedy struck he was only fourteen. This poem focuses on how people reacted to the death. The title of this poem is unusual as a mid-term break is normally thought of as a break off school that has been planned beforehand but in the poem it is unexpected. I feel that Heaney is very honest when he writes about how people reacted to the death of his brother. The poem is set into eight stanzas, the first seven contain three lines and the last only contains one. The first stanza is set in the sick bay of what we think is his boarding school. Heaney was waiting on his neighbours to pick him up and take him home. We wonder why he was sitting in a sick bay and not at home with his family. Heaney seemed bored of waiting: â€Å"I sat all morning†¦ counting bells knelling classes to a close.† This phrase ‘counting bells’ suggests that time was passing by slowly. The word ‘all’ is emphasised as if he is really bored and can’t wait to leave the sick bay. The quote also includes alliteration on the letter ‘l’ showing the long chiming of the bells. The connotations of the word ‘knelling’ are it reminds us of funerals and church bells which also suggest something not so nice has happened. Throughout the stanza we wonder what he is waiting for and why the neighbours are picking him up and not his parents, which suggests that something has happened to them which leaves us with an uneasy feeling. The second stanza is set outside the family home on the front porch. When Heaney arrives home he meets his father crying which is unusual for him as his father normally took ‘funerals in his stride.’ Heaney also meets ‘Big Jim Evans’ who is suggested to be a family friend or a farm worker. ‘Big Jim Evans’ makes a tactless comment by saying ‘it was a hard blow.’ On first reading you don’t realise how awkward the situation would be for Heaney after the tactless comment was made. Some people may react very harshly to the comment as it is a very upsetting time for families and friends,  although we only realise the full extent of this gate at the end of the poem. The next three stanzas are set in the living room with many grieving family members and friends paying their respects. These stanzas are joined by enjambment as the poem carries on after each stanza without full stops. As Heaney entered the living room his youngest sibling ‘cooed and laughed and rocked the pram’ in excitement, an activity that seemed out of place for such a sad event. He was also embarrassed by the older men shaking his hand as he walked through the door. He felt very awkward as it was an unusual thing to happen to him. The old me were telling him how sorry they were for his trouble. Strangers where being informed that he was the eldest, away at school. Heaney noticed that they were whispering which would have meant the situation would have been awkward for him. Heaney’s mother took his hand in hers which wasn’t only to comfort him but to comfort her as well. As she held his hand she ‘coughed out angry tearless sighs.’ She was probably very distressed and angry, not only at herself but also the driver who had hit her son. At ten o’clock the ambulance arrived with his brother’s body. In the poem Heaney refers to his brother’s body as ‘the corpse’ which sounds very impersonal and a strange word to use describing a family member. I think Heaney wasn’t allowing himself to believe it was his brother. The body arrived ‘stanched and bandaged by the nurses.’ The next two stanzas are set the next morning upstairs in the bedroom. Throughout these two stanzas Heaney uses personal pronouns but before he had spoken about his brother as another body. Heaney sits alone next to his brother’s body. These two stanzas have a feel of a calm and soft atmosphere which contrasts with the first five stanzas. The first five stanzas have a more awkward, tense and sad atmosphere. In the room the unusual feeling is gone. The metaphor used at the start of stanza seven, ‘wearing a poppy bruise’ reminds us of death and unhappy times. The bruise placed upon his left temple, was probably the same size, shape and colour as a poppy. Heaney uses the word ‘wearing’ to describe his brother’s bruise. By using this word it makes it sound as if it was just there and could be taken off, not something that was permanent and part of his brother. Heaney described his brother as if he was lying in his cot not a coffin. By doing this it conveys  the feeling that he is just asleep, all well and peaceful a bit like a baby. He looks normal as he had ‘no gaudy scars’ on his body. We find out that Heaney hadn’t seen his brother for six weeks and seeing his brother just lying there with no expression of happiness at his arrival must has made him feel angry and extremely sad but still he never shows any personal emotions in the way he writes. The last line of stanza seven is where we find out what happened to the little bot. Heaney’s younger brother had been hit by a ‘bumper’-part of a car-which had ‘knocked him clear’ hence the lack of horrible cuts and scars. As the boy lay In his coffin he was ‘soothed’ by snowdrops and candles which helped to calm and create a peaceful environment for grieving family members. The last stanza of the poem is structured with only one line making it standout and seem important. This stanza is very emotional not just for the family but also for the reader as you find out exactly how old the younger brother was when he was hit by the car. Heaney uses the word ‘box’ which sounds more homely, less threatening, not so much like a coffin. A box makes it sound very small unlike a coffin which is normally quite big. The alliteration on the letter ‘f’ in the last line helps Heaney emphasise the age of the little boy. The last line is placed on its own separated from the rest just like the little boy removed from the world alone by death: ‘A four foot box, a foot for every year.’ The simplicity of the poem’s structure emphasises the emotions that were carried out throughout the poem. During the poem you get the feeling that Heaney is grieving for his younger brother by holding back his emotions because it would be too painful and uncomfortable for him to express it openly. In the first few stanzas Heaney tries to distance himself from everyone and the fact that his brother has passed away by using the word ‘corpse.’ Heaney uses emotionless statements in his first few stanzas which to me shows that he had emotions but was trying really hard not to show them. I have enjoyed reading ‘Mid-term Break’ even though it is an emotional poem as it has given me a lot to think about. I have thought about Heaney must have felt knowing he wasn’t going to see his brother again. This poem was very interesting and emotional even though Heaney at times, tries to  hold back his emotions and it is interesting to see how people coped in their own different ways with the death.

Religion Pakistan

Religion is a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of life and the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a supernatural agency, or human beings’ relation to that which they regard as holy, sacred, spiritual, or divine. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life. They tend to derive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle from their ideas about the cosmos and human nature.The word religion is sometimes used interchangeably with faith or belief system, but religion differs from private belief in that it has a public aspect. Most religions have organized behaviors, including congregations for prayer, priestly hierarchies, holy places, and/or scriptures. The development of religion has taken different forms in different cultures. Some religions place greater emphasis on belief, while others emphasize practice. Some religions focus on the subjective experi ence of the religious individual, while others consider the activities of the community to be most important.Some religions claim to be universal, believing their laws and cosmology to be binding for everyone, while others are intended to be practiced only by one, localized group. Religion often makes use of meditation, music and art. In many places it has been associated with public institutions such as education, the family, government, and political power. Types of Religions Religion defines who you are, what you are, and your views about the world around you. You must understand, a religion is much more than deity worshiping. Religion is the philosophy of life and a belief system.There are as many as four thousand and two religions in this world. Surprisingly, people know only a handful of religion. The four largest religious groups by population, estimated to account for between 5 and 6 billion people, are Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism. Four largest religions| Adhe rents[citation needed]|   % of world population| Article| World population| 6. 8 billion| Figures taken from individual articles:| Christianity| 1. 9 billion – 2. 1 billion| 29% – 32%| Christianity by country| Islam| 1. 3 billion – 1. 57 billion| 19% – 21%| Islam by country| Buddhism| 500 million – 1. billion| 7% – 21%| Buddhism by country| Hinduism| 950 million – 1 billion| 14% – 20%| Hinduism by country| Total| 4. 65 billion – 6. 17 billion| 68. 38% – 90. 73%| | Christianity is one of the oldest religions of the world and has a large number of followers. It is estimated that Christianity has over two billion followers around the globe. Christianity practices a few beliefs and traditions of other religions. Like the Judaism and Islam, Christianity as a religion believes in the concept of one God. Hence, Islam, Judaism and Christianity are known as â€Å"ethical monotheism†.Judaism is older than Christian ity and this religion is the oldest of Abrahamic religions. Judaism is based on laws and principles of the Hebrew bible known as Tanakh. The Old Testament of Bible describes the struggles of the Hebrews or the Jews. After Moses frees them from the Egyptian captivity, they wander for almost forty years before they reached Jerusalem, the â€Å"Promised Land†. Today there are 14 million Jews in the world. Islam has 1. 3 billion religious followers. It is one of the fastest growing religions in the world. Followers of Islam religion worship Allah and consider Muhammad as their prophet.Like the Christians and the Jews, Muslims believe in one God. Hence, it is one of the three â€Å"monotheistic† religions of the world. Quran is their holy book and this religion follows strict religious discipline and customs. The life of a Muslim is guided by the Five Pillars or the five principles such as Shahadah (faith), Sala (ritual prayer), Zakah (alms tax), Sawm (Ramadan fasting) and Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca). Islam is an Arabic term and means surrendering to the will of God. You could say Islam is a system of belief that gives importance to family life, way of dressing, cleanliness and ethics.It also stresses on the importance of religious rituals and observances. There are many religions that follow their own system of beliefs, rituals and traditions. These religions are classified as prophetic religion, revealed religion, sacramental and mystical religion. Hinduism is considered to be one of the most tolerant religions in the world. The ultimate aim of any Hindu is to attain moksha from the cycle of rebirth. Historians believe over the centuries Hinduism had adopted many spiritual traditions and practices, which are seen even today in the homes of many Hindus.It is not easy to generalize the beliefs of Hinduism because the practices vary widely among the believers of this religion. Religion in Pakistan The Badshahi Masjid in Lahore, Pakistan, was built durin g the Mughal Empire Islam is the state religion in Pakistan, which is practised by about 95-97% of the 174,578,558 people of the nation. The remaining 3-5% practice Christianity, Hinduism and other religions. Muslims are divided into two major sects, the majority of them practice Sunni Islam while the Shias are a minority who estimate 5-20% depending on the source.Nearly all Pakistani Sunni Muslims belong to the Hanafi Islamic law school. The majority of Pakistani Shia Muslims belong to the Twelver (Ithna Asharia) branch with significant minority groups who practice Ismailism, which is composed of Nizari (Aga Khanis), Mustaali, Dawoodi Bohra, Sulaymani, and others. The religion of Islam was first introduced in the territory that is now called Pakistan Umayyad dynasty in the early-8th century led by Muhammad bin Qasim against Raja Dahir, the Hindu ruler of Sindh. The Umayyad Muslims conquered the northwestern part of the Indus Valley, from Kashmir to the Arabian Sea.The arrival of th e Arab Muslims to the provinces of Sindh and Punjab, along with subsequent Muslim dynasties, set the stage for the religious boundaries of South Asia that would lead to the development of the modern state of Pakistan in 1947 as well as forming the foundation for Islamic rule which quickly spread across much of South Asia. Following the rule of various Islamic empires, including the Ghaznavids, the Ghurids, and the Delhi Sultanate, the Mughals controlled the region of Pakistan from 1526 until 1739.Muslim technocrats, bureaucrats, soldiers, traders, scientists, architects, teachers, theologians and Sufis flocked from the rest of the Muslim world to the Indian subcontinent during the Mughal era. The Mughal Empire declined in the early 18th century after the Afsharids and the Afghan Durrani Empire from the west came to take over what is now Pakistan. Constitution of Pakistan on religion The constitution of Pakistan establishes Islam as the state religion, and provides all its citizens t he right to profess, practice and propagate their religion subject to law, public order, and morality.The constitution limits the political rights of Pakistan's non-Muslims, and only Muslims are allowed to become the President or the Prime Minister. Moreover, only Muslims are allowed to serve as judges in the Federal Shariat Court, which has the power to strike down any law deemed un-Islamic. List of religions in Pakistan Based on information collected from the Library of Congress, Pew Research Center, CIA World Factbook, Oxford University, University of Pennsylvania, U. S. State Department and others, the following is a list of all the religions that are practised in Pakistan.The percentages are estimations depending on the source. * Islam * Sunni Muslims: 80-95% * Shia Muslims: 5-20% * Ahmadi Muslims: approximately 2. 3% or 4 million * Other religions * Christians: approx. 1. 6% or 2,800,000 people * Hindus: approx. 1. 6%or 2,443,614 people * Baha'is: 79,000 * Sikhs: 20,000 * Zoro astrian/Parsis: 20,000 * Buddhist: Unknown * Jews: Unknown * | Islam The Faisal Mosque in Islamabad, which is the largest mosque of Pakistan and is also one of the largest in the world, was built by King Faisal of Saudi Arabia.Islam is the state religion of Pakistan, and about 95-97% of Pakistanis are Muslims. The Muslims are divided into 2 sects, Sunni Islam and Shia Islam. The Shia Islam in Pakistan is practised by 5-20% of the Muslims and the remaining larger number of Muslims practice Sunni Islam. There are a number of Islamic law schools called Madhab (schools of jurisprudence), which are called fiqh or ‘Maktab-e-Fikr' in Urdu. Nearly all Pakistani Sunni Muslims belong to the Hanafi Islamic school of thought while small number belong to the Hanbali school.The majority of Pakistani Shia Muslims belong to the Twelver (Ithna Asharia) branch, with significant minority who adhere to Ismailism branch that is composed of Nizari (Aga Khanis), Mustaali, Dawoodi Bohra, Sulaymani, a nd others. Islam to some extent syncretized with pre-Islamic influences, resulting in a religion with some traditions distinct from those of the Arab world. Two Sufis whose shrines receive much national attention are Ali Hajweri in Lahore (ca. 11th century) and Shahbaz Qalander in Sehwan, Sindh (ca. 12th century).Although members of Ahmadiyya (also derogatorily known as Qadiani) are considered to be Muslims, the government of Pakistan does not consider this group followers of Islam. The Pakistani parliament has declared Ahmadis to be non-Muslims. In 1974, the government of Pakistan amended its constitution to define a Muslim â€Å"as a person who believes in finality of Prophet Muhammad†. Ahmadis believe in Muhammad as the best and the last law bearing prophet and Mirza Ghulam Ahmad as the Christ of Muslims who was prophesized to come in the latter days and unite the Muslims.Consequently they were declared non-Muslims by a tribunal, the records of which have not been released to date. In 1984, Ordinance XX was enacted, which made it a crime for Ahmadis to call themselves Muslims or adherents of Islam, to â€Å"pose as Muslims†, to call their places of worship Masjid, or to proselytize, punishable by a prison term. According to the last Pakistan census, Ahmadis made up 0. 25% of the population, which is highly disputed due to the already existing state treatment of Ahmadis in Pakistan.The website adherents. comcited a report according to which the Ahmadiyya Muslim community was represented by 2,000,000 (1. 42%) adherents in 1995. Several other news report however claim adherents amounting to about 4 million, which is difficult to verify. [edit] Christianity Main article: Christianity in Pakistan Saint Patrick's Cathedral, Karachi. Christians make up 1. 6% of Pakistan's population, about 2. 8 million people out of a total population. [1] They are the second largest religious minority community in Pakistan.Majority of the Pakistani Christian communi ties belong to converts from the low caste Hindus from Punjab region, from the British colonial era. The community is geographically spread throughout the Punjab province, whilst its presence in the rest of the provinces is mostly confined to the urban centers. There is a Roman Catholic community in Karachi which was established by Goan and Tamilian migrants when Karachi's infrastructure was being developed by the British during colonial administration between World War I and World War II. [edit] Judaism Main article: Jews and Judaism in PakistanJews (Urdu: pronounced â€Å"Yehudi†) are a very small religious group in Pakistan. Various estimates suggest that there were about 2,500 Jews living in Karachi at the beginning of the 20th century, and a smaller community of a few hundred lived in Peshawar. There were synagogues in both cities; while the Karachi synagogue was burnt down. [citation needed] The one in Peshawar still exists but has fallen into disuse. Nearly all Pakist ani Jews have emigrated. [citation needed] [edit] Hinduism Main article: Hinduism in Pakistan Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, KarachiHinduism has an ancient history in Pakistan, the Rig Veda was believed to have been composed in the Punjab region. [citation needed] Hindus today are a much reduced community numbering around 3 million or about 1. 6%. [1] According to the last census 93% of Hindus live in Sindh, 5% in Punjab and nearly 2% in Balochistan. [citation needed] [edit] Sikhism Main article: Sikhism in Pakistan Nankana Sahib Gurdwara in Punjab, Pakistan The number of Sikhs remaining in Pakistan today is very small; estimates vary, but the number is thought to be on the order of 20,000. 7] The shrine of Guru Nanak Dev is located in Nankana Sahib near the city of Lahore where many Sikhs from abroad make pilgrimage to this and other shrines. [edit] Buddhism Main article: Buddhism in Pakistan Like Hinduism, Buddhism has an ancient history in Pakistan. There are no established Buddhist c ommunities and numbers are very few. [edit] Zoroastrianism Further information: Parsi people Before the independence of Pakistan in 1947, major urban centres in what is now Pakistan were home to a thriving Parsi business community.Karachi had the most prominent population of Parsis in Pakistan and were mostly Gujarati-speaking. After independence, majority of Pakistan's Parsi populace migrated to India, notably Bombay; however a number of Parsis still remain in Pakistan and have entered Pakistani public life as social workers, business folk, and diplomats. The most prominent Parsis of Pakistan today include Ardeshir Cowasjee, Byram Dinshawji Avari, Jamsheed Marker, as well as the late Minocher Bhandara. [edit] Baha'i Main article: Baha'i Faith in Pakistan The Baha'i Faith in Pakistan begins previous to its independence when it was part of India.The roots of the religion in the region go back to the first days of the Babi religion in 1844,[22] with Shaykh Sa'id Hindi who was from Mul tan. [23] During Baha'u'llah's lifetime, as founder of the religion, he encouraged some of his followers to move to the area that is current-day Pakistan. [24] In 1921 the Baha'is of Karachi elected their first Baha'i Local Spiritual Assembly. [23] By 1956 Baha'i local assemblies spread across many cities,[25] and in 1957, East and West Pakistan elected a separate National Baha'i Assembly from India and later East Pakistan became Bangladesh with its own national assembly. 26] Waves of refugees arrived in 1979 due to the Soviet Union invasion of Afghanistan and the Iranian Revolution in Iran. [27][28] The Baha'is in Pakistan have the right to hold public meetings, establish academic centers, teach their faith, and elect their administrative councils. [29] However, the government prohibits Baha'is from travelling to Israel for Baha'i pilgrimage. [30] Recent estimates are over 79,000[18] though Baha'is claimed less than half that number. [31] [edit] Kalash Religion This is the religion of the Kalash people living in a remote part of Chitral.Adherents of the Kalash religion number around 3,000 and inhabit three remote valleys in Chitral; Bumboret, Rumbur and Birir. Their religion is unique but shares some common ground with Vedic and Pre-Zoroastrian religions. [edit] Atheism Main article: Atheism There may also be some atheists and agnostics in Pakistan, particularly in the affluent areas of the larger cities. Some were born in secular families while others in religious ones. According to the 1998 census, people who did not state their religion accounted for 0. 5% of the population, but social pressures against claiming no religion was strong. 7] There is slight of atheism in the country. Pakistan's laws, which stipulate the death penalty for blaspheming, institutionalize such discrimination. Subsequently, most atheists and agnostics keep their views private and choose to portray themselves publicly as indifferent Muslims rather than non-Muslims. 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America Belize  Ã‚ · Costa Rica  Ã‚ · El Salvador  Ã‚ · Guatemala  Ã‚ · Honduras  Ã‚ · Nicaragua  Ã‚ · Panama  Ã‚ · Southern America Argentina  Ã‚ · Bolivia  Ã‚ · Brazil  Ã‚ · Chile  Ã‚ · Colombia  Ã‚ · Dominica  Ã‚ · Ecuador  Ã‚ · Guyana  Ã‚ · Paraguay  Ã‚ · Peru  Ã‚ · Suriname  Ã‚ · Uruguay  Ã‚ · Venezuela CaribbeanAntigua and Barbuda  Ã‚ · Bahamas  Ã‚ · Barbados  Ã‚ · Cuba  Ã‚ · Dominican Republic  Ã‚ · Grenada  Ã‚ · Haiti  Ã‚ · Jamaica  Ã‚ · Saint Kitts and Nevis  Ã‚ · Saint Lucia  Ã‚ · Saint Vincent and the Grenadines  Ã‚ · Trinidad and Tobago  Ã‚ ·| Islam in Oceania[show] Australia Australia  Ã‚ · Norfolk  Island  Ã‚ · Christmas  Island  Ã‚ · Cocos  (Keeling)  Islands Melanesia East  Timor  Ã‚ · Fiji  Ã‚ · New  Caledonia  Ã‚ · Papua New Guinea  Ã‚ · Solomon  Islands  Ã‚ · Vanuatu Micronesia Guam  Ã‚ · Kiribati  Ã‚ · Marshall  Islands  Ã‚ · Northern  Mariana  Islands  Ã‚ · Federated  States of  Micronesia  Ã‚ · Nauru  Ã‚ · Palau PolynesiaAmerican  Samoa  Ã‚ · Cook  Islands  Ã‚ · French  Polynesia  Ã‚ · New  Zealand  Ã‚ · Niue  Ã‚ · Pitcairn  Ã‚ · Samoa  Ã‚ · Tokelau  Ã‚ · Tonga  Ã‚ · Tuvalu  Ã‚ · Wallis and Futuna| This box: view  Ã¢â‚¬ ¢Ã‚  talk  Ã¢â‚¬ ¢Ã‚  edit| Islam is the official religion of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, which has a population of about 174,578,558. [1] The overwhelming majority (95-97%) of the Pakistani people are Muslims while the remaining 3-5% are Christian, Hindu, and others. [2][3] Pakistan has the second largest Muslim population in the world after Indonesia. Sunnis are the majority while the Shias make up between 10-20%[4][3][5][2] of the total Muslim population of the country.Pakistan has the second largest number of Shias after Iran, which numbers between 17 million to as high as 30 million according to Vali Nasr. [6] Contents[hide] * 1 Umayyad invasion of Sindh and the arrival of Islam * 2 Islam and the Pakistan Movement * 3 Politicized Islam * 4 Muslim sects in Pakistan * 5 Laws and customs * 6 Media and pilgrimages * 7 Islamic education * 8 See also * 9 Further reading * 10 References * 11 External links| [edit] Umayyad invasion of Sindh and the arrival of Islam Main article: Muslim conquest in the Indian subcontinentThe Badshahi Masjid, literally the ‘Royal Mosque', was built in 1674 by Aurangzeb. It is one of Lahore's best known landmarks, and epitomizes the beauty and grandeur of the Mughal era. Islam arrived in the area now known as Pakistan in 711 CE, when th e Umayyad dynasty sent a Muslim Arab army led by Muhammad bin Qasim against the ruler of Sindh, Raja Dahir, this was due to the fact that Raja Dahir had given refuge to numerous Zoroastrian Princes who had fled the Islamic conquest of Iran. Mohummad Bin Qasim's army was defeated in his first thee attempts.The Muslim army conquered the northwestern part of Indus Valley from Kashmir to the Arabian Sea. The arrival of the Arab Muslims to the provinces of Sindh and Punjab, along with subsequent Muslim dynasties, set the stage for the religious boundaries of South Asia that would lead to the development of the modern state of Pakistan as well as forming the foundation for Islamic rule which quickly spread across much of South Asia. Following the rule of various Islamic empires, including the Ghaznavid Empire, the Ghorid kingdom, and the Delhi Sultanate, the Mughals controlled the region from 1526 until 1739.Muslim technocrats, bureaucrats, soldiers, traders, scientists, architects, teach ers, theologians and Sufis flocked from the rest of the Muslim world to Islamic Sultanate and Mughal Empire in South Asia and in the land that became Pakistan. [edit] Islam and the Pakistan Movement The Muslim poet-philosopher Sir Allama Muhammad Iqbal first proposed the idea of a Muslim state in northwestern South Asia in his address to the Muslim League at Allahabad in 1930. His proposal referred to the four provinces of Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan, and the NorthWest Frontier — essentially what would became Pakistan.Iqbal's idea gave concrete form to two distinct nations in the South Asia based on religion (Islam and Hinduism) and with different historical backgrounds, social customs, cultures, and social mores. Islam was thus the basis for the creation and the unification of a separate state. Allama Muhammad Iqbal in 1937, in a letter to Jinnah wrote, After a long and careful study of Islamic Law I have come to the conclusion that if this system of Law is properly understoo d and applied, at last the right to subsistence is secured to every body.But the enforcement and development of the Shariat of Islam is impossible in this country without a free Muslim state or states. This has been my honest conviction for many years and I still believe this to be the only way to solve the problem of bread for Muslims as well as to secure a peaceful India. [7] But just three days before the creation of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah made a different commitment. A commitment to secularism in Pakistan.In his inaugural address he said, You will find that in the course of time Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense as citizens of the State. This statement of Jinnah is an object of great controversy since then and this vision of a Pakistan in which Islamic law would not be applied, contrary to Iqbal's perception, was questioned sho rtly after independence. [edit] Politicized IslamFaisal Mosque in Islamabad, which is the largest mosque of Pakistan and is also one of the largest in the world, was built by King Faisal of Saudi Arabia. From the outset, politics and religion have been intertwined both conceptually and practically in Islam. Because Prophet Muhammad established a government in Medina, precedents of governance and taxation exist. Through the history of Islam, from the Ummayyad (661-750) and Abbasid empires (750-1258) to the Mughals (1526- 1858), Safavis (1501–1722) and the Ottomans (1300-1923), religion and statehood have been treated as one.Indeed, one of the beliefs of Islam is that the purpose of the state is to provide an environment where Muslims can properly practice their religion. If a leader fails in this, the people have a right to depose him. In March 1949, the first constituent assembly passed Objectives Resolution, which declared that the state of Pakistan will be submitted to the sovereignty of God. In 1950, thirty one Ulema passed a demand draft, called Twenty Two Points of Ulema. This drafted demanded preparation of constitution according to Objectives Resolution. It also demanded changes in the law according to Shariah.In 1977, the government of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto outlawed alcohol and drugs and changed the weekend from Sunday to Friday, but no substantive Islamic reform program was implemented prior to General Zia-ul-Haq's Islamization program. Starting in February 1979, new penal measures based on Islamic principles of justice went into effect. These carried considerably greater implications for women than for men. A welfare and taxation system based on Zakat and a profit-and-loss banking system were also established in accordance with Islamic prohibitions against usury but were inadequate. edit] Muslim sects in Pakistan Further information: Sectarian violence in Pakistan  and  Shi'a Islam in Pakistan Data Durbar in Lahore, Pakistan is the tomb of A li Hajweri, eleventh century Sufi. People come each year to pay their respects, to say prayers and worship. The large complex also includes Jamia Hajweri, or Hajweri Mosque. According to the CIA World Factbook and Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, 95-97% of the total population of Pakistan is Muslim. [3] The majority of the Pakistani Muslims are Sunnis, while Shias are estimated 10-20%. 8] [4] [3] [5] [2] The Muslims belong to different schools which are called Madhahib (singular: Madhhab) i. e. , schools of jurisprudence (also ‘Maktab-e-Fikr' (School of Thought) in Urdu). The Hanafi school of Sunnis includes the Barelvi and Deobandi schools. Although the vast majority of Pakistani Shi'a Muslims belong to Ithna ‘ashariyah school, there are significant minorities: Nizari Ismailis (Agha Khanis) and the smaller Mustaali Dawoodi Bohra and Sulaimani Bohra branches. The Salafi sect is represented by the Ahle Hadith movement in Pakistan.Many people on the Makran coast of Baloc histan follow the Zikri sect of Islam. The two subsects of Sunni Hanafi school, Barelvis and Deobandis, have their own Masjids. The Shi'a Ithna ‘ashariyah school has its own Masjids commonly termed as Hussainias (Imambargahs). Mustaali Dawoodi Bohra and Sulaimani Bohra also have their own Masjids, while the Nizari Ismailis pray in Jama'at Khanas. The Ahmadiyya community, a minority group is also present. Ahmadis have been declared non-Muslims by the Government of Pakistan.In 1974, the government of Pakistan amended Constitution of Pakistan to define a Muslim â€Å"as a person who believes in finality of Prophet Muhammad†. [9] For this reason, Ahmadis are persecuted on behalf of their beliefs. Ahmadis believe in Muhammad as the best and the last law bearing prophet and Mirza Ghulam Ahmad as the Christ of Muslims who was prophesied to come in the latter days and unite the Muslims. Consequently they were declared non-Muslims by a tribunal, the records of which have not bee n released to date.According to the last Pakistan census, Ahmadis made up 0. 25% of the population. However the website adherents. com[10] proposes that the Ahmadiyya Muslim community made up 1. 42% of the population; which is likely to be a less biased source. The Economist puts the figure of Ahmadiyya adherents to 4 million. The Ahmadis claim their community is even larger. Sufism has a strong tradition in Pakistan. The Muslim Sufi missionaries played a pivotal role in converting the millions of native people to Islam.As in other areas where Sufis introduced it, Islam to some extent syncretized with pre-Islamic influences, resulting in a religion with some traditions distinct from those of the Arab world. The Naqshbandiya, Qadiriya, Chishtiya and Suhrawardiyya silsas have a a large following in Pakistan. Sufis whose shrines receive much national attention are Data Ganj Baksh (Ali Hajweri) in Lahore (ca. 11th century), Baha-ud-din Zakariya in Multan and Shahbaz Qalander in Sehwan ( ca. 12th century) and Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai in Bhit, Sindh and Rehman Baba in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province. edit] Laws and customs There is no law in Pakistan enforcing hijab and wearing of Hijab by Pakistani women is fairly uncommon. However, the practice of wearing Hijab among younger women in urban centers is slowly growing due to media influence from the Middle East and Persian Gulf countries. The episodes of sectarian violence have significantly decreased in frequency over the years due to the conflictual engagement of the Islamic militant organizations with the state's armed forces and intelligence agencies. [edit] Media and pilgrimagesMedia and pilgrimages has influenced Pakistani Muslims to learn more about Islam as a result the local heterodox beliefs and practices are being replaced with orthodox beliefs from Quran and Sunnah. The inexpensive travel, simpler visa rules and direct air travel to Saudi Arabia has resulted in large number Pakistani Muslims going to Medina and Mecca for Haj and Umrah. This has helped to increase Pan-Islamic identity of Pakistani Muslims. The Muslim print media has always existed in Pakistan which included newspapers, books and magazines.The Muslim satellite channels are widely available and are watched by Pakistani population. [edit] Islamic education The Study of Islam as a subject is compulsory for all Muslim students up to Matriculation or O'levels in all schools in Pakistan. Islamic education to the masses is also propagated mainly by Islamic schools and literature. Islamic schools (or Madrassas) mostly cater to the youth from impoverished social backgrounds and those learning to be Islamic clerics. More casual and even research oriented material is available in the form of books.While the most prominent of these schools are being monitored, the latter are being ‘moderated' by both the government and some of the scholars, thereby also removing in the process the various material present in it that is used by An ti-Islam/Anti-Sunni writers. Oldest and universally accepted titles such as the Sahih Bukhari have been revised into ‘summarised' editions and some of the old, complete titles, translated to Urdu, the national language, are not available for purchase now. These changes are also a herald to new outbreaks of religious controversy in the region.

The Fall of Enron Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

The Fall of Enron - Essay Example It was 1985 when Kenneth Lay’s Houston Natural Gas merged with Nebraskan-Northern Natural Gas Company’s holding company, InterNorth, to form Enron. The two separate companies were primarily dealing with the distribution and transmission of oil and electricity in the United States of America. They were also active in the construction, development and maintenance of power plants, pipelines and other similar infrastructure worldwide (Wikipedia, 2006). Under the new company name, Lay was appointed as the Chief Executive Officer and wanted to expand Enron’s market share as he had envisioned for his former venture. Houston Natural Gas had previously been in the business of generating their revenues from junk bonds from which its proceeds were used in the formation of Enron. Kenneth Lay aimed at becoming the biggest player in the energy sector through successful trade earnings from futures contracts (NPR, 2006). To his advantage, Spectrum 7, an oil-well concern welcomed a partnership with Enron a year after its creation. Spectrum 7 was headed by George W. Bush, son of the then-Vice President George H. W. Bush. With falling gas prices in the mid 1980’s, Enron and other gas firms vigorously lobbied for deregulation. The deregulation action came into effect when buyers switched to the cheaper alternative – fuel oil. No doubt fluctuating gas prices allowed Enron to start marketing gas futures; securing gas prices at later date promised to their stakeholders. Similarly, the company lobbied once again for electricity just before selling electric power futures contracts (NPR, 2006). From then on, Enron was aggressive in expanding its services in the water utility sector by creating Azurix that partly collapsed on the NYSE in 1999 and shut down operations in 2001 (Wikipedia, 2006). Jeffery Skilling was hired in 1990 to lead the new division – Enron

DragonflyHelm Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

DragonflyHelm - Assignment Example s beauty of the samurais who were wealthy, the armor they used was tailor-made to their specifications while utilizing a variety of materials that ranged from various forms of metal, silk, leather and lacquer. The iconic part as far as Japanese armor is concerned is the head protection that is comprised of fierce-looking facemasks and stagy helmets that are intended to underscore the superhuman image of power of the person who wears it. In Japanese culture, the dragonfly is taken to symbolize martial success as a consequence of the similarity of the term â€Å"victory† to â€Å"dragonfly† in the Japanese language. The dragonfly is a periodic representation that is linked to the late summer through to the early summer season. In general, in Japan, the dragonfly is a representation of strength and happiness as well as courage while regularly appearing in arts and literature, especially haiku (Mitchell and Lasswell 30). Additionally, in ancient mythology, Japan was referred to as Akitsushima that means â€Å"Land of the Dragonflies†. In creating the symbolism with the dragonfly, its back wings are comparatively larger than its front ones and this signifies that times will get better in the future. The nymph, which is the larval stage of the dragonfly feeds on mosquitoes, and this is considered as they action of the young people in the society stopping evil even before the evil begins. Additionally , the dragonfly stops utilizing gills and begins breathing normal air as soon as it gets into contact with it, and this represents quick adaptation to harsh conditions. The Kabuto helmet that is shaped like a dragonfly was made in the seventeenth century in Japan using various material including lacquer, silk, Iron, wood and leather as well as pigments and papier-mà ¢chà ©. Even though the artifact is famous as far as Japanese culture is concerned its artist is not known. High-ranking members of the Japanese society utilized embellishments like this so that they could be located

Industry Research Part III Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Industry Research Part III - Essay Example This paper, written by Enrico Moretti, is a very good source for analyzing and researching what factors led wage inequalities to grow in many countries in recent years. The housing market faces challenges unparalleled in the history. Wage inequality is another threat on the economy that seems to claims more victim day by day. This article argues that declining wages and wage inequality around the world present two different problems. The high levels of inequality can definitely lead to adverse social, economic and political troubles that would bring insecurity and unrest. The second is that, global purchasing power will be decreased due to declining wages and it may cause a decline in the global consumption. The severity of wage inequalities and its impacts on all our spheres have been well detailed in this article. According to the report published by International Labor Office, there are severe wage inequalities that lead to unemployment for workers in 83 countries around the world. (Dewan S, 2008). It means, the wage inequality raises issue to the 70% of world population. According to the research, the US is one of the developed countries where the difference between highest wages and lowest wages has grown more rapidly. Wage inequality is referred to the difference between wages of skilled and unskilled labors. The increase in wages inequality can be measured by using nominal wages. The wage difference between skilled and unskilled labors is significant in determining inequality. In the US, it is a known fact that, due to increased demand for skilled labors in cities, skilled labors have moved to metropolitan cities where housing costs are higher. The average daily expenses also get higher. As has been discussed by Moretti (2008), skilled labors are exposed to high cost living. At the same time, it shows that a relative increase in their real wage

Women in Antebellum America Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Women in Antebellum America - Essay Example Women acquired superiority in social matters, and their voice would thus be heard. Regarding the introduction of education for women, many women joined learning institutions to acquire relevant information which would enable, better their lives. The education provides to women enabled them rear their children properly as well as providing significance influence to their husbands. The same reasoning lead to the opening up of the teaching profession suitable for females since they were considered having moral superiority over men and were innately fit to handle children. The piety morality of women, as well as concern over families, presents the impetus into the involvement in antebellum movements’ reform. Additionally, education gave women the capacity to articulate problems they face, and eventually propose necessary alternatives. Reforms provided women with necessary ideologies, which facilitated the, establishment of this cause. More conservative work charity attracted the upper classes’ members; more radical functions including abolitionism, helped draw men and women from social groups of lower levels. However, reformers of a working -class indicated less integration to such movements. Despite the fact that women suffered divisions from religion affiliation, class, and marital status, they indicated uniqueness in mind in the capacity to help others, a concept which was translated into women’s moral superiority overpowering men. The concept of moral superiority boosted efforts to raise women’s political, economic, and legal position. Women, as well, contributed to the economy of the nation through taxation exercised on their earnings, given that their population was significantly high. The impact of religion was also evident in the history of American woman. The Divine Word (The Bible) puts it, â€Å"The wise women buildeth her house.† The implication of the wisdom in this

Risk of Expropriation Involved in Pakistan Essay

Risk of Expropriation Involved in Pakistan - Essay Example Its relationships with the India are not good whereas the current situation in Afghanistan and future political risks involved in Iran can also increase the overall risk involved in the country. The political risk is on the higher side because it neighbors the violent Afghanistan. Apart from that it has also a history of Nationalization process under which private businesses were nationalized during 1970s. Apart from that a fragile political system in the country poses a greater risk to the foreign firms considering investing into the country. Pakistan has traditionally been an agriculture based country with most of the GDP coming from this sector. On industrial front, the country has a sound textile manufacturing base however after the emergence of WTO country is facing difficulties in keeping its traditional superiority in terms of textile exports as the neighboring countries of Bangladesh, China as well as India are offering much cheaper prices as compared to Pakistan in International Markets. "Pakistan's advantages include relatively low wages - amounting to as little as half the level of salaries in India - as well as reasonable real estate costs, plentiful government incentives and a readily available supply of worker"(Thibodeau,2007). "The textile sector exports have been stagnant for the past five years. Exports have oscillated between US $4.5 - 5.5 billion. US $5 billion has been a psychological barrier for the textile industry of Pakistan."(SMEDA, 2005). Investment into Textile sector of the country therefore is a very lucrative option however there are risks involved in it also. Where does the Risk Come From There are various sources of Risks in this country. The Law and Order situation is one very critical risk which companies looking to work in the country may have to face however the risk of expropriation comes from the Government itself. The mounting pressures on the economy as well as having a history of nationalization, the government of Pakistan seems to be the biggest source of risk for companies willing to work and invest into the country. There are different reasons for that. The general attitude of the public in country is not so in favor of the external players working in the market therefore social pressures on the government may force them to take actions such as expropriation that may not serve the interests of the companies willing to work in the country.(ADB,2001) Further to that Textile market in Pakistan is really going through a bad patch as neighboring countries have almost captured the market which was once the traditional markets for Pakistan. This lost space may further create pressures on the government to protect the local industry and do not allow foreign investors to consolidate themselves. Further, Pakistan is a key ally of US in its war on terrorism and the situation in Afghanistan and its tribal areas may provide US a credible opportunity to enter into Pakistan also. Further many believe that changing priorities of the US government could further deteriorate the risk profile of the country.(Rogers,2006) Thus the sources of the risks are multiple in nature as not only emerge

The Evolution of Skateboard Photography Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Evolution of Skateboard Photography - Essay Example llenweber 16). A common fact is that skateboarding has evolved from just another hobby to an internationally recognized sport. It is no longer considered to be a preserve of daredevils and adolescents who seek a way to vent their frustrations. For instance, in 1990, people used to skateboard mainly in parks and on the streets (if they found the opportunity to). Skateboarders and their fans then decided that they needed to shed the bad image that was associated with the hobby and turn it into something more appealing and enriching not just to them but also their fans. Eventually, the various skateboarding associations decided that they would market their hobby as a sport by growing it from the community. They established various skateboarding competitions in different neighborhoods different states in America and within no time the trend had caught on. Every neighborhood wanted to have a skateboarding association cum team, and this made the competition stiffer. A short time after this , the various stakeholders decided to make the participation worthwhile by offering prizes to the best performers. They sought financial assistance from local companies and community-based organizations (CBOs) who recognized it as a way of getting young people off the streets and giving them something to do and look forward to. Many young people sat up and took notice, and eventually most of them decided to join this latest ‘trend†. Within a short time, there were skateboarding championships being held in various states and soon after a national championship was established. Now, it is common knowledge that by the time there is a national championship anywhere (especially in a country like the United States), it means that a sport or hobby has garnered enough attention to warrant such a move (Wu?llenweber 26). Firms started tapping into this new frenzy in order to use it as an advertising avenue (it was particularly strategic because of its popularity among young people) . Through advertising, those companies managed to get the media to cover or even mention skateboarding. By 2009, we had professional skateboarders who supported themselves using the financial benefits they incurred from skateboarding. They were earning thousands of dollars by doing something they loved, and the media had no option but to take notice and accommodate this new sport. Now we have the World Cup of Skateboarding, a global skateboarding federation that organizes the formal World Championships of Skateboarding series that is held in many cities across the world (Bolster & Gesmer 12). This federation is also responsible for organizing and officiating other skateboard contests. Information about Shot Styles and Photography Specifics i) Use a Fisheye Lens Fisheye lens and skateboarding photography go hand in hand. The extremely wide angle lens offers an appealing three-dimensional look (Bolster & Gesmer 22). It allows one to get closer to the subject, capturing where they are from, where they are going, and what they are doing. A fisheye lens also affords your photos a room to breathe while at the same time maintaining a sense of impact. ii) Pre-focus This applies not only to skateboard photography, but also to motion photography or any type of action. iii) Keep a Clean Background The sky provides a perfect background in which to take skate photos. It is also a convenient backdrop to find because skaters tend

Impact of customer loyalty programme on customer perception and Research Proposal

Impact of customer loyalty programme on customer perception and attitude towards hospitality brands - Research Proposal Example This study all about the positive aspects of the loyalty programs in today’s hospitality industry. The legendary question in the history of the business management is how to satisfy the customers. It is very obvious to understand that customer is the king in any business as the customers are the vital factor in the business that generates the revenue for the company. There are many kinds of customers for various kinds of industry but, for any industry it is very important to satisfy the customers mainly for the hospitality industry where the customer speaks the ultimate words. It is very important for the hospitality industry to think from the customers prospective. The customer’s perception and attitude towards the services provided by the hospitality industry are the vital factors. The customer loyalty programs are very much vital for this industry mainly for the hotels, in most of the hotels the loyalty programs run as these hotels want their customer to be happy and the lingering effect of the loyalty programs will get back the customers in the hotel in the near future . Through out the history of the customer relationship management it has been seen that, the business people have applied many ways to satisfy their customer. The customer loyalty programs have proven to be the most successful methods of satisfying the customers. The needs and wants of the customers are always changing as the time passing by. The main aim of the loyalty programs are to retain and win back the customers. The retention of a customer saves lots of money cost. There are several costs which can be saved and profits can be generated and they are 1: Acquisition cost: the cost of acquiring new customer, 2: Base profit: that is the difference between the price the customer pays and the company’s cost. 3: Revenue growth: a long term loyal customer gives long term revenue for the company. 4: Cost saving: A matured

Learning Expirience Essay Example for Free

Learning Expirience Essay Experience can shape our behavior and personality. More over our experiences contribute to our development over time. Learning process occurs when we experience situation that have negative or positive effect on us. In this essay I will briefly describe my personal learning experience; I will also define the concept of learning, and will provide analysis of what I have learned from this experience. In addition my essay will include the analysis and application of classical and operant conditioning as well as cognitive- social learning. My Experience Every person’s identity is formed by the various roles that they perform in the world. In fact becoming a mother is one more such role and it has psychological implications. Four month ago I became a mother to a wonderful, my first baby boy. The experience of giving birth, as well as being home with a newborn for the first few weeks was overwhelming, painful, and emotionally tiring. I am 25 years old and was so exciting to becoming a mother, however when my son was born for the first few weeks I have experienced anxiety, stress, depression, fear and even anger. It has been almost 4 month and my baby is my life, I cannot imagine how I was getting frustrated and feeling all those things when my baby is my joy. Today I am still tired, and stressed, however anger and depression is gone. I have learned from this experience that I need to accept the change in my life, and avoid becoming frustrated. Being prepared for things to be different could have prepared me to deal with situation differently. Also positive attitude should have been my best ally instead of being afraid and having negative thoughts. At last I have learned from this experience that I need to try to develop a new and balanced lifestyle that takes into consideration all areas of my new life. Learning Learning is the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience (David A. Kolb, 1984). As we learn, we alter the way we perceive our environment, the way we interpret the incoming stimuli, and therefore the way we interact, or behave (Carpenter Huffman, 2012). Learning through Classical Conditioning One of the best-known characteristics of behavioral learning theory is classical conditioning. Classical conditioning is a learning process that occurs through associations between an environmental stimulus and a naturally occurring stimulus (Carpenter Huffman, 2012). There are basic principles of classical conditioning process. Such as the unconditioned stimulus (UC) and unconditioned response (UR), as well as conditioned stimulus (CS) and conditioned response (CR) (Carpenter Huffman, 2012). The unconditioned stimulus is one that unconditionally, naturally, and automatically triggers a response (â€Å"The propositional nature of human associative learning,† 2009). For example, baby crying made me feel sad and frustrated, and baby smiling made me feel loved, happy and positive. For instance, when I saw my bay for the first time the feeling of pain was simply gone. As I spend those first weeks with my baby although I have had mood swings and feeling of anger sometimes, however every time I looked at my baby I naturally felt better and calmer. The unconditioned response is the unlearned response that occurs naturally in response to the unconditioned stimulus. For example, feel of love in response to my baby smile is unconditioned stimulus. The conditioned stimulus is previously neutral stimulus that, after becoming associated with the unconditioned stimulus, eventually comes to trigger a conditioned response (â€Å"The propositional nature of human associative learning,† 2009). For example, when my baby cried I felt frustration and in the same time my husband was trying to explain me something thus my husband voice would be conditioned stimulus. Although the sound of my husband voice is unrelated to my baby’s cry and feeling of frustration, if the sound of his voice was paired multiple times with the baby’s cry, the sound would eventually trigger the conditioned response. The conditioned response is the learned response to the previously neutral stimulus. For instance, feeling frustrated when I heard my husband talking to me. In my view classical conditioning is a useful technique that can be applied by creating a positive environment to help people to overcome anxiety, fear and frustration. For example, a situation like my baby’s crying with pleasant surroundings would have helped me to learn new associations. Instead of feeling anxious, frustrated and angry in that situation, I learn to stay relax and calm (Carpenter Huffman, 2012). Operant Conditioning Operant conditioning is a technique of learning that happens through rewards and punishments for behavior. Through operant conditioning, an association is made between a behavior and a consequence for that behavior (â€Å"The propositional nature of human associative learning,† 2009). The elimination of an undesirable outcome can be used to decrease or prevent undesirable behavior. Feeling frustrated, being angry with situation simply led to more stress and created more problems for myself emotionally and physically. Positive reinforcement: Getting to know my baby, his first smile and lough created a positive and happy environment thus increasing my positive behavior. To conclude learning process revolves around human life. People learn something new every single day, thus creating new experiences and knowledge. Self-development and growth naturally occurs through learning.

PESTEL analysis of the global coffee industry

PESTEL analysis of the global coffee industry Corporate strategy is the way a company or organization creates values through the configuration and co-ordination of its multi-market activities (Collis, 1997). Coffee is the most widespread drink in the world with approximately half-a-trillion cups consumed every year. There are two fundamental types of coffee: espresso and regular, or non-espresso. Espresso is the variety of coffee available in cafà ©s and restaurants, whilst regular coffee is generally meant for the home. Nearly 70% of the worlds coffee is produced by the Americas of which Brazil contributes 30% to the global production. The coffee industry of the world employs nearly 25 million people while approximately 5 million people work in the coffee industry in Brazil. Brazil has in excess of 3 billion coffee plants. The three major kinds of commercially produced coffee bean are Arabica, Robusta in addition to Liberia. Brazilian Coffee production figures rose by more than 12 million (60kg) bags to an amazing 46 million during 2008 making the country streets ahead of the other two top world coffee producers of Vietnam (19.5 million bags) and Colombia (13 1 million bags). PORTERS FIVE FORCES : Threat of substitution: Other beverages apart from coffee the substitutes are tea, soda, fruit juice, water, beer and other alcoholic drinks, other quickà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ grab foods apart from pastries, muffins, doughnuts, etc. Lowerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ end or less luxurious coffee places. Places that offer people a place to hang out, chat, relax or even work include tea houses, fast food places, iceà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ cream parlors, sideà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ walk cafes, and bars and pubs. Accordingly when there are so many substitutes available, the threat is high and seems to be increasing by day to day. Threat of new entrants: Some of the more current and ongoing threats of new entrants include fast food chains such as McDonalds, Burger King and Dunkin Donuts. The entry barrier for the coffee industry is relatively moderate. Any large and wellà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ funded company where capital is not a problem could be potential entrants, since they have a strong brand image over the industry. Rivalry: There are many big players in the Brazil retail coffee market and with large no of small scale coffee shops big players have to fight out with small shops across different regions in US. With most of the customers taking coffee to home and provides convenience which is the major factor for them. There is an intense competition among the players to build up their customer base. Bargaining power of suppliers: There is more bargaining power for suppliers since the advancement in technological innovations such as automated coffee machines, latte and espresso machines, etc has made them to bargain over the industry. These changes, has made the supplier power high. Bargaining power of buyers: Buyers do not have the power to bargain in the market, considering Starbucks. The sheer scale of Starbucks business reduces the bargaining power of any single group of buyers. McDonalds who claim to offer premium roast coffee of reasonable quality at a lower price, so buyers need not bargain their needs. PESTEL Political/Legal: High standards relating particularly to coffee producing methods are becoming more important in the industry and may gain political prominence. There is increasing pressure for businesses to trade ethically, that is, socially, environmentally, and economically responsible. This is reflected in the coffee industry by an increased demand and rising market value for sustainable coffees such as certified coffee and fair trade coffee, which guarantees a fair price to producers. The fair trade market which is now worth  £100 million, is growing with developments such as Tescos launch of their own Fair trade range. Fair trade is also a means by which the coffee shop industry can differentiate their products and gain a socially responsible reputation; Starbucks customers now have the option to buy fair trade coffee. Oxfam have claimed there is a niche in the coffee shop market and have responded by launching their own brand of Fair trade coffee Progresso which is sold on already established premises such as bookstores. Economical: The impact of coffee on Brazilian economy was much stronger. The greater difficulty of coffee production and trade established important sectorial linkeages within the Brazilian economy. Coffee was the foundation of the economy, accounting for 63% of the countrys exports. Brazilian economy went through periods of growth but also difficulties and increasing trends towards coffee overproduction. The economic performances and development prospects of many developing countries are largely dependent on commodity issues. (Photius.com, 2004) Social: The coffee market must adapt to a change in consumer attitudes or else it may be threatened by health and lifestyle issues. In 2003 the hot drinks market declined by an estimated 2.3%. Consumers, especially young people, are becoming more health conscious which makes coffee a less attractive choice; the increasing number of alternatives available such as health and energy drinks are becoming competitors in the coffee industry. Research carried out by Mintel shows that there is an increased diversification of tea, with a trend towards premium and herbal teas. The coffee industry are responded to this change in attitude by provision of de-caf drinks, options such as soy milk, and alternative drinks such as freshly squeezed fruit juices, chai lattes and herbal teas. Technological: Consumers are less inclined to buy coffees and teas in supermarkets due to the wide variety of coffees that are available in coffee shops today. Hi-tech equipment and premium ingredients are now easily accessible and are used to make a variety of hot and cold beverages that are sold in coffee shops; from cappucinos to the ice blended coffees. As a result consumers are becoming more knowledgeable about the ranges of specialised fresh coffees and premium teas that are available, and their tastes are changing to accompany them. Environmental: The environmental impact is almost always positive and it is important that coffee production and processing should be taken into account for environmental needs to make sure optimal physical sustainability. Even more necessary is that the economic environment should be such as to encourage stability and reasonable living standards for the populations involved with coffee and to make sure the sufficient care should be given to make sure the maintenance of the quality. (Change the environment.) http://www.ico.org/sustainable_coffee.asp STRUCTURAL DRIVERS OF CHANGE: Product Innovation: Product innovation is a driving force that has allowed the coffee industry to grow. Coffee drinks were developed as an anytime coffee drink. Such drinks are Espressos, Cappuccinos, Frappaccinos, Lattes, and Mochas. Whether a consumer likes it hot or cold is no difference now; iced coffee is for those that do not feel like a hot cup. Black, White, Irish, Turkish and Americano are also other types of coffee to choose from. Flavored coffee is a pillar innovation to this product category allowing different consumers taste buds to run wild. Chocolate covered coffee beans are another innovation to the coffee industry. This industry growth has also allowed companies the opportunity to promote to different consumer markets. Young and old purchasers, people that like hot or cold coffee, and those that like a coffee drink in the morning or evening are all targeted now that the product lines have broadened the scope of the industry. Product innovation has helped consumers differentiation issues, along with allowing them to drink it anytime of day they need an extra tasty boost of energy. Pricing: Prices of coffee are relatively inelastic, with consumers becoming more aware of the quality of their coffee, where it is derived from, and the atmosphere in the branded coffee shops. As a result consumers will regard a high priced quality branded product as good value; more than two-thirds (70%) of coffee drinkers will pay more for a good cup of coffee. This was evident when Coffee Nation increased sales by moving from a cheap instant coffee to an espresso coffee with improved packaging. Consumers life style: Consumers lifestyle is the other driving force that ties in with the customer base and usage. Society is changing, with the new generations being a huge influence. Parents, a huge factor in the lifestyle, attitudes, and opinions of their children, drink coffee and are, thus, promoting coffee to the offspring. These young persons are looking for caffeine to keep them going through their increasingly busy days. At age 13, who knew that coffee was needed to add to their ever-so hyper lives? Coffee is established as a drink older people consume. Young people are always aspiring to be older than they are, so coffee is marketed in a different way to the younger generations as specialty coffee and gourmet beverages. Establishing loyalty early while coffee drinkers are young will ensure a prospective future for this industry. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_41/b3954201.htm Industry life cycle model: Introduction stage: In the introduction stage the profit will be low and the cost will be very much expensive. The market growth starts with the introduction stage with low competition and high prices and the demand will be comparatively low. Growth stage: Profits start with the growth in the sales. Varieties of coffee with added flavors being focused during growth stage to get the brand image, value and growing market share. Maturity stage: During maturity stage the profit of the industry increases and the demand also increases. Competition will be very high and customer satisfaction will increase. Saturation takes place due to brand value. Decline stage: It is very difficult to survive in the market if the industry wont be innovative and introduce new products. By analyzing the life cycle model we can implicate that the coffee industry should come up with new innovative product. The coffee industry lies between the maturity stage and decline stage. Coffee has some advantages in health regards which decreases the diabetes and makes brain alert. Coffee consumers due to raising health concerns they can go for alternatives such as green tea which is good for health more than coffee. Therefore I conclude coffee industry will lies between the maturity and decline stage and it may decline if there is any serious health issues occurs around the world. Scenarios Substitute product: Energy drinks may all together substitute the coffee in future. The countries like china and India being the worlds largest producers of tea. They can come up with new innovative products and it will be created in the retail industry. Considering the health concerns people may prefer green tea than coffee. The Chinese have known about the medicinal benefits of green tea from ancient times. Today scientific research in Asia and in West is providing hard evidence for the health benefits long associated with drinking green tea. There is also a research representing that drinking green tea reduces high cholesterol, cancer, impaired immune function. http://chinesefood.about.com/library/weekly/aa011400a.htm Climate change: Climate change is just one of numerous factors that may affect global coffee production. The international coffee organization considers it one of the most important ones. Temperature and rainfall conditions are the two main drivers when its come to yield, i.e. production. As temperature increases coffee ripens more quickly leading to a fall in inherent quality. According to Brazil Rising temperatures suggest coffee production will become viable in areas formerly considered too prone to frosts. Meteorological agencies report temperatures consistently above the historical average since the 1990s. However, too high temperatures will reduce the overall acreage with climatic potential for coffee production. www.thecoffeeguide.org Demand for quality: Since the industry has already passed the maturity stage the players were try to increase the quality by analyzing their brewing systems, and by trying to bring different flavours in the coffee. Following the recommendations of the committee, the international coffee council adopted resolution in February 2002 to implement the coffee quality program. The CQP is designed to improve the balance supply and demand of coffee by stimulating demand through the provision of the better overall standard of quality to the market. http://www.ico.org/improving_quality.asp

Characters in Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens Essay -- Great Exp

Characters in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens Dickens has many ways of making his characters both striking and memorable, he uses the dialogue and blends it with the setting and social background as illustrated by ‘torn by briars; who limped’. Dickens is very descriptive; this also helps making the character real. Dickens creates a creepy mood when we are told about the graveyard in which we meet Magwitch as shown by ‘as if he were eluding the hands of dead people’. He uses the graveyard and the gibbet in the distance to help create this mood which adds to the edgy atmosphere. The tone of this extract is dramatic and intimidating; Dickens achieves this by using short, but descriptive sentences. Dickens makes us feel sorry for Magwitch because of the way he speaks, ‘wittles’ and ‘pecoolier’ are examples of this. As Magwitch talks to Pip, we, as the reader notice that Magwitch talks to Pip as a child and uses language that would only scare a child : ‘you little devil, or I’ll cut your throat!’. When pip meets Miss Havisham, Dickens makes it seem like it is a nice, rich room, however we soon find out it is a dull, lifeless room that hasn’t seen light in years : ‘. Dickens uses long, descriptive sentences here to introduce the setting and mood of the room. Dickens slowly gives us information bit by bit so we build a picture of what is going on. He slowly reveals that Miss Havisham has been jilted at the alter. Wemmick’s home reflects his personality in the way that he likes to be secure and safe. Wemmick is one of the most memorable of Dickens’s characters, as he is slightly out of the ordinary and has his own way of doing things. Wemmick keeps his work and his home life very separate, this is... ...rrible places to be; they carried lots of diseases and were extremely unhygienic. Miss Havisham is from an upper class background. She is very wealthy, however remains unmarried. Marriage for women in those days was more important than it is today because it used to be the men making all the money while the women looked after the house; however Miss Havisham has plenty of money so her problem is that she is lonely. Wemmick is in the working class and works in the prison as a clerk, the conditions of prisons in those days was very bad, which may be the reason why he keeps his home life and work life completely separate. Dickens achieves making his characters both striking and memorable by describing them in heavy detail, but not making it boring by having too much. In my opinion Wemmick is the most memorable character as I could imagine him being real.

Ramblings from a Rednecks Diary :: Essays Papers

Ramblings from a Rednecks Diary Not since I was three have I been affected by a book this much. When I was a toddler The Berenstein Bears had the influence to make me cry from sadness and scream from fear. In reality I did not actually scream or cry after reading this book, but I was extremely close. In â€Å"Bezhin Lea† I was frightened for Pavlusha when he ran off after the dogs, and I felt real fear when the boys began telling fables of the surrounding areas. In â€Å"Meeting† the girl was so tearful that the urge to jump into the book and comfort her almost overcame me, and never had I wanted to see something bad happen to a person as I did to the bailiff in the â€Å"Bailiff.† My feelings regarding serfs had never been put on such a personal level. Sketches from a Hunter’s Album changed my perspective about serfs and peasants intensely. I do not think his book would have as much impact if it was not for his intense physical and emotional projections of serfs that Turgenev conveys for the reader. Every time a new character is introduced he stops to completely acquaint the reader with the person as much as he is acquainted with the person. Since I truly learned about serfdom, peasantry, and slavery, it has been common for me to generalize them by the statement, â€Å"they suffered,† or â€Å"they were stupid.† After reading just a few sketches, I realized that the serfs are actually human. They are not stupid animals to be pushed around and taken advantage of by their â€Å"mastersâ€Å". It was evident in the first sketch, â€Å"Khor and Kalinych,† that Khor was an intelligent and industrious man, but yet he was only a serf. He had been smart enough to find a way to make money for himself and to afford a pretty heavy rent imposed by his owner. He had enough money but if he actually bought his freedom he would be a small fish in a big pond, but as long as he was serf and rented his own land he was living large. He had his family, his health, and enough to keep everyone happy. It was also evident by this sketch and another â€Å"Lgov† that if a serf had education or intelligence he was able to maintain a certain amount of piece and happiness.

Competition :: essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Two best friends are torn apart. A man meticulously plots revenge on the person who got the job he was dying for. A nation is full of rage and fear because another country beat them in the race to walk on the moon. Sadly, all of these situations were caused by one thing, competition. In Alfie Kohn’s essay, â€Å"Competition Is Destructive†, he describes competition as having a â€Å"toxic effect on our relationships†(11). Although competition has many positive effects in this world, when talking specifically about relationships, whether it be between best friends, two strangers, or even entire nations, it fuels negative feelings and attitudes that transform people into monsters. Close relationships often have their ups and downs. When one spends enough time with a person it is inevitable that they will have an argument. Best friends, for example, share everything with each other. They laugh together, cry together and trust one another completely. Yet throw a boy that they are both interested in into the picture and they are lying and backstabbing their way into his arms. Or perhaps they are both dying to play Juliet. Suddenly they view each other as enemies who will stop at nothing for the part. One might spread rumors about the other or sabotage her audition. Even something as innocent as grades can turn into a knockdown, drag-out, fight to the finish. They resort to cheating, or anything that will give them a leg up from the other. These crazy situations are just a few of the many examples that show how competition can create feelings of resentment, bitterness and even hatred between people who at one point were inseparable. Competition between good friends is not the only instance in which negative feelings can occur. Surprisingly, the exact same feelings of resentment and hostility can happen between two perfect strangers. With no valid reason, children and adults alike can work up an enormous grudge against a person that they have never spoken to, or possibly never even seen. Take for instance a boy on a high school football team. Off the field he is a respectable student who is always considerate of others. Yet the second he steps on that field he transforms into a monster who is out to â€Å"get† the other team, to â€Å"show them who’s boss.† He has never met these people before and has no reason to feel such anger towards them other than the fact that they are standing in the way of his team winning the game.

Dulce et Decorum est †Anthem for Doomed Youth Essay

â€Å"Dulce et Decorum est† and â€Å"Anthem for Doomed Youth† are two poems written by Wilfred Owen during the First World War. Owen, like most soldiers, joined up after being convinced that war was fun by propagandistic posters, poems and stories, and once he had realised that the truth was quite the opposite of this, he decided that it was his responsibility to oppose and protest against poets like Jessie Pope through poetry itself. People were not prepared for the sheer scale and manner of death and the mechanised nature of trench warfare, and had false expectations of the heroic endeavour, but little awareness of the realities. However, compared to â€Å"Dulce†, the anger portrayed is dramatically understated. â€Å"Dulce† is an outrageous protest, displaying the â€Å"haunting† and â€Å"bitter† effects of war, and after describing in great detail the horrific story of a soldier â€Å"drowning† and â€Å"choking† in gas, Owen reveals his passionate hatred for the false and misleading idealisms of heroism in war using particularly emphatic imagery in â€Å"cancer† and â€Å"froth corrupted lungs†. The fact that â€Å"Anthem† is a sonnet, is ironic in that they are usually about love, and because it is actually about grief, it somewhat lulls the reader into a false sense of security, therefore making the poem more effective. Both poems seem to talk about the vile and painful conditions in war, â€Å"Dulce† using onomatopoeia in â€Å"trudge†, giving the impression that war is truly appalling, immediately going against the common belief that it is a game from poems like â€Å"Who’s for the game?†. Also, true to both poems is the idea of undignified and casual death, rather than the heroic, glorious death promised by governmental propaganda. For example, in â€Å"Dulce†, Owen talks about the way they â€Å"flung [the dead soldier] in a wagon† with such brutal nonchalance. Furthermore, â€Å"Anthem† introduces a typical Victorian funeral with singing â€Å"choirs†, and juxtaposes it with the â€Å"shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells† on the battlefield, and with the constant end-stopped lines, this conveys a sense of solemn grief rather than the vicious anger in â€Å"Dulce†, which tends to use enjambment more frequently. Also, â€Å"Anthem† discusses the lack of ceremony and dignity in which people are â€Å"honoured† after their death on the battlefield, and Owen reveals his anger for this using the powerful, hyperbolic alliteration in â€Å"rifles’ rapid rattle†. In addition, the fact that the sound of machine gun fire is reflected in the phrase â€Å"rifles’ rapid rattle† presents to the reader that the harsh realities of war are indeed more than just frightening. In addition, a sense of urgency and immediacy is portrayed in the second stanza of â€Å"Dulce†, when Owen uses direct speech and exclamations in â€Å"Gas! Gas!†, while the epizeuxis and use of the present continuous tense gives further emphasis to this desperate urgency .On the other hand, â€Å"Anthem† has a strong sense of sympathy and general tranquillity throughout the second stanza, which is juxtaposed by something quite the opposite in the first. As well as this, the light lexis used in words such as â€Å"glimmers† and â€Å"tenderness† in the second stanza, give the impression that it is a poem of mourning and respect rather than anger and hate. In general, â€Å"Dulce† uses fairly vulgar and crude language, conveying his disrespect for propagandistic poets, as well as his anger at the unawareness of the dangers of war of the British public: â€Å"He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.† Owen’s use of the words â€Å"guttering, choking [and] drowning†, has numerous implications and effects. Firstly, a â€Å"gutter†¦Ã¢â‚¬  represents the bottom of society, and therefore shows how soldiers dying is in fact not a respectable act, but rather an act that is hardly noticed by society. Also, the onomatopoeic sounds of â€Å"guttering† and â€Å"choking†, give an even more emphatic image of death on the battlefield, portraying Owen’s desire for the awareness of the harsh realities of war in youth culture as well as in everyday men. Finally, the fact that Owen uses three separate adjectives to describe the horrific scene, in addition to the tri-conic feel it gives, the phrase implies that Owen could not put what he was seeing into words, and therefore persuading the reader that war is simply a catastrophic, desperate excuse for a fight, sacrificing millions of men in the process. Unlike â€Å"Dulce†, â€Å"Anthem† brings out the mournful, respectful side of Wilfred Owen through the melancholy atmosphere he creates through the modulation of harsh imagery to a more resigned tone: â€Å"The monstrous anger of the guns†¦ †¦but in their eyes Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.† This dramatic contrast between coarse and frightening imagery in â€Å"monstrous anger of the guns† and the solemn melancholy in â€Å"the holy glimmers of goodbyes† is a very moving one. This is not only because the phrase refers to tears in young men’s eyes, which in itself is a saddening image, but also because it refers to â€Å"goodbyes†, forcing a more personal image of saying â€Å"goodbye† to close friends or relatives as they go to war upon the mind of the reader, again, creating a sombre mood. In addition, the end-stopped line following â€Å"goodbyes† is very effective in that it makes the â€Å"goodbye† seem all the more sudden, harsh, and hurtful. In conclusion, â€Å"Dulce† and â€Å"Anthem†, although they are both written in protest against the deceiving propaganda made by various people, they go about it in different ways. â€Å"Dulce† is an outright outrage at individuals, which we know from Owen’s draft that it was targeted at Jessie Pope, using coarse and harsh language to do so. â€Å"Anthem† on the other hand is a more solemn and moving poem, although it starts as if it were to be an outrage, before we learn that in fact, it is only grieving for the dead and their lack of ceremony, and it becomes literally, an anthem for doomed youth.

Audience Analysis

The ACA Open Knowledge Online Guide Tyrone L. Adams, Ph. D. [[email  protected] edu] D’Aquin Professor of Journalism and Communication Department of Communication University of Louisiana, Lafayette and Peter A. DeCaro, Ph. D. [[email  protected] edu] Department Chair and Associate Professor of Communication Department of Communication California State University Stanislaus The Significance of Audience Analysis: Strategically Considering Your Target Populace It cannot be said often enough: KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE!Knowing your audience—their beliefs, attitudes, age, education level, job functions, language and culture—is the single most important aspect of developing your speech. Your audience isn’t just a passive group of people who come together by happenstance to listen to you. Your audience is assembled for a very real reason: They want to hear what you have to say. In public speaking, the audience is the entire reason This module helps you understand: Th e critical importance of understanding your audience. The various methods used in analyzing a given audience.The five layers of any given audience analysis. you are giving the speech; thus, the audience is the most important component of speechmaking. We analyze our audience because we want to discover information that will help create a link between the speaker and the audience. We call this link identification. Aristotle loosely called it â€Å"finding a common ground. † This isn’t a one-way process between the speaker and the audience; rather, it is a two-way transactional process. When you ask an audience to listen to your ideas, you are asking them to come partway into your experience as a speaker.And, in return, it is your obligation to go partway into their experience as an audience member. The more you know and understand about your audience and their needs, the better you can prepare your speech. For example: Bob Mullins, a local bank officer, was preparing fo r a speech at the Rotary Club in Dallas, Texas on â€Å"finding the right loan† for a diverse ethnic audience. He knew his topic extremely well, had put a lot of hard work into his research, and had his visual aids in order. One of the things he had not completely considered, however, was the audience to which he would be speaking.On the day of the event, Mr. Mullins delivered a flawless speech on car and home loans, but the speech was not received well. You see, on this particular week, a major segment of the audience consisted of the â€Å"Junior Rotarians† who wanted to hear about â€Å"personal savings accounts† and â€Å"college savings plans. † It was a critical mistake. Had Bob considered the full nature and makeup of his audience prior to the event, he might not have been received so poorly. A hard lesson learned. This module is dedicated to understanding how a speaker connects with an audience through audience analysis.This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3. 0 United States License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons. org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3. 0/us/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA. I. How Do I Analyze My Audience? Whenever thinking about your speech, it is always a good idea to begin with a thorough awareness of your audience and the many factors comprising that audience. In speech communication we simply call this â€Å"doing an audience analysis. An audience analysis is when you consider all of the pertinent elements defining the makeup and characteristics of your audience. There are many elements to consider, too, such as: age, gender, education, occupation, language, ethnicity, culture, background knowledge, needs and interests, and previously held attitudes, beliefs, and values. Of course, this is not an all-inclusive list. But, it does help you get a good general understanding of the demographics shaping up whom, precisely, you will be addressing.From the Greek affix demo (of the people) we come to understand that demographics are detailed accounts of human population characteristics. These accounts are usually rendered as statistical population segments. Demographics are widely used by advertising and public relations professionals to analyze specific audiences so that their products or ideas will carry influence. However, all good public speakers consider the demographic characteristics of their audience, as well. It is a, if not the, fundamental stage of preparing for your speech.So now you may be saying to yourself: â€Å"Gee, that’s great! How do I go about analyzing my particular audience? † Well, first you need to know that there are three overarching methods (or what we like to call â€Å"paradigms†) for doing an audience analysis: (1) audience analysis by direct observation, (2) audience analysis by inference, and (3) audience analysis through data sampling. Once you get to know how these methods work a bit better, you should be able to select which one (or even combination of these methods) is right for your circumstances.Audience Analysis by Direct Observation Audience analysis by direct observation, or direct experience, is, by far, the most simple of the three paradigms for â€Å"getting the feel† of a particular audience. It is a form of qualitative data gathering. We perceive it through one or more of our five natural senses—hearing, seeing, touching, tasting, and smelling. Knowledge that we acquire through personal experience has more impact on us than does knowledge that we learn indirectly. Knowledge acquired from personal experience is also more likely to affect our thinking and will be retained for a longer period of time.We are more likely to trust what we hear, see, feel, taste, and smell rather than what we learn from secondary sources of information. All you r eally need to do for this method of observation is to examine the broad composition of your audience working in its natural state. If you are lucky enough to be able to do this before speaking to your audience, you will be able to gather some basic reflective data that will help you arrange your thoughts and arguments for your speech. One excellent way to become informed about your audience is to ask them about themselves.In its most basic form, this is data collection. In the classroom situation, you should have had ample time to get to know your fellow classmates and become familiar with who they are on a personal level. Through class conversations—and your unmonitored small-group conversations before and after class—you will be able to get to know and appreciate each class member as both a human being and an audience member. You will come to understand what interests them, convinces them, or even makes them laugh.Do not discount even a simple form of data collection such as distributing a three- or four-item questionnaire before class. You might arouse interest and curiosity in your topic while you also gain valuable data. Knowledge acquired from personal experience is also more likely to affect our thinking and will be retained for a longer period of time. Clearly this cannot be done in every speaking situation, however. Often, we are required to give an unacquainted-audience presentation. Unacquainted-audience presentations are speeches where you are completely unfamiliar with the audience and its demographics.In these cases, it is always best to try and find some time to sit down and talk with someone you trust (or even multiple parties) who might be familiar with the given audience. These confidantes can be very constructive in helping you understand the context in which you will be speaking. You see, not understanding the basic demographic characteristics of an audience, or further, Who is it that I am going to be talking to? that audienc e’s beliefs, values, or attitudes about a given topic, makes your presentation goals haphazard, at best.Look around the room at the people who will be listening to your speech. What types of gender, age, ethnicity, and educational-level characteristics will you be appealing to? What expectations does your audience have for your presentation? These are all important questions you should be asking yourself before you begin doing your research and drafting your outline. Who is it that I am going to be talking to? What, exactly, makes them, as listeners, tick? Audience Analysis by Inference Audience analysis by inference is merely a logical extension of your observations drawn in theWhat, exactly, makes them, as listeners, tick? method above. It is a form of critical thinking known as inductive reasoning, and another form of qualitative data gathering. An inference is when you make a reasoned tentative conclusion or logical judgment on the basis of available evidence. It is best used when you can identify patterns in your evidence that indicate something is expected to happen again or should hold true based upon previous experiences. Do you need to learn how to interpret information and draw conclusions? Absolutely! We make inferences—or reasonable assumptions—all the time.For example, when we hear someone speaking Arabic, we infer that they are from the Middle East. When we see this person carrying a copy of The Koran, we infer that they are also a follower of the Muslim faith. These are reasoned tentative conclusions that we make based upon the evidence available to us and our general knowledge about people and their traits. When we reason, we make connections, distinctions, and predictions; we use what is known or familiar to us to reach a conclusion about something that is unknown or unfamiliar for it to make sense. Granted, of course, inferences are sometimes wrong.Here’s a familiar example: Some of your classmates recommend a part icular course to you, telling you that it is relatively simple. You’ve heard similar things from other students, so you take the course and discover that they were, indeed, right. These same classmates recommend another course allegedly just as trouble-free as the last one. Only this time, you discover the opposite to be true. The course was insanely difficult. You inferred, or made a reasonable assumption based on information from your fellow classmates, that the course they recommended would be easy. Hey! You aren’t alone in this regard.Everybody makes these types of mistakes. It’s a normal part of processing information. Audience Analysis by Data Sampling Unlike audience analysis by direct observation and analysis by inference, audience analysis by data sampling uses statistical evidence to quantify and clarify the characteristics of your audience (data is the plural form of datum). These characteristics are also known as variables, and are assigned a numeric al value so we can systematically collect and classify them. They are reported as statistics, also known as quantitative analysis or quantitative data collection.Statistics are numerical summaries of facts, figures, and research findings. Audience analysis by data sampling requires you to survey your audience before you give your speech. You need to know the basics of doing a survey before you actually collect and interpret your data. The Basic Questionnaire There are a great number of survey methods available to the speaker. However, we will cover three primary types in this section because they are utilized the most. The first type of survey method you should know about is the basic questionnaire, which is a series of questions advanced to produce demographic and attitudinal data from your audience.You can easily gather information from your audience, using questions similar to these below: My academic level in college: I currently have: no children 1 child 2 children 3 or more ch ildren I can best be classified as being: Caucasian Black or African American Hispanic of Asian descent other My marital status is: single married divorced/separated widowed These questions probe more deeply into the psyche of your audience members, and will help you see where they stand on certain issues. reshman sophomore junior senior My age is: less than 18 years of age between 18-21 years of age between 21-25 years of age over 25 years of age Clearly, audience members should not be required to identify themselves by name on the basic questionnaire. Anonymous questionnaires are more likely to produce truthful information. Remember, all you are looking for is a general read of your audience, you should not be looking for specific information about any respondent concerning your questionnaire in particular. It is a bulk sampling tool, only.While you can gather basic demographic data (as shown above) easily, we need to adjust our questions a bit more tightly, or ask more focused qu estions, in order to understand the audience’s â€Å"predispositions† to think or act in certain ways For example, an attitudinal extension on the basic questionnaire might ask some of the following questions: I regard myself as a: conservative liberal socialist independent I believe that: there is a God there is not a God there might be a God, but I’m unsure none of the above These questions probe more deeply into the psyche of your audience members, and will help you see where they stand on certain issues. Of course, you may need to change these questions a bit to get to the heart of your specific topic. But, once you do, you’ll have a wealth of data at your disposal which, ultimately, will tell you how to work with your target audience.I believe that abortion is: wrong, and should be illegal wrong, but should remain legal okay, but should be illegal okay, and should remain legal none of the above Value Hierarchy by Ordered Categories Another method of finding out your audience’s value set is to survey them according to their value hierarchy. A value hierarchy is a person’s value structure placed in relationship to a given value set. The way to determine a person’s value hierarchy is to use the ordered categories sampling method. In ordered categories, the surveyor lists a number of values on a piece of paper, and asks the respondent to order them on another piece of paper, according to their importance to the respondent (the respondent is the person who fills out the questionnaire).What occurs is that the respondent takes a series of values and, in turn, develops them into a concrete self-ordered The way to determine a person’s value hierarchy is to use the ordered categories sampling method. list. Each response is different, but when analyzed by the speaker, common themes will present themselves in the overall data. Accordingly, the speaker can then identify with those common value themes. See the exa mple below for a given speech on â€Å"homeland security initiatives:† Targeted Value Set Life Liberty Safety Freedom Justice Family Faith Patriotism Democracy Likert-type Testing of Attitudes The final method of assessing your audience’s attitudes deals with Likert-type testing.Likert-type testing is when you make a statement, and ask the respondent to gauge the depth of their sentiments toward that statement either positively, negatively, or neutrally. Typically, each scale will have 5 weighted response categories, being +2, +1, 0, -1, and -2. What the Likert-type test does, that other tests do not do, is measure the extent to which attitudes are held. See how the Likert-type test does this in the speech example on â€Å"unsolicited email† below: UNSOLICITED EMAIL 1. Unsolicited email should be illegal 2. Making unsolicited email illegal would be fundamentally unfair to businesses 3. Making unsolicited email illegal would be a violation of the First Amendment (Free Speech) 4. I usually delete unsolicited email before ever opening it 5.I sometimes open unsolicited email when I am bored Strongly Agree 1 Agree Neither agree nor disagree 3 Disagree Strongly Disagree 5 Ordered Value Set 1. Freedom 2. Democracy 3. Liberty 4. Safety 5. Justice 2 4 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 A small Likert-type test will tell you where your audience, generally speaking, stands on issues. As well, it will inform you as to the degree of the audience’s beliefs on these issues. The Likert-type test should be used when attempting to assess a highly charged or polarizing issue, because it will tell you, in rough numbers, whether or not your audience agrees or disagrees with your planned advocacy. †¦ re your audience members literally â€Å"speech captives† who have somehow been socially or systematically coerced into hearing you? II. The â€Å"Five Layers† of Audience Analysis No matter which of the above inquiry methods you choo se to do your audience analysis, you will, at some point, need to direct your attention to the five â€Å"layers† of audience analysis. These are the five layers through which you will learn to better appreciate your audience. Let’s now examine these layers and understand the variables and constraints you should use to estimate your audience’s information requirements. Layer 1: The Situational Analysis The situational audience analysis layer considers the situation for which your audience is gathered.This layer is primarily concerned with why your audience is assembled in the first place. Are they willingly gathered to hear you speak? Have your audience members paid to hear you? Or, are your audience members literally â€Å"speech captives† who have somehow been socially or systematically coerced into hearing you? These factors are decisively important, because they place a major responsibility upon you as a speaker, whichever the case. The entire tone an d agenda of your speech rests largely upon whether or not your audience even wants to hear from you. Many audiences are considered captive audiences in that they have no real choice regarding the matter of hearing a given speech. In general, these are some f the most difficult audiences to address because these members are being forced to listen to a message and do not have the full exercise of their own free will. Consider for a moment when you have been called to a mandatory work meeting. Were you truly happy to listen to the speaker, in all honesty? Some might say â€Å"yes,† but usually most would rather be doing something else with their time. This is an important factor to keep in mind when preparing your speech: some simply do not want to listen to a speech they believe is compulsory. The voluntary audience situation, in stark contrast, is completely different. A voluntary audience is willingly assembled to listen to a given message.As a rule, these audiences are much easier to address because they are interested in hearing the speech at hand. To visualize how this works, reflect upon the last speech, concert, or show you’ve attended of your own accord. While the event may or may not have lived up to your overall expectations, the very fact that you freely went to the occasion speaks volumes about your predisposition to listen to—and perhaps even be persuaded by—the information being presented. There’s something else to be said about captive versus voluntary audiences, as well. Modern communication researchers have found that captive audiences are more heterogeneous and that voluntary audiences are more homogeneous.In other words, when captive audiences are gathered, the audience is typically heterogeneous or characterized by many demographic differences among individuals. On the other hand, when voluntary audiences assemble, by and large, they are populated by homogeneous groupings, or, audiences which are characteriz ed more by their demographic similarities than their differences. Sometimes audiences are mixed in their situational settings, too. For instance, take the everyday classroom situation. While college is pronounced to be a voluntary listening situation in that students choose to attend higher education, many people in the college classroom environment sadly feel as if they are still â€Å"trapped† in school, and would rather be elsewhere. Obviously, this erception colors how information is being processed—and in some cases, not being processed. On the other hand, some students in college are truly there by choice, and attentively seek out knowledge from their teacher-mentors. What results from this mixed audience situation is a hybrid captive-voluntary audience, with those who are only partially interested in what is going on in the classroom and those who are genuinely involved. Of course, this leaves you with a difficult set of circumstances when preparing for your cla ss speeches. Both you and your professor are well aware that the audience you will be speaking to Would you be more inclined to talk to issues bearing upon id not enroll in the course to hear from you, specifically. However, this difficulty of speaking to a hybrid captive-voluntary audience does present you with an excellent opportunity: you will have the good fortune of speaking to people who do and do not, fully, want to hear from you. What a prospect! You literally get to hone your speech skills on both types of audiences, thereby learning a skill set that many never get to exercise. You should begin this wonderful opportunity by considering ways to inform, persuade, and humor a mixed situation audience. Think of it as a learning occasion, and you’ll do just fine. Layer 2: The Demographic Analysis those gender, age, and race qualities?The second layer of audience analysis is demography. As mentioned before, demographics are literally a classification of the characteristics of the people. Whenever addressing an audience, it is generally a good idea to know about its: age, gender, major, year in school, race, ethnicity, religious affiliation, et cetera. There are two steps in doing an accurate demographic analysis: (1) the gathering of the demographic data, and (2) the interpretation of this demographic data. Sometimes, this information is gathered by the questionnaire sampling method, and is done formally. On other occasions, this information is already available in a database and is made available to the speaker.Some noteworthy speakers even have â€Å"scouts† who do demographic reconnaissance on an audience prior to a speaking event, and make ad hoc interpretations on that audience based upon key visual cues. For example, congresspersons and senators frequently make public appearances where they use stock speeches to appeal to certain audiences with specific demographic uniqueness. In order to know what type of audience he or she will be addr essing, these politicians dispatch staff aides to an event to see how many persons of color, hecklers, and supporters will be in attendance. Of course, doing ad hoc interpretation of demographic characteristics is, indeed, more an art form than a science. Still, it is a common practice among many professional speakers.Consider for a moment how valuable knowing that your audience will be mostly female, between the ages of 25 and 40, predominantly married, and Caucasian, could be to you as a public speaker. Would you change your message to fit this demographic? Would you be more inclined to talk to issues bearing upon those gender, age, and race qualities? Or, would you keep your message the same, no matter the audience to whom you were addressing? Frankly, the smart speaker would shift his or her message to adapt to the audience. And, in a nutshell, that’s the purpose of doing demographics: to embed within your message the acceptable parameters of your audience’s range of needs.This, of course, raises an extremely important ethical issue for the modern speaker. Given the ability to do demographic data analysis and interpretation of an audience, does a speaker shift his or her message to play to the audience entirely? Or, on the other hand, does a speaker not shift his or her message so as to remain true to his or her motives? It is a delicate balancing act, for certain. Demographic information not only has the ability to truly enlighten a speaker, it also has the ability to modify a speaker’s original intent. Only you will be able to alleviate the tension between a speaker’s need to adapt to an audience and his or her need to remain true to form.Some political critics have even argued that our modern leadership no longer â€Å"leads,† it merely speaks according to demography and issue polls. Layer 3: Psychological Description: On Attitudes, Beliefs, and Values Unless your selected speech topic is a complete mystery to your aud ience, your listeners will already hold â€Å"attitudes, beliefs, and values† toward the ideas you will inevitably present. As a result, it is always important to know where your audience stands on the issues you plan to address ahead of time. The best way to accomplish this is to sample your audience with a quick questionnaire or survey prior to the event. This is known as the third layer of audience analysis, or psychological description.There are three things you seek to identify when performing a description: the audience’s (1) attitudes, (2) beliefs, and (3) values. They are your calculated allies †¦ it is always important to know where your audience stands on the issues you plan to address ahead of time. in understanding how your audience thinks. 1. Attitudes What exactly is an attitude? In basic terms, an attitude is a learned disposition to respond in a consistently favorable or unfavorable manner with respect to a person, an object, an idea, or an event. Attitudes come in different forms. You are very likely to see an attitude present itself when someone says that they are â€Å"pro† or â€Å"anti† something.But, above all else, attitudes are learned and not necessarily enduring. Attitudes can change, and sometimes do, whereas beliefs and values do not shift as easily. Let’s examine a sample list of attitudes below: Pro-war Anti-affirmative action Pro-choice Pro-business Anti-discrimination Anti-war Anti-slavery Pro-gaming Anti-government Pro-capital punishment Pro-diversity Pro-life Anti-gambling Anti-drugs Anti-capital punishment These are just a small range of issues that one can either be â€Å"for† or â€Å"against. † And, while we are simplifying the social scientific idea of an attitude considerably here, these examples serve our purposes well. Remember, attitudes are not as durable as beliefs and values.But, they are good indicators of how people view the persons, objects, ideas, or events that shape their world. 2. Beliefs Beliefs are principles. Beliefs are more durable than attitudes because beliefs are hinged to ideals and not issues. For example, you may believe in the principle: â€Å"what goes around comes around. † If you do, you believe in the notion of karma. And so, you may align your behaviors to be consistent with this belief philosophy. You may not engage in unethical or negative behavior because you believe that it will â€Å"come back† to you. Likewise, you may try to exude behaviors that are ethical and positive because you wish for this behavior to return, in kind. You may not think this at all, and believe quite the opposite.Either way, there is a belief in operation driving what you think. Let’s now turn to examine some sample beliefs: – The world was created by God. – Marijuana is an addictive gateway drug. – Ghosts are all around us. – Smoking causes cancer. – Anyone can acquire HIV.  œ Evolution is fact, not fiction. – Marijuana is neither addictive nor harmful. – Ghosts are products of our imagination. – Smoking does not cause cancer. – Only high-risk groups acquire HIV. 3. Values A value, on the other hand, is a guiding belief that regulates our attitudes. Values are the core principles driving our attitudes. If you probe into someone’s attitudes and beliefs deep enough, you will inevitably find an underlying value.Importantly, you should also know that we structure our values in accordance to our own value hierarchy, or mental schema of values placed in order of their relative individual importance. Each of us has our own values that we subscribe to and a value hierarchy that we use to navigate the issues of the world. Truth be known, we really aren’t even aware that we have a value hierarchy until some of our values come in direct conflict with †¦ we make decisions small and grand, based from our value hierarchi es. each other. Then, we have to negotiate something called cognitive dissonance, or the mental stress caused by the choice we are forced to make between two considerable alternatives. For example, let’s assume that you value â€Å"having fun† a great deal. You like to party with your friends and truly enjoy yourself.And, in this day and age, who doesn’t? However, as a young adult now experiencing a significant amount of independence and personal freedom at college, you have many life options at your disposal. Let’s also say that some of your close personal friends are doing drugs. You are torn. Part of you wants to experience the â€Å"fun† that your close friends may be experiencing; but, the more sane part of you wants to responsibly decline. In honesty, you are juxtaposed between two of your own values—having â€Å"fun† and being responsible. This real life example is somewhat exaggerated for your benefit. Realize that we make dec isions small and grand, based from of our value hierarchies.Let’s look at some basic values common to people around the world: Accomplishment Aesthetics Authority Competency Creativity Learning Flexibility Health Independence Intellectual stimulation Leisure Material Status Peace Power Security Teamwork Layer 4: Multicultural Audience Analysis Demography (as outlined in Layer 2) looks at issues of race and ethnicity in a basic sense. However, we believe that in our increasingly diverse society, it is worthy to pay particular attention to the issue of speaking to a multicultural audience. Odds are that both your classroom audience and any real world audience that you encounter will have an underlying multicultural dimension.As a speaker, you need to recognize that the perspective you have on any given topic may not necessarily be shared by all of the members of your audience. Therefore, it is imperative that you become a culturally effective speaker. Culturally effective speak ers develop the capacity to appreciate other cultures and acquire the necessary skills to speak effectively to people with diverse ethnic backgrounds. Keep these issues ever-present in your mind: Language: Many people speak different languages, so if you are translating words or phrases, make sure that your translations are correct and that you are using concrete language instead of slang or jargon, which can be confusing.Advancement Affiliation Broadminded Competition Economic Return Family Freedom Helping others Influence Intellectual status Loyalty Moral fulfillment Physical work Prestige Self-expression Variety Adventure Appearance Community Cooperation Education Fast Pace Friendship Honesty Integrity Leadership Management Order Pleasure Recognition Travel Wisdom Cognition: Realize that different cultures have different cultural-cognitive processes, or means of looking at the very concept of logic itself. Accordingly, gauge your audience as to their diverse ways of thinking and be sensitive to these differing logics. Ethnocentricity: Do not assume that your culture is dominant or better than other cultures. Ethnocentrism is the belief that one’s own culture or ethnicity is superior to others. Remember that, in many cases, you will be appealing to people from other cultures. Ethnocentric viewpoints have the tendency to drive a wedge between youKnowing that culture does play a major role in interactions between you and your audience is a good step in becoming an effective communicator. and your audience. Values differ greatly: Not only do individuals have value systems of their own, but societies promote value systems, as well. Keep in mind the fact that you will be appealing to value hierarchies that are socially-laden, as well as those that are individually-borne. Communication styles differ greatly: While you are trying to balance these language, cognition, cultural, and value issues, you should also recognize that some cultures prefer a more anima ted delivery style than do others.The intelligent speaker will understand this, and adapt his or her verbal and nonverbal delivery accordingly. Audience Analysis and the Multicultural Audience Today’s speakers face many cultural challenges. These challenges include ethnocentrism, stereotyping, verbal and nonverbal misinterpretations, differences in information processing, and translation difficulties. Ideally, it would be wonderful to be able to master every culture and language, but we cannot be superhuman. Still, there are some universal cultural attributes you can identify through audience analysis that will give you a basic understanding about your multicultural audience.Knowing that culture does play a major role in interactions between you and your audience is a good step in becoming an effective communicator. The key is for you to find alternative approaches to delivering your message, with both verbal and nonverbal elements of communication, that are more in line with your audience’s cultural instincts. There are three areas of cultural orientation we will explore: (1) cognitive styles: how we organize and process information; (2) decision-making: what we accept as evidence; and (3) communication patterns: how we communicate verbally and nonverbally. 1. Cognitive Styles The word cognitive means thought. So, â€Å"cognitive styles† refers to thought patterns.Studies of cognitive styles suggest that people fall into open-minded and closed-minded categories. The openminded person seeks out information before making a decision. They are more likely to see the â€Å"relatedness of issues. † They admit that they don’t have all of the answers, and they need to learn more before they can draw a conclusion. The closed-minded person has tunnel-vision—he or she sees only a narrow range of data and ignores the rest. They accept information only if it conforms to their established mindset. Another aspect of cognitive styles is how people process information. We divide such processing into associative and abstractive characteristics. A person who thinks associatively is filtering ew data through the screen of personal experience, such as in direct observation. New data can be understood only in terms of similar past experiences. This person’s mind is generally closed to all information that does not reflect established values. Individuals that display abstractive characteristics think very analytically, and concepts are abstracted quickly. Innovation often takes precedence over tradition. So you can see how understanding these differences will help you develop your speech. And a third cognitive process is how we actually link information in a chain to come to a conclusion or decision. Generally, there are two types of thinking: linear and systemic.Linear thinking means that we process information by creating an associative link, that is, we first begin with A, then go to B, then to C, and so on, until we have created a chain of reason in order to come to a conclusion. Individuals who process information systemically consider all of the information at one time, mulling it over. This type of person may holistically consider A, B, C, and D, at the same time in order to come to a conclusion. Each type of cognitive process requires a different style of organization and delivery of your speech. The trick is to know how If they think that you are a credible speaker, chances are you can influence their decision-making process. and when to use both styles, and that’s where audience analysis comes in. 2.Decision-making Members of different cultures arrive at decision-making in different ways. These ways can be described as faith, fact, and feeling. The person who acts on the basis of faith is using a belief system which can be a religion or political ideology. Presenting facts in your speech that do not reflect religious or political beliefs can be a waste of time. His or her faith operates independently from facts. People who believe in facts want to see evidence to support your position. They can be the most predictable to persuade. People tend to accept scientific evidence rather than question or reject it. And finally, people who believe in feelings are the most common throughout the world.These are the people who â€Å"go with their gut instincts. † If they think that you are a credible speaker, and they develop a â€Å"liking† for you, chances are you can influence their decision-making process. 3. Communication Patterns Verbal Communication Each culture has a system for communicating. Hall has indicated that these systems can fall into two categories: low-contextual communication and high-contextual communication. Cultures that express themselves in a high-context communication system emphasize how intention or meaning can best be conveyed through the context (e. g. , social roles or positions) and the nonverbal channels (e. g. , pa uses, silence, tone of voice) of the verbal message.The high-context system is also known as an indirect verbal style, or indirect communication, verbal statements tend to camouflage the speaker’s actual intentions and are carried out in a softer tone of voice. Rules for speaking and behavior are implicit in the context. What this means is that much of the communication is expressed through nonverbal behavior—a slight nod of the head, a simple hand gesture as acknowledgement, a brief smile. Compare this to a low context communication system, where exchange of facts and information is stressed. Information is given primarily in words and meaning is best expressed explicitly. The lowcontext system is also known as a direct verbal style, or direct communication, verbal statements tend to reveal the speaker’s intentions with clarity and are enunciated with a forthright tone of voice.Generally speaking, low-context communication (LCC) refers to communication patterns of direct verbal orientation: straight talk, nonverbal immediacy, and sender-oriented values (i. e. , the sender assumes the responsibility to communicate clearly). In the LCC system, the speaker is expected to be responsible for constructing a clear, persuasive message that the listener can decode easily. In comparison, high-context communication (HCC) refers to communication patterns of indirect verbal orientation: self-humbling talk, nonverbal subtleties, silence, and interpreter-sensitive values (i. e. , the receiver or interpreter of the message assumes the responsibility to infer the hidden or contextual meanings of the message).In the HCC system, the listener or interpreter of the message is expected to â€Å"read between the lines,† to accurately infer the implicit intent of the verbal message, and to decode the nonverbal subtleties that accompany the verbal message. Nonverbal Communication As the global village continues to shrink and cultures co-mingle, it is essen tial for public speakers to become more sensitive, more aware, and more observant to the nearly limitless numbers of motions, gestures, and body language that surround us every day. And as we cross over cultural borders, we should learn to respect, learn, and understand more about them. Nonverbal communication is a powerful form of human expression. It is everywhere.People all over the world use their hands, heads, and bodies to communicate expressively. Nonverbal messages are often the primary means of relating our emotions, our attitudes, and the nature of our relationships with oth- Eye contact is an important channel of communication. ers. Nonverbal messages can express what verbal messages cannot express and are assumed to be more truthful than verbal messages. Some major areas of nonverbal behaviors include: eye contact, facial expressions, gestures, posture and body orientation, proximity, paralinguistics, and humor. Eye contact is an important channel of communication. It si gnals interest in others and for some, eye contact with your audience increases the speaker’s credibility.You’ve heard the statement â€Å"Look at me when I’m speaking to you,† or you are taught in public speaking to make â€Å"eye contact† with your audience. This is another culturally dependent orientation. Among the Japanese, one way to show that you are listening is to close the eyes in contemplation and nod the head slightly, up and down. The Japanese are not ignoring the speaker nor are they taking a nap. It is one way to show concentration and attentiveness. The Japanese prefer indirect eye contact; they avoid direct or prolonged eye contact as mush as possible. Making eye contact with your audience is important, but knowing who to make that eye contact with is equally as important.Remember, some audience members expect you to look them directly into their eyes, while others may prefer indirect eye contact. What about something as simple as a hand gesture – say the â€Å"thumbs up† with a closed fist? In the U. S. it can mean support or approval, â€Å"O. K†. or â€Å"Good Job! † It is also used for â€Å"hitch-hiking† in the U. S. In France this same gesture means zero. In Japan it means money or coins. In Nigeria it is a rude gesture. In Australia, if pumped up and down, is an obscene gesture, and in Germany and Japan it is the signal for â€Å"one. † Here’s where you walk a fine line—if you fail to gesture while speaking, you may be perceived as boring, stiff, and unanimated.A somewhat lively and animated delivery may entertain your audience and demonstrate your confidence about your knowledge of the speech material. On the other hand, if you emphasize certain nonverbal gestures that one or more segments of your audience find offensive, you may wind up alienating them. We can make some general assumptions about Low-Contextual and High-Contextual cultures. The e xchange of facts and information is stressed with members of Low-Context cultures. Information is given primarily in words and meaning is expressed explicitly. There is a stress on task performance, and the communication style is considered to be unemotional and impersonal, with a high degree of objectivity.Low-Context individuals are also informal communicators, where dispensing with ceremony and rigid protocol is accepted, if not the norm. Reasoning is deductive; based on theory and logic. And members prefer analytical thinking, which breaks problems into small chunks. Direct eye contact is expected from both the speaker and audience. In High-Context cultures, shared experience makes certain things understood without them needed to be stated explicitly. Rules for speaking and behaving are implicit in the context, as is the preference for implicit communication. The communication style is emotive and personal, with a high degree of subjectivity and a stress on relationships. There is a high emphasis on protocol and social customs.Reasoning is based on experience and experimentation, with a preference for holistic thinking that is focused on the big picture and interrelationships between components. Indirect eye contact is expected from both speaker and audience. Remember that no two people behave in precisely the same way. Nor do people from the same culture perform exactly the same gestures and body language uniformly. For almost any nonverbal gesture there will probably be someone within a given culture who might say, â€Å"Well, some might attach that meaning to it, but to me it means†¦Ã¢â‚¬  and then they will provide a different interpretation. It is not only what you say in your speech that is important, but it’s how you say it that can make a difference to a multicultural audience.Gestures and body language communicate as effectively as words, and at times, even more so. Do we expect other cultures to adopt our customs or are we willing t o adopt theirs? We may not have time to study a language, but taking time to learn the nonverbal signals is a powerful communicator. We want to create a safe, inclusive environment for all audience members. Even though we have these cultural differences, people come together because they share similar interests. The success of your speech depends upon you, your research, and the quality and accura- †¦ you want to put your best work forward, and let your audience see your confidence and preparation shine through. cy of your information.Remember, communication always takes place between individuals, not cultures, but understanding cultural orientations will always help you become an effective speaker. Without nonverbal communication, our world would be static and colorless. Layer 5: â€Å"Topic Interest† and â€Å"Prior Knowledge† Analysis Finally, you want to query your audience for their interest in, and prior knowledge of, your topic. If the goal of your speech i s to deliver a unique and stirring presentation (and it should be), it would make perfect sense to know ahead of time if your audience: (1) is interested in what you have to say, and (2) has any prior knowledge regarding your topic.It stands to reason that you do not want to give a boring or trite speech. That much is clear. Instead, you want to put your best work forward, and let your audience see your confidence and preparation shine through. And, it also stands to reason that you don’t want to make a speech that your audience already knows a lot about. So, your job here is to â€Å"test† your topic by sampling your audience for their topic interest and topic knowledge. Defined, topic interest is the significance of the topic to a given audience; oftentimes related precisely to the uniqueness of a speaker’s topic. Likewise, topic knowledge is the general amount of information that the audience possesses on a given topic.These are not mere definitions listed fo r the sake of argument; these are essential analytical components of effective speech construction. Unlike multicultural audience analysis, evaluating your audience’s topic interest and topic knowledge is a fairly simple task. There are two ways to go about doing this: (1) through informal question and answer dialogue in class, or (2) more formally through an actual survey. Either way, it is best to have some information, rather than none at all. Imagine if you will, the laundry list of topics that people have heard over and over and over, ad nauseam. You can probably name some yourself, right now, without giving it much thought.If you started listing some topics to yourself, please realize that this is the point of this section of this module; your audience is literally thinking the same exact thing you are. Given that, topic preparation is strategically important to your overall speech success. Again, do not underestimate the power of asking your audience whether or not you r topic actually interests them. If you find that many people are not interested in your topic, or already know a lot about it, you have just saved yourself from a potentially mind-numbing exercise. After all, do you really want to give a speech where your audience could care less about your topic—or even worse— they know more about the topic than you do yourself? Not at all!The purpose of this section is to help you search for the highly sought-after public speaking concept called uniqueness, or when a topic rises to the level of being singularly exceptional in interest and knowledge to a given audience. We know that you wish to excel in giving your speech, and indeed you shall. But first, let’s make sure that your audience is â€Å"turned on† by your topic and hasn’t already heard the subject matter so much that they, themselves, could give the speech without much (if any) preparation. One final note: There’s an old adage in communication studies that reasons: â€Å"know what you know; know what you don’t know; and, know the difference between the two. In other words, don’t use puffery to blind your audience about your alleged knowledge on a particular subject. Remember, there is likely to be someone in your audience who knows as much about your topic, if not more, than you do. If you get caught trying to field an embarrassing question, you might just lose the most important thing you have as a speaker: your credibility. If you know the answer, respond accordingly. If you do not know the answer, respond accordingly. But, above all, try and be a resource for your audience. They expect you to be something of a de facto expert on the topic you choose to address. Conclusion Obviously, when thinking about what kind of topic you are going to select, it is compulsory for you to keep your audience in mind.Not doing so will put your speech at risk of not corresponding â€Å"Fail to plan, plan to fail. † with the information needs of your audience and further jeopardize your credibility as a speaker. In this module, we have covered (I) how to analyze an audience and (II) the five layers of audience analysis. In sum, this information equips you with the foundational knowledge and skill-set required to ensure that your topic complements your audience. And, after all, if we are not adapting to meet the needs of our audience, we are not going to be informative or convincing speakers. There’s a contemporary maxim that runs strong: â€Å"Fail to plan, plan to fail. We, your authors, believe that if you have failed to fully consider the nature, make-up, and characteristics of your audience, you are—for all intents and purposes—neglecting the spirit of the public speaking exercise. Confidently speaking to audiences can be somewhat addictive. The experience, when properly executed, can be empowering and help you succeed personally and professionally throughout your life . But, you must consider whom you are addressing first, and take their every requirement into account. We are linked to, joined with, if not bound by, our audiences. And, your main speaking ambition should be to seek identification with them, and for them to, likewise, seek identification with you. Works Consulted Bem, D. J. (1970).Beliefs, attitudes, and human affairs. 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To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons. org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3. 0/us/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.