PCs are Better than Macs for Home Users essays

PCs are Better than Macs for Home Users essays For years, Macs and PCs have been competing for home users. Apple has recently released the new iMac, and the notebook version of the iMac the iBook. Even though several years ago, Macs were better than PCs, now, PCs are better than Macs for home users in terms of performance and expansion options. To some consumers, performance is often the most important factor in buying a computer. Performance doesnt necessarily mean how well the computer performs potentially, but only on specific tasks. Both iBook and iMac are designed for home users, most of whom neither care about number of floating-point operations per second, nor know what it means. Very few home users will pay $500 for Photoshop 5.0 to edit photos on their PC. The more likely uses for home computers are: word processing, browsing the Internet, and 3-D gaming. Since the most popular word processor is developed by Microsoft and allegedly optimized for Windows, it would be unfair to compare the Mac version of MS Word with the Windows version. However, comparing the performance in 3-D games and the Internet is fair. Even though PC Magazine specializes in PCs, it reviewed the iBook as soon as it came out. The article focused on performance of the iBook and compared it to a similar IBM-compatible notebook. Since there are no new IBM-compatible notebooks that match iBooks specifications, PC Magazine decided to use the notebook they believed to be closest to iBook the IBM ThinkPad iSeries 1480. They have very few similarities: the both notebooks are available in different colors, and neither notebook has the fastest processor from its platform. Apple claims that its notebooks are up to twice as fast as comparable Microsoft Windows-based portables (qtd. in Hill 53). This statement is very vague it doesnt say how they compared the portables, and what Apple meant by comparable. Since similar statements have been ma...

The Troubled Succession of Charles V of Spain

The Troubled Succession of Charles V of Spain By the time he was 20, in 1520, Charles V ruled the largest collection of European land since Charlemagne over 700 years earlier. Charles was Duke of Burgundy, King of the Spanish Empire and the Habsburg territories, which included Austria and Hungary, as well as Holy Roman Emperor; he continued to acquire more land throughout his life. Problematically for Charles, but interestingly for historians, he acquired these lands piecemeal - there was no one single inheritance - and many of the territories were independent countries with their own systems of government and little common interest. This empire, or monarchia, may have brought Charles power, but it also caused him great problems. The Succession to Spain Charles inherited the Spanish Empire in 1516; this included peninsular Spain, Naples, several islands in the Mediterranean and large tracts of America. Although Charles had a clear right to inherit, the manner in which he did so caused upset: in 1516 Charles became regent of the Spanish Empire on his mentally ill mother’s behalf. Just a few months later, with his mother still alive, Charles declared himself king. Charles Causes Problems The manner of Charles’ rise to the throne caused upset, with some Spaniards wishing for his mother to remain in power; others supported Charles’ infant brother as heir. On the other hand, there were many who flocked to the court of the new king. Charles caused more problems in the manner in which he initially governed the kingdom: some feared he was inexperienced, and some Spaniards feared Charles would focus on his other lands, such as those he stood to inherit from Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian. These fears were exacerbated by the time it took Charles to put aside his other business and travel to Spain for the very first time: eighteen months. Charles caused other, much more tangible, problems when he arrived in 1517. He promised a gathering of towns called the Cortes that he wouldn’t appoint foreigners to important positions; he then issued letters naturalizing certain foreigners and appointed them to important positions. Furthermore, having been granted a large subsidy to the crown by the Cortes of Castile in 1517, Charles broke with tradition and asked for another large payment while the first was being paid. He’d so far spent little time in Castile and the money was to finance his claim to the Holy Roman throne, a foreign adventure feared by Castilians. This, and his weakness when it came to resolving internal conflicts between the towns and nobles, caused great upset. The Revolt of the Comuneros 1520-1 During the years 1520 - 21, Spain experienced a major rebellion within its Castilian kingdom, an uprising that has been described as the largest urban revolt in early modern Europe. (Bonney, The European Dynastic States, Longman, 1991, p. 414) Although certainly true, this statement obscures a later, but still significant, rural component. There is still debate on how close the revolt came to succeeding, but this rebellion of Castilian towns - who formed their own local councils, or communes - included a true mix of contemporary mismanagement, historical rivalry, and political self-interest. Charles wasn’t completely to blame, as pressure had grown over the last half-century when towns felt themselves increasingly losing power versus the nobility and the crown. The Rise of the Holy League Riots against Charles had begun before he had even left Spain in 1520, and as the riots spread, towns began rejecting his government and forming their own: councils called comuneros. In June 1520, as nobles remained quiet, hoping to profit from the chaos, the comuneros met and formed themselves together in the Santa Junta (Holy League). Charles’ regent sent an army to deal with the rebellion, but this lost the propaganda war when it started a fire that gutted Medina del Campo. More towns then joined the Santa Junta. As the rebellion spread in the north of Spain, the Santa Junta initially tried to get Charles V’s mother, the old queen, on their  side for support. When this failed, the Santa Junta sent a list of demands to Charles, a list intended to keep him king and moderate his actions and make him more Spanish. The demands included Charles returning to Spain and giving the Cortes a much greater role in government. Rural Rebellion and Failure As the rebellion grew larger, cracks appeared in the alliance of towns as each had their own agenda. The pressure of supplying troops also began to tell. The rebellion spread into the countryside, where people directed their violence against the nobility as well as the king. This was a mistake, as the nobles who had been content to let the revolt carry on now reacted against the new threat. It was the nobles who exploited Charles to negotiate a  settlement and a noble led army which crushed the comuneros  in battle. The revolt was effectively over after the Santa Junta was defeated in battle at Villalar in April 1521, although pockets remained until early 1522. The reaction of Charles wasn’t harsh given the standards of the day, and the towns kept many of their privileges.  However, the Cortes was never to gain any further power and became a glorified bank for the king. The Germania Charles faced another rebellion which occurred at the same time as the Comunero Revolt, in a smaller and less financially important region of Spain. This was the Germania, born out of a militia created to fight Barbary pirates, a council which wanted to create a Venice like city-state, and class anger as much as a dislike of Charles. The rebellion was crushed by the nobility without much crown help. 1522: Charles Returns Charles returned to Spain in 1522 to find royal power restored. Over the next few  years, he worked to change the relationship between himself and the Spaniards, learning Castilian, marrying an Iberian woman and calling Spain the heart of his empire. The towns were bowed and could be reminded of what they had done if ever they opposed Charles, and the nobles had fought their way to a closer relationship with him.

Online multimedia cannot compete against the traditional CD multimedia Essay

Online multimedia cannot compete against the traditional CD multimedia systems.IN REPORT FORMAT - Essay Example Here I will show how the traditional CD technology was better as compared to new online multimedia technology. The term media is employed in difference to media which simply make use of conventional types of hand-produced or printed material. Multimedia comprises a mixture of animation, video, audio, interactivity, still images and text content types (Kenneth, 1998). Multimedia is an elderly notion that has been specified fresh meaning by the computer industry in the course of their hard work to make multimedia compatible computing platforms. If we define Multimedia in the scholarly sense then it will be called as the â€Å"interactive dramatization of information†. Multimedia technology employs the computer to unite animation, text, audio, and graphics and complete motion video in the user control. However mixture of these functions have been obtainable for several years, it has been hard to merge them so that the non-technical consumer is able to control them and thus produce documents or functions that add in all these features. Usually, putting collectively such arrangement necessitates the abilities of a computer programmer or an information technology professional. In the pervious few years there has been infrequent employ made of multimedia resources together in academia and in business, however this has been mainly driven by exper t persons working ad hoc and in separation. Multimedia is generally played and recorded, accessed or displayed by information processing multimedia devices, like that a computerized or an electronic device, however it can be a fraction of a live multimedia performance (Parker et al, 1996). This section presents the evolution of the multimedia technology from its origin to present online multimedia technology. In the year 1965 the expression Multimedia was employed to explain the â€Å"Exploding Plastic Inevitable†, a performance that combined live cinema, experimental

That which is accepted as knowledge today is sometimes discarded Essay

That which is accepted as knowledge today is sometimes discarded tomorrow. Consider knowledge issues raised by this statem - Essay Example Back in 1917, Albert Einstein is seen to have introduced a theory in which he proposed that the universe was essentially static in nature. This theory was taken seriously by most astronomers and various scientists and upheld as being the acceptable knowledge. However, this theory has recently been proven to be entirely wrong and a new theory has been developed alluding to the fact that the universe is not static in nature. Throughout human history, development and civilization, this has generally been the trend, as the development of new knowledge is seen to constantly cause the old accepted knowledge to be discarded. This however begs the question of does new knowledge always happen to cause the older knowledge to be discarded? Does the development of new knowledge automatically cause the older knowledge to be considered as being useless? Human beings are generally able to gain knowledge by the use of various means such as the use of sense perception, language, reason and emotion. T he gaining of new information in human beings is often seen to be so automatic that it is largely considered to be quite difficult for someone to be able to stop this process. It is by the acquisition of this new knowledge that humans resort to discarding the old knowledge in favor of the new knowledge that they happen to have gained (International Baccalaureate Organization 13-20). The incessant thirst and quest by man to gain new knowledge is seen to lend claim to the postulation that no system is ever completely understood, no picture is ever complete and there is no explanation that is ever sufficiently finalized. This fact is exemplified by the fact that our most established paradigms such as the Theory of Gravity are still seen to be referred to as being theories. This aspect is seen to convey the idea that this existing knowledge might, and will most likely eventually be replaced by a deeper understanding. As we continue to try and burrow deeper in an attempt to gain an in-de pth understanding, we are able to constantly find a number of new patterns that serve to contradict the acceptable truth that we thought we knew pertaining to the system that we happen to be observing. While some of these new truths and details cause us to essentially fine tune our existing theories, they sometimes however force us to replace these old theories with a wholly new theory. Various historical discoveries are seen to constantly cause us to modify our currently acceptable human knowledge. Perhaps one of the illustrations that I find to be most interesting in the illustration of this aspect is the effect of the continuous discovery of new, and previously undiscovered human fossils. By the early years of the 20th century, the larger part of the world’s leading anatomists believed that the earliest humans evolved and developed somewhere in either Asia or in Europe. By this time, the fossil remains of the Neanderthal man had recently been discovered in Europe and there had also been some claims of the discovery of the fossil remains of the Java man in Indonesia as well as the Piltdown man remains in England. While these remains were seen to be quite primitive it was evident that they closely resembled modern human beings and it is this aspect that helped in lending credence to validity. However a fossil discovery in South Africa in 1924 was seen to critically challenge the acceptable knowledge and view of an Eurasian cradle for mankind. An Australian scientist working in Johannesburg received two boxes of rocks that

To Hang or Not to Hang Essay Example for Free

To Hang or Not to Hang Essay The debate and controversy surrounding the issue of death penalty has been revisited numerous times.   Bohm (1991) rightly concludes that â€Å"over the last decade and a half, few issues have received greater attention in criminology and criminal justice than the proper role of capital punishment in this society.†[1](p.4)   And like most social debates, the battle has been fought beyond the legislative halls and into the everyday grind of daily life.   Opinions are abundant as individuals passionately make the cases in support of or in opposition to the penalty of death.    And through the written word, this writer wishes to contribute to the debate. Thesis   It is this writer’s view that the death penalty should be abolished.   However, it must be clearly stated that this opinion is not primarily founded on the usual moral or religious reasons.   Rather, abolishment of the death penalty should be had as it is a waste of potentially productive human life and is contrary to the interests of the state.   This paper, in the latter sections, will also introduce an alternative model to death penalty that will reconcile the points-of-view of those in favor and those opposed to the penalty. In order to sufficiently discuss the arguments for the abolition, it is necessary that the movement, dubbed the ‘Abolitionist Movement’, be traced to its roots.   According to Schabas (1997), â€Å"the abolitionist movement finds its roots in the writings of European theorists Montesquieu, Voltaire and Bentham, and English Quakers John Bellers and John Howard. However, it was Cesare Beccarias 1767 essay, On Crimes and Punishment that had an especially strong impact throughout the world. In the essay, Beccaria theorized that there was no justification for the states taking of a life.†[2] (p.13)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Those in favor of abolishing the death penalty usually present a case founded on the following arguments that the death penalty (1) is a cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment, (2) does not serve as an effective deterrent to crime and (3) is morally reprehensible as only the Supreme Power has the right to take a human life, especially considering that the courts’ pronouncement of guilt may be subject to error.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The first argument is reiterated by Amnesty International (AI), the leading international non-governmental Human Rights organization calling for the abolition.   According to AI, â€Å"[a]n execution, just like torture, involves a deliberate assault on a prisoner. Even so-called humane methods such as lethal injection can entail excruciating suffering.†[3]   In Why Abolish the Death Penalty? (2007), the same organization called on the United Nations to abolish the penalty by likening it to torture: â€Å"[l]ike torture, an execution constitutes an extreme physical and mental assault on a person already rendered helpless by government authorities.†[4] If tortuous acts are now found to be universally reprehensible, there is no logical argument why capital punishment could not be considered in the same light.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Secondly, the statistics with regard to the relationship between capital punishment and crime rates are contradictory and inconsistent.   Many factors affect criminality in the society: socio-economic conditions, poverty rates, levels of education etc.   By saying that the institution of capital punishment will ensure a crime-free society, or atleast lessen the incidences of criminality, is misleading and uncorroborated by statistical data.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Thirdly, there is a question of morality involved in this debate. Does the state have the moral ascendancy to take away a person’s life?   There are obviously religious issues that are interlocked within this debate. However, even despite whatever religious arguments there may be, there is still the great issue of the court’s fallibility.   There have been many cases, well-documented at that, wherein a pronouncement of guilt has been overturned. How then could one ensure that we are not killing innocents? Upon closer examination, â€Å"the practice of the death penalty reveals that no criminal justice system is, or conceivably could be, capable of deciding fairly, consistently and infallibly†¦ criminal justice systems are vulnerable to discrimination and error. Expediency, discretionary decisions and prevailing public opinion may influence the proceedings.†[5] Anti-Thesis Those who support the continued application or the reinstitution of the death penalty use the issue of deterrence as their main argument.   It is the first and foremost duty of the state to protect its citizens from dangers to their persons and property.   The death penalty is one way of accomplishing this task. In Debating the Death Penalty: Should America Have Capital Punishment? The Experts on Both Sides Make Their Best Case (2004), Bedau writes that â€Å"[p]erhaps the most straightforward argument for the death penalty is that it saves innocent lives by preventing convicted murderers from killing again.†[6](187) This conclusion is rooted in the logic that for those of reasonable intelligence and unimpaired faculties, there is usually a thought-process (even if short-lived) that precedes the commission of an act; a thought process that weighs the pros, cons and possible consequences. In the above quoted work by Bedau, Professor James Q. Wilson explains that     Ã¢â‚¬Å"[p]eople are governed in their daily lives by rewards and penalties of every sort. We shop for bargain prices, praise our children for good behavior and scold them for bad, expect lower interest rates to stimulate home building and fear that higher ones will depress it, and conduct ourselves in public in ways that lead our friends and neighbors to form good opinions of us. To assert that ‘deterrence doesnt work’ is tantamount to either denying the plainest facts of everyday life or claiming that would-be criminals are utterly different from the rest of us.†[7] (189) â€Å"In order to understand the complex question of capital punishment as a deterrent,† writes Bedau in The Death Penalty in America: An Anthology (1964), â€Å"it is necessary to place it within the context of the nature and purposes of punishments in general. Punishments under law are usually framed with a two-fold purpose—retribution and prevention.†[8](258) A punishment serves to incapacitate the offender in order that he or she will no longer to able to commit more crimes.   This may be done relatively (through incarceration) or absolutely (through capital punishment).   â€Å"But by far the most common way to employ a punishment as a preventative of crime is to adopt a sufficiently severe penalty so as to compel general obedience out of fear of the consequences of disobedience—the classic doctrine of deterrence.†[9] (260) It must be noted that the State is not a gleeful party in this debate that revels with each death of a wayward citizen.   The death of a citizen is a tragic event; tragic but necessary with the view of safeguarding the rest of the unerring population.   Not only will it ensure that rapists and murderers will feel the full brunt of the law’s retribution, it will discourage others with similar deviant tendencies. Those who cry for abolition, twist Sacred Scripture to suit their needs.   An example of how misleading abolitionists’ arguments can be is reflected in this passage from Bedau (1964)[10]: Many who oppose capital punishment make a strong argument out of the Sixth Commandment: Thou shalt not kill ( Exod. 20:13). But they fail to note the commentary on that Commandment which follows: Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death. If a man willfully attacks another to kill him treacherously, you shall take him from my altar that he may die ( Exod. 21:12,14). It is faulty exegesis to take a verse of Scripture out of its context and interpret it without regard to its qualifying words. (124)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Capital Punishment, therefore, is a necessary measure to ensure that the state has sufficient leverage against those who commit heinous crimes.   Its modern application is spared for those individuals who have insurmountable evidence against them.   Supporting the death penalty does not mean that there are some people who deserve to die.   Rather, it means that every individual in society deserve to have safe streets for themselves and for their children. Synthesis   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Like the proponents for each faction in this debate, I too have a passionate argument for the abolition of capital punishment.   However, I oppose it not merely on the bases of the conventional arguments, outline in the first section.   Personally, I am not wholly convinced with the arguments and rationale of either side. To clarify my claim, I cannot in good conscience support capital punishment because it is a waste of a potentially productive human life.   Furthermore, on some level, I feel that death is not the ultimate retribution.   For heinous crimes like the rape of a minor or the murder of a child, as a citizen, I would expect nothing less than the full wrath of the law unto a person. If the death penalty were abolished from systems entirely, the remaining ‘heavy’ retributive method left for the state would be lifetime imprisonment without the possibility of parole.   This would, and is probably already, straining the resources of the states by having to build more prisons with money that could have otherwise gone into other areas of society that need rehabilitation: healthcare, education, etc. Therefore, I see another model as an alternative: Death Penalty should be the choice of the condemned person.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   If the thought of death is unpalatable to the inmate, as it could understandably be, there should be a system of Death row livelihood put into place.   But instead of the inmates getting the revenues or even a portion of it, the money created should either be put back into the government system, using the funds to benefit causes like education that are definitely of more societal worth than expending money on killing these people.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   There are many non-threatening jobs that could be done by inmates from the safety of their own prison cells, like sorting mail or doing laundry.   This would create an entire labour force that supports itself.   Unlike slavery or involuntary servitude, these inmates have been found guilty of heinous crimes, none of which (ideally) would be of having the wrong skin-tone.   One of the main reasons for the existence of a penitentiary system is not merely to punish but also to rehabilitate those who have been found of being a danger to the rest of civilized society. How then does killing them or keeping them incarcerated accomplish that? We would be making more animals than saving human beings.   By putting them to work, it would not only make the abolitionists happy but also the coffers of the state would get healthier. And more importantly, it cannot be involuntary servitude should the inmate opt to work instead of being injected with a deadly cocktail, or being electrocuted, hung or shot by a firing squad.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Surely after years of human evolution, we can find a better, more intelligent way of punishing those that dare to wreak havoc and endanger the rest of civil society. Reference Page Amnesty International.   Death Penalty. Retrieved from www.amnesty.org on 22 July, 2008 Amnesty International. Why Abolish the Death Penalty (2007). Retrieved from   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   www.amnesty.org on 22 July, 2008 Bedau, A. (2004). Debating the Death Penalty: Should America Have Capital Punishment? The Experts on Both Sides Make Their Best Case. Oxford University Press. New York. Bedau, A. (1964) The Death Penalty in America: An Anthology. Aldine Publishing.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Chicago. Bohm, R. ed. (1991) The Death Penalty in America: Current Research. Anderson   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Publishing Co. Schabas, W. (1997). The Abolition of the Death Penalty in International Law. Cambridge University Press, second edition    [1] Bohm, R. ed. (1991) The Death Penalty in America: Current Research. Anderson Publishing Co. [2] Schabas, W. (1997). The Abolition of the Death Penalty in International Law. Cambridge University Press, second edition [3] Amnesty International.   Death Penalty. Retrieved from www.amnesty.org on 22 July, 2008 [4] Amnesty International. Why Abolish the Death Penalty (2007). Retrieved from www.amnesty.org on 22 July, 2008 [5] ibid. [6] Bedau, A. (2004). Debating the Death Penalty: Should America Have Capital Punishment? The Experts on Both Sides Make Their Best Case. Oxford University Press. New York. [7] Ibid. [8] Bedau, A. (1964) The Death Penalty in America: An Anthology. Aldine Publishing. Chicago. [9] Ibid. [10] Ibid.

Kurt Cobain’s Shocking Suicide :: essays research papers

Kurt Cobain’s Shocking Suicide Kurt Cobain was citied in the Seattle area with a shotgun. Days later on the fifth of April, Kurt Cobain went into the small room above his garage in his Seattle home and ended it all. Fans across the world were stunned by the news of Kurt Cobain’s sudden and shocking suicide. Kurt was the leader of the multiplatinum grunge band Nirvana, and was widely hailed as the â€Å" John Lennon of his generation.† He was a gifted song writer and erratic performer. However, Cobain's name was presented at times with disillusionment and unhappiness. Kurt had spoken, written lyrics, and even sung in his songs about suicide. Yet, one question could almost be echoed around the world – Why?   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Cobain' s fans struggled with the huge loss of their â€Å" poet of pain.† It was as though they had lost a close friend. They felt that Kurt was an artist who could read their minds, knew their problems, and spoke their language. No one seemed to understand why at the height of his popularity a twenty-seven year old rock sat would put a twenty-two gauge shotgun in his mouth and pull the trigger.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The media attacked the incident. Every type of media from MTV to the entire local Newspapers spoke something of Kurt Cobain’s suicide. Some blamed the suicide on his unhappy childhood and how he was a Ritalin child. While others blamed it on his drug addiction that he had spent all of his young life trying to relieve himself from. But why the reasoning for the unpredictable suicide, Cobain left behind millions of fans asking why he’s gone.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Why? Most people who commit suicide do so for personal reasons, such as despair, fears of the future, fears of failure or of not being loved. Society plays a huge part in a lot of suicides. As society becomes more complex a person’s stress level rises which follows loneliness.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Following the initial shock came the inevitable soul searching for those closets to him- what more should or could we have done? Cobain left behind a fairly new family. He had recently married Courtney Love, the leader of the grunge band Hole, in 1992. Later in 1993 they conceived a baby girl together, Frances Bean which was about two years old at the time of Kurt’s death. Some say that Courtney did not grieve but there is no way possible that she didn’t, because of the fact that they reached stardom together as Kurt Cobain’s Shocking Suicide :: essays research papers Kurt Cobain’s Shocking Suicide Kurt Cobain was citied in the Seattle area with a shotgun. Days later on the fifth of April, Kurt Cobain went into the small room above his garage in his Seattle home and ended it all. Fans across the world were stunned by the news of Kurt Cobain’s sudden and shocking suicide. Kurt was the leader of the multiplatinum grunge band Nirvana, and was widely hailed as the â€Å" John Lennon of his generation.† He was a gifted song writer and erratic performer. However, Cobain's name was presented at times with disillusionment and unhappiness. Kurt had spoken, written lyrics, and even sung in his songs about suicide. Yet, one question could almost be echoed around the world – Why?   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Cobain' s fans struggled with the huge loss of their â€Å" poet of pain.† It was as though they had lost a close friend. They felt that Kurt was an artist who could read their minds, knew their problems, and spoke their language. No one seemed to understand why at the height of his popularity a twenty-seven year old rock sat would put a twenty-two gauge shotgun in his mouth and pull the trigger.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The media attacked the incident. Every type of media from MTV to the entire local Newspapers spoke something of Kurt Cobain’s suicide. Some blamed the suicide on his unhappy childhood and how he was a Ritalin child. While others blamed it on his drug addiction that he had spent all of his young life trying to relieve himself from. But why the reasoning for the unpredictable suicide, Cobain left behind millions of fans asking why he’s gone.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Why? Most people who commit suicide do so for personal reasons, such as despair, fears of the future, fears of failure or of not being loved. Society plays a huge part in a lot of suicides. As society becomes more complex a person’s stress level rises which follows loneliness.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Following the initial shock came the inevitable soul searching for those closets to him- what more should or could we have done? Cobain left behind a fairly new family. He had recently married Courtney Love, the leader of the grunge band Hole, in 1992. Later in 1993 they conceived a baby girl together, Frances Bean which was about two years old at the time of Kurt’s death. Some say that Courtney did not grieve but there is no way possible that she didn’t, because of the fact that they reached stardom together as

Literary Analysis of American Literature Essay

As Elinor Ostrom explains, â€Å"To a great degree, his stories speak for those who are disenfranchised, cheated, abused, or ignored because of race or class. † Hughes’s stories speak of the downtrodden African-Americans neglected and overlooked by a prejudiced society. The recurring theme of powerlessness is exemplified in his narration â€Å"Let America Be America again†, â€Å"Harlem† and â€Å"The Negro Speaks of Rivers†. Hughes uses rhyme to draw attention to the poetic element of his narration â€Å"Let America Be America Again†. Words such as â€Å"be† and â€Å"free†, â€Å"dreamed and â€Å"schemed†, â€Å"wreathe† and â€Å"breathe† etc. all demonstrate rhyming. The central theme is that the author feels left out of the American Dream. Hughes is writing a poem of someone who feels that America is a land that lives up to begin to add up to that. The tone is angry and resentful. In this poem he is not representing the point of view of one particular group. Hughes conveys that there are many people who’ve come here with hopes and dreams and they’re being let down. He’s also saying that there is an economic disparity between people. In essence the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer, because there is no equal opportunity. That idea is something that is not real for many people because of their race, economic situation, and come up. The reader is immediately introduced to the fact that the author does not believe that America is all it can be due to the fact that the word again is used. He wants America to be â€Å"the dream it used to be. † But the powerful line is #5 which reads â€Å"America was never America. † This enhances what many people feel, that Americas ideals of equality, liberty, and land of the free don’t seem real. In a sense there is a positive tone because there is a hope that America can be a â€Å"great strong land of love,† O, let my land be a land where liberty Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath, But opportunity is real, and life is free, Equality is in the air we breathe. Liberty, which is another word for freedom is important in the dream America holds so preciously. The central message here is one of greed. Money is at the center of what America has become. Hughes feels that â€Å"power, gain† and owning property is the focus. It’s all about money. He says in line #32 to what America has become in his views. â€Å"Of owning everything for one’s own greed! † At the later stage of the poem, Hughes is coming back and saying sarcastically that he wouldn’t say there is freedom. He is speaking for the â€Å"millions† of people who have been struggling, hoping, working, flying flags, â€Å"who have nothing† except for dreams that are â€Å"almost dead. † â€Å"Harlem† by Langston Hughes is a poem that talks about what happens when we postpone our dreams. The poem is made up of a series of similes and it ends with a metaphor. The objective of the poem is to get us to think about what happens to a dream that is put off, postponed; what happens when we create our very own shelve of dreams? The â€Å"dream† refers to a goal in life, not the dreams we have while sleeping, but our deepest desires. There are many ways to understand this poem; it varies from person to person. Someone like me may see this poem as talking about just dreams in general. Others may see it as African-American’s dreams. Although the meter of â€Å"Harlem† varies, the poem has a rhythmic, lyrical quality achieved through alliteration, rhyme, repetition of certain words, and carefully placed stressed syllables. People need to think twice before deferring their dreams. Langston Hughes says it best in his poem Harlem asking the question. What happens to a dream deferred Langston Hughes describes the outcome of the question as an altogether bad idea, saying that deferring your dream is â€Å"fester like a sore† or â€Å"it stinks like rotten meat†. By using imagery, he wants the reader to know what it is like to defer a dream and how bad it is. The first image in the poem proposes that the dream dries up like a raisin. This simile likens the original dream to a grape, which is round, juicy, green and fresh. Once the dream has lain neglected for too long, it dries up. Where the raisin image invokes the senses of taste and sight, the simile of the sore conveys a sense of touch and bodily impact. By comparing the dream to a sore on the body, Hughes suggests that unfulfilled dreams become part of us, like scars. In Langston Hughes’ poem â€Å"The Negro Speaks of Rivers,† Hughes makes use of some interesting poetic techniques. This poem is written in free verse, at first glance, seems to be unstructured. Hughes repeats words and lines, but does not make use of repeated sounds. Finally, some of his word choices near the end of the poem help to bring the message of the poem across more strongly. These poetic techniques contribute greatly to the quality of the poem. The textual details of the poem invoke strong imagery related to veins, rivers, and the roots of trees and give the reader a sense of the timelessness of these objects. In the short first stanza, the speaker in the poem by Langston Hughes states that he has â€Å"known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins. † From this early point in the point in the poem, images of the canals of veins that run throughout the human body as well as similar images of rivers that wind around and are shaped like veins form our understanding that this poem is about more than blood or water, it is about roots and circuits. He has a very deep meaning about how people feel by debating that his soul is so much stubborn now at this point that no external source could change it. Hughes’ poems illustrate many of the problems that African Americans faced during the depression era, ranging from prejudice and discrete racism to a general air of hopelessness and despair. His poetry basically develops the idea of celebrating and idealizing the Negro life in America. He is not much like the other poets who just uses a single voice/entity, instead has a tendency to express the visualizations through a number of voices making it more realistic. His expression consists of renunciation and feelings of personal cruelty.