Invisible Man :: Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

One obvious theme that I picked up when I read Invisible Man was the theme of invisibility. I think the theme of invisibility has different meanings to it. One meaning is that invisibility suggests the unwillingness of others to see the individual as a person. The narrator is invisible because people see in him only what they want to see, not what he really is. Invisibility, in this meaning, has a strong sense of racial prejudice. White people often do not see black people as individual human beings. Another meaning of the theme of invisibility is the idea that it suggests separation from society. While the narrator is in his hole, he is invisible. He cannot be seen by society. He is invisible because he chooses to remain apart. Invisibility, in this meaning, is similar to hibernation, with the narrator’s choice to remain in his cave and think. This meaning of the theme doesn’t relate to me, but in a way, relates to the poet, Emily Dickinson, who wrote, â€Å"The Win d Tapped Like a Tired Man.† Dickinson withdrew from the world in her early twenties and became a recluse. It’s like Emily chose to be isolated from the rest of the world, just like the narrator in Invisible Man did. The third meaning is that invisibility indicates lack of self-hood. A person is invisible if he has no self, no identity. If a person doesn’t have a soul, spirit, personality, etc., then they seem like a ghost, a thing who is cold and invisible. Invisible Man may be read as a story about the narrator’s development. It is a first-person narrative, and because you experience the novel through the narrator, you get to know him better than anyone else. One pattern of development is that of innocence to experience. At first, the narrator is extremely innocent and does not understand what is happening to him. He does not believe people are bad. He does not see that Bledsoe is making a fool of him. As he suffers, he learns. With experience, he begins to see the world more as it really is. Experience teaches him to be a better judge. This relates to me, because experience is a major importance in my life. Four years ago, when I first started forensics, I was â€Å"innocent† or inexperienced. But as I started experiencing new techniques of how to present the speech, I learned more and, therefore becoming a better judge.

PacSun Store Analysis Essay

Customer ProfileThe current customer of the Junior girls department of the PacSun are young women who are driven by surfing, skateboarding, snowboarding, and other associated actives and lifestyle. The typical customer wardrobe is consists of everyday casual apparel that is versatile enough for excessive movement and wear. Customer Demographics:†¢Female†¢14-18 yrs old†¢middle class†¢ high school education†¢have average 2 siblings†¢parents both work, have college degrees†¢outdoor active lifestyle†¢interest in surf, skateboarding, and/or snowboarding†¢personality is free spirited, spontaneous, social, and sport orientedIn regards to the statistics of the buyer profile compared to the actual product consumer profile is influenced by outside factors. An average of 45% of the customers where young girls with a female parental that purchased items, 35% of the customers were young women in groups of 2 or more, while 15% of those groups all purchased individual items. There was an average of 15% of customers who where young women by themselves, 2% of the remaining profile were parents (mainly women) who where purchasing for someone else, then another 2% where male parental’s purchasing for someone else, and the last 1% was young women with a mate. Within the department’s customer profile, there is an average of 65% of girls that were sizes 3-7 and/or S/M; and the remaining 35% where either above or below the average size range. Department AnalysisI. Department Environment-The environment of the department is very energetic and free spirited. All the employee’s were friendly and conservative toward each customer. It was about four o’clock p.m. when I visited the PacSun location. There were an estimated eight female customers in this department. The sales associates working the floor were eager to help each customer with there individual needs. When entering the store it takes an average of three seconds before being welcomed to the store. II. Merchandise Appearance-The merchandise in this department was all put in  it’s designated section. The merchandise on the floor racks was organized by related items and style preference. The items on the walls were grouped in sections of tops, pants, and jackets that looked best with each other. The clearance section was clean and organized by sizes, and all the merchandise was in the correct size section. The displays were organized with coinciding outfits, a few pairs of jeans and tee-shirts, folded next to each other with a couple bags/ backpacks; the display flows well with the product layout in the department. III. Merchandise Classification-The Classifying of the products was very versatile with the other products. All of the merchandise stock is focused on surf and skate brands of clothing. The majority of the stock is in tee-shirts, sweatshirts, and jeans. This department classification of products is focused more on large assortment of merchandise within a small variety of classifications. This merchandise scheme works well with this store because it allows each customer to personalize the individual items in to outfits of their own style preference. Data SummaryI. Compare and contrast: After reviewing the primary and secondary data, to get a better understanding of the PacSuntarget market and realistic profitability goals, it seem to be within a match able range of the comparison of experiencing the same demographics. In the field study conducted there seems to be a low amount of consumers shopping, but when added to an average amount of customers per day it is appropriate. At this particular location farther inland from the coast, the store has more foot traffic because of the decrease of competition in other surf/skate store near the coast. The income data compared to the guesstimate of income, based on purchasing amounts spent, does not match up. It seems that people were spending more money then bring in. When looking over the work force statistics, it seems that more parents are working and allow children to buy more products for the missed time together, allowing for huge indulges in money spent shopping. I feel that the customer is a teenager with working parents and most shop is done on own. The customer is give fixed amounts to spend and pre-though  periods through out the year. The consumer is likely to be working a small part-time job and spends paycheck on personal wants and entertainment. The loyal PacSun customers like to create their own activities related style through items at the store. There clothing chooses are selected more through durability and versatility, then innovative trends. The customer is entertainment seeking and dedicate. It is more like that the customers of PacSun are returning customers then new ones, once image is established by consumer, they tend to continue on the same path. II. Modification MixAs a buyer for PacSun it would be advisable to really study the store surroundings because even though the seasons are changing, it is likely that customers will purchase tank tops andshort-sleeve shirts year round. The need for jackets is usually slim, but a wide range of sweatshirt and sweaters is a necessity because the San Diego area does get windy during the end of the year. Being a buyer for specific classification of customers is defiantly easier when in a usually predicable climate, like San Diego. Knowing the trendy colors for each season is more necessary then knowing the trendy cut shirt cuts, because the PacSun consumer wants to be able to wear the item for season after season, not just for a few months. The most important thing to remember, as a buyer, is to buy the products for the customer not the corporation. Meaning to always fulfill the customers needs before selling products for corporate popularity and profitability. If logical, I would widen the size range of the clothing to open up the target market to teenagers in the plus size range. This will increase the foot traffic in the store. Other then the sizing, the store have the right products and styles in it that lives up to the PacSun reputation. If it were possible to reach a different customer segmentation, while maintaining the current the merchandise is stores, it would have to be to add another section for Pre-teenagers, ages 10 to 14 years old, there are many younger customers that are already set in there type of clothing classification of style related to there activities, like surfing and skate boarding. This would consist of extending the sizes and styles to Boy and Girl sizes and styles, but using the same consistency of brands. This would create a whole new foot traffic and profitability for PacSun stores. Bibliography –www.pacsun.com, copyright 2007-www.hoovers.com, copyright 2007-onsight analysis. date January 23, 2007

PHP vs. ASP Essay

Introduction PHP and ASP are the two best web technologies this century is to offer. In their own ways, they have created trust and market for their product and development environment. Anstey (2003) mentions that PHP belongs to a free software community and open source general purpose software which is very easy to use and correct its bugs from the community of developers around the world. ASP is a program that runs on IIS server and is a free component with windows operating system and offers various features (Argence, 2008). ASP.NET is a unified Web development platform that provides services necessary for developers to build enterprise-class Web applications. ASP.NET provides programming model and infrastructure for more secure, scalable, and stable applications. ASP.NET is a compiled, .NET based web environment developed in any .NET compatible languages like Visual Basic .NET, C#, JScript.NET, etc. Additionally, the entire .NET Framework is available to any ASP.NET application. Developers can easily access the benefits of these technologies, which include the managed common language runtime environment, type safety, inheritance, and so on. The foundation of all Web applications is that they deliver dynamic content over a protocol which by model is stateless. Most of the ASP.NET developments fall in client-server architecture programming model. Minimal points to be considered for a typical web application modeled as client-server architecture are given below. User interface and client environment (Page layout). Data verification, transfer and store. Security. Scalability, reliability and availability of the application. Optimized resource utilization and performance. Handling unpleasant instances gracefully. Navigation. Literature review PHP traces back to the development of Perl and C which emerged quite successfully as a result of the contribution of the various programmers around the globe and as a result of its being an open community. The various versions came out successfully through 1997 to 2004 where the features were added and successfully taken up to cater to the development paradigm of the large scale of internet users. ASP came handy with Windows 95 with the features of IIS server installed. It was an established standard which takes into account the various databases into consideration and is based on the COM model. The various differences among PHP and ASP make sure that all to a good extent the feature are compiled and carries enough advantage to understand the loopholes and make sure that all the various utilities are enforced well.   PHP and ASP depict large scale differences in the form of various factors like cost, integration of features, speed, platform compatibility, additional costs, base language, database connectivity and many others. Cost: As PHP is not single handedly owned by any individual or an organization it does not requires to be purchased for use. Even for the support of the backend, it uses a database technology named MySQL which is also available free of cost (DuBois, 2002). The hosting of the PHP pages into the Linux server and their deployment is quite affordable and can be done with ease. Glass (2004) mentions that ASP is synchronized with Microsoft Windows operating system and comes along with it bearing the cost of the operating system. Moreover hosting ASP pages is expensive over the internet and features like email, file uploading and other features are quite expensive at the same time. Integration with operating environments and databases: PHP makes sure that all the operating environments are taken care to its fullest capability and is compatible with Windows, UNIX, Linux, Solaris and others. Its platform dependency format makes sure that all the various compatibility with operating environments makes it quite viable in nature. PHP integrates with the databases like MySQL and others in a great fashion. ASP on the other hand is compatible with Windows only and makes sure that Microsoft oriented databases like MSSQL server would be well integrated with it. For other database platforms it requires to download various libraries and components for integration and workability (Hull, 2002). Performance: PHP is an interpreted language and make sure that the interpreted nature makes it fast for getting the customization done. The memory requirement of the PHP pages is quite optimizable and runs very fast with the greater understanding of the various features. Database connections of PHP are also quite flexible and make sure that all the various database functionality like stability, transactions, replication, triggers and stored procedures are handled quite well (Merrall, 2000). ASP on the other hand is a compiled language and the software glitches are quite often not corrected or take a long time to get it done. The compiled nature makes sure that all the various factors like throughput and response time is quite low for the hosted pages. Its exclusivity with Microsoft windows operating system makes it platform independent with regard to various hosting and access problems. Enhanced capabilities and compatibility: These include file transfer programs and utilities, compression of data, uploading of files, integration of XML an MD5, encryption techniques and email facilities are not included in ASP, even if it does it requires the support of large third party packages installed, which are very easily integrated in PHP. PHP.net (2008) mentions that complex functions like dynamic images, IMAP, SNMP, dynamic flash, PDF, native access to Oracle, Ovrimos, Postgre, Sybase, mSql, MSSQL, Ingres, Interbase and Informix databases, LDAP, and sockets and many others are easily integrated with PHP, however it would create a big problem with its integration with ASP. PHP is compatible with various web servers for its functioning however ASP requires it to be easily integrated with only IIS and PWS as explained by Pires (2005). Conclusion   Although both ASP and PHP are web server end languages for web development, it makes sure that the factors like cost, installation, performance, compatibility issues are economized to its full   extent. PHP offers the best integration of the speed and performance factors and make sure that all the various promises are met for catering to the web development (Zhang, 1999). ASP is most suitable with the Microsoft platform and makes sure that all the features are captured and managed for the various services. References Anstey, Marty (2003). PHP vs ASP. Retrieved 19, February 2008 from http://marty.anstey.ca/programming/php/articles/ Argence d Ricardo (2008). Web Hosting, PHP vs AS.P. Retrieved 18, February 2008 from http://articles.topofhosting.com/web-hosting-php-asp.php DuBois, Paul (2002). MySQL Cookbook. O’Reilly, October 2002. Glass, Michael (2004). Beginning PHP, Apache, MySQL ® Web Development. Wiley Publicizing sons. ISBN: 0-7645-5744-0. Hull, Sean (2002). PHP vs. ASP.NET Redux. Retrieved 18, February 2008 from http://www.oracle.com/technology/pub/columns/hull_php2.html Merrall, Graeme (2000). PHP/MySQL Tutorial PHP.net (2008). See: http://www.php.net/manual/en Pires, Halstatt (2005). ASP vs. PHP. Retrieved 18, February 2008 from http://www.webpronews.com/expertarticles/2005/12/22/asp-vs-php Zhang, Ying (1999). Web Database Step-by-Step Guide.

Women in china Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3500 words

Women in china - Essay Example while working against great odds including an enormous population in a vastly spread out country which had limited resources to look after its people. Women in China have increasingly played a role that has been equal to men. They have found a new place in the society, working with men at all levels from the farm to industry, academia and government. The laws of the present day China have granted equality to women with men in all spheres of life, while recognizing that they have certain differences. Women are considered to be equal to men in rights as well as obligations to the society, have equal entitlements with regard to work, education, ownership of property and the right to form a family. The reality of women in China is certainly getting better and although at present, despite there being no legal impediments to equality, women still trail behind the men in China. Family planning and birth control policies of the state in China which have been put into place in response to the huge population pressure have been a source of controversy and irritation despite the achievements, requiring women to undergo forced abortions and sterilizations. This essay takes a look at the position of women in present day China. China is a country with unique culture, traditions and a communist as well as a feudal past which has attempted to modernize itself relatively quickly in a short span of time, achieving considerable success with these efforts. Its huge population has always presented problems at the national level and has meant that the government has had to adopt some controversial measures to keep in check these pressures. The government of China has, however, attempted to enhance the status of women and grant them a level of equality with men in the society. The revolution of 1949 meant that equality for women in China was considered to be legitimate and in line with the aims of the new government. Women comprise approximately 49% of the total population of China and

Quantitative vs. Qualitative research Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Quantitative vs. Qualitative research - Essay Example of the measures of concepts, then the research respondents are selected, the next step is issuing research instruments and data collection, what follows is data processing and analysis, after this process finding are drawn and conclusions made. The main steps involved in qualitative research are: setting the overall research questions, then selecting necessary subjects and sites, then relevant data ought to be collected, then interpretation follows, then theoretical and conceptual work follows, the last step is writing up conclusions and findings. In quantitative research, the quality issues involved are issues such as reliability, this deal with the measure of stability and consistency. Replication seeks to find out whether the study is repeatable. Validity seeks to establish whether what is measured is the one intended or if the conclusions are well founded. In qualitative research, quality issues are trustworthiness that entails credibility of the findings, transferability in terms of the applicability of the findings to other contexts; dependability is whether the findings apply at other times. Conformability is whether the investigator’s values have intruded to a high degree. Relevance is the importance of a topic in the field of study and the contribution made by the literature in that field. Quantitative research has major preoccupations such as measurement and reliability validity, causality which entails explanation on reason as to why things are the way they are and the direction taken by the causal influence, that is, dependent and independent variables. Another of these preoccupations is generalization which covers the question on the scope of the context, sample and population, as well as the extent to which the samples are representative. Replication is a value that seeks to reduce contamination of results by researcher values or biases, thorough procedure descriptions, and ability to duplicate in varying context. In qualitative research, the

Social Web Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Social Web - Research Paper Example Besides pros there are several cons of maintaining these connections as well. This is a very grave issue as these side effects are negatively shaping the human society and leading it into a dangerous future. The current report mentions what negative effects these advancements are having on the individuals of the society and thus on the society as a whole. Some future trends of the so called social web are also highlighted along with addressing some measures that should be looked up by governing authorities. This is essential for a safer and prosperous future. INTRODUCTION Social Web is the new terminology with which the visual social connections of each digital device are connected to each other via the internet. The platforms that support the evolution and maintenance of the social connections are various and limitless. Examples of platforms supporting social web profiles are Facebook, Twitter, Orkut LinkdIn etc. The globalization of today’s world sees it as such that virtual ly every human being is connected to the web in one way or the other. People connected to the internet have the privilege of accessing all other sorts of information on it. Via the Internet anyone connected to it can stay up-to-date with the very latest information, can telecommute, check stock prices, compare prices and shop online, communicate with others in chat rooms or on bulletin boards, take different online learning courses, learn how to cook food, train tickets and even earn an accredited degree.... BACKGROUND/HISTORY The roots of communications and information technology can roughly be dated back to the advent of ‘telephone’ by Graham Bell in the year 1875 (Saari, 2006). It is the tenure from the analog telephone to the most well equipped cell phones today that modified the lifestyles of their users’ en-route. Thus behavioral changes on the fronts of societies were also exhibited. American computer scientist Alan Kay said, "Technology is all that stuff that wasn't around when (you) were born   because the stuff that was around when you were born   was just part of the landscape. Like the pencil." Also, McLuhan (1960) said, "The new electronic interdependence recreates the world in the image of a global village"   Once, invented the technological changes went on at a very rapid rate, quick decisions were made regarding the changes in each decade. Presently, decisions need to be formulated that would cater to the long lasting consequences of the very adv anced changes on the society. The social and economic impacts of these technologies are the most important changes that should never be overlooked. As said by mathematician Konsbruck Lee Robert, (n.d.) â€Å"Today, innovations in information technology are having wide-ranging effects across numerous domains of society, and policy makers are acting on issues involving economic productivity, intellectual property rights, privacy protection, and affordability of and access to information. Choices made now will have long- lasting consequences, and attention must be paid to their social and economic impacts.† The social impacts of Information and technology advancements have turned the present human society upside down from what it used

AMERICAN HISTORY TEXTBOOK ANALYSIS AND COMPARISONS Dissertation

AMERICAN HISTORY TEXTBOOK ANALYSIS AND COMPARISONS - Dissertation Example Particular emphasis in the course of the research study shall be based on the perspective of the Southern American dwellers and that of British perspectives regarding the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968). These perspectives shall be taken from textbooks from these two locations namely South United States of America and Britain. The researcher is therefore interested in finding answers to the following specific objectives at the end of the current research study: 1. What were the causes of the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968)? 2. What are the specific events that were recorded during the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968)? 3. Who are the major protagonists who led the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968)? 4. How do the British educational curriculums through its textbooks perceive the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968)? 5. How does the American educational curriculum th rough its textbooks perceive the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968)? 6. What were the eventual results of the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968)? 7. ... This assertion is the general hypothesis underlying the current research, which the researcher is going to compare and contrast ten different textbooks from America and Britain to draw a conclusion on the assertion. Most often than not, the kind of ideas that people from these two setting have of the African American depends on the encounter that they have personally had with them in history. The researcher’s goal for the research will therefore be accomplished if at the end of the day a conclusion is drawn on whether or not Americans and British perceive the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968) from the same perception. Significance of the Study There are major academic and practical justifications that back the importance of the current research and why it is worth undertaking. In the first place, the successful conclusion of the present research work is going to be a major tool for the establishment of historical accuracy. This said against the backdrop that different textbooks from different setting such as America and Britain seem to portray the same case from different perspectives. In some cases, such a practice tends to distort and bend some of the facts behind history. With this text analysis research, a line will be drawn between the contrasting facts to establish historical accuracy. Another importance of this research work will be to enhance personality awareness creation. This will be done from the viewpoint where the true identity of the African American will be understood through their history. Indeed, the history of the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968) establishes a lot about the identity of the African American population because it brings to bear their dreams and