Advanced Information Systems Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Advanced Information Systems Management - Essay Example 253). A Customer Relationship Management System (CRM) is a form of information system which involves the application of various hardware and software applications for effective management of information and data on clients or customers with a view of achieving the goals and objectives of the organization. This essay gives a critical analysis and discussion of the value that CRM systems within government owned organization in the UK public sector. The essay includes concepts of contemporary application of information systems in the public sector. More specifically the essay illustrates knowledge management through decision support and application of expert systems in data mining. Customer Relationship Management System (CRM) In accordance to Shanks, Jagielska and Jayaganesh (2009, p. 263), CRM is an information system based business strategy which is designed to help users to achieve an understanding the needs of customers. The CRM also helps in anticipating customer needs and applyin g technological application to manage them with a view of meeting the expectations of customers (Ku, 2010, p. 1087). The implementation or application of CRM involves processes of interaction among people, technology and business processes. Therefore it is through the adoption and application of CRM that effective integration of core processes of customer service, sales and marketing is achieved (Khodakarami and Chan, 2011, p. 256). It is apparent that CRM is a contemporary phenomenon which has been employed within the public sector. This technology is therefore replacing the orthodoxy and less efficient approaches which were employed by government organizations in delivery of services to the public (Wilson, Daniel and McDonald, 2002, p. 195). Figure 1: CRM Value of CRM within Government Organizations in the UK Stjepanovic (2010, p. 273) argues that the value of CRM to a government organization is basically the efficiency which characterizes the use of information system. For exampl e the use of database management systems and application within a CRM framework leads to speedy retrieval and presentation of data and information to clients when they need it. Within a government organization, customer service involves retrieval and presentation of data to customers upon request. This information or data is often retrieved from government databases through the process of data mining (Wilson, Daniel and McDonald, 2002, p. 198). If for instance a customer requests for data on taxation, salaries or benefits, the government owned organizations are mandated to provide it immediately. Nonetheless, the efficiency of data mining and presentation data to the client or customer depends on the level of expertise, skills and knowledge that a government employee has (Stjepanovic, 2010, p. 276). The skills that are required include the use of various software applications within the CRM system such as Microsoft Word Excel and database management applications. Shanks, Jagielska a nd Jayaganesh (2009, p. 264) point out that CRM is valuable to a government organization because it reduces the costs that are associated with business activities or office processes. Within the UK and the EU in general, government organizations are increasingly competing for public funds or government funding. Because of this, many organizations require to reduce the costs of operations in order to achieve effective utilization of the resources available to them. Technology reduces costs

Client Paper Essay Example for Free

Client Paper Essay Human service professionals, or helpers, will likely work with many different clients, each with their own set of problems. These problems can range from physical abuse and neglect, aging issues including death and dying, and a number of other issues concerning the basic needs of life. Problems can also encompass the many different situations people find themselves in either as a result of life choices or out of no fault of their own. These problems may include homelessness, combat veteran issues, and mental illness. Whatever the problem or problems are, it is the responsibility of the helper to use a wide range of skills to assess client needs, create a treatment plan, and offer resources and emotional support to the client as they accomplish the goals included in the treatment plan. These skills include communication, empathy, compassion, patience, analytical skills, and teamwork. A range of problems faces human services clients â€Å"Problems for clients are rarely single issues, and the human service professional should approach each client with the expectation of more than one problem.† (Woodside McClam, 2011, p. 131) Every problem that a client presents with cannot be predicted. In fact, client problems encompass a wide range of needs and circumstances. For example, a client who is struggling with domestic violence may also have a need for mental health support. A client with mental health issues may also be experiencing a lack of food, clothing or shelter. The problems facing clients are very broad and it is helpful to better understand them. Problems facing children and families include physical and sexual abuse, poverty, lack of a healthy home, or little education. Children are especially vulnerable as they cannot provide for themselves. Although â€Å"[t]he best place to serve kids is in their home and with a family,† there may be a necessity for placement in foster care or, in some ca ses, adoption (Moffat, 2011, p. 5). The elderly also face  unique problems such as lack of mobility, losing their independence, and end of life issues. When the elderly can no longer care for themselves, finding in-home care or placement in assisted living or nursing home facilities becomes the focus. In addition, the elderly may struggle with some of the basic needs of life such as food, shelter and clothing. Immigrants, veterans, and people with disabilities face other problems in the human service field. Immigrants struggle with adapting to a new culture in a new country as well as learning a new language. Immigrants may have problems with finding employment, housing, and legal help, as well. Veterans need assistance with adjusting to civilian life including adjusting their skill sets to match employment opportunities. Combat veterans especially struggle with physical and mental disabilities and are in need of appropriate services for rehabilitation. Disabled people face challenges in personal care as well as employment, including issues with rehabilitation and adapting to their disabilities. The need for residential or group care facilities may also be at issue for the disabled community. Problems with substance abuse and addiction, mental illness, and clients with criminal records also exist. Many of these problems co-exist in a client’s life and need to be addressed as a whole. â€Å". . . the client is an individual comprised of psychological, social, economic, educational, vocational, and spiritual dimensions and possibly will have needs in many of those areas.† (Woodside McClam, 2011, p. 132) Specific helping skills can be used with clients Essential to the helping process is knowledge and practice of professional and interpersonal skills that help the human service professional in effectively addressing the needs of clients. These skills include communication, empathy, compassion, patience, analytical skills, and teamwork. Chief among these are interpersonal and communication skills, because more workers deal directly with a variety of people† (Moffat, 2011, p.9). The work of human service professionals centers on building relationships of trust with the client. It is the responsibility of the helper to facilitate effective communication. Listening is vital to the process. In order to fully grasp the client situation, the helper needs to observe both the verbal and nonverbal messages. Listening involves paying  attention to both words and actions as they go hand in hand in understanding the total message being given. G.E. Egan introduced the SOLER concept for responsive listening. Learning this concept can be v ery useful to the human service professional (Egan, 2010). Details of the SOLER concept are illustrated in the following table: S Face client Squarely O Adopt an Open posture L Lean toward the person E Maintain good Eye contact R Try to be relatively Relaxed In addition to the SOLER method, paying attention to vocal tone and speech rate, and verbal tracking of the client’s message will exhibit attending behavior and help the communication process (Ivey, Ivey Zalaquette, 2009). The helper can encourage the client to discuss their issues openly by not changing the subject they have chosen. Effective listening shows compassion for the client and creates an opportunity to show empathy and patience, additional skills that are essential to the success of the human service field. Clients in the human service field come from a variety of situations. Their values and belief systems vary widely as much as their problems do. In order to effectively help people, helpers need to develop acceptance and understanding of these differences. Unconditional acceptance of the client is essential to the success of treatment. Helpers need to see the situation and experience feelings from the perspective of their client. Patience is necessary for the he lping process as there are likely to be setbacks or resistance to the treatment plan. Helpers should learn to adapt their approach as the situation changes; which leads to the skill of critical thinking. â€Å"The ability to think creatively helps workers determine ways to get around hurdles that interfere with clients’ efforts to succeed† (Moffat, 2011, p.10). Throughout the helping process, a variety of changes is bound  to occur. Whether these are positive or negative changes, client and human service professional must work together to deal with them and continue to move forward with the assistance process. Using analytical and problem-solving skills, helpers can overcome the roadblocks to treatment and continuously work towards solutions. Treatment often involves networking with a number of other professionals and utilizing a variety of resources. Being able to work well as a team is another essential skill for human service professionals. Psychologists, Social Workers, Mental Health Facilitators and Counselors are all participants in the work of h uman services. Using communication, empathy, compassion, patience, analytical skills, and teamwork, the helper can effectively recognize and define the variety of client problems that exist and work with them towards accomplishing the goal of the helping process, which is to encourage responsibility and promote self-help. References Egan, G.E. (2010). The skilled Helper: A problem management and opportunity development approach to helping (9th ed.). Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole Ivey, A. E., Ivey, M. B., Zalaquett, C. P. (2009). Intentional interviewing and counseling: Facilitating client development in a multicultural society (7th ed.). Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole Moffat, C. (2011). Helping those in need: Human service workers. Occupational Outlook Quarterly, 55(3), 22-32. Woodside, M., McClam, T. (2011). An introduction to human services (7th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole, Cengage.

The Varying Definition Of Politeness Across Cultures English Language Essay

The Varying Definition Of Politeness Across Cultures English Language Essay CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.0 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background of the study The definition of politeness varies across cultures and the claims for universals have shown divergence and also lack of clarity as they have received serious attention since the Brown and Levinson theory was proposed (1978, 1987). Lakoff (1989) defined the term Polite as the use of politeness rules regardless of expectation whereas the term non-polite behaviour refers to the act of not using politeness rules when they are not expected. The Brown and Levinsons (BLs) model has contributed a lot in the study of politeness discourse although there are many criticisms that have been made by some researchers due to its lack of clarity concerning the definition of politeness and concomitant concepts of across studies and within the same studies (A. J. Meier, 1995). Furthermore, the BLs theory is said to be ethnocentric because it is derived directly from the high value which is based on individualism in the Western culture (Kasper, 1990: 252-253) and the fact that their distinction between the negative and positive politeness is dubious (Meier, 1995: 384). Goffmans (1967) work has also contributed a lot in the field of politeness discourse and has become one of the most significant in the research of language use. Goffman has introduced the notion of face (BL, 1987: 61). The BL defined the term politeness in terms of speakers need to say things which enable them to mitigate the imposition inherent in speech acts and also the face that those speech acts threaten including the face of the speaker as well as the face of others. A mitigated form is a form that is used in speech by expressing a given prepositional content in order not to offend others (Linde, 1988). According to Leech (1983), politeness is needed and important in the theory of linguistic pragmatics in order to explain the reasons that cause speakers to violate Grices Co-operative principles and its maxims. Self-politeness is taken seriously in Leechs framework. The self-politeness is important in the theo ry of linguistic politeness because it involves the face of the speaker which tends to be as vulnerable as the face of the hearer. This vulnerability is viewed in two ways and is described in the BL model. First, there are speech acts that threaten faces of others and speech acts that threaten the self-face. Second, the face of the speaker can also be attacked by the hearer just as the face of the hearer can be attacked by the speaker in a conversation. Brown and Levinson have devoted an entire book of politeness although its concept is never actually defined. They focused on two types of politeness strategies which are the negative and positive strategies that are used in order to reduce the imposition or threat to an addressees face upon the enactment of an inherently face-threatening act. Negative strategies are characterized as expressions of restraint, formality, and distancing whereas positive strategies are described as expressions of solidarity, intimacy, informality, and familiarity (A. J. Meier, 1995). These strategies focus on the positive and negative face notions. Positive face refers to a persons self-esteem and how he or she wants to be appreciated and accepted by the society. On the other hand, negative face refers to a persons freedom to act. Every individual has the rights to be involved in making decision. Speakers have to perform various speech acts in communication and these acts tend to threaten the face of the speaker or the hearer or both which can cause misunderstandings among them. There are five superstrategies that were proposed by the Brown and Levinson theory which are: Without redressive action, baldly Positive politeness Negative Politeness Off record Withhold the FTA Rudeness is the contrast of the term politeness. Lakoff (1989) defined the term rude as an act that disregards politeness rules when they are in fact expected although there is no clarity in considering what politeness rules consist of and on what basis they are determined in order to be considered as polite (A. J. Meier,1995). An apology is an act of politeness which is stated in Holmes (1990: 156) and is practised in most cultures of the world. According to Britain (1992), high rising tones which are used in declarative sentences are considered as markers of politeness in New Zealand English. In the work of Bublitz (1980), the terms please, just, passive voice, and tag questions are considered as the expressions of politeness. Politeness routines such as Thank you and Youre welcome are also essential in communication. In order not to sound rude when speaking to others, the appropriate politeness strategies should be implied and practised which can avoid misunderstandings between th e speakers and hearers. According to Janney and Arndt (1992), tact resembles the BLs concepts and it is important in order to avoid conflicts. Blum-Kulka (1989:67) on the other hand considers tact as an aspect of the appropriate polite behaviour. Kasper (1990:200) argued that the strategies and means of politeness are not exactly endowed with politeness values, which creates a question mark in ones mind. If polite strategies are not always polite as what is said by her, one would wonder what qualifies them as politeness strategies to begin with. Furthermore, some would argue that there is no particular style nor particular syntactic constructions (Fraser and Nolen, 1981; Zimin, 1981) can be polite or impolite. Many would question when and where to be polite and this is when sociolinguistic competence becomes important. Sociolinguistic competence is the knowledge of appropriate language use (Joseph A. DeVito, 2008). Lakoff (1989: 103) made an equate clarity with non-politeness where she maintained that politeness only differs in importance depending on the discourse genre which she believed that the more transactional the interaction is, the less important politeness will be. 1.2 Statement of the problem The universality of politeness is yet to be clarified because politeness varies across cultures which create problems in establishing objective measures for application across cultures. In this case, misunderstandings in communication can occur when one is unaware of another ones culture. Ehlich (1992) has warned of the dangers of ethnocentricity in determining the standards of politeness that apply to all groups whereas Hymes (1986:49) emphasized on the cautions of the tendencies in seeking the satisfaction of universal framework without considering the empirical inadequacy of them. Malaysia is a country that consists of various ethnics that have different practices, cultures and beliefs. Its biggest ethnic groups are the Malays, followed by the Chinese, Indian, and lastly the minority ethnics. Politeness is important because it can cause misunderstandings if it is not taken seriously. However, due to the culture differences politeness is viewed differently by different groups of so ciety in Malaysia. The BLs model cannot be applied in some of these cultures because they do not seem to fulfil each others wants. Gu (1990) argued that the BLs concepts are not adequate to account for aspects of Chinese and Matsumoto (1988, 1989) argued that the BLs notion of face with its individual territorial rights cannot be applied to the Japanese since the Japanese are more concerned with positional relation to others rather than with the individual territory. Everyone has the tendency to be rude when speaking to other people and they can in fact choose to be or not to be rude whenever and wherever they want. However, does this mean that they do not know the rules of politeness? According to the BL theory of politeness, an utterance is considered polite when there is an implicature that is generated due to the violation of the conversational maxims in order to save the face of others. An utterance can be polite even though the implicature is not. If that is so, how can someone tell when someone else meant to be polite or rude? A speakers communication competence is correlated to the degree of politeness. In order to be a competent speaker, one must possess communicative competence which consists of four types of competencies which are Grammatical competence, Sociolinguistic competence, Discourse competence, and Strategic competence. Grammatical competence is the mastery of the language and Sociolinguistic competence is the knowledge of app ropriate language use. Discourse competence on the other hand means the knowledge of how to connect utterances in a text in order to make sure it is both cohesive and coherent. Finally, strategic competence refers to the mastery of the strategies used by speakers to compensate for breakdowns in communication as well as the strategies that they use in order to enhance the effectiveness of the communications. The BLs model agreed with Grices co-operative principles and the conversational maxims which consider politeness as part of rational communication. Grices theory assumed that communication involves the intention of a speaker which is directed at a hearer and intended to be recognized (Brown and Levinson, 1987:7) and that communication is governed by a rational Cooperative Principle and also a number of maxims which give rise to conversational implicatures (1987:3). The co-operative principles emphasized four maxims which are the maxim of quantity, maxim of quality, maxim of relation, and maxim of manner which are formulated under the assumption that the common purpose of the talk exchange is to be maximally efficient and reliable. If one has to follow the BLs concepts, one probably has to flout the co-operative principles. Ones utterance can be polite even if the speaker doesnt mean anything polite. One can be rude even though it is not done on purpose and one can be polite even thou gh it is not meant. According to Grice (1957:219, 1968:122), in order to mean something by an utterance one must have the intention to produce some effect in an audience by means of the recognition of this intention. In short, one can choose to follow the Brown and Levinsons concepts or neglect its message to save the face of others. Interruptions are not tolerated in the English language but it is tolerated in the Italian language. It is considered rude for a person to interrupt another persons speech in the English culture. (Brian Paltridge, 2005). Interruption is also considered as a Face Threatening Act. (Jonas Pfister, 2010). For this reason, interruption is considered rude among Malaysians for example interrupting a persons conversation when he or she is not finished talking. If this is true, what about the practice of interruptions in a debate competition? One may question when and where can politeness be applied. Some would even consider interruption by permission in a conversation is tolerable. If so, one may question the accuracy of the definition of the terms rude and polite. Both competent and incompetent speakers can choose to neglect the politeness rules whenever they want and yet, they are still considered as competent and incompetent speakers of a language. 1.3 Objectives of study This study seeks to: To investigate the politeness practices among competent and incompetent speakers of English in Malaysia. To understand the many reasons that lead to rudeness among most incompetent and competent speakers of English in their conversations. To give guidance to incompetent and competent speakers of English in helping them to understand the politeness strategies. To help us understand the needs in educating these incompetent and competent speakers of English in language usage. 1.4 Research questions The following are the research questions for the study: 1.4.1 What are the factors that cause incompetent and competent speakers of English to have the tendencies to sound rude in their speeches? 1.4.2 What are the ways that may help the incompetent and competent speakers of English in improving their speeches? Who are responsible in helping the incompetent and competent speakers of English in improving their speeches? When and where should the incompetent and competent speakers of English be polite when having a conversation with others? Significance of the Study This study is important in order to help us understand about the problems faced by the incompetent and competent speakers of English in their everyday conversations. This study is also concern whether there is a need for maxim of politeness in our everyday conversation. Politeness is hardly defined due to the lack of clarification of its term and its definition has been argued by many researchers in their various theories of politeness. Researchers such as Lakoff (1973), Leech (1983), Kingwell (1993), Davis (1998), and Kalia (2004, 2007) believed that a maxim of politeness is needed in our everyday conversation and their views will help us to understand the significance of the term polite. This study also explores the competent and incompetent speaker of English in Malaysias point of views of the term polite based on their own understandings and practices since politeness can differ across cultures. I will also explain why the Brown and Levinsons theory is not satisfactory and cannot be universally accepted. Through this study, a Malaysian perspective of the term polite can be explored, understood and compared. Scope of the study This study is conducted in Fakulti Bahasa Moden dan Komunikasi (FBMK) UPM which is confined to the population of 12 selected ESL learners in Malaysia. All of the respondents are picked randomly from 3 major races in Malaysia which are Malay, Chinese, and India besides. However, the natives of Sabah and Sarawak are not included. Definition of Terms For the purpose of the study, the following terms are defined below in order to facilitate a better understanding of the studys main concern. 1.7.1 Polite The term polite refers to the use of politeness rules regardless of expectation (Lakoff, 1989). Besides that, an utterance is considered polite if and only if there is an implicature that is generated due to the violation of a conversational maxims because of concerns of face (Brown and Levinson, 1987). 1.7.2 Non-polite The term non-polite refers to the behaviour of not using politeness rules and yet not expected (Lakoff,1989). 1.7.3 Rude The term rude on the other hand includes the disregarding of the politeness rules when they are in fact expected (Lakoff, 1989). 1.7.4 Positive Face The term Positive face refers to the want that the wants be desirable to others and also the wants be approved of by others (Brown and Levinson, 1987). 1.7.5 Negative Face The term Negative face refers to the want of every member that his wants be desirable to at least some others. Negative politeness is said to be more polite than the positive politeness.

Retail and the Media :: essays research papers

Retail and the Media Today's media focuses more on a corporations mistakes and less on what the companies give back to the community, making it impossible for the public to see the truth. In every large corporation, there is going to be a fair share of so called ‘scandals’. Unfortunately, the media preys on these scandals to bring us, the public, juicy gossip to get through the day. In my opinion, most of the scandals brought to the public’s attention have no bearing on the products and services a company brings to the consumer.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Low Pay rates One of the many topics retailers are hit for is low pay rates. A survey done in 2003, showed the average pay rate for workers in retail to be $6.49. Unfortunately what the media leaves out is â€Å"the relatively low pay of sales workers is strongly influenced by the large numbers employed in the retail trade industry† (Buckley, 2003, Bureau of Labor Statistics, 9). It does not take a lot to run a register, stock a shelf, zone a side counter or unload a truck. You get paid for the job you do. Although the pay rate for a sales worker is low compared to the wage in other areas of interest, most retailers offer other benefits. These benefits include, but are not limited to, the following: 401k plans with company contributions; health care; stock purchase plans with company contributions; critical need funds for employees who come upon hard times; and some companies even offer college scholarships to employees and their families. Now as you move up in a company, your pay increases with the position. In the same survey done for the average wage of the sales worker, it shows the average rate for a manager is $33.26 (Buckley, 2003, Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2). This tends to be something that is overlooked in the media. You can compare it to starting out in an office as a mail clerk. Sure, you work for a big corporation in a big building on Wall Street, but you still are not making the bank. But as you work your way up, your pay rate reflects it. In any job, you have to start out on the bottom and work your way up to career status. Here is an example of a mother who stuck with her low paying job and in the end got the pay off:

Children and Youth Essay

The study of children and youth—or childhood studies—involves researchers from diverse disciplines who theorize and conduct research on children and adolescents. Woodhead (2004) aptly explains, Interest in Childhood Studies is for many born out of frustration with the narrow versions of the child offered by traditional academic discourses and methods of inquiry, especially a rejection of the ways psychology, sociology, and anthropology traditionally partition and objectify the child as subject to processes of development, socialization or acculturation. (P. x) sociologists use these four perspectives, childhood scholars trained in other disciplines also use these perspectives. I will then consider the usefulness of childhood studies as an interdisciplinary area of study and present a vision for the future of childhood studies within sociology. CONTRIBUTIONS OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO CHILDHOOD STUDIES Historical Approaches to Childhood Studies Historical research informs what the concept of childhood means. Arià ¨s ([1960] 1962) made the first argument that childhood is socially and historically constructed. He did not view it as a natural state defined by biology. By examining works of art dating back 1,000 years, he noted a difference in the rendering of children prior to the 1700s, wherein children were depicted as little adults and not as a distinctive group. In agreement with Arià ¨s, Demos (1970) put forth a similar argument using evidence gathered on the Puritans of the Plymouth Colony in the 1600s, noting that children were not considered a special group with shared needs or status. These researchers asserted that the shift from treating children as small adults to children as valuable individuals to be protected goes hand-in-hand with other societal shifts such as the spread of schooling and the decline of child mortality. While Arià ¨s’s hypothesis has been challenged and criticized by historical research and empirical evidence (see Gittins 2004; Nelson 1994), his ideas have inspired social scientists to study ordinary children, and many studies have been produced as a result. As a dialogue w ith the Since the late 1980s, sociologists have made sizable contributions to the study of children and youth, and the field of childhood studies has become recognized as a legitimate field of academic enquiry. Increasingly, childhood is used as a social position or a conceptual category to study. Like women’s studies, the study of children has emerged as an interdisciplinary field. Researchers of children from established disciplines, such as anthropology, education, history, psychology, and sociology, have found a meeting place in this emergent interdisciplinary field of childhood studies. In the following sections, I will first outline the relative contributions of different approaches to the field of childhood studies. Some approaches find a home within one discipline, while other approaches are used by more than one discipline. Specifically, I will examine approaches outside sociology, such as historical, developmental psychological, and children’s literature, and then I w ill discuss four perspectives used by sociologists, namely the cultural approach, the social structural approach, the demographic approach, and the general socialization approach. While 140 Bryant-45099 Part III.qxd 10/18/2006 7:43 PM Page 141 The Sociology of Children and Youth– †¢ –141 work of Arià ¨s, De Mause ([1976] 1995:4) developed a psychogenic theory of history, which asserted that parentchild relations have evolved to create greater intimacy and higher emotional satisfaction over time. De Mause explained that parent-child relations evolve in a linear fashion and that parent-child relationships change incrementally and, in turn, fuel further historical change. In response to this, Pollock (1983) dismisses the findings of researchers such as Arià ¨s, Demos, and De Mause, who assert the modern or incremental approach to childhood, arguing that â€Å"parents have always valued their children: we should not seize too eagerly upon theories of fundamental change in parental attitudes over time† (p. 17). While Pollock specifically counters the conclusions of Demos on children living in the 1700s in the Plymouth colony, his conclusions respond to all prior research positing that childhood is a modern concept. Historical research documents that the idea of c hildhood emanates from the middle class as members of the middle class first advanced laws to limit child labor and promoted education and protection of children (Kehily 2004). The shift of children from economic to emotional contributors of the family after the seventeenth century took place first among middle-class boys and later became the expectation for all children, regardless of social class or gender (Zelizer 1985). A good example of this middleclass perspective is illustrated in the writing of Mayhew, a social commentator from the nineteenth century (1861, in Kehily 2004), who writes about a disadvantaged eightyear-old street vendor from the working class who has â€Å"lost all childish ways† in the Watercress Girl in London Labour and the London Poor. While Mayhew calls attention to the plight of workingclass children in the mid-nineteenth century, other research (Steedman 1990; Gittins 1988) indicates that it is not until the early twentieth century that the childhood concept is redefined for working-class children in the United Kingdom. Child poverty and ill health were viewed as social problems and resulted in a shift away from economic to increased emotional value of children and altered expectations that children should be protected and educated (Cunningham 1991). The idea of lost or stolen childhood continues to be prominent in popular discussions of childhood (Kehily 2004:3). With this, historical approaches offer a great deal to the field of childhood studies because they allow us to view the concept of childhood as malleable. The childhood concept does not have the same meaning today as it did 300 years ago in a given culture, and it does not have the same meaning from culture to culture or even across social classes during a historical moment. Most historical research focuses on Western forms of childhood, yet these constructs may be useful for understanding certain aspects of childhood in non-Western contexts, especially when similar socioeconomic factors, such as industrialization, and a shift from an agrarian to a cash economy, may frame conditions. Ideas about how childhood is bound by culture, political economy, and epoch continue to be played out today in many non-Western contexts. For example, Hollos (2002) found that a new partnership family type emerged alongside the lineage-based system as a small Tanzanian community underwent a shift from subsistence agriculture with hoe cultivation to wage labor. These family types exhibited two distinct parental perspectives on what childhood should be and how children should spend their time. Partnership families emerging with a cash economy tend to view their children as a means of enjoyment and pleasure, whereas lineage-based families typically see their children as necessary for labor needs in the near term and as investments and old-age insurance in the long term. In this way, historical perspectives have the potential to inform contemporary cultural and social constructive theories on children and childhood studies. The next step is to move beyond Arià ¨s and the dialogue he cre ated to address the persistence of current social issues that involve children such as child poverty, child labor, and disparities across childhoods worldwide (see Cunningham 1991). Developmental Psychological Approaches to Childhood Studies Sully’s Studies of Childhood (Sully [1895] 2000, quoted in Woodhead 2003) notes, â€Å"We now speak of the beginning of a careful and methodological investigation of child nature.† By the early twentieth century, developmental psychology became the dominant paradigm for studying children (Woodhead 2003). Developmental psychology has studied and marked the stages and transitions of Western childhood. Piaget’s (1926) model of developmental stages stands as the foundation. Within the developmental psychology framework, children are adults in training and their age is linked to physical and cognitive developments. Children travel a developmental path taking them in due time to a state of being adult members of the society in which they live (Kehily 2004). Children are therefore viewed as learners with potential at a certain position or stage in a journey to child to an adult status (Verhellen 1997; Walkerdine 2004). Social and cultural researchers have critiqued the developmental psychological approach, largely faulting its treatment of children as potential subjects who can only be understood along the child-to-adult continuum (Buckingham 2000; Castenada 2002; James and Prout [1990] 1997; Jenks 2004; Lee 2001; Stainton Rogers et al. 1991). Qvortrup (1994) notes that developmental psychology frames children as human becomings rather than human beings. Adding to this, Walkerdine (2004) suggests that while psychology is useful in understanding children, this usefulness may be bound to Western democratic societies at a specific historical moment. Still, Lee (2001) cautions that we should not give developmental psychology a wholesale toss, noting, â€Å"What could growing up mean once we have distanced ourselves Bryant-45099 Part III.qxd 10/18/2006 7:43 PM Page 142 142– †¢ –THE SOCIOLOGY OF THE LIFE COURSE from the dominant frameworks’ account of socialization and development?† (p. 54). Likewise, Kehily (2004) notes that considering differences between sociology and developmental psychology is useful, yet it is also useful to consider what is shared or complementary across the two. Developmental psychologists have not reached consensus on the relative importance of physical, psychological, social, and cultural factors in shaping children’s development (Boocock and Scott 2005). Gittins (1988:22) urges social scientists studying children to bear in mind the nature versus nurture debate. Bruner (2000) explains that both biological and social factors are important because babies are born with start-up knowledge, which they then add and amend with life experiences. Concurring with this approach, Chomsky (1996) explains that a child’s biological makeup is â€Å"awakened by experience† and â€Å"sharpened and enriched† through interactions with other h umans and objects. Walkerdine (2004) considers developmental psychology as limited because of its deterministic trajectory and sociology as limited because of its omission of psychological factors alongside sociological or cultural factors. Walkerdine (2004) points to several developmental psychological approaches to consider the social production of children as subjects, namely situated learning (Cole and Scribner 1990; Haraway 1991), acquiring knowledge through practice or apprenticeship (Lave and Wenger 1991), actor network theory (Law and Moser 2002), and the idea of assemblages as children learn to fill a child role in society (Deleuze and Guattari 1988). These approaches allow the researcher to include children’s internal and external learning practices and processes. As such, developmental psychology can continue to contribute to childhood studies. In the 1990s, sociologists helped cull and identify useful concepts and tools for childhood studies by criticizing develop mental psychology. As the field of childhood studies continues to grow into a defined and recognized discipline, useful tools and concepts from developmental psychology should be included. Likewise, Woodhead (2003) asserts that several concepts and tools from developmental psychology— notably scaffolding, zone of proximal development, guided participation, cultural tools, communities of practice—are also relevant for childhood studies (see Lave and Wenger 1991; Mercer 1995; Rogoff 1990; Wood 1988). Psychologists’ concern with the individual child can complement sociological research that considers children as they interact within their environment. worlds are created. Hunt (2004) notes that children’s literature may be unreliable for understanding childhood because children’s books typically reflect the aspirations of adults for children of a particular epoch. Hunt (2004) holds however that children’s literature remains a meeting place for adults and children where different visions of childhood can be entertained and negotiated. In agreement with historical research on the concept of childhood, children’s books were first produced for middle-class children and had moralizing purposes. Later, children’s books were produced for all children, filled with middleclass values to be spread to all. There is agreement and disagreement on the definition of childhood when examining the children’s literature of different time periods and different cultures. For example, several books of the 1950s and 1960s—including The Borrowers, Tom’s Midnight Garden, and The Wolves of Willoughby C hase—depicted adults looking back while children are looking forward (Hunt 2004). Likewise, Spufford (2002:18) notes that the 1960s and 1970s produced a second golden age of children’s literature that presented a coherent, agreed-on idea of childhood. Furthermore, an examination of children’s literature indicates different childhoods were being offered to children in the United States and Britain during the nineteenth century. British children were depicted as being restrained, while American children were described as independent and having boundless opportunity (Hunt 2004). In this way, culture and children’s material world coalesce to offer very different outlooks on life to children. The goal of books may change, from moralizing to idealistic, yet across epochs and cultures they teach children acceptable roles, rules, and expectations. Children’s literature is a powerful platform of interaction wherein children and adults can come together to d iscuss and negotiate childhood. Cultural and Social Construction Approaches to Childhood Studies Anthropological cultural studies have laid important groundwork for research on children, and sociologists have extended these initial boundaries to develop a social construction of childhood. Anthropological research (Opie and Opie 1969) first noted that children should be recognized as an autonomous community free of adult concerns and filled with its own stories, rules, rituals, and social norms. Sociologists then have used the social construction approach, which draws on social interaction theory, to include children’s agency and daily activities to interpret children’s lives (see James and Prout [1990] 1997; Jenks 2004; Maybin and Woodhead 2003; Qvortrup 1993; Stainton Rogers et al. 1991; Woodhead 1999). Childhood is viewed as a social phenomenon (Qvortrup 1994). With this perspective, meaning is interpreted through the experiences of children and the networks within which Children’s Literature as an Approach to Childhood Studies Childhood as a separate stage of life is portrayed in children’s books, and the medium of books represents a substantial part of the material culture of childhood. Books may be viewed as a window onto children’s lives and a useful tool for comprehending how and why children’s Bryant-45099 Part III.qxd 10/18/2006 7:43 PM Page 143 The Sociology of Children and Youth– †¢ –143 they are embedded (Corsaro 1988). Researchers generally use ethnographic methods to attain reflexivity and include children’s voices. In this section, I will first discuss the social constructivist approach of childhood research in two areas, children’s lives within institutional settings such as day care centers and schools, and children’s worlds as they are constructed through material culture. Evidence suggests that young children actively add meaning and create peer cultures within institutional settings. For example, observations of toddler peer groups show preferences for sex emerge by two years of age and race can be distinguished by three years of age (Thompson, Grace, and Cohen 2001; Van Ausdale and Feagin 2001). Research also indicates that play builds on itself and across playgroups or peer groups. Even when the composition of children’s groups changes, children develop rules and rituals that regulate the continuation of the play activity as well as who may join an existing group. Knowledge is sustained within the peer group even when there is fluctuation. School-based studies (see Adler and Adler 1988; Corsaro 1988; Hardman 1973; LaReau 2002; Thorne 1993; Van Ausdale and Feagan) have added a great deal to our understandings of childh ood. Stephens (1995) examined pictures drawn by Sami School children of Norway to learn how the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster and its nuclear fallout affected their lives. The children expressed themselves through their drawings to show how the depleted environment affected their health, diet, work, daily routines, and cultural identity. Van Ausdale and Feagan (2001) explain how racism is created among preschool children’s play patterns and speak. They find that children experiment and learn from one another how to identify with their race and learn the privileges and behaviors of their race in comparison with other races. Using participant observation of children in a primary school setting, Hardman (1973) advanced the idea that children should be studied in their own right and treated as having agency. She found that children represent one level of a society’s beliefs, values, and social interactions. The children’s level interacts as muted voices with other levels of society’s beliefs, values, and social interactions, shaping them and being shaped by them (Hardman 1973). Corsaro (1988) used participant observations of chi ldren at play in a nursery school setting to augment Hardman’s idea of a children’s level. He observed and described children as active makers of meaning through social interaction. Likewise, Corsaro and Eder (1990) conceptualize children as observing the adult world but using elements of it to create a unique child culture. A few studies (see Peer Power by Adler and Adler 1988 and Gender Play by Thorne 1993) show how the cultural world of children creates a stratification structure similar to that of the adult world in a way that makes sense for children. Thorne’s (1993) study of children’s culture is set in an elementary school setting, wherein children have little say in making the rules and structure. Still, she finds children create meaning through playground games that use pollution rituals to reconstruct larger social patterns of inequality as they occur through gender, social class, and race (Thorne 1993:75). Similarly, other studies show how behaviors within peer cultures—such as racism, masculinity, or sexism (see Frosh, Phoenix, and Pattman 2002; Hey 1997; James, Jenks, and Prout 1998) and physical and emotional abuse (Ambert 1995)—are taught and negotiated within children’s peer groups. In addition, childhood can be interpreted through the material makeup of children’s worlds, generally taking the form of toys (see Lamb 2001; Reynolds 1989; Zelizer 2002). Zelizer (2002) argues that children are producers, consumers, and distributors. Lamb (2001) explains that children use Barbie dolls to share and communicate sexual knowledge within a peer group producing a secretive child culture. Cook (2004) contends that the concept of child has been constructed through the m arket. Through a social history of the children’s clothing industry, Cook explains how childhood became associated with commodities. He contends that childhood began to be commodified with the publication of the first children’s clothing trade journal in 1917. By the early 1960s, the child had become a legitimate consumer with its own needs and motivations. The consuming child has over time been provided a separate children’s clothing department stratified by age and gender. As in Cook’s thesis, others (e.g., Buckingham 2004; Jing 2000; Postman 1982) provide evidence to add support to the idea that children’s consumption defines childhood. Jing (2000) explains how the marketing of snack foods and fast foods to children has dramatically affected childhood in China. Likewise, television (Postman 1982) and computers (Buckingham 2004) reshape what we think of as childhood. Children are argued to have a reversed power relationship with adults in terms o f computers because children are more comfortable with this technology (Tapscott 1998). In addition, access to the Internet has created a new space for peer culture that is quite separate from adults. Through chat rooms and e-mail, children can communicate and share information among peers without face-to-face interaction. As a result, the stage on which children’s culture is created is altered. Social Structural Approaches to Childhood Studies Social structural approaches to childhood studies can be divided into two areas, those that distinguish children’s experience by age status and those that distinguish children’s experience by generational status. Because age is the primary criterion for defining childhood, sociologists who study children have found aging and life course theories that focus on generation to be useful. Thorne (1993) argues for the use of age and gender constructs in understanding children’s lives as well as considering Bryant-45099 Part III.qxd 10/18/2006 7:43 PM Page 144 144– †¢ –THE SOCIOLOGY OF THE LIFE COURSE children as social agents. Therefore, it is how children actively construct their worlds as a response to the constraints of age and gender. Passuth (1987) asserts that age is the salient factor for understanding childhood based on her study of how children 5 to 10 years old define themselves as little and big kids in a summer camp setting. Passuth found that age was more important than other stratification markers such as race, social class, and gender. Likewise, Bass (2004) finds that children are active agents but also that age should be considered first as it may structure the opportunities open to children who work in an open market in sub-Saharan Africa; however, other secondary factors such as economic status and gender also structure the life chances of these children. Studies based on children in the United States suggest that age should be considered along with race, gender, and social class to explain how children negotiate power and prestige within their peer groups (Goodwin 1990; Scott 2002). For other sociologists, generation provides the most useful concept to explain the lives of children (Mayall 2000:120). Other researchers (Alanen 2001; Qvortrup 2000) assert that generational relationships are more meaningful than analyses focusing on gender, social class, or ethnicity. While the concept of childhood is not universal, the dichotomy of adult and child is universal and differentiated by age status. This age status patterns differential power relations wherein adults have more power than children and adults typically regulate children’s lives. Childhood is produced as a response to the power of adults over children even when children are viewed as actively shaping their childhoods (Walkerdine 2004). Adults write children’s books, create children’s toys and activities, and often speak on behalf of children (e.g., the law). In this way, the generational divide and unequal authority between adults and children define childhood. Mayall (2002) uses the generational approach to explain how children contribute to social interaction through their position in the larger social order, wherein they hold a child status. The perspective of children remains meaningful even through the disadvantaged power relationship they hold vis-à  -vis adults in the larger social order. It can therefore become a balancing act between considering structural factors or the agency of children in understanding childhood. The life course perspective holds that individuals of each generation will experience life in a unique way because these individuals share a particular epoch, political economy, and sociocultural context. Foner (1978) explains, â€Å"Each cohort bears the stamp of the historical context through which it flows [so that] no two cohorts age in exactly the same way† (p. 343). For example, those who entered adulthood during the Depression have different work, educational, and family experiences compared with individuals who entered adulthood during the affluent 1950s. Those of each cohort face the same larger social and political milieu and therefore may develop similar attitudes. The social structural child posits that childhood may be identified structurally by societal factors that are larger than age status but help create age status in a childhood process (Qvortrup 1994). Children can be treated by researchers as having the same standing as adult research subjects but also may be handled differently based on features of the social structure. The resulting social structural child has a set of u niversal traits that are related to the institutional structure of societies (Qvortrup 1993). Changes in social norms or values regarding children are tied to universal traits as well as related to the social institutions within a particular society. Demographic Approaches to Childhood Studies Much of American sociology takes a top-down approach to the study of children and views children as being interlinked with the larger family structure. It is in this vein that family instability leading to divorce, family poverty, and family employment may affect children’s experiences. For example, Hernandez (1993) examines the American family using U.S. Census data from the twentieth century and notes a series of revolutions in the family—such as in decreased family size and the emergence of the two-earner family—that in turn affected children’s well-being and childhood experiences. Children from smaller families and higher incomes typically attain more education and take higher-paid employment. Hernandez (1993) contends that mothers’ increased participation in work outside the home led to a labor force revolution, which in turn initiated a child care revolution, as the proportion of preschoolers with two working parents increased from 13 percent in 1940 to 50 percent in 1987. More recent data indicate that about 70 percent of the mothers of preschoolers work outside the home (U.S. Bureau of the Census 2002). This child care revolution changes the structure of childhood for most American children. Time diary data indicate that the amount of children’s household chores increased from 1981 to 1997 (Hofferth and Sandberg 2001). Lee, Schneider, and Waite (2003) further note that when mothers work in the United States, children do more than their fathers to make up for the household labor gap caused when mothers work. Hence, expectations for children and childhood are altered because of a larger family framework of considerations and expectations. Family life structures children’s well-being. When marriages break up, there are real consequences in terms of transitions and loss of income that children experience. The structural effects on children of living in smaller, more diverse, and less stable families are still being investigated. Moore, Jeki elek, and Emig (2002) assert that family structure does matter in children’s lives and that children fare better in families headed by two biological, married parents in a low-conflict marriage. Some research indicates that financial support from fathers after a divorce is low (Crowell and Leaper 1994). Coontz (1997) maintains that divorce and single parenthood generally exacerbate preexisting financial uncertainty. These impoverished conditions may diminish children’s physical and emotional Bryant-45099 Part III.qxd 10/18/2006 7:43 PM Page 145 The Sociology of Children and Youth– †¢ –145 development and adversely affect school performance and social behaviors. However, this is not in all cases. Research (Cherlin et al. 1991) shows that children of separated or divorced families have usually experienced parental conflict and behavioral and educational problems before the family broke up. Hernandez (1993) suggests that the parental conflict and not the divorce or separation may provide more insight into children’s disadvantages. Hetherington and Kelly (2002) found that about three-fourths of children whose parents divorced adjusted within six years and ranked the same on behavioral and educational outcomes as children from intact families. Another study (Smart, Neale, and Wade 2001) finds positive attributes of children of divorce as children reported that they were more independent than friends who had not experienced divorce. The demographic study of children has taken place predominantly from the policy or public family vantage point with the assumption that there are consequences for children. Childhoods are typically framed with a perspective that views children’s worlds as being derivative of larger social forces and structures. Very little agency is noted or measured in these studies. While the demographic approach does not offer detailed explanation like research put forth by social constructivist childhood scholars (see James and Prout 1990), this approach provides a valuable perspective for framing and interpreting children’s lives. Socialization Approaches to Childhood Studies Research indicates that socialization may affect both children and parents. Developmental psychology allows us to consider how children are affected by the socialization provided by parents, and more recent research put forth by psychologists and sociologists suggests that this exchange of information may be a two-way process. LaReau (2002) puts forth a more traditional model of socialization as she details how American families of different races and classes provide different childhoods for their children. In her research, the focus is on how children and parents actively construct childhood even as they are possibly constrained by race and class. She found evidence for two types of child rearing, concerted cultivation among middle- and upper-middle-class children, and the emergence of natural growth among working- and lower-class children. LaReau’s study describes the process that puts lower- and higher-class children on different roads in childhood that translate into vastl y different opportunities in adulthood. Rossi and Rossi (1990) studied parent-child relationships across the life course and found that parents shape their children as well as their grandchildren through parenting styles, shared genes, social status, and belief systems. Alwin (2001) asserts that while rearing children is both a public and private matter, the daily teaching of children the rules and roles in society largely falls to parents. Furthermore, Alwin (2001) explains how American parental expectations for their children have changed over the last half-century, noting an increased emphasis on self-discipline through children’s activities that help develop autonomy and self-reliance. Zinnecker (2001) notes a parallel trend in Europe toward individualism and negotiation, and away from coercion in parenting styles. In contrast, Ambert’s (1992) The Effect of Children on Parents questions the assumptions of the socialization perspective and posits that socialization is a two-way process. Ambert argues that having children can influence one’s health, income, career opportunities, values and attitudes, feelings of control, life plans, and the quality of interpersonal relations. She questions the causality of certain problematic children’s behaviors, such as clinginess among some young children or frequent crying among premature babies. Ambert contends that children’s behavior socializes parents in a patterned way, which agrees with the sentiment of de Winter (1997) regarding autistic children and that Skolnick (1978) regarding harsh child-rearing methods. Likewise, psychologist Harris (1998) argues that the parental nurture or socialization fails to ground the direction of causation with empirical data. She explains that parenting styles are the effect of a child’s temperament and that parents’ socialization has little influence compared with other influences such as heredity and children’s peer groups. Harris’s approach, known as group socialization theory, posits that after controlling for differences in heredity, little variance can be explained by children’s socialization in the home environment. Harris provides evidence that most children develop one behavioral system that they use at home and a different behavioral system for use elsewhere by middle childhood. Group socialization theory can then explain why immigrant children learn one language in the home and another language outside the home, and their native language is the one they speak with their peers (Harris 1998). Likewise, other studies (Galinski 1999; Smart et al. 2001) find evidence that children play a supportive role and nurture their parents. In a parallel but opposing direction, other studies suggest that having children negatively affects parents’ lifestyles and standards of living (Boocock 1976) and disproportionately and negatively affects women’s career and income potentials (Cri ttenden 2001). Indeed, research indicates that socialization may affect both children and parents. While most research concentrates on the socialization of children by parents and societal institutions, more research should focus on the socialization of parents. In this way, children may be viewed as affecting the worlds of their parents, which in turn may affect children. Interdisciplinary Involvement and Implications Childhood research benefits from the involvement of a diverse range of disciplines. On the surface these approaches appear to have disagreement in terms of methods and theoretical underpinnings, yet these approaches challenge more traditional disciplines such as sociology, psychology, and anthropology to consider what best interprets children’s lives. In some cases, the interaction across Bryant-45099 Part III.qxd 10/18/2006 7:43 PM Page 146 146– †¢ –THE SOCIOLOGY OF THE LIFE COURSE disciplines creates new approaches, such as those of sociologists who use general socialization theory from developmental psychology. Similarly, historical research on the value of children being tied to a certain epoch with a specific level of political economy can inform the valuation of children and their labor in poorer countries around the globe today. There is a need for continued interdisciplinary collaboration, and thought is being given to how children and childhood studies could emerge as a recognized interdisciplinary field of inquiry. Woodhead (2003) offers three models for interdisciplinary effort for advancing the study of children and childhoods: (1) a clearinghouse model, (2) a pick ‘n’ mix model, and (3) a rebranding model. The clearinghouse model (Woodhead 2003) would include all studies of children and childhood, all research questions and methodologies, and all disciplines that are interested. This clearinghouse model would view different approaches t o the study of children for their complementary value and would encourage researchers to ask â€Å"different but equally valid questions† (James et al. 1998:188). The pick ‘n’ mix model (Woodhead 2003) envisions that an array of child-centered approaches would be selectively included in the study of children. If this were to happen, the process of selection could complicate and hamper the field of childhood studies in general. Fences may be useful in terms of demarcating the path for childhood scholars but also may obstruct the vista on the other side. The rebranding model (Woodhead 2003) would involve researchers collaborating across disciplines on research involving children while informing and remaining housed within more traditional disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, and psychology. In this scenario, children and childhood scholars remain within sociology while also being committed to interdisciplinary involvement. This scenario has served to strengthen sociological research in general. For example, James and Prout (1990) coined the term sociological study of childhood, and later James et al. (1998) developed the con cept of sociological child. More recently, Mayall (2002) has suggested the use of the term sociology of childhood to move children and childhood studies to a more central place within sociology. In turn, this strengthens children and childhood studies across disciplines by forging a place for children in the traditional discipline. The field of interdisciplinary childhood studies has the potential to widen its reach by creating constituencies across older disciplines. Additionally, childhood studies can learn from the development experience of other interdisciplinary fields such as women’s studies or gerontology. Oakley (1994:13) asserts the shared concerns across the academic study of women and children because women and children are socially linked and represent social minority groups. In a similar vein, Bluebond-Langner (2000) notes a parallel in scholarly potential for childhood studies of the magnitude of women’s studies, predicting that childhood studies will aff ect the twenty-first century in much the same way as women’s studies has the twentieth century. Weighing the contributions across disciplines, it is clear that developmental psychology has laid the groundwork for the field of childhood studies, yet the resulting conversation across scholars and disciplines has produced a field that is much greater than the contributions of any one contributing discipline. Therefore, childhood scholars have much to gain through conversation and collaboration. CONSIDERING SOCIOLOGY AND CHILDHOOD STUDIES Within sociology, scholars approach the study of children in many ways. Some sociologists take a strict social constructivist approach, while others meld this approach to a prism that considers social structures that are imposed on children. Some sociologists focus on demographic change, while others continue to focus on aspects of socialization as childhoods are constructed through forces such as consumer goods, child labor, children’s rights, and public policy. All these scholars add to the research vitality and breadth of childhood studies. In addition, children and childhood studies research centers, degree programs, and courses began to be established in the 1990s, most of which have benefited from the contributions of sociologists and the theories and methods of sociology. Childhood studies gained firm ground in 1992 in the United States when members of the American Sociological Association (ASA) formed the Section on the Sociology of Children. Later, the section name wa s changed to the Section on the Sociology of Children and Youth to promote inclusiveness with scholars who research the lives of adolescents. In addition to including adolescents, American sociologists are also explicitly open to all methods and theories that focus on children. The agenda of the Children and Youth Section has been furthered by its members’ initiation and continued publication of the annual volume Sociological Studies of Children since 1986. In agreement with the ASA section name addition, the volume recently augmented the volume name with and Youth and became formalized as the annual volume of ASA Children and Youth Section. The volume was initially developed and edited by Patricia and Peter Adler and later edited by Nancy Mandell, David Kinney, and Katherine Brown Rosier. Outside the United States, the study of children by sociologists has gained considerable ground through the International Sociological Association Research Group 53 on Childhood, which was established in 1994. Two successful international journals, Childhood and Children and Society, promote scholarly research on children from many disciplines and approaches. In particular, British childhood researchers have brought considerable steam to the development of childhood studies through curriculum development. Specifically, childhood researchers wrote four introductory textbooks published by Wiley for a target Bryant-45099 Part III.qxd 10/18/2006 7:43 PM Page 147 The Sociology of Children and Youth– †¢ –147 class on childhood offered by the Open University in 2003. The books are Understanding Childhood by Woodhead and Montgomery (2003), Childhoods in Context by Maybin and Woodhead (2003), Children’s Cultural Worlds by Kehily and Swann (2003), and Changing Childhoods by Montgomery, Burr, and Woodhead (2003). The relationship between the discipline of sociology and childhood studies appears to be symbiotic. Even as sociologists assert that the study of children is its own field, this does not preclude the development of childhood studies across disciplinary boundaries. Sociologists capture the social position or status of children and have the methods for examining how childhood is socially constructed or situated within a given society. Sociologists can also continue to find common ground with other childhood scholars from other disciplines to develop better methods and refine theories that explain children’s lives. Advances in the interdisciplinary field of childhood studi es serves to strengthen the research of sociologists who focus their work on children. Likewise, sociological challenges to the interdisciplinary field of childhood studies since the 1990s have provided useful points of critique and improvement to the study of children’s behavior and children’s lives. CURRENT AND FUTURE RESEARCH: SOCIAL POLICY AND CHILDREN’S RIGHTS Current and future research on children falls into two main areas, social policy and children’s rights. Arguably, there is some overlap between these two large themes. Indeed, Stainton Rogers (2004) maintains that social policy is motivated by a concern for children, yet children have very little to no political or legal voice. Children do not vote or decide what is in their best interests or what children’s rights are. Social policy requires us to consider the intersection of children as dependents or not yet adults and children as having certain rights. It has previously been noted that children are citizens and should be treated as citizens but with their own concerns (James and Prout 1997), yet there is still much to be clarified. Public policy can be used to improve the lives of children. Research has established that poverty matters in the lives of children, as measured in child well-being indicators, and public policies have been enacted to help families rise out of poverty (Hernandez 1993). Research on the impact of increased income after a casino opened on a Cherokee reservation indicates that Native-American children who were raised out of poverty had a decreased incidence of behavior disorders (Costello et al. 2003). At other times, public policies affect children as a byproduct or consequence. One example is the 1996 Welfare Reform Law (or PRWORA), which made work mandatory for able-bodied, American adults and put time limits of five years and a day on receiving public assistance. Still, much is to be learned as to the effect, if any, of this legislation on children (Bass and Mosley 2001; Casper and Bianchi 2002). In addition to income, public policy shapes the experience of family life by recognizing some forms while ignoring others. A substantial number of children will experience many family structures and environments as they pass through childhood, regardless of whether the government legitimates all these forms (Clarke 1996). Likewise, examining children’s experiences in various family forms is a useful area of current and future study. Children’s rights can be examined in terms of protecting children from an adult vantage point or in terms of providing children civil rights (or having a legal voice). The view of protecting children is a top-down approach positing that children are immature, and so legal protections should be accorded to keep children safe from harm and abuse and offer children a basic level of developmental opportunities. In contrast, the civil rights approach asserts that children have the right to participate fully in decisions that may affect them and should be allowed the same freedoms of other citizens (Landsdown 1994; Saporiti et al. 2005). In addition, the framing of children’s rights takes different forms in richer and poorer countries around the globe. For richer countries, granting children rights may involve allowing children civil and political voice, whereas in poorer countries, basic human rights bear out as more important. Child labor is an issue that has been examined in terms of the right of children to learn and be developed and the right of children to provide for oneself (see Bass 2004; Neiwenhuys 1994; Zelizer 1985). Future studies wil l also need to consider the relationship between children’s rights as children become study subjects. Innovative approaches are being used to include children’s voices and input in the research process (Leonard 2005), yet there is still much to be done in this area in terms of developing methodologies that allow children to participate in the research process. Indeed, incorporating children in the research process is a next logical step for childhood studies. However, childhood scholars are adults and therefore not on an equal footing with children (Fine and Sandstrom 1988). Furthermore, there is momentum to include children’s perspectives in the research process at the same time that there is a growing concern for children’s well-being, which may be adversely affected by their participation as subjects in the research process. Future research on children should focus on the children’s issues through social policies yet also consider childrenâ€⠄¢s rights in tandem or as follow-up studies. It is generally the matter of course to take children or youth as a definitive given and then seek to solve their problems or create policies for them. Future research should focus on practical children’s issues and use empirical research projects to increase our knowledge of the nature of childhood. The last 15 years provide evidence to support the idea that childhood researchers should continue to bridge disciplines and even continents to find common ground.

Biography of Rebecca Nurse, Salem Witch Trials Victim

Biography of Rebecca Nurse, Salem Witch Trials Victim Rebecca Nurse (February 21, 1621–July 19, 1692) was a victim of the notorious Salem witch trials, hanged as a witch at 71 years of age. Despite being a fervent churchgoer and an upstanding member of the community- a newspaper of the day referred to her as saint-like and a perfect example of good Puritan behavior- she was accused, tried, and convicted of witchcraft and put to death without the legal protections Americans would come to enjoy. Fast Facts: Rebecca Nurse Known For: Hanged during the 1692 Salem witch trialsAlso Known As: Rebecca Towne, Rebecca Town, Rebecca Nourse, Rebecka Nurse. Goody Nurse, Rebeca NurceBorn: February 21, 1621 in Yarmouth, EnglandParents: William Towne, Joanna BlessingDied: July 19, 1692 in Salem Village, Massachusetts Bay ColonySpouse: Francis NurseChildren: Rebecca, Sarah, John, Samuel, Mary, Elizabeth, Francis, Benjamin (and sometimes Michael) Early Life Rebecca Nurse was born on Feb. 21, 1621 (some sources give this as her baptism date), in Yarmouth, England, to William Towne and Joanna Blessing. Her entire family, including several siblings, immigrated to the  Massachusetts Bay Colony  sometime between 1638 and 1640. Rebecca married Francis Nurse, who also came from Yarmouth, around 1644. They raised four sons and four daughters on a farm in Salem Village, now  Danvers, Massachusetts, 10 miles inland from the bustling port community of Salem Town, now Salem. All but one of their children were married by 1692. Nurse, a member of Salem Church, was known for her piety but also for occasionally losing her temper. She and the Putnam family had fought in court several times over land. During the witch trials, many of the accused had been enemies of the  Putnams, and Putnam family members and in-laws were the accusers in many cases. Trials Begin Public accusations of witchcraft in Salem Village began on Feb. 29, 1692. The first accusations were leveled against three women who werent considered respectable: Tituba, an Indian slave; Sarah Good, a homeless mother; and Sarah Osborne, who had a somewhat scandalous history. Then on March 12, Martha Corey was accused; Nurse followed on March 19. Both women were church members and respected, prominent members of the community. Arrested A warrant issued on March 23 for Nurses arrest included complaints of attacks on Ann Putnam Sr., Ann Putnam Jr., Abigail Williams, and others. Nurse was arrested and examined the next day. She was accused by townspeople Mary Walcott, Mercy Lewis, and Elizabeth Hubbard as well as by Ann Putnam Sr., who cried out during the proceedings to accuse Nurse of trying to get her to tempt God and dye. Several spectators adopted head motions indicating that they were in Nurses thrall. Nurse was then indicted for witchcraft. On April 3, Nurses younger sister, Sarah Cloyce (or Cloyse), came to Nurses defense. She was accused and arrested on April 8. On April 21, another sister, Mary Easty (or Eastey), was arrested after defending their innocence. On May 25, judges John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin ordered the Boston jail to take custody of Nurse, Corey, Dorcas Good (Sarahs daughter, age 4), Cloyce, and John and Elizabeth Parker for acts of witchcraft committed against Williams, Hubbard, Ann Putnam Jr., and others. Testimony A deposition written by Thomas Putnam, signed on May 31, detailed accusations of torment of his wife, Ann Putnam Sr., by Nurses and Coreys specters, or spirits, on March 18 and 19. Another deposition detailed accusations of afflictions on March 21 and 23 caused by Nurses specter. On June 1, townsperson Mary Warren testified that George Burroughs, Nurse, Elizabeth Proctor, and several others said they were going to a feast and that when she refused to eat bread and wine with them, they dreadfully afflicted her and that Nurse appeared in the room during the taking of the deposition. On June 2, Nurse, Bridget Bishop, Proctor, Alice Parker, Susannah Martin, and Sarah Good were forced to undergo physical examinations by a doctor with a number of women present. A preternathurall Excresence of flesh was reported on the first three. Nine women signed the document attesting to the exam. A second exam later that day stated that several of the observed physical abnormalities had changed; they attested that on Nurse, the Excresence ... appears only as a dry skin without sense at this later exam. Again, nine women signed the document. Indicted The next day, a grand jury indicted Nurse and John Willard for witchcraft. A petition from 39 neighbors was presented on Nurses behalf, and several neighbors and relatives testified for her. Witnesses testified for and against Nurse on June 29 and 30. The jury found Nurse not guilty but returned guilty verdicts for Good, Elizabeth How, Martin, and Sarah Wildes. The accusers and spectators protested loudly when the verdict was announced. The court asked the jury to reconsider the verdict; they found her guilty after reviewing the evidence and discovering that she had failed to answer one question put to her (perhaps because she was nearly deaf). She was condemned to hang. Massachusetts Gov. William Phips issued a reprieve, which was also met with protests and rescinded. Nurse filed a petition protesting the verdict, pointing out she was hard of hearing and full of grief. On July 3, the Salem Church excommunicated Nurse. Hanged On July 12, Judge William Stoughton signed death warrants for Nurse, Good, Martin, How, and Wildes. All five were hanged on July 19 on Gallows Hill. Good  cursed the presiding clergyman, Nicholas Noyes, from the gallows, saying if you take away my life God will give you blood to drink. (Years later, Noyes died of a brain hemorrhage; legend has it that he choked on his blood.) That night, Nurses family removed her body and buried it secretly on their family farm. Of Nurses two sisters who also were charged with witchcraft, Easty was hanged on Sept. 22 and Cloyces case was dismissed in January 1693. Pardons and Apology In May 1693, Phips pardoned the remaining defendants accused of witchcraft. Francis Nurse died on Nov. 22, 1695, two years after the trials had ended. That was before Nurse and 21 others of the 33 who had been convicted were exonerated in 1711 by the state, which paid compensation to the families of the victims. In 1957, Massachusetts  formally apologized for the trials, but It wasnt until 2001 that the last 11 of those convicted were fully exonerated. On Aug. 25, 1706, Ann Putnam Jr. publicly apologized for the accusing of several persons of a grievous crime, whereby their lives were taken away from them, whom, now I have just grounds and good reason to believe they were innocent persons... She named Nurse specifically. In 1712, Salem Church reversed Nurses excommunication. Legacy The abuses of the Salem witch trials contributed to changes in U.S. court procedures, including the guarantee of the right to legal representation, the right to cross-examine one’s accuser, and the presumption of innocence instead of guilt. The trials as a metaphor for the persecution of minority groups remained powerful images into the 20th and 21st centuries, particularly in playwright  Arthur Millers The Crucible  (1953), in which he used events and individuals from 1692 allegorically for the anti-communist hearings led by Sen.  Joseph McCarthy  during the  Red Scare  of the 1950s. The Rebecca Nurse homestead still stands in Danvers, the new name of Salem Village, and is open to tourists. Sources Salem Witch Trials: American History. Encyclopedia Britannica.The Witchcraft Trial of Rebecca Nurse. History of Massachusetts blog.An Unexpected Turn in the Trials. The Salem Journal.

Economic Ramifications of Stringent Tort Laws

Economic Ramifications of Stringent Tort Laws Part 1. Executive SummaryWe look at the progressive stringent interpretation of tort laws. We observe the starvation of the economic engines and commanding heights of the economy. This effect is all the more evident in tobacco, pharmaceutical and automobile industries in the US. This has resulted in stifled innovation and risk averse behavior on the part of industries in these sectors. We draw parallels from history, where we look at the evolution of tort law, with the beginning of the industrial revolution, and how it has maintained a harmony between the capitalist, the worker and the consumer. The history in this field had gone through the successive processes of integration and disintegration, and at this point it was going through a process of reintegration along new lines. The conflict between the justice culture and the market culture underlies our tort wars.The precarious balance between the capitalist, worker and consumer is currently being threatened by excessive damages awa rded by courts in various cases.Strawberry TortAdditionally, courts fail to take into account the resources available at the disposal of the defendant, while awarding damages; resulting in large-scale bankruptcies. This could lead to a vicious cycle of bankruptcies of industrial and financial institutions, resulting in economic catastrophe. We specifically study the impact of these fallouts on the medical insurance industry.We see a breakdown of law in this case, and propose that law has overstepped its boundaries and threatens to destroy the very society it seeks to protect. Unless this situation is urgently rectified, we predict a breakdown of free market capitalism and its benefits of freedom of expression and action.Part 2. Introduction?The life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience?The objective of the project is to look at the Economic Ramifications of the circumvention...

Terms of Arithmetic and Math in Spanish

Terms of Arithmetic and Math in Spanish You can talk about math in Spanish by learning a few basic terms. Many of the words are ones you already may know from other contexts. Spanish Terms of Arithmetic Here are the words for the simple mathematical functions and how theyre used with numbers: Addition (Suma):  Dos ms tres son cinco. (Two plus three is five.) Note that in other contexts, ms is usually an adverb. Subtraction (Resta):  Cinco menos cuatro son uno. (Five minus four is one.) Multiplication (Multiplicacià ³n):  Tres por cuatro son doce. (Three times four is twelve.) In other contexts, por is a common preposition. Division (Divisià ³n):  Doce dividido entre cuatro son tres. (Twelve divided by four is three.) Doce dividido por cuatro son tres. (Twelve divided by four is three.) Entre is another common preposition. Note that all of these sentences use the verb son, which is plural, in contrast with the singular verb is of English. It is also possible to use es or  the phrase es igual a (is equal to). Other Mathematical Terms Here are some less common mathematical terms: el cuadrado de - the square ofel cubo de - the cube ofecuacià ³n - equationelevado a la enà ©sima potencia - raised to the nth powerfuncià ³n - functionnà ºmero imaginario - imaginary numberpromedio - average, meanquebrado, fraccià ³n - fractionraà ­z cuadrada - square rootraà ­z cà ºbica - cube root Sample Sentences Solo un idiota que no sabe que dos ms dos son  cuatro le creerà ­a. (Only an idiot who doesnt know that two plus two equals four would believe him.) Una fraccià ³n es un nà ºmero  que se obtiene de dividir un entero en partes iguales. (A fraction is a number that is obtained by dividing a whole number into equal parts.) Pi se obtiene al dividir la circunferencia de un cà ­rculo del dimetro. (Pi is obtained by dividing the circumference of a circle by the diameter.) El triple de un nà ºmero menos el doble del mismo nà ºmero son ese nà ºmero. (Three times a number minus two times that number is that number.) Una funcià ³n es como una mquina: tiene una entrada y una salida. (A function is like a machine: It has an input and an output.) Una ecuacià ³n es una igualdad matemtica entre dos expresiones matemticas. (An equation is an equality between two mathematical expressions.) La ciudad est dividida en dos partes iguales. (The city is divided into two equal parts.)  ¿Cul es el resultado de dividir 20 por 0.5? (What is the quotient of 20 divided by 0.5?) El cuadrado de un nà ºmero menos el doble del mismo nà ºmero son 48.  ¿Cul es ese nà ºmero? (The square root of a number minus double the same number is 48. What is that number?) El promedio de edad de los estudiantes es de 25 aà ±os. (The average age of the students is 25.) La divisià ³n entre cero es una indeterminacià ³n. Asà ­Ã‚  la expresià ³n 1/0 carece de sentio. (Division by zero yields an indeterminable number. Thus the expression 1/0 doesnt make sense.) Los nà ºmeros imaginarios pueden describirse como el producto de un nà ºmero real por la unidad imaginaria i, en donde i denota la raà ­z cuadrada de -1. (Imaginary numbers can be described as the product of a real number by the imaginary unit i, where  i denotes the square root of -1.)

King Lear by Shakespeare Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

King Lear by Shakespeare - Essay Example Lance Baker is an excellent actor as the daughter to Regan’s husband. Steve and Jesse, acting as Gloucester’s sons were also strong characters who were influential in the act. The acts of the three actors who played the role of Lear’s daughters had substantial stage impact. Their performances depicted lack of experience in Shakespearean work. One could easily realize the lack of vocal and dramatic power in the rest of the play. The director’s simple scenic design synchronized with the modern-dress Lear. Geno’s lighting design, which is rather dramatic, highlighted the performances of the actors. The moment that had the biggest impression was in the first act when Lear had a hilarious exchange with Oswald. The part is impressive because it gives relief to me in preparation of facing the terrible suffering that the play dramatizes. When Lear asks who he was, Oswald replies, â€Å"My Lady’s father.’ Lear gets surprised on hearing the reply and repeats it. He calls Oswald names such as dog and slave. Oswald in a satirical tone declines that he is none of the names that Lear uses on him and begs for a pardon. The folly in the exchange continues and makes the portion of the act a memorable theatrical performance. The staging of the scene where Edgar pretends to show Gloucester the edge of a Dover cliff from was performed convincingly. The actor playing the part of Edgar perfectly did his portion of the play. On the stage, the two actors acting as Edgar and Gloucester walked at a rather raised platform with the one acting as Edgar breathing hard to convince Gloucester that the ground was steep. When they reached the end section of the platform, they stopped and â€Å"Edgar† points at the wall that had the image of scenery of the sea. His description of the sea and the corresponding scenery captured the mind of the reader before â€Å"Edgar† walks away leaving the old man to fall approximately two feet down to the normal

Sedimentary Rocks Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Sedimentary Rocks - Essay Example The key characteristic feature of sedimentary rocks is that they are layered. Although there cover of the earth’s crust is extensive (about 75 per cent), sedimentary rocks only constitute about five per cent of the total volume of the crust. The earth’s crust mainly consists of the igneous and metamorphic rocks. Sedimentary rocks are vital sources of the natural resources such as coal and drinking water (Stille and Fichter, 2008). Formation of Sedimentary Rocks Sedimentary rocks are usually formed in areas where there is water or water had existed in one particular time. The dead materials of animals, plants, and pieces of rocks or minerals are then transported to these areas (water bodies) by wind, water, ice, or gravity where they are often dropped off and sink to the bottom. At the bottom of the water bodies, they little by little begin to form layers which build on top of one another. This puts pressure on the lower layers thus the weight of all of the layers pushes down the lower layers until they harden into rock.   This process does not occur in few years but takes millions of years to happen.   During this process, the water body dries up and the sedimentary layer that used to be under water becomes a surface layer (Boggs, 1995). Categories of Sedimentary Rocks According to Stille and Fichter (2008), sedimentary rocks are categorized into three main groups based on sediment type. The three categories include: Clastic Sedimentary Rock: they are formed from mechanical weathering debris. Examples include sandstone, conglomerate and breccias. Organic Sedimentary Rocks: they are formed from accumulation of dead plant and animal materials. Examples include coal and some limestones. Chemical Sedimentary Rocks: they are formed by precipitation of dissolved materials from solutions. Examples include some limestones and rock salt. Distinguishing Characteristics between the Three Categories of Sedimentary Rocks Clastic Sedimentary Rocks These are the most common type of sedimentary rocks and are comprised of granular materials which occur in sediments. Clastic rocks largely consist of surface minerals such as clay, feldspar and quartz which are formed as a result of physical breakdown of rocks and alteration of rocks chemically. Clastic sedimentary rocks are classified according to the size of the particle which is dominant in the rock. For example, Breccia is composed of large angular fragment, sandstone is composed of sand size weathering debris and conglomerate is made up of large rounded particles. Clastic sedimentary rocks have clastic texture; they are made up of clasts (Stille and Fichter, 2008). Organic Sedimentary Rocks Organic sedimentary rocks are composed of organic matter: animal and plant fragments. This type of rock is usually formed in two ways. One type (which includes limestone and chest) forms in the sea due accumulation of dead plankton shells whereas as the other one (coal) is formed due accumulation of dead plant on the earth surface (Boggs, 1995). Chemical Sedimentary Rocks Chemical sedimentary rocks are formed by inorganic precipitation of supersaturated mineral constituents. They form within the depositional basin from components of chemicals dissolved in water. Unlike clastic sedimentary rocks, the direct origin of chemicals is not east to esteblish. The chemicals could originate from magma or from an

Outline an activity that will promote creative engagement using Essay

Outline an activity that will promote creative engagement using electronic educational games.You can choose an electronic game f - Essay Example Education has developed over the years into a highly intricate developmental activity for humans in all civilized locations of the world. Set patterns of curricula and defined standards have to be met in order to qualify for the desired and specific professional goals. Modern education involves the usage of electronic media which can be either in the form of informative multimedia presentations or interactive activities using a computer interface. The following paragraphs illustrate an educational activity planned for 12 year old children. By the age of 12 years most children have acquired basic language and mathematical skills and are well aware of themselves and the surroundings they live in. However, the real world is quite different from the narrow confines of a classroom or home and there is a need to increase the awareness of children about other places of economic importance to humans, like factories, farms, markets and industries. Students in cities usually are isolated from such places and rarely visit them until advanced age. They can however, now be given a virtual experience of any environment using interactive electronic media like computers and interactive games. Instead of going to an actual place, children can now visit virtual farms, factories, etc. on a personal computer through role playing games which are available freely on the internet. Some examples are HP (Hewlett Packard games) which come bundled with their PCs (personal computers) or other online interactive game sites like Shidonni, Runescape and Roblox (Respective websites) Activity The purpose of this activity will be to familiarize children with farm life through a role playing game, ‘Farmscapes’, available for trial download from the Hewlett Packard (HP) website (HP website). Children will be assisted by the teacher to sign up for role playing games’ available at the HP website which offers free (trial) as well as paid games for online subscribers (HP website). Co branded as Wild Tangent games, these are thoroughly well designed, interactive and attractive games for children (Wildtangent website). To play the game, a person has to register with a valid email and the teacher can assist the students in doing so. As the students’ may not be aware with the intricacies of downloading and installation of the game, the teacher will download, install and assist the child to initiate the game on a desktop PC. For this particular activity, the children will be asked to choose the game ‘Farmscapes’ and familiarize themselves with various farming operations. The main character of this game is ‘Joe’ who owns a ranch. Children will assist Joe in various farm activities like sowing, fertilizing, growing, harvesting the crops and selling them to reap profits for the rancher. They will learn how to run a dairy, a chicken farm, a beehive, etc., and indulge in interactive activities on the computer screen akin to actual farm operations. The children will learn to cope with natural disasters and farm operations necessary for running a profitable agricultural business. There are hidden treasures and mysteries which attract the children to the game and sustain their attention. Children can spend the allotted time on the game and leave the rest for the next day, on which they can resume activities on their farm. This takes away the strain on children from having to complete an activity in a single instance. Ability to resume on the next day provides adequate rest to the

Self assessment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Self assessment - Essay Example Department of State/Bureau of International Information Programs, 2015). While these features can be observed among many, a skilled entrepreneur will know how to utilize these features for business purposes. In this essay, I intend to discuss the similarities in features that I possess to become an entrepreneur besides discussing the role of entrepreneurship in successful business undertakings, identifying the impacts of entrepreneurial activities in the business world and the roles played by innovation and creativity. The essay will also focus on my personal views of entrepreneurial activities, with reference to my experience in Sotheby as GNTG’s Human Resources Assistant. The discussion will also emphasize my roles in voluntary works in cooperation with my friends. In accordance to the context presented, I will discuss my IT skills and activities about how it helps in performing entrepreneurial activities. Scholars and theorists argue that to become a successful entrepreneur, several key attributes must be possessed inclusive of creativity skills, leadership qualities, passion to work for betterment, self-confidence, and ignition to bring innovation in business, along with the abilities of making smart investments, dedication and flexibility (Business Case Studies, 2015). Although this provides a general view to the characteristics of an effective entrepreneur, there have been considerable arguments concentrating on the do’s and don’ts of entrepreneurship. Referring to these attributes, I was able to observe many similarities and dissimilarities as well as strengths and weaknesses in myself as an entrepreneur. These similarities became more apparent to my during my internship programme in GNTG, which is a Chinese investment firm, where I used to work as a human resource assistant. My work in GNTG was to receive and fill information