Article Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

Article - Research Paper Example The most common environmental factors are toxins and exposure to pesticides. Toxic chemicals like MPTP, Toluene, Carbon Disulphide, and cyanide; and certain pesticides like rotenone and paraquat affect significant changes in vital neural components. Exposure to toxic chemicals and pesticides are found to cause damage and loss of â€Å"dopaminergic neurons and clinical Parkinsonism† (Chao et al.). Pesticides like paraquat and rotenone has also been observed to depreciate both dopaminergic neurons and typical Parkinsonism. Furthermore, these chemicals inspire contact with genetic expression thereby curbing genetic mutations. As a result, genetics have been particularly considered in the continuing research on Parkinson’s disease. There is no known cure for Parkinson’s disease so far; and most of the treatments available today are used to either prevent or contain the degeneration of the disease. According to Chao et al (2012), current treatments for Parkinsonâ€⠄¢s disease are categorized into two main subgroups: symptom-relieving drugs and surgical treatments. Common symptom-relieving drugs include L-dopa, dopamine agonists, bromocriptine, ropinirole, cabergoline, and pergolide among others. Examples of surgical treatments for Parkinson’s disease patients are â€Å"deep brain stimulation, implantation of embryonic dopaminergic cells, and gene therapy† (Chao et al.). These surgical treatments generally aim for tempering motor and non-motor symptoms. Recently, the use of nutraceuticals has been widely employed as an alternative to treating degenerative symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. One example of nutraceuticals – essentially refers to â€Å"food or food products† (Chao et al.) that are scientifically found to provide medical and health benefits, and which exhibit potential preventive capabilities against certain diseases – are antioxidants like Vitamins C and E. According to Anderson et al., consuming foods

Hispanic American Diversity Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 4

Hispanic American Diversity - Research Paper Example Mexican Americans have been living for a very long time in the United States and have adapted accordingly to the demands of the culture and society. In 2006 it was found that 14 percent of the documented immigrants in the United States belonged to Mexico. These Americans are diverse when it comes to their language. Twenty-six percent of the Mexican Americans can talk in both Spanish and English, 23 percent of them talk English whereas 51 percent speak Spanish. The political stance of Mexican American remains the same as the other Hispanic groups as they have been long ignored in the political arena because of their language differences. However, their voting rights were established long back and they are able to vote easily. It has also been realized that they form a great portion of the voters and they have been specifically targeted by many leaders. Although their political strength is increasing with every passing day it can be still seen that injustice prevails against these immi grants in terms of education, testing and immigration reforms. The Mexican Americans follow the principles of Catholicism accordingly. The economic condition of these Americans has not become any better as there still remains a huge gap between the born Americans and the immigrants. The rate of poverty, unemployment is higher in this group if compared with the Whites (Schaefer 2010; Keedle 2010). Puerto Ricans form another major group of Hispanics in the United States. These Americans tend to be more oriented towards the English Language as they have been a part of the US history. These people have known to be undergoing a phenomenon known as neocolonialism as they are not able to accept the American identity as a whole. The economic stance of the Puerto Ricans is not as good as the whites and they are known to suffer from a higher rate of unemployment too.     

Relationship Between Childhood Well-being and Poverty

Relationship Between Childhood Well-being and Poverty Introduction This paper explores the relationship between childhood well-being and poverty. Using structural equation modelling a multidimensional picture of child well-being is developed which is linked to previous work on multidimensional poverty indicators at household level (Tomlinson et al. forthcoming). Following a brief literature review of childhood poverty and well-being research, there follows an analysis of several waves of the British Household Panel Study – a valuable source of data collected directly from children as well as adults in the same households. The paper attempts to map the experience of poverty at household level and relate it to the child’s well-being. Rather than seeing poverty as a facet of child well-being, as other researchers often do, this work conceptually distinguishes between the two and shows how they are linked. Following the literature review various structural equation models are estimated that measure different dimensions of child well-being. These dimensions are then related to other aspects of the child’s life including the experience of poverty, age and gender, household composition, income, parental education and employment status. The effects of poverty are broken down into more detailed dimensions and the relative impact of each dimension is discussed. Finally, the models are used to inform targeting strategies with respect to child welfare policy. Crucially the differential impact of various potential policy instruments is assessed through the models. Mainstream child poverty research Since New Labour took office and pledged to eliminate child poverty by 2020 a myriad of policy changes and political statements has been issued to address the problems associated with poverty and deprivation during childhood. Indeed the costs of child poverty and its immediate and future effects are becoming increasingly alarming. For instance, recent research has found that poor children are more likely to get into trouble inside and outside school and more likely to be involved in drug abuse (ONS 2002). The direct costs of this are estimated to be considerable. For example:  £6000 for a 6 month non-custodial sentence  £21000 for a custodial sentence of 6 months Cost of attending pupil referral unit:  £10000/year Drug programmes cost on average  £15000/person over a 4 year period (Source: Godfrey et al. 2004) Much of the literature relating to child poverty in the UK has focussed around two areas: first the identification of households where risk is greatest and second, the so-called ‘scarring’ of children and the transmission of disadvantage into adulthood. With respect to the former it is now well known that poor children in particular are more likely to come from the following types of household: Workless households Benefit dependent households Lone parent families Low income households Families with younger children are more likely to be poor Large families Ethnic minority households Those in rented accommodation See, for example, Hirsch (2006a), Lloyd (2006). In addition Bradshaw (2006a) has extensive breakdowns of poverty rates for different social groups with children; Platt (2007) has an analysis of ethnicity, employment and child poverty; large families are extensively discussed in Iavacou and Berthoud (2006) and so on. In other words it is no longer an issue of identifying which types of environment – from a household perspective – are important, but rather moving towards a measurement model that can assess the impacts of the various dimensions associated with poverty on the child and its well-being. This is the approach taken in this paper. With respect to the second set of literature on scarring and transmission, the impact of poverty on a child’s future life-chances has also been extensively researched. Moreover, these impacts appear to have increased as child poverty increased during the 1980s and 1990s (Fahmy, 2006). Gregg and Wadsworth (2001) have noted the increased polarisation of working versus non-working households and the effects that this has had on poverty rates. That is the growth of dual-earner versus no-earner households. Using cohort studies such as the British Cohort Study (BCS) and National Child Development Study (NCDS), a series of papers has shown that low income in childhood leads to poor educational attainment in later life. For example, see Blanden and Gregg (2004) which also provides a useful review of the US literature on this topic. Gregg and Machin (2000) and Glennester (1995) come to similar conclusions. Fahmy has also reviewed the literature with respect to youth poverty (youth being defined as being aged 16-25). The consequences of poverty identified for this group, referred to as ‘hazardous transitions’ into adulthood, include: A high probability of becoming a ‘NEET’ (not in employment, education or training – see Istance et al 1994 for an earlier study) A bad career track (Craine 1997) A reduced level of citizenship and civic participation (Dean 1997) A higher risk of homelessness (Smith 1999, see also Flouri and Buchanan, 2004) Stewart has also documented various consequences of child poverty in later life. Adding low self-esteem, low expectations, reduced educational attainment, benefit dependency and poor labour market outcomes to the list. See Stewart, (2005) and also Hobcraft (1998) and Ermisch et al. (2001). While all this work is very convincing and commendable there is relatively little literature relating child poverty in the here and now and its immediate impact on the life and environment of the child. It is almost as if this were less important than the future costs. However, there is also a growing interest in the current well-being of children and its measurement. Early literature on this is extensively reviewed in Pollard and Lee (2002). This covers definitions of well-being, the indicators developed and instruments used in the measurement process. Moreover, two recent special issues of Social Indicators Research (SIR, 2007a, 2007b) have already been devoted exclusively to the topic (and a third issue is on the way). Interestingly, one strand of this work relates to human rights which shows the level of importance now being attached to these issues. Bradshaw et al. (2007) discuss concepts of well-being which are predicated on the UN convention on the rights of the child (UNCRC). Essentially this accepts the multi-dimensional nature of well-being from at least four perspectives: first that it is non-discriminatory, second that it is in the best interests of the child, third that it relates to the child’s survival and development, and fourth that it respects the views of the child (Bradshaw et al 2007: 134). The link to poverty and deprivation is sometimes made explicit in this literature: for example, ‘child well-being and deprivation represent different sides of the same coin’, Bradshaw et al. (2007). On the other hand, US, and very recent British, research shows well-being to be related to, but not the same as childhood poverty (Land et al., 2006; Bradshaw and Mayhew, 2005) for reasons that are not well-understood, but which probably include protective behaviour by parents (e.g., Flouri, 2004) and individual resilience (e.g., Masten and Coatsworth, 1998, Masten, 2001). Thus there is confusion about the relationship between well-being and poverty. Sometimes poverty is cited as a specific dimension of well-being, and sometimes as a separate concept entirely. For example, Bradshaw et al. (2007) have developed an eightfold classification of child well-being and generated one composite summary indicator from internationally comparable data. The eight dimensions being: Material well-being Housing Health Subjective well-being Education Relationships Civic participation Risk and safety These are measured by standardised scores which are added together to form the individual indices and an overall summary index which is then used for international comparison. There is then no accepted or uncontroversial measure of child well-being. The general thrust of the debate is that child well-being must be measured along several dimensions and poverty (or particular dimensions of poverty such as material deprivation) is sometimes included and sometimes not. The approach taken in this paper is somewhat different in that the two concepts are kept completely distinct as explained in more detail below. The measurement of poverty and well-being The approach here uses two sets of measures reflecting two aspects of the situation of children living in British households. First of all we measure poverty at the household level using structural equation models. This is done along several dimensions using data from the British Household Panel Study (BHPS) and is discussed in Tomlinson et al. (forthcoming). The dimensions are: financial strain, material deprivation, the environment, psycho-social strain, civic participation and social isolation. These are combined into an overall weighted index referred to as the Poverty Index (PI). Second we use structural equation models to measure various dimensions of childhood well-being. We are restricted in the questions that are asked and cannot include all the dimensions listed by Bradshaw et al. (2007). However, we measure four different aspects of child well-being including ‘home life’ which relates to family relationships and parental control (similar to Bradshaw’s ‘relationships’ dimension), ‘educational orientation’ (again similar to Bradshaw et al.), ‘anxiety’ (based in part on Bradshaw’s subjective well-being indicator) and ‘delinquency’ (which also relates to risk and safety). However, a crucial difference with our approach is that we treat dimensions such as material well-being and housing as aspects of household level poverty rather than childhood well-being. Thus we keep poverty and well-being conceptually distinct and analyse the relations between the two. It is the association between these four measures of child well-being and the numerous measures of poverty already developed that is the ultimate focus of the paper. In summation we take a multidimensional approach to both well-being and poverty and we examine the correlates of poverty with a child’s current well-being. In this way we can assess the impacts of poverty on the child’s immediate social environment and state of mind rather than what the future might hold. Models which can link together different aspects of poverty with various aspects of children’s livelihoods will assist in developing strategies to alleviate some of these problems. In other words we identify which aspects of poverty have the most serious impacts on the child (and hence will probably affect their future life chances to the greatest extent). Using structural equation models (SEM) There are now many academics using more advanced statistical techniques to measure poverty from a multi-dimensional perspective (e.g., Jenkins and Cappellari, 2007, Tomlinson et al., forthcoming, Whelan et al. 2007a, 2007b). These techniques, such as item response theory, structural equation modelling and latent class analysis, can be used not only to analyse which families with children are actually in poverty, but also which particular aspects of this poverty are more intense (such as bad housing, material deprivation, financial strain and so on). This is the approach taken in this paper with respect to the measurement of poverty and the measurement of child well-being the two being linked together within a coherent methodological framework and then related specifically to policy and policy targeting. Like the more traditional method of factor analysis, a SEM reduces a large number of observed variables to a smaller number of factors. However, in a SEM the variables are conceptualised as observed manifestations of an underlying or ‘latent’ dimension. Each observed variable in a SEM also has an error term associated with it, allowing measurement error to be isolated and controlled for in a way that is impossible with factor analysis. But, most importantly, a SEM requires a strong theoretical justification before the model is specified. Thus the researcher decides which variables are to be associated with which latent unobserved factors in advance. There are two fundamental types of SEM used to measure or test the validity of latent concepts – first and second order confirmatory factor analysis models (CFAs). We use first order CFAs below to measure child well-being. A first order CFA simply attempts to measure preordained underlying latent concepts. The left side of figure 1 shows a simple CFA which has two latent unobserved variables: L1, material deprivation; and L2, financial strain. L1 is measured by the observed variables V1 to V4 and L2 is measured by variables V5 to V7. The single headed arrows represent coefficients or loadings in the model and are usually shown in standardised form much like beta coefficients in regression analysis. The covariance between material deprivation (L1) and financial strain (L2) is represented by the double headed arrow. The associated error terms are shown as the circles labelled e1 to e7. Using statistical techniques such as maximum likelihood estimation and making assumptions abou t the distributions of the variables and error terms in the model, the coefficients and covariances can be estimated. In all SEMs a variety of fit statistics is available to assess the validity of the models constructed (see Klein, 2005, Byrne, 2001). Usually it is assumed that the observed variables in the model are continuous and that the distribution of the variables is multivariate normal. More recently available software is beginning to allow the explicit modelling of categorical, binary and censored variables (such as MPlus which is used in this study). Models of this kind can be made as complex as necessary to describe real-world situations and employ many latent variables and various interactions between them. Covariates or controls can also be applied to the overall measurement models to assess differences between groups or to assess the impact of a particular variable on the latent concepts under consideration. Furthermore, scores can be generated for the unobserved latent variables. These scores are analogous to the factor scores obtained using factor analysis. The BHPS and the measurement of childhood well-being The analysis that follows utilizes data from the British Household Panel Study (BHPS) and follows the methods discussed in Tomlinson et al. (forthcoming). The BHPS commenced in 1991 with an initial sample of around 10,000 individuals resident in some 5,000 households. These individuals have subsequently been re-interviewed each year and the sample has also been extended to include more households from Scotland and Wales and to embrace Northern Ireland (although Northern Ireland is excluded from this analysis). The data can be weighted to provide an accurate picture of life in Great Britain at different points in time. The analysis here covers the period 1997, 1999 and 2001 (i.e. BHPS waves 7, 9 and 11) and draws on information concerning the following topics for the measurement of poverty: income, finances and benefits; stress; material deprivation; general housing and neighbourhood characteristics and social exclusion and civic participation. The level of poverty at household level is measured by the responses given by the head of household and calculated as detailed in Tomlinson et al. (forthcoming). Each individual dimension of poverty as well as an overall score (the Poverty Index) is computed via a SEM for each household with children. Households with heads under 18 years of age or over 64 years of age are excluded from the sample analysed to calculate poverty scores. We also use a unique data resource available within the BHPS and consistently applied across the three waves. Children aged between 11 and 15 within these households were also asked to complete a separate questionnaire which forms the basis for the measurement models of child well-being. Questions included relate to home life, schooling, anxiety and psychological aspects of life, social isolation and delinquent behaviour. Estimating a structural equation model of childhood well-being As with the measurement of our multi-dimensional poverty index we attempted to create measures of multidimensional childhood well-being using 1st order CFAs based on the responses given by the 11 to 15 year olds in the BHPS panel for the years 1997, 1999 and 2001. The models have been estimated separately for all three waves. Questions change significantly in other available waves and these waves have not been included in the present analysis. The four dimensions of well-being are estimated using the following variables (which are all measured as ordinal scales except the variable relating to suspension from school which is binary): 1. Home life is a measure of the children’s relations to their parents and family and how much control the parents have over them: How much children talk to their parents How much control parents exercise over TV How much the family share meals together 2. Educational orientation is a measure of how well the child is doing at school and their attitudes to teachers and so on: How much the child likes his/her teachers Whether the teachers ‘get at me’ General feelings about school Whether the child is doing well at school 3. Anxiety is a measure of the child’s psychological health and feeling of self-worth Whether the child feels unhappy Whether the child has lost sleep How useless the child feels How much of a failure the child feels Whether the child feels no good The extent to which the child feels lonely The extent to which the child is left out of activities 4. Delinquency is an attempt to measure aspects of criminal tendencies or anti-social behaviour: Whether the child has ever been suspended from school How often the child plays truant How much experience the child has with smoking cigarettes Whether the child vandalises property Whether the child has friends that use illegal drugs (there is no direct question about the respondent’s own drug use) A first order confirmatory factor analysis model was estimated to measure the four dimensions (see figure 2 for an example from wave 11) and further models developed with controls for gender and age of the child and the overall Poverty Index of the head of household. We attempted this with each of the three waves of the BHPS, but all three models gave similar results and good fit indices. The model estimation was done using MPlus 4 with the observed variables being treated as ordinal rather than continuous where appropriate. Results and discussion of the basic model The first order models produce a good fit to the data (see Table 1) and the coefficients on the observed variables are all in the expected direction and all statistically significant at the 1% level. Some error terms were allowed to co-vary as illustrated in the figure based on very high modification indices in the initial modelling attempts. Examining the latent constructs themselves and the correlations between them reveals the relationships between the various dimensions of well-being. That is educational orientation is strongly associated with parental influence and negatively associated with anxiety and delinquency. Delinquency is also positively associated with anxiety etc. (Table 1). Table 1Fit statistics and correlations for the simple models (wave 11) Fit statistics: (N=1201) Without controlsWith controls Chi-square 426.959 (79 d.f.)639.104 (130 d.f.) CFI0.9370.902 TLI0.9550.921 RMSEA0.0570.057 Correlations between latent variables in controlled model (all significant at 1%):   Home life Educational Orientation Anxiety Educational Orientation +.54 Anxiety -.18 -.36 Delinquency –.63 -.54 +.22 The controlling variables are also salient. Girls are more anxious than boys, but have better educational orientation and relations with their parents. There is no significant difference between girls and boys with respect to delinquency. The age controls show that home life diminishes with age, while delinquency increases. Children of 11 and 12 also have stronger educational orientation than their older peers. However, the most striking result is that poverty (measured by our composite multidimensional index) has a highly significant and detrimental effect on all four of the well-being dimensions. That is it contributes to anxiety and delinquency and detracts from educational orientation and home life. Thus we can show that poverty has a serious debilitating effect on child well-being in the here and now. The relative importance of poverty for each dimension of well-being is also evident. The strongest effect appears to be on home life (–0.22) followed by educational orientat ion (–0.13). The impact on anxiety and delinquency is less strong (both at 0.10), but still highly significant. Thus we can show that the overall impact of the experience of poverty appears to affect home life and education the most while still having an effect on anxiety and anti-social behaviour. However, one of the issues we wish to deal with (not least from a policy targeting perspective) is to see which sub-dimensions of poverty are the most salient with respect to child well-being. For example, as we have measured poverty in a multidimensional way, which particular dimensions have the biggest impact? In our previous measurement work we developed several indicators of multidimensional poverty. Namely the poverty index is a weighted summation of several sub-indices: financial strain based on bad finances and missed housing payments material deprivation based on the levels of material possessions in the household and whether the household could afford to do certain things the environment which is based on a combination of housing and neighbourhood characteristics social isolation based on lack of social support civic participation based on participation in civic life psycho-social strain based on stress, mental health and anxiety The most desirable way to test the effects of the various dimensions on well-being would be to include them all as covariates in a measurement model similar to that shown in figure 2. However, because the various dimensions of poverty are highly correlated with each other this presents problems for the estimation (that is there is a multicollinearity issue). Rather than attempt to do this, individual models have been estimated with each sub-dimension of poverty included by itself in place of the overall poverty index in a similar fashion to the model in Figure 2. The relative sizes and significance of the coefficients relating to the individual sub-dimensions of poverty will allow an assessment to be made as to which elements of poverty are the most serious with respect to the child’s welfare. The results are summarised in figure 3 (this is a diagrammatic summary of results from wave 11 (2001) and shows only the significant effects). The results show that different aspects of poverty have different effects on the various aspects of well-being. For example, the financial dimension affects all the aspects of well-being whereas material deprivation only affects two (being detrimental to home life and increasing delinquency). A poor environment in terms of bad housing or neighbourhood results in reduced quality of home life, increased anxiety and delinquency. By using these results it becomes clear that policy aimed at poverty reduction could in principle be targeted in particular ways that would have different benefits as far as the diverse dimensions of child well-being are concerned. Improving the environment of children – both within and outside the household – may well have a greater overall impact on well-being than improving material deprivation. On the other hand if educational performance is the main criterion then financial strain, and civic participation of the household become the key areas. If home life is seen to be the main issue then finance, material deprivation, the stress of the parents, the environment and civic participation would be the key foci. This policy dimension is returned to below. It is also interesting to note that social isolation (a measure of social exclusion) of the head of household has no bearing on the four well-being indicators. However, there are also other controlling factors that can be incorporated in the models determining child well-being besides poverty, age and gender. Using the structural equation framework with covariates allows several alternative model specifications to take into account different offsetting factors with respect to child welfare. There is already evidence from the UK that certain situations in childhood can ‘buck the trend’ in reducing the negative outcomes of child poverty. For example, Blanden (2006) has shown that parental interest (mainly the father for boys and the mother for girls) has a positive impact on adult educational outcomes. She also shows that higher educational attainment early in the child’s life has a positive impact later on as does the school’s characteristics and the social mix of the child’s school. So research has shown that there may be mediating effects (such as parenting or living in a good neighbourhood) that offset the deleterious impact of poverty and deprivation. For example, McCulloch and Joshi (2001) found using the National Child Development Survey that although poverty and living in disadvantaged neighbourhoods does correlate with lower test scores at school, the family environment and family support can offset this effect. In the US the extensive work of Aber and his colleagues has also shown that there are negative effects on child specific outcomes from poverty and material hardship and that cognitive and emotional outcomes are affected by low income and material hardship (e.g., Gershoff et al, n.d.), but that this is mediated by parental characteristics. With this idea of mediation in mind several alternative models have thus been estimated to take account of the following factors which are included as further controls in the models: Household composition (such as the presence of other children and single versus multiple adult households) Educational attainment of the household head Employment status of the head of household Income rather than multidimensional poverty indices The household composition model will enable an assessment of family relations and its impact on well-being. The education model will assess the impact of parental human capital irrespective of other considerations. While the employment and income models can be usefully compared with the Poverty Index model (in other words can income or employment status merely substitute for poverty)? These results are summarised in table 3 for wave 11 (2001). The models were essentially the same as shown in figure 2, but without including the Poverty Index as a control which confounded the income and employment status models (again because of multicollinearity). Household composition was tested by including a variable indicating whether the household was a single adult household (versus other types) and dummy variables representing the number of children in different age categories. The results show clearly the influence of adults is significant when it comes to home life and delinquency (whereas being a single adult household has no effect on anxiety or educational orientation). Single parent households are therefore at a possible disadvantage when it comes to controlling their children. Even when a control for income is included in this model in an attempt to separate out the impact of low income from single parenthood the single adult variable is still significant in the same way. The presence of other children or siblings appears to have no impact on the child respondent’s well-being. Education of the head of household also has an impact on home life and educational orientation of the child, but only where the household head is educated to a higher educational level (that is degree level). The models for employment status included variables for self-employed status, unemployed and non-employed (i.e. not working and not actively looking for a job). Clearly the household head not having a job has an effect on the child’s well-being (although this is also correlated with the Poverty Index). In the case of being non-employed (which includes housewives, the disabled, and other economically inactive people) this has an impact on all four well-being dimensions to the detriment of the child whereas being unemployed only affects home life and delinquency. Self-employment has no effect. One possible explanation for the difference between unemployed and non-employed effects might be a reflection of the impact of long-term poverty and deprivation on children. That is t hose household heads that are not economically active for one reason or another and classed as non-employed rather than unemployed may well suffer from longer periods of chronic financial hardship, whereas the unemployed may be intermittently working and thus have experienced periods where they were no longer poor. Table 3Effects of various controls on the basic well-being model with various controls in addition to age and gender of the child (wave 11). Significance level is 1%. Standardised coefficients shown.

Popes An Essay on Criticism -- Religion Essays Papers

Pope's An Essay on Criticism When Samuel Johnson ascribed to a new work "such extent of comprehension, such nicety of distinction, such acquaintance with mankind, and such knowledge both of both ancient and modern learning as not often attained by the maturest age and longest experience," he was speaking of young Alexander Pope's An Essay on Criticism (1711), written when he was about twenty, and published when he was only twenty-three years old (in Mack 177).1 Others have not been as generous in their comments about the prodigy's efforts. One history of criticism textbook describes the work rather ingloriously: "There are repetitions and inconsistencies, some conventional pronouncements along with injunctions of lasting value; but nowhere . . . are the principles organized into a coherent whole, and no cut-and-dried theory [of criticism] therefore emerges" (in Morris 145).2 Despite this harsher pronouncement, Alexander Pope's An Essay on Criticism 1 Johnson's evaluation of Pope's Essay has been upheld if f or no other reason than that so many of the work's bon mots have established noteworthy careers in daily household English. As Mack observed (177), "Pope will sometimes manage a verbal maneuver so simple in appearance, so breathtaking on reflection, that the common sense of mankind has plucked it out of the poem and made it a part of speech: 'A little Learning is a dang'rous Thing' (205); 'To err is Humane; to Forgive, Divine’ (525); `For Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread' (625). And several more. Next to Shakespeare, we may recall, Pope has contributed more to our common language than any other poet. It is a gift not lightly to be dismissed." One primary complaint against the work is that it plagiarized the ... ...he Scriptures and in Pope, the goals of cosmic and poetic restoration are ones for which we can and must give thanks. Works Cited Clark, Donald B. Alexander Pope. Twayne's English Author Series. New York: Twayne Publishers, Inc., 1967. Isles, Duncan. "Pope and Criticism," in Alexander Pope, edited by Peter Dixon. Writers and their Backgrounds. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1972. Mack, Maynard. Alexander Pope: A Life. New York: W. W. Norton and Company in association with New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985. Morris, David B. "Civilized Reading: The Act of Judgment in An Essay on Criticism," in Alexander Pope, edited and with an introduction by Harold Bloom. Modern Critical Reviews. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1986. Williams, E. Audra and Aubrey, eds. Pastoral Poetry and An Essay on Criticism. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1961.

Football Accident

Period 5 11/1/12 Unthinkable When I look at my life, and I think about the hardest things for me to overcome, I would have to say, the ultimate being, telling my mother and father that I would be sitting out of football my senior year of high school. Most would say how could this possibly be something that you would find challenging, but then you don’t know my mother and father. I started playing sports, football, in particular, at the age of 7. I was kind of a chunky little kid, even had a funny gait when I ran, but you couldn’t tell that if you talked to my parents. To my mom and dad, I was a superstar.I started playing flag football through the YMCA program, and then moved up to Pop Warner. Here’s the crazy part. My mom or dad came to every practice, and every game, rain or shine. I think I was the only kid that knew one of my parents would be on the sidelines, whether at practice or a game. Now to be honest, those were tough years for me, as most times, my pa rents would be watching me sitting on the bench, because I did not get to play very often. During those years, I put on a brave face and never let my parents know how embarrassed I was and how I felt I let them down.The crazy part was, when my parents met with other player’s parents, they talked about me like I was the star of the team, never made me feel bad for not playing in a game. Again, come rain or shine, they were always there for me. Those were tough years for me. Every coach found a reason why I just wasn’t ready to be a starting player. Then something really incredible happened during my 7th grade year. This didn’t start off incredible, in fact, it was quite humiliating. Everyone that wanted to try out for the 7th grade football team met after school one day.Here were all the players and parents that I had been playing with for the last six years, and as the kid that sat on the bench most of the time, you can imagine, I was the odd man out. All these parents bragging about their own kids, the great plays, the touchdowns, but there stood my mom and dad, proud as ever. They were with their superstar. As the three of us stood there together, my father later told me that it was one of the most intimidating days he’d had in a long time, looking at the parents of the kids that got to play. My mother told me to do the best I could do, and my day would come.My dad always said because he wasn’t a coach or assistant coach on these teams, I didn’t get a fair chance, but in my heart, I just didn’t think I was a great player. Good, yes, but not great. Tryouts came and went, and once again, I assumed I would be a bench warmer. As I said earlier, this turned out to be an incredible year, and something happened that I never expected. Now that I look back, I still have to ask myself, â€Å"Did that really happen? †   Ã‚   All of the kids I played football with throughout the years were, of course, picked for the starting positions.Some of these very kids have made headlines in the last couple of years, but let’s get back to me. One cold dark evening, my Hedrick team was playing the Talent Bulldogs and one of the kids that normally played the wide receiver position was sick that day. The coach asked me to step in and give it a try. I can’t describe the butterflies in my stomach. My hands and knees shook and my heart began to race. I finally was given a chance and I was terrified. Well, guess what? Not only did I catch the ball and run it in for an 80 touchdown yard touchdown, but I did this game and game again.After gaining the starting wide receiver position, I gained the starting linebacker position and proved my dominance once again on the field. At the end of the season, I was voted Most Valuable Player for both offense and defense for not only junior varsity but for varsity as well. Now, with that said, you can only imagine my parents. Their son going from a bench play er to the number one player on both teams. My parents would run down the sidelines, whooping it up as I ran the ball. They finally had the superstar they’d been waiting for. Over the next few years, my playing improved, and I had moved to high school ball.Playing varsity for north as a freshman, and just like before, my parents did not miss a practice or game, even if it meant driving a few hundred miles. My parents and especially my dad kept waiting for my next big break, my time to shine. Then in my junior year, I found myself transferred to a new school, tried out and actually made the Varsity football team. My parents were so proud of me, and I was proud of myself. I don’t know who was more excited, me or my parents. My parents were on Cloud Nine, talking about nothing but football and Friday Night Lights.It was an exciting time of my life. The coach tried me out at Outside Linebacker, because of my speed, strength, and my ability to get around the offensive line. Then the unthinkable happened at practice. I was sent in on a blitz, and hit the offensive lineman with my shoulder. It felt like my arm had been ripped from its socket as I writhed on the ground in pain. The trainers ran over and rushed me to the hospital. I never would have guessed in a million years what a fateful day that would be. My shoulder was completely out of its socket, the tendons and ligaments torn.The most important year of my life had just been stripped away from me. Not only was surgery required, but months of physical therapy. My orthopedic doctor told me I could no longer play football without risking irreparable damage. I never told my parents this, and the doctor never told them. I kept that dream of Friday night lights in my parent’s hearts until I should have been signing up for football camp. This is when I had to tell them what the doctor said, and there would be no football in my life, no letter, no photos, and no glory. To me, this was the hardest da y of my life.On this day, I knew I was breaking my parent’s hearts. Everything they had looked forward to for my senior year of football was gone. I played the game, but they had lived the sport. Something died this day, maybe just a dream of mine, but it seemed so much more. Like a part of me was left on the field that sad day that I suffered my injury. To this day I day dream of the achievements I could have over came if I had no suffered that injury. Maybe one day when I have kids I will be able to live my football career through my future son†¦ but until that day comes I’m stuck watching in the stands

Road Not Taken Robert Frost

Journeys illustrate the voyage between places of interest. They are demonstrated by expressing to the audience the hardship and mixed emotions you go through to the destination. Some examples of positive effects on those who embark on a mission are that it hinders them to get out of their comfort zone and helps them appreciate what they have, if a problem occurs while embarking on your voyage it will have to be resolved to make the mission you board on possible. The text analysed â€Å"The Road Not Taken† by Robert Frost and the type of text is poetry. My second choice of text was â€Å"The Wizard of Oz† by Victor Fleming the text type is a movie. Some possible techniques analysed are rhyme, imagery, symbolism, long shot, up shot and a full shot. In the title â€Å"The Road Not Taken† describes a journey that hasn’t been trekked upon; people chose the comfort of a common path to avoid obsticles of hardship and beyond the unknown. In the movie â€Å"The Wizard of Oz†, the hardship of deciding which road or path to take by choosing which pathway she will travel on the unknown. Embarking on the unknown; in the poem The Road Not Taken, the author uses rhyme to make it easier or clearer for the reader to contemplate. â€Å"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and be one traveller long I stood. † In â€Å"Two roads diverged† it was offering us a choice on which path to stride on, by illustrating â€Å"yellow wood† it characterizes the road as cautious. â€Å"And be one traveller long I stood† one traveller alone, no companion, own choice, uncertainty of which path to voyage on. Therefore the uncertainty is the obsticle of hardship of his journey. Furthermore in the movie, The Wizard of Oz we distinguish Dorothy and Toto embarking on their journey. In the long shot Dorothy and Toto illustrate the extensive road ahead of them. It also shows the solitude of Dorothy that she’s got nowhere left to go apart from running away. The baggage in her hand emphasizes that she’s taken everything she owned and not returning home. Low modality demonstrates the gloominess of the journey ahead. In relation to ‘The Road Not Taken’ and ‘The Wizard of Oz’ both texts, illustrate solitude, hardship, beyond the unknown and the uncertainty of choice. Embarking on the unknown; in the poem ‘The Road Not Taken’ the author uses imagery to illustrate the choice between the different paths. The unknown is there to explore. â€Å"Then took the other, as just as fair, and having perhaps the better claim, because it was grassy and wanted wear. † In ‘Then took the other just as fair’ illustrates to us that the author portrays the rare choice of which path he chose to take. ’And having perhaps the better claim’ the author is certain that he’s made the right choice. ‘Because it was grassy and wanted wear’ the imagery described as the grass has never been tread on or hasn’t been walked on; undisturbed. Therefore the text symbolizes the choice of journeys undertaken prior. Furthermore in the movie ‘The Wizard of Oz’ we observe Dorothy, Glinda and the wicked witch of the west. In the full shot we establish that Dorothy’s house has landed on top of the wicked witch of the east. The witch of the west approaches to save the ruby shoes but they are mysteriously positioned on Dorothy’s feet. The witch cautions Dorothy that there will be vengeance. In the full shot we observe Dorothy’s face that she’s petrified. The full shot demonstrates emotions on the characters face. In the background the munchkins are laying flat on the ground terrified from the witch after the witch’s journey flying. In relation to â€Å"The Road Not Taken† and â€Å"The Wizard of Oz† in both texts we establish the uncertainty of choice chosen and the different journey’s they embark upon. Embarking on the unknown; the author uses symbolism to illustrate the colour of his journey. â€Å"And that morning equally lay, in leaves no step had trodden black. † In ‘leaves o step had trodden black’ this portrays that no living being had ever walked upon this path before due to the fact that the black is symbolising gloominess and depression. Therefore, again the uncertainty of the unknown is the obsticle of the journey he’s embarking upon. Furthermore, in the movie â€Å"The Wizard of Oz† we establish the flying monkeys in the air with Dorothy in their arms. The upshot was used to illustrate to us the length and height they flew up from the ground to emphasize to the viewers that they should be fearful of them. The dull use of colours focuses on the darkness the witch and the monkeys originate from. The monkeys disrupt Dorothy’s journey which she was so close to getting to her destination. In relation to both texts we distinguish the interruption of the journey, the gloominess of the different types of journey you embark upon. In conclusion to these two texts we establish that journeying upon the unknown can position you in a situation you don’t want to be placed in. Also the hardship and the uncertainty of choice upon the voyage and the solitude of both characters in both texts are demonstrated throughout the mission. Furthermore we learn that different types of dangers and obsticles can interrupt the journey you are embarking upon.