...This essay is based on the 2007 book The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable by Nassim Nicholas Taleb (1960 - ). It is hardly an obscure tome, having been on the New York Times bestseller list for several weeks. Before I get to the essence of this essay I believe explaining what the term “Black Swan” means and saying a few words about the author would be in order. It was once thought in the Old World that only white swans existed. Then from Australia came the realization that there were black swans. And no, they were not white swans made black by bootblack or any other artificial coloring medium. After millennia of observations in the West of millions of white swans, the sighting of one black swan was enough to invalidate this long and firmly held belief. In a broader sense then A Black Swan is a sudden, monumental, and completely unexpected event. WWI, WWII, and 9/11 were Black Swans. If one were to win a multi-million dollars lottery that would be a personal Black Swan (Black Swans are not all negative, although given the troubles experienced by some of these huge lottery winners, this might also be negative). But a Black Swan is more than this – it goes to the heart of and challenges the putative acceptance of Gaussian probabilities. Least you think Gaussian or bell shaped probability functions are theoretical only and not important in real life, then consider that not only mathematics, but engineering, medicine, social sciences, economomics, the insurance...
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...One: Annotation Bibliography By Vincent Berry WHAT IS YOUR RESEARCH QUESTION? Are record labels racism and political in the music industry? What impact does racism and politics have on the artist and fan base? SUMMORIZE SOURCE INFORMATION FOR EACH ANNOTATION Suisman, David. "Co Workers in the Kingdom of Culture: Black Swan Records and the Political Economy of African American Music." Teaching the Journal of American History Vol. 90, No. 4.March 2004 (2004): 1295-1324. Web. 1 Mar. 2004. African American owned Record Company, which produced records for African American consumers, was faced with attempts by a large record corporation to force them into bankruptcy. Why would a large company do this for such a small African American owned company? How would it merit attention from African American people in this medium when you have more important subjects like voting rights and lynching? Moreover, why would it merit any attention at all, not to mention, selling records to black consumers. This article answers these questions and investigates the rise and fall of the small record company and explores the political economy in which it operated. Black Swan Records created by Henry H. Pace, who saw a way to respond to a hostile environment that African American people faced with, both in the entertainment industry and in American society. The protégé of W.E.B Du Bois, also saw that African Americans were not equally even when they were freed from slavery. Access to material goods...
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...Introduction In my essay I am going to be discussing ‘Tragic Ballets ‘and ‘Heroines’. As a child I spent a brief period studying ballet and on a visit to Prague, in February 2013, I enjoyed watching the Russian Ballet perform 'Giselle' at the Prague State Opera House. I have often wondered why so many ballets and the female heroines in them end in tragedy. My essay will discuss the issues that female heroines face and the events that eventually bring them to their fate. I will also discuss the origins and definitions of ‘heroine’ and ‘tragedy’. In order to examine my chosen themes I started my investigation by watching, analysing and comparing the films ‘Black Swan’, ‘The Red Shoes’ and the ballet ‘Giselle’. I read the feminist writings of Marina Warner on the portrayal of women, the Catholic Church and also her book on ‘Joan of Arc. In my essay I will be discussing the themes of love, conquest, devotion, deception, spirituality and how they play a role in altering the lives of the female protagonists in various different situations and offer my own opinions on how the tragedies are formed. I will begin my comparison of the female heroines that I will be discussing, with Giselle. Figure 1'Giselle and Count Albrecht' The Russian Ballet Giselle is a poor peasant’s daughter who falls in love with Count Albrecht. Count Albrecht’s character plays the main part in the protagonist Giselle’s downfall during the ballet, as he breaks her heart when she learns that he is betrothed...
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...To what extend the need of being perfect leads man to its own destruction? Perfection seen through the film “The Black Swan”. Claudia Patricia Villacís Galarza IB Code: 001421-054 Words: 3980 Abstract The research question of this extended essay is: To what extend the need of being perfect leads man to its own destruction? It is an analysis of perfection through the film The Black Swan. In the film the main character, Nina, is an obsessed ballerina who at the end destroyed her own life. I began the essay trying to prove that her obsession with being perfect is what leaded her to her destruction and death, but after analyzing the movie it all turned around. I based my investigation in reviews of the film, different type of articles; such as from doctors who give their opinion about Nina’s behavior. These ones in particular where the most important for the answer of my research question, because these doctors have analyzed the mental condition of Nina and together with my own opinion it helped me to come to a conclusion. I also focused on the opinion of various dancers about the film, because they are the ones that understand the world of ballet more than anyone else. At last there were also interviews with the director to explain why he decided to make this movie and what he was trying to prove through it. The movie was, of course my principal source, I applied the whole investigation in the analysis of the movie. Then after having read all that information and having...
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...In the second half of the 19th century neoclassical economists emerged as a revolt against the school of classical economic thought. Neoclassical economics sought to explain the maximisation of utility with an underlying theory of rational choice theory. In the post war period a movement occurred that sought to synthesis the macroeconomic, long run theories of John Maynard Keynes with the microeconomic, short-run theories of neoclassical economics. This essay will explore how John Hick’s ISLM synthesis of Keynes is related to the neoclassical growth model. In addition it will explore how both the growth model and theory of capital reproduce problems inherent in the explanation of multi-sector economies. The Keynesian revolution, one of the “most significant events in twentieth century economic science,” disputed society’s adherence to classical laissez-faire economics (Yaroufakis, Halevi, & Theocarakis, 2011). The unsubstantiated ability of the self-clearing markets to maintain equilibrium was challenged during the early twentieth century by John Maynard Keynes in his text The General Theory. Yet as the depression strengthened and the global economic climate changed, a group of economists emerged that ceased to be either anti- or pro-Keynesian. Known as the Neo-Keynesians, they incorporated the macroeconomic framework of Keynes’ theory for understanding short run aggregate issues while the neoclassical model remained relevant for long term microeconomic analysis of growth. With...
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...K. The Man Who Was Thursday Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness AND one of: Lord Jim, The Secret Agent, Nostromo, Under Western Eyes Ford, Ford Madox. The Good Soldier Forster, E. M. Howards End, A Passage to India (plus the essays “What I Believe” and “The Challenge of Our Times” in Two Cheers for Democracy) Galsworthy, John. The Man of Property Greene, Graham. One of: Brighton Rock, The Power and the Glory, The Heart of the Matter Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World Joyce, James. Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses Kipling, Rudyard. Kim Lawrence, D. H. Two of: Sons and Lovers, Women in Love, The Rainbow, The Plumed Serpent Lewis, Wyndham. Tarr, manifestos in BLAST 1 Mansfield, Katherine. “Prelude,” “At the Bay,” “The Garden Party,” “The Daughters of the Late Colonel” (in Collected Stories) Orwell, George. 1984 (or Aldous Huxley, Brave New World) Wells, H. G. One of the following: Ann Veronica, Tono-Bungay, The New Machiavelli West, Rebecca. The Return of the Soldier Waugh, Evelyn. One of: Vile Bodies, A Handful of Dust, Brideshead Revisited Woolf, Virginia. Two of: The Voyage Out, Jacob’s Room, Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse, Orlando, Between the Acts (plus the essays “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” and “Modern Fiction” in Collected Essays) B. POETRY The...
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...Brittany Wiegreff Professor Eichler English 102 B16 10/18/2011 Essay 2 The Ugly Duckling Analysis The tale of “The Ugly Duckling” has been told for many generations. It is the story of a little swan that is mistakenly hatched in a duck’s nest and because of his strange and different appearance he is teased and ridiculed. Even his mother can’t understand how this “ugly duckling” could be one of her own. The ugly duckling goes through many hardships and a long, lonely winter. Then upon seeing his reflection in the pond he realizes that he has become a beautiful swan and happily swims off, joining a group of nearby swans. At first glance, many may perceive this as a cut and dry fairy tale. Sending the message that without outward beauty, you will never be able to achieve inner peace and happiness. I feel that with the writing of this tale Andersen was trying to send a different message. I think Andersen was trying to encourage us to be true to ourselves and to have tolerance and acceptance of others. By remaining true to ourselves and following our dreams we will someday acquire the inner peace and happiness we desire. Next, there are four themes of writing to choose to follow from. In this story the theme is man vs. society. It is man vs. society because the little duckling is being left out and made fun of by society. He is being treated differently because he looks different than a normal duckling should look like. Because he was born later than his siblings and he looks...
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...curly hair in exchange. Once she got home her sister Lizzie noticed she started to waste away. When her sister saw it, she decided to go down there and meet the goblin’s men who violated her after she refused to eat their fruits. They spread their fruit’s juice on Lizzie who gave that to her sister when she got back home, once she drank it, Laura got healed. Like a lot of other poems, Goblin’s Market wrote by the poet Christina Rossetti is full of some characteristics of the Romantic Era. The Romantic Era also known as the Romanticism was an artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe toward the end of the 18th century and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate period from 1800 to 1840.The aim of our essay will be to discuss how Goblin Market exemplifies characteristics of Romantic Era. Goblin’s Market is a rich poem equipped with an unbelievable textured language talking about two sisters Laura and Lizzie. Living beside the goblins market that appears to be a place where horrible creatures exposed and forced women to eat their prohibited fruits. This poem shows the love existing between these two sisters and describes their pain and joy with everything that happened with the goblins and also shows how deep these two sisters love each other. In this enjoyable poem we note many characteristics of the Romantic Era like repetition, simile, anaphora, foreshadowing, and metaphor. Firstly, we can talk about the repetition used in the goblin’s market...
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...#essay 1 #Miaoshu Jiang #07/09/2012 When I was a little girl, I loved bedtime stories, especially those in Andersen's Fairy Tales. My mom often read them for me, but, most of the time, I enjoyed reading them myself. While I was proud of the ugly duckling who eventually evolved to a gorgeous swan, happy for Cinderella who suffered so much but found her prince in the end, and sorry for the little match girl who was found frozen to death on the last night of the old year, I was impressed by the author’s solid knowledge of literature. He easily controlled my mood by merely applying some simple words. At that time, I thought literacy equaled a good story. As time went by, I started to study in a primary school. Somehow, I went to a composition class in grade four and became the best student in that class by the end of that semester. However, at first, I did not understand the assignments. In my mind, I still loved stories, and all I wanted to write were lovely stories. However, a description of a building was the first required assignment. Since stories were the only writing style I knew, it made me so confused that I even did not know how to start . Nevertheless, I had no choice but tried to observe, touch and feel the object that I was going to write. Gradually, I found I fell in love with the process of watching before writing. It made me understand that literacy was not just a good story but came from a thorough observation of life. Quickly I became a high school...
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...A) Write about the techniques Tennyson uses to tell the story in Tithonus The purpose of this essay is to discuss narrative methods and techniques used by Tennyson to tell the story in the poem Tithonus. Tennyson uses the theme of light to effectively illustrate the intense love Tithonus felt for Aurora but simultaneously this also highlight the love Tithonus will never feel again. This is shown by constantly mentioning the East where the sun rises, and also by the words ‘Thy sweet eyes brighten slowly….yet they blind the stars’- by saying her eyes blind the stars Tennyson could also be saying how he (Tithonus) too was at one point blinded by his love for her. The use of imagery within the poem like ‘glimmering’ and ‘lights’ gives readers the idea that his life was happy with her in it yet, the contrast of language, ‘gloomy’, ‘shadows’, ‘twilight’ underlines the fact that he is no longer joyful as he is now without her. Another reason we could argue that he is no longer happy is that he may be envious of how she is immortal and forever youthful but he is immortal but consistently aging; this interpretation is supported by the continuous mentioning of immortal youth ‘To dwell in the presence of immortal youth, Immortal age beside immortal youth’. Also the use of the word twilight suggests that Tithonus state is that he is caught in the middle, forever watching the circle of life without him in it – ‘the woods decay…dies the...
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...Assignment: Write an essay (700-1000 words) in which you analyse and interpret the short story Poetic Justice. Your essay must include the following points: • A characterization of Jed Cunningham • The narrator’s image of herself • The significance of their youthful relationship • Comment on the language and the point of view • The theme(s) • The title Text: Poetic Justice, a short story by Diana Appleyard, published in Days of Wine and Roses, Black Swan, London 2004. Poetic Justice Emil Lindgaard Nielsen The short story pivots around a mature woman whom recently discovered a social network for her old school, in which people tend to post descriptions of their current lifestyles. This makes her reminisce of old days and in particular her old boyfriend, Jed Cunningham. Jed was a rather odd fellow, who didn’t have intensions to stand out but somehow never seemed like everybody else. He was tall, with thick black hair, blue eyes, pale skin, broad shoulders and a mouth with a constant sardonic smile. He was smart, cynic and seemed ready to or already had entered adulthood. The curse of him not being capable of doing expected things caused him into living on a remote island by himself. The narrators saw him as a bit of a hipster, embracing the lifestyle of carpe diem, way before everybody else. Her perception of herself is at first rather negative. When she first thinks back on her youth, she isn’t pleased with her current body. Her stomach extends over her waistband...
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...Emotional Appeal in Jennifer Pozner’s “The Unreal World How many times have you seen a reality TV show that pans out the exact same way as others you have seen before? These shows claim to be unscripted yet almost always have similar characters that act the same way. This is because Reality TV executives cast people they know can be easily manipulated into entertaining television. By using diction and figurative language in “The Unreal World”, Jennifer Pozner arouses fury from the audience that helps prove reality TV forces an idea of unattainable beauty on women and creates hurtful gender and racial stereotypes. To elicit anger from the audience, Pozner uses diction to demonstrate how Reality TV gives women unachievable standards for beauty. Pozner explains how Reality TV has this idea of a “perfect ten” (445). The use of a numbered scale implies that women are constantly being judged on their looks. It also insinuates that women can achieve a perfect score on this scale even though perfection is unattainable. A scale implies that everyone is judged the same way; however, beauty can come in many different forms. Both of these implications are incredibly hurtful to the young women watching these shows because it puts an onus on external aspects of the human body rather than the internal. Shows exist that are completely devoted to finding flaws in women such as “Are you Hot?: The Search for America’s Sexiest People.” This show uses a laser “flaw finder” (446) to rate women...
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...The Stories Ugly Duckling, “Daphne And Apollo” and Metamorphosis all share the theme of transformation. As seen in the present time appearance transformation change the way other views that person. In the Story the Ugly Duckling, the duckling is seen as ugly by the others only because of its appearance, but when everyone realizes it changes it is not a duck, but instead it is a Swan the view and feelings are changed. In Metamorphosis Gregor the main character goes through an appearance transformation overnight his family see him as different and sympathizing with him. In The myth “Daphne and Apollo” Daphne transforms and Apollo’s feelings change in a different way than in the other two stories. In real life there is no unconditional love and...
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...Reason, Romanticism, Realism, and Modernism Since 1660 the literary world has gone through four major periods, The Age of Reason, Romanticism, Realism, and Modernism. Each period had very distinct characteristics and writers who were able to define the style through their words. The Age of Reason was a time of wit, philosophy, and satire that Johnathan Swift and Voltaire utilized to explain their views on the modern world. Fredrick Douglass, William Wordsworth, and Jean Jacques Rousseau embodied the greatest aspects of the Romanticism era focusing on solitude, nature, and feelings. In 1830 the Realism movement started, a movement strife with inclusiveness and determinism that was highlighted in the works of Gustave Flaubert and Fyodor Dostoevsky. The most recent period was Modernism in which William Butler Yeats and T.S. Eliot used rationalism and psychoanalysis when writing their poems. Each period uprooted the period before it and the writers values and views contradicted those of the writers who proceeded them. The major aspects of each period are very apparent when dissecting the writers who lived through them. The Age of Reason covered from 1660 to 1770 and focused on order, cities, and used satire as a tool to find reason. Voltaire’s Candide and Swift’s A Modest Proposal were both satire that questioned traditions and philosophical norms of the times. In Candide, Voltaire mocks the idea that eternal optimism of ones course in life by continuously throwing...
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...Tattoos and Piercings throughout Different World Cultures COM/150 Effective Essay Writing Tattoos and Piercings throughout Different World Cultures Did you know that almost a fourth of men and women between 18 and 50 years of age have at least one tattoo? How about that 15% of those people have at least one body piercing ("Northwestern University News Center," n.d.)? These statistics may be surprising, but the fact is that tattoos and piercings are growing increasingly more popular in today’s society. Although we can see that people of all ages have tattoos and piercings, they seem to be the most popular among teenagers and young adults. The popularity of these sometimes taboo actions have not always been so popular though, and while some people may perceive tattoos and piercings negatively; the fact is that they have many different meanings in cultures throughout the world. This essay will discuss a few of the different cultures in which tattoos and piercings can be seen. Both tattoos and piercings have been around for some time now. Tattoos are thought to have been around for thousands and thousands of years. Some scientists believe that the marks which were found on the mummified body of an iceman from 3300 B.C. could possibly be tattoos ("History Of Tattooing", 2003). Most piercings have been around for thousands of years as well. Piercings such as the nostril and the ear lobe date back to nearly 5000 years ago ("Body Piercing History", 1998). Among some people...
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