...The short story, “Two Kinds”, written by Amy Tan, is written from the point of view of the character named Jing-Mei. There are three experiences which demonstrate her viewpoint. In the first experience, Jing-Mei is being told by her mom about the “American dream”. At first, she strives to pursue this prodigy. Her mom would test her every night after dinner. Through Jing-Mei’s eyes, she starts to realize that it was not the life she wanted to live. Lines in the story illustrate this when he says “I won’t let her change me, I promised myself. I won’t be what I’m not.” (p.406). In the second experience, Jing-Mei performs in a talent show. Her mother forced her to learn how to play the piano. After seeing a little girl playing the piano magnificently, her mother was inspired to make Jing-Mei become a famous pianist. Through her eyes, she was not really concerned about playing well and didn’t practiced efficiently. As a result, when she played her piece at the talent show, she fumbled on some notes. As it suddenly became a snowball effect. At this point, Jing-Mei felt ashamed of herself and was not satisfied with how her performance went. Indeed, we see this exact thought in the lines of the story when she states, “my whole face quivering as I tried not to cry” (p.410). In the third experience, we see Jing-Mei at home about two days after the talent show. After her mom kept reminding her about her usual four o’clock lesson, Jing-Mei replies that she was not going to play the piano...
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...“Lead or Follow” Should I conform? Should I rebel? This has and always will be, a constant battle struggled individually, or as a society. A certain amount of conformity needs to exist in life in order to avoid disorder. This is the reason we have laws. Take those laws, rules, control, or even expectations, to an extreme, and some form of rebellion is probable. Struggle with these opposites, and you have a catalyst for war, or perhaps, being fired from a job. Literature represents life, and this theme can be found at the root of many literary works. “The Lottery,” by Shirley Jackson, reflects blind conformity by the villagers with a hint of rebellion. Every June 27th the lottery takes place; the prize for winning is death. The villagers believe sacrificing one of their own will ensure a good harvest. The villagers are so blasé about the lottery it is said “the whole lottery took less than two hours, so it could begin at ten o’clock in the morning and still be through in time to allow the villagers to get home for noon dinner” (339/1). We get our first sense of possible rebellion when Mr. Adams says, “over in the north village they’re talking of giving up the lottery” (342/31) Mrs. Adams adds, some villages have already given it up. Old Man Warner’s retort is, “Pack of crazy fools…Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon. First thing you know, we’d all be eating stewed chickweed and acorns,” (342/32) summing up the villagers belief in the continued need of this tradition....
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...Is There Any Genetic Evidence to Explain Why Musical Prodigies Exist? Kristina Vianca Constantino Tabuena San Diego Miramar College Abstract By definition, one is considered a musical child prodigy if he or she possesses an exceptional ability, at a professional level, for music at a young age. Musical ability is defined as the capacity for music perception and production. This is really interesting because the children looks like they have been hand-picked by nature to have these gifts since they have parents who are just like any of us. This phenomenon has been known for a long time, however, there are only a few researches that have been done about this and that is why we hardly understand why musical geniuses exist and how come it is not common at all. Some theories suggest that prodigies are linked to autism. Some of these children have been treated as subjects for long-term researches to find any genetic factors that will link a trait that characterizes being a musical prodigy. The phenomenon of musical geniuses is a product of both genetic factors, as seen in their family background and link to autism, and environmental factors like family support and their devotion to practice. Methods I chose this topic because I find musical prodigies very interesting. I already started researching about them since I have been watching documentaries and following news about them. I watched a documentary about a polyglot, a master of multiple languages, named Tim Doner and I...
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...fascinating question “Are child prodigies born or made?” To begin with, the author strictly defines prodigy as a child who by age 10 displays a mastery of a field. Initially, I had no doubt about this definition; however, after reading some online information, I got to know that although there was growing consensus with the author’s definition, it would be going too far to say that such a consensus exists without controversy. There may, for example, be some wisdom in the view of Radford (1990), who has argued that there are so many problems with specifying at what age, and against what standard, a child would have to perform to be called a prodigy. Personally, I much more agree with Radford’s viewpoint than the strict definition of the author. He regards age as the standard to demiliate a prodigy, while I agree with Radford that each field has its own standards, and it seems better to try to specify what is uniquely characteristic of the child prodigy than restricting a certain age to call someone a prodigy. Prodigies, as the author says, can be found anywhere and in any race or culture. However, there are some factors that prevent some child prodigies from being discovered or developed. Besides poverty, lack of education, and absence of opportunities in the past, most of which have been mentions in the text, there are two other factors that I feel quite upset to know when searching further online information. First is the history of child prodigies in South – East Asia,...
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...STAGE 2 ENGLISH COMMUNICATIONS TEXT RESPONSE Shine – Interview with Scott Hicks David Helfgott. An Australian child prodigy at the piano. Yet not many people have heard of this person. Until now; the 1996 movie Shine starring Geoffrey Rush and Noah Taylor, shows just this; the life of David Helfgott… a rambling and mentally ill, yet brilliant piano player. In an interview with the director, Scott Hicks answers a few pressing questions of the movie. Interviewer – Thank you for taking the time to have this interview. First up, I would like to know what some of the challenges that you encountered while making the movie? Scott Hicks – Thanks, it’s good to be here. The main challenge that I found while Shine was in the making, was getting enough...
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...Objective summary Prodigy by Marie Lu 12–7–17 SPOILERS AHEAD In Marie Lu’s dystopian novel, Prodigy, we follow the story of Day and June, the main characters, who have rebelled from their supposedly terrible Republic, as they attempt to complete their mission to escape the Republic and fulfill their personal needs for their families, friends, and People of the Republic. Through Day’s and June’s experiences through the book, we learn that everyone is not always who the seem. The story begins in Los Vegas, where Day and June are trying to get assistance from the Patriots, another opposing group of the Republic. They believe that Patriots can help Day find his little brother, Eden, who was stolen by the Republic. To their surprise,...
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...WHAT IS CLONING? Have you ever wished you could have a clone of yourself to do homework while you hit the skate park or went out with your friends?Imagine if you could really do that. Where would you start?What exactly is cloning?Cloning is the creation of an organism that is an exact genetic copy of another. This means that every single bit of DNA is the same between the two!You might not believe it, but there are human clones among us right now. They weren't made in a lab, though: they're identical twins, created naturally. Below, we'll see how natural identical twins relate to modern cloning technologies.How is cloning done?You may have first heard of cloning when Dolly the Sheep showed up on the scene in 1997. Cloning technologies have been around for much longer than Dolly, though.How does one go about making an exact genetic copy of an organism? There are a couple of ways to do this: artificial embryo twinning and somatic cell nuclear transfer. How do these processes differ?1. Artificial Embryo TwinningArtificial embryo twinning is the relatively low-tech version of cloning. As the name suggests, this technology mimics the natural process of creating identical twins.Open large version In nature, twins occur just after fertilization of an egg cell by a sperm cell. In rare cases, when the resulting fertilized egg, called a zygote, tries to divide into a two-celled embryo, the two cells separate. Each cell continues dividing on its own, ultimately developing into a separate...
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...”Two Kinds” by Amy Tan deals with. The short story Two Kinds is a text written with a first-person narrator. The agonist in the text is a girl named Jing-Mei. Both of her parents are from china, but they now live in America, where Jing-Mei is born. As the story moves on, we follow Jing-Mei, and how her parents, mostly her mother, have always had extremely high expectations to her. We see, that she enjoys this in the beginning: “In fact, in the beginning, I was just as excited as my mother, maybe even more so. I pictured this prodigy part of me as many different images, trying each one on for size.”(P. 107, L. 22-24). What we also can draw out of this quote, is the aforementioned expectations from her mother, as we hear that the mother is excited for her daughter perhaps being a prodigy. Following Jing-Mei further, we see that she goes through a development. Every night after dinner her mother gives her some tests, in hope of her daughter becoming a prodigy – and as time goes on, she grows tired of these tests. Ultimately this results in her disappointing the mother. Jing-Mei is as described earlier a dynamic character. She seems somewhat stubborn, as she does not wish to be changed just because of the way the mother wants her to be. That also explains why she does not wish to play the piano, as the only reason for her to play piano, is because she is forced to do so by her mother. She does, however, say herself that she could have...
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...Justification HCA-240 Paula Arceneaux 10/13/2013 Angela Seip I know the hospital has been planning on making an investment on equipment to boost services. I would recommend investment on the General Electric Prodigy Bone Density equipment. Making decisions especially on major equipment must factor in various considerations, such as the cost of the equipment and projected returns that the equipment is likely to bring in to the hospital. The Bone Density scan has been selected as the ideal investment for this hospital. Though the equipment requires substantial spending, the equipment has higher possibility for reimbursement. Bone Densitometers are used in medicine to evaluate calcium bone density, which is changed in several diseases such as osteopenia and osteoporosis. These machines have been technologically advanced and are in current use for clinical diagnosis. A woman is at a higher risk of an osteoporotic fracture than getting breast cancer, having stroke and or heart attack combined, approximately 40% of women will experience at least one fracture during their lifetime. The World Health Organization recommends that women 65 and older be regularly measured for osteoporosis to reduce the risk of fracture and spinal abnormalities often related to the disease. The Lunar Prodigy by General Electric uses a direct-digital detector and a narrow-angle fan-beam to enhance efficiency and accomplish excellent precision in spine, femur and total body measurements. Dual-energy Vertebral...
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...online consumer, Intuit’s product line could be a great benefit to Microsoft being able to position them as a leader in that market. In terms of market share in the personal finance/checkbook software market, Intuit had a 69% share in units and an 85% share in value. This is in comparison to a 22% and 7% share for Microsoft respectively. Bill Gate’s vision of the future relies heavily on personal financial management and electronic commerce, and with the significant position Intuit has created in the personal finance market, Microsoft would be able to capitalize, integrate and position them for future success. By integrating Intuit’s 7 million users under their own umbrella, they would easily dwarf the second leading firm in the market, Prodigy, which numbered under 2 million users in...
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...that those immigrant people don’t realize. Most of the time, either their children come with them when they are young, or they get to be born in the states, but the parents don’t realize that the time, the place, the environment, and the culture are different, and they can hardly enforce it on their children. In this story, which was in 1960, the narrator, Jing-Mei stood up to her mother and tried not to follow her mother’s will to make her a prodigy, so she could compete with one of her friend’s daughter. Very important questions here, Are those ideas and thoughts still can be applied nowadays, and what are the children’s actions against those ideas? What is the influence of those ideas on the children’s lives? First of all, is it a fact that those ideas and thoughts can still be enforced these days? The way that the mother grew up in her country, which was china, was totally different from the way that children grew up in America. She thought that she could make her daughter a prodigy in any matter. “Of course, you can be a prodigy, too” (1), the mother said. She tried to make her daughter be like people on the TV programs, when they sing a song, dance in fantastic way, or do some unbelievable stuff. Also, she tried to make her daughter a hair stylist; in fact, her daughter unintentionally failed. The mother always tried to do the same to her daughter, as her...
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...Whenever Microsoft releases a new desktop operating system, users inevitably ponder the purchase or assembly of a new system. Although Windows 8’s controversial interface changes and obvious accommodations for mobile hardware may cause die-hard desktop users to approach the new OS with trepidation, Windows 8 offers many enhancements worth an upgrade. First and foremost, Windows 8 is streamlined to perform well on lower-end hardware than its most recent predecessors. Its minimum requirements are similar to Windows 7, but Windows 8 uses less memory, consumes less disk space, and its UI elements aren’t as graphically rich. Windows 8 also leverages most GPUs to accelerate more OS elements in hardware than does Windows 7. All of these changes in Windows 8 culminate in an operating system that simply doesn’t need high-end hardware to run well. Knowing that, we set out to build a speedy Windows 8-ready system for under $500. With such a limited budget, dedicating a significant amount of money to any single component isn’t a possibility. With the right balance though, half a grand should be plenty of cash to put together a nice Windows 8 system with minimal compromise. Choosing our components Let’s get what’s probably going to be the most controversial decision out of the way first: The heart of our sub-$500 Windows 8 system is an AMD A8-3870K APU, or Accelerated Processing Unit (basically a CPU + GPU combo). The 3870K sports a quad-core CPU running at 3.0GHz and an integrated, on-die...
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...because workers depend on them to help define the boundaries of acceptable and unacceptable behavior. Organizations may be interested in being ethical in order to avoid criminal liability or bad reputation, or they may be interested in being ethical because the human beings who run them believe it’s the right thing to do and want to be part of a fair and just environment. Ethical lapses can cost an organization dearly in shattered customer confidence, increased government regulation, and huge fines. In some industries, companies have joined together in voluntary efforts to promote ethical conduct among organizations in the industry (Trevino & Nelson , 2007). The short film that I have selected that addresses’ organizational issues is “Prodigy”, http://sharerp.com/73. This film is about a talented teen named Isaiah who must decide between a future as a rich athlete or happy musician. The issues in this film are important because this young man’s future and the future of the college he chooses depends on the choices he makes. Running Head: THE RESPONSIBILITY PROJECT 3 Isaiah’s mother is deceased and he was raised by his father and grandfather in New Orleans. From a very young age Isaiah became a good athlete and musician. He played basketball with his father all the time and continued playing basketball all the way through high...
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...Culture consistently informs the way one views others and the word, two examples of this are "Two Kinds" and "By Any Other Name". The first example that displays how culture informs the way one views others and the world is in Amy Tan's Novel Excerpt, "Two Kinds". Across the novel Tan writes about a child trying to fit into a new culture. In the novel it says, "We didn’t immediately pick the right kind of prodigy. At first my mother thought I could be a Chinese Shirley Temple"(Tan, 18). The excerpt shows that Tan's mother tried to make her fit into American culture. Her mother does this by forcing Tan to be a prodigy of Shirley Temple. The second example that displays how culture informs the way one views other and the world is in Santha...
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...being “part of a movement” he is enveloped in the culture of shoes During this time of his life, his lifestyle was heavily influenced through what he thought was the best way to be approved by his peers. Though culture takes a major role in one’s views of the world, wanting to fit in, making decisions, and pleasing others around oneself are the factors that truly effect one’s viewpoints as aspects of his or her culture. Playing an instrument is a part of one’s culture due to all the practicing and traditions that come with it. In “Two Kinds” the mother tells the narrator to be a prodigy and she agrees stating “My mother and father would adore me” (Tan 22). The reader can understand that Amy wants to earn praises from her parents, so she goes through with all the rigorous training to find a way for her to be a prodigy. As her childhood goes on, she realizes that she wants to be herself and not the prodigy she believes she cannot become when stating “Why don’t you like me the way I am? I cried “I’m not a genius! I can’t play the piano” (Tan 24). At this moment, Tan is...
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