...Essay by David Sedaris ’’Me Talk Pretty One Day’’ ’’Me Talk Pretty One Day’’ is an essay written by David Sedaris in 2005. The essay is about David Sedaris himself and his own experiences to learn a foreign language, French. He has some struggles learning it even though Sedaris has taken some French lessons in New York before moving to Paris. But being 41 years old and start all over in school again can be a challenge, especially if you have a strict teacher. Before David Sedaris decided to move to Paris, France, he took a French course in New York, where he lived so that he would not be an absolute beginner when attending the French class in Paris. The first day of school, Sedaris seems excited and it all seems, as he writes, nerve-racking. He already knows that he is expected to perform, which put a definite pressure on him with the French teaching system, ‘’That’s the way they do it here – everyone into the language pool, sink or swim’’. He also does not feel as confident with the French language as the other students, but he realizes that his nervousness is the least of his problems. The teacher of his French course is a very intimidating woman, who seems to have no interest in the students’ well being. She is picking on the students and making fun of their answers, because of their broken French. Their teacher seems very violent, ‘’We soon learned to dodge chalk and protect our heads and stomachs whenever she approached us with a question’’. She does not hit them...
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...Multi-Layered and multi-levelled? Public law architectures for the 21st century Since the 19th century the world has changed. Some aspects of life have changed more, others less. The means of communication, technology and transportation of the 21st century, for example, are light-years away from those of the 19th century. Public law concepts have not kept pace. In the words of an author of the book reviewed here, reflecting on the concept of ‘the state’ and the problem of sovereignty: in political as in constitutional legal theory, we still need to cut off the King’s head,1 as we are still entrenched in the philosophical and constitutional language of the 19th century.2 But recently, with European integration and globalisation, change has also occurred in the traditional concepts of public law such as “state” or “constitution”. The book edited by Bamforth and Leyland is about this change over the last thirty years or so.3 “Public Law in a Multi-Layered Constitution” is a significant contribution to a better understanding of how public law is transformed, in Great Britain and elsewhere. The title of the book as well as its introduction (pp. 1-26) state that its central theme is the transformation of the British constitution into a “multi-layered constitution.” This is meant to refer to a constitution that “contains multiple, but inter-connected and sometimes overlapping European and national layers”,4 where “power (both legislative and political) has been spread away from the Westminister...
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...‘La France est un des pays d’Europe qui offre la plus grande diversité linguistique’. (Dglflf: 2008). Discuss. When speaking about the linguistic diversity of a country we refer to the existence of a variety of languages within that country (Oxford English Dictionary, 2006) .France is made up of both the central “hexagon” and thirteen overseas territories ,departments and collectives ( commonly known as DOM TOM’s). In this essay, I will show that the large geographical scope of France, its multi-cultural population and strong emerging youth-culture make it one of the most linguistically diverse countries in Europe. I will approach the discussion from the outside in, firstly focusing on the languages of the DOM TOM’s, then moving to mainland France and discussing the non-territorial languages. I will then move onto the regional languages of the metropole, their endangered language status and the extent of governments attempt to preserve them. I will focus primarily on the Breton language in this discussion. Finally, I will briefly mention the language of youth and how its deviation from standard French can be viewed as language diversity, all the while commenting on the gradual regression of speakers of minority languages and asking is the idea of France as one of the most linguistically diverse countries in Europe in jeopardy? Despite the numerous living languages In France, the country is officially classed as a monolingual state: French being the only official language...
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...Big essay: Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris, 2005 In my essay I will focus on the writer’s tone and on the attitude to learning foreign languages that is explored in the text Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris. Me Talk Pretty One Day is an essay about the narrator’s, David, time in Paris where he means to learn French. He feels quite intimidated by the other foreign students who, in his opinion, speak excellent French. The teacher assigned to the French class he is partaking in, is extremely tough and intimidating. While going through the alphabet, she proceeds to ask the students questions that will only serve as a humiliating experience for the chosen party. David spends many hours every day studying and preparing for the upcoming classes. His private life is heavily affected by the teacher’s harsh treatment in class, driving him to not to speak in public or on the phone. It feels like an uphill battle for David, but after some months David realizes while in class that he understands everything the teacher is saying. He counteracts the teacher’s provocation with his own sly remark, indicating his perfect understanding of her choice of wording. The tone is this essay moves throughout the essay from being sarcastic through uncomfortable to depressed until it ends on a more hopeful note. In the start the tone is quite sarcastic when he, after the mentioning of his age as being forty-one, describes his start in Paris as that of the circumstances in which a much younger...
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...Essay Three Important dates First draft: Begin prewriting and writing first draft in class on March 22. The first draft must be handwritten. Continue writing draft on April 1. Draft due: Upload as a rich text file via joule by April 3 no later than 11:00 a.m. (10 pts. draft) Peer review: In-class peer review on April 3. Bring two copies of your typed essay. (10 pts./peer review) Revise/edit: In-class revise/edit on April 5. Final draft and self-evaluation: Due on April 8. (100 pts./essay and 10 pts./evaluation) Topic: Select one of the following topics. 1. Compare and contrast your culture to another culture. Select at least three points to c/c. Make sure you are not making random or biased judgments but are exploring similarities, differences, and their significance. 2. Compare and contrast your work ethic to another individual’s work ethic. Select at least three to c/c. Make sure you are not making random or biased judgments but are exploring similarities, differences, and their significance. 3. Compare and contrast two potential places of employment. Select at least three points to c/c. Make sure you are not making random or biased judgments but are exploring similarities, differences, and their significance. 4. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of living in an individual or collective society. Select at least three points to c/c. Make sure you are not making random or biased judgments but are exploring similarities, differences, and their significance...
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...|Email |thogan@au.westfield.com | | | | |Unit Code |SSK12 | |Unit name |Introduction to University Learning | |Date |31 March 2012 | |Assignment name |Essay 1 | |Tutor |Kersti Niilus | |Student’s Declaration: | |Except where indicated, the work I am submitting in this assignment is my own work and has not been submitted for assessment in another | |unit....
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...For other uses, see Essay (disambiguation). Essays of Michel de Montaigne Essays are generally short pieces of writing written from an author's personal point of view, but the definition is vague, overlapping with those of an article, a pamphlet and a short story. Essays can consist of a number of elements, including: literary criticism, political manifestos, learned arguments, observations of daily life, recollections, and reflections of the author. Almost all modern essays are written in prose, but works in verse have been dubbed essays (e.g. Alexander Pope's An Essay on Criticism and An Essay on Man). While brevity usually defines an essay, voluminous works like John Locke's An Essay Concerning Human Understanding and Thomas Malthus's An Essay on the Principle of Population are counterexamples. In some countries (e.g., the United States and Canada), essays have become a major part of formal education. Secondary students are taught structured essay formats to improve their writing skills, and admission essays are often used by universities in selecting applicants and, in the humanities and social sciences, as a way of assessing the performance of students during final exams. The concept of an "essay" has been extended to other mediums beyond writing. A film essay is a movie that often incorporates documentary film making styles and which focuses more on the evolution of a theme or an idea. A photographic essay is an attempt to cover a topic with a linked series of photographs;...
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...Nauru, the world’s smallest republic with 21 sq. kilometers of land, is a phosphate rock island with rich deposits near the surface that allows easy strip mining operations. Nauruans enjoyed strip mining for a century as it made them among the richest people in the world. Billions of dollars worth of phosphates had been exported. The damage to their environment due to mining was so severe. The rehabilitation of the devastated land and the replacement of income from phosphate are serious long-term problems. Since 2000, Nauru’s economy has relied largely on payments for fishing rights within its exclusive economic zone and the detention center camps for asylum seekers to Australia, which held Afghan, Burmese, and Sri Lankan refugees. The government-owned mining company, the Republic of Nauru Phosphate Company, or RONPhos, initiated the mining of subsurface secondary reserves of phosphate in late 2009, along with a new rehabilitation program for mined-out land. The rehabilitation program includes the development of a new national cemetery, a nursery for developing native flora for the reforestation of the island, a catchment area for a freshwater reservoir and a conservation area. The Nauru’s example is a warning for the Philippines. The Philippines is the fifth most mineral-rich country in the world for gold, nickel, copper, and chromite. It is home to the largest copper-gold deposit in the world. The Mines and Geosciences Bureau has estimated that the country has an estimated...
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...France The little powerhouse that is France is home to the most romantic city in the world, Paris. Its area is slightly less than the size of Texas at 643,701 sq km. Other major cities in the country are Marseille-Aix-en-Provence, Lyon, Lille, and Cannes which is famous for the film festival. French is the official language, and its neighbors include Belgium, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Switzerland. The United States has quite a few less neighbors at 2, which are Canada and Mexico. France is easily navigable by water as all natural waterways crisscross the country. The Loire River is 625 miles long, beginning in the southeastern part of France and flows into the Bay of Biscay. While the Loire is the longest, the Rhone is the ‘biggest river in France in terms of depth and volume’ (USA Today, Travel Tips). The Seine River comes in third, but is largest as far as popularity and name recognition go. It is home to many places tourists frequent. France is also surrounded by many well-known bodies of water including the Atlantic Ocean, the English Channel, the Bay of Biscay, and the Mediterranean Sea. The populations of France and the United States differ tremendously. An estimated 62,814,233 people call France their home while an estimated 313,847,465 people live in America. The French are principally Celtic and Latin, Slavic, North Africa, and Indochinese and Americans are white, black, Asian, Amerindian and Alaska native, native Hawaiian, and other Pacific Islander (The World...
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...Brazilians get close to each other while speaking Portuguese to one another. A pat on the back is normal during conversation. Brazilians are said to be theatrical and over emotional. Brazilians use the thumbs up sign to show their means of approval. However the ok sign is very offensive to Brazilians. Eye contact is important because it shows your interest in what they are speaking about. Brazilians prefer face-to-face meetings to written communication because it allows them to know the person they are doing business. The individual they deal with is more important than the company. It is considered acceptable to interrupt someone who is speaking. French is the original language of France. Interruptions often occur while emotions run high. First names are only used by family and close friends. The French have and animated and theatrical style. A handshake is a common form of greeting. Only friends can greet each other with kiss on the cheek. Mutual trust and respect is required to get things done. Trust is earned through proper behavior. The French are very direct because they are not afraid of asking questions. English, Mandarin, Malay, and Tamil are the national languages of Singapore. Pausing before answering to a question indicates that they have given the question appropriate thought and they response carefully. They tend to be subtle, indirect and implicit in their communications. Singaporeans rely on facial expression, tone of voice and posture to tell them what someone...
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...Comparing and Contrasting France Verses Kenya awd Introduction Kenya is located approximately on the map as 2N, 38E. (Latitude, Longitude.) Kenya became independent in 1963, and only had three presidents since. The current population is estimated as 30, 339,770. The official language is Swahili. It has a host of cultural practices and beliefs. France is a country in Western Europe. It is famous for its wine and cheese. People in France also enjoy croissants and different kinds of bread but baguette is the most popular. They also like truffles; a black, warty fungus that grow in the roots of oak and hazelnut trees. Truffles are really expensive and they use trained pigs to find them. The study compares these two countries France and Kenya within the setting of International Management practices. Comparing and Contrasting France Verses Kenya Kenya is located in East Africa and borders Somalia to the northeast, Ethiopia to the north, Sudan to the northwest, Uganda to the west, Tanzania to the south, and the Indian Ocean to the east. The country straddles the equator, covering a total of 224,961 square miles (582,600 square kilometers; roughly twice the size of the state of Nevada). Kenya has wide white-sand beaches on the coast. Inland plains cover three-quarters of the country; they are mostly bush, covered in underbrush. In the west are the highlands where the altitude rises from three thousand to ten thousand feet. Nairobi, Kenya's largest city and capital, is...
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...to maintain Canada’s army. Canadians have 500 000 men enlisted in the army but if we need 100 000 more men to win the war then I say we need conscription. But I hear you saying, “You can force a man to go to war but you can’t make him fight” ladies and gentleman I can assure you that if a man’s life is in danger and he has a gun to defend himself with he will use it. As for who it will affect most I believe the French-Canadians will be the people most affected if the conscription goes through. I believe this because the province of Quebec has had the least amount of participation in the war. When asked why they cared so little about the war the French-Canadians said, “We do not care about Britain” But as many of you know Britain and France are on the same side of the war. When we confronted...
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...veil, I want people to think about the impact that this ban can have on women like me. Even though I do not live in France, countries around France are beginning to act similarly, and so sooner or later it will affect me and the women around me. “In our country, we cannot accept that women be prisoners behind a screen, cut off from all social life, deprived of all identity,” he said to rolling applause. “The burqa is not a religious sign, it’s a sign of subservience, a sign of debasement – I want to say it solemnly: It will not be welcome on the territory of the French Republic” (“Sarkozy speaks out against burka”, 2009) is what French president Nicholas Sarkozy said on March 2004, according to BBC News. What happens if the ban is applied is that women who are seen wearing the veil in public will be fined 15o euros (£119). 30,000 euros and a one-year sentence to jail will befall men who force their women to wear the veil (“French Senate Votes to Ban Islamic Veil in Public”, 2010). The word people use to describe the veil differs from a group to another. Muslim women in France refer to it as Hijab, French refer to it as foulard, English refer to it as headscarf, and the media refers to it as veil (voile). The veil itself has no meaning, since it is just a piece of cloth, just like a shirt or a trouser. It is the symbolic meaning that matters. Since 2004, France has become known for targeting Muslim women wearing the veil...
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...development of France as a nation and the French identity has been a complicated and gradual process. Though it is true that France is a country in Western Europe and its inhabitants speak French, there is much more to the definition of France as a nation, society, or culture. France began its development by becoming a civilization, something directly opposed to "barbarism" and, as defined by the Oxford English Dictionary, "the action or proves of civilizing or of being civilized; a developed or advanced state of human society." France then began to develop into a nation, or a modern political institution. Many of its national values are based on Enlightenment philosophers, who said that "governments should be reflections of the governed, of the people" (Lesson 1). Just as France does, every nation has a history, or "origin story," that describes how it originated and what type of being belongs in the French nation. After the Gauls, Roman Empire, and German invasion, the French Revolution finally brought about three values that define the French nation: liberté, fraternité, and égalité (liberty, brotherhood, and equality). The following two articles will show how these values and others, such as French exceptionalism and separatism, affect the French attitude towards the European Union. The first article summarizes France's response to a request from the European Commission for information about its recent Roma expulsions. According to the background, government in France "has been...
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...The business plan assumed that the people from all over Europe would flock to EuroDisney. This plan wasn’t good because it failed to recognize how diverse those consumers would be. Although Europe is united as the European Union, the cultures have always been extremely distinct and independent. To what degree do you consider that these factors were a) foreseeable b) controllable by either EuroDisney or the parent company Disney? A closer look into the history and a better understanding of the characters of Europe and the European market place would have enabled the Disney executives to foresee many of the problems. Most of the problems could have been controllable and others were inevitable. It was clear that the choice to open in France was going to cause some commotion. If Disney had researched French history this would have been understood. For the American executive to insist on English being the only spoken language at the park was completely wrong. There are strong facts showing the French culture monitors words which are absorbed from other languages. The way Americans do business is completely different to the French way, so pushing the American way was disrespectful. The French take their liberty and...
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