Religious Uncertainty and the Cycle of Life and Death in the Poems of Research Paper

Religious Uncertainty and the Cycle of Life and Death in the Poems of Dylan Thomas - Research Paper Example His works, published in his teenage between 1930 and 1934, portray the struggle between crisis of his life, like finding his own identity which is typical of teenage, and himself. His musical writing style was infatuated with the sound and rhythm of words, and their manifold meanings. The richness of meaning often became illogical, and the innovatory syntax depicting celestial and sexual descriptions made his poetry somewhat hard to understand. The themes of religious uncertainty and the cycle of life and death may have arisen from some catastrophic life events, like the marriage of his love and his relationship with his father. When he travelled to London and Wales between 1934 and 1936, the years of publication of Eighteen Poems and Twenty-five poems respectively, he met a lot of literary personalities and started an affair with the poet and novelist, Pamela Hansford Johnson, who later on got married to the novelist C.P. Snow. This incident made Thomas a heart-broken hard drinker. Thomas had always felt a lot of difficulty in writing first-rate poetry and to be considered as a poet (Poetry Foundation). This also led him to plagiarize at times. Thomas started bringing elements of sadness, war, and financial failures in his poetry when he moved to a borrowed house in Wales with his wife. When Thomas married Caitlin Macnamara in 1937, they were impoverished. They moved to Laugharne, Wales and remained there till Thomas died in 1953. The monetary troubles that they encountered, like the recurrent borrowing of lodgings, started overlapping his artistic style of writing. Admirers and critics started seeing a drift in his poetry in which he, then, talked about his love for his wife, child, dwelling, and death. War, which broke out in Europe in 1939, became a noticeable subject of his poetry published in his third book, the Map of Love. However, due to war, the work was a failure. These external circumstances added to his conception of life and death, and religious u ncertainties that showed themselves in his later works. Thomas’s relationship with his father is also of particular interest in understanding his style of writing (Kabra, Mutoko and Mendonca). ‘Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night’, is a villanelle he wrote in 1945 for his father, D.J. Thomas, who was struggling with cancer. It was a 19-line poem and consisted of five tercets and a quatrain on two rhymes. The first and third lines of the first tercet recurred alternately as a catchphrase finishing the subsequent stanzas, and connected as the last couplet of the quatrain. In this poem, Thomas addressed his own father as he moved toward sightlessness and death. The relationship showed Thomas's philosophical admiration for his father's adamant intellectual autonomy, which was now under control of poor health. Having emotionally moved and agitated, Thomas made himself show his emotions and respect in the intricate structure of the villanelle. His musical writing sty le made the five tercets lead by a quatrain, with the opening and ending lines of the stanza coming alternately as the ending lines of the next stanzas. The recurring lines collected into a couplet at the last part of the quatrain. We see only two rhymes and ten syllables in each line. He talked about wild men, good men, and grave men in this

How does Japan benefit from the export of its media products Essay

How does Japan benefit from the export of its media products - Essay Example This research will begin with the statement that animation industry in Japan is gaining due spotlight within the country and as well as from overseas. The use of modern technologies in making animation films has attracted producers and directors from all over the globe to import Japanese animation film features. Media industries from the western countries have shown interests in making 3 dimensional (3D) movies. 3D movies have proved to offer viewers a lifetime experience in watching movies. In 2010, a survey conducted by the Japanese government found out that 127.08 million people are residing in and around Japan. Among them, 65.7 million belong to the labor force. Furthermore, the unemployment rate surveyed in the same year showed that it has the lowest unemployed people among the G7 nations. The aging population of Japan has been a concern for the government. 22.9 percent of the total population is beyond 65 years of age. Thus, the survey shows that though Japan has the lowest une mployment rate, the aging population might hurt the production of successful animation films, leading to low exports and revenue. Though Japan is considered to have the latest technological equipment, most of the country’s infrastructure has been destroyed by the natural calamities, such as earthquakes in 2011. It has been estimated that India may overtake Japan as the third biggest economy in the world in terms of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The recent earthquake in 2011 has affected the animation industry which accumulates approximately USD 2.5 billion each year. Thus, it has been noted that the American animators have grown interests in working with Japanese animation companies which are generally viewed as the leader in this industry. Moreover, the contribution from different sectors is evident for making the animation industry the best in the world. The animation industry of Japan exports its media products throughout the world. Data provided by the member companies th at combine the Association of Japanese Animation shows that income from exporting media products was nearly 16.2 billion Yen. Furthermore, big anime companies that are not a member of the association, generate profits of around 1 billion Yen to about 4 billion Yen through overseas sales. Thus, the country’s estimated revenue through media products can be almost 18 to 20 billion Yen.

Justice, Gender, and Affirmative Action Essay Example for Free

Justice, Gender, and Affirmative Action Essay Affirmative action Introduction                   Affirmative action is a policy that is aimed at providing positive measures to remedy effects of past discrimination against members of certain groups (Clayton Crosby 1992, p.2). One of the areas that suffer underrepresentation of the diverse, underrepresented individuals and minority group in colleges is the laws schools and subsequently in the legal profession. The questioned posed is â€Å"Is affirmative action the best solution to alleviating this crisis or is it the major cause together with other practices that have contributed to these underrepresentation?                   First of all is the admission procedure. Admission selection considers those with a bachelor’s degree for an accredited university or college. Few underrepresented minority students are able to attend college and obtain the relevant qualifications. Moreover, there are disparities in number of applicants and the number who get enrolled. For example in 2000, 74500 individuals submitted their application to ABA- approved school and an estimate of 67% of the total were admitted (ABA/ LSAC Pre-Conference Report, 2005, p, 4). This illustrates a flaw in the acceptance procedure that focus on higher merit in which its well document trend that underrepresented minorities score less on the Law Schools Admission Test (LSAT).                   Secondly the individual state bar exams are a severe impediment. â€Å"While the LSAT remains a reliable predictor of success in law school and the Law School Admission Council (makers of the LSAT), warn against over-reliance on numerical qualifiers alone† (ABA/ LSAC Pre-Conference Report, 2005, p, 5). Raised cut off points detriment the minorities who are disproportionately at the bottom in addition the bars are also misapplied. The percentage of residents in a state should have a proportionate percentage at the law school. The lack of a national bar does also contribute to this issue.                   The above two examples illustrate why affirmative action is needed in leveling admissions. Higher merit and higher cut off points are serving to lock out minority groups from accessing law education. In coming up with a criteria for selection, the selection board should put into consideration performance of minority groups which is at the lower end of the spectrum.                   Terry Eastland suggests that affirmative action promotes discrimination. He argues that there is nothing like positive or negative discrimination. In Higher education for example, when the institution sets a lower grade for color students, the act in itself creates discrimination. These groups of students who will be enrolled under affirmative action are well aware that they are in that position due to their race. It is a negative experience that is not easy to erase. Sometimes attitudes from the majority students will affect the students from the minority. The majority students may not look at the minority as equals.                   Affirmative action leads to stigma. Eastland says that very few people are aware of the abilities and potential of the marginalized groups. In this case they are likely to be less respected and less valued. This can end up psychologically affecting these groups and it can be worsened if they fail to perform. Terry end believes that an environment should an equal working basis. If students have to be enrolled for higher education, it should be based on merit and not race. This will create an equal working environment of mutual relationship.                   Furthermore, Eastland equates ‘Affirmative action’ to ‘lower standards’. The rationale of having a policy that sets asides positions after a normal criterion creates a barrier between quality and less quality. By having this policy, institutions are accepting that results posted from minority groups are of lesser quality and lesser magnitude to that from the majority. Policy makers argue that the minority are affected by certain factors that make them not to equal results of the majority. It then beats logic that it would be easier resolving factors that make minority perform lesser than providing a criterion that guarantee certain results.                   Terry Eastland comments and views in regard to affirmative action tend to disapprove use of affirmative action against underrepresentation based on color. His views do not factor underrepresentation due to gender. However the logic behind his reasons and those of other scholars can equally be equated to affirmative action on gender and sex segregation                   Gender affirmative actions have shown to improve the status of women in the society. In fact advocates for gender affirmative actions have sprung from various women activists and organizations. Women have gained access to representations in legislative organs, various courses in colleges that stereotypically were set for men. However it is urged that continuous paying attention to a group of people will result in then differences becoming more salient than the commonalities among people (Clayton Crosby 1992, p.11). This statement thus emphasizes Terry Eastland’s arguments against affirmative action.                   To conclude, the benefits of affirmative action are actually visible. Moving forward however, the fundamental principles of affirmative action seem to have been overtaken with time. Putting into consideration Terry Eastland arguments in regard to affirmative action, the negatives of affirmative action outweigh the positives. Affirmative action has led to lower productivity, increased segregation and stigmatization. The call to end affirmative actions thus is justified. References Clayton, Susan D, and Faye J. Crosby. Justice, Gender, and Affirmative Action. Ann Arbor, Mich: Univ. of Michigan Press, 1992. Print. Law Schools Admission Council. Pre Conference Report (2005) Collaborating to Expand the Pipeline. Retrieved from http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/migrated/op/pipelineconf/PipelinePostReport.authcheckdam.pdf Source document