Religious Views on War Essay

1. To complete this Graded Assignment, retrieve the Religious Views on War DBQ. Use this document with its essay instructions and the DBQ Checklist to complete this DBQ essay. Please consult the rubric throughout the process. Using the documents, compare the views of major world religions on war. What additional kind of document(s) would you need to compare the views of major world religions on war? Essay: Three major world religons have their roots in India: Hinduism, Buddhism and Sikhism. Buddhism and Sikhism both grew from Hinduism. All three share the idea of non-violence (ahimsa). The term ‘non-violence’ was actually coined in English (about 1920) by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948) as a direct translation of ‘ahimsa’, ‘avoiding harm to others’. The idea of non-violence was very important to Mahatma Gandhi’s thinking and actions as a Hindu leader during India’s approach to independence in 1947. He wrote: ‘I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent Hinduism is perhaps the oldest world religion; in some of its writings ahimsa has been considered the highest duty from the beginning of time. Jainism also grew out of Hinduism; Jainists believe that people should strive to become detached from the distractions of worldly existence; and that the practice of ahimsa is an essential step on the way to personal salvation Buddhism developed from the teaching of Siddhartha Gautama, called the Buddha (c.563 – 483 BC), who believed that human suffering could be overcome by following a particular way of life. The first precept of Buddhism is ‘non-harming’ (ahimsa): Buddhists reject violence. Buddhism is clearly pacifist in its teaching, and many Buddhists say quite bluntly that it is ‘better to be killed than to kill’. Some Buddhists have been very active in promoting peace, particularly during the Vietnam War (1961- 1975), when they  offered a ‘Third Way’ of reconciliation between the American and Communist armies. Some Buddhist monks burned themselves to death in self-sacrificing protest against the war. In the Guru’s house, religion and worldly enjoyment should be combined – the cooking pot to feed the poor and needy and the sword to hit oppressors.

Economics and Higher Grades Essay

Should I study more in math? T-Chart Cost Benefit Less time for things I like to do. | Higher grades. | Less time for family and friends. | Increased scores in finals. | Less time to earn money. | Graduate high school and more opportunities. | 1 Explain how the concepts of scarcity, choice, and opportunity cost relate to your dilemma. For scarcity it would be that instead of me doing other things of my liking I would study, resulting in higher grades. Opportunity cost would be for example working which comes with making money and letting that go but then in the long run being able to graduate high school and have more opportunities. 2 What are the possible short-term costs and benefits? What are the possible long-term costs and benefits? Explain your answers and make sure all are listed in your chart. The short term costs would be to give up things I like in return for higher grades. Also giving up some time with friends & family would be shown in my final scores as it gives more time for studying. Also not working or making an income would take up less time and would make me be able to concentrate full time on my studies. 3. Which column has more responses? Which column has more powerful responses? Explain which points are most important to you and why. I believe the more powerful response come from the benefit as they are what I want the most and don’t really compare to the other short term effects. For example I would rather want to graduate and whatnot than to have money right now as I know it will help me in the future. 4. Based on the chart and your reflection of the above questions, what will be your final choice? Was this process helpful to you in reaching a decision? Write a brief paragraph with at least three details to persuade your instructor that this is the best decision. I would take more time to study as it pays off in the long run and would obviously be more beneficial to me than not doing it. It will also as you can see in the chart make me be able to excel more in the area’s in math I am having trouble with. I will be able to not have any trouble in passing exams, and I will be acquiring more knowledge on the subject for the future. Giving up work will also put a negative impact in short term for my wallet but it will give more time for me to acquire other knowledge on the subject.

Case Analysis: the Bribery Scandal at Siemens AG

The Siemens bribery scandal brought to light a strategic dilemma facing multi-national firms attempting to gain a competitive edge by operating abroad; specifically, how can they balance adherence to their own ethical and legal standards with the customs required to do business efficiently, or perhaps at all, in foreign markets? Germany’s Co-Determination law has since drawn intense criticism as hampering competitiveness and creating untenable situations for management, rife with conflict-of-interest issues, not only because of Siemens, but also because of the number of other German-based companies accused of bribing labor union representatives. The forced resignation of CEO, Klaus Kleinfeld, despite the resulting success during his tenure, illustrates the predicament international managers face with regard to conflicting operational methods, and leads us to larger questions about accountability within an organization. As the case study author states, the Siemens scandal is representative of what many firms believe is the inevitable â€Å"ethical cost of intense competition in global markets†, particularly emerging markets, where payments for contracts are described as common place and perhaps even required. ?Perhaps the most glaringly problematic observation remains that the Siemens AG top management claims that they failed to notice rampant, and arguably conspicuous embezzlement leading to lucrative foreign contracts. Are there flaws in the German System of Corporate Governance? The 2007 scandal resulting in charges against Siemens’ Chief of Information Technology, Johannes Feldmayer, and Chief of Finance, Karl-Hermann Baumann, was rooted in illegal payments designed to work around German corporate governance laws. In this instance, IG Metall complained that Siemens was illegally funding smaller, rival union, AUB, in an attempt to grow and cultivate it as an ally against IG Metall in the bargaining process. This scandal marked the beginning of the unearthing of unethical behaviors in other German-based firms that have since lead to criticism that the Co-Determination law is antiquated and hampers competitiveness. The Co-Determination law was designed to provide a mechanism for worker participation in management decision-making via a two-tiered system with a supervisory board having oversight of the management board. Critics, however, argue that the law, in fact, limits the management board’s ability to make strategic decisions due to the control exerted by labor holding 50% of the seats on the supervisory board. I agree with the author’s statement that this creates, â€Å"a suspicious alliance between the management and the labor representatives†. The end result was often agreements made prior to the official meetings to facilitate outcomes favorable to management. Although the law was meant to bring balance to the corporate governance structure, I would argue that the potential for corruption of the labor representatives, or on the other end of the spectrum, obstruction of the management board, has a destabilizing effect likely to manifest in questionable and dysfunctional partnerships, such as was the case with Siemens. Another component of the Co-Determination law prevents selection of supervisory board members who are non-German, regardless of the expertise or perspective they could bring to the table. Naturally, the result is a limited, often recurring, and potentially like-minded pool of candidates, which the author points out, may have contributed to the ousting of Kleinfeld. The facts presented indicate that the lion’s share of the bribery scandal took place under Heinrich von Pierer, who was the CEO from 1992 until 2005, and the supervisory board chairman from 2005 to 2007. Kleinfeld took over in 2005 and, within a period of only two years, had accomplished a remarkable and profitable restructuring, as evidenced by a 26% increase in the stock price. This was not without growing pains, however, as it is speculated that Kleinfeld’s aggressive management style, often described as â€Å"American†, did not meet with the approval of the more conservative supervisory board. As such, analysts opined that the bribery scandal was used as an opportunity to remove Kleinfeld, citing the need for a â€Å"new beginning†. I agree that this is likely the case. The growth under Kleinfeld was impressive, particularly given the timeframe. Furthermore, the timing of the actual instances of bribery put them squarely during von Pierer’s tenure as CEO; and he had already stepped down from the supervisory board. Nevertheless, under the power granted by the Co-Determination law, the supervisory board opted to bring in a new CEO, Peter Loescher, indicating, in my opinion, that its issue with Kleinfeld was not performance based. Why Such Risky Business? The history of Siemens AG paints a picture of a successful and arguably dominant multi-national firm, with a reputation for a war chest of competencies and innovative products. The obvious question, then, is why would a firm with this resume and list of global achievements become involved with corruption and criminal behavior? The author recounts the opinions of analysts who believe the answer is simple; many firms view the types of payments at the heart of the Siemens scandal to be the necessary cost of doing business in the current global environment. At first glance, the facts of this case may seem to support this theory. There were â‚ ¬420 million of questionable payments made over a seven year period from 1999 to 2006. Official Siemens records showed the payments as having gone to external consultants. It was determined, however, that they were actually paid to foreign purchasing officials and that the expenditures coincided with the procurement of â€Å"fixed line telecommunications business in various international markets†, including Italy, Puerto Rico, Greece, and the United States. By March of 2007, two former Siemens managers were convicted of embezzlement of company funds for the purpose of bribing foreign officials. The employees argued that their actions did not violate any laws, resulted in no personal gain, and were taken solely for the purpose of improving Siemens’ positioning. They argued that they worked, only to secure a lucrative deal in which the payments were required by Enel management as part of the standard bid process. In fact, Siemens AG argued that the court order requiring forfeiture of earnings from the contract, prior to 2002 when the German government instituted a law prohibiting bribes to private officials abroad, specifically, had no basis in law. As previously stated, these events may appear to support the case in favor of questionable payments and loose ethical boundaries as a necessary cost of business. It is my opinion, however, that these events illustrate a flawed management culture and strategy. They are evidence of a system where a focus on true technological innovation has given way to a focus on unfettered expansion, and the unnatural duplication of the monopolistic type control over infrastructure in developing countries that was enjoyed during previous decades in other parts of the now industrialized world. If Siemens had bolstered their technologically competitive strength, they would not need to rely so heavily on their financial strength to gain entry into markets. Is this the New Cost of Doing Business? The fact that Siemens top management continue to take the official position that, despite the scope, depth, and intricacies of the bribery scandal, they had no knowledge of it remains difficult to explain. Further, they take no responsibility, save acknowledgement that they lacked adequate internal compliance systems. I find the truthfulness of this position to be of remote possibility due to the conspicuousness and magnitude of the payments, as well as their direct correlation with the securing of highly lucrative contracts. Moreover, the idea that entire sections of Siemens’ managers were of the character that they would be comfortable blatantly committing criminal acts for the sole benefit of their employer, but not themselves, I find to be quite counter-intuitive. The debate over whether events such as those unearthed at Siemens are part of the usual and customary cost of doing business abroad must be framed in terms of the complete denial of culpability by the top management. A legitimate, above-board expense is accounted for, tracked, and justified; this is the case even when it is outside the norms of the firm’s home country. It is not hidden from shareholders. A buffer of scapegoat-able employees need not lie between it and top management. If a light cannot be readily shown upon it, I believe it is without question, unethical. Whether or not it is illegal, however, depends upon the laws in the countries the firm is operating in. I could conceive of a situation where a firm could distribute cash â€Å"incentive† payments openly, on the books, as well as legally. In addition, firms have other options. They could improve their offerings to increase the competitiveness of the bid, and/or structure them with above-board incentives. They could operate with a clear and unwavering zero-tolerance policy for bribery; recognizing that it will be necessary to educate those conducting bid processes in markets where it is believed to be common to expect questionable payments. A firm could also exercise patience, and restraint, and be willing to walk away from markets requiring participation in corrupt processes. The Kleinfeld Conclusion. The Siemens AG supervisory board did provide adequate justification for the decision not to renew Kleinfeld’s contract, due to the scandals breaking during his time as CEO; yet, I believe that they were wrong in doing so in light of his track record of impressive and expedient accomplishments. Though his termination clearly pleased the board, unless Mr. Loescher is able to maintain the growth trajectory set by Kleinfeld, I believe his departure will not inspire confidence from management or shareholders. This is of concern because confidence has a direct impact on value, which could make it harder to move beyond the bribery scandal. Was it Worth It? One question still remains: was Siemens really at fault, given the apparent prevalence of these sorts of issues among other German companies; or was their only sin gett ing caught? It is my opinion that the magnitude of the â€Å"bribing† which took place at Siemens made it highly unlikely that knowledge of it would stay buried. I believe Siemens had to have anticipated this, hence the buffer between top management and the â€Å"bribers†. I believe they made a calculated business decision that whatever the consequence may ultimately be, it was a greater benefit to get a foot hold in the infrastructure of those markets. In short, yes, Siemens is to blame, and yes, they are okay with it.

Process vs Product Drama in Education Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 1

Process vs Product Drama in Education - Essay Example According to the paper the intrinsic, imaginative of the student was part of learning and was based on the intrinsic needs of the individual. A new student-centered approach became a primary and secondary method of approaching process vs. product drama in education in England†¦ the exploration of intrinsic, imaginative needs from the ‘mind’s eye’ or inner visualization of the student was the basis of discussion and practice for production and performance moving into the 20th century. Thus, many of the ‘product vs. process drama’ perspectives were based on the intrinsic processes of the student-centered learning experiences. Teacher and drama education practitioner, Harriet-Finlay Johnson   claimed freedom of expression concerning ‘aesthetic valuation’ of product, production and performance of plays†¦a student’s aesthetics and perspective should be the diverse ‘lens’ through which the value of dramatic proce ss or theatrical experiences be judged. Analysis of the research literature is a predominant method by which this thesis.

Different responses Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Different responses - Essay Example People with specific leanings, shaped by their age, gender or values, may observe and interpret Mrs. Mallard’s character using their own lens of perception. Feminists readers, on reading the immense emotional turmoil that Mrs. Mallard goes through as the realization dawns on her that she is finally free, may lament the bondages of marriage that pushed a woman to such desperation and depravity that she had to wait for a husband’s death to breathe in free air. A feminist perspective would therefore interpret Mrs. Mallard as a wife, who was feeling stuck and suffocated by her husband, probably due to lack of compatibility between them. In spite of this repressed desperation, Mrs. Mallard has been conditioned by the society to continue to play the role of a good wife. She plays that role as automation, even forgetting what her true feelings and desires were, until one day her husband is dead and her deeply buried feelings rush to the surface. Even at that specific moment, she reacts, with I believe female readers would relate and sympathize with Mrs. Mallard’s character, as more often than not, women have experienced suppressi on and had to repress their desires to maintain appearances of congeniality imposed on them by society. On the other hand, male readers probably would be harsher and judgmental of Mrs. Mallard, as she is a woman well provided for by her husband who had a â€Å"face that never looked saved with love upon her†. Ideally, in a male dominated society, a woman’s assigned position is to dedicate herself to husband and home, which is does not appear to be the case with Mrs. Mallard. A woman, whose husband is dead, is expected to feel the emotions of remorse, despondence and even fear of a long and lonely life, even if that husband was a dastard when alive. Chopin has managed to capture the presumed dead husband’s character in just a few sentences - that he was a good husband who

Cross Border Investment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Cross Border Investment - Essay Example Investors need to identify these issues and act wisely to minimise the risks involved in cross border investment while maximising the expected returns out of the investment. This paper identifies and elaborates major issues related to cross border investment and viability of this tool in portfolio diversification. Europe is known to be one of the pre-eminent real estate investment destinations for foreign investors. Western European countries such as France, United Kingdom, Germany and Italy etc have remained to be the most favourable real estate markets; however, properties in these countries are extremely high-priced. This is directing attention of foreign investors to the Eastern European countries. These emerging and new markets offer various investment attractions to the foreign investors. Investors from all parts of the world in particular from the UK are taking keen interest in exploring these countries' investment potential. Furthermore, as these countries move towards EU accession, significant growth in their commercial and business activities can be observed. This further adds up to the attraction of these countries as a tool for international portfolio diversification. ... Myer et al. define the term diversification as, "the complete removal of unsystematic risk in an effort to minimize the fluctuations of a portfolio's return in excess of what the market will reward" (1999, p. 163). Diversification in the form of investment portfolio has remained popular among investors for the last several decades. Through portfolio diversification companies and investors invest their funds in several dimensions such as shares, securities, bonds, derivatives and real estate etc. One such strategy becoming substantially appealing to investors in present times is diversification of risk through investment in international financial and real estate assets. Under cross border investment, companies and investors look for investment opportunities around the world and make the most of favourable situation in foreign countries. Investors might opt for either a complete international investment portfolio or a combination of domestic and international financial assets and real estate. Investors are supposed to attain maximum returns out of their invested funds when they diversify the investment over a range of different countries with significant investment opportunities. Research demonstrates that cross border diversification of investment portfolio carries substantial benefits for the investment with respect to risk reduction as well as return maximisation (for example, Addae-Dapaah & Loh (2005); Cheng et al. (1999); Gordon et al. (1998); Sirmans and Worzala (2003) etc.). Cheng et al. affirm this point as, "significant diversification benefits are available when investments are spread out over many different countries" (1999, p. 463). Investors can not only take advantage of favourable situation prevailing in

The Main Codes Of Ethics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Main Codes Of Ethics - Essay Example There is a difference however in the two groups codes when it comes to whether the principles are obligatory or aspirational. The ASPA's code is much shorter than the ACA's. If you were to ask the author of the ASPA's code if the principles were obligatory, he or she would probably say yes. However, because there is so little detail, the principles are really more aspirational. They do not cover specific situations (unlike the ACA's) and they are full of generalities. The ACA's code is much more specific and lays out what counselors should do when they are faced with various scenarios. This is a better form of guidance. ACA code A2a talks about Informed Consent—this is something much more specific than in the ASPA's code. This difference is noticeable as well in terms of illustrative versus exhaustive elements. The ACA's is exhaustive. It is long and complex and can be used in disciplinary hearings in order to punish counselors who go astray. It details what is appropriate and what is not appropriate regarding relationships with patients. The ASPA's code is not exhaustive. It isn't really illustrative either. It just lays out a few general ground rules. The sad truth is that we need such codes of ethics. Without them, each of these organizations would have trouble with their members. Codes of ethics bind together members. In today's world ethical relativism dominates so it is important to have codes that are carefully written down and that are exhaustive and detailed such as the ACA's. What is ethical relativism?

Narrative criticism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Narrative criticism - Essay Example es of narrative criticism have emerged; some people have claimed that narrative criticism is a fundamental tool in communication processes owing to the fact that it facilitates the understanding of texts and how they reflect on human life structures, thus creating a platform for information sharing and exchange (Pullman, 7). As a method of literary analysis, this approach has been a subject of negative and positive criticism. To begin with, some scholars have claimed that the application narrative criticism is majorly based on a dimension of literary analysis that allows readers to assess literary works in a holistic manner, by noting different characteristics and styles that are similar to other literary works, taking into consideration, the beginning, middle as well as the end (Powell, 3). On the other hand, some narrative critics have asserted that it is basically a method that does not focus on a holistic analysis of literary works, but rather focus on specific elements of literary works, which seem relevant to the story line or the main theme. Moreover, this group of critics has claimed the narrative criticism is a basic tool for literary analysis that engages its readers through understanding how the literary works relate with real life experiences (Byron, 13). This is usually achieved through various points of view passed by the narrators and relating them to the real life experiences of its readers. According to Allan Powell (1990), Narrative criticism can be considered a function of events. This is because in its application, a high sense of priority is given to the text from the ideas of ‘implied readers’ and ‘implied author’: The essence of implied author as well as implied reader are usually determined by signatures emerging from the text. Powell also asserts that narrative criticism is a function of events, basically due to the fact that it involves taking into consideration characters and settings of a literary analysis that forms its

Bank of Americas Problem Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 6000 words

Bank of Americas Problem - Research Paper Example The bank spent billions of dollars in a bid to solve the issues Countrywide was involved in but almost four years later, the problems still persist and BAC has not been as profitable as it was before it acquired Countrywide. The reason has remained controversial about the failure of the bank’s performance soon after the acquisition and on the basis of this controversial issue; this paper has been decided to be taken up. Countrywide has been selectively considered as the most influencing fact towards the failure of the bank which is evident from various articles searched for during the making up of this paper. Various charts consisting of figures related to the downfall in the bank’s performance after acquiring Countrywide have been incorporated in this paper so that a comprehensive notion of the entire fact can be derived. The aim of this paper has been set with respect to resolving the present problematic situation of the bank pertaining to its merging with Countrywide during the year 2008.   Bank of America Position Bank of America (BAC) prides itself in its position and the role it plays in serving households, businesses, individuals and families to grow and succeed as a way of fuelling the economy. The bank upholds high standards of corporate governance and ethical conduct as a way of demonstrating its commitment. BAC is the biggest US lender in terms of assets and has about 13.9 million mortgages half of which are marred by controversy and are in the process of being segregated into good and bad. The effort to perform mortgage segregation on the part of BAC is aimed at staving off lawsuits arising from Countrywide mortgages (Plunkett, â€Å"Mortgages and Credit Industry Almanac†). BAC works with the belief of holding strength and rebuilding strength on failure each time. The recreation of strength after failure or even sustenance of strengths is undertaken by the bank mainly through concentration on key goals of the corporationâ€⠄¢s performance. The goals are obviously set according to the vision of the corporation and the strategies laid down by it for reaching to the vision in the long term. On this note, the vision statement of BAC is to evolve as the best company in the segment of financial services within the world. BAC holds the belief that the bank has its entire resources set for achieving the long-term goal in the form of vision. The vision is deemed to be also achievable by the bank based on the capabilities that it holds. The bank believes that the capabilities of the bank are efficient enough for meeting the financial requirements of the clients and the consumers. These capabilities are believed to be taking the bank near to the vision it has set for the future (Bank of America, â€Å"Annual Report 2010†). For the purpose of fulfilling its long-term vision, the bank concentrates heavily on its mission which is evident from the banks’ follow up of certain strategies.  

Learning Contract Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Learning Contract - Essay Example Inclusion of time spans of learning and the methods of assessment enables the tutors meet specific aims and objectives of the teaching and learning. Learning contracts, according to Knowles (2008) incorporate skills and values ought to be learnt by the students in a specific period of time. Malcolm Knowles model of learning contracts include the approaches that ought to be used by the tutors so as to achieve the set goals and objectives of a lesson. Targets are mandatory in setting up a lesson in order for the learning objectives to be attained. Malcolm’s model indicates that for objectives to be met it is important that target dates are put in place. Time factor enables the tutors and learners work towards a specific goal based not on assumptions but on factual terms designed by time factor. For learning to be proven successful, evidence based on response by learners has to be portrayed by learners. If the evidence brought forward has an element of validity, then learning may be described as successful. Learning contracts are beneficial in terms of ability to deal with all manners of learners in a classroom setting. Learning contracts also motivate learners to strive to attain their maximum best for the reason that majority are aware of what is expected of them at the end of the learning session. Learning contracts instill a sense of responsibility between the instructor and learners during the learning

Health and Social Care Essay Example for Free

Health and Social Care Essay In this essay I am going to talk the patterns and trends of health and ill health among different social groupings. I will talk about each pattern and trend in its own paragraph, Social class, Gender, Ethnicity, Age and Geographical location. I will talk about the links between these to health issues. I will back these up through the use of evidence such as statistics. I will then conclude what I have found out. Firstly I will talk about each pattern and trend. Social Class Social class helps to deter the reasons for individual’s health and ill health. Social classes also help with understanding health and ill health, this is done through the basis of individuals lifestyle class, for example the lower class who work in the worst conditions and have the lower ranked jobs are seen to have the poorer health. Were as the higher class are them which work in jobs that mean they work higher into the society such as office work. Meaning they’re less likely to contract or suffer with an illness or such like because their environment is completely different. Another thing which means individuals is more likely to have better health care, due to their higher position in society and better paid jobs. Yet as society has developed further more, The Equality Act 2010, now covers individuals to receive fair payments no matter your class ranking or your gender. [NVLE] Social class determines a lot of health and ill health trends across the world. There is overwhelming evidence that this is the case and that life expectancy is due to this rating system of social classes. Members of higher social classes are living longer and experiencing better healthcare than members of the lower social classes. For example if someone of lower class comes it a health care profession with an issue but is drunk they’re treat noticeably different to the higher class people who need medical help. Research in the past such as the black report has shown that differences in health and well-being were an effect of the level of peoples income, as well as the quality of their housing and the environment which they lived and worked in. [Stretch and Whitehouse 2010] As you can see here, that social class plays a large part in the whole  families health as well. It also shows us that the individuals who are in the higher social class, the ones with the high income, have a better chance when the individual comes to being treated and have a better chance because of the factors of their housing, income and the wider range of opportunities available with that amount of money readily available to them. This demonstrates the huge difference based around their background, jobs and life compared to an individual who has a much less income and is in the bottom of the class rankings. There are several different influence which can cause this to happen for the individuals, a lot of chances can be taken away from the individual as a result of the social class system, as this demonstrates it can be very unfair to certain individuals. [change In the social world] Gender Gender plays a larger role in individuals health. This plays a large part on the individuals choices and opinions which take place, this is because of the rights which men hold compared to the ones which women held. This plays a big part in the individual based around their work and past experiences, for example women pay for attention about their health because they seek more medical help about things compared to men, this is because of their background such as working history and women have more attention towards their health care. This means that women gain the necessary treatment at a more beneficial time based around their illness because of their more frequent trips to doctors and medical professions, who diagnose them with an illness or issue which enables them to receive the adequate care. Were as men don’t tend to visit the doctor as regularly, meaning they don’t gain the same treatment and often die at younger age. This is called Disease prevalence. From here the main thing which medical professions tend to diagnose women with is depression. Gender also determines how the individuals treatment is seen and how their illness is advanced, this means that most of the time men’s treatment is more intense because they leave the issue to progress compared to women. Another thing is that women tend to live longer than men and this is proven by statistical graphs, these show that women live a longer life then men. The reasons for this are based around women and men, these show different variation in lifestyles and job workings etc. This graph shows the life expectancy over several years has increased, but it has shown that the male gender has still increasing at a lower level then female gender. [AIHW] There are many other issues associated with gender, these are associated around the lifestyle factors and habits such as smoking. There is a higher death rate based around males which can be linked with their higher levels of smoking and drinking. This is also based around the individuals participating in dangerous sports and activities. This Is based around their need for more adventure and risk taking, this can also be linked with road accidents. Meaning a higher death rate for males between 17 and 24. [Stretch and Whitehouse 2010] Ethnicity The link between race and illness is difficult to study systematically because there are several different racial types or races throughout the world and travelling has become more available these racial types have expanded. Another thing which means finding patterns and trends based around an individuals racial type has become harder, is the fact that there are now more difficult, because a lot of small ethnical groups live within inner city areas. The connection based around individuals living within cities is poorer housing, pollution and higher employment and deprived areas. This means that its harder to deter whether the individuals poor health is because of the their ethnicity or poverty. As well as the implications of higher poverty and the lack of access to health services throughout the area of that individual. Another issue based around trying to treat individuals is language and cultural difficulties, these are things which are standing in the way of individuals being able to receive health care or limit the access to certain health care. An issue which also means that individuals struggle around the basis of health care, such as religious and cultural matters, this is supported by the fact that Asian people, they speak little English and require a female doctor. Due to the issue of different racial groups and the several different languages and due to everyone having different first languages, then individuals may need different communication techniques such as translators. Due to these being in a short supply then these aren’t often in place. Health and social care workers need to understand individuals cultural and religious belief, this means that people need to be fully met, if not then the individual is being left vulnerable to higher levels of ill health. [Stretch and Whitehouse 2010] Age As people age you expect them to suffer a certain amount of difficulties, such as body functions becoming less efficient and them becoming less agile. As time has progressed this has changed, now people over the retirement age are more fit, healthy . these individuals contribute to our society through paid work, voluntary actions/ activities and caring for people throughout their families. This is supported by the 2001 census which revealed that 342,032 people ages 65 and over provided 50 hours or more unpaid care per week. It also remains true that there is a higher level of illness among the older population and particularly among the people over the age of 75. Throughout a 3 month period in 2003, 24% of people over the age of 75 attended causality or out-patients department of a hospital, compared with 14% of people of all other ages. These statistics are from the General Household Survey 2003.The Alzheimer’s Society in 2007 estimated that one in 20 people over 65 and one in five people over the age of 80 suffered from dementia. [Stretch and Whitehouse 2010] (extend) Age is something which creates several different patterns, this is based around the fact that as people age they become more prone to extracting an illness or disease or something such as a life long problem. This means that the individuals require more treatment and help. Yet as this treatment and helps is advancing the individuals life expectancy is continually increasing. Yet as you can see in the older generations, that the  individuals with longer life expectancy are women, this can reflect back to the factors which are demonstrated in gender, the men go out smoking, drinking and socialising, were as the women tend to stay at home caring for their family and are deprived from those opportunities. This shows that the women tend to be healthier and live longer with less health problems. Location There are also regional variations in patterns of health and illness. Throughout different parts of the country mortality and morbidity rates vary and also within towns and cities throughout the UK. The poorer regions and the poorer parts of cities have a higher level of illness. This can be based around the pollution and deprived areas within the cities. This is because of poorer sanitation and poorer facilities throughout the area. This can also be related to groups and people within the area, such as gangs. This can aslo be related to crime within that area, meaning that the safety and the area has become more deprived. For example, research has identified that there are regional trends in the incidence of lung cancer across the UK. Within England the rates of people with lung cancer are higher than average in the north-west, northern and Yorkshire regions and below average in the south-western, southern and eastern regions. [Stretch and Whitehouse 2010] Location reflects and accounts for many areas of health and social care which are based around the individual, for example the availability of health care professions for the varying ages. You may have to travel at distance to reach a suitable health care profession, this can be based on the fact that if you live within a small area in a city which is seen as deprived and has high levels of crime, then people may be unprepared to work within the area. Another factor may be based around the community of people within that area, such as ethnicity groups and people who use drugs, alcohol and such like, these may never think about seeking medical help as they’re unaware of their body and if anything is wrong. This is all based around the individual developing trends and patterns of ill health around certain areas because of their needs and problems, poorer living conditions and pollution within that area. [NVLE] I conclude form what I have written above, that all of these, Social class, Gender, Ethnicity, Age and Geographical location of the individual, plays a large part based around the individuals health. I have found that many lifestyles factors have contributed to the individuals health, yet equal many judgemental factors have also contributed to the individuals health. I found that social class has contributed to the individuals health because of their availability to wider health care and the prices which may have relation to their illness. Were as gender has contributed to the individuals health because of their leisure and more daring activities and lifestyle choices which they consume, as well as their working area. Ethnicity has contributed to the individuals health care based around the fact the individual has moved and is living within a small area which may be deprived, (linking with location) and is unable to communicate and pay for their health care because of the move and ch ange. Age contributes to the individuals health care because of the growing issues related to becoming older and now having to look after younger family members, this has also been contributed to because of their lifestyle when they were in their teens and early adulthood and the choices they made then such as smoking. Location has contributed to health care because of the area in which the individual can afford to live and the events which may happen within that area, such as crime and the poor facilities around. As I have concluded there are many contributions throughout these health and social care patterns and trends, they all have their own individual way of contributing to the individuals care. References: [AIHW] 2013. Life expectancy.[Online] Available at https://www.aihw.gov.au/uploadedImages/Subjects/Deaths/_Content/General_content/life-expectancy-figure-1-SAS.png?n=8696 [Accessed 10th March 2014] Health and Social Care Level Btec level 3 book , Beryl Stretch and Mary Whitehouse 2010 NVLE [change in the social world]2009. [Online] Available at http://catalog.flatworldknowledge.com/bookhub/reader/4306?e=barkbrief-1.1-ch13_s02# [Accessed 10th March 2014]

The Palestine-Israeli Conflict Essay Example for Free

The Palestine-Israeli Conflict Essay The central problem of the Palestine-Israeli conflict is a struggle over Palestine. The Zionists want to make Palestine a â€Å"Jewish State† for arriving Jewish settlers and the anti-Zionists, who are native Muslim/Christian/Arab Palestinians re resisting expulsion. (Ould-Mey, Abstract) Palestinians have been living under Israeli military occupation since 1967. Israel frequently violates the Geneva Conventions. The Geneva Conventions are â€Å"a set of principles instituted after World War II to ensure that civilians would â€Å"never again† suffer as they had under Nazi occupation. (If Americans Knew, Current Situation, Para 4) Consequently, Palestinians are powerless against Israel. For example, Palestinians cannot leave Gaza or the West Bank unless Israeli guards allow them to. They are also not allowed back in unless Israeli Guards allow them to. Often their requests are denied. The current conflict dates back to the 1800s when a group in Europe (Zionists) decided to colonize Palestine. As more Zionists moved into Palestine the indigenous population became increasingly concerned. Eventually fighting broke out that was only made worse as World War II led to more Jewish immigration to Palestine. Finally, the UN chose to use a strategy where an outside power divides up other people’s land in an attempt to resolve the fighting. The UN recommended giving away 55 percent of Palestine to a Jewish state. This led to a war in 1947-49. By the end of the war Israel had conquered 78 percent of mandatory Palestine; three-quarters of a million Palestinians had been made refugees; over 500 towns and villages had been destroyed; and a new map was drawn up, in which every city, river and hillock received a new, Hebrew name, as all vestiges of the Palestinian culture were to be erased. † (If Americans Knew, History, para 7) A second war in 1967 led to Israel occupying the additional 22 percent of Palestine that had eluded it in 1948. This left Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip living in a kind of limbo. These people no citizenship and no power over their own lives. Today, many Palestinians are resisting the occupation of Israel in the West Bank and Gaza Strip causing the conflict to continue. A resolution can only happen if Israel loosens its control over Palestine. The only way this will ever be a possibility is if there is a decline of U. S. support of Israel. With less involvement by the U. S. the U. N. will be able to play a greater role in the peace process. This would be a positive first step in resolving the conflict. At this point the U. N. could allow Palestinian refugees back into their homes. The U. N. could also take away the right of any Jew to be able to settle in Palestine. These steps would not completely resolve the conflict but it would the start of a resolution. As long as the U. S. continues to stand behind Israel, the conflict will not be resolved. It is important to note that this would ultimately benefit the U. S. as well as the U. S. support of Israel damages the country’s relationship with other nations and Muslim consumers.

Risk Management in Healthcare: Advantages and Disadvantages

Risk Management in Healthcare: Advantages and Disadvantages Submitted to : Mr. Emmanuel Badu Risk Management in healthcare facility The health care environment faces different and numerous of emerging risk, related to health care reform. The purpose of risk management is to pinpoint potential problems before they can affect and occur, so that the organization can planned and invoked ahead of time if needed. The risk handling process can mitigate unfavourable results on attaining objectives of the organization. This is a continuous and vital process of the business and management, and it should address the issues that can affect the achievement of objectives. Risk management must applied effectively that would mitigate and anticipate the risk that can critical the project. The effective risk management can measure by early and aggressive approach with collaboration and actively participation of stakeholders. Stable and strong management are important to build an environment that has open communication regarding possible risk. Internal and external risk must both consider for example cost, technical and schedule. Enterprise risk management helps ensure effective reporting and compliance with laws and regulations, and helps avoid damage to the entity’s reputation and associated consequences. In sum, enterprise risk management helps an entity to get where it wants to go and avoid pitfalls and surprises along the way. (Flaherty, 2004, p.1) Benefits of risk management in healthcare facility The healthcare facilities are always experiencing tremendous pressure from its consumer to provide highest-quality, reasonable cost care, workforce and aging population. Implementing this program has a place from planning to operations for handling crisis especially in healthcare facility where lives are handled. Challenges highlight that need to address in a healthcare facility are patient safety, regulations, policy, medical error and impact of legislation. The potential issues can have a big impact or can create a long term effects. Ignoring the potential risk can compromise patient care, financial losses and increase liability. Compliance is one of the benefit of implementing risk management, this ensure aspects of accreditation, licensure, medical conditions and coverage. This can prevent and protect the healthcare organization from degrees of loss. It can also provide effective mitigation or lessen the potential loss. â€Å"If you follow the principles of risk management you can mitigate collateral losses following an adverse event† (Hiatt, 2007, p.1). Another benefit is to provide a framework to increase patient outcomes, for example patient’s survey can inform the organization if clients are not satisfied with service, and this is an issue to consider for quality improvement. Lastly reduction of adverse effects, the organization should know there strengths and weaknesses to prepare them to face the challenges for providing quality care. Uncertain situation presents both risk and opportunity, it can erode or enhance the organization. Risk management enables the management to effectively fac e and deal with unexpected situation and increase its value. â€Å"Risk management is typically a hybrid function bridging a number of disciplines to reduce the incidence of organizational loss† (Hall, 2015, p.1) Risk management Reviewing activities and internal environment This component is the foundation of the framework, and it wraps how the health care facilities view and addressed the risk. It encompasses the management’s style and philosophy, it is a set of values, attitudes and practices to deal with risk. This is communicated within in the organization by policy statements and actions as well. The management aligned the people, process, and organization to facilitate successful action to cope in risk appetite. The said style is communicated and must be understood by the member of the organization. Every member of the organization should know the organizations philosophy, ethical values integrity, and culture of the workplace. Setting objectives Objectives are always aligned with tone of organization and always consistent with the risk appetite. It has four categories the strategic, operations, reporting and compliance. The objective should work well with all levels of risk that the organization accept in order to achieve its objective or risk tolerance. The successful risk management gives an assurance that the objectives will be reached and achieved within acceptable level of residual risk. Setting objectives is a tool that make and create target for the organisation to achieve. The healthcare facility need to set objectives to ensure all staff or employees are on the same level or same page when working in the facility. The employees will need to understand the reason behind the organisation to maximize the effectivity and efficiency. Management also need to set objectives for the employees to meet the level of expected action within the organization. According to Vitez (2009) â€Å"objectives should be clear, measurable and realistic† (p.1). Event identification This refers both on the internal and external circumstances. The organization identifies possible events that may affect negatively and positively on achieving its goals and objectives. Some of the internal categories originally from the choices of management; Operational risk, Empowerment risks, Information technology risk, Integrity risk, Financial risk, and decision risk. â€Å"The objective of risk identification is the early and continuous identification of events that, if they occur, will have negative impacts on the project’s ability to achieve performance or capability outcome goals† (Mitre Institute, 2007, p.1). Risk assessment with particular reference to the impact and likelihood risk The risk are identified, studied its impact, and the basis for determining how to solve and managed them. It’s a combination of qualitative and quantitative in order to determined and analyse how to managed and prioritize risk. The risk are ranked by levels this can help the managers to know and visualize future effects. First level is the Low exposition area refers to not significant situation that may be controlled, this usually can solve within the organization among the team. Second level Medium exposition area, this refers fair or not so urgent attention. The impact can be high and or low risk, but should managed accordingly to prevent high impact and prevent the likelihood. Third level is the High exposition area, refer to risk that need urgent attention, critical importance and on top priorities. Risk response plans The organizations management select the alternative risk response and the effects on risk that have high probability to happen and also the impact on financial against the benefits. Developing sets of plans to avoid, lessen and accept the risk. The four possible risk ask avoidance, treating, transferring and tolerance. Avoidance refers to response where you avoid or exit the causes of risk. Treating where action is implemented to lessen or mitigate the risk of unfavourable impact. Transferring means reducing or decreasing the likelihood and impact of risk. One of the popular transferring response is insurance. Tolerance refers to no action taken to the present risk. The organization must able to treat risk to know its causes and evaluate whether to manage or tolerate it according to convenience and opportunity of the response. Control activities Building strong actions plans, policies and procedures to be implemented to make sure the response to risk has positive and favourable outcome. This are also the policies and procedures build and implemented to make sure the risk action are has favourable outcome. Different type of control are preventive controls, manual controls, management controls and others. The control activities are part of the procedures by every organization to reach their objectives. It is the foundation for all other categories and components of internal control, gives discipline and structure. Information and communication It is important for the organization to have exchange of information that are relevant to risk identification and this should communicated within the organization. Effective communication and reporting is very vital to the organization’s risk management. The information can also be assessed through quality such as accurate, accessible, current and timely. The communication is also by shared mission and process, successful both informal and informal internal communication and external communication such as stakeholders. Poor communication has a big impact on the organization through increase of mistake and errors and increases stress and fears among the staff. On other hand, the effective communication of gives success within the facilities. Monitoring This is evaluation and assessment of the quality performance of the organization. This can be done by activities and different evaluation or can be both. The effectiveness of the organization or healthcare facilities on risk management should be monitored, to able to response properly, changes may implement, and to avoid crisis that may cause losses of the business. â€Å" If there was a health care risk management solution that could monitor any changes in criminal history or licensure status and instantly alert the employer if there has been new incident, that tool could be immensely helpful. (Wisjesinghe, 2010, p.1) This is really important because it can give information to the management for effectiveness and efficiency of the program. Also by means of monitoring the situation is always under control. Reference list: Garvey, P.R. (2013) Risk Identification retrieved from https://www.mitre.org/publications/systems-engineering-guide/acquisition-systems-engineering/risk-management/risk-identification Hall, S. ( 2015) The Role of Risk Management in Healthcare Operations retrieved from http://www.psfinc.com/press/the-role-of-risk-management-in-healthcare-operations Hiatt, C. (2011) 5 Tangible benefits of an Effective Risk Management Program retrieved from http://www.beckersasc.com/asc-accreditation-and-patient-safety/5-tangible-benefits-of-an-effective-risk-management-program.html Vitez, O. (2009) The Importance of Setting Business Objectives retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/importance-setting-business-objectives-4724.html Wijesinghe, D. (2010) Healthcare Risk Management : What’s your biggest exposure? Retrieved from http://hr.toolbox.com/blogs/really-know-your-contractors/healthcare-risk-management-whats-your-biggest-exposure-37663  © The International Academy of New Zealand 2013 DHM706 International Healthcare Policy Version 7Page 1 Assessment moderated on 12 August 2013

Drug Testing in the Workplace Essay -- Pre-Employment Drug Testing

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Drug testing has become a very big issue for many companies. Approximately eighty-one percent of companies in the United States administer drug testing to their employees. Of these, seventy-seven percent of companies test employees prior to employment. Even with the commonality of drug testing, it is still a practice that is generally limited to larger corporations which have the financial stability, as well as the human resources to effectively carry out a drug testing program. In the United States, it is suggested that as many as 70 percent of drug users are employed. Now this is a huge chunk, but as a result of drug testing, these big corporations have a significantly lower percentage of the employed drug users on their workforce. Inversely, medium to smaller companies tend to have more. United States companies, who employ more than five hundred workers, employ only 1.3 percent of the employed drug users, while medium size companies, employing only twenty-five to five hundred employees, have 43 percent of the employed drug users on their payroll, and smaller companies, with fewer than twenty-five employees, provide jobs for the remaining 44 percent.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Now, why is it important for companies to perform drug tests? First, drug users are a third less productive than the average employee, and tend to take more sick days. They are almost four times more likely to cause an on the job accident and injure themselves as well as someone else. They are also five times more likely to injure themselves outside of the workplace, which in turn affects both performance and attendance. Now I?m sure almost everyone can attest to the fact that drugs, including alcohol can cause some serious injuries. A study by the United States Postal Service found that substance abusers, when compared to their non-substance abusing co-workers, are involved in 55 percent more accidents, and sustain 85 percent more on-the-job injuries? (Why Drug Test). Another study conducted by the National Council reports that ?80 percent of those injured in ?serious? drug-related accidents at work are not the drug abusing employees but non-using co-workers and others? (Why Drug Test). All of these facts relate back to the general duty of the employers to provide a safe work environment for all of their employees. Companies also want to create a safe, productive work environment in order ... ...Spring 2002.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   8.) Bryan Jr., Leslie A. ?Drug Testing in the Workplace.? Professional Safety. Oct.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  2010.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   9.) Pryweller, Joseph. ?Insurers, States, Offer Incentives for Testing.? Plastics News.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  18 June 2001.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   10.) Professional Services of America. Drug Free Workplace Policy.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   11.) Bixby, Michael; Dudley-Beck, Caryn; Cihon, Patrick. The Legal Environment of Business. Prentice Hall: Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, 2001.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   12.) Supreme Court Reporter October Term 2009 Volume 109 A. West Publishing   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Company: St. Paul, Minnesota, 2009.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   13.) ?Drug Testing in the Workplace.? The American Civil Liberties Union.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  http://www.aclu.org/library/pbp5.html. 21 May 2002.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   14.) Daniels, Susan. ?Drug-testing Cuts Accident Costs: Study.? National   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Underwriter (Property and Casualty/Risk and Benefits Management   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Edition v. 101). 23 June 2007.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   15.) Elkin, Sam. ?How to Establish a Drug-free Workplace.? Occupational Hazards v. 61. March 2011.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   16.) Thatcher, Mike. ?Chemical Warfare.? People Management. 24 Oct. 2010. 17.) ?Why Drug Test Laboratory Corporation of America 2003

The Central Question of Hamlet Essay -- Essays on Shakespeare Hamlet

The Central Question of Hamlet  Ã‚      Hamlet's tragedy is a tragedy of failure-the failure of a man placed in critical circumstances to deal successfully with those circumstances. In some ways, Hamlet reminds us of Brutus in Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar." Hamlet and Brutus are both good men who live in trying times; both are intellectual, even philosophical; both men want to do the right thing; both men intellectualize over what the right thing is; neither man yields to passion. But here the comparison ends, for though both Brutus and Hamlet reflect at length over the need to act, Brutus is able immediately to act while Hamlet is not. Hamlet is stuck "thinking too precisely on th' event-". Hamlet's father, the king of Denmark, has died suddenly. The dead king's brother,Claudius, marries Hamlet's mother and swiftly assumes the throne, a throne that Hamlet fully expected would be his upon the death of his father. Hamlet's father's ghost confronts Hamlet and tells him that his death was not natural, as reported, but instead was murder. Hamlet swears revenge. But rather than swoop instantly to that revenge, Hamlet pretends to be insane in order to mask an investigation of the accusation brought by his father's ghost. Why Hamlet puts on this "antic disposition" and delays in killing Claudius is the central question of the play. But Hamlet did not swear to his dead father that he, detective-like, would investigate. Hamlet swore revenge. And he has more than enough motivation to exact revenge. Does it not, think thee, stand me now upon- He that hath killed my king, and whored my mother; Popped in between th' election and my hopes, Thrown out his angle for my proper life, And with such cozenage-is't not perfect cons... ...play that is flawed, not our understanding of it. The central question of the play is, then, a question without an answer if one is seeking the answer within the play. Shakespeare was supposed to supply us with an answer, or at least with a reason why there is no answer. He offers us neither. Instead, this most celebrated of Shakespeare's plays offers us a literary mystery which has captured the attention of all who have come into contact with it. It's time to file the question under "Unsolved Mysteries." But for those who persist in analyzing the plot of the drama, or Hamlet's psychology, or both in order to explain this particular enigma, I suggest that you're looking in the wrong place. Try history.    Works Cited    *A. C. Bradley, "Shakespeare's Tragic Period-Hamlet," Shakespearean Tragedy, MacMillan and Company Limited, 1904, pp. 70-101   

Hero Essay -- essays research papers

As a person grows so do the things they hold dear to themselves and the things they look up to. Heroes take many forms when we are children, from the comic book superhero to the imaginary friend. As we grow from children to young adults our heroes change to those more tangible, movie stars or athletes. When we reach adulthood, the definition of hero becomes clear and our heroes become those that we love and can look up to. It took me a while to realize it but my hero is an 83 year old woman. In 1986, at the ripe age of 6, I was given the news that a big storm was coming. As a child the news of a big storm frightened me, I was paralyzed by the fear of being struck by lightning. The sky became unsettled, a shade of gray that left even the brightest spirit longing. The rains came hard and fast, the thunder and lightning along with it. Shortly after the wind began to pick up. I had seen The Wizard of Oz and became extremely worried that our entire apartment building would be ripped from the foundation and taken to some far off world. At the pinnacle of the storm there was a knock at the door. Of course I didn’t hear the knock because it’s hard to hear when you have your ears plugged so as to avoid the thunder. It was Auntie Lou, everyones favorite babysitter. With rain cap on her head and umbrella in hand, she had braved the storm to come visit my sister and I. With a joyful look on her face Lou asks if anyone wanted to go for a walk. Had anyone els...

New Manager Stumbles Case Analysis Essay

Suggest some options for Goldstone at this point. What might he do to help himself achieve success in his current situation?  First, Goldstone must think back about what he has done in the last 6 months and analyze his own performance. In this way, he can find out what mistake he has made in his management ; also, he needs to figure out the reasons for why he was making mistakes. Afterwards, he needs to face the reality and encourage himself to ask people who is on higher level when he does not know what to do. For example, in this situation, he needs to stop being defensive and reluctant of talking with Ludlow. Instead, he needs to use his valuable experience to help him propose a solid plan and discuss with Ludlow. The conversation between him and Ludlow was not helpful for both his and the company’s development. Therefore, they need to both realize the problem and start to cooperate with each other in order to create a double-win situation for them. Secondly, it will be an great asset for Goldstone if he can find a mentor within the company or the company could assign a mentor who had sufficient experience to help Goldstone out. Indeed, the company had many training programs and also the employee development training seminar which allowed the managers to sit together and exchange their thoughts and experience. However, the training program was all about theory and was really difficult for managers to put it into action; also, the training seminar were not effective as all the managers were just feeling sympathized but not sharing any useful management advice with each other. In order to find out an effective way to solve the current problems, he needs to talk with a mentor whom he can consult from. Moreover, company needs to let him know that the mentor is more than welcome to consult him and answer his questions. Through this way, Goldstone can articulate the company’s strategy and benefit for a long term. Furthermore, Goldstone can suggest the executive level to develop more practical training and management skills for the new managers. In this way, Goldstone can have a better relationship with  executive level people as they can see Goldstone are putting efforts to this company; also, it is good for Bulwark’s long term development. Last, Goldstone needs to work on his people management. In addition to consulting from his potential mentors and Ludlow, he needs to figure out a way to manage the sales rep working for him. Instead of simply managing and instructing them what to do, he needs to maintain a good relationship with them. In other words, he needs to get respect from them and get trust from them. He needs to apply golden rule and think for his sales rep which can help him avoid accidents like losing Puckett happen again. Also, he needs to use his courage and his strength to win the respect from his best sales rep Tony Skrow. As Skrow is the most successful sales rep in his team, winning the respect and trust from him can help Goldstone getting the entire control of the whole team.

Population Problem in Bangladesh Essay

Bangladesh is one of the world’s most densely populated countries with 150 million people, 49 percent of whom live below the national poverty line. In addition, child malnutrition rate rates of 48 percent, in condition that is tied to the low social status of women in Bangladeshi society. Contents 1 General overview of the Bangladesh economy 2 Rural and urban poverty 3 Causes of rural and urban poverty 4 Environmental problems and poverty 5 Implications of poverty in Bangladesh 6 See also 7 References General overview of the Bangladesh economy In Bangladesh, there are many problems like, poor infrastructure, political instability, corruption,and insufficient power supplies etc,†Ã¢â‚¬  but the Bangladesh economy has grown 5-6% per year since 1996. However, Bangladesh still remains a poor, overpopulated, and inefficiently-governed nation with about 45% of the Bangladeshis being employed in the agriculture sector.[1] Rural and urban poverty Bangladesh is one of the world’s poorest countries. Bangladesh has to depend on international help. Since the 1990s, there has been a declining trend of poverty by 1% each year, with the help of international assistance.[2] According to World Bank in 2005, 40% of the population was still be below the national poverty line.[3] The population in Bangladesh is predominantly rural, with almost 80% of the population living in the rural areas.[4] Many of them live in remote areas that lack services such as education, health clinics and adequate roads, particularly road links to markets.[2] A low estimate of 20% of the rural poor is in chronic poverty. They suffer from persistent food insecurity, own no land and assets, are often uneducated and may also suffer serious illnesses or disabilities. Another 29% of the rural population is considered moderately poor. Though they may own a small plot of land and some livestock and generally have enough to eat, their diets lack nutritional values. As a result of health problems or natural disasters, they are at risk of sliding deeper into poverty. Women are among the poorest of the rural poor, especially when they are the sole heads of their households. They suffer discrimination, have few earning opportunities and their nutritional intake is often inadequate.[2] In the urban areas, there is about 37% of the urban population living below national poverty line.[5] For those living in urban areas, especially the capital Dhaka, and major industrial cities such as Chittagong, Khulna, and Rajshahi, they enjoy a better standard of living, with electricity, gas, and clean water supplies. Despite this, there is still a significant proportion of Bangladeshis living in slums that fall apart during the monsoon season and have no regular electricity, limited access to health care and to clean drinking water.[6] Causes of rural and urban poverty One of the main causes of rural poverty is due the country’s geographical and demographic characteristics. A large proportion of the country is low-lying, and thus is at a high risk to flooding. Many of the rural poor live in areas that are prone to extreme annual flooding which cause huge damage to their crops, homes and livelihoods. In order to rebuild their homes, they often have to resort to moneylenders, and that causes them to fall deeper into poverty. In addition, these natural disasters also cause outbreaks of cholera and other waterborne and diarrheal diseases such as dengue and malaria which will affect them physically and lower their productivity levels.[2][4][7] Another cause of rural poverty is due to the fast growing population rate. It places huge pressure on the environment, causing problems such as erosion and flooding, which in turn leads to low agricultural productivity. The causes of urban poverty are due to the limited employment opportunities, degraded environment, and bad housing and sanitation. The urban poor hold jobs that are labor demanding, thus affecting their health conditions. Therefore, the urban poor are in a difficult situation to escape poverty.[7] Environmental problems and poverty With 80% of the country situated on the flood plains of the Ganges, Brahmaputra, Meghna and those of several other minor rivers, the country is prone to severe flooding. While some flooding is beneficial to agriculture, high levels of flooding have been found to be a retardant on agricultural growth.[8] On average, 16% of household income per year is lost due to flooding, with roughly 89% of the loss in property and assets. Of these, households engaged in farming and fishing suffer a greater loss relative to income.[9] A positive relationship exists between flood risk and poverty as measured by household income, with people living under the poverty threshold facing a higher risk of flooding, as measured by their proximity to rivers and flood depth.[9] Property prices also tend to be lower the higher the risk of flooding,[10] making it more likely that someone who lives in a flood-prone area is poor and vice versa, as they might not be able to afford safer accommodation. Also, they tend to depend solely or largely on crop cultivation and fisheries for their livelihood and thus are harder hit by floods relative to their income. Important to the finances of farmers operating small farms is their self-sufficiency in rice and floods adversely affect this factor, destroying harvests and arable land. Farmers hit are often forced to undertake distressed land selling[11] and in doing so, risk being pushed into or deeper into poverty. In areas hard hit by floods, especially disaster floods such as the 1988 flood, several researchers have found that many of the affected households have resorted to selling off assets such as land and livestock to mitigate losses.[12][13] Also, in an area hard-hit by poverty and prone to floods, it was found that many of the poor were unwilling to pay for flood protection. The main reason cited had been lack of financial resources although it was found that many of these people are willing to substitute non-financial means of payment such as labour, harvest or part of their land[13] The above is problematic as it creates a vicious cycle for the poor of Bangladesh. Because the poor may not be able to afford safer housing, they have to live near the river which raises their risk of flooding. This would result in greater damage suffered from the floods, driving the poor into selling assets and pushing them further into poverty. They would be further deprived of sufficient resources needed to prevent extensive damage from flooding, resulting in even more flood damage and poverty. It then becomes even harder to escape this cycle. Even those farmers slightly above the poverty line are but just one bad flood away from the ranks of the poor. Implications of poverty in Bangladesh The Gross National Income (GNI) per capita measured in 2008 prices is a staggering low of US $520 while GNI Purchasing Power Parity per capita is US $1440 (2008).[14] This is a dismal figure when compared to other developed economies. Even though the poverty rate in Bangladesh has been decreasing, it is doing so at a slow rate of less than 2% per year.[15] 49% of the population still remains below the poverty line. Poverty matters because it affects many factors of growth – education, population growth rates, health of the workforce and public policy. Poverty is most concentrated in the rural areas of Bangladesh, hence creating disparities between the rural and urban areas. However, urban poverty remains a problem too. In particular, poverty has been linked strongly to education and employment. Research papers published by the Bangladesh Institute of Studies (BIDS) have shown that poverty acts as both a cause and effect of a lack of education, which in turn adversely affects employment opportunities. Having an unskilled workforce also greatly decreases the productivity of the workforce which decreases the appeal of Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) and thus impedes sustainable economic growth. In essence, education is an important contribution to the social and economic development of a country. Secondly, rising landlessness is also a consequence of poverty in Bangladesh. In the year 2000, among the poorest of the poor – the poorest 20 percent of the population – four out of five owned less than half an acre of land. Not only did many own no acreage at all, but landlessness has been increasing in rural Bangladesh along with the number of small and marginal farms.[16] The 2000 HIES found nearly half (48 percent) of the country’s rural population to be effectively landless, owning at most 0.05 acres. Roughly three-fifths of all households in the two poorest quintiles fell into that category. Lastly, for the chronic poor, issues such as food security and health hamper social mobility. According to a study done by the World Bank on Dhaka, the poor suffers from a lack of proper healthcare in their areas due to the expensive and poor quality health care services.[17] The poverty stricken areas either do not have the available facilities, or can only afford low quality healthcare. This is a problem that is common in both the rural and urban poor. For the urban poor, the problem has worsened as they can only afford to stay in slums where there are problems of overcrowding and unhygienic living conditions. These two factors results in the spread of diseases amongst the poor whom cannot afford better healthcare. Also, one cannot deny that a healthy and well-fed citizen is better suited for increased productivity as part of the workforce. Thus, poverty matters because it affects the social welfare of citizens.

Fulcher of Chartes:Pope Urban’s Speech at Clermont Essay

8.4 Fulcher of Chartres, â€Å"Pope Urban II’s Speech at Clermont† As the crusades began, Christians gathered to hear the insightful speech given by Pope Urban II in which he was able take unruly knights and give them a common enemy to fight. The enemies were the Muslims and Turks who were attacking the Byzantine Empire and the Holy Land. Urban II’s speech gave insights to the knightly class who were engaging in warlike tendencies and encouraged them to help people in need. On November 27, 1095, Pope Urban II began his influential speech to the church officials and nobles who were in attendance. In the beginning of his speech, Urban II said that he was given permission by God to come and speak to them about what was going on. The situations that were going on in the Christian society included the knightly class fighting each other, raping young women, robbing the churches, and other unseemly activities. Pope Urban II told them that in order to become â€Å"frien ds† with God, they would have to do things that were pleasing to God. These included leaving all matters that revolved around the church to the leaders of the church, and if they [the knights] were to rob the leaders of the church they will be cursed. At this point of his speech Pope Urban II is building up to the main reason for this call to order. Urban II informed his audience that the people of the Byzantine Empire were in need of their help, and it was their duty to help them. He explained to his listeners that the Turks and the Arabs have conquered the Byzantine Empire and taken over the Christian lands. Pope Urban II told the people that Christ commands them to help the Byzantine Empire regardless of their social class. â€Å"On this account I, or rather the Lord beseech you as Christ’s heralds† (358). Pope Urban II went on to say that whoever was to die in battle or die in any other kind of way, they would receive forgiveness for their sins. This is saying that no matter what they have done in the past, they would be forgiven for it all. Urban II continued to convince the people at his speech to help the Byzantine Empire defeat the Turks and Arabs and win back the Christian territory. This would lead to what is now called the First  Crusade. Crusade began in the fall of 1096 in Constantinople where crusaders gathered. The crusaders included the knights and people of Byzantine Empire. The Crusaders began to march through territories controlled by the Turks and Arabs which included Edessa and Antioch. They continued to head to Jerusalem in June 1099. The crusaders the n proceeded on a â€Å"five-week siege of Jerusalem† which fell in July of 1099. Crusaders then took over cities along the Mediterranean coast and built â€Å"fortified castle all over the Holy Land to protect their new territories† (Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History). The crusaders defeated the Egyptian relief army in August 1099. Pope Urban II died on July 29, 1099 and was not able to see the victory of reclaiming Jerusalem. Fulcher of Chartres clearly exemplified that he was bias towards Pope Urban II’s speech. Although he was there to hear the speech, he did not record the speech until years later. This proves that he truly believed in what Pope Urban II was protesting. Not only did Urban II’s speech help to reclaim the Christian lands, it also encouraged the knightly class and others listeners to reconnect with God’s laws and commandments. The First Crusades were not the ending of the battles, there was a second and third crusade. The crusaders failed in the second crusade, and had a dismal failure in the third crusade. These battles show that the Christian warriors had wanted to have what was rightfully Christ’s, and would not stop at any cost until they had it. Works Cited Chartres, Fulcher Of, trans. â€Å"Pope Urban II’s Speech at Clermont† p. 357-359 Mason, Ohio: Cengage Learning, 2012. Print. Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters. â€Å"The Crusades (1095–1291)†. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/crus/hd_crus.htm (October 2001)

Professional Development of Nursing Professionals Essay

In this day and age when medicine becomes more technological and industry driven, nursing needs to find its new role in the rapidly transforming healthcare system. In 2010 the Institute of Medicine (IOM) published proposals about remodeling of nursing in the U.S. – â€Å"The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health.† This report points out to the need for changes in education, expanding practice, and demonstrating leadership in nursing. This modification will have a strong effect on the nursing in future and will contribute to changes of scope and standards of practice. Impact of the IOM Report on Nursing Education In regards to nursing education IOM report proclaim, â€Å"nurses should achieve higher levels of education and training through improved education system that promotes seamless academic progression.† (IOM Report, 2010). Today healthcare system is advancing rapidly and requires from all caregivers to improve their knowledge and specialization. The training and education that was given in the past to the nurses does not satisfy the demands of modern days and need to changed dramatically to allow them to keep up with rapidly changing scope of todays medicine. Nowadays, ever-growing complexity of patients demands from nurses to achieve a higher level of education in order to deliver a higher-quality patient care. To achieve this goal nursing schools have to develop new educational model, that provide competencies in decision making, quality improvement, systematic thinking, and team leadership. Another recommendation that IOM repot promotes to raise the proportion of BSN graduates among of the nurses to 80% by the end of 2020 (IOM, 2010). An increase in the percentage of nurses with a bachelor degree would help to manage a challenging and increasingly diverse healthcare environment. Impact of the IOM Report on Practice, Particularly in Primary care Nowadays, the health care system starts to focus on the new ways to provide patient-centered care by delivering more primary care and working on education of communities by promoting disease prevention and healthy lifestyles. Nurses now qualified to provide these services, since they have enough scientific knowledge and training. Regrettably, however this welcomed change is hindered by various restrictions coming from outdated policies and rules. These restrictions prevent nurses to deliver services to the patient and community in the full capacity. The IOM report advice to redesign the roles of nurses to satisfy the need for improved and safe service to the public. The report also advised to revise the outdated standards of practice and eliminate the obstacles to maximize the contribution to the community that nurses can make. Impact of the IOM Report on Nursing Role as a Leader Public is not used to seeing the nurse as a leader, mostly because of historical and rather stereotyped role of a nurse as a physician extender. However, in a constantly changing climate of a healthcare reform and increasing power of entities such as insurance companies, nurses cannot stay passive any longer if they want to continue to be relevant. â€Å"Because nurses have regular and close proximity to patients and scientific understanding of care processes across the continuum of care, they have a unique ability to act as partners with other health professionals and to lead in the improvement and redesign of the health care system and its many practice environments, including hospitals, schools, homes.† states in IOM recommendation. A unique nurses role as a patient advocate combined with a stronger leadership role that they ought to embrace is indispensible in order to form new health care policies that put patient in the center of the discussion. Changing Your Practice to Meet the Goals of the IOM Report Another key point of IOM report is to promote a high level education in the nursing. I am working toward achieving my goal and receiving Bachelor degree in nursing. I’m an operating nurse with more than fifteen years of an experience. Over many years of my practice I have achieved a high level of skill in many different areas of my profession. Now looking back I have a renewed appreciation to all the nursing educators that trained me so well and equipped me with tools to strife for continued self-improvement. I feel that now is my turn to pass on the torch and make sure that the future generation of nurses with rip from my experience and knowledge. Current concerning trend in the nursing is an acute deficiency in experienced locally educated nurses. As stated by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing,† U.S. nursing schools turned away 78,089 qualified applicants from baccalaureate and graduate nursing programs in 2013 due to an insufficient number of faculty,† (AACN, 2014). I fully intend to use my BSN education to embark on the difficult role as a nurse educator initially on my workplace and possibly later in a nursing academic institution In summary, an academic nursing education is an important evolution in my profession since it equips me with knowledge, skills and tools to continue to provide better patient care in safer environment, take part in shaping future health care policies and pass on my knowledge in an efficient way. References American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN). (2014). Nursing Faculty Shortage. Washington, DC Retrieved from: http://www.aacn.nche.edu/media-relations/fact-sheets/nursing-faculty-shortage Institute of Medicine of the National Academies (IOM). (2010). The future of nursing: Leading change, advancing health. Retrieved from: http://iom.edu/Reports/2010/The-Future-of-Nursing-Leading-Change-Advancing-Health.aspx

An Analysis of The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

Her first novel, The Edible Woman, was published in 1969 to wide acclaim. Atwood continued teaching as her literary career blossomed. She has lectured widely and has served as a writer-in–residence at colleges ranging from the University of Toronto to Macquarie University in Australia. Atwood wrote The Handmaid’s Tale in West Berlin and Alabama in the mid-1980s. The novel, published in 1986, quickly became a best-seller. The Handmaid’s Tale falls squarely within the twentieth-century tradition of anti-utopian, or â€Å"dystopian† novels, exemplified by classics like Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s 1984. Novels in this genre present imagined worlds and societies that are not ideals, but instead are terrifying or restrictive. Atwood’s novel offers a strongly feminist vision of dystopia. She wrote it shortly after the elections of Ronald Reagan in the United States and Margaret Thatcher in Great Britain, during a period of conservative revival in the West partly fueled by a strong, well-organized movement of religious conservatives who criticized what they perceived as the excesses of the â€Å"sexual revolution† of the 1960s and 1970s. The growing power of this â€Å"religious right† heightened feminist fears that the gains women had made in previous decades would be reversed. In The Handmaid’s Tale, Atwood explores the consequences of a reversal of women’s rights. In the novel’s nightmare world of Gilead, a group of conservative religious extremists has taken power and turned the sexual revolution on its head. Feminists argued for liberation from traditional gender roles, but Gilead is a society founded on a â€Å"return to traditional values† and gender roles, and on the subjugation of women by men. What feminists considered the great triumphs of the 1970s—namely, widespread access to contraception, the legalization of abortion, and the increasing political influence of female voters—have all been undone. Women in Gilead are not only forbidden to vote, they are forbidden to read or write. Atwood’s novel also paints a picture of a world undone by pollution and infertility, reflecting 1980s fears about declining birthrates, the dangers of nuclear power, and -environmental degradation. Some of the novel’s concerns seem dated today, and its implicit condemnation of the political goals of America’s religious conservatives has been criticized as unfair and overly paranoid. Nonetheless, The Handmaid’s Tale remains one of the most powerful recent portrayals of a totalitarian society, and one of the few dystopian novels to examine in detail the intersection of politics and sexuality. The novel’s exploration of the controversial politics of reproduction seems likely to guarantee Atwood’s novel a readership well into the twenty-first century. Atwood lives in Toronto with novelist Graeme Gibson and their daughter, Jess. Her most recent novel, The Blind Assassin, won Great Britain’s Booker Prize for literature in 2000. Plot Overview Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead, a totalitarian and theocratic state that has replaced the United States of America. Because of dangerously low reproduction rates, Handmaids are assigned to bear children for elite couples that have trouble conceiving. Offred serves the Commander and his wife, Serena Joy, a former gospel singer and advocate for â€Å"traditional values. † Offred is not the narrator’s real name—Handmaid names consist of the word â€Å"of† followed by the name of the Handmaid’s Commander. Every month, when Offred is at the right point in her menstrual cycle, she must have impersonal, wordless sex with the Commander while Serena sits behind her, holding her hands. Offred’s freedom, like the freedom of all women, is completely restricted. She can leave the house only on shopping trips, the door to her room cannot be completely shut, and the Eyes, Gilead’s secret police force, watch her every public move. As Offred tells the story of her daily life, she frequently slips into flashbacks, from which the reader can reconstruct the events leading up to the beginning of the novel. In the old world, before Gilead, Offred had an affair with Luke, a married man. He divorced his wife and married Offred, and they had a child together. Offred’s mother was a single mother and feminist activist. Offred’s best friend, Moira, was fiercely independent. The architects of Gilead began their rise to power in an age of readily available pornography, prostitution, and violence against women—when pollution and chemical spills led to declining fertility rates. Using the military, they assassinated the president and members of Congress and launched a coup, claiming that they were taking power temporarily. They cracked down on women’s rights, forbidding women to hold property or jobs. Offred and Luke took their daughter and attempted to flee across the border into Canada, but they were caught and separated from one another, and Offred has seen neither her husband nor her daughter since. After her capture, Offred’s marriage was voided (because Luke had been divorced), and she was sent to the Rachel and Leah Re-education Center, called the Red Center by its inhabitants. At the center, women were indoctrinated into Gilead’s ideology in preparation for becoming Handmaids. Aunt Lydia supervised the women, giving speeches extolling Gilead’s beliefs that women should be subservient to men and solely concerned with bearing children. Aunt Lydia also argued that such a social order ultimately offers women more respect and safety than the old, pre-Gilead society offered them. Moira is brought to the Red Center, but she escapes, and Offred does not know what becomes of her. Once assigned to the Commander’s house, Offred’s life settles into a restrictive routine. She takes shopping trips with Ofglen, another Handmaid, and they visit the Wall outside what used to be Harvard University, where the bodies of rebels hang. She must visit the doctor frequently to be checked for disease and other complications, and she must endure the â€Å"Ceremony,† in which the Commander reads to the household from the Bible, then goes to the bedroom, where his Wife and Offred wait for him, and has sex with Offred. The first break from her routine occurs when she visits the doctor and he offers to have sex with her to get her pregnant, suggesting that her Commander is probably infertile. She refuses. The doctor makes her uneasy, but his proposition is too risky—she could be sent away if caught. After a Ceremony, the Commander sends his gardener and chauffeur, Nick, to ask Offred to come see him in his study the following night. She begins visiting him regularly. They play Scrabble (which is forbidden, since women are not allowed to read), and he lets her look at old magazines like Vogue. At the end of these secret meetings, he asks her to kiss him. During one of their shopping trips, Ofglen reveals to Offred that she is a member of â€Å"Mayday,† an underground organization dedicated to overthrowing Gilead. Meanwhile, Offred begins to find that the Ceremony feels different and less impersonal now that she knows the Commander. Their nighttime conversations begin to touch on the new order that the Commander and his fellow leaders have created in Gilead. When Offred admits how unhappy she is, the Commander remarks, â€Å"[Y]ou can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. † After some time has gone by without Offred becoming pregnant, Serena suggests that Offred have sex with Nick secretly and pass the child off as the Commander’s. Serena promises to bring Offred a picture of her daughter if she sleeps with Nick, and Offred realizes that Serena has always known the whereabouts of Offred’s daughter. The same night that Offred is to sleep with Nick, the Commander secretly takes her out to a club called Jezebel’s, where the Commanders mingle with prostitutes. Offred sees Moira working there. The two women meet in a bathroom, and Offred learns that Moira was captured just before she crossed the border. She chose life in Jezebel’s over being sent to the Colonies, where most political prisoners and dangerous people are sent. After that night at Jezebel’s, Offred says, she never sees Moira again. The Commander takes Offred upstairs after a few hours, and they have sex in what used to be a hotel room. She tries to feign passion. Soon after Offred returns from Jezebel’s, late at night, Serena arrives and tells Offred to go to Nick’s room. Offred and Nick have sex. Soon they begin to sleep together frequently, without anyone’s knowledge. Offred becomes caught up in the affair and ignores Ofglen’s requests that she gather information from the Commander for Mayday. One day, all the Handmaids take part in a group execution of a supposed rapist, supervised by Aunt Lydia. Ofglen strikes the first blow. Later, she tells Offred that the so-called rapist was a member of Mayday and that she hit him to put him out of his misery. Shortly thereafter, Offred goes out shopping, and a new Ofglen meets her. This new woman is not part of Mayday, and she tells Offred that the old Ofglen hanged herself when she saw the secret police coming for her. At home, Serena has found out about Offred’s trip to Jezebel’s, and she sends her to her room, promising punishment. Offred waits there, and she sees a black van from the Eyes approach. Then Nick comes in and tells her that the Eyes are really Mayday members who have come to save her. Offred leaves with them, over the Commander’s futile objections, on her way either to prison or to freedom—she does not know which. The novel closes with an epilogue from 2195, after Gilead has fallen, written in the form of a lecture given by Professor Pieixoto. He explains the formation and customs of Gilead in objective, analytical language. He discusses the significance of Offred’s story, which has turned up on cassette tapes in Bangor, Maine. He suggests that Nick arranged Offred’s escape but that her fate after that is unknown. She could have escaped to Canada or England, or she could have been recaptured. Character List Offred – The narrator and protagonist of The Handmaid’s Tale. Offred belongs to the class of Handmaids, fertile women forced to bear children for elite, barren couples. Handmaids show which Commander owns them by adopting their Commanders’ names, such as Fred, and preceding them with â€Å"Of. Offred remembers her real name but never reveals it. She no longer has family or friends, though she has flashbacks to a time in which she had a daughter and a husband named Luke. The cruel physical and psychological burdens of her daily life in Gilead torment her and pervade her narrative. Read an in-depth analysis of Offred. The Commander – The Commander is the head o f the household where Offred works as a Handmaid. He initiates an unorthodox relationship with Offred, secretly playing Scrabble with her in his study at night. He often seems a decent, well-meaning man, and Offred sometimes finds that she likes him in spite of herself. He almost seems a victim of Gilead, making the best of a society he opposes. However, we learn from various clues and from the epilogue that the Commander was actually involved in designing and establishing Gilead. Read an in-depth analysis of The Commander. Serena Joy – The Commander’s Wife, Serena worked in pre-Gilead days as a gospel singer, then as an anti-feminist activist and crusader for â€Å"traditional values. In Gilead, she sits at the top of the female social ladder, yet she is desperately unhappy. Serena’s unhappiness shows that her restrictive, male-dominated society cannot bring happiness even to its most pampered and powerful women. Serena jealously guards her claims to status and behaves cruelly toward the Handmaids in her household. Read an in-depth analysis of Serena Joy. Moira – Offred’s best friend from college, Moira i s a lesbian and a staunch feminist; she embodies female resourcefulness and independence. Her defiant nature contrasts starkly with the behavior of the other women in the novel. Rather than passively accept her fate as a Handmaid, she makes several escape attempts and finally manages to get away from the Red Center. However, she is caught before she can get out of Gilead. Later, Offred encounters Moira working as a prostitute in a club for the Commanders. At the club, Moira seems resigned to her fate, which suggests that a totalitarian society can grind down and crush even the most resourceful and independent people. Read an in-depth analysis of Moira. Aunt Lydia – The Aunts are the class of women assigned to indoctrinate the Handmaids with the beliefs of the new society and make them accept their fates. Aunt Lydia works at the â€Å"Red Center,† the re? education center where Offred and other women go for instruction before becoming Handmaids. Although she appears only in Offred’s flashbacks, Aunt Lydia and her instructions haunt Offred in her daily life. Aunt Lydia’s slogans and maxims drum the ideology of the new society into heads of the women, until even those like Offred, women who do not truly believe in the ideology, hear Gilead’s words echoing in their heads. Nick – Nick is a Guardian, a low-level officer of Gilead assigned to the Commander’s home, where he works as a gardener and chauffeur. He and Offred have a sexual chemistry that they get to satisfy when Serena Joy orchestrates an encounter between them in an effort to get Offred pregnant. After sleeping together once, they begin a covert sexual affair. Nick is not just a Guardian; he may work either as a member of the Eyes, Gilead’s secret police, or as a member of the underground Mayday resistance, or both. At the end of the novel, Nick orchestrates Offred’s escape from the Commander’s home, but we do not know whether he puts her into the hands of the Eyes or the resistance. Ofglen – Another Handmaid who is Offred’s shopping partner and a member of the subversive â€Å"Mayday† underground. At the end of the novel, Ofglen is found out, and she hangs herself rather than face torture and reveal the names of her co-conspirators. Cora – Cora works as a servant in the Commander’s household. She belongs to the class of Marthas, infertile women who do not qualify for the high status of Wives and so work in domestic roles. Cora seems more content with her role than her fellow Martha, Rita. She hopes that Offred will be able to conceive, because then she will have a hand in raising a child. Janine – Offred knows Janine from their time at the Red Center. After Janine becomes a Handmaid, she takes the name Ofwarren. She has a baby, which makes her the envy of all the other Handmaids in the area, but the baby later turns out to be deformed—an â€Å"Unbaby†Ã¢â‚¬â€and there are rumors that her doctor fathered the child. Janine is a conformist, always ready to go along with what Gilead demands of her, and so she endears herself to the Aunts and to all authority figures. Offred holds Janine in contempt for taking the easy way out. Luke – In the days before Gilead, Luke had an affair with Offred while he was married to another woman, then got a divorce and became Offred’s husband. When Gilead comes to power, he attempts to escape to Canada with Offred and their daughter, but they are captured. He is separated from Offred, and the couple never see one another again. The kind of love they shared is prohibited in Gilead, and Offred’s memories of Luke contrast with the regimented, passionless state of male-female relations in the new society. Offred’s mother – Offred remembers her mother in flashbacks to her pre-Gilead world—she was a single parent and a feminist activist. One day during her education at the Red Center, Offred sees a video of her mother as a young woman, yelling and carrying a banner in an anti-rape march called Take Back the Night. She embodies everything the architects of Gilead want to stamp out. Aunt Elizabeth – Aunt Elizabeth is one of the Aunts at the Red Center. Moira attacks her and steals her Aunt’s uniform during her escape from the Red Center. Rita – A Martha, or domestic servant, in the Commander’s household. She seems less content with her lot than Cora, the other Martha working there. Professor Pieixoto – The guest speaker at the symposium that takes place in the epilogue to The Handmaid’s Tale. He and another academic, working at a university in the year 2195, transcribed Offred’s recorded narrative; his lecture details the historical significance of the story that we have just read. Analysis of Major Characters Offred Offred is the narrator and the protagonist of the novel, and we are told the entire story from her point of view, experiencing events and memories as vividly as she does. She tells the story as it happens, and shows us the travels of her mind through asides, flashbacks, and digressions. Offred is intelligent, perceptive, and kind. She possesses enough faults to make her human, but not so many that she becomes an unsympathetic figure. She also possesses a dark sense of humor—a graveyard wit that makes her descriptions of the bleak horrors of Gilead bearable, even enjoyable. Like most of the women in Gilead, she is an ordinary woman placed in an extraordinary situation. Offred is not a hero. Although she resists Gilead inwardly, once her attempt at escape fails, she submits outwardly. She is hardly a feminist champion; she had always felt uncomfortable with her mother’s activism, and her pre-Gilead relationship with Luke began when she became his mistress, meeting him in cheap hotels for sex. Although friends with Ofglen, a member of the resistance, she is never bold enough to join up herself. Indeed, after she begins her affair with Nick, she seems to lose sight of escape entirely and suddenly feels that life in Gilead is almost bearable. If she does finally escape, it is because of Nick, not because of anything she does -herself. Offred is a mostly passive character, good-hearted but complacent. Like her peers, she took for granted the freedoms feminism won and now pays the price. The Commander The Commander poses an ethical problem for Offred, and consequently for us. First, he is Offred’s Commander and the immediate agent of her oppression. As a founder of Gilead, he also bears responsibility for the entire totalitarian society. In person, he is far more sympathetic and friendly toward Offred than most other people, and Offred’s evenings with the Commander in his study offer her a small respite from the wasteland of her life. At times, his unhappiness and need for companionship make him seem as much a prisoner of Gilead’s strictures as anyone else. Offred finds herself feeling sympathy for this man. Ultimately, Offred and the reader recognize that if the Commander is a prisoner, the prison is one that he himself helped construct and that his prison is heaven compared to the prison he created for women. As the novel progresses, we come to realize that his visits with Offred are selfish rather than charitable. They satisfy his need for companionship, but he doesn’t seem to care that they put Offred at terrible risk, a fact of which he must be aware, given that the previous Handmaid hanged herself when her visits to the Commander were discovered. The Commander’s moral blindness, apparent in his attempts to explain the virtues of Gilead, are highlighted by his and Offred’s visit to Jezebel’s. The club, a place where the elite men of the society can engage in recreational extramarital sex, reveals the rank hypocrisy that runs through Gileadean society. Offred’s relationship with the Commander is best represented by a situation she remembers from a documentary on the Holocaust. In the film, the mistress of a brutal death camp guard defended the man she loved, claiming that he was not a monster. â€Å"How easy it is to invent a humanity,† Offred thinks. In other words, anyone can seem human, and even likable, given the right set of circumstances. But even if the Commander is likable and can be kind or considerate, his responsibility for the creation of Gilead and his callousness to the hell he created for women means that he, like the Nazi guard, is a monster. Serena Joy Though Serena had been an advocate for traditional values and the establishment of the Gileadean state, her bitterness at the outcome—being confined to the home and having to see her husband copulating with a Handmaid—suggests that spokeswomen for anti-feminist causes might not enjoy getting their way as much as they believe they would. Serena’s obvious unhappiness means that she teeters on the edge of inspiring our sympathy, but she forfeits that sympathy by taking out her frustration on Offred. She seems to possess no compassion for Offred. She can see the difficulty of her own life, but not that of another woman. The climactic moment in Serena’s interaction with Offred comes when she arranges for Offred to sleep with Nick. It seems that Serena makes these plans out of a desire to help Offred get pregnant, but Serena gets an equal reward from Offred’s pregnancy: she gets to raise the baby. Furthermore, Serena’s offer to show Offred a picture of her lost daughter if she sleeps with Nick reveals that Serena has always known of Offred’s daughter’s whereabouts. Not only has she cruelly concealed this knowledge, she is willing to exploit Offred’s loss of a child in order to get an infant of her own. Serena’s lack of sympathy makes her the perfect tool for Gilead’s social order, which relies on the willingness of women to oppress other women. She is a cruel, selfish woman, and Atwood implies that such women are the glue that binds Gilead. Moira Throughout the novel, Moira’s relationship with Offred epitomizes female friendship. Gilead claims to promote solidarity between women, but in fact it only produces suspicion, hostility, and petty tyranny. The kind of relationship that Moira and Offred maintain from college onward does not exist in Gilead. In Offred’s flashbacks, Moira also embodies female resistance to Gilead. She is a lesbian, which means that she rejects male-female sexual interactions, the only kind that Gilead values. More than that, she is the only character who stands up to authority directly by make two escape attempts, one successful, from the Red Center. The manner in which she escapes—taking off her clothes and putting on the uniform of an Aunt—symbolizes her rejection of Gilead’s attempt to define her identity. From then on, until Offred meets up with her again, Moira represents an alternative to the meek subservience and acceptance of one’s fate that most of the Handmaids adopt. When Offred runs into Moira, Moira has been recaptured and is working as a prostitute at Jezebel’s, servicing the Commanders. Her fighting spirit seems broken, and she has become resigned to her fate. After embodying resistance for most of the novel, Moira comes to exemplify the way a totalitarian state can crush even the most independent spirit. Themes, Motifs Symbols Themes Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work. Women’s Bodies as Political Instruments Because Gilead was formed in response to the crisis caused by dramatically ecreased birthrates, the state’s entire structure, with its religious trappings and rigid political hierarchy, is built around a single goal: control of reproduction. The state tackles the problem head-on by assuming complete control of women’s bodies through their political subjugation. Women cannot vote, hold property or jobs, read, or do anything else that might allow them to become subv ersive or independent and thereby undermine their husbands or the state. Despite all of Gilead’s pro-women rhetoric, such subjugation creates a society in which women are treated as subhuman. They are reduced to their fertility, treated as nothing more than a set of ovaries and a womb. In one of the novel’s key scenes, Offred lies in the bath and reflects that, before Gilead, she considered her body an instrument of her desires; now, she is just a mound of flesh surrounding a womb that must be filled in order to make her useful. Gilead seeks to deprive women of their individuality in order to make them docile carriers of the next generation. Language as a Tool of Power Gilead creates an official vocabulary that ignores and warps reality in order to serve the needs of the new society’s elite. Having made it illegal for women to hold jobs, Gilead creates a system of titles. Whereas men are defined by their military rank, women are defined solely by their gender roles as Wives, Handmaids, or Marthas. Stripping them of permanent individual names strips them of their individuality, or tries to. Feminists and deformed babies are treated as subhuman, denoted by the terms â€Å"Unwomen† and â€Å"Unbabies. † Blacks and Jews are defined by biblical terms (â€Å"Children of Ham† and â€Å"Sons of Jacob,† respectively) that set them apart from the rest of society, making their persecution easier. There are prescribed greetings for personal encounters, and to fail to offer the correct greetings is to fall under suspicion of disloyalty. Specially created terms define the rituals of Gilead, such as â€Å"Prayvaganzas,† â€Å"Salvagings,† and â€Å"Particicutions. † Dystopian novels about the dangers of totalitarian society frequently explore the connection between a state’s repression of its subjects and its perversion of language (â€Å"Newspeak† in George Orwell’s 1984 is the most famous example), and The Handmaid’s Tale carries on this tradition. Gilead maintains its control over women’s bodies by maintaining control over names. The Causes of Complacency In a totalitarian state, Atwood suggests, people will endure oppression willingly as long as they receive some slight amount of power or freedom. Offred remembers her mother saying that it is â€Å"truly amazing, what people can get used to, as long as there are a few compensations. † Offred’s complacency after she begins her relationship with Nick shows the truth of this insight. Her situation restricts her horribly compared to the freedom her former life allowed, but her relationship with Nick allows her to reclaim the tiniest fragment of her former existence. The physical affection and companionship become compensation that make the restrictions almost bearable. Offred seems suddenly so content that she does not say yes when Ofglen asks her to gather information about the Commander. Women in general support Gilead’s existence by willingly participating in it, serving as agents of the totalitarian state. While a woman like Serena Joy has no power in the world of men, she exercises authority within her own household and seems to delight in her tyranny over Offred. She jealously guards what little power she has and wields it eagerly. In a similar way, the women known as Aunts, especially Aunt Lydia, act as willing agents of the Gileadean state. They indoctrinate other women into the ruling ideology, keep a close eye out for rebellion, and generally serve the same function for Gilead that the Jewish police did under Nazi rule. Atwood’s message is bleak. At the same time as she condemns Offred, Serena Joy, the Aunts, and even Moira for their complacency, she suggests that even if those women mustered strength and stopped complying, they would likely fail to make a difference. In Gilead the tiny rebellions of resistances do not necessarily matter. In the end, Offred escapes because of luck rather than resistance. Motifs Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes. Rape and Sexual Violence Sexual violence, particularly against women, pervades The Handmaid’s Tale. The prevalence of rape and pornography in the pre-Gilead world justified to the founders their establishment of the new order. The Commander and the Aunts claim that women are better protected in Gilead, that they are treated with respect and kept safe from violence. Certainly, the official penalty for rape is terrible: in one scene, the Handmaids tear apart with their bare hands a supposed rapist (actually a member of the resistance). Yet, while Gilead claims to suppress sexual violence, it actually institutionalizes it, as we see at Jezebel’s, the club that provides the Commanders with a ready stable of prostitutes to service the male elite. Most important, sexual violence is apparent in the central institution of the novel, the Ceremony, which compels Handmaids to have sex with their Commanders. Religious Terms Used for Political Purposes Gilead is a theocracy—a government in which there is no separation between state and religion—and its official vocabulary incorporates religious terminology and biblical references. Domestic servants are called â€Å"Marthas† in reference to a domestic character in the New Testament; the local police are â€Å"Guardians of the Faith†; soldiers are â€Å"Angels†; and the Commanders are officially â€Å"Commanders of the Faithful. All the stores have biblical names: Loaves and Fishes, All Flesh, Milk and Honey. Even the automobiles have biblical names like Behemoth, Whirlwind, and Chariot. Using religious terminology to describe people, ranks, and businesses whitewashes political skullduggery in pious language. It provides an ever-present reminder that the founders of Gilead insist they act on the authority of the Bible itself. Politics and religion sleep in the same bed in Gilead, where the slogan â€Å"God is a National Resource† predominates. Similarities between Reactionary and Feminist Ideologies Although The Handmaid’s Tale offers a specifically feminist critique of the reactionary attitudes toward women that hold sway in Gilead, Atwood occasionally draws similarities between the architects of Gilead and radical feminists such as Offred’s mother. Both groups claim to protect women from sexual violence, and both show themselves willing to restrict free speech in order to accomplish this goal. Offred recalls a scene in which her mother and other feminists burn porn magazines. Like the founders of Gilead, these feminists ban some expressions of sexuality. Gilead also uses the feminist rhetoric of female solidarity and â€Å"sisterhood† to its own advantage. These points of similarity imply the existence of a dark side of feminist rhetoric. Despite Atwood’s gentle criticism of the feminist left, her real target is the religious right. Symbols Symbols are objects, characters, figures, or colors used to represent abstract ideas or concepts. Cambridge, Massachusetts The center of Gilead’s power, where Offred lives, is never explicitly identified, but a number of clues mark it as the town of Cambridge. Cambridge, its neighboring city of Boston, and Massachusetts as a whole were centers for America’s first religious and intolerant society—the Puritan New England of the seventeenth century. Atwood reminds us of this history with the ancient Puritan church that Offred and Ofglen visit early in the novel, which Gilead has turned into a museum. The choice of Cambridge as a setting symbolizes the direct link between the Puritans and their spiritual heirs in Gilead. Both groups dealt harshly with religious, sexual, or political deviation. Harvard University Gilead has transformed Harvard’s buildings into a detention center run by the Eyes, Gilead’s secret police. Bodies of executed dissidents hang from the Wall that runs around the college, and Salvagings (mass executions) take place in Harvard Yard, on the steps of the library. Harvard becomes a symbol of the inverted world that Gilead has created: a place that was founded to pursue knowledge and truth becomes a seat of oppression, torture, and the denial of every principle for which a university is supposed to stand. The Handmaids’ Red Habits The red color of the costumes worn by the Handmaids symbolizes fertility, which is the caste’s primary function. Red suggests the blood of the menstrual cycle and of childbirth. At the same time, however, red is also a traditional marker of sexual sin, hearkening back to the scarlet letter worn by the adulterous Hester Prynne in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s tale of Puritan ideology. While the Handmaids’ reproductive role supposedly finds its justification in the Bible, in some sense they commit adultery by having sex with their Commanders, who are married men. The wives, who often call the Handmaids sluts, feel the pain of this sanctioned adultery. The Handmaids’ red garments, then, also symbolize the ambiguous sinfulness of the Handmaids’ position in Gilead. A Palimpsest A palimpsest is a document on which old writing has been scratched out, often leaving traces, and new writing put in its place; it can also be a document consisting of many layers of writing simply piled one on top of another. Offred describes the Red Center as a palimpsest, but the word actually symbolizes all of Gilead. The old world has been erased and replaced, but only partially, by a new order. Remnants of the pre-Gilead days continue to infuse the new world. The Eyes The Eyes of God are Gilead’s secret police. Both their name and their insignia, a winged eye, symbolize the eternal watchfulness of God and the totalitarian state. In Gilead’s theocracy, the eye of God and of the state are assumed to be one and the same. Chapters 1–3 Summary: Chapter 1 The narrator, whose name we learn later is Offred, describes how she and other women slept on army cots in a gymnasium. Aunt Sara and Aunt Elizabeth patrol with electric cattle prods hanging from their leather belts, and the women, forbidden to speak aloud, whisper without attracting attention. Twice daily, the women walk in the former football field, which is surrounded by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. Armed guards called Angels patrol outside. While the women take their walks, the Angels stand outside the fence with their backs to the women. The women long for the Angels to turn and see them. They imagine that if the men looked at them or talked to them, they could use their bodies to make a deal. The narrator describes lying in bed at night, quietly exchanging names with the other women. Summary: Chapter 2 The scene changes, and the story shifts from the past to the present tense. Offred now lives in a room fitted out with curtains, a pillow, a framed picture, and a braided rug. There is no glass in the room, not even over the framed picture. The window does not open completely, and the windowpane is shatterproof. There is nothing in the room from which one could hang a rope, and the door does not lock or even shut completely. Looking around, Offred remembers how Aunt Lydia told her to consider her circumstances a privilege, not a prison. Handmaids, to which group the narrator belongs, dress entirely in red, except for the white wings framing their faces. Household servants, called â€Å"Marthas,† wear green uniforms. â€Å"Wives† wear blue uniforms. Offred often secretly listens to Rita and Cora, the Marthas who work in the house where she lives. Once, she hears Rita state that she would never debase herself as someone in Offred’s position must. Cora replies that Offred works for all the women, and that if she (Cora) were younger and had not gotten her tubes tied, she could have been in Offred’s situation. Offred wishes she could alk to them, but Marthas are not supposed to develop relationships with Handmaids. She wishes that she could share gossip like they do—gossip about how one Handmaid gave birth to a stillborn, how a Wife stabbed a Handmaid with a knitting needle out of jealousy, how someone poisoned her Commander with toilet cleaner. Offred dresses for a shopping trip. She c ollects from Rita the tokens that serve as currency. Each token bears an image of what it will purchase: twelve eggs, cheese, and a steak. Summary: Chapter 3 On her way out, Offred looks around for the Commander’s Wife but does not see her. The Commander’s Wife has a garden, and she knits constantly. All the Wives knit scarves â€Å"for the Angels at the front lines,† but the Commander’s Wife is a particularly skilled knitter. Offred wonders if the scarves actually get used, or if they just give the Wives something to do. She remembers arriving at the Commander’s house for the first time, after the two couples to which she was previously assigned â€Å"didn’t work out. † One of the Wives in an earlier posting secluded herself in the bedroom, purportedly drinking, and Offred hoped the new Commander’s Wife would be different. On the first day, her new mistress told her to stay out of her sight as much as possible, and to avoid making trouble. As she talked, the Wife smoked a cigarette, a black-market item. Handmaids, Offred notes, are forbidden coffee, cigarettes, and alcohol. Then the Wife reminded Offred that the Commander is her husband, permanently and forever. â€Å"It’s one of the things we fought for,† she said, looking away. Suddenly, Offred recognized her mistress as Serena Joy, the lead soprano from Growing Souls Gospel Hour, a Sunday-morning religious program that aired when Offred was a child. Analysis: Chapters 1–5 The Handmaid’s Tale plunges immediately into an unfamiliar, unexplained world, using unfamiliar terms like â€Å"Handmaid,† â€Å"Angel,† and â€Å"Commander† that only come to make sense as the story progresses. Offred gradually delivers information about her past and the world in which she lives, often narrating through flashbacks. She narrates these flashbacks in the past tense, which distinguishes them from the main body of the story, which she tells in the present tense. The first scene, in the gymnasium, is a flashback, as are Offred’s memories of the Marthas’ gossip and her first meeting with the Commander’s Wife. Although at this point we do not know what the gymnasium signifies, or why the narrator and other women lived there, we do gather some information from the brief first chapter. The women in the gymnasium live under the constant surveillance of the Angels and the Aunts, and they cannot interact with one another. They seem to inhabit a kind of prison. Offred likens the gym to a palimpsest, a parchment either erased and written on again or layered with multiple writings. In the gym palimpsest, Offred sees multiple layers of history: high school girls going to basketball games and dances wearing miniskirts, then pants, then green hair. Likening the gym to a palimpsest also suggests that the society Offred now inhabits has been superimposed on a previous society, and traces of the old linger beneath the new. In Chapter 2, Offred sits in a room that seems at first like a pleasant change from harsh atmosphere of the gymnasium. However, her description of her room demonstrates that the same rigid, controlling structures that ruled the gym continue to constrict her in this house. The room is like a prison in which all means of defense, or escape by suicide or flight, have been removed. She wonders if women everywhere get issued exactly the same sheets and curtains, which underlines the idea that the room is like a government-ordered prison. We do not know yet what purpose Offred serves in the house, although it seems to be sexual—Cora comments that she could have done Offred’s work if she hadn’t gotten her tubes tied, which implies that Offred’s function is reproductive. Serena Joy’s coldness to Offred makes it plain that she considers Offred a threat, or at least an annoyance. We do know from Offred’s name that she, like all Handmaids, is considered state property. Handmaids’ names simply reflect which Commander owns them. â€Å"Of Fred,† â€Å"Of Warren,† and â€Å"Of Glen† get collapsed into â€Å"Offred,† â€Å"Ofwarren,† and â€Å"Ofglen. † The names make more sense when preceded by the word â€Å"Property†: â€Å"Property Offred,† for example. Thus, every time the women hear their names, they are reminded that they are no more than property. These early chapters establish the novel’s style, which is characterized by considerable physical description. The narrator devotes attention to the features of the gym, the Commander’s house, and Serena Joy’s pinched face. Offred tells the story in nonlinear fashion, following the temporal leaps of her own mind. The narrative goes where her thoughts take it—one moment to the present, in the Commander’s house, and the next back in the gymnasium, or in the old world, the United States as it exists in Offred’s memory. We do not have the sense, as in some first-person narratives, that Offred is composing this story from a distanced vantage point, reflecting back on her past. Rather, all of her thoughts have a quality of immediacy. We are there with Offred as she goes about her daily life, and as she slips out of the present and thinks about her past. Chapters 4–6 Summary: Chapter 4 As she leaves the house to go shopping, Offred notices Nick, a Guardian of the Faith, washing the Commander’s car. Nick lives above the garage. He winks at Offred—an offense against -decorum— but she ignores him, fearing that he may be an Eye, a spy assigned to test her. She waits at the corner for Ofglen, another Handmaid with whom Offred will do her shopping. The Handmaids always travel in pairs when outside. Ofglen arrives, and they exchange greetings, careful not to say anything that isn’t strictly orthodox. Ofglen says that she has heard the war is going well, and that the army recently defeated a group of Baptist rebels. â€Å"Praise be,† Offred responds. They reach a checkpoint manned by two young Guardians. The Guardians serve as a routine police force and do menial labor. They are men too young, too old, or just generally unfit for the army. Young Guardians, such as these, can be dangerous because they are frequently more fanatical or nervous than older guards. These young Guardians recently shot a Martha as she fumbled for her pass, because they thought she was a man in disguise carrying a bomb. Offred heard Rita and Cora talking about the shooting. Rita was angry, but Cora seemed to accept the shooting as the price one pays for safety. At the checkpoint, Offred subtly flirts with one of the Guardians by making eye contact, cherishing this small infraction against the rules. She considers how sex-starved the young men must be, since they cannot marry without permission, masturbation is a sin, and pornographic magazines and films are now forbidden. The Guardians can only hope to become Angels, when they will be allowed to take a wife and perhaps eventually get a Handmaid. This marks the first time in the novel we hear the word â€Å"Handmaid† used. Summary: Chapter 5 In town, Ofglen and Offred wait in line at the shops. We learn the name of this new society: â€Å"The Republic of Gilead. † Offred remembers the pre-Gilead days, when women were not protected: they had to keep their doors closed to strangers and ignore catcalls on the street. Now no one whistles at women as they walk; no one touches them or talks to them. She remembers Aunt Lydia explaining that more than one kind of freedom exists, and that â€Å"[i]n the days of anarchy, it was freedom to. Now you are being given freedom from. † The women shop at stores known by names like All Flesh and Milk and Honey. Pictures of meat or fruit mark the stores, rather than lettered signs, because â€Å"they decided that even the names of shops were too much temptation for us. † A Handmaid in the late stages of pregnancy enters the store and raises a flurry of excitement. Offred recognizes her from the Red Center. She used to be known as Janine, and she was one of Aunt Lydia’s favorites. Now her name is Ofwarren. Offred senses that Janine went shopping just so she could show off her pregnancy. Offred thinks of her husband, Luke, and their daughter, and the life they led before Gilead existed. She remembers a prosaic detail from their everyday life together: she used to store plastic shopping bags under the sink, which annoyed Luke, who worried that their daughter would get one of the bags caught over her head. She remembers feeling guilty for her carelessness. Offred and Ofglen finish their shopping and go out to the sidewalk, where they encounter a group of Japanese tourists and their interpreter. The tourists want to take a photograph, but Offred says no. Many of the interpreters are Eyes, and Handmaids must not appear immodest. Offred and Ofglen marvel at the women’s exposed legs, high heels, and polished toenails. The tourists ask if they are happy, and since Ofglen does not answer, Offred replies that they are very happy. Summary: Chapter 6 This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary. (See Important Quotations Explained) As they return from shopping, Ofglen suggests they take the long way and pass by the church. It is an old building, decorated inside with paintings of what seem to be Puritans from the colonial era. Now the former church is kept as a museum. Offred describes a nearby boathouse, old dormitories, a football stadium, and redbrick sidewalks. Atwood implies that Offred is walking across what used to be the campus of Harvard University. Across the street from the church sits the Wall, where the authorities hang the bodies of executed criminals as examples to the rest of the Republic of Gilead. The authorities cover the men’s heads with bags. One of the bags looks painted with a red smile where the blood has seeped through. All of the six corpses wear signs around their necks picturing fetuses, signaling that they were executed for performing abortions before Gilead came into existence. Although their actions were legal at the time, their crimes are being punished retroactively. Offred feels relieved that none of the bodies could be Luke’s, since he was not a doctor. As she stares at the bodies, Offred thinks of Aunt Lydia telling them that soon their new life would seem ordinary. Analysis: Chapters 4–6 The theocratic nature of Offred’s society, the name of which we learn for the first time in these chapters, becomes clear during her shopping trip. A theocracy exists when there is no separation between church and state, and a single religion dominates all aspects of life. In Gilead, state and religion are inseparable. The official language of Gilead uses many biblical terms, from the various ranks that men hold (Angels, Guardians of the Faith, Commanders of the Faith, the Eyes of God), to the stores where Offred and Ofglen shop (Milk and Honey, All Flesh, Loaves and Fishes), to the names of automobiles (Behemoth, Whirlwind, Chariot). The very name â€Å"Gilead† refers to a location in ancient Israel. The name also recalls a line from the Book of Psalms: â€Å"there is a balm in Gilead. This phrase, we realize later, has been transformed into a kind of national motto. Atwood does not describe the exact details of Gilead’s state religion. In Chapter 2, Offred describes her room as â€Å"a return to traditional values. † The religious right in America uses the phrase â€Å"traditional values,† so Atwoo d seems to link the values of this dystopic society to the values of the Protestant Christian religious right in America. Gilead seems more Protestant than anything else, but its brand of Christianity pays far more attention to the Old Testament than the New Testament. The religious justification for having Handmaids, for instance, is taken from the Book of Genesis. We learn that neither Catholics nor Jews are welcome in Gilead. The former must convert, while the latter must emigrate to Israel or renounce their Judaism. Atwood seems less interested in religion than in the intersection between religion, politics, and sex. The Handmaid’s Tale explores the political oppression of women, carried out in the name of God but in large part motivated by a desire to control women’s bodies. Gilead sees women’s sexuality as dangerous: women must cover themselves from head to toe, for example, and not reveal their sexual attractions. When Offred attracts the Guardians, she feels this ability to inspire sexual attraction is the only power she retains. Every other privilege is stripped away, down to the very act of reading, which is forbidden. Women are not even allowed to read store signs. By controlling women’s minds, by not allowing them to read, the authorities more easily control women’s bodies. The patriarchs of Gilead want to control women’s bodies, their sex lives, and their reproductive rights. The bodies of slain abortionists on the Wall hammer home the point: feminists believe that women must have abortion rights in order to control their own bodies, and in Gilead, giving women control of their bodies is a horrifying crime. When Offred and Ofglen go to town to shop, geographical clues and street names suggest that they live in what was once Cambridge, Massachusetts, and that their walk takes them near what used to be the campus of Harvard University. The choice of Cambridge for the setting of The Handmaid’s Tale is significant, since Massachusetts was a Puritan stronghold during the colonial period of the United States. The Puritans were a persecuted minority in England, but when they fled to New England, they re-created the repression they suffered at home, this time casting themselves as the repressors rather than the repressed. They established an intolerant religious society in some ways similar to Gilead. Atwood locates her fictional intolerant society in a place founded by intolerant people. By turning the old church into a museum, and leaving untouched portraits of Puritan forebears, the founders of Gilead suggest their admiration for the old Puritan society. Chapters 7–9 Summary: Chapter 7 I would like to believe this is a story I’m telling. I need to believe it. I must believe it. Those who can believe that such stories are only stories have a better chance. (See Important Quotations Explained) At night, Offred likes to remember her former life. She recalls talking to her college friend, Moira, in her dorm room. She remembers being a child and going to a park with her mother, where they saw a group of women and a few men burning pornographic magazines. Offred has forgotten a large chunk of time, which she thinks might be the fault of an injection or pill the authorities gave her. She remembers waking up somewhere and screaming, demanding to know what they had done with her daughter. The authorities told Offred she was unfit, and her daughter was with those fit to care for her. They showed her a photograph of her child wearing a white dress, holding the hand of a strange woman. As she recounts these events, Offred imagines she is telling her story to someone, telling things that she cannot write down, because writing is forbidden. Summary: Chapter 8 Returning from another shopping trip, Ofglen and Offred notice three new bodies on the Wall. One is a Catholic priest and two are Guardians who bear placards around their necks that read â€Å"Gender Treachery. † This means they were hanged for committing homosexual acts. After looking at the bodies for a while, Offred tells Ofglen that they should continue walking home. They meet a funeral procession of Econowives, the wives of poorer men. One Econowife carries a small black jar. From the size of the jar, Offred can tell that it contains a dead embryo from an early miscarriage—one that came too early to know whether it was an â€Å"Unbaby. † The Econowives do not like the Handmaids. One woman scowls, and another spits at the Handmaids as they pass. At the corner near the Commander’s home, Ofglen says â€Å"Under His Eye,† the orthodox good-bye, hesitating as if she wants to say more but then continuing on her way. When Offred reaches the Commander’s driveway she passes Nick, who breaks the rules by asking her about her walk. She says nothing and goes into the house. She sees Serena Joy out in the garden and recalls how after Serena’s singing career ended, she became a spokesperson for respecting the â€Å"sanctity of the home† and for women staying at home instead of working. Serena herself never stayed at home, because she was always out giving speeches. Once, Offred remembers, someone tried to assassinate Serena but killed her secretary instead. Offred wonders if Serena is angry that she can no longer be a public figure, now that what she advocated has come to pass and all women, including her, are confined to the home. In the kitchen, Rita fusses over the quality of the purchases as she always does. Offred retreats upstairs and notices the Commander standing outside her room. He is not supposed to be there. He nods at her and retreats. Summary: Chapter 9 Offred remembers renting hotel rooms and waiting for Luke to meet her, before they were married, when he was cheating on his first wife. She regrets that she did not fully appreciate the freedom to have her own space when she wanted it. Thinking of the problems she and Luke thought they had, she realizes they were truly happy, although they did not know it. She remembers examining her room in the Commander’s house little by little after she first arrived. She saw stains on the mattress, left over from long-ago sex, and she discovered a Latin phrase freshly scratched into the floor of the closet: Nolite te bastardes carborundorum. Offred does not understand Latin. It pleases her to imagine that this message allows her to commune with the woman who wrote it. She pictures this woman as freckly and irreverent, someone like Moira. Later, she asks Rita who stayed in her room before her. Rita tells her to specify which one, implying that there were a number of Handmaids before her. Offred says, guessing, â€Å"[t]he lively one . . . with freckles. † Rita asks how Offred knew about her, but she refuses to tell Offred anything about the previous Handmaid beyond a vague statement that she did not work out. Analysis: Chapter 7–9 Atwood suggests that those who seek to restrict sexual expression, whether they are feminists or religious conservatives, ultimately share the same goal—the control of sexuality, particularly women’s sexuality. In the flashback to the scene from Offred’s childhood in which women burn pornographic magazines, Atwood shows the similarity between the extremism of the left and the extremism of the right. The people burning magazines are feminists, not religious conservatives like the leaders of Gilead, yet their goal is the same: to crack down on certain kinds of sexual freedom. In other words, the desire for control over sexuality is not unique to the religious totalitarians of Gilead; it also existed in the feminist anti-pornography crusades that preceded the fall of the United States. Gilead actually appropriates some of the rhetoric of women’s liberation in its attempt to control women. Gilead also uses the Aunts and the Aunts’ rhetoric, forcing women to control other women. Again and again in the novel, the voice of Aunt Lydia rings in Offred’s head, insisting that women are better off in Gilead, free from exploitation and violence, than they were in the dangerous freedom of pre-Gilead times. In Chapter 7, Offred relates some of the details of how she lost her child. This loss is the central wound on Offred’s psyche throughout the novel, and the novel’s great source of emotional power. The loss of her child is so painful to Offred that she can only relate the story in fits and starts; so far the details of what happened have been murky. When telling stories from her past, like the story of her daughter’s disappearance, Offred often seems to draw on a partial or foggy memory. It almost seems as if she is remembering details from hundreds of years ago, when we know these things happened a few years before the narrative. Partly this distance is the product of emotional trauma—thinking of the past is painful for Offred. But in Chapter 7, Offred offers her own explanation for these gaps: she thinks it possible that the authorities gave her a pill or injection that harmed her memory. Immediately after remembering her daughter, Offred addresses someone she calls â€Å"you. † She could be talking to God, Luke, or an imaginary future reader. â€Å"I would like to believe this is a story I’m telling,† Offred says. â€Å"Those who can believe that such stories are only stories have a better chance . . A story is a letter. Dear You, I’ll say. † In the act of telling her imagined audience about her life, Offred reduces her life’s horror and makes its oppressive weight endurable. Also, if she can think of her life as a story and herself as the writer, she can think of her life as controllable, fictional, something not terrifying because not real. We learn in Chap ter 8 that Serena used to campaign against women’s rights. This makes her a figure worthy of pity, in a way; she supported the anti-woman principles on which Gilead was founded, but once they were mplemented, she found that they affected her as well as other women. She now lives deprived of freedom and saddled with a Handmaid who has sex with her husband. Yet Serena forfeits what pity we might feel for her by her callous, petty behavior toward Offred. Powerless in the world of men, Serena can only take out her frustration on the women under her thumb by making their lives miserable. In many ways, she treats Offred far worse than the Commander does, which suggests that Gilead’s oppressive power structure succeeds not just because men created it, but because women like Serena sustain it. Nolite te bastardes carborundorum—the Latin phrase scrawled in Offred’s closet by a previous Handmaid—takes on a magical importance for Offred even before she knows what it means. It symbolizes her inner resistance to Gilead’s tyranny and makes her feel like she can communicate with other strong women, like the woman who wrote the message. In Chapter 29 we learn what the phrase means, and its role in sustaining Offred’s resistance comes to seem perfectly appropriate. Chapters 10–12 Summary: Chapter 10 Offred often sings songs in her head—â€Å"Amazing Grace† or songs by Elvis. Most music is forbidden in Gilead, and there is little of it in the Commander’s home. Sometimes she hears Serena humming and listening to a recording of herself from the time when she was a famous gospel singer. Summer is approaching, and the house grows hot. Soon the Handmaids will be allowed to wear their summer dresses. Offred thinks about how Aunt Lydia would describe the terrible things that used to happen to women in the old days, before Gilead, when they sunbathed wearing next to nothing. Offred remembers Moira throwing an â€Å"underwhore† party to sell sexy lingerie. She remembers reading stories in the papers about women who were murdered and raped, but even in the old days it seemed distant from her life and unrelated to her. Offred sits at the window, beside a cushion embroidered with the word Faith. It is the only word they have given her to read, and she spends many minutes looking at it. From her window, she watches the Commander get into his car and drive away. Summary: Chapter 11 Offred says that yesterday she went to the doctor. Every month, a Guardian accompanies Offred to a doctor, who tests her for pregnancy and disease. At the doctor’s office, Offred undresses, pulling a sheet over her body. A sheet hangs down from the ceiling, cutting off the doctor’s view of her face. The doctor is not supposed to see her face or speak to her if he can help it. On this visit, though, he chatters cheerfully and then offers to help her. He says many of the Commanders are either too old to produce a child or are sterile, and he suggests that he could have sex with her and impregnate her. His use of the word â€Å"sterile† shocks Offred, for officially sterile men no longer exist. In Gilead, there are only fruitful women and barren women. Offred thinks him genuinely sympathetic to her plight, but she also realizes he enjoys his own empathy and his position of power. After a moment, she declines, saying it is too dangerous. If they are caught, they will both receive the death penalty. She tries to sound casual and grateful as she refuses, but she feels frightened. To revenge her refusal, the doctor could falsely report that she has a health problem, and then she would be sent to the Colonies with the â€Å"Unwomen. † Offred also feels frightened, she realizes, because she has been given a way out. Summary: Chapter 12 It is one of Offred’s required bath days. The bathroom has no mirror, no razors, and no lock on the door. Cora sits outside, waiting for Offred. Offred’s own naked body seems strange to her, and she finds it hard to believe that she once wore bathing suits, letting people see her thighs and arms, her breasts and buttocks. Lying in the bath, she thinks of her daughter and remembers the time when a crazy woman tried to kidnap the little girl in the supermarket. The authorities in Gilead took Offred’s then-five-year-old child from her, and three years have passed since then. Offred has no mementos of her daughter. She remember