The experiences of American Civil War Veterans in April 1865 Research Paper

The experiences of American Civil War Veterans in April 1865 - Research Paper Example Coming home after four years of war must have had a lasting impact on the veterans. Posttraumatic stress, loneliness and physical injury were some of the things they went through. In other words, they literally went through hell. It must have killed them inside to know that they had to put on a bright face to reassure their loved ones and the nation as well that everything was okay. As evidenced from the wide range of memoirs, autobiographies and civil war diaries present in the annals of American history, individual experiences of the soldiers varied. As their experiences varied, so did their sentiments, hopes and future aspiration. Perhaps, one thing that they shared was a sense of pride and nationalism. The war was finally over. Confederate General Robert Lee had surrendered his authority to the Union under LTG U.S. Grant on April 9, 1865. Background In order to achieve clarity, it is important to place the civil war into its proper historical context. This begins with an understa nding that the issue of slavery in the United States was in the center of the worst internal conflict the country has ever experienced. The plantation elite, most of who were in the South ripping the benefits of slavery and forced labor in their tobacco, wheat and sugarcane plantation lacked the enthusiasm to relinquish their slave. They openly opposed abolition and maintained that it was within their rights to own property. Their argument was that abolition was repugnant to the constitutional right to own property. However, due to the rise of humanitarianism, the issue of slave ownership came under sharp criticism amid calls for the abolition of slavery. The anti-slavery campaign was the ethical cornerstone of the Republican presidential campaign in 1860 spearheaded by Abraham Lincoln1. Upon ascension to presidency, Lincoln vowed to champion for the emancipation of all slaves in the spirit of protecting human dignity under the ‘all men are equal’ mantra. The subsequent election of Abraham Lincoln angered a section of Southern states for fear that Lincoln would make good on his abolition pledge. In 1861, South Carolina alongside ten other Southern states wrote to the federal government declaring their intention to secede from the continental USA. Subsequently, the eleven states declared their secession after forming the Confederate States of America. The period that ensued is considered the mother of all internal conflicts. The resultant series of upheavals claimed the lives of thousands of American civilians and soldiers and leaving property worth millions of dollars destroyed. Slavery was central in the American civil war since the South remained adamant to relinquish their slaves even after Lincoln issued the historic Emancipation Proclamation after provoking his presidential powers. The president pushed for the inclusion of emancipation in the constitutional definition of liberty2. This marked the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution. A frican American slaves fled from their owners and sought refuge in the Union camps as the war raged on. It is prudent to underscore the significance of the issue of slavery since it was the sole reason behind the conflict. April 1865 Going by the memoirs, books, journals and diaries of veteran soldiers, the period beginning April 9 to April 30 was poignantly etched in the minds of the entire nation. This was a period of uncertainty and the atmosphere was tense. Historians believe that

Business Models for High Tech Products Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Business Models for High Tech Products - Essay Example This limitation applies equally well to Apple’s other technological ventures such as the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad and others where it is obvious that Apple’s products target the upper segments of the market alone. This is more often done by Apple through differentiating their products with larger price tags for example the i-series of products from Apple is generally 30% or more priced from other market competitors. Whereas companies like Nokia have been ruling the market through domination of the underdog customer, Apple has chosen not to do so. Recently as other competitors have jumped into Nokia’s market share, the company has held steady because the lower end of the market is still firmly in its hand. In Apple’s case this is very different. Time and again Apple has found itself in troubled waters because Apple’s market segment (more appropriately targeted customer segment) has come under attack from other product makers. This has meant the bleeding of revenue to other competitors while Apple scrambles to innovate their products in the market segment under attack in order to keep relevant. The case of Windows 7 is very relevant in this regard. The introduction of Windows 7 hit the iOS market for computing solutions rather hard and Apple’s domestic computing solutions user drifted out of hand while Apple scrambled to recapture their interest. Had Apple been more diversified such as in the government and the corporate sectors, the threat would not have been that dangerous. Currently Apple derives most of its revenue from the mobile computing lineup consisting of the iPod, the iPad and the iPhone. The segment of mobile computing is expected to rise all the more in coming years as people would be looking for simple, lightweight mobile devices instead of grounded desktops and bulky laptops. The question now is how Apple plans to survive in an already crowded environment. Historically Apple has been providing its core and peripheral consumers with something new every other quarter or so but this run at innovation seems like dying down now. Future Course of Action Strangely enough Apple has always had the â€Å"Steve Jobs† stigma. As long as Mr. Jobs was online, Apple’s â€Å"applecart† seemed to move in the right direction. In this sense, Apple has always been a Jobs-centric company. The death of Steve Jobs in recent days might spell disaster for Apple as a company because previous runs with Jobs provide ground for such belief. Apple can already be seen entangled in a losing battle as the company’s most recent release the iPhone 4S was a complete disaster. The primary reason that the iPhone 2G succeeded was because it gave something to the market that was never there already even with the large variety on hand. Apple fanatics and others were all expecting Apple to come out with some new and innovative device that would once again revolutionize the world of smart phone s but Apple has failed to live up to these expectations. This serves as a beacon for Apple’s future course of action – the company should refrain from delivering half baked pizzas one after the other. The company needs to bring in something big and well planned and executed like Steve Jobs delivered the iPod lineage. For another thing, Apple needs to lower the price tags on its devices

Discussion board Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Discussion board - Essay Example Younger children might have suggested the best place for the third eye was the forehead, since they might not understand more abstract concepts other than current, real-life eye placement. The subject solved the problem with theoretical reasoning and provided a less tangible placement for the third eye that took into consideration the objective of the new third eye rather than simple function as a seeing tool. Piaget would likely reinforce that people in this stage of development would come up with unique solutions in this hypothetical situation without resorting to only obvious outcomes. Adults may not always reason according to Piaget’s theory due to many different factors, one of which is cultural beliefs that either promote or support abstract thinking. For example, family influence in a more docile and less motivated family structure might not have the same support network for education and creativity as other people. Social influence is important in human development. Ye s, ASU has helped in this effort. ASU challenges students to excel in learning and also to become motivated to consider alternative possibilities to unique problems. The college focuses on theoretical concepts that challenge more conceptual solutions to real-life problems in many classroom teachings.

Using a Cell Phone While Driving Essay Example for Free

Using a Cell Phone While Driving Essay Have you ever used a cell phone while driving? Is it dangerous or not? Using a cell phone while driving is common, but widely considered dangerous. We can’t imagine our life without using a cell phone. It is a part of our daily activities. We use a cell phone to make calls, E-mails, text massages, surf the Internet, to listen music’s and many other daily activities. Many of these activities take place while a person is driving. So, it is not only becoming a part of our daily activities, but also putting our life at risk. In my point of view, using a cell phone while driving increases the risk of accident. Using a cell phone while driving distracts our mind. Distraction is an important risk factor of traffic injuries. Suppose, you are holding your phone on your ear, listening to the conversation, and managing your car all at once. Youre not paying attention; you could miss a turn or not see something coming out into the road. This can be incredibly dangerous. Using a cell phone while driving distracts your mind obviously. It can cause your eyes off the road, hands off the steering wheel and mind off the sudden situation that can lead a dangerous accident and consequent may be sport death. Moreover, if you are speaking on cell phone being on the road you can not notice all traffic signals, may reach too close to other vehicle and find it very hard to keep a regular speed. That’s why you must remove your cell phone from steering wheel and have to keep your eyes on the road. So, calling, talking or reading a message on cell phone while driving distract your mind that can lead an accident. Using a cell phone while driving decrease performance level of the driver, no matter how excellent you are at driving. Driving is a skill that requires full attention of mind to safely control the vehicle. A cell phone conversation reduces that skills and you may forget lane keeping and changing, traffic rules, signals and cannot control the speed of your vehicle. One of my friend said that, he was almost killed on his motorcycle while trying to avoid being hit by reckless driver who was engaged on cell phone. So, talking on a cellphone while driving reduces the  competency level of control the vehicle as well as increases the probability of accident. Moreover, if you texting message while driving, you require a lot of focus on writing because you are constructing sentences. Often while texting, your eyes will leave the road. This is very dangerous, as a result you can hit a pedestrian, another vehicle and other hazard in the road. Engaging on a cell phone while driving is very risky task. A cell phone can distract your mind and reduce your driving skills. It will grab your attention and can easily lead to an accident. There is no doubt, using a cell phone while driving put your life at risk as well as other.

Change Management Plan :: Business Management Analysis

Change Management Plan Change is essential to today's business environment. If a company is to survive and succeed on a macro level, they should analyze and adopt the best overall plan for change on an enterprise level. When examining the best way to make changes in a company that will globally affect the company, it is usually best to look at the total picture before acting, lest the plan fail. This paper will briefly summarize four key areas that leaders and managers must understand in order to successfully make a change, or in the case of our model company CrysTel, manage change dynamically throughout the life of the company. In order to understand completely the change it wants to make, the company must understand the implications of the change and the human variables of change implementation. The company should also strive to understand how to monitor the progress of the change, and how to ensure the continued success of the change. The following paragraphs are an explanation of what CrysTel is, why i t needs to change, and how these four key areas can be manipulated to help it succeed in its dynamic need for change in the ever-changing environment it lives in. Implications of Organizational Change CrysTel is a telecommunications company that exists in a very dynamic environment, and it has the need for all aspects of itself to be dynamic and able to change relatively quickly. The upper management recently realized that CrysTel has the need to bring more products and services into its portfolio. That means that everybody who works for the company needs to be good at analyzing the best way to change, implementing a change, and sustaining the change. It also means that CrysTel employees need to change with the organization. In order for all of the employees to be good at the constant change that will be happening and be as dynamic as they need to be, they have to have good and dynamic leaders and managers to aid in the effort. Without the support from above, the employees will probably lose focus and the desire to see the company succeed (Miller et al, 2004). If the company does not prepare well, it might experience a high turnover rate as well. A study conducted by Lester Coch a nd John R.P. French showed that if a group of workers was not prepared for a change properly, that group exhibited a high turnover rate (Krietner & Kinicki, 2003).

Effects of Desertification

Environmental problems Of all the global environmental problems, desertification is, perhaps, the most threatening for poor rural people. The most accepted definition of desertification states that it is land degradation in arid, semiarid, and dry sub-humid areas resulting from various factors, including climatic variations and human activities. Drylands cover almost 40 percent of the total land surface of the world and are inhabited by approximately 1 billion humans dispersed over more than 100 countries. These people include many of the world's most vulnerable, marginalized, and politically weak citizens. In spite of the progress in the understanding of the ecological dimension of this phenomenon, few communities' wellbeing has improved by the myriad action plans and activities carried out by local, regional, or national organizations, particularly in Africa. A growing body of evidence suggests that a closer look at the social system and the role of its components is critical to understanding this frequent outcome. Drylands are characterized by water scarcity stemming from the conjunction of low water offer (i. e. , precipitation) and high water demand (i. . , water lost to the atmosphere as water vapor from soil via evaporation and from plants through transpiration). Drylands' precipitation is highly variable through the year and occurs in infrequent, discrete, and largely unpredictable events. In turn, the high evaporative demand of the atmosphere, resulting from high air temperatures, low humidity, and abundant solar radiation, determines that water availability is the dominant con trolling factor for biological processes such as plant growth and herbivore productivity. Thus drylands, though not barren, are ecosystems of low and highly variable productivity capable of limited human settlement and vulnerable to anthropogenic disturbance. The proximate causes of desertification are complex and vary from region to region. The European Mediterranean region has a long history of human misuse. War, urbanization, farming, and tourism have, over the years, altered vegetation to such an extent that, at present, virtually no natural vegetation exists there and soil erosion is ubiquitous. In contrast, Australian drylands have experienced extensive degradation only recently. The introduction of domestic livestock by Europeans in the late 1880s, together with the fences used to concentrate these animals and the suppression of fire, drastically reduced the abundance of perennial grasses, leaving more soil exposed to erosion by water or wind, and triggered shrub encroachment. In the Sahelian region of Africa, where the concept of desertification was first coined at the beginning of the 20th century, the replacement of the original vegetation by crops, the increase of grazing pressure over the remaining lands, and the collection of wood for fuel resulted in a reduction of the biological or economic productivity of the land. In particular, inappropriate use of heavy machinery, deficient irrigation schemes, and grazing management practices led to soil erosion, salinization, and overgrazing. Any attempt to assess the impact of desertification on human societies should first acknowledge the difference between the ways water-limited ecosystems shape the functioning of social systems and the effects of desertification itself. Desertification imposes an additional constraint on human well-being by further reducing the limited ecosystem goods (e. g. , food, timber, water) and services (e. g. , soil maintenance, erosion control, carbon sequestration) that drylands provide. Failure to address this difference would lead to an overestimation of the desertification effects. Additionally, the manifestations of desertification vary widely, depending on the capacity of each country to mitigate its impacts. For example, in Africa it resulted in declining productivity and intensifying food insecurity and widespread famines, whereas in the Mediterranean region desertification seriously threatens water supply, while many regions of northern Europe are experiencing an increase in dust deposition due to north African soil erosion. In poor countries with a large proportion of their territory in arid and semiarid regions, desertification may trigger a downward spiral where a significant amount of a nation's human and financial resources are devoted to combating past desertification effects, leaving less available to invest in health, education, industry, and governmental institutions. The ultimate precarious social conditions thus developed generally lead to migrations, exacerbating urban sprawl, and may bring about internal and cross-boundary social, ethnic, and political strife. Approaches to the desertification problem broadly fall into two competing perspectives: the predominant global environmental management (GEM) discourse and the populist discourse. Whereas the former discourse rests on neoliberal values and Malthusian thinking, the latter has its philosophical roots in the self-reliant advocacy derived from the dependency schools of the 1970s and 1980s. The GEM discourse depicts overpopulation in drylands as the main problem leading to the degradation of the ecosystems on which they depend. As seen in the GEM discourse, the global problem of desertification requires a global solution. Therefore, GEM supporters promote topdown, interventionist and technocentrist solutions implemented through international institutions and conventions, such as the UN Convention to Combat Desertification. On the contrary, the populist discourse–populist in the sense that it positively portrays the acts of local people–emphasizes that the marginalization of smallholders and pastoralists started during the colonial period and was subsequently deepened by global capitalism, transnational corporations, and northern consumers as the principal causes of land overexploitation and degradation. International assistance in the form of debt per nature exchanges or technological transferences is regarded as part of the problem itself. Rather, the populist discourse focuses on local or traditional knowledge and community-based action as major sources to overcome environmental problems. However, despite its diametrically opposed explanations of the desertification problem, neither discourse denies an impending crisis caused by desertification. Why, almost a century after its first detection, does desertification continue to be among the most important environmental problems faced by humankind? Though no single answer exists, there are some arguments to sketch an answer. Undoubtedly the inherent complexity of the desertification phenomenon hampers almost every phase of the sequence leading to the mitigation or control of an environmental problem (i. e. , first detection, general recognition, agreement on regulation). For instance, a long period elapsed between when French foresters first perceived what they called â€Å"the desert advance† and the widespread diffusion of the desertification tragedy that took place in the Sahelian region of Africa after a series of drought years at the beginning of the 1970s; today improvements in our understanding of rangelands functioning and climatic variability allow for faster detection and prevention. These advances show that vegetation dynamics in drylands may remain seemingly unaffected by an increase in land use pressure until there is a sudden shift to a lower-productivity stable state, with stochastic climate events, such as severe droughts, acting as triggers. Additionally, incomplete or inadequate scientific knowledge, together with the urgent need of integrative solutions for the Sahelian drama, may have driven actors to resort to the first workable options, leading to erroneous regulations at that time. However, regulations of this kind are not dependent on scientific knowledge alone but also on political pressure mechanisms. Thus an explanation of the failure to achieve sound regulation needs to consider political issues as well. The predominance of the GEM discourse, despite the poor performance of top-down solutions to â€Å"unsustainable† resource management, can be explained by its convenience for the interests of three main groups involved in the desertification issue: national governments, international aid donors, and scientists. National governments benefit not only from foreign financial aid but also from the use of desertification as the basis for severely repressive social control. International donors and institutions find the problem of desertification a reason unto itself for their involvement, whereas scientists may highlight the global nature and severity of the desertification problem as a means to obtain research funds. On the contrary, the bottom-up approaches promoted by the populist discourse do not fit the terms and conditions of bilateral and multilateral funding and instead stress the principles of participation and decentralization. It is apparent that the progress achieved in our comprehension of desertification has not been matched by an improvement in the regulations aimed at mitigating its consequences. While the accumulation of knowledge generated during the past decades provides evidence against both discourses' main tenets, they nonetheless remain influential in the political and scientific arenas. Future contributions to the solution of the desertification problem require the synthesis of recent social and ecological advances into a new synthetic framework that overcomes the constraints upon the solutions imposed by the GEM and populist discourses. Social scientists hope that a new desertification paradigm–that is, the dryland development paradigm, which represents a convergence of insights from both discourses–is emerging. Bibliography: 1) Adger, W. Neil, Tor A. Benjaminsen, Katrina Brown, and Hanne Svarstad. 2001. Advancing a Political Ecology of Global Environmental Discourses. † Development and Change 32:681-715. 2) Herrmann, Stefanie M. and Charles F. Hutchinson. 2005. â€Å"The Changing Contexts of the Desertification Debate. † Journal of Arid Environments 63:538-55. 3) Reynolds, James F. and D. Mark Stafford-Smith. 2002. Global Desertification: Do Humans Create Deserts? Berlin: Dahlem University Press. 4) Veron, Santiago R. , Jose M. Paruelo, and Martin Oesterheld. 2006. â€Å"Assessing Desertification. † Journal of Arid Environments 66:751-63.

Blue Like Jazz Conversion Stories

In the book Blue like Jazz there is a couple of conversion stories I would like to talk about. The first one comes from Chapter 4. It is the conversion of Millers friend Penny. Penny was a person who did not like Christians and Christianity based on the stereotypes that she had seen and the world has given to them. In the chapter it says that Penny wanted nothing to do with Christianity until she met a friend from her school. She went to college at the same place as miller, which is reed college, and after her freshman year she decided to study at a school in france. While there she was introduced to another student from Reed who she was very fond of and her name is Nadine. Nadine was a very nice person to Penny and listened to Penny’s childhood problems intently and with care. One night Nadine told Penny that she was a christian and Penny was very upset by it. She did not want to believe that this person that was so nice, kind and listened to her so well was a Christian because from her perspective of Christianity these were not traits of a Christian. Then when Penny started to think about it she found out that maybe Christianity has something to offer her. This was the beginning process of her conversion. She may not have changed her ways immediately but this way of thinking and meeting Nadine really opened up her mind to Christianity. Later in the book it goes to talk about how she converts after hearing the voice of God while she was high on drugs. This may or may not be true but personally I believe that it is. I think that God will come to people when they are most vulnerable and tell them straight up what they need to here. A couple of days later after hearing Gods voice she prayed and asked for forgiveness of her sins and that is the day that she converted. All that was left was a public display of conversion, also known as baptism.