A World Of Diversity Essays - Sociology Of Culture, Chauvinism

A World of Diversity Ethnocentric, derived from the Greek words of Ethnos, meaning race, people or cultural group, and Kentrikos, meaning concentrated about or directed to a center is a word that greatly describes many cultures on this planet we call Earth . The official definition of Ethnocentric is " characterized or based on the attitude that ones own group is superior" or "having race as a central interest". There is a whole world of problems, politics, and, other cultures, but it seems that the average American's only interest is that of themselves. The reason I chose to focus more on the American being ethnocentric is because I have been exposed the most to this culture. Why is it that in most foreign countries being knowledgeable about world politics is just as important as their own culture's politics? America is the melting pot of the world with so many different cultures and we accept this variety into our country as we were accepted when our ancestors came over. Today I feel that people are arrogant towards those foreigners who don't wash away their former demeanor. Why don't we realize that we are so lucky to live in a secure and free country that should glorify diversity and not promote prejudice. When we make contact with people whose beliefs and cultural tradition challenge our own perspective most feel some sort of intimidation. Professor Michael Bond from Simon Fraser University quoted: the mere existence of different others is inherently threatening because they either implicitly or explicitly challenge the absolute validity of one's own perspective. According to this analysis, prejudice is a psychological inability to tolerate the existence of different others and results from a need to maintain absolute faith in one's own cultural world view". Ethnocentrism in my opinion is very ignorant, unintelligent, and closed minded in that your normal rituals may seem just as strange to other cultures, but are seen by them in a more understanding way. Ethnocentrism has been instilled in us since birth, learning to attach our selves to our cultural groups depending on them for comfort and a sense of safety. Piaget's theory on child development states that a child believes he is the center of the universe until he learns to "de-center" himself, i.e., he realizes that the world can be constructed from a number of different perspectives. This is when the child starts to care for others and takes a better understanding of respect and friendliness towards them. People as a whole in a way have to "de-center" their strong cultural beliefs, as well as the thought that their culture is the only one important enough to concern themselves with. American sociologist, political economist and the originator of the term ethnocentric, William Graham Sumner, in 1904 defined ethnocentrism as : the view of things in which one's own group is the center of everything and all others are scaled and rated, in reference to one's group. Each group thinks that its own folkways are the only right ones. And if it observes that other people have other folkways, these excite its scorn. Ethnocentrism may manifest itself in behavior such as warfare, attitudes of superiority, hostility, violence, discrimination, and verbal aggression. In the past, groups such as the Nazi's, the Crusaders and, the Muslims have waged wars and death over cultural and religious differences using ethnocentrism as there incentive. Hate groups are also formed on this notion believing that their religious or cultural group is superior to others when in reality their customs are simply different. I realize that we are all ethnocentric to varying degrees because we are born into a culture at birth and we cling to that culture as a

Emotional Poems for Veterans Day

Emotional Poems for Veterans Day When emotions take over, the poet within you often emerges. These Veterans Day excerpts from poems touch the heart and soul of every patriot. They will send chills down your spine. They bring the horror of war home. If you know a veteran, share these words to let them know their devotion to country is important and appreciated. Veterans Day Poems Stephen Crane War Is Kind Do not weep, babe, for war is kind.Because your father tumbles in the yellow trenches,Raged at his breast, gulped and died,Do not weep.War is kind. Philip Freneau On the Departure of the British From Charleston But fame is theirs - and future daysOn pillard brass shall tell their praise;Shall tell - when cold neglect is dead - These for their country fought and bled. Walt Whitman Leaves of Grass I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them,And the white skeletons of young men - I saw them;I saw the debris and debris of all the dead soldiers of the war;But I saw they were not as was thought;They themselves were fully at rest - they suffer’d not;The living remain’d and suffer’d  - the mother suffer’d,And the wife and the child, and the musing comrade suffer’d,And the armies that remain’d suffer’d. Edgar Guest The Things That Make a Soldier Great Endanger but that humble street whereon his children run,You make a soldier of the man who never bore a gun.What is it through the battle smoke the valiant soldier sees? John McCrae In Flanders Fields In Flanders fields the poppies blowBetween the crosses, row on row,That mark our place; and in the skyThe larks, still bravely singing, flyScarce heard amid the guns below. Li Po Nefarious War In the battlefield men grapple each other and die;The horses of the vanquished utter lamentable cries to heaven,While ravens and kites peck at human entrails,Carry them up in their flight, and hang them on the branches of dead trees. Rudyard Kipling Tommy Its Tommy this, and Tommy that,And chuck him out the brute,But its Savior of his Country,When the guns begin to shoot. Siegfried Sassoon Aftermath But the past is just the same - and War’s a bloody game...Have you forgotten yet?...Look down, and swear by the slain of the War that you’ll never forget. Wilfred Owen Anthem for Doomed Youth What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?Only the monstrous anger of the guns.Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattleCan patter out their hasty orisons. Alfred, Lord Tennyson The Charge of the Light Brigade Half a league, half a league,Half a league onward,All in the valley of DeathRode the six hundred.‘Forward, the Light Brigade!Charge for the guns!’ he said:Into the valley of DeathRode the six hundred. Elizabeth Barrett Browning Mother and Poet Dead! One of them shot by the sea in the east,And one of them shot in the west by the sea.Dead! both my boys! When you sit at the feastAnd are wanting a great song for Italy free,Let none look at me! Sophie Jewett Armistice We pray the fickle flag of truceStill float deceitfully and fair;Our eyes must love its sweet abuse;This hour we will not care,Though just beyond to-morrows gate,Arrayed and strong, the battle wait.

Business Ethics Problem Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Business Ethics Problem - Essay Example Therefore, employees should behave professionally and ethically in all situations because ethical behavior is the key to the resolution of complex issues. Hall (2011) states, â€Å"Ethics pertain to the principles of conduct that individuals use in making choices and guiding their behaviors in situations that involve the concepts of right and wrong† (p. 112). In this paper, I will relate an example of a U.S. software company where a customer confidence problem occurred between an employee from the programming department and a customer of the company. The base of the issue was less accounting knowledge of the software developer. Description of the Company The name of the company where the ethical issue arose is SyBase. The company belongs to the Computer Software industry and deals with the development of software products and applications. The company started its operations in 1984. The company has become one of the top software companies of the United States due to the qualit y of its products and services. The Ethical Issue An ethical issue occurred in SyBase in 2004. One day, a customer came to the customer service department and made a complaint about the accounting software that the company developed for him on request. He made a claim that the application had some errors because it was not giving correct results. The software was showing incorrect results for the calculations of Net Present Value, Internal Rate of Return, and some other calculations. He wanted to meet the software developer who developed that accounting software for him. When the customer services officer to whom the customer brought the issue contacted that database developer, he started making excuses and did not come to meet the customer. Upon telling the real situation to the developer, he asked the customer services officer to make the customer come after a week. The customer left the office and came again after a week to get the remodeled accounting software. When the customer services officer told the developer about the arrival of the customer, he asked him to apologize to the customer once more. The reason was that the developer was still not able to remove the errors. The customer became disappointed with the situation and asked the customer services officer to file a complaint to the manager of the programming department. When the manager investigated the issue, he came to know that the software developer was not able to fulfill the requirements of the customer due to which he was delaying the issue. The developer did not have a grip over complex accounting issues due to which he was not able to develop reliable accounting software for the customer. The ethical issue in this example was that the developer tried to hide his inability in removing the errors by delaying the issue. Individuals Involved in the Issue The individuals involved in the issue were the software developer, the manager of the programming department, and a regular customer of the company. Outcome of the Issue The issue not only decreased the customer’s confidence in the company but also resulted in putting a spot on the company’s image. The developer could have tackled the situation in a much different way. He should have made the company aware of the real situation instead of being afraid of losing his job. Recommendations for the company The manager of the

HDL 660 learder Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

HDL 660 learder - Essay Example His courage, intelligence, determination, and innovativeness are traits and skills that I admire. President Barrack Obama has been the most influential leader in my life due to his willingness to make hard decisions. He is a credible leader, committed, humorous, influential, and is trusted by many Americans to head the country. The most important trait is his ability to influence the people through his speech and decision making. I apply these lessons by being a committed, credible, available, and trustworthy group leader. Trait Assessment: Articulate= 4; perceptive= 5; Self-confident= 4; self-assured= 5; persistent= 3; determined= 5; trustworthy= 5; dependable= 4; friendly= 5; outgoing=4; conscientious= 3; diligent= 4; sensitive= 5; empathic= 4 (35). Skill Assessment: technical skill= 23; Human skill= 25; conceptual skill= 22 (64). Strong traits such as perception, determination, sensitivity, self-assurance, and trustworthiness are necessary to create a strong friendship with associates. Strong human skills are also necessary for effective interaction with others. These strong traits and skills have enabled me to become an influential and effective group leader. Improving conceptual skills and persistence are the most promising areas of improvement. These strengths will help improve self-expression and self-awareness necessary for authentic

Wk5 (31) Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Wk5 (31) - Essay Example Ethno centricity means that one observes a culture from the point of view of the culture and not necessarily from the point of view of one’s own culture. Lack of Cultural sensitivity can lead to stereotyping. The instance of this or the example of this is the point where people engage in stereotyping without sensitivity. Usually, we see Hollywood movies engage in stereotyping without cultural sensitivity and this often result in caricatures of the people being stereotyped. The stereotyping is more prevalent in popular culture and depictions of public images by generalizing the cultural and racial characteristics to include all members of the group. The skills that I would use include the usage of culture specific jargon and words to describe the culture in non stereotypical fashion. This can be done by an increased awareness of the culture of the others and by an effort and attempt to know the culture of the other without compromising on the factual element. The necessary pre-requisites for such skills would ensure that I can foster cultural sensitivity without engaging in stereotyping. The dimensions that Iveys identifies within the three organizing principles are perception of the self, aculturlization and style of personality. These are the organizing principles around which the concept of the verbal and non-verbal discrepancies is built. Each of the dimensions is important and a good point of study from the view point of observation and interviewing the subjects. The most important behavior to observe is that of the perception of the self as this is often a gateway into the future of the self as compared to the other dimensions that merely touch upon the fringes. The perception of the self is an important starting point for further analysis into the causes of what makes the people behave in a certain way. The specific examples for each kind of dimension are the ways in which the behaviors are influenced by the dimensions. The information

Social Class Is Form Of Social Stratification Sociology Essay

Social Class Is Form Of Social Stratification Sociology Essay Introduction: Social class is a form of social stratification which impacts on peoples lives either negatively or positively. It refers to wealth, education level, occupation and prestige of a particular group of people. Factors which are inter-connected include the gender, sexuality, race and abilities (McDowell et al., 2013). It is important that social class be understood in the context from which it originates, primarily due to factors which occur inter-connectedly as mentioned above. There are many concepts relating to social stratification, but for the purpose of this essay I will focus mainly on Karl Marxs conflict theory, supplemented by Max Webbers functionalist ideology. Similarly factors such as education and employment will be central in this essay. I believe that the acquisition of knowledge and prestige via employment plays an important role in defining an individuals lifestyle and subsequently their life chances. Body: It must be noted that most of the research done by Karl Marx was based on westernized capitalist societies and it is primarily due to this fact that his concept of conflict theory exists in an economic realm or context (Lenski, 2008). Marx demarcated class of people in terms of either lower, middle or upper class. In Manifesto of the Communist Party Marx refers to lower-class societies as the proletariat and the upper-class as the bourgeoisie. The proletariat are a class of people who do manual labour which requires no specific skill, or simply put, they are the working (blue-collar) section of society. The bourgeoisie employ the working class society in order to increase their capital (Mohandesi, 2013). It is interesting to note that the position an individual finds himself or herself relative to the above category, impacts on their life chances and thus their social class. According to Max Weber (Davidson, 2009) social class and a persons life chances are interdependent. In this se nse, the higher an individual is positioned in the social hierarchy (class) the better his or her life will be; the opposite occurs for those who are in a poorer position. Factors include becoming wealthier, increasing ones prestige, the acquisition of knowledge and the improvement of an individuals living conditions. These are known as social advancements or improvements. According to a research study by Jean Anyon (1980) educational opportunities vastly improved as the socio-economic conditions of a particular social group increased. Anyon (1980) in Social Class and the Hidden Curriculum of Work found that schools were organised in a manner which reflects the social class of the families. Her results were derived from five schools which were broken down into working-class, middle-class, affluent professional and executive elite schools. Furthermore Anyon (1980) concludes that skills and knowledge which moves toward social power or prestige are obtainable to children from higher social groups but are inaccessible to the working class which are offered a practical curriculum. This study shows that the curriculum grooms children to fill an employment role suited to their social class or better put, so that the more challenging professions are occupied by the most skilled and talented individuals. In this sense, lower class schools educated individuals i n a manner which requires them to follow orders rather than use their own initiative and understanding of the work. The emphasis on individualism increases as the social class of the school increases. In my experience I concur with what Anyon has found because there exists numerous types of schools or institutions ranging from technical to managerial and professional. Examples are the Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Cape Town College and The University of the Western Cape. Marx also suggests that institutions are used to oppress the subordinates of a society, this statement coupled with Anyons research, displays a rather frightful image. Institutionally people are being transformed and socialized, from a young age, to follow the layers of strata found in society. Education ultimately leads to employment which in turn culminates in the acquisition of wealth or material property. According to Max Weber, the ownership of physical assets, which is obtained by means of production, creates unique characteristics in terms of the individuals life chances (Shortell, 2012). Furthermore, Weber believes that the ownership of property is central to class differences and in this case there will always be a relationship between employee and employer or property renter and property owner. In our modernized capitalist society empowered by neoliberalism, emphasis is placed on the acquisition of wealth thereby stratifying society into upper-class rich and the lower-class poor inhabitants. In this sense one can improve ones social class by increasing wealth and also the ownership of property-making this an open societal system (opposed to the system of slavery). Employment is therefore an opportunity to achieve wealth and increase status, however, inequalities o ccur whereby a bread baker (regardless of his skill) has less chances to improve his conditions than the owner of the bakery. Functionalists (Marxism) would argue that economic disparity benefits the majority of society and is also an essential element for the operation of society as a whole (Lenski, 2008). Conclusion: In my opinion, I see employment as the second phase in a three phase process in light of an individuals life chances. The first phase being education and the last being a successful business owner or CEO. As mentioned above, the level of education provided to individuals varies according to their socio-economic standing. This is the crux of my argument mainly due to the manner in which institutions shape society in preparation for their pre-planned future i.e. external forces of which they have no control over. A false consciousness thus exists in the open capitalist society whereby the proletariat is made to believe that they have equal opportunities to improve their life chances, when in actual fact their original social class serves as a key which only opens a limited number of doorways to success. Those who are endowed with a higher social class are granted unlimited opportunities to all elements of success, prestige, wealth, knowledge and ultimately advantages to better their li fes chances.

P.g. Wodehouse, His Life, And His Works :: essays research papers

Does an artist create a masterpiece without a source of inspiration? Does an architect construct a building without first looking at a blueprint? As with all great minds, writers also need a source of inspiration or a "Blueprint" for their literature. In the short story, "The Truth About George", author P.G. Wodehouse uses his own life experiences as a blueprint for creating George and the other characters in the story. There are influences from Wodehouse's childhood and his formative years in "The Truth about George", the story about a man named George struggling to find a cure for his speech impediment in order to win the affections of a woman. P(elham) G(renville) Wodehouse, "Plum" to his friends(Babuser 1248). Was born to a well-to-do family in Surrey, England on Ocotber 15, 1881 in Guildford, England. He was educated at Dulwich, London and started writing at a young age. By the end of his life, PG Wodehouse turned out more than ninety stories and fifty other miscellaneous pieces of works such as film scripts, etc. (Jasen 1). During his childhood P.G. Wodehouse was abandoned by his parents and lived with various relatives. Although, as David Damrosch notes, Wodehouse "always insisted that he had a happy childhood, including a relationship with a father who was 'normal as rice pudding'"(Damrosch 453). He moved from England to Hong Kong and to the United States. He was introduced and brought up by a variety of aunts, uncles, nannies, and schools. (Damrosch 453). He went through many things such as being captured by the Germans during WWII, where he made radio broadcasts in which he described his experiences as a prisoner and ridiculed his captors. (Bassett 1). After the war, Wodehouse moved to the United States, which he calls "the romance capital of the world" where he met his wife, Ethel Rowley (Babuser 1248). and settled, becoming a citizen in 1955. (Jasen 2). He lived out the rest of his life in Southampton, New York, where he wrote farces, short stories, and many other works of literature until his death on February 14, 1975. Wodehouse would later use his vast experiences to write his enormous collection of prose,etc. Wodehouse wrote many works of literature based on his life. He based his characters and stories around his own imagination. Evelyn Waugh writes that Wodehouse's characters are "creations of pure fancy" and that "it is all Mr.