Modernist Opera :: Modernism Music Art Opera Essays

Modernist Opera Modernism, a major artistic movement of the first half of the twentieth century, is traditionally a classification of the visual arts, including such schools as Abstraction, Impressionism, and Expressionism. In architecture, too, was Modernism recognized, in the work of people like Frank Lloyd Wright. Even in literature, with the increasing use of symbolism, Modernism was an influence. Modernists in all of these art forms are consciously engaged in the expansion of the boundaries of their art, and in asking their audiences to reject the status quo, both of the art and of some aspect of society or culture the art form addresses. When faced with a discussion about the possibility of the existence of Modernist opera, classificationists around the world can be heard coughing quietly into their drink and muttering something vague about having somewhere else to be. Until recently, opera and Modernism were two terms rarely, if ever, heard together. The large amount of scholarshi p that has been devoted to the study of Modernism and its principles has not been extended with the same vigour to include its application to opera. Questions have been raised about whether it is even possible to define â€Å"Modernist opera,† and few have attempted such a feat. I confess some confusion as to why the issue raises such difficulties. An examination of just three of the operas written in the time period, Richard Strauss’s Salome, Alban Berg’s Wozzeck, and Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera, shows us that a categorization of Modernism is not inappropriate to the genre. Like the visual and literary arts of the time, these operas are attempting to redefine their genre and to bring public awareness both to the possibilities of the genre and to societal issues. Perhaps I will begin my argument about the suitability of a category of Modernist opera with a small disclaimer. It is important to note that, as far as opera is concerned, there is no definite boundary between pre-Modernist works and Modernism itself. One can argue that Wagner’s attempts in the nineteenth century to make opera into something new are examples of an early Modernist inclination. Wagner had new ideas so immense that he had to build his own theatre to house them. His interest in revolutionary politics and in the philosophical ideas of great thinkers like Nietzsche is certainly unique for opera composers prior to the twentieth century.

Psy: Obedience Essay

Obedience is the act of practicing obeying; dutiful or submissive compliance. Humans have an instinct to obey because of the role authority plays. Milgram’s research proves my point in his case study that involved shocks of voltage. From birth, we learn that everything has a consequence or punishment after an action. Children learn simple philosophies in their youngest age such as obeying their parent’s requests. Something as simple as eating vegetables has a consequence. A reward gives the child satisfaction to emphasize the good behavior or, in the opposite case, bad behavior. As humans get older, this simple idea enlarges when it applies to different phases in life. Scientists like Milgrim and Marta Laupa study factors that play a role in obedience using variables like electrical shocks. In the psychology department, scientists like Milgrim, studied obedience to understand human behavior. He used cruel and unusual ways to study how humans will react to authority. The punishments included electrical shocks at different voltages. This is just one of way psychologists test authority versus obedience. His experiment involved 42 participants, some of them being the enforcer and some acting as the victim. The authority role would execute the victim with electrical shocks beginning from 15 to 450. Milgrim’s blind case study took place at Harvard University where the participants agreed to take part without any kind of explanation. The authoritative volunteer requested the number of voltages from the patient. No one objected the voltage until it reached a maximum of 450. As the voltage amount rose, the participants allegedly showed signs of stress and nervousness but never refused the electricity until the last and most fatal amount of voltage. Later, Milgrim altered the study by placing the authority figure outside of the electricity room. He or she used a loudspeaker to inform the victim of the situation. Participants were all of the sudden more reluctant to obey. This unethical experiment showed researchers and fellow observers how humans obey powerful authority to almost fatal conditions. Rather than disobeying, humans will instinctively continue even when conditions are close to death. Milgrim’s results differ from Laupa. Unlike Milgrim’s results, Laupa’s were less shocking, literally. The process involved students who were appointed as conflict managers or honor patrol. The chosen ones were taught to approach students to resolve arguments such as turn-taking. Laupa required 80 children from four classes: first grade, third grade, fifth grade, and seventh grade. Subjects were then put in situations where they must chose to listen to another person. For example, the scientist listed a few such as la dy versus former peer authority. This example is fundamental to the understanding of obedience. This illustration baffles children because they are put in a situation where the lady has adult status, which shows authority but no knowledge, but the former peer authority shows knowledge but no adult status like the previous lady. Laupa’s case proves that children are a biased subject to chose for the obedience in Milgrim’s case because children have a different way of thinking compared to adults who have prior experience to the social world. Children’s naive way of thinking benefits them since they are not interested in social system that adults are in everyday. Common sense would tell us that most people believe obedience is a critical aspect in social life and plays a great role in maintaining social order. On the contrary, every human being at different ages posses different aspirations that reflect their behavior. While some people respect authority by obeying, many do not, such as criminals or the students in detention. In Milgrim’s study, it is obvious that almost everyone respected authority possibly because they were under the impression that there were greater consequences or that they were in dire need to comply. In Laupa’s study, however, it showed that children were doubtful to peer authority and even adult authority. While some children are less timid than others, children have the instinct to question others because younger people are unaware of the social status adult figures hold. When comparing the two cases studies by Milgrim and Laupa, observers would agree that from childhood, people identify authority and obey them according to their figure in society or the status they hold.

Philosophy Statement

I believe that each child learns at their own pace, and it’s important to accommodate each individual. To reference Pestalozzi, I also believe children have more meaningful learning experiences with hands-on activities and it allows them to draw their own conclusions because they are experiencing what they’re learning first hand. I believe it’s my job as a teacher to create an environment that encourages children to think critically and allow them to experience things first hand.I also understand that each child learns differently, and not every child is the same, and it’s my job as a teacher to accommodate them to the best of my ability and create an environment where children feel comfortable to ask questions or voice their opinions. My goal as a teacher is to be a good role model to my students. I want to be able to develop a relationship with each of my students. I to be able help children with their self esteem by promoting individuality and diversity .I also understand the importance of assessment and believe it’s my job to assess each student thoroughly to better understand them and help them through whatever they are struggling with. I also believe it’s important to create an environment that promotes a child’s autonomy, to help them draw their own conclusions and think critically to help them build skills early on that they will need throughout adulthood. Over all I want to be the one teacher in a child’s life who made a difference.I believe that one of my strengths is that I’m accepting of others. I come from a half Hispanic and half Irish family and I was immersed in both cultures. I accept people no matter their religion, culture, or ethnicity and I promote diversity because I come from a diverse family. I believe this will be a very positive attribute when dealing with families and students because not every student is the same and it’s important to make each family feel welcome i n the classroom regardless of their cultural background.I also believe that I am a very observant person which would be a very important skill in assessing my students which is a very significant part of being a teacher. I’ve always been observant, even as a child, I wanted to understand how things worked and why certain things affected others. Properly assessing students can put help put a stop to bullying, it can allow the teacher to better understand their students and find a method of teaching that works for each individual, and also can help keep parents updated on their child’s learning development.An area of future growth would be my communication skills. I’m not very articulate when I talk to crowds; I get nervous and falter my words. I’m more of a quiet person, I like to keep thoughts to myself and when I’m forced to express them I feel out of my element. This is something that is a work in progress and it is, slowly but surely, getting mu ch easier for me. This is very important as a teacher to be able to effectively speak to the students and teach the material well. It’s also very important to keep in contact with parents to update them on activities and their child’s progress.

Washington The Indispensable Man essays

Washington The Indispensable Man essays In the book, Washington: The Indispensable Man, author James Thomas Flexner exposes the real man behind the myths that surround George Washington, the father of our country. In doing so he portrays Washington as a man with real flaws and real strengths. This paper deals with the beginning of Washington's political career and answers questions about Washington's influence in shaping a new united nation from 13 independent colonies several years after its independence from Britain and the man George Washington was a Federalist who fervently believed in a strong central government, which would hold power that would pervade the 13 colonies, which represented the Union of the late 1700s. In private writings, Washington wrote, "experience has taught us that men will not adopt and carry into execution measures the best calculated for their own good, without the intervention of a coercive power (198). Without this coercive power, Washington believed that the nation would not exist for any length of time. Prior to what became known as the Constitutional Convention, the states ignored the Continental Congress to the point that at any given meeting there were seldom enough delegates to form a quorum. It seemed that each state violated the Articles of the Confederation when it was beneficial to the state to do so. Flexner notes for instance that New York resented any authority that would weaken its own laws that milked other states (198). In addition, states succumbed to the whims of the majority, while neglecting the minorities, creating class conflict. Though this saddened Washington, he had no intention of intervening. After the Revolutionary War he had retired to Mount Vernon to experience what many claim were the best years of his life. Upon his retirement he had vowed not to return to public life. Because of this he did not plan to attend the ...

The Bible and Archaeology

The Bible and Archaeology An important step forward in scientific archaeological research, and a 19th-century outgrowth of the previous centurys Enlightenment  was the search for the truth of the events written about in the ancient historical accounts of the past. The main truth of the Bible, Torah, Koran, and the Buddhist sacred texts among many others is (of course) not a scientific one but a truth of faith and religion. The roots of the scientific study of archaeology are deeply planted in the establishment of the boundaries of that truth. Is the Bible Fact or Fiction? This is one of the most common questions I get asked as an archaeologist and it is one for which I have yet to find a good answer. And yet the question is at the absolute heart of archaeology, central to the growth and development of archaeology, and it is the one that gets more archaeologists into trouble than any other. And, more to the point, it brings us back to the history of archaeology. Many if not most citizens of the world are naturally curious about ancient texts. After all, they form the basis of all human culture, philosophy, and religion. As discussed in the earlier parts of this series, at the end of the Enlightenment, many archaeologists began actively searching for the cities and cultures described in the available ancient texts and histories, such as Homer and the Bible, Gilgamesh, Confucian texts, and the Vedic manuscripts. Schliemann sought Homers Troy, Botta sought Nineveh, Kathleen Kenyon sought Jericho, Li Chi sought An-Yang, Arthur Evans at Mycenae, Koldewey at Babylon, and Woolley at Ur of the Chaldees. All of these scholars and more sought archaeological events in the ancient texts. Ancient Texts and Archaeological Studies But using ancient texts as the basis for historical investigation was- and still is- fraught with peril in any culture: and not just because the truth is hard to parse out. Governments and religious leaders have vested interests in seeing that religious texts and nationalistic myths remain unchanged and unchallenged- other parties might learn to see the ancient ruins as blasphemous. Nationalistic mythologies demand that there is a special state of grace for a particular culture, that the ancient texts are received wisdom, that their specific country and people are the center of the creative world. No Planet-Wide Floods When early geological investigations proved without a doubt that there was no planet-wide flood as described in the Old Testament of the Bible, there was a great cry of outrage. Early archaeologists fought against and lost battles of this sort time and again. The results of David Randal-McIvers excavations at Great Zimbabwe, an important trading site in southeastern Africa, were suppressed by the local colonial governments who wanted to believe that the site was Phoenician in derivation and not African. The beautiful effigy mounds found throughout North America by Euroamerican settlers were wrongly attributed to either the mound builders or a lost tribe of Israel. The fact of the matter is that ancient texts are renditions of ancient culture which may be partly reflected in the archaeological record and partly will not be- not fiction nor fact, but culture. Better Questions So, lets not ask if the Bible is true or false. Instead, lets ask a series of different questions: Did the places and cultures that are mentioned in the Bible and the other ancient texts exist? Yes, in many cases, they did. Archaeologists have found evidence for many of the locations and cultures mentioned in the ancient texts.Did the events that are described in these texts happen? Some of them did; archaeological evidence in the form of physical evidence or supporting documents from other sources can be found for some of the battles, the political struggles, and the building and collapse of cities.Did the mystical things that are described in the texts occur? Its not my area of expertise, but if I were to hazard a guess, if there were miracles that occurred, they wouldnt leave archaeological evidence.Since the places and the cultures and some of the events that are described in these texts happened, shouldnt we just assume that the mysterious parts also happened? No. Not any more than since Atlanta burned, Scarlett OHara really was dumped by Rhett Butler. There are so many ancient texts and stories about how the world began and many are at variance with one another. From a global human standpoint, why should one ancient text be more accepted than any other? The mysteries of the Bible and other ancient texts are just that: mysteries. It is not, and never has been, within the archaeological purview to prove or disprove their reality. That is a question of faith, not science.

Johnson Controls Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Johnson Controls - Research Paper Example Information systems are also considered long-term capital investment projects. The following are some of the traditional capital budgeting models used to evaluate capital projects: The payback method The accounting rate of return on investment (ROI) The net present value The cost-benefit ratio The profitability index The internal rate of return (IRR) These methods rely on measures of cash flows into and out of the firm. Capital projects generate cash flows into and out of the firm. The investment cost is an immediate cash outflow caused by the purchase of the capital equipment (capital outlay). In subsequent periods, the investment may cause additional cash outflows related to repair and maintenance that will be balanced by cash inflows resulting from the investment. Cash inflows take the form of increased revenues generated from the improved facilities or reduced costs in production and operations. The difference between cash outflows and cash inflows (net cash flows) is used for ca lculating the financial worth of an investment. Once the cash flows have been established, several alternative methods are available for comparing different projects and deciding about the investment. Financial models assume that all relevant alternatives have been examined, that all costs and benefits are known, and that these costs and benefits can be expressed in a monetary terms. When one has to choose among many complex alternatives, these assumptions are rarely met in the real world, although they may be approximated (Aggarwal, 2002). Tangible benefits can be quantified and assigned a monetary value. Intangible benefits, such as more efficient customer service or enhanced employee goodwill, cannot be immediately quantified but may lead to quantifiable gains in the long run. Shim and Siegel (2008) argue that traditional capital budgeting has a number of challenges. The models do not express the risks and uncertainty of their own costs and benefits estimates; cash flows are unce rtain; inflation may affect costs and benefits differently; technology—especially information technology—can change during the course of the project, causing estimates to vary greatly; intangible benefits are difficult to quantify. These factors wreak havoc with financial models. The difficulties of measuring intangible benefits give financial models an application bias. Traditional approaches to valuing information systems investments tend to assess the profitability of individual systems projects for specific business functions. Theses approaches do not adequately address investments in IT infrastructure, testing new business models, or other enterprise-wide capabilities that could benefit the organization as a whole (Gregory, 1999). The traditional focus on the financial and technical aspects of an information system tends to overlook the social and organizational dimensions of information systems that may affect the true costs and benefits of the investment. Howeve r, there are other modern methods that can be used as alternatives to the traditional methods. One of the approaches is the option pricing or real options theory recognizes the interactions among option holders’ optimizing behavior, asset uncertainty, and market disciplines. Recently, the option pricing theory has been applied in the evaluation of nonfinancial assets or ‘

Capitalism Structure Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Capitalism Structure - Essay Example When a company is going to liquidation due to bankruptcy, it has to repay the debt capital first. The equity shareholders will be paid back their investment only after setting off the secured creditors, debenture holders, preference shareholdersetc. So the companies should deeply analyze financial implications before taking capital structure decisions. In United Kingdom, a secured creditor can even proceed with liquidating the company and claim the amount due to him by the company. Even though the cost of capital plays an important role while taking decision regarding the capital structure, the bankruptcy code also plays a prominent role in the decisions. Therefore, care must be taken while deciding capital structure. The companies cannot make changes in the bankruptcy code, but they can make adjustments in the debt-equity combination (capital structure) of their financial structures in order to accommodate bankruptcy code considerations. This assumes importance since the interests o f equity holders would be compromised or endangered if debt capital is allowed to mount beyond reasonable proportions or as needed by the organisation. Increase in equity capital does not endanger the company's existence or survival, however creditors and loan syndicates could call back their loans, or bring action for claim settlements, thus, putting the company at the doorsteps of bankruptcy. The UK bankruptcy code is a creditor-supportive and a debt-friendly code. That means the debt holders will be having right in deciding the liquidation of the companies. "If the cash flows generated by the project are insufficient to meet debt payments, the firm is in default. Continuation decisions in default are regulated by the bankruptcy code in place." (Acharya, Sundaram and John, p.2). If a company is taking effective and efficient decision regarding the capital structure, it can easily overcome the problems which may arise due to unfavourable bankruptcy code. So while deciding on the ca pital structure, an optimum combination should be selected. While discussing the effect of bankruptcy code in the capital structure decision, the asset-specificity should also be considered. Asset-specificity can be defined as "aspect or feature of an asset (such as a specialized machine) that makes it useful for one or few specific purposes and which, therefore, cannot easily be sold off quickly in a fire-sale." (Asset Specificity: Definition. 2009). If a company has low asset-specificity, it can use more debt capital in the capital structure. If the company is in a situation of liquidation or bankruptcy, it can easily sell off its assets and meet the debts like repayment of creditors, preference shareholdersetc. In other words, if the companies whose assets are fit for providing as security for funds borrowed, can use more debt capital in the capital structure. Because at the time of bankruptcy it will not face any difficulty in repaying the loan or borrowed money as it can sell o ff such assets. Whatever combination is used in the capital structure, the objective of the company should be to increase the wealth of the equity shareholders. If the bankruptcy code of a country is debt capital friendly, it is not better for the companies to follow 'trading on equity' (trading on equity refers to using more debt capital