Allied and Central Powers :: essays research papers

Allied Powers Fance has not forgotton its humiliating defeat at the hands of Germany in 1871. France was waiting for the chance to reestablish its power on the continent. France was willing to ally itself with another longtime enemy, Britain, to strenghten its hand against Germany. Great Britain had traditionally followed a policy of neutrality, which served it well. Yet some Britains were now calling for a new alliances, to counter the rising power of the German Empire. Britain depended on industrial strength for survival. Germany was a threat to that strength, as well as to Britains naval power. Russia had been defeated by the Japanese in 1905 and was troubled by unrest within borders. Russia felt a need to prove its strength to the other nations of Europe. It also desired to extend its influence and protection over Slavs in Balkan countries. Central Powers The German Empire had been created in 1871. Included in its territory were the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine, taken from France. Now Germany was the leading power on the Continent. But Germany was not secure. Directly to the west was France, waiting for the chance to reclaim Alsace-Lorraine. To the east was Russia, recently allied with France. And on the seas the rapidly growing German navy competed with the more powerful British navy. The Austro-Hungarian, Empire was not a nation of one people, but an empire of many nationalitites. The peoples that made up the empire were mainly Austrians, Hungarians, and Slavs. But the Austrians and Hungarians ruled the empire. Many SLavs who lived in the provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina wanted to be part of the new nation of Serbia. Furthermore, Rumania and Italy had designs on territory within the empire. Russian ambitions in the Balkans brought them into conflict with the Austro-Hungarians.

Day After Tomorrow

FTER Hollywood cinema and climate change: The Day After Tomorrow. Ingram, David. In Words on Water: Literary and Cultural Representations, Devine, Maureen and Christa Grewe-Volpp (eds. ) (Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 2008). Climate change, like many other environmental problems, is slow to develop, not amenable to simple or fast solutions, and caused by factors that are both invisible and complex (Adam 17).Making a narrative film about climate change therefore does not fit easily into the commercial formulae of mainstream Hollywood, which favour human-interest stories in which individual protagonists undergo a moral transformation before they resolve their problems through heroic action in the final act. Can such classical narratives mediate an issue as complex as climate change without being not only inadequate, but even dangerous, lulling their audience into a false sense of security about our ability to deal with such problems?Ecocritic Richard Kerridge observes that a British journalist responded to the nuclear accident at Chernobyl in 1986 by framing it within the familiar narrative of the Second World War, with its emphasis on ‘a successful outcome and a narrative closure'. For Kerridge, such narrative strategies may be an overly reassuring way of representing environmental threats, and reveal therefore that the ‘real, material ecological crisis' is ‘also a cultural crisis, a crisis of representation' (Kerridge 4).Yet, as Jim Collins argues, ‘mass-mediated cultures', including those of popular Hollywood cinema, are characterised by ‘semiotic complexities of meaning production', which leave even popular, generic texts open to multiple interpretations (Collins 17). Film theorist Stephen Prince describes a Hollywood movie as a ‘polysemous, multivalent set of images, characters, and narrative situations', which therefore constitute what he calls an ‘ideological agglomeration', rather than a single, coherent ideological position (Prince 40).This polysemy may arise from the Hollywood industry's commercial intention to maximize profits by appealing to as wide and diverse an audience as possible by making movies which, ideologically speaking, seek to have it all ways at once. One consequence is that, when we theorize about the effects popular movies may or may not have on public awareness of environmental issues, those effects are more complex, and less deterministic, than is often assumed is some academic film theories.This essay will explore the range of meanings generated by The Day After Tomorrow (2004), which frames the issue of anthropogenic climate change within the familiar genres of the disaster and science fiction movie. Ideological analysis of the film, combined with a study of its audience reception, suggests that even a classical Hollywood narrative can generate a degree of ideological ambiguity which makes it open to various interpretations, both liberal and conservative. Th e ideological ambiguity of The Day After Tomorrow derives in part from the way its narrative mixes the modes of realism, fantasy and melodrama.A realist film will attempt to correspond to what we understand as reality, mainly through the optical realism of its mise-en-scene and the sense of psychological plausibility produced by both its script and the performance of its actors. Melodrama, on the other hand, will simplify character and heighten action and emotion beyond the everyday. Hollywood movies tend to work by moving between these two modes of representation. Some genres, such as science fiction and horror, also move between realism and fantasy, a mode which exceeds realist plausibility by creating a totally fictive and impossible diegetic world.As a science fiction movie, then, The Day After Tomorrow deliberately blurs the distinction between realism and fantasy. The narrative begins from a scientifically plausible premise: the melting of the Artic ice-cap, caused by anthropo genic global warming, cools the North Atlantic Current, colloquially known as the ‘Gulf Stream', and thereby affects the weather in the Northern hemisphere. The movie then extrapolates from this premise beyond even the worst-case scenarios proposed by climate scientists.The switching off of the thermohaline current generates a global superstorm, as a result of which an ice sheet covers Scotland and a tsunami floods Manhattan. The movie's literary source, it is worth noting, was The Coming Global Superstorm (1999), by Art Bell and Whitely Streiber, whose television talk show on the paranormal suggests an interest in the ‘parascientific'; that is, in speculation beyond what is provable or falsifiable by scientific method. When interpreted literally, that is, as realism, The Day After Tomorrow clearly violates notions of scientific plausibility.The basic climatology in the movie is inaccurate: hurricanes can only form over large bodies of warm water, not the cold seas found in high latitudes, where polar lows are the main storm systems. The movie also distorts the science of climate change, mainly by accelerating the time frame within which its effects take place, and by making them much worse than predicted. Any slowdown in the thermohaline current would take a period of years, at least, and probably centuries, rather than the days featured in the film.Moreover, even if the North Atlantic Current did switch off, average temperatures would still be likely to rise, rather than fall, because of the greenhouse gasses already in the atmosphere (Henson 112-5). The film's central narrative, in which government paleoclimatologist Jack Hall (Dennis Quaid) walks in sub-zero temperatures all the way from north of Philadelphia to the New York Public Library, to rescue his son Sam (Jake Gyllenhall) who is sheltering there, is thus impossible: neither would survive such low temperatures.For helicopters to freeze in mid-air, temperatures would not only be too cold for snow, but also too cold for human survival. Burning books in a library would be insufficient to keep people alive. Such implausibilities are worth pointing out, not because cinema audiences necessarily take what they see as scientific truth, but because science fiction often provides an opportunity to learn some real science. Indeed, as we will see later in this essay, environmental groups used the release of the movie as a ‘teachable moment' on the science of climate change (Leiserowitz 6).The two-disc DVD edition of the movie includes a documentary on the science of climate change; screenwriter Jeffrey Nachmanoff commented on its release that, although ‘our primary concern' in making the film ‘was entertainment rather than education. On the DVD, there's room for both'. Acknowledging that the time frame he created for the movie was accelerated for fictional purposes, and that the ‘superfreeze' was ‘purely a cinematic device', he added that ‘t he political, agricultural and societal consequences of a sudden change in the ocean currents would still be catastrophic' (Nachmanoff 1).To dismiss The Day After Tomorrow purely for its scientific inaccuracies, then, clearly misses the point of the movie, which is to use realist elements of climate science as a starting point for melodrama and fantasy, so that it can dwell on the spectacle of extreme weather, appropriate for a blockbuster disaster movie, and also invite the audience's emotional engagement with the human-interest story that becomes the main focus of narrative. It is to these elements in the film that we will now turn.As a ‘natural disaster' melodrama, the film works on an opposition between nature and civilization, and invites an ambiguous identification on the part of the viewer: in Hollywood terms, we are invited to ‘root for' both nature and civilization at various points in the narrative, although the values of civilization eventually become the domi nant ones. Before that happens, however, the scenes of extreme weather make the experience of environmental apocalypse strangely attractive. As Maurice Yacowar observes, the natural disaster movie ‘dramatizes people's helplessness against the forces of nature' (Yacowar 218).The set pieces of extreme weather in The Day After Tomorrow reveal the sublime power of wild nature: violent, chaotic, powerful beyond human control, and therefore exciting and seductive. Environmentalist Paul Hawken writes that the concept of doomsday ‘has always had a perverse appeal, waking us from our humdrum existence to the allure of a future harrowing drama' (Hawken 204). As Stephen Keane points out, although disaster movies regularly feature television news reports commenting on the events that are taking place, they do not go on ‘to make the critical point that we are all electronic voyeurs' (Keane 84).The Day After Tomorrow follows this pattern. The audience's complicity in seeking cin ematic thrills in the scenarios of mass death and destruction caused by the weather is encouraged, rather than questioned, by the movie itself. Indeed, such thrills are the raison d'etre of its genre. Yet the aesthetics of the sublime have always been based on vicariousness; if we take pleasure in the destructive forces of nature, it is from the safe distance of our movie seats, where we are in the position of voyeurs, rather than of victims.This construction of victimhood in the disaster movie depends on narrative alignment: when people die, we do not dwell on them, nor on the bereaved people they leave behind. Typical of the disaster genre, the focus of nature's destructiveness in The Day After Tomorrow is the city. Hollywood disaster movies, writes Geoff King, share with millennial groups ‘a certain delirious investment in the destruction of the metropolis' (King 158). When a series of tornadoes attack Los Angeles, the mise-en-scene focuses on familiar landmarks: the Hollyw ood sign, the Capitol Records building, and a billboard advertising the model Angelyne.Screenwriter Jeffrey Nachmanoff observes on the DVD commentary that preview audiences greeted the moment where the Angelyne sign flattens the television reporter with cheers and applause (Emmerich). The sense of retribution is difficult to avoid: perhaps there is poetic justice in the media figure, parasitical on other people's suffering, finding his nemesis in Angelyne, the model and aspiring actress who paid to advertise herself on her own billboards, and thus became for some emblematic of the meretricious values of the city.As Mike Davis observes, Los Angeles is often given special treatment in apocalyptic narratives. ‘No other city,' he writes, ‘seems to excite such dark rapture'. Unlike other cities, the destruction of Los Angeles ‘is often depicted as, or at least secretly experienced as, a victory for civilization' (Davis 277). Geoff King draws upon Mikhail Bakhtin's notio n of the ‘carnivalesque' to account for such moments of ‘licensed enjoyment of destruction', based on an ‘overturning of cultural norms' (King 162). But the destruction is too cruel, as well as unfocussed and generalised, to be simply an anti-authoritarian gesture.As Susan Sontag noted, science fiction films provide a ‘morally acceptable fantasy where one can give outlet to cruel or at least amoral feelings' (Sontag 215). Freud's notion of the ‘death wish' thus better captures the dark side of such fantasies. For Freud, such aggressions were natural drives that need to be controlled; art provides catharsis for such anti-social instincts. Patricia Mellencamp draws on Freud to argue that American television is both ‘shock and therapy; it both produces and discharges anxiety' (Mellencamp 246).The disaster movie works in a similar way, mobilising and exploiting our negative drives and emotions. But are there unconscious meanings specific to the natura l disaster movie? One reading of such movies is as ‘revenge of nature' narratives, which enact a fantasy of nature getting its own back for its mistreatment at the hands of human beings. Psychoanalyst Karl Figlio draws on the theories of Melanie Klein to argue that scientific thinking itself is an act of repressive violence towards Nature. ‘Nature killed,' he writes, ‘is nature in a vengeful mood, a primitive retaliatory phantasy that fuels apocalyptic forebodings.The more scientific the culture, the more it is at the mercy of irrational fears, and the more it is dependent on scientific protection from them' (Figlio 72). He cites Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as an ‘extreme example of scientific mapping that calls forth revenge from nature' (75). According to this reading, then, when we watch nature getting its revenge, we as viewers are able to purge our guilt about its degradation. However, as Yacowar notes, the moral attitude of the typical disaster movie is ambiguous. Poetic justice in disaster films,' he writes, ‘derives from the assumption that there is some relationship between a person's due and his or her doom'. However, this notion breaks down when the ‘good die with the evil' (Yacowar 232). The Day After Tomorrow works according to these generic expectations, with Nature at times appearing amoral in its destructiveness, and at other times, a force of moral retribution and punishment. The arrogant businessmen who bribe the bus driver, and the corruptible bus driver himself, get their comeuppance when they drown in the tidal wave that engulfs Manhattan.Jeffrey Nachmanoff reveals in the DVD commentary that, in an early draft of the script, the businessman had been negotiating an insider deal with the Japanese businessman killed by the hailstorm in Tokyo (Emmerich). In the final version, the latter lies to his wife on his cell phone moments before his death. The ethical critique in these scenes fits into the ideological agenda of many disaster films. As King writes, such films ‘include an element of criticism of capitalism, but this is a gesture that for the most part leaves its core values largely intact.A few ‘excesses' are singled out, such as the greedy cost-cutting that undermines the integrity of the eponymous star of The Towering Inferno, leaving the remainder mostly untouched' (King 153). In The Day After Tomorrow, then, greedy, self-interested individuals are punished. Yet innocent people also die in the movie, including the climate scientists who freeze to death in Scotland, led by the avuncular Terry Rapson (Ian Holm), and Jack's friend Frank (Jay O. Sanders), who falls to his death through the roof of a building, after cutting his own rope to prevent his friends from endangering their lives in trying to rescue him.These are figures of heroic sacrifice, also central to the disaster genre, because they bring out the redemptive aspects of the apocalypse. The film does not stat e clearly where the British royal family stand in this hierarchy of innocence and guilt: what is clear, is that death by climate change is no respecter of class privilege and wealth. The disaster movie, then, is about which values are the key to survival. The rescue of the innocent, French-speaking African family is thus crucial in einforcing the movie's ethical hierarchy based on racial, national and gender differences: they are saved by the white American woman (Laura), who in turn is saved by the white American male (Sam), thereby enacting in miniature two important themes in the movie. The most important of these is the narrative of male heroism and redemption. Melodrama, writes Linda Williams, is about a ‘retrieval and staging of innocence' (Williams 7). In this film, the melodramatic plot of father rescuing son makes the moral point that hard-working fathers need to take a more active role in bringing up their sons.The movie implies that, although millions of people may be dead, if one American family can be saved, then at least some good has come out of the eco-apocalypse. This message is more liberal, or at least not as unambiguously patriarchal, as in earlier disaster movies. In keeping with Stephen Prince's notion of ideological agglomeration, mentioned earlier, although Jack's wife is a doctor, she ends up playing the role of surrogate mother to a seven-year old boy with cancer, separated from his parents by the storm.The movie can thus be interpreted as either liberal (she is a doctor) or conservative (she is placed in the stereotypical female role of nurturer). The second important theme in the movie is the United States' self-appointed role as global protector-policeman. The rescue narrative trumpets the frontier values of male physical heroism, strong leadership and individualism, encapsulated by the iconic image of the torch of the Statue of Liberty emerging from the waves of the tsunami that engulfs Manhattan.However, America's role in w orld politics is also questioned by a more liberal discourse in the movie, when American refugees are forced to flee illegally into Mexico, in an ironic reversal of the real politics on the national border. This ironic reversal is itself made ambiguous, though, when later the United States government writes off all Third World debt, but in return, wins the right for its citizens to live as ‘guests' in those countries. It should be noted that not all Hollywood movies with environmental themes are as individualistic in their proposed solutions as The Day After Tomorrow.Some have endorsed more collective forms of action, even in narratives led by strong individuals: an image of placard-waving protestors recurs in Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home (1995) and Fly Away Home (1996) as a sign of collective resistance. Ultimately, The Day After Tomorrow prefers American notions of liberal individualism, which it turns into universal values by identifying them with human civilization as a whole. Indeed, civilization, rather than wild nature, becomes the real object of audience identification by the end.The choice of the New York Public Library as the place of sanctuary and rescue is significant in this respect. One of the survivors makes sure he preserves the Gutenberg Bible from burning, not because he believes in God, he says, but because, as the first book ever printed, it represents ‘the dawn of the age of reason'. ‘If Western civilization is finished', he adds, ‘I'm going to save at least one little piece of it'. Ultimately, then, the movie celebrates reason and science as the values most central to Western civilization. Unusually for a Hollywood disaster movie, scientists are neither evil nor incompetent.As Yacowar notes, specialists in disaster movies, including scientists, ‘are almost never able to control the forces loose against them'. The genre thus serves ‘the mystery that dwarfs science' (Yacowar 228). This is also true of The Day After Tomorrow, in that the scientists are unable to contain the devastating effects of climate change once they have begun. ‘Ultimately,' writes ecocritic Sylvia Mayer, ‘the movie makes the point that the most advanced and dedicated scientific work is still powerless against the forces of nature once they are unleashed' (Mayer 111).Nevertheless, the scientists are the heroes of the movie. Their advice on the risks of climate change was ignored by the politicians until it was too late. As the director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration angrily tells the Vice-President: ‘You didn't want to heat about the science when it would have made a difference'. The scientists' computer models prove correct: in the movie, unlike in real life, climate science provides the clear, certain and unambiguous knowledge necessary for survival.Moreover, advanced technology is ultimately a force for good. Jack is able to locate his son in the Public Library un der the frozen wastes of Manhattan because of his friend's portable satellite navigation system (which, of course, would not work in such a massive storm). He is also seen driving a hybrid Toyota Prius earlier in the film. Reason, science and technology thus win the day. However, as Sylvia Mayer also notes, the movie stops short of simplistically advocating a technological fix for environmental problems as complex as climate change (Mayer 117).The values of civilization finally triumph over the destructive forces of wild nature when the pack of wolves, which escaped from Central Park Zoo earlier in the movie, return to attack Sam and his friends when they are searching for medicine and food. That the wolves are computer-generated special effects only adds an extra layer of irony to the triumph of civilization and benign technology in the movie. Indeed, the movie itself can be seen as a paean to the imaginative power of Computer Generated Imaging.In Eco Media (2005), Sean Cubitt argu es that The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2002-3) can be read as a celebration of the computer technologies from which it was made, which are an artisanal mode of production that demonstrates a creative place for technology within ‘green' thinking. There is an ‘increasing belief', he suggests, ‘that through the development of highly technologised creative industries, it is possible to devise a mode of economic development that does not compromise the land' (Cubitt 10). The thematic resolution of The Day After Tomorrow is ambiguous, however.The ending of the movie follows the recurrent pattern of the genre identified by Geoff King, in which ‘the possibility of apocalyptic destruction is confronted and depicted with a potentially horrifying special effects/spectacular ‘reality', only to be withdrawn or limited in its extent' (King 145). Typically, then, destruction is extensive, but total apocalypse is prevented at the last moment. The superstorm passes, the reby confirming Jack's earlier opinion that the storms will last ‘until the imbalance that created them is corrected' by ‘a global realignment'.Gazing at a beautiful, calm Earth, an astronaut in the International Space Station comments that he has ‘never seen the air so clear'. In Winston Wheeler Dixon's phrase, this could be the ‘exit point for the viewer' that disaster movies invariably provide (Dixon 133); the moment where the audience is let off the hook with a simplistic, evasive solution to the seemingly intractable problem explored in the rest of the movie. To return to the question posed at the start of this essay, does such an ending merely encourage evasion, denial and complacency in regard to issues such as anthropogenic climate change?Dixon argues that contemporary American cinema serves those who ‘wish to toy with the themes of destruction', from movies about atomic apocalypse to those that flirt with Nazism. This cinematic ‘cult of d eath', he concludes, is ‘the ultimate recreation' for an exhausted, media-saturated culture, a cult which ‘remains remote, carefully contained within a box of homicidal and genocidal dreams' (Dixon 139). But the ideological ambiguity of The Day After Tomorrow, as well as its audience reception, suggests that the process of interpretation is more open and varied than this.From an environmentalist perspective, the melodramatic ending of the film is ambiguous. No matter what human beings do, it appears, the Earth will heal itself. According to this reading, the message of the movie is that, because the storm eventually passes, we don't need to worry. This message resembles the right-wing appropriation of the Gaia hypothesis; that is, the idea, proposed by the British chemist James Lovelock, that the Earth as a whole is a self-regulating system in a natural state of homeostatic balance.In his 1999 book Hard Green: Saving the Environment from the Environmentalists, Peter Hube r used the concept of Gaia to justify a conservative manifesto that called for the dismantling of existing environmental regulations. The ‘most efficient way to control' pollutants such as greenhouses gases, he argued, ‘is not to worry about them at all. Let them be. Leave them to Gaia' (Huber 128). The notion of Gaia, we should note, is not the sole property of New Age environmentalists or deep ecologists.According to this interpretation, the movie appears to endorse the idea that humanity, through a combination of ingenuity, courage and chance, can survive whatever Nature may throw at us, an argument used by conservatives like Huber to justify a non-interventionist approach to environmental issues. It is a mistake, however, to assume that the final moments of a movie, when narrative closure is achieved, dictate its overall meaning. An analogy may be drawn here with the critical analysis of the role of women in film noir.As Janey Place argues of the female characters in films such as Double Indemnity (1946), ‘it is not their inevitable demise we remember but rather their strong, dangerous, and above all, exciting sexuality' (Place 48). In a similar way, the most memorable images in The Day After Tomorrow are probably the scenes of extreme weather. The main advertising image for the movie showed the shot of the hand of the Statue of Liberty held above the storm surge: an image of survival which at least includes a sense of struggle, rather than the calm, reposeful Earth revealed at the close of the film.Indeed, the above interpretation of the film as conservative is contradicted by its more explicit message, which advocated liberal political reform in the election year of 2004. Early in the film, Vice-President Becker, played by an actor who bears an obvious resemblance to Dick Cheney, refuses to listen to the advice of scientists on global warming, arguing that to take action would harm the American economy. In another reference to George W. Bush's presidency, we are told that the administration in the movie has also refused to sign up to the Kyoto Protocol on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.At the end of the movie, Becker, now President, appears on television to apologise to the nation out of a newfound sense of humility: ‘For years we operated under the belief that we could continue consuming our planet's natural resources without consequence. We were wrong. I was wrong'. Perhaps the most unbelievable part of the whole movie, the President's public apology confirms the words of the African-American homeless man earlier in the film, who refers to people with their ‘cars and their exhausts, and they're just polluting the atmosphere'.The disaster has been a wake-up call for America, and the new start will allow for the changes in lifestyle necessary for a more sustainable future. The government will also change its attitude to the Third World from one of arrogance to gratitude. In these moments, th e movie works as a secular form of jeremiad; ‘secular' because the environmental catastrophe is not seen as punishment from God, but as human-created. Opie and Elliott argue that both ‘implementational and evocative strategies' are necessary in successful jeremiads, and cite Rachel Carson's Silent Spring (1962) as a powerful exemplar (Opie and Elliott 35).The Day After Tomorrow also uses both pathos and rational argument to convince its audience of the need to take steps to avoid environmental catastrophe. Critical speculation on the effectiveness or otherwise of making a disaster movie about global warming can draw on the conclusions of an empirical study by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research of the reception of the movie in Germany. This found that the movie did not appear to reinforce feelings of fatalism in its audience. Less than 10% of the sample agreed with the statement, ‘There's nothing we can do anyway', whereas 82% preferred, ‘We hav e to stop climate change'. Reusswig). Indeed, the Potsdam study makes hopeful reading for environmentalists. It found that the publicity surrounding the film triggered a new interest in climate change, and raised some issues previously unfamiliar to audiences, such as the role of oceans in global warming. A similar study of reception in the United States concluded that the film ‘led moviegoers to have higher levels of concern and worry about global warming, to estimate various impacts on the United States as more likely, and to shift their conceptual understanding of the climate system toward a threshold model.Further, the movie encouraged watchers to engage in personal, political, and social action to address climate change and to elevate global warming as a national priority'. However, whether such changes constituted merely a ‘momentary blip' in public perceptions remained to be seen (Leiserowitz 7). These empirical studies are important because they show that audienc e reception is a more complex and variable process than it is sometimes taken for in film theory. According to some versions of psychoanalytic ‘subject positioning' theory, Hollywood movies like The Day After Tomorrow tend to render spectators passive.Under the influence of Bertolt Brecht's theories of narrative, film academics such Colin McCabe and Steven Heath argued that only modernist or avant-garde narrative techniques can produce a more active (even revolutionary) film spectator. As the 1992 textbook New Vocabularies in Film Semiotics puts it, psychoanalytic film theory ‘sees the viewer not as a person, a flesh-and-blood individual, but as an artificial construct, produced and activated by the cinematic apparatus' (Stam 147). In his book The Crisis of Political Modernism (1999), D.N. Rodowick exposes the flaws in such thinking. The politics of political modernism, he writes, assume ‘an intrinsic and intractable relation between texts and their spectators, reg ardless of the historical or social context of that relation' (Rodowick 34). But film viewers are flesh-and-blood individuals, and when they are treated as such by film theorists and researchers, the phenomenon of film reception becomes more complex and nuanced, and less deterministic and stereotyped, than that imagined by subject positioning theory.Empirical audience research shows that we do not all watch the same movie in the same way, and that audience responses are complexly determined by a long list of variables, such as nation, region, locality, class, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, race and, last but certainly not least, individual temperament. When we look at the public reception of The Day After Tomorrow, then, it is clear that different interest groups appropriated the movie in different ways.Both sides of the public debate about climate change interpreted the movie within a realist framework, either positively or negatively, and produced selective readings in order to fur ther their own agendas. Patrick Michaels, one of the minority of scientists who stills rejects the idea of human-created climate change, pointed out the scientific flaws in the movie, and damned Hollywood for irresponsibly playing into the hands of liberal environmentalists by exaggerating the threat of global warming (Michaels 1).Liberal-left environmental campaigners also understood that the movie's foundation in science was flawed. However, they found its scientific exaggerations and inaccuracies less important than what they saw as its realistic portrayal of the American government's denial of the scientific evidence for global warming. As former Vice-President Al Gore put it, ‘there are two sets of fiction to deal with. One is the movie, the other is the Bush administration's presentation of global warming' (Mooney 1). Gore joined with the liberal Internet advocacy organization MoveOn. rg, which used the movie's release as an opportunity to organize a national advocacy ca mpaign on climate change. Senators McCain and Lieberman also used the movie to promote the reintroduction of their Climate Stewardship Act in Congress (Nisbet 1). Greenpeace endorsed the ‘underlying premise' of the film, that ‘extreme weather events are already on the rise, and global warming can be expected to make them more frequent and more severe'. It summed up its response to the movie with the line: ‘Fear is justified' (Greenpeace 1-2).The use of this movie to encourage environmental debate suggests that it is perhaps only if Hollywood movies like The Day After Tomorrow are people's sole, or even main, source of information on the environment that we should worry. As Sylvia Mayer argues, Hollywood environmentalist movies ‘have the potential to contribute to the development of an ‘environmentally informed sense of self' that is characterised by an awareness of environmental threats, by the wish to gain more effective knowledge about them and by a d isposition to participate actively in efforts to remedy the problem' (Mayer 107).In this respect, a classical, Hollywood-style narrative does not necessarily inculcate or reinforce a feeling a complacency or denial it its audience. In any case, no narrative can be as complex as the reality to which it refers; all art is a process of simplifying, selecting and giving shape to reality. Classical narrative forms and genre movies such as The Day After Tomorrow can focus thought and provide an imaginative and provocative response to environmental crisis. WORKS CITED Adam, Barbara (1998), Timescapes of Modernity: The Environment and Invisible Hazards, Routledge, London and New York.Bell, Art and Streiber, Whitely (1999), The Coming Global Superstorm, Pocket Star Books, New York. Collins, Jim (1989), Uncommon Cultures: Popular Culture and Post-Modernism, Routledge, New York and London. Cubitt, Sean (2005), Eco Media, Rodopi, Amsterdam and New York. Davis, Mike (1998), Ecology of Fear: Los Angeles and the Imagination of Disaster, Henry Holt and Co. , New York. Dixon, Wheeler Winston (2003), Visions of the Apocalypse: Spectacles of Destruction in American Cinema, Wallflower Press, London and New York.Emmerich, Roland, director (2004), The Day After Tomorrow, 20th Century Fox, Two-disc DVD. 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King, Geoff (2000), Spectacular Narratives: Hollywood in the Age of the Blockbuster, London and New York, I. B. Tauris.Lieserowitz, Anthony A (2004), ‘Before and After The Day After Tomorrow: A U. S. study of climate change risk perception. ‘ Environment. 46 (9), 22-37. www. findarticles. com/p/articles/mi_m1076/is_9_46/ai_n856541/print, 1-12. Mayer, Sylvia (2006), ‘Teaching Hollywood Environmentalist Movies: The Example of The Day After Tomorrow', in Sylvia Mayer and Graham Wilson (eds), Ecodidactic Perspectives on English Languages, Literatures and Cultures, Trier, WVT. Mellencamp, Patricia (1990), ‘TV Time and Catastrophe, or Beyond the Pleasure Principle of Television', in Logics of Television, ed.P atricia Mellencamp, Indiana University Press, Bloomington. Michaels, Patrick J. (2004), ‘Apocalypse Soon? No, but This Movie (And Democrats) Hope You'll Think So. ‘ The Washington Post, May 16th 2004, B01. www. washingtonpost. com/ac2/wp-dyn/A28338-2004May14? language=printer Mooney, Chris (2004), ‘Learning From Nonsense? ‘, Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, http://www. csicop. org/doubtandabout/global-warming Nachmanoff, Jeffrey (2004), ‘Jeffrey Nachmanoff on The Day After Tomorrow'. http:// www. amazon. co. uk/gp/feature. html.Nisbet, Matthew (2004), ‘Evaluating the Impact of The Day After Tomorrow: Can a Blockbuster Film Shape the Public's Understanding of a Science Controversy? ‘, Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, http://www. csicop. org/ Opie, John and Elliott, Norbert (1996), ‘Tracking the Elusive Jeremiad: The Rhetorical Character of American Environmental Discourse', in James G. Cantrill and Christine L. Oravec (eds), The Symboli c Earth: Discourse and Our Creation of the Environment, University Press of Kentucky, Lexington. Place, Janey (1978), ‘Women in Film Noir', in E. Ann Kaplan (ed), Women in Film Noir.BFI, London. Prince, Stephen (1992), Visions of Empire: Political Imagery in Contemporary American Film. Praeger, New York. Reusswig, Fritz, Scwarzkopf, Julia and Pohlenz, Philipp (2004), ‘Double Impact: The Climate Blockbuster ‘The Day After Tomorrow' and its impact on the German Cinema Public. ‘ PIK Report 92, Potsdam, 1-61. http://www. pik-potsdam. de/research/publications/pikereports/summary-report-n-92 Rodowick, D. N. (1999), The Crisis of Political Modernism: Criticism and Ideology in Contemporary Film Theory, University of Illinois Press, Urbana and Chicago.Sontag, Susan (2001), Against Interpretation, Vintage, London. Stam, Robert, Burgoyne, Robert and Flitterman-Lewis, Sandy (1992), New Vocabularies in Film Semiotics: Structuralism, post-structuralism and beyond, Routledg e, London and New York. Williams, Linda (1998), ‘Melodrama Revisited', in Nick Browne (ed), Refiguring American Film Genres, University of California Press, London. Yacowar, Maurice (1986), ‘The Bug in the Rug: Notes on the Disaster Genre', in Barry Keith Grant (ed), Film Genre Reader, University of Texas Press, Austin.

Personal Reflection On Teaching Experience - 906 Words

Reflection on Teaching Experience Our Final project for EDU 581- Clinical Teaching in Health professions was to build on our Educational experience in EDU 497- Teaching and Learning in Higher Education and Health professions in planning and implementing a lesson related to Health Professions Education. This lesson design and implementation was so important for me, because it was my first official lesson to teach. So, the guidelines given by the course instructors in the course modules helped me to design my comprehensive lesson plan beyond a novice expertise. I chose to deliver my lesson in our face-to-face meeting in May 2014. I decided to choose a topic of a common interest amongst different healthcare providers â€Å"International Patient Safety Goals†. The plan to my project included: knowing Audience, Learning goals/objectives, Needs assessment, and timed implementation scheme. Needs assessment Evidence that there is a need for such a lesson. The main phrase we know quoted from the Hippocratic Oath is â€Å"First do not harm†. Patient safety as a new discipline of health care quality and management, emphasizes on the process of reporting, analyzing and preventing of Medical Errors that often lead to adverse health events. The WHO called patient safety an endemic concern, as 1of 10 patients around the world is impacted from errors. Also, IOM report (1999): â€Å"To Err Is Human: building a safer health system† †¢ 98,000 patients die each year from preventable medical errors. †¢Show MoreRelatedSocial Relationships Of A Teacher s Environment942 Words   |  4 Pagescreated by the experiences that develop a teacher’s personal story. Therefore, we must pay close attention to the daily experiences that dictate our future if we are to gain true understanding of who we are (Clandinin, 2007). Understanding how teacher stories are established requires us to recognize that the process is constantly changing to meet the demands of the professional environment the teacher is exposed to. The teacher story will undergo many changes as new knowledge and experience is addedRead MoreReflective Practice in the Classroom1629 Words   |  7 Pagesquestions such as, could I have done something to avoid it? These experiences usually make us grow and we learn from experience, and we will be better prepared to face the situation if it happened again. 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This is supported by Brookfield, he says that Critically reflective teaching happens when we identify and scrutinise the assumptions that undergirdRead MoreThe Professional Development Of A Teacher1631 Words   |  7 PagesAs an aspiring teacher I feel that it is extremely important to recognise that good teaching methods have a significant positive impact on how students lean. It is crucial to understand that a good teacher does not just simply require advanced skills and knowledge in their subject area but is essential that we are good role models to pupils, as well as promoting a good example of moral and ethical and positive attitudes. â€Å"In addition to knowing what and knowing how, teachers must also be competentRead MoreThe Importance Of A New Piece Of Equipment Essay1559 Words   |  7 PagesIntroduction Work may contribute to an educational outcome, such as a qualification or Statement of Attainment; leading to a job outcome. Learning how to use a new piece of equipment; and/or a personal result, such as extending an individual’s self-esteem (Innovation and Business Skills Australia 2012, p. 2). There is a growing interest among educators, employers and community leaders in implementing work-based learning into schools as a means of enriching the academic curriculum with in-demand careerRead MoreReflection Of My Own Personal Development1637 Words   |  7 Pagesbeen established that reflection is a generic term for intellectual and effective activities, in which individuals examine their experiences, in order to develop new understanding and intrapersonal appreciation (Knowles, et al., 2006). Research in this field has advocated reflective practice as an approach to professional development which positively impacts coaching effectiveness (Cropley, et al., 2012). This reflect ive report shall discuss, analyse and evaluate my own personal development throughoutRead MoreWhat Effective Practice Really Means1690 Words   |  7 PagesIn everyday life if we want to improve on something that we have done, we must be open to reflection, so that we can identify our strengths and weaknesses and find areas that can be improved on. As the GTCNI competence Framework states, â€Å"Teachers should keep curricular, subject and pedagogical knowledge up-to-date through reflection, self-study and collaboration with colleagues.† (Internet source 1) By taking this into consideration it is then evident that just like in everyday life, if teachersRead MoreReflecting practice is an important role within early years1700 Words   |  7 Pagesconsidering areas for personal development.   Then I would like you to describe how you ensure personal attitudes or beliefs do not obstruct your quality of work.   Task B   Reflecting on practice is an important role within early years.   Explain why reflecting on practice and work activities are important in order to develop knowledge skills and practice. Identify where you go for sources of support in your learning and development and describe the process for implementing a personal development planRead MoreReflection Of The Confucius A Chinese Philosopher s Saying Essay1604 Words   |  7 Pagessaying: By three methods we may learn wisdom: first, by reflection, which is noblest; second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest. Confucius (551 BC - 479 BC) Chinese Philosopher Definition of Reflective Practice: This practice is one of the oldest theory that experienced by ancient Greeks over 2500 years ago as a concept of intention in exploration of truth, and this old concept meaning of reflection features in many modern definitions. Donald Schon introducedRead MoreProfessional Development Of An Effective Teacher1432 Words   |  6 Pagesrelevant literature, identify and explain four key aspects that are important for teacher development. Thinking about your own professional development, select your personal priority from these four aspects and provide justification for your choice. As an aspiring teacher I feel that it is extremely important to recognise that good teaching methods have a significant positive impact of how students lean. It is crucial understand that a good teacher does not just simply require advanced skills and knowledge

Geography Essay - 705 Words

01.01 Assignment Historians apply geographic skills in order to learn about the past and solve historical problems. Complete the two parts of the following written assignment to show your understanding of these skills. Part 1 Explore the interactive maps to answer the three questions in Part 1 of this assignment. If you need to review how to use a maps scale, please go to the Locating Places section of the Map Tutorial and read through page 3. Please remember to submit your responses for Part 1 and Part 2 to your instructor in the assessment area. 1. Using the scale on the interactive map, give the approximate distance in miles that the Pilgrims traveled in their journey from Plymouth, England, to Plymouth, Massachusetts. The†¦show more content†¦Orlando is about 221.7 miles south of Hollywood. South Carolina is about 618.2 miles from Hollywood. Hollywood is a very hot and humid place. There are no mountains and hills it’s all flat land. It doesn’t snow it is summer all year. However, we do have rainfall during the months of April to July. There are many different ethnicities that live in Hollywood Florida. The city has a heavy Hispanic population. There are two large ethnic groups that live in Hollywood which are Puerto Ricans, and Cubans. 2. Convince someone to move to a U.S. city of your choice, by describing the location using terms from the lesson. Be sure to include the name of the city and state you are writing about and make your response at least one paragraph in length. You would love to live in the Big Apple also known as New York City. There are many people who live in city. New York is a very well known city in the United States. New York is its own region. It is an airport hub, and has many tourists that come to the city every year. New York is known for the towering Skyline. The two landmark dominant buildings that are in Manhattan are the Empire State, and Rockefeller Center. New York’s climate is subtropical. New York has four seasons! During the summer it is very hot and humid, in winter it is very cold and snowy so you will have to take out your scarves, gloves, coats, and boots! In the fall it is cool but the leaves turn orange, gre en, and yellow it is veryShow MoreRelatedGeography And The World Of Geography1221 Words   |  5 Pagessuch as globalization, political geography, or industries and services. I was surprised at what all we learned in such a short period of time. I gained a new prospective and information about the world around me. Throughout the semester, my understanding and knowledge about geography has drastically changed from before this course. This course has made me think about topics and things that I have never reflected upon. I have had this standard premonition of geography as just places or maps, but thereRead MoreGeography And Human Geography701 Words   |  3 PagesGeography is a science that deals with the description, distribution, and interaction of the diverse physical, biological, and cultural features of the earths surface (Websters). We study geography so that we can better understand the locations of places, people, cultures, physical features of the Earth and more around us and the world. Studying geography requires looking at all of Earth’s systems. Geography is used almost everyday in our daily lives. For example, using a global positioning systemRead MoreGeography : The Five Themes Of Geography740 Words   |  3 PagesWhat is geography, and why do we study it? Geography is the study of the physical features of the Earth and its atmosphere, and of human activity as it affects and is affected by these, including the distribution of populations and resources, land use, and industries. We study Geography to understand basic physical systems that affect everyday life. Also, to understand the geography of past times and how geography has played important roles in the evolution of people, their ideas, places and environmentRead MoreWhat Is Geography?1066 Words   |  4 Pages What is geography to you? Well geography is the study of physical features of the earth and its atmospheres of human activity as it affects and is affected by this distribution of populations and resources.as well as land use and industries. Geography has do with many things such as history ,culture and society .the Japanese history, it has to do with feminist science it goes back further than all this . My topic about geography I have chosen to write about Mr. Christopher Columbus. ChristopherRead MoreImportance Of Geography Essay773 Words   |  4 PagesKerrigan Moore Why is Geography Important? Mrs. Bezy Geography Honors Period 8 8/14/17 Why is Geography Important? In geography there are five main themes that we learn about: location, place, region, movement, and human and environment interaction. There are various reasons why we study geography. Geography is what we use to locate things around the world. It can tell us where a state is, to where an exact street is. Geography is a very useful resource. The first mainRead MoreIntroduction to Geography-Montessori1341 Words   |  6 PagesIntroduction to Geography The world is getting smaller, we now live in a global village due to our enlarged technical skills. It is today as easy to fly from eg. Dublin to Rome as it was to travel from Dublin to Cork 150 years ago, Not to mention flights to the moon back. Geography has turned out to be the study of man in space. Between mass media and frequent travel the child is bombarded with impressions about the planet he lives on. In today’s world the child hears random words, names ofRead MoreWhat Is Environmental Geography? Essay944 Words   |  4 Pages Final Exam 1. What is environmental geography? Essentially, environmental geography is the study of the distribution pattern of environments across the earth, how these environments change over time and the reasons for this change, as well as how the activities of humans affect these changes and are affected by them (â€Å"A - EG SP16 - What is Environmental Geography†). 2. Briefly discuss the 5 â€Å"Human Drivers of Environmental Change† The five â€Å"Human Drivers of Environmental Change† are demographic,Read MoreIntro to Geography Essay1759 Words   |  8 PagesIntroduction to Geography Research paper week 7 I learned more than I anticipated while studying the Introduction to Geography. There are Four Geographic Traditions; Earth Science Tradition, Culture-Environment Tradition, Location Tradition and Area Analysis Tradition. The Earth Science Tradition covers physical geography such as landforms, natural resources, weather and climate. 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Finance Crisis And Its Effects On The Financial Crisis

After the breakout of finance crisis, leaders of the G-20 vowed to take control of the derivative market and finally pass the BASEL III. All the participants including the bankï ¼Å' speculators, exchange platform and institutions, regulators, the offices, political leaders and the households who had a harmful effect from the financial crisis require the reassurance for such a crisis to never occur again. Society as a whole suffered a loss from it, because the wide spread fear and constraint of consumption resulted in higher than expected rates of unemployment, deflation was expected and occurred drastically. Investment was strained down significantly. There are both counterparty and transparency risks that contributed to the derivative†¦show more content†¦For individual speculators and the managers of financial firms, they have incentives to increase profit where they prefer more risk investment when counterparties and others obey the rules to keep a sustainable marker. Therefore, the transparency policy had been implemented to expose more information around prices and volumes combined with the standardising policy of derivatives contracts, which also increase market efficiency and liquidity. The main regulations introduced are as follows: †¢ Greater standardisation of OTC derivatives contracts: Greater standardisation would enhance the efficiency of operational processes; facilitate the increased use of central counterparty (CCP) clearing and trading on organised trading platform to support greater comparability of trade information. By working with international regulators and the industry to take steps in identifying and agreeing which products can be further standardised, both in terms of underlying contract terms and operational processes where this must be implemented on a timely basis. †¢ More robust counterparty risk management. All OTC derivative trades, whether or not centrally cleared, should be subject to robust arrangements to mitigate counterparty risk. For all financial firms this should be through the use of CCP clearing for clearing eligible products. For trades which are not centrally cleared these should be subject to robust bilateral collateralisation arrangements and appropriate risk capitalShow MoreRelatedFinancial Crisis And Its Effects On The World Of Finance1336 Words   |  6 PagesAccording to many experts, this was one of the most severe financial crises in our history since 1930. This crisis was so complex that was known throughout the world under many names, such as â€Å"the Great Recession†, â€Å"the financial crash of 2008†, â€Å"the Trouble Asset Relief Program bailout†, and â€Å"the Great Panic† (Biegelman Bartow, 2012). Whatever its name, this crisis undoubtedly disorder the world of finance dramat ically. 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Deception Point Page 19 Free Essays

Rachel found herself uncharacteristically tongue-tied. Sensory overload was setting in†¦ the habisphere, the meteorite, the secrets, finding herself unexpectedly face-to-face with a television star. â€Å"I’m surprised to see you here,† she said, attempting to recover. We will write a custom essay sample on Deception Point Page 19 or any similar topic only for you Order Now â€Å"When the President told me he’d recruited civilian scientists for authentication of a NASA find, I guess I expected†¦ † She hesitated. â€Å"Real scientists?† Tolland grinned. Rachel flushed, mortified. â€Å"That’s not what I meant.† â€Å"Don’t worry about it,† Tolland said. â€Å"That’s all I’ve heard since I got here.† The administrator excused himself, promising to catch up with them later. Tolland turned now to Rachel with a curious look. â€Å"The administrator tells me your father is Senator Sexton?† Rachel nodded. Unfortunately. â€Å"A Sexton spy behind enemy lines?† â€Å"Battle lines are not always drawn where you might think.† An awkward silence. â€Å"So tell me,† Rachel said quickly, â€Å"what’s a world-famous oceanographer doing on a glacier with a bunch of NASA rocket scientists?† Tolland chuckled. â€Å"Actually, some guy who looked a lot like the President asked me to do him a favor. I opened my mouth to say ‘Go to hell,’ but somehow I blurted, ‘Yes, sir.'† Rachel laughed for the first time all morning. â€Å"Join the club.† Although most celebrities seemed smaller in person, Rachel thought Michael Tolland appeared taller. His brown eyes were just as vigilant and passionate as they were on television, and his voice carried the same modest warmth and enthusiasm. Looking to be a weathered and athletic forty-five, Michael Tolland had coarse black hair that fell in a permanent windswept tuft across his forehead. He had a strong chin and a carefree mannerism that exuded confidence. When he’d shaken Rachel’s hand, the callused roughness of his palms reminded her he was not a typical â€Å"soft† television personality but rather an accomplished seaman and hands-on researcher. â€Å"To be honest,† Tolland admitted, sounding sheepish, â€Å"I think I was recruited more for my PR value than for my scientific knowledge. The president asked me to come up and make a documentary for him.† â€Å"A documentary? About a meteorite? But you’re an oceanographer.† â€Å"That’s exactly what I told him! But he said he didn’t know of any meteorite documentarians. He told me my involvement would help bring mainstream credibility to this find. Apparently he plans to broadcast my documentary as part of tonight’s big press conference when he announces the discovery.† A celebrity spokesman. Rachel sensed the savvy political maneuverings of Zach Herney at work. NASA was often accused of talking over the public’s head. Not this time. They’d pulled in the master scientific communicator, a face Americans already knew and trusted when it came to science. Tolland pointed kitty-corner across the dome to a far wall where a press area was being set up. There was a blue carpet on the ice, television cameras, media lights, a long table with several microphones. Someone was hanging a backdrop of a huge American flag. â€Å"That’s for tonight,† he explained. â€Å"The NASA administrator and some of his top scientists will be connected live via satellite to the White House so they can participate in the President’s eight o’clock broadcast.† Appropriate, Rachel thought, pleased to know Zach Herney didn’t plan to cut NASA out of the announcement entirely. â€Å"So,† Rachel said with a sigh, â€Å"is someone finally going to tell me what’s so special about this meteorite?† Tolland arched his eyebrows and gave her a mysterious grin. â€Å"Actually, what’s so special about this meteorite is best seen, not explained.† He motioned for Rachel to follow him toward the neighboring work area. â€Å"The guy stationed over here has plenty of samples he can show you.† â€Å"Samples? You actually have samples of the meteorite?† â€Å"Absolutely. We’ve drilled quite a few. In fact, it was the initial core samples that alerted NASA to the importance of the find.† Unsure of what to expect, Rachel followed Tolland into the work area. It appeared deserted. A cup of coffee sat on a desk scattered with rock samples, calipers, and other diagnostic gear. The coffee was steaming. â€Å"Marlinson!† Tolland yelled, looking around. No answer. He gave a frustrated sigh and turned to Rachel. â€Å"He probably got lost trying to find cream for his coffee. I’m telling you, I went to Princeton postgrad with this guy, and he used to get lost in his own dorm. Now he’s a National Medal of Science recipient in astrophysics. Go figure.† Rachel did a double take. â€Å"Marlinson? You don’t by any chance mean the famous Corky Marlinson, do you?† Tolland laughed. â€Å"One and the same.† Rachel was stunned. â€Å"Corky Marlinson is here?† Marlinson’s ideas on gravitational fields were legendary among NRO satellite engineers. â€Å"Marlinson is one of the President’s civilian recruits?† â€Å"Yeah, one of the real scientists.† Real is right, Rachel thought. Corky Marlinson was as brilliant and respected as they came. â€Å"The incredible paradox about Corky,† Tolland said, â€Å"is that he can quote you the distance to Alpha Centauri in millimeters, but he can’t tie his own necktie.† â€Å"I wear clip-ons!† a nasal, good-natured voice barked nearby. â€Å"Efficiency over style, Mike. You Hollywood types don’t understand that!† Rachel and Tolland turned to the man now emerging from behind a large stack of electronic gear. He was squat and rotund, resembling a pug dog with bubble eyes and a thinning, comb-over haircut. When the man saw Tolland standing with Rachel, he stopped in his tracks. â€Å"Jesus Christ, Mike! We’re at the friggin’ North Pole and you still manage to meet gorgeous women. I knew I should have gone into television!† Michael Tolland was visibly embarrassed. â€Å"Ms. Sexton, please excuse Dr. Marlinson. What he lacks in tact, he more than makes up for in random bits of totally useless knowledge about our universe.† Corky approached. â€Å"A true pleasure, ma’am. I didn’t catch your name.† â€Å"Rachel,† she said. â€Å"Rachel Sexton.† â€Å"Sexton?† Corky let out a playful gasp. â€Å"No relation to that shortsighted, depraved senator, I hope!† Tolland winced. â€Å"Actually, Corky, Senator Sexton is Rachel’s father.† Corky stopped laughing and slumped. â€Å"You know, Mike, it’s really no wonder I’ve never had any luck with the ladies.† 22 Prize-winning astrophysicist Corky Marlinson ushered Rachel and Tolland into his work area and began sifting through his tools and rock samples. The man moved like a tightly wound spring about to explode. â€Å"All right,† he said, quivering excitedly, â€Å"Ms. Sexton, you’re about to get the Corky Marlinson thirty-second meteorite primer.† Tolland gave Rachel a be-patient wink. â€Å"Bear with him. The man really wanted to be an actor.† â€Å"Yeah, and Mike wanted to be a respected scientist.† Corky rooted around in a shoebox and produced three small rock samples and aligned them on his desk. â€Å"These are the three main classes of meteorites in the world.† Rachel looked at the three samples. All appeared as awkward spheroids about the size of golf balls. Each had been sliced in half to reveal its cross section. â€Å"All meteorites,† Corky said, â€Å"consist of varying amounts of nickel-iron alloys, silicates, and sulfides. We classify them on the basis of their metal-to-silicate ratios.† Rachel already had the feeling Corky Marlinson’s meteorite â€Å"primer† was going to be more than thirty seconds. How to cite Deception Point Page 19, Essay examples

The Art of Snowboarding free essay sample

As I make my way up the mountain my heart begins to quicken from excitement and the feeling of anticipation runs through my body. An experience down a mountain, that Eve been waiting months for, was moments away from taking place. Trees shook and snow flurried about the ground creating the mountain smog. As the gondola pulled its way to the top, the sun began to peak Its way through and there I saw the view of the beautiful vast mountain range surrounding Killing Mountain In Vermont. The gondola slowed at the top of the mountain and quickly the doors slid open. ABA my snowboard from the gondola rack and briskly walk to a flat side on the mountain and plop down In the sparkling snow and strap both my feet In. Although, my dad and brother already began to race down the mountain, I stop for a moment and find the quietness In my mind that relaxes me. We will write a custom essay sample on The Art of Snowboarding or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page For Just a second, hear nothing but my heartbeat, I see nothing but the mountain In my mind and I feel only the wind on my face. As I regain my excitement for the moment I brush the dusting of snow off my snowboard and launch myself down the hill. The edge of my board cuts deeply causing snow powder to spray everywhere. Speeding down the steep mountain felt like floating on air. It was a kind of thrill someone couldnt find anywhere else. My legs continued to carve my board to the left and to the right while maintaining my balance. I feel my heart pounding and my body begin to sweat as I take in the beautiful sights of the pure white snow passing by. Finally at the bottom of the last hill I twist my snowboard toe side and glide while digging into the snow until coming to a complete stop. The wind that was plunging through my ears and ice cold breeze that froze my nostrils had calmed.Nothing could have beaten the smile t painted on my face from ear to ear. I unstrung my back foot from my snowboard and spot my dad and brother waving me over. I skate towards them and we each share our experiences then hop in the gondola to do it all again. Snowboarding down a great mountain, which feels endless, for the first time, is unlike the feeling of any first time. Snowboarding is unlike any other sport, because the conditions are ever changing, and every run, every chance to race down the mountain Is a first time to be better, stronger and learn more about my body.As the gondola chimes Its way to the pop I cant help but turn around once again to take In the beauty of the view. Something that causes a person to appreciate the time and space that theyve found Is truly something to experience. By embellisher gondola pulled its way to the top, the sun began to peak its way through and there I in Vermont. The gondola slowed at the top of the mountain and quickly the doors slid open. I grab my snowboard from the gondola rack and briskly walk to a flat side on the mountain and plop down in the sparkling snow and strap both my feet in. Moment and find the quietness in my mind that relaxes me.For Just a second, I hear thing but my heartbeat, I see nothing but the mountain in my mind and I feel only cuts deeply causing snow powder to spray everywhere. Speeding down the steep mountain felt like floating on air. It was a kind of thrill someone couldnt find changing, and every run, every chance to race down the mountain is a first time to be better, stronger and learn more about my body. As the gondola chimes its way to the top I cant help but turn around once again to take in the beauty of the view. Something that causes a person to appreciate the time and space that theyve found is truly something to experience.