Democracy, Demagoguery, And Critical Rhetoric - 1444 Words

Julia Vu Professor Parker RWS 200 21 March 2015 Demagoguery Throughout history, when it comes to a national crisis, many leaders and politicians tend to advance towards what the people want to hear. In order to gain their audience’s support, most political leaders and public speakers use the practice of demagoguery to have useful influence held towards their argument. In Patricia Roberts-Miller’s article â€Å"Democracy, Demagoguery, and Critical Rhetoric,† analyzes what demagoguery is and how it affects the audience. Speakers or authoritative figures that engage with demagoguery use strategies such as scapegoating and polarization in order to establish a separation between in-groups and out-groups; in-groups tend to form hateful discrimination on out-groups and define them with negative features. An example of demagoguery that Roberts-Miller uses is in Adolf Hitler’s speech about how he wanted German people to change their views and beliefs on the Jewish. Her article however, also consists of several fallacies an d may seem somewhat unethical. Throughout Wayne LaPierre’s speech on the Newtown Tragedy in 2012, there is usage of what Roberts-Miller claims to be demagoguery. Wayne LaPierre is the Vice President of the National Rifle Association (NRA). After the shooting that occurred at Sandy Hook elementary, LaPierre expresses his sympathy for the families of the loss and he then gathers the attention of parents who may be uneasy about their children’s safety at school. ThroughoutShow MoreRelatedInternational Media s Coverage Of An Event Essay3208 Words   |  13 PagesTelegraph journalists were opportunistic about the slow developments inside the cafà ©, using the unresolved nature of the crisis to exasperate a media climate of conflicting narratives, inaccuracy, hyperbole, ill-informed speculation and inflammatory rhetoric. Furthermore, the Telegraph’s coverage illustrates the extent to which the character of a news organization, and the learned (or preexisting) assump tions of their journalists, may influence the framing of a story. The Telegraph is an Australian tabloid

Key Aspects Of Time Management - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 2 Words: 485 Downloads: 3 Date added: 2019/05/31 Category Management Essay Level High school Tags: Time Management Essay Did you like this example? Time Management is essentially the ability to organize and plan the time spent on activities in a day. The result of good time management is increased effectiveness and productivity. It is a key aspect of project management and involves skills such as planning, setting goals and prioritizing for a better performance. Planning Planning consists of identification of the intention of the Project Management Group with respect to the steps one intends to follow toward the execution of the project. It includes depicting what the Project Management group intend to do, how it will be done, and what will be used to do it. Setting Goals When setting goal, we ensure that we follow the SMART process. SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound) goals that motivate you. There are a lot of time wasters in our daily (working) lives, which is why we need a way to manage our time better. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Key Aspects Of Time Management" essay for you Create order Time Management is often associated with business, but you need this skill in every part of life. For project managers, it is particularly important to possess time management skills to be successful. A lack of effective time management can have a negative impact on a project in the long run. Time is one of the three triple constraints and any deviation from the schedule has an effect on the cost and scope of a project. In most cases time really is money. Ineffective time management can also increase stress and frustration in the project manager and the team members. Worst case scenario: a burnout. Effective Time Management The key to good time management is not to work more, but to work more efficiently. Task list and priorities Planning is key in project management. An effective planning method is to identify all the tasks that you need to do to complete a project. This can be done by making a to-do or task list. The next step is to prioritize these tasks. Estimate and track time accurately After you have identified and prioritize the tasks it is time to estimate how much time it will take to complete them. Make sure that you include all constraints and other factors in your estimation. Most of the time things will not go as planned, so include buffer times for unforeseen events into your project schedule. Create a schedule After all the planning and estimating, you can create a project schedule, which includes all tasks and their duration. I know I mention them a lot, but Gantt charts are really a staple of project management that help you schedule activities and assign resources. For more complex projects, add a critical path to visualize which tasks are most important to complete the project. Reference Tourangbam, D. K. (2011). Time Management. New Delhi: Vij Books India Private Limited. AEON, B., AGUINIS, H. (2017). Its about Time: New Perspectives and Insights on Time Management. Farrell, M. (2017). Time Management. Journal of Library administration.

The Need for Stronger Bullying Laws Free Essays

Bullying is a very negative action and creates major problems in our society. Nothing good ever comes out of bullying someone. It can however change someone’s life forever. We will write a custom essay sample on The Need for Stronger Bullying Laws or any similar topic only for you Order Now It actually does ruin many lives both of the bully and of the victim. The bully if caught and punished will then have a criminal record for the rest of their life. Unless they get psychological help, they will probably end up being a repeat offender. The victim often becomes depressed, withdrawn and often times either commits suicide or becomes a bully themselves. Bullying is more than just a part of growing up. It is a very violent form of aggressive behavior. Anti-bullying Laws will never completely solve the problem; only mask it temporarily until everyone starts working together to stop the root of this cruel behavior. Adults know that this behavior is wrong but many time don’t know when or if they should step in and do something. The important thing to remember when deciding to step in is how the adult feels about taking control of the situation versus how the victim might feel about having a parent or elder stick up for them. Sometimes the victim feels that elder involvement may make the situation even worse. They often feel the only way to solve the problem is to handle it themselves. â€Å"Anti-bullying laws are being enacted in almost every state in the U. S. However, they are not being enforced and are nowhere near strong enough to identify and make the abuser stop or continue to repeat his/her actions again on someone else or even sometime the same victim they began with. Only 44 of our 50 states currently have anti-bullying laws in place. Ohio does have a law in place and is found in the Ohio Revised Code, section 3313. 666. The law prohibits harassment, intimidation, or bullying in schools. It went into effect on March 30, 2007. † (University of Nebraska, 2006). This law applies to every public school in Ohio, however, does not apply to private schools. So, if the law only applies to certain people then how is it supposed to be a solution to the problem? Bullying happens very often off school grounds or even in the home. Often the school will deny that there is a problem and that the victim is either lying or exaggerating the story. When this happens the parent needs to take their complaints even further. The superintendent of the school ystem should be their next step. If that does not work they can then contact an attorney or even their city’s police force. All of these venues need to be reminded that refusal to recognize that the problem is going on violates the Ohio law prohibiting bullying. â€Å"Many parents end up feeling like they have exhausted all efforts in dealing with school authorities and/or they do not feel school officials have been recept ive enough in meeting the child’s needs, especially when the child continues to being a victim of ongoing harassment, bullying, assaults, or emotional bullying. If the adult or parent feels this way then they should not sit back and give up or feel defeated. They can however, pursue other means of support from medical, mental health, social services or even community based programs. But lastly, they can also contact the police. † (McGraw, 2008). As a parent myself of a severely bullied child, this advice really hits home for me. A parent often feels backed in a corner and helpless not being able to stop their child’s pain. This was an excellent book to read to teach parents, teachers and administrators that there is always help out there. They just have to know the channels to follow. In an article from the Register-Herald in Beckley, West Virginia, dated February, 26, 2011, a house panel agreed to arm educators with a stronger law to cope with cyber bullying over objections by some opponents that it goes too far by dealing with off campus texting and other wireless harassment. One major dispute was schools right to deal with bullying beyond school grounds, even on a vacation, for example. But in that scenario the bullying would have to spill over into school days and then disrupt the education process before it falls under a teachers right to act. Children should not be afraid to go to school. No matter where kids are no matter what time of year it is, a school now has jurisdiction to discipline now when they come back to school. Although, that is a great law parents also need to be more involved in the children’s lives. They need to know what is going on. They need to make their children feel that their home is their â€Å"safe place† and that they can come to their parents whenever problems arise. But the problem today is that the economy pulls parents in to working multiple jobs while older siblings or babysitters are left to care for the younger ones. Schools need to pay more attention and make use of their city’s Juvenile Court System to deal with unruly and abusive students and children. In another article by Tanya Roth of the York County Virginia Gazette dated August 9, 2010, a case that resulted in suicide caused by bullying resulted in a wrongful death suit seeking ten million dollars in damages. The mother of a high school freshman is suing school officials and one sheriff’s deputy for failing to enforce the anti-bullying policies she believes would have saved her sons life, but did not. Her son hanged himself on May 31, 2010. The suit details a meeting that took place at the school concerning the bullying, with all the defendants present. The school personnel should have been aware of the risk of emotional damage caused by the continued bullying, and should have enforced the anti-bullying policies available to them. Parents, elders and victims themselves are grasping at straws as a means to stop this physical and mental abuse. â€Å"Some parents are even filing law suits based on the theory of â€Å"premises liability. † Under this theory, occupiers and owners of land, including school, are required to keep their premises safe for those who are legally allowed to be there. (University of Nebraska, 2006). These laws are only a band-Aid to the reoccurring problem and in most cases never fully help the victim. The mental damage never goes away therefore just gives a victim â€Å"false hope† that they are going to be safe. Prevention of bullying needs to happen at the school, in class, and at t he individual level. Bullying can also be prevented at home. â€Å"At the school level there needs to be better supervision of the students’ activities, an interesting, fun outdoor environment, contact phone numbers for the students and the parents, and teacher training groups. In the classroom there are many things teachers and students can do. They can make class rules against bullying and have activities that encourage good behavior. In the classroom, meetings between the teachers, parents, and students can help to prevent bullying. Teachers or other authorities can have serious discussions with the bully to reduce the amount of bullying that occurs. † (McGraw, 2008). But everyone needs to wake up and realize that there is a problem in every state of the U. S. and in many cases in every home. Bullying creates a vicious circle. It makes the victim scared of the bully, which encourages the bully and makes it easier for him/her to bully the victim again and again. Repeated bullying keeps adding to the intensity and makes the victim more scared and it many cases suicidal and the circle keeps going on; unless the pattern is broken by someone outside this horrible circle. I chose this topic because I am amazed at the amount and severity of bullying that is allowed to go on in schools, the public and in many cases behind closed doors at home. After reading several books and articles and hours or research that I have spent on this topic; I am convinced more than ever that people truly need to take this problem seriously both at home and in school. The biggest problem is that both parents and schools turn their heads as a means to not have to admit that there is a problem to begin with. So, I am back to my original question: Are anti-bullying laws a solution, a band-aid to the problem or just a means of false hope to make the victim temporarily feel safe? I am not sure this problem will ever be solved. Bibliography McGraw, J. (2008, November). Jay McGraw’s Life Strategies for Dealing with Bullies. New York: Aladdin. University of Nebraska Lincoln. (2006, June). Facts about Bullying. Retrieved from www. targetbully. com/wst_page6. html Porterfield, M. (2011, February 26). Panel Agree to Stronger Bullying Laws. The Register -Herald. Retrieved from http://www. register-herald. com/local/x1709532935/Panel-agrees-to-stronger-bullying-laws/ Roth, T. (2010, August 9). School Bullying: Student Suicide Leads to Suit. York County, Virginia Gazette. Retrieved from: How to cite The Need for Stronger Bullying Laws, Papers

Theories of Meaning free essay sample

The main concepts in the theory of reference are naming, truth, denotation (or truth of), and extension. Another is the notion of values of variables. All the notions of the theory of meaning are out of the same box. There are several theories of meaning, such as Referential Theory, Ideational Theory, Use Theory, and Behavioural Theory. 1. The Referential Theory The theory of meaning which relates the meaning of a word to the thing it refers to, or stands for, is known as the referential theory. This theory was first expounded by Aristotle in the fourth century BC. It is generally possible to explain the meaning of a word by pointing to the thing it refers to. In the case of proper nouns and definite noun phrases, this is especially true. When we say The most famous English poet is William Shakespeare, we do use the most famous English poet and William Shakespeare to mean a particular person. We will write a custom essay sample on Theories of Meaning or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page When we explain the meaning of desk by pointing to the thing it refers to, we do not mean a desk must be of the particular size, shape, colour and material as the desk we are pointing to at the moment of speaking. We are using this particular desk as an example, an instance, of something more general. That is, there is something behind the concrete thing we can see with our eyes. And that something is abstract, which has no existence in the material world and can only be sensed in our minds. By saying desk is a piece of furniture with a flat top and four legs, at which one reads and writes, we are in resorting to the concept of desk, or summarizing the main features, the defining properties, of a desk. But not every word has a reference. Grammatical words like but, if, and do not refer to anything. And words like God, ghost and dragon refer to imaginary things, which do not exist in reality. What is more, it is not convenient to explain the meaning of a word in terms of the thing it refers to. The thing a word stands for may not always be at hand at the time of speaking. Even when it is nearby, it may take the listener some time to work out its main features. For example, when one sees a computer for the first time, one may mistake the monitor for its main component, thinking that a computer is just like a TV set. This Referential Theory of linguistic meaning would explain the significance of all expressions in terms of their having been conventionally associated with things or states of affairs in the world, and it would explain a human being’s understanding a sentence in terms of that person’s knowing what the sentence’s component words refer to. It is a natural and appealing view. Indeed it may seem obviously correct, at least so far as it goes. And one would have a hard time denying that reference or naming is our cleanest-cut and most familiar relation between a word and the world. Yet when examined, the Referential Theory has some problems: * Not every word refers to an actual thing. First, some words don’t refer to anything that exists. â€Å"Pegasus† does not denote anything real, because there is no winged horse after all * Referential Theory treats a sentence as a list of names for things to which the words refer. But a list of names says nothing: â€Å"William Shakespeare England† The meaning cannot be understood, if the sentence is not grammatically correct. * There is more to meaning than reference. Some words can refer to the same thing but not share the same meaning, for example â€Å"Elizabeth II† and â€Å"the Queen. † 2. The Ideational (Mental Image) Theory The 17th-century British linguist John Locke held that linguistic meaning is mental: words are used to encode and convey thoughts, or ideas. Successful communication requires that the hearer correctly decode the speaker’s words into their associated ideas. The meaning of an expression, according to Locke, is the idea associated with it in the mind of anyone who knows and understands that expression. This theory of meaning associates the meaning of a particular word with a particular idea in the human mind. But the ideational account of meaning, as Locke’s view is sometimes called, is vulnerable to several objections. For example, a person’s idea of â€Å"grass† can be associated in his mind with the idea of â€Å"warm weather†. But the meaning of â€Å"grass† or any other word may be different for each person. As the example shows, the ideational account ignores the â€Å"public† nature of meaning. Whatever meanings are, they must be things that different speakers can learn from and share with one another. If we suppose that a person associates the complex expression â€Å"brown cow† with the idea of fear, though he is not fearful of all brown things or of all cows—only brown cows. Thus, the meaning of â€Å"brown cow†, for this person, is not determined by or predictable from the meanings of â€Å"brown† and â€Å"cow†. Because the example can be generalized (anyone can associate any idea with any complex expression), it follows that the ideational account is unable to explain the compositionality of natural languages. These mental representations differ a lot among different persons. If one person hears the word strawberry, an image of an appetizing dessert plate – possibly covered with lots of whipped cream – might pop up. Another person might prefer them with powder sugar, and another one without any topping at all. Or one might even be disgusted by the idea of strawberries, because of a severe allergic reaction in the past. To be practically usable, the ideas need to have some generality, exceeding the individual level. But it is difficult to achieve this generalization without resorting to the notion of idea in the platonic sense that is somehow mysteriously present in people’s minds. A mental image theory cannot assure that speakers of the same language carry the same mental image for any given concept. To the extent that one speaker’s mental image of a â€Å"grandmother† is different from that of another speaker, the theory cannot explain our ability to communicate via language. A mental image theory predicts the possibility that every speaker has their own private language. If mental images do not supply the critical distinctions necessary for meaning another possibility would be that humans rely on a set of innate semantic features to construct meaning. The mental images we have for simple properties (such as red, hot, sour, etc. ) can never be stated. We simply cannot describe the meaning of the word â€Å"red† by using other words. If we could, then someone who has been blind since birth would know what red means by hearing a description of our mental image, which is impossible. 3. The Use Theory A radically different theory of meaning qualifies the meaning of an expression as its use in a language system. The Use Theory was developed in the 20th century be Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Austin. The Use Theory of meaning does not refer to an external entity (a referent, an idea, or stimuli and responses) to qualify a word’s meaning, but instead qualifies the meaning of a word as the value it gets through the linguistic system in which it is used. Many words do refer to things, and that many words have a mental image or idea associated with them, but the primary bearers of meaning are not words but sentences. Words have meaning only when they are used in sentences: without such a context they have no meaning. When we ask what some particular word means, we seem to be asking from the way it’s used in the sentence. In fact, the only meaning a word can have is the meaning it gains from the meaning of the sentences in which the word is typically used. The following sentences show how the different meanings of a word are expressed by using that word in different sentences: I gave him a hand with his baggage. (i. e. help) The crowd gave him a hand. (i. e. applause) Please hand me the scissors. (i. e. give) She is a green lawyer. (i. e. inexperienced) He is looking green. i. e. nauseous) We had a green Christmas last year. (i. e. without snow) But if the meaning of sentences is primary and the meaning of words is derivative – we cannot derive the meaning of a sentence from the meanings of sentences. Wittgenstein and Austin held that the meaning of sentences is to be found in their use. Language is a tool, and just as we don’t really know what a hammer is until we know what i t is being used to do. In order to know what a particular sentence means we need to ask, â€Å"What is this speaker in this particular context using this sentence? If someone says â€Å"Hold it†, we cannot know what the sentence means until we know what the speaker means. Did the speaker say â€Å"Hold it† to get someone to stop doing something, or to instruct someone to grasp hold of an object? Only when we have answered this question, we will know what the sentence means. It is important to pay attention to the context, for the context typically gives us the clues we need to determine what the speaker is using a sentence to do, and what the sentence means. There are various contextual features we can make use of, such as the social setting, the speaker’s personal goals, the nature and expectations of the audience, and what has just been said by other speaker. Changing the context of a sentence can sometimes dramatically affect its meaning. For example: The queen is in a vulnerable position: (a) when said by a spectator at a chess match and (b) when said by a teacher in a lecture on the role of monarchy in Britain. The President has been shot and died a few minutes ago: (a) when said by a character in a film and (b) when said by a radio announcer in a news broadcast. Let me go: (a) when said by a person whose arm has been grabbed by someone and (b) when said by a child, whose teacher has asked for a volunteer to run an errand. More commonly context affects meaning in equally dramatic ways. Usually, there are only a few possible uses of a sentence in any particular context, and we can make reasonable judgment of its primary or intended use. 4. The Behavioural (Speech-Act) Theory Speech act theory is built on the foundation laid by Wittgenstein and Austin. John Searle is most often associated with the theory. The Speech-Act theory is a theory where the effect of an utterance is analyzed in relationship to the speaker and listener’s behaviour. According to Searle, to understand language one must understand the speaker’s intention. Since language is intentional behaviour, it should be treated like a form of action. Thus Searle refers to statements as speech acts. The speech act is the basic unit of language used to express meaning, an utterance that expresses an intention. Normally, the speech act is a sentence, but it can be a word or phrase as long as it follows the rules necessary to accomplish the intention. When one speaks, one performs an act. Speech is not just used to designate something, it actually does something. Speech act stresses the intent of the act as a whole. Understanding the speaker’s intention is essential to capture the meaning. Without the speaker’s intention, it is impossible to understand the words as a speech act. Speakers perform acts by observing two types of rules: constitutive rules or definition rules (create or define new forms of behaviour) and regulative or behaviour rules (these rules govern types of behaviour that already exist). Theory of meaning that holds that the meaning of linguistic expressions can be explained in terms of the rules governing their use in performing various speech acts (e. g. , asserting, commanding, exclaiming, promising, questioning, requesting, warning). In contrast to theories that maintain that linguistic expressions have meaning in virtue of their contribution to the truth conditions of sentences where they occur, it explains linguistic meaning in terms of the use of words and sentences in the performance of speech acts. The meaning of a natural language is behaviouristic: the meaning of an expression, as uttered on a particular occasion, is either the behavioural stimulus that produces the utterance, the behavioural response that the utterance produces, or a combination of both. Thus, the meaning of â€Å"fire! † as uttered on a particular occasion might include running or calling for help. But even on a single occasion it is possible that not everyone who hears â€Å"fire! † will respond by running or calling for help. Suppose, for example, that the hearers of the utterance include a fireman, a pyromaniac, and a person who happens to know that the speaker is a pathological liar, the behaviour of each person is different, because the meaning of â€Å"fire! † for some is different from the meaning of â€Å"fire! † for those who run or call for help. Thus, the situations which prompt people to utter speech, include every object and happening in their universe. In order to give a scientifically accurate definition of meaning for every form of a language, we should have to have a scientifically accurate knowledge of everything in the speaker’s world. Conclusion All four theories consider the referential aspects, the individual aspects, and the social aspects. The theories of meaning are evidently short of detail on several important issues, for example, the public understanding of notions, the role of context and how it functions in determining meaning, the constraints on wide frameworks, and the types of ambiguity that the theories have. There is much more, of course, to a natural language than merely being a symbolic system; such a language may even amount, through associated features. Different theories elaborate on these in different ways and to different degrees. Bibliography 1. D. Davidson. Theories of Meaning and Learnable Languages. Oxford, 1984. 2. G. Evans . Truth and Meaning. Oxford, 1976. 3. M. Platts. Ways of Meaning. London, 1979. 4. R. Dale. The Theory of Meaning. London, 1996. 5. W. Hughes. Critical Thinking. London, 2006. Contents Introduction 1. The Referential Theory 2. The Ideational (Mental Image) Theory 3. The Use Theory 4. The Behavioural (Speech-Act) Theory Conclusion Bibliography