All About Maps Essay Example for Free

All About Maps Essay What are maps? Maps are the world reduced to points, lines, and areas, using a variety of visual resources: size, shape, value, texture or pattern, colour, orientation, and shape. A thin line may mean something different from a thick one, and similarly, red lines from blue ones. How do maps represent reality? A photograph shows all objects in its view; a map is an abstraction of reality. The cartographer selects only the information that is essential to fulfil the purpose of the map, and that is suitable for its scale. Maps use symbols such as points, lines, area patterns and colours to convey information. Why are maps important? A map gives a miniature picture of a very large space. A map is a guide to a space you have not encountered before. Maps have distance, mountains, rivers, and shapes of places or destinations. With a map, one does not have to depend on local directions. For a small price, it is a direction finder and a dependable way to take a journey. What are atlases? An atlas is a collection of maps in book form. Atlases are made for different regions and areas, and are prepared for desk use or travel use. A travel atlas is usually packaged for easy use during a trip, often with spiral bindings so it can be folded flat, and with maps at a large zoom so that they can be easily consulted on the go. A desk atlas features sizes and bindings that are typical for reference books: usually a paperback or hardcover format. Lines of latitude These are imaginary lines that circle the world in an east-west direction. They tell you how far north or south a place is from the Equator. They are drawn parallel to the Equator. There are five main lines of latitude. They are the Equator, the Tropic of Cancer, the Tropic of Capricorn, the Arctic Circle and the Antarctic Circle. Lines of longitude Longitude is the angular distance, measured in degrees, east and west of the Prime Meridian, which is at 0o. These are imaginary lines that run across the Earth’s surface in a north-south direction, from the North Pole to the South Pole. Legends and symbols Since a map is a reduced representation of the real world, map symbols are used to represent real objects. Without symbols, we wouldnt have maps. Both shapes and colours can be used for symbols on maps. A small circle may mean a point of interest, with a brown circle meaning recreation, red circle meaning services, and green circle meaning rest stop. Colours may cover larger areas of a map, such as green representing forested land and blue representing waterways. To ensure that a person can correctly read a map, a Map Le

Communication In Intimate Relationships

Communication In Intimate Relationships What makes relationships successful? What kind of process do we go through to create an intimate relationship? What are some of the problems we encounter during them and how should we go about solving those issues? The questions above are some of the subjects I am going to tackle in this paper. Relationships can be very rewarding if the good outweighs the bad. The success in an intimate relationship depends highly upon effective communication. There is not only one specific way for couples to communicate, because each relationship is different. It is important to know good forms of communication to improve the quality our relationships. Date night is the movie I chose to compare my subject to a movie. In this movie, a couple is having After being in a relationship for three years, I feel as though my relationship with my boyfriend is fairly successful. What makes a relationship successful? In my opinion, the following are important qualities of an intimate relationship: Friendship, love, respect, compassion, and passion among others. Friendship is a good basis for any relationship. I dont believe a couple has to start from friendship, but from what I have seen, it is important for a friendship to develop. While spending a lot of time together, it is important to have similar likes and interests, as friends do, to keep the fire going. Love is an obvious importance to an intimate relationship, because it is needed to endure the hard times of a relationship, as well as the easy times. Compassion is necessary when a person in a relationship is having a hard time and needs support; it is very important for a couple to support each other. Respect is very important to me, because I expect a mutual respect between my boyf riend and I to keep our boundaries set, and to keep us both happy. Our thoughts and opinions are important to each other. Every relationship has its own priorities in which different values are more important, as Anderson explains in more complex terms: Personal predispositions of one person will interact with the intimacy displays of another to produce unique individual valences of the intimacy displays of their partner (52). The process to form a strong bond in a relationship takes a good amount of time. They differ couple to couple and take the different steps at different speeds. Floyd lists Mark Knapps model of relationship development as the following: initializing stage, experimenting stage, intensifying stage, integrating stage, and bonding stage. The initializing stage is meeting for the first time (342-345). After the initial meeting comes the experimenting stage, which is where two people get to know each other through conversation (such as figuring out what kind of music, movies, and activities someone likes.) Next is the intensifying stage, which is when two people go from just having occasional conversations, to being closer friends. The intensifying stage may also include hanging out in groups of friends or only with each other. The integrating stage is when other people start to notice your relationship and that commitment has developed. The last stage is bondage, which is when a relationsh ip is announced to everyone, and everyone acknowledges the two as a couple. My last experience with the model of relationship development was quick. I met my boyfriend and four days later, we started dating. We got to know each other quickly, because we spent a lot of the summer together, directly after meeting, and we had many common interests. The experimenting stage occurred quickly, and we became closer friends in our quickly started relationship. The intensifying and integrating stage came pretty much at the same time. Everyone knew that we liked each other and were in a relationship almost right away. Bondage for us was very natural and everyone accepted us as a couple, and still does. What are some ways to improve our relationships? Research says that for a satisfying relationship, there should be five positive behaviors for every one negative and that unsatisfying relationships have only one positive behavior for every negative (Floyd.) In my personal relationship, my time together with my boyfriend is focused on forming at least five of those positive behaviors. Most days, we have many more than five positive behaviors for every one negative behavior, and I believe that does directly correlate with happiness in our relationship. Sorgen, on her WebMD feature says Its the rare couple that doesnt, sooner or later, run into a few bumps in the road. According to Sorgen, to improve communication, couples should do the following: make time, set up rules, listen to each other, and make sure to argue in private if you cant keep your voice down. I feel like my relationship follows these guidelines. We make sure no matter how busy we are, we find time to spend together, an d talk subjects out, if we need to. If we do get into arguments, we have rules, so we dont become too mean. We also try our best to listen to each other whether we disagree or not, and we definitely dont make a scene in public. Personally, being sensitive to anothers emotions and feelings is important to do; that is a problem I have in my relationship. When he doesnt agree with what I am saying, he becomes rude. I am an emotional girl, and my feelings are hurt easily and he knows what to say to get me to stop talking. It would help us a lot if he would calm down when I get emotional, and talk calmly instead of getting angry. This would prevent us from saying words we dont mean. Sometimes, when I am emotional for a serious reason, he fails to take my emotions seriously, and says something to upset me more. Why do we become emotional when we do? The most common way in which emotions occur is when we sense, rightly or wrongly, that something that seriously affects our welfare, for bett er or worse, is happening or about to happen.. (Ekman 19.) Although my boyfriend may be somewhat emotionally insensitive, he does apologize afterwards if he hurts my feelings, which means a lot to me. Compromise is important in relationships also. It can never just be about one person, or it is a one-road relationship that is bound to fail. According to Floyd, its important to emphasize excitement and positivity, handle conflict constructively, have realistic expectations, and manage dialectical tensions (362-367.) For my boyfriend and I, we try to be spontaneous and do things out of the ordinary on a regular basis; that emphasizes excitement. Just like in Date Night, when Phil and Claire Foster have problems because of having the same every day routine, romantic relationships may have problems when things are the same every single day. When they are chased and almost killed after being mistaked for thieves when they took another couples reservations at a restaurant. After all the excitement of being chased and almost killed, their relationship was much better because they appreciated each other much more after all the excitement. A change in a mundane schedule sometimes can help to get away from relationship problems. We also try to thank each other for things that we do just to make each other happy, so that both of us know we appreciate what we do for one another; that emphasizes positivity. Handling conflict constructively is the most important, because there is conflict in every relationship that I have seen and if conflict isnt handled constructively, it could obviously lead to an unhealthy relationship. Realistic expectations help to keep order in a relationship. You cant expect a person to completely drop his/her life to be with another person. There has to be balance in the relationship for it to be fair. Managing dialectical tension is dealing with two opposite needs (Floyd 366). Another way to help a relationship is to accept the person for who they are and not to try to change who they are. You should love a person for who he/she is, and if you cant accept that person for who he/she is, you shouldnt be in a relationship with him/her (Sorgen). In this paper, I explained what makes a relationship successful, and what can be done to make a relationship better. Every couples relationship is different and there is not one way to go about handling a relationship, or its problems. Make sure you love, respect, and show care for the person you love, and try to understand each others opinions and beliefs, even if you dont exactly agree with your significant other. Work Cited Anderson, Peter A., et al. Progress In Communication Sciences Volume XIV. Stamford: Ablex, 1998. Print. Elkman, Paul. Emotions Revealed: Recognizing Faces and Feelings to Improve Communication. New York: Henry Holt, 2003. Print Floyd, Kory . Interpersonal Communication: The Whole Story. New York, McGraw Hill, 2009. Print. Levy, Shawn. Date Night. 20th Cetnury Fox, 2010. Sorgen, Carol. 7 Relationship Problems and How to Solve Them. WebMD. N.d. Web. 15, Oct. 2010.

Definition And Characteristics Of Cluster Computing

Definition And Characteristics Of Cluster Computing The evolution of networks and especially the Internet is that nowadays, they need more resources to process data more quickly. Given that the use of a machine could not meet these requirements, it appeared that the act of distributing the spots over several machines to run simultaneously would remedy this problem. In what follows, we describe the different characteristics of a cluster and its various categories. Then we will look networks (architecture, topologies, components ,). Then finally we will discuss how communications are in clusters. 2 Definition and characteristics of a cluster Were talking about clustering, server cluster or farm Computing Technologies for designer consolidate multiple independent computers (called nodes) to enable management comprehensive and go beyond the limitations of a computer to: Increase availability Facilitating the scalability Enable load balancing Facilitate management of resources (CPU, RAM, hard disks, network bandwidth). Clusters of servers are an inexpensive method, residing in the establishment of multiple computers apparatre network that will be a single computer with more capabilities (more powerful, etc..), they are widely used for parallel computing. This maximizes use of resources enables the distribution of different treatments on nodes. A major advantage of a cluster is he no longer need to buy expensive multiprocessor servers but it is now possible to settle for smaller systems that can connect to the following one to other according to changing needs. There are different types of cluster: Extended distance cluster: This is a cluster with nodes located in different data centers separated by distance. Extended distance clusters are connected through a cable which guarantees high-speed network access between nodes until all the guidelines for the fault tolerant architecture are followed. The maximum distance between nodes in a cluster distance scope is defined by the limits of technology and data replication limits networking. Metropolitan Cluster: This cluster geographically distributed within the confines of a metropolitan area requiring authorization for filing of cabling and network components for data replication redundant. Continental Cluster: This is a group of clusters that use networks of roads and service networks public data replication and cluster communication to support failover package between different clusters in different data centers. Continental clusters are often located in different cities or countries and may extend over hundreds or thousands of kilometer. 3 General architecture of a cluster A cluster is essentialy composed by more than one machine (PC, server ), operating system, interconexion technologies, parallel programming environment, middleware and application- cation. Fig 1 : General architecture of a cluster 4 Differents classes of Cluster 4.1 High availibility cluster 4.1.1 Architecture Fig 2 : Architecture of a hight availibility cluster 4.1.2 Definition High availability clusters are used to protect one or more sensitive applications. To do this, the application and all the resources necessary for it will be controlled permanently. For powerful protection application, include this protection in the hardware, the network and operating system. Generally, several products are used to protect multiple applications on a same node but there are solutions that can protect as many applications as you want. With these solutions, we are not obliged to raise all applications and can be made case by case basis. If the cluster software reconnat failure then, initially, it will try to restart the X resource both locally on the same node. Then, if this resource does not restart, the software will start the application switch to another node. In any case, the customer will notice that the application is located on another node in the cluster and their access APPLICATION as before. The typical high availability clusters contain only a few nodes but can use clusters involving 32 or 64 knots. If a cluster contains more than two nodes, so we can define different switching planes. This can be useful to decrease the reduction of performance after a seesaw. 4.2 High Performance cluster 4.2.1 Architecture Fig 3 : Architecture of a hight performance cluster 4.2.2 Definition The main function of a high performance cluster (also called High Performance Technical Clustering HPC) is to increase the power of a PC. To perform this, it is necessary to cut the stain that has been carried out into sub-tasks. The result is the total sub-tasks. The Management Unit to coordinate all the sub tasks and the node that receives the result are the only critical points (single point of failure). These components can be protected via a high availability cluster. The crash of one of the nodes is not a disaster because the work of this node can be done by another. The performance of the cluster but it will weaken the cluster always work. 4.3 Load balancing cluster Architecture Fig 4 : Architecture of a load balancing cluster Definition A Cluster is a load balancing server farm with the same function. A splitter is required to distribute the requests of users each node, it verifies that each node has the same workload. The application will be sent to the node that has the fastest time in response to it. This algorithm can provide better performance at anytime. The performance of the cluster depend on the dispatcher. It will choose the node that has the opportunity to address the application of the user as quickly as possible. Without any protection the cluster load balancing can be a SPOF (single point of failure). Best is to add redundancy to this cluster. If one node is no longer in working condition, the cluster will work as same. The dispatcher will identify the dead node and does include more in its calculations, the overall performance of the cluster then it will decrease. The web-server farms (Google. ..) represent an example of cluster load balancing. 5 Inteconnexion technologies Today, improved network technologies help achieve more efficient cluster. These must integrate the speed interconnect technologies to support the wide bandwidth and low latency communication between nodes in the cluster. Because these two indicators measure the performance of interconnects. The selection of a technology cluster interconnect network depends several factors, such as compatibility with the hardware in the cluster, the operating system, price and performance. In what follows, we will detail some of the most used technologies. 5.1 Myrinet Myrinet (ANSI / VITA 26-1998) is a high-speed network protocol designed by Myricom to be used as system interconnect multiple machines forming a cluster. Myrinet causes much less overhead network on its own communication protocol that most used protocols such as Ethernet, and then offers a higher bandwidth, less interference and less latency when using the system processor. Although it can be used as a traditional network protocol, Myrinet is often used by programs that know how to use it directly, negating the need for system calls. Physically, Myrinet uses two fiber optic cables, one for sending data and one for reception, each connected to a machine via a single connector. The machines in question are connected to each other through routers and switches with low latency (the machines are not directly connected to each other). Myrinet also offers some features that improve tolerance to errors, mostly managed by the switches. These features include flow control, error control and st atus monitoring of each physical connection. The fourth and final version of Myrinet, also named Myri-10G supports a throughput of 10 Gbps and is interoperable in terms of physics with 10 Gbps Ethernet standard (cables, connectors, distance, type of signal). 5.2 Infiniband It is a computer bus has high-speed. It is intended to both internal and external communications. It is the result of the merger of two competing technologies, Future I / O, developed by Compaq, IBM, and Hewlett-Packard, with Next Generation I / O (ngio), developed by Intel, Microsoft, and Sun Microsystems. InfiniBand uses a bi-directional bus with low cost, and enjoying a low latency. But he will remain very rapid, as it provides a throughput of 10 Gbps in each direction. InfiniBand uses a technology that allows multiple devices to simultaneously access the network. Data are transmitted as packets, which together form messages. The InfiniBand is now widely used in the world of HPC (High Performance Computing) as a PCI-X or PCI-Express APPOINTED HCA (Host Channel Adapter) operating at 10 Gbit / s (SDR, Single Data Rate), 20 Gbps (DDR, Double Data Rate) or 40 Gbit / s (QDR Quad Data Rate). It also requires specialized network using switches (or switches) and InfiniBand copper cables o r type CX4 Fiber for long distances (using an adapter to Fiber CX4). The protocol allows the use of InfiniBand these cards natively by making use of the protocol VERBS or software overlays: IPoIB (IP over InfiniBand) that presents an Ethernet layer on top of Infiniband and thus the possibility to configure an IP over InfiniBand ports. SDP (Sockets Direct Protocol), which presents a socket layer over InfiniBand. SRP (SCSI RDMA Protocol) which allows frames to encapsulate SCSI over InfiniBand. Some manufacturers offer windows InfiniBand attached storage rather than Fibre Channel. These overlays offer lower performance in the native protocol, but are easier to use because they not require the redevelopment of applications to use the InfiniBand network. In the world of HPC libraries MPI (Message Passing Interface) generally use the native layer to deliver directly VERBS best possible performance. Gigabit Ethernet Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) is a term used to describe a variety of technologies used to implement the Ethernet standard has a data transfer rate of one gigabit per second (or 1000 megabits per second). These technologies are based on twisted pair copper cable or fiber optics. They are defined by the IEEE 802.3z and 802.3ab. Unlike other Ethernet technologies, Gigabit Ethernet provides flow control. The networks on which they are located will be more reliable. They are equipped with FDR, or Full-Duplex Repeaters that allow multiplex lines, using buffers and localized flow control to improve performance. Most of its switches are constructed as new modules for different models of compatible Gigabit switches already exist. 5.4 SCI (Scalable Coherent Interface) SCI Scalable Coherent Interface, IEEE Standard 1596-1992 is a providing a shared memory system has low latency across a cluster. SCI can use a memory extending to the set of the cluster, thus ridding the programmer to manage this complex. This can be seen as a kind of BUS INPUT / Output processor-memory via a LAN. The facilities of programming it offers and the fact that SCI is an IEEE standard has made it a fairly popular choice for the interconnection of machines in a high performance cluster. 6 Comparison of Interconnect technologies This comparison includes the main criteria for judging the performance of a cluster and by needs and resources of each organization technologies will vary. Gigabit Ethernet Infiniband Myrinet SCI Bandwidth 850 230 Latency (Â µs) 10 01/02/10 Max nods 1000 > 1000 1000 1000 Table 1 : Comparison of Interconnects technologies 7 Performing test A group of authors Pourreza, Eskicioglu and Graham led the ratings performance of a number of technologies we have presented above. The parameter they have taken into account is the timing of the execution of the same applications on cluster nodes identical. They tested a number of standard algorithms namely NAS Parallel Benchmark and the Pallas Benchmark and some applications of parallel computing the real world on the first and second generation Myrinet, SCI, but also on FastEthernet (100Mbps) and Gigabit Ethernet (1000Mbps). The results obtained are presented below. These tests were performed on a cluster has eight nodes under RedHat 9.0 with kernel 3.2.2 and gcc 2.4.18smp. Each node has: A dual Pentium III; a 550 MHz processor with 512 MB of SDRAM memory shared; local disks (all activities of entry-exit in the experiments are performed on local disks to eliminate the effects of access to NFS). Each node also has the first and second generations of Myrinet, Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet network interface card and point-to-point SCI (Dolphin WulfKit). All interfaces of network cards are connected to dedicated switches except those of SCI which are connected to a mesh configuration (24). 7.1 Bandwidth Fig 6 : Bandwith of four interconnects H. Pourreza,Graham,Eskicioglu Latency Fig 7 : Latency of four interconnects H. Pourreza,Graham,Eskicioglu The basic performance of different interconnect technologies in terms of bandwidth and latency are presented respectively in Figures 1 and 2. This indicates that Fast Ethernet is significantly lower than all the others, and Gigabit Ethernet is visibly lower than SCI and Myrinet shows that despite a bandwidth substantially similar. From these results, it is clear that Fast Ethernet is probably only suitable for applications related to the calculation. Conclusion The competitive nature of business and progress of research fields have created a need for computer systems scalable, flexible and reliable. Advanced applications now require a large computing power. Clusters provide a solution to his problems. Clusters represent a promising future for this new concept provides scalability in the world of data processing. Thanks to the different technologies we use to implement them, there are networks that are becoming performants. Because these new technologies can have high bandwidth and low latency. Performance tests carried out have demonstrated that some technologies were more efficient than others. When setting up the cluster, it should choose an architecture and an appropriate network topology to avoid excessively reducing network performance. The use of cluster is less expensive than buying a supercomputer, since it uses the resources of several machines on which the spots are distributed and most of the clusters using the Linux operating system which is a powerful system around because of its flexibility, workability and low cost. Sources : The essence of Distributed Systems : Joel M. Crichlow Parallel Computing , Theory and Comparisons : G. Jack Lipovski, Miroslaw Malek Parallel Computers : Hockney Jesshope Parallel and Distributed Computation, Numerical Methods :Dimitri P. Bertsekas, John N.Tsitsilklis. Practical Parallel Processing, An introduction to problem solvin in Parallel : Alan Chalmers and Jonathan Tidmus.

The Effect of Pride and Prejudice on Darcy and Elizabeths Relationship

The Effect of Pride and Prejudice on Darcy and Elizabeth's Relationship The novel 'Pride and Prejudice' was written in 1796. It was written by a writer who's name was Jane Austin. The book was first published in 1813, and has consistently been Jane's most popular novel. The original version of the novel was written in 1796, and was called 'First Impressions'. In the story there is a family called 'The Bennett's'. This is one of the main families in the book. The whole novel is almost based around this family. In this family there is, Mr & Mrs Bennett, Jane, Elizabeth, Mary, Lydia, and Kitty. There are five daughters. Mrs Bennett is very determined to get her daughters married to someone with a lot of money. An entail is to limit the inheritance of property or estate to a specified succession of heirs. A good marriage is very important for everyone. This is because the person you get married to is the person that you are going to spend the rest of your life with. In the time that Austen wrote her novel, marriage was for life. There was no way out of a marriage. Divorce was not a common occurrence as it is today. A good marriage is important because you and your partner are together "to have and to hold, in sickness and in health" There are many effects of pride on the relationship of Darcy and Elizabeth. In chapter 33, Darcy says, "It distressed her a little," this evidence, tell us that Darcy thinks that she likes another man called Colonel Fitzwilliam. He believes that she will marry to have financial security because Colonel Fitzwilliam is rich. However, Elizabeth knows that she will marry for love and not for money. So Darcy is shown to be prejudiced against Elizabeth, because she is of low... ...rcy, and Elizabeth's relationship. I think that both characters have each other to blame for the inconveniences they caused each other. They are both proud of their own social status and they both do not which to be judged. However they both are prejudiced towards each other in many senses. Darcy is prejudice towards Elizabeth because he believes that she should be flattered that he has proposed to Elizabeth, being of a lower class than he is. On the other hand, Elizabeth is prejudiced towards Darcy, because she judges him on first impressions and on what she hears about him. I think that this pride and this prejudice that both characters poses, only causes them to be distant from each other for a longer period of time and that they should have been a happy couple form the start. This could have been done if they did not let their pride come in the way.

effects of interracial relationship on children Essay -- essays resear

Effect of Interracial relationships and the child   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Interracial marriages can include the union between Asians, Hispanics, Blacks, Whites, and any other groups. However, when people talk about race relations, the focus is on Blacks and Whites. No matter what type of ethnic groups are involved in these type of relationships, one important result of these marriages are children. After doing some research and looking over some materials, I now have a strong understanding of the issues surrounding children of interracial marriages, and the problems parents encounter with their mixed race children. Children from interracial marriages are no longer denied the same benefits and privileges as the children prior to Loving. Celebrities like Tiger Woods may have changed society's views on interracial children, but are there more serious effects on these children than what is shown by Tiger Woods? More than 1.5 million children lived with biracial parents in 1990.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Many books have been out about the effects of interracial marriages on children. One of the biggest problems facing interracial children is an identity crisis. However, Tiger Woods and other famous children of interracial marriages have helped to...

Media Case Study in Friends Tv Show

Case Study Introduction The society of nowadays is filled with advertisements, messages, films, blogs, technology, etc. The meanings that they carry have to be transmitted to the audience through different media. (Branston and Stafford, 2006) It appears important for the receiver to analyse and understand the meanings carried by each type of medium. In order to do so, the different â€Å"vehicles† used by media have to be identified. Different vehicle theories include: semiotics, genres, narratives, representation, audiences, etc. Ibidem) And while they all have to be gathered and related to form a medium, these theories have on their own signs to be interpreted by the viewer. Media has to construct meanings about the world in order to represent it appropriately or logically enough for the audience to understand, and make sense out of what they are seeing. (O’Sullivan etal. , 1994) Representations of the world have to be understood by the audience. It allows an easier a nd faster understanding of what media is trying to portray and by doing so saves time needed to achieve other goals o since the media has limits of time and space. (Wilson, 1993) For instance, T. V. hows, in order to save time and capture viewers in the story faster, resort to stereotypes â€Å"There may be a shared recognition of the world as represented through familiar or dominant images and ideas† (O’Sullivan etal. , 1994) A good example of a type of media that uses representations as a way to help audience identify with the world presented on T. V. is the very popular show named: Friends. It debuted in 1994 through NBC and moved on to become one of the shows with the highest rate in television. It won multiple awards during its time on air until its end in May 2004. In 2002 the show won an Emmy for outstanding comedy series. (TBS. om, 2009) It had a big cultural impact, for instance, phrases from the sitcom became common in American slang, and songs from the show became very famous around the globe. It is a sitcom that presents the life of six friends (3 males and 3 females) middle aged, middle class who live in New York. They live close to each other and spend a lot of time together discussing very different themes. They all have different personalities and different backgrounds but compliment each other comically. This case study will analyse through the theory of representations, the stereotypes presented by the female characters: Rachel, Phoebe and Monica. pic] The Representations When referring to representations in the media, it is important to notice that stereotypes are present very often. Especially in a commercial T. V. show such as Friends, creators have to turn into cultural stereotypes in order for the audience to easily and quickly identify each role; who plays whom in a story and, in certain situations, justify their actions. â€Å"Within the media, limits of time and space plus the desire of achieving rapid audience recognit ion have obliged the stereotypical representations to be constructed and portrayed†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Wilson, 1993) The role of Rachel Green represents the rich bimbo girl. She comes from a wealthy background, her father, is a successful doctor able to provide her and her sisters with a fancy childhood. She has never worked, is not self sufficient, and as mention in chapter 12 of season 6 â€Å"The one with the joke† (Blinkx. com, 2000) she is always trying to please others. She is in many ways an exaggeration of a spoiled American girl. Rachel is dumb, lost, and she does not know what she wants. According to Wilson (1993) stereotypes have to be exaggerated or maximised, since there is a necessity for audience recognition. If there is no recognition then it becomes a commercial failure. For this reason the character of Rachel is exaggerated. She cries over anything, she is afraid of commitment, irresponsible, and does not want to take care of anyone as much as she wants to be taken care of. But there is a necessity for her to form part of the group of friends. Her irresponsibility can be very funny, guys always want to date her because she is pretty. In a sitcom of its genre (comedy) the familiar is necessary and comfortable (Branston and Stafford, 2006) for this reason, someone has to play the pretty, spoiled one. The sets of characters and values portrayed by Rachel involve in it a diversity that the audience can relate her to. Whether it means that they identify with her and her actions (for example, girls with good economic status), or see in her someone they know, or maybe even look up to her. On the other hand, the role of Monica Geller represents the controlling responsible one. Her character is the opposite from Rachel, obsessive-compulsive, and very competitive. She is probably the more mature female of the show. She comes from a suburban middle class family, known for having overweight during high school, she is Rachel’s best friend, but admire and envied her during youth. She likes to be in charge of everything, plans every detail and enjoys serving other. Her representation in the show is maximised, her obsession for order and cleanness is exaggerated, but this traits help the viewer to identify her and categorise her as the â€Å"mother hen† of the group. (Warnerbros. com, 2009) Although she was pretty the audience tends to forget this fact and relate her more with the need of a responsible one in the group. As mention above, there is comfort in familiarity, in this case the role of Monica becomes funny when the audience relates her actions with reality, for instance, mothers cleaning the mess left by little children. She is referenced to in the chapter mention above as â€Å"high maintenance† American slang to refer the fact that she needs a lot of attention and everything has to be done the way she likes it. She goes ahead and proves it by then forcing Chandler (her boyfriend) to learn a speech and mention that she is not â€Å"high maintenance. What this scene is portraying is an irony that proves how embroidered stereotypes can be a useful tool in sitcoms since they are funny. By evoking irony, the media uses stereotypes and disguise them as jokes allowing the label to become somewhat acceptable and familiar. (Branston and Stafford, 2006) Finally, the role of Phoebe Buffay who represents the hippie one. An eccentric character, who enjoys from playing music but is not really g ood, she does not care what others think about her. Phoebe’s character is a very sensitive one who goes beyond to help others, she is not interested in conventional things such as marriage, babies, or money. But rather she is concern with environmental, spiritual issues. With a troubled past, she became homeless at age 14 (Warnerbros. com, 2009). She is very dumb but knows how to play and have fun with others. The circumstances of this character are ironic and funny. Once again, creators of the show play with exaggeration of personalities and portray the obliged hippie New Yorker. Phoebe’s character is a clear example of how stereotypes are not always wrong (Branston and Stafford, 2006) , and they do portray reality but in a magnified way. New York is a city known for its extravagant movements regarding animals, and vegetarianism among others. So Phoebe played that side of New York which is radical. Conclusion The three characters above represent not only labels for people of their own circumstances but also they represent 3 very common stereotypes in which women can be categorised in the media; the sex object, the mother, and the friend. The three characters are also very different from each other going from the little princess, to the tough one, to the weird one. But in many ways these stereotypes are not always negative, they are not rigid or unchanging, and they help the audience to identify and differentiate the 3 characters. According to O’Sullivan etal. 1994) the media production is based on the need to please the audience. For this reason, if certain values or believes predominate in media output it will be due to the fact that society is sharing such same values and believes. In the case of â€Å"Friends† such conceptions of people from specific backgrounds in America are constantly presented in soci eties’ believes and therefore portrayed with this specific characters in the show. Ideologies work through symbolic codes, (O’Sullivan etsl, 1994) and because the media cannot speak directly to the audience it uses semiotics. These signs are represented with people through stereotypes. It is important to understand and analysed the latter so that there is a better understanding of society and culture. People uses stereotypes everyday to achieve a mental understanding of the society and the people they meet in their everyday lives. But even when stereotypes portray the real world in many aspects, it is important to notice that they are also often exaggerated and closed and they limit a viewer’s point of view of a determined group or person. They can be funny and helpful but the media should understand that portraying a group of people using stereotypes can cause negative cultural impact. Stereotypes should not become prejudices or send an erroneous message to the audience. When recurring to stereotypes, the media has to be very sensitive and take care of every detail as to portray people openly with no set rules and as accurate as possible. This was well achieved by â€Å"Friends† T. V. show since characters evolve, acquire new characteristics their personalities changed and they all achieved their goals. References Branston, G. and Stafford, R. ( 2006) The Media Student’s Book. 4th ed. Routledge. U. K. Pp. 141-156 Blinkx. com (no date) Friends. The one with the joke. Retrieved online on 3rd October 2009 from: http://www. blinkx. com/video/friends-the-one-with-the-joke/CljtsymVdOFbvw5xENhNNQ O’Sullivan, T. etal. (1994) Studying the media. An Introduction. St. Martin’s Press Inc. New York, U. S. A. Pp 113, 115, 117, 122, and 125. Tbs. com (2009) Friends, About the show. Retrieved online on 3rd October 2009 from : http://www. tbs. com/stories/story/0,,268,00. html Wilson, S. (1993) Mass Media, Mass Culture. 3rd ed. Mc Graw Hill. United States. Pp. 225-236 Warnerbros. com (2009) Friends. Retrieved online on 3rd October 2009 from: http://www. warnervideo. com/friends15/

Dominican vs Haiti

Haiti vs. the Dominican Republic Comparing Two Sister Countries They say the grass is always greener on the other side, for Haiti this saying seems to be true. Haiti and the Dominican Republic share the island of Hispaniola, but are completely different in many ways. Haiti is the poorest countries in the western hemisphere and almost all of its people live in poverty, while the Dominican Republic is one of the wealthier countries.In 1960, both countries had the same per capita real GDP but in the last 50 years, the Dominican Republic has more than tripled its growth compared to Haiti. While these two countries are similar in geography and historical institutions, the growth between the two is drastically different. Throughout this paper, I will compare both countries economic growth and why two countries with the same geographic area are so different. Up until the 1960’s, the Dominican Republic and Haiti had very similar economic stance and were relatively growing at the same pace.But suddenly, over the next decade, the Dominican Republic rapidly increased, while Haiti barely grew at all. One reason, according to Jared Diamond’s book â€Å"Collapse†, is that because Haiti resides on the western side of the island and has a lower rainfall percentage resulting in deforestation and loss of soil fertility, which effects the agricultural industry and hinders their growth. Another factor is that Haiti has less than half the space that the Dominican Republic does, but in the 1960’s Haiti had a larger population.Throughout the 1960’s, it seemed as Haiti was beating the Dominican Republic in population, but if you look at graph 1, you can see that as soon as the 1970’s came about Haiti’s population growth slow down compared to the Dominican Republic. Because Haiti occupies a smaller portion of the island compared to the Dominican Republic, it has a higher population density in a smaller area, which also contributes to the poor soil fertility and deforestation, effecting Haiti’s agricultural industry.While Haiti’s agricultural industry was decreasing, the manufacturing industry increased because Haiti provided low-cost labor. This was a huge role in Haiti’s economy during the 1970’s, as well as other services such as tourism. But tourism soon decreased due to political turmoil during the 1980’s, and the media had identified Haiti has the place where the immune deficiency disease, commonly known as AIDS, had originated from. This caused Haiti to experience a rapid decrease in its economy, as you can see in the per capita real GDP in graph 2.You can identify the growth through the 1970’s, and then during the 1980’s you notice that it starts to decrease. This was just the beginning of Haiti’s downfall. On the other side of Hispaniola, the Dominican Republic was growing at a much faster pace. The Dominican Republic has the largest economy in the Car ibbean and second largest of population and land mass. It has a very stable manufacturing and construction industry. They also have mining, which exports many major minerals, like gold and silver.Tourism has also increased over the years, which has been the leading factory in the country’s service industry. The Dominican Republic’s government fully supported the growth of the tourism industry, but when the country’s water supply became poor and there was a shortage of many supplies and materials they needed, the tourism industry decreased. While researching these two countries policies and economy standings, I came across information about both countries relationships to the United States.The United States and Dominican Republic have a very good relationship, and the US has strong interests in the Dominican Republics’ strong economy and stable democratic development. The two countries have a strong export and trading relationship, and work together on man y foreign affairs, such as trafficking illegal substances and immigration policies. This strong political and economical relationship, I believe, has greatly helped the rapid growth that the Dominican Republic has experience over the last half century.