Foucault's Philosophy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Foucault's Philosophy - Essay Example It is important to situate the topic, to understand in what context it should be viewed in Foucault’s theory. Discipline is distinguished from either torture or punishment; by these distinctions, the discussions on discipline, therefore, excludes those practices that subject the body to atrocious and terrifying abuse, and the strictly punitive measures to which errant individuals are subjected for purposes of either retribution or rehabilitation in atonement for their misdeeds. In describing disciplines, Foucault goes through a description of what they are not. For one, disciplines are not slavery because they do not involve the ownership of the body and its attendant violence. They are not served because they do not subject the individual will to the expressed will of the master. Disciplines are not vassalage because the latter entails a distant relationship that exerts no power over individual behavior or department, but only on the claim to the products of labor and ritual symbols of loyalty. Finally, they are not ascetism, which is a spiritual renunciation of things worldly, and seeks to increase one’s utility over his own body – the reverse of what disciplines do. Foucault draws a parallel between economic exploitation and disciplinary coercion: "If economic exploitation separates the force and the product of labor, [then] disciplinary coercion establishes in the body the constricting link between an increased aptitude and an increased domination† (Foucault, 1977:138).... They are not service, because they do not subject the individual will to the expressed will of the master. Disciplines are not vassalage because the latter entails a distant relationship that exerts no power over individual behaviour or deportment, but only on the claim to the products of labor and ritual symbols of loyalty. Finally, they are not ascetism, which is a spiritual renunciation of things worldly, and seeks to increase one’s utility over his own body – the reverse of what disciplines do. Foucault draws a parallel between economic exploitation and disciplinary coercion: â€Å"If economic exploitation separates the force and the product of labour, [then] disciplinary coercion establishes in the body the constricting link between an increased aptitude and an increased domination† (Foucault, 1977:138). Clearly, then, the aim of discipline is to make the body more capable to do things in a certain way, while at the same time detaching this competency from t he individual’s will over it in favour of a higher degree of obedience to the external will. Discipline then is a â€Å"political anatomy of detail† (p. 139), and the results of discipline then are obedient or â€Å"docile† bodies. Foucault broadly traces the genealogy of disciplinary methods that span centuries. First among these is the art of distributions which refers to how the spatial allocation of individuals influences the body to comply with what is desired of the individual. These refer to enclosures such as factories, schools, barracks; partitioning, where â€Å"each individual has his own place, and each place its individual† (Foucault 1977:143); and functional sites architecturally designed to enhance supervision and

EMPLOYEE RELATIONS STUDY Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

EMPLOYEE RELATIONS STUDY - Essay Example For instance, this exploration prioritizes the individual, as opposed to collective relationship, which varies among companies based on values of management (Cradden, 2005, 44). Nonetheless, it is necessary to understand that relationships occur in a range of circumstances, different degrees and impinge upon relationship. For example, a legal context that involves a level of individual in legally enforceable contracts that prevail between employees and employers. Unitarism This is a perspective through which companies are considered to be an individual or groups sharing a common interest, objective and values, which are pleasant and integrated. On the other hand, the management has right to manage employees, legitimately and rationally, thereby representing organizations and interests of capital. In this case, this perception is considered to be a single focus of employees’ loyalty; in fact, this becomes a basis of establishing legitimate authority with the organization (Bacon and Storey, 2000, 407). Moreover, unitarism is a perspective, which is related to management’s supports and interests. Besides, it is a perspective, which has been attributed to ‘team’ approach. ... Apparently, unitarist perspective focuses on the role management in establishing a situation where employees and organization are gaining, thereby considering alignment of their interests. In this case, this perspective is a compulsion for managers to surpass their managerial styles in the process of managing their employees' relations, thereby emphasising on leadership capabilities (Cradden, 2005, 44). Moreover, this perspective encourages managers to be convincing and influential leaders in the organization, thereby eliminating the need for a trade union. Unitarist perspective leads to an assumption that considers stakeholders to be rational members with aims of identifying common interests. Actually, this is a perception, which offers a steady rationale, which stresses common objectives to facilitate achievement of a stable employee relations system. Furthermore, unitarist perspective is in essence individualists in its approach towards employees’ relation; in fact, this wo rks best for individualist in IR systems. There has been a shift of numerous IR systems from trade unions to individualist paradigms; thus, unitarist perspective has proofed to be significant in relation to this form of IR perspectives. Weaknesses of unitarist perspective Unitarist perspective has a limitation caused failure to realize that there are powers associated with inequalities between employees and employers. Moreover, the inequality between employees and employers leads to generation of diverse forms of conflicts in the organization (Kessler and Purcell 2003, 315). On the other hand, there are expectations that managers should exert significant power over

Book critique Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Book critique - Assignment Example Content Summary The book "The 5 Love Languages of Teenagers: The secret to Loving teens effectively" by Gary Chapman deals with teenagers and the bond they share with their parents. Teenage is a time of life at which an individual is establishing his moralities, social beliefs and personality. Therefore children in their teens need their parent’s support, acceptance and unconditional love. Teenagers are vulnerable to negative and accusing words; instead they require words of affirmation and affection. Spending quality time with your teenagers and having real conversations is vital and so is to give your free acts of service. Parents should give thought to their child’s mood and preferences and should show patience when anger comes along, to win with their children ultimately by making them see reason. But in the view of the author the most significant of all things is to keep loving your children unconditionally, that is to show your support even when they fail to come up to your expectations1. Evaluation "The 5 Love Languages of Teenagers: The secret to Loving teens effectively" by Gary Chapman is a manual to parent child relationship when the child hits his teens. It looks into the matters of routine relationships and gives cause to make them special. It does that by giving counsel to parents such as when teenagers’ provide the parents with a cause of ceremony; they should celebrate it with gifts and praise. A particularly neglected idea when it comes to respect child’s want for independence was emphasized that the teenagers should start being given suitable responsibilities so that they might not feel their lives to be useless. The book also devotes some chapters for times when trouble in the life of teenager or the parent child relationship occurs. For example it gives excellent advice upon times when your child is not being the communicative type, and parents are having a hard time understanding the root of his problems. In addi tion it has helpful advice for single parents, who are the neediest cases. Looking into cons, the book fails to address (at large) teenage children who have a natural inclination towards law breaking and misconduct or have fallen into seriously bad company. Overall the book is a gain to youth ministry because it delves into teenage psychology to a great extent and provides reasonable solutions to the underlying intricacy. â€Å"Middle School Ministry Made Simple† by Kurt Johnston Author Information Kurt Johnston is working for junior high ministry from late 1980’s; to be specific he is the junior high Pastor at saddleback church in southern California. He has written a couple of books on the request of Standard publishing. His first book was â€Å"Controlled Chaos: Making Sense of Junior High Ministry†, whose upgraded version is presented in his new book "Middle School Ministry Made Simple†. He lives at Lake forest, California with his wife Rachel and his two children Kayla and Cole. Content Summary The book "Middle School Ministry Made Simple† and its author Kurt Johnston believe in the reforms that the junior high school world has been through and think it important to change the strategies to run junior high schools accordingly. The book provides a guideline on recruiting volunteers and the role they can play in middle school ministry by emphasizing on taking in a number of volunteers but

Influence of Arabic on Spanish language up to the 15th century Essay

Influence of Arabic on Spanish language up to the 15th century - Essay Example This paper will argue the impact of Arabic language on the Spanish language by exploring factors that contributed to the influence. Arab Muslim invaded the Iberian Peninsula in 711 and conquered it. The invasion ended the Visigothic Kingdom. The settlement of the Muslim Arab in the Iberian Peninsula influenced the lifestyle as evident by the immortalisation of the first Muslim general Tariq in the Ar. Gabal, previous referred as Calpe (Beale-Rivaya 9). The activities of Muslim Arab in the peninsula included converting the people of the Peninsular into the Islamic faith. Pharies argues in his book, A Brief History of the Spanish Language, that the presence of the Arabic speakers among the Spanish speakers influenced the language and the culture of the Spanish. Initially, the Spanish people were not Muslim (Penny 2). The Muslim Arabs taught the Islamic religion in Arabic, thus influencing the Spanish language. Penny (2) argues that the nature of influence that Arabic language and activity had to Spanish in the Peninsular of Bipartite nature. That is, the contribution through borrowing of thousand of thousands of wo rds and political perspective that explains how Castilian managed to establish itself in the present day Spain. The dominance of the Arabic language among the Ibero-Romance was probably due to the following factors: first, the Muslim invaders inhabited the Latin speaking population and settled among the Latin speakers for several centuries, second, the forces that invaded the peninsular did not carry their women. Thus, the generation after the settlement of the invaders was a result of mixed marriages. Muslims in the early centuries tolerated their subjects. Scholarship on influence of Arabic language to the Spanish language has mentioned the above aspects as probable factors that promoted the influence of the Arabic language among the Latin speakers (Beale-Rivaya 8). Scholarships that attempt to explain the transmission of the Arabism to the Spanish language have argued that Mozarabic bridged between the Spanish and Arabic (Isabelli 5). Mozarabic is a language that is much closer to the Arabic language. Pharies posits that the Arabic language was the super stratum language in the Andalusia Ro mance and ad stratum to peninsular Romance. This argument believes that the influence of Arabic language did not only occur because of the superiority of the Muslim regime whose official language was Arabic, but also the influence of the other minor communities. Thus, the influence to the language did not only influence the Ibero-Romance but also other communities the felt the influence of the Arabic rule in Andalusia. Historians believe that a superior culture institute its influence through language instruction (Penny 8). The same is must have applied in influencing the language of the Spanish. The influence of the Roman Empire to Andalusia is evident through Italianisms of the Spanish vocabulary during the Renaissance. In the above case, bilingual interaction did not occur between the Italian speaking communities and the Spanish speaking communities. This attribute has influenced some scholars to believe that language borrowing does not only occur in an instance of bilingual inte rac

Human Rights and democratic society Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 10000 words

Human Rights and democratic society - Essay Example The various conflicts and revolutions in the world have shaped the concept of human rights as we know it. In the last two hundred and fifty years, we see the clamor for human rights as the clamor of a world and of the various peoples inside it for equality and freedom. Starting with the French and American revolutions towards the latter part of the eighteenth century, it is this very notion of human rights that has led colonized states and revolutionary movements to assert their voices and fight for their freedoms against oppressive and despotic governments - from the Tiananmen Square uprising in China to the struggle of the East Timorese against Indonesian occupation. All human rights are universal, indivisible and interdependent and interrelated. The international community must treat human rights globally in a fair and equal manner, on the same footing, and with the same emphasis. While the significance of national and regional particularities and various historical, cultural and religious backgrounds must be borne in mind, it is the duty of States, regardless of their political, economic and cultural systems, to promote and protect all human rights and fundamental freedoms. When the United Nations was created in 1948 by a world still reeling from the ravages of the Second World War and intent on healing the wounds wrought by it, it was tasked to become the primary agency in defining and advancing human rights. From then on, various other agencies were created, addressing specific human rights concerns. Notable examples of this are the International Labor Organization and the UNICEF. However, the universality of human rights has oftentimes been challenged by critics on the allegation that the Western bias is very much evident, and that the popularity of it in recent times is nothing more than the remnants of a neocolonial attitude purveyed by the crafty and bought by the undiscerning. A refutation of this was attempted by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1968 through a study that demonstrated that "the profound aspirations underlying human rights correspond to concepts - the concepts of justice, an individual's integrity and dignity, freedom from oppression and persecution, and individual participation in collective endeavors - that are encountered in all civilizations and periods." Some Islamic scholars like Safi (2000) remain unconvinced: The pragmatic arguments for the universality of human rights are problematic, because they either completely overlook the significant impact cultural differentiation has on values and perceptions, or ignore the fact that agreements through UN reflect, more often than not, political compromises by political elites, rather than normative consensus. Further, many of the ruling elites who pretend to speak on the behalf of the peoples of the developing world lack political legitimacy and public support, and have embraced ideological outlooks at odds with the surrounding cultures. In the absence of genuine democracy in the countries of the South, no one can

Health policy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 8

Health policy - Essay Example all Americans hold a health insurance, failing which they have to pay a fine, and secondly various measures have been taken to cut down health related costs. These methods include providing health care institutions rewards for cutting down costs while penalizing them for bad care. The results have been phenomenal so far as according to data taken from Jan 2012 to Dec 2013, there has been a significant 8% decline in readmission cases (The Economist). Obamacare is likely to free the health budget that currently makes up a very high percentage of the GDP, thus allowing the American government to spend the money in other feasible projects. I completely agree with the views presented it the article, as well as with the view with which Obamacare was introduced as I believe prior to this bill there was a lot of negligence and over charging done by doctors for their own benefit. However, this bill would put an end to such illegal practices and help save millions of dollars of US tax payers which can be routed to other important projects (The

Microeconomics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 8

Microeconomics - Essay Example I would consider both fixed and variable costs in deciding to go to travel to New York from Los Angeles by either a plane or a car. Fixed costs that I will consider for the trip via plane include cost of an air ticket, luggage fees, and services provided on the journey, which are fixed costs as they have been determined by the airline and do not vary. Transportation costs to and from the airport, traffic and other costs arising after alighting from the plane are among the variable costs for consideration when traveling via plane. Fuel, food at stops, amount of traffic on the road, are the variable costs to be considered for travelling by car while car maintenance, toll fees, any repairs made on the way, parking fees paid in the course of the journey, washing and storage payments, and wear and tear to the car are fixed costs when travelling by car. As is evident, both fixed and variable costs are considered in making the decision on which transport from to use to New York from Los Ang eles. Ruegg, Rosalie T. The Police Patrol Car: Economic Efficiency in Acquisition, Operation, and Disposition : Prepared for National Institute of Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice, Law Enforcement Assistance Administration, U.s. Department of Justice. Washington: The Bureau, 1978.