...cheating. Both Willy and Bud try to succeed with exaggerated and unrealistic goals due to the pressure presented to them through external forces such as their mentors, society, their families, and the workplace. The pressure that Bud and Willy’s mentors place on them causes them to exaggerate their goals to unrealistic levels. As a result, Willy’s lucidity spirals into a deep depression that leaves him in a delusional mentality that refuses to let him face the reality of his present situation while Bud’s sanity becomes overcome by his hunger for power that is fed by his ego and arrogance. Ben Loman is the foil to Willy Loman’s character. He is wealthy, bold, and a ruthless business man. He is the epitome of a success story and living the American Dream. Ben is one of the fortunate few who found incredible success without much work, something which Willy recognizes and wants. Willy Loman believes that like his brother, he too can rise from humble beginnings to importance. His specific angle on this outlook is that a man succeeds by selling his charm; that to be well liked is the most important aspect a man can have. After working as a salesman for thirty long years, Willy finds he can no longer make the sale and his dream is left unfulfilled. He discovers that charisma is no longer a business hook, proven through his interactions with his younger boss Howard. Business has become something mechanic, impersonal, and...
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...Greed Greed is a scary motive. Greed is what created today’s world. Imperialism is one-sided, forcing things onto products, environments, cultures. Imperialism started spreading from Europe in the 16th century, dramatically affecting everything in its past. The effects of past imperialism contributed to a globalized world and still does to this day. Imperialism went through two significant stages and were all affected by greed, whether it was for more land, a bigger economy, or more power. Greed began the growth of European imperialism through the conquering of North America and South America. European imperialism is what founded the United States and created the first worldly genocide, wiping out Native American tribes, Hispanic colonies, and countless others. Imperialism, then, spread throughout the rest of the world creating one, if not, the biggest genocide in world history in Tasmania. Searching for more land, trying to expand country’s power and economy caused more pain and suffering than it did good in the first phase of Imperialism. The outcome of early global imperialism did not come into effect until quite some time later, slavery being the first. Europeans were the superior people based on the fact that they...
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...Realism and Naturalism Old Grannis and Miss Baker - Necessary or Needless? June 17, 2013 In "Frank Norris' "Drama of a Broken Teacup": The Old Grannis - Miss Baker Plot in McTeague", Donna M. Campbell disagrees with the critics that have argued that the Old Grannis - Miss Baker storyline in McTeague, is out of place and unnecessary. Rather, Campbell claims that the storyline is not deserving of the abuse heaped on it, and argues the alternate, that it is essential to the plot of McTeague, helping us both with the storytelling itself, and also with advancing the naturalistic nature and style of the stories of the other two couples in McTeague, Trina and McTeague as well as Zerkow and Maria Macapa. Campbell's main argument is that based on the two types of stories in the text, naturalistic stories as well as commonplace, "local color fiction", embodied in the actions of all three couples in McTeague, Norris is able to fully examine and explore what naturalistic writing is meant to entail. Using Norris' own words in his letter to Isaac Marcosson, Norris claims that he is writing a novel of "straight naturalism with all the guts I can get into it" (P. 48). According to Campbell, "Thus each pair of lovers functions on several levels: as representatives of varying social levels and codes of manners; as unwitting victims of the world of forces; as "owners" in several senses - of money, of passions, of restraint; and finally as characters in plots suitable to the differing...
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...Next, greed undoubtedly plays a role in the American Revolution. As the seeds for the war are planted many years prior, the associated greed is as well. From the beginning, the colonies followed an economic policy of mercantilism, which meant the colonies directly benefit Great Britain. Britain expected the colonies to only trade with them, and create certain items based on their needs, and pay taxes. However, the colonists, wanting to maximize profits, did not follow this policy, and tax evasion, bribery, and smuggling became common practice. Britain was unable to strictly enforce these rules and followed a method called salutary neglect in which they allowed the colonies to continue the illegal behavior because they profited greatly from...
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...American Greed: Party’s Over – Tyco’s Kozlowski Assignment 5.1.1 - Video Analysis 1. What was the fraud? According to the video, Tyco’s CEO and CFO were indicted on multiple counts Tax Evasion, Grand Larceny and sentenced to 8 to 25 years in prison. After the original trial ended in a mistrial because of an 11 to 1 deadlocked vote, prosecutors filed again for a second trial which ended in a unanimous vote of Guilty. The CEO – Dennis Kozlowski was indicted on tax evasion for avoiding paying more than $1 million in New York sales taxes on expensive art that he purchased. He was also indicted on grand larceny for paying himself huge bonuses which were not approved by the Board of Directors and for using the company’s Key Loan Program as a revolving line of credit making huge loans to himself. He paid off some of those loans with the huge bonuses that he paid himself. In some cases, he even forgave his own loans. The CFO, Mark Swartz, was also indicted on grand larceny for his knowledge and participation in the bonus and loan schemes. Among the charges listed, “Kozlowski and Swartz we convicted of: grand larceny, conspiracy to commit fraud, tax evasion, unauthorized bonuses, abusing corporate loans programs and falsifying records. Kozlowski was ordered to pay $167 million in restitution and fines along with his prison sentence.” 2. How was the fraud carried out? Tyco was a fairly large company that manufactured fire protection systems...
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...Greed is something every human is born with. It doesn’t matter what class you come from or where you’re from, you got it.The more power you get, the worse it gets, for example let's say “dan” works hard and gets enough money to buy a factory, now he’s making money and he has a few employees. He is now making enough money to support his family very comfortably, he goes on excursions to Europe and Africa. His employees “larry” is trying to support his 5 member family on pennies a day, his youngest son (7) is working in a cigar factory and comes home later than anyone just to help support his family. Dan could afford to pay not just larry but all his employees much better than he has been. This is not right, but a common practice in the late 1800s to the early to mid 1900s....
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...Evaluating the role of ethnic identity in explaining the occurrence of contemporary civil conflicts in sub-Saharan Africa. High hopes for many newly independent states of Africa became diminished as the 1990s saw over a quarter of the continent's states facing armed insurgencies within their borders (Young, 2002: 534). Commentators often point to pathological, deep-seated hatreds in an African tribal mosaic as the bases of such conflict. The fact is, however, that the continent is awash with political grudges, ethnically-framed and otherwise, but civil wars rarely break out. Thus this essay seeks to take a more nuanced approach to understand the analytical challenge posed by such disorder. Starting out by countering the centrality of ethnic identity, it firstly seeks to demonstrate that ethnic identities do not exist primordially, but that they are constructed on weak foundations. Secondly it endeavours to show that where cleavages do exist along lines of cultural difference, simple heterogeneity is insufficient to account for the outbreak of conflict. Next, it moves to underline the fact that more important in explaining civil conflict is whether such conflict is feasible. This is understood both in terms of the perceived capacity of the state and in terms of the viability of insurgency for would-be rebels. A final conclusion will then be expounded that ethnicity is not a central factor, but that it is simply one of a number of strategies under which conflict may be framed...
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...differences in culture and work ethic between Americans and Japanese. It shows how each group handles conflict in the work place, as well as at home. The main characters and leaders are faced with dilemmas and have to figure out how to work as a team to keep the automobile manufacturing plant up and running smoothly. According to Western Washington University (2011), there are many different sociological differences between the Japanese and Americans. Most importantly, the views of conflict and conflict resolution differ greatly. In the United States, conflict is seen as something that is inevitable, or bound to happen, whereas in Japan, conflict is considered dangerous to all relationships and should be diffused before it begins or avoided at all costs (Western Washington University, 2011). This fact along plays a major roll in the struggles between the Americans and the Japanese at the automobile manufacturing plant in Gung Ho. The American workers almost seemed as though they were looking for conflict to solve, but the Japanese executives were quick to avoid it at any cost possible. Culture also plays a major roll in determining how the characters approached and completed tasks presented to them. In the movie, a few of the American and Japanese main characters argue about their differences in spending time with family. The Japanese say that their job is their life; it is most important so they can provide for their families. For the Americans, they preferred to spend as much time...
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...(High-Context & Low-Context Culture Styles. (n.d.)). According to Edward Hall, these cultures prefer group harmony and consensus to individual achievement. They focus more on a speaker’s tone of voice, facial expression, gestures, posture, etc. than the actual words said. Travel effect stated four reasons why American workers chose not to use their vacation time. The first reason was the dread of returning from a vacation to piles of work, followed by the belief that no one will be able to step in and do their job for them while they're gone, not being able to afford going on vacation and lastly the fear of being seen as replaceable. “Indians are more efficient. Americans believe in more action and fewer words.” (SocialPC. (n.d.)). As previously stated, there are many differences between American and Indian work culture. Americans tend to be more relaxed work wise, while Indians tend to be extremely hard working. Due to their hard work, Indians quickly learned to adapt to new cultures and are very successful in other countries. Many of the differences between American and Indian culture arise from the fact that Indian cultures are based around their religions. Americans tend to be more individualistic and live life at their own will while Indians tend to rely more on the values of religion and family. Reference Chapter 1 Lecture: High-Context & Low-Context Culture Styles. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.marin.edu/buscom/index_files/Page605.htm Goudreau, J. (2013)...
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...filthy rich off of it. Clearly, these investors had to have had the education and long career in the financial industry in order to have the knowledge to pull off maneuvers like this. This whole idea of excess that ran rampant in the 80s leads us to ask the question “when is enough, enough?” This paper is going to compare and contrast the 1987 film Wall Street and the 1990 novel American Psycho. Out of both texts, there are common elements and themes found throughout. These themes include capitalistic greed, vanity and morality during the Reagan 80s. The paper will also touch on common perceptual elements seen throughout both texts, such as the perception of “yuppies” and the perception of Wall Street type professionals. After two successful books which detailed the life of rich, sexually ambiguous teenagers during the 1980’s, 27 year old Bret Easton Ellis developed a character that in some sick, twisted way can be relatable to by most people today. Patrick Bateman is a young Wall Street executive who lives a lifestyle anyone would want. He has a job that pays him plenty of money, all American good looks, a graduate of Harvard Business School and he is only 27 years old. There are two things about him though that people are unaware of though; he is a brutally insane sociopath that murders, tortures and kills people for fun, and he is obsessed with vanity. That latter...
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...The early twentieth century consisted with the duality between prosperity and corruption. In response to this veiled reality of the nation, some people sought to disillusion society from conforming with the problematic status quo, two of which were famous writers Zora Neale Hurston and F. Scott Fitzgerald. The two had their own respective grievances about the nation, but both used their writings to bring awareness about the follies of society. Hurston and Fitzgerald challenge the preconceived status quo of a perfect and progressive American society—set with values such as separate but equal, social classes, consumer culture, and so on—through their respective essay and novel, the former dealing with the erasure of African American culture due...
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...Matthew Smith March 2, 2014 History 2010-012 Defiance of Patriots Paper The Boston Tea Party was shaped by events that occurred inside and outside North America and had nontraditional actors; poverty in Bengal, pressure from New York and Philadelphia, Native Americans, and the youth all played roles in causing the tea protests. In Bengal the East India Company was administrating the country and their greed drove the country into poverty, hardship, and starvation. Pressure from Philadelphia and New York put on Boston to hold true to their non-importation agreement, including a ban on tea, helped motivate actions for the Boston Tea Party. The Native Americans played a nontraditional role for the protesters in Boston because of what they symbolized. The youth of Boston were another example of nontraditional actors that helped shape what the protests became. Boston faced many struggles as a town, from being heavily taxed to having their port shut down. Citizens of Boston never gave up the hope of freedom and they came together as a town to fight for what they thought was just.. The East India Company was in Bengal, today located in India, and they were administrating the colony for the British government on a charter granted to them. In the year 1769 not a single drop of rain fell, rice was 20-50 times higher the normal price, an estimated 1.2 million died, and citizens were driven into poverty, this was called the Fall of 1769. The East India Company was only in Bengal...
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...Running head: THE GREAT GATSBY ESSAY #2 1 The Great Gatsby Essay #2 Logan Daniel Laabs Madonna University English 3020: Major American Writers (Tuesdays) THE GREAT GATSBY ESSAY #2 2 The Great Gatsby Essay #2 The Great Gatsby takes place over the summer of 1922 and is set in the area around Long Island, New York. At first glance Fitzgerald makes a superficial statement about romanticism; Gatsby’s love for Daisy and how that love was destroyed in 1919 when Gatsby left for the war and instead married Tom Buchanan. The better part of the story shows Fitzgerald’s real theme, the decline of the American Dream in the 1920s during a time when prosperity and material excess was at an all high. Fitzgerald renders the 1920s as a time for low social and moral values which is demonstrated by the greed, pessimism, and need to ascend to power. An example of this is the large parties that Gatsby throws every Saturday night in order to impress others. The American dream seems to fade away with the need for wealth and pleasure dominating more moral objectives. This seemed to only intensify after World War I when young Americans came back home after witnessing brutal carnage. Another factor that lead Americans to desire wealth was the rise in stock market, which could have lead many people to easily acquire a small fortune themselves. Furthermore, crime was at an all-time high due to the flourishing underworld were bootleg liquor was in massive demand by the rich...
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...Runaway by Kanye West is a short film where Mr. West, both director and lead character, encounters a woman humanoid that crash landed on earth while on a drive in his Lamborghini. Both Mr.West and the women humanoid feed off each other in this film with scenes that held symbolic meaning to both life today and past life. A very important thing that Kanye fail to realize is that regardless of race people act similar when it comes to having power and being different. What Kanye have basically done with his short film symbolically is a switch within the role of dominance from white to black. When symbolically speaking should have shown a world with equal dominance from all people of different race and color. In Runaway there is a scene where Kanye and his humanoid girlfriend are at a dinner table with other guest as they prepare to eat. Everybody at the long white dinner table was of color, black or African descent, and most of the servants were white women. Kanye along with his guest wore white, which signified purity, as opposed to the white women who wore black to signify the switch within the dominate role of society. There was a sense of unwantedness at the dinner table towards the humanoid from Mr. West’s guests. Mr. West tries to kill the awkwardness with entertainment. This scene is very ironic due to Mr. West being an entertainer himself but trying to send a subliminal message by having white women entertain black people. This sense holds many deep meaning towards society...
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...“The american dream is that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability of achievement.” James Truslow Adams For many, this quote perfectly defines the american dream. A dawn of a new era seemingly encourages a life filled with glamour and prosperity as millions began their journey to the promised land. But does this dream live up to its expectations? Perhaps not as it reasons the corruption in today’s society. Despite the amount of hard work and dedication expended in attaining this goal, very few are able to obtain this degree of luxury. A man by the name of Jay Gatsby is a prime example of this. Although he worked to his literal death, Gatsby was unable...
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