...Throughout my second semester of AP Lang, I have learned an abundance of information in regards to what it means to be a good writer and analyzer. This semester was challenging in a way that is preparing me greatly for future english classes at Iowa State. New skills were introduced to me, making it easy to be proud of myself for the work I put in, ending with grades that reflected this effort. My overall knowledge on the active writing process, revision stages and analytical skills has increased immensely, allowing myself to feel greatly prepared for the many future classes that will benefit from my learning. Through the many course outcomes of this class, I have been able to improve my overall writing skills. Right away it was clear how...
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...Devon Greenhalgh 6.08 Then, in an essay that synthesizes at least three of the sources, develop a position about how this era reflects human nature in times of change People have slowly but surely develop throughout the ages. People have always rejected sharp changes in their life but can easily handle it. In between civil rights arguments and the depression of the 1930s, this era expresses how human nature is in times of change. To begin with in the 1930s there was a massive drop in the economy. This caused many people and businesses to go bankrupt and a lot of people to become hungry. In source A the author explains in times of need its human nature to band together. He emphasized this point in how most of them didn’t have jobs but one woman who did (even though she wasn’t paid for it) she was able to take home stale cake and she shared it instead of keeping it for herself. Also he emphasizes how when he actually earned $3000 he gave most of it away to help his community. In times of change a lot of the good shows in human nature. Another example of human nature that is express in this era was the easiness it was to give up. During the 1930’s there was a great drought which contributed to the depression and put a lot of farmers in debt. For some its human nature to give up if they don’t see the positivity in the situation. From the source f this quote describes how many people of the dust bowl felt: “my dreams and ambition had been flouted by nature’ and my shattered...
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...By 2154, humans have severely depleted Earth's natural resources. The Resources Development Administration (RDA) mines for a valuable mineral – unobtanium – on Pandora, a densely forested habitable moon orbiting the gas giant Polyphemus in the Alpha Centauri star system.[12] Pandora, whose atmosphere is poisonous to humans, is inhabited by the Na'vi, 10-foot tall (3.0 m), blue-skinned, sapient humanoids[34] who live in harmony with nature and worship a mother goddess called Eywa. To explore Pandora's biosphere, scientists use Na'vi-human hybrids called "avatars", operated by genetically matched humans; Jake Sully, a paraplegic former marine, replaces his deceased twin brother as an operator of one. Dr. Grace Augustine, head of the Avatar Program, considers Sully an inadequate replacement but accepts his assignment as a bodyguard. While protecting the avatars of Grace and scientist Norm Spellman as they collect biological data, Jake's avatar is attacked by a thanator and flees into the forest, where he is rescued by Neytiri, a female Na'vi. Witnessing an auspicious sign, she takes him to her clan, whereupon Neytiri's mother Mo'at, the clan's spiritual leader, orders her daughter to initiate Jake into their society. Colonel Miles Quaritch, head of RDA's private security force, promises Jake that the company will restore his legs if he gathers intelligence about the Na'vi and the clan's gathering place, a giant arboreal called Hometree,[35] on grounds that it stands above the richest...
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...Storyline: In the year 2154, the RDA Corporation plans to explore Pandora, an earth-like moon situated at a distant galaxy for its rich abundance of unobtanium - a valuable mineral. The planet is inhabitant by Na ‘vi, a blue skinned species which are human like with feline characteristics. As Pandora’s atmosphere does not any human survival, scientists create human-Na’vi hybrids known as Avatars. These avatars are controlled by genetically matched human operators. Jake Sully was sent as a replacement for his identical twin brother who was recently murdered. Jake is a paraplegic war veteran. Dr. Grace Augustine who is the head of the Avatar Program appoints Jake as a bodyguard. In Pandora, Jake escorts Augustine and biologist Norm Spellman. The group was attacked by a large predator and eventually Jake gets separated from his team. Later, he was rescued by Neytiri, a female Na’vi. Hse took Jake to their clan where he was given a warm welcome. Back in the camp, Jake was identified by the leader of RDA security forces colonel Miles Quaritch who promises Jake to get back his real legs in exchange for intelligence about the natives. He was also appointed a task of making the Na’vis to abandon Hometree which was situated above a large deposit of unobtanium. In the meanwhile, Jake grows close towards Neytiri and her clan Omaticaya. Jake started enjoying his life through his avatar and eventually tries to stop his people to destroy the Omaticaya’s peaceful life on the Hometree...
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...Modernity In the 18th century, the enlightenment began to take fruit in the world. In France, the people began to get upset and in the french revolution they took over their monarchy. Which later they gained an emperor named Napoleon Bonaparte. His thoughts were to conquer all Europe and to make it all Frenchify. In Great Britain, the Industrial Revolution began to take place and to affect in a beneficial way to all Europe and America. Modernity is a time period where the people believed in the secularization, being social and having the most modern things in the science area was the best of the best. The movie Metropolis directed Fritz Lang has a very big image in how modernity was represented. In the film, secularization was a big part. For example, this meant that it was a typical post-medieval and post-traditional and became a historical period. The Secularization of modernism is that religion was emancipated. In the movie religion was something difficult to talk about. The workers were making plans in order to see a woman, Maria, give basic lessons of the bible that was christianity. The workers or slaves seen her as a god because she gave them the hope they needed to keep having strength for their family and themselves. The owner of Metropolis, Joh Fredersen, wanted to keep everything under control which meant he didn't want the workers to feel any type of hope in being free. That meant he had to prohibit any type of religion and beliefs. In order to get rid of this...
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...James Cameron’s movie Avatar was a major discussion amongst my friends when it came out. All of them had seen it at midnight opening, while I was stuck home doing errands and work. For weeks they would talk about how amazing the scenery was and how epic the fights were between the Na’vi and humans. I was completely lost during each discussion we had when we hung out at Starbucks or each other’s houses. I hated not knowing what the movie was about and finally I decided to watch it online. Now I know the reason why people thought it was awesome. I was just like every other viewer who thought the scenery was breathtaking and the story was amazing. Although I have seen Avatar about a hundred times now, I never once thought there were hidden messages occurring behind the movie. I had to watch it again so I could see why people seemed to view Avatar as being an environmental or political issue. The movie seems able to predict how our future will turn out, a type of religion being practiced, and show us acts of imperialism being displayed throughout the story. I was so distracted by the technology used to create Avatar’s scenery; and how amazing the creatures and characters looked that I never once noticed how it could be possibly be allegory of our own world. The movie seems to predict that our future will become miserable. That we will gradually fall short of supplies and that Earth will end up dying. So far this seems to be true because the earth is already fighting back for...
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...COM-120 February 16, 2014 Intercultural Communication Paper I chose to write about the movie Avatar. Avatar is a science fiction movie set in the 22nd century. The film's title refers to a genetically engineered Na'vi body with the mind of a remotely located human, and is used to interact with the natives of Pandora. The story centers around a paraplegic marine named Jake Sully. Jake’s twin brother was a scientist on the planet Pandora, and part of an avatar program. When his brother died, Jake was offered his job, as he had the same DNA match up as his brother’s avatar body. Shortly after arriving, he is asked by the greedy corporate figureheads, Parker Selfridge and Colonel Quaritch, to infiltrate the native humanoid "Na'vi" people of Pandora and negotiate the surrender of their sacred tree home because there was a huge unobtainium mine worth a lot of money under the tree. If Jake agrees and is successful, he will get a spinal surgery that will fix his legs. When Jake took his brother’s job, he did not know anything about Pandora and its people. The Na’vi were a ten-foot-tall, blue-skinned native tribe, considered to be a very eco-friendly, living off the land, and only taking what they needed to survive. In addition, The Na’vi were a peaceful civilization. They did not fight amongst themselves, but worked together to grow as a whole. As Jake learned the language and culture of the Na’vi aliens, he grows to love them, and in turn, falls in love with the beautiful...
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...The film depicts the main character, Rocky Balboa, in a lower class neighborhood of Philadelphia, highlighting his surrounding environment, occupational value, friends and peers as impoverished. The first important part of the early exposition is the scenes showing Balboa at work, as a loan shark for a larger operation. This job requires Balboa to confront and physically assault debted customers if unable to make their respective payment. This lays the groundwork for the journey of achieving the “American Dream”. Balboa working such a low-end, odd job just to make ends meet symbolizes the working class, more specifically the lower class. This gives insight to the struggles these people face everyday, not only through Balboa’s work as a loan shark, but the dock worker in a dirty environment who is unable to pay his loan in the same scene. Many signs throughout the early exposition align with the reasoning within the rhetorical framework. For example, Rocky attempts to go to the boxing gym but because of his lack of success and low amount of money, Mick gives Rocky’s locker to someone else. This exposes how America views poor people, and illustrates the intolerance of poor people in society. Though America creates programs and means of financial aid in order to help the poor, there is a general understanding of American society that the rich are celebrated and the poor are considered disgraceful in the public eye. This does not reinforce my own opinion, it is just a fact of some...
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...Avatar In the future, Humans have traveled through space and locate a planet named Alpha Centauri B-4. The planet is known by the locals as Pandora, which is populated by exotic plants and weird creatures. The human travelers intend on seizing the wealth the planet has to offer. The savior of the story is a former Marine by the name of Jake Sully. Jake Sully joins the native population of the planet in the hopes of avoiding planetary conquest by the human travelers set on depleting Pandora of its environmental wealth. The movie Avatar is a great success with its great action scenes, its creation of futuristic vehicles, the creation of new alien life forms, the expert use of CGI, the beautiful and awe inspiring cinematography, and the selection of vivid and brilliant colors for use throughout Pandora. Avatars introduction and use of the Combat Amp Suit, Grinder Vehicle and Scorpion Gunship helped in taking the combat scenes from an everyday science fiction fight to a whole new level. With raising the bar in combat fight scenes the Combat Amp Suit accessories displayed in the movie emphasize the detail spent by James Cameron in creating the perfect combat vehicle for his movie. The combat suit is fitted with cannons, flamethrower, slashing blade and various firing projectiles. The Grinder Vehicle is an ATV on steroids. The Grinder Vehicle is instrumental in helping the human travelers gain access through the dangerous and dense forest to the indigenous population...
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...Analyzing Ava ta r: A Rev iew Essa y Nekeisha Alexis-Baker By the time I decided to see James Cameron’s Avatar, I had already heard enough about the film to be unsure whether it would be worth the time, effort and petroleum to see it. People’s comments about the film ranged from praise for its groundbreaking 3D animation; to criticism of its racist portrayal of the indigenous; to disappointment with the overly predictable storytelling; to appreciation for its critique of colonization and civilization. I even heard complaints from fellow peace church Mennonites about its overwhelming use of redemptive violence. After seeing the film through my Christian anti-civilization (anti-civ) anarchist vegan antiracist woman of color lenses, my sense is that Avatar is more complex than many of its detractors or advocates acknowledge. Set on the planet Pandora, Avatar is a sci-fi story of a mercenary-backed corporation’s attempt to confiscate and mine the land inhabited by humanoid aliens known as the Na’vi. Enter Jake Sully, the paraplegic U.S. marine protagonist who joins the science and anthropology wing of the operation as a substitute navigator for his deceased twin brother’s avatar. Early in the film, we discover that the avatar is an expensive high-tech clone that allows its user to temporarily experience and subsequently infiltrate the Na’vi community. After a series of unexpected events during his first avatar excursion, Jake finds himself living amongst the Na’vi clan known as...
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...Every now and then, a bit of slang comes along that draws a bright red line between young and old. In 2012, that slang term is YOLO. If you are over 25, YOLO likely means nothing to you. If you are under 25, you may be so familiar with YOLO that you’re already completely sick of it. A tip to the oldsters: YOLO is an acronym for “You Only Live Once.” It shot to fame earlier this year thanks to the rapper Drake, whose song “The Motto” has the hook, “You only live once, that’s the motto...YOLO, and we ’bout it every day, every day, every day.” After a video for the song was released in February, the buzzword spread quickly among the high school and college-age set by word of mouth, not just in person but through the turbocharged vehicle of social media. How quickly? Consider the lists of slang compiled every semester by students of Connie Eble, a professor of English at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. YOLO was entirely absent from the submissions by Eble’s fall 2011 classes. By the spring semester, YOLO had become the most frequently mentioned slang term among the students, just edging out “totes” for “totally” and “cray” (or “cray-cray”) for “crazy.” What accounts for the meteoric rise of YOLO, and how has it gone virtually unnoticed by nonmillennials? Its appeal to the youthful is self-evident. YOLO as a shorthand mantra defines youth, on a certain level. What is teenagehood if not the adventurous, often foolhardy, desire to test the limits of acceptable...
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...Avatar The avatar is the story of the World’s marine take over “Pandora” to take the plant’s supply of “unobtainium”. In Avatar, the Marines work with a group of researchers to learn the ways and traditions of the native people called the “Na’vi” hopes to access extremely costly and effective supply. The researchers came up with a different way to make it easier, by “growing bodies mixed with human DNA mixed with the native populations,” genetic material in order for the military to fit in better and earn the confidence of the “Na’vi”. They call these new bodies “avatars” and are able to link the bodies to each other. The main character, Jake Sully, was on an assignment with a group of researchers that his twin brother worked with. He was the only one that could use that avatar. On the first day of working in the avatar bodies, After wondering away from his group, he was stalked by this creature saved by a native woman named “Neytiri”. She was hunting when she came across Jake Sully. Neytiri had planned to fire a “poison dipped arrow”, but when “seeds of life” from the holy tree set itself on her arrow, she decided he needed to be left alone. The Na’vi belief structure is a lot like the Christian worldview. The native people of Pandora are very spiritual people who only believe in one goddess known as, Eywa. Eywa “is the creator of all living things and a part of all living things” according to Neytiri. Similar to what we, the Christians, believe about God. The worldviews...
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...While being informed by a Vietnamese translator that he was fighting The Pride of Ho Chi Minh, or the highly elite 29th Regiment of the North Vietnamese Army (NVA), Lieutenant Colonel Weldon Honeycutt responded by saying “Tell him I’m glad to know they’re around here. Tell him that’s why we came here- to kill North Vietnamese soldiers-and if they are around, they’ll just be doin’ us a favor78-79.” This bold statement, stated by the commander of a unit tasked to take a hill with heavily fortified enemy positions, shows that he understood his mission- plain and simple. LTC Honeycutt, commander of the 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry (the "Rakkasans"), lead his unit in accordance with the doctrinal tasks of mission command. LTC Honeycutt was responsible for the United States victory on Hamburger Hill through the operations process activities by correctly understanding the operational environment, properly directing his unit and combat power, accurately assessing the evolving situation, and properly leading his subordinates to a successful mission. A profane, outspoken, fiercely competitive man, Honeycutt was the prototype of the hard-nosed commander. Born in 1931 in the mill town Greensboro, North Carolina, Honeycutt had lied, at sixteen with only a sixth-grade education, about his age and enlisted in the army. At five feet eight, other officers thought he lacked having command presence. Because of this, he applied himself to the military life with a religious passion and quickly...
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...United States Army Adjutant General School Mission Command Essay The Battle of Dong Ap Bia: Hamburger Hill LTC Weldon Honeycutt CPT Shamika Hill Adjutant General Captain Career Course 003-16 June 30, 2016 For ten long days, American and South Vietnamese Army troops fought alongside each other to gain control of Dong Ap Bia, Hill 937. Their mission was to search and destroy the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and the Viet Chong (VC), believed to have grouped in the A Shau Valley area. The battle now known as Hamburger Hill begun May 10, 1969 and is recognized as one of the last major encounter between the Americans and the NVA. Lieutenant Colonel (LTC) Weldon Honeycutt, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment (3-187th) was determined to accomplish his assigned mission and seize Hill 937. After ten long hard fought days and many casualties from both sides, the 3-187th successfully occupied the hill on May 20. But at what cost? LTC Honeycutt improper use of the mission command principles; understanding, assessing, and visualizing; led to a prolonged engagement which cost additional casualties. Hamburger Hill occurred during Operation Apache Snow, the second part of a three-phased campaigned aimed at annihilating the NVA bases in the treacherous A Shau Valley. LTC Honeycutt and the 3-187th received the mission to search and destroy the Peoples of Vietnam Forces (PAVN) in the A Shau Valley in order to block the NAV from infiltrating the northern providence...
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...'Auld Lang Syne' Song Lyrics, Meaning And Everything You Need To Know About The Popular New Year's Eve Song By Carey Vanderborg@CareyDrew2 on December 31 2012 3:07 PM Among the many traditions that come with ringing in the new year, the singing of “Auld Lange Syne” has become a staple of every gathering. While “Auld Lange Syne” was originally a Scots poem written by Robert Burns in 1788, it was eventually set to the tune of a traditional folk song. The title of the Scottish tune translates to "times gone by" and is about remembering friends from the past and not letting them be forgotten. Now, at the conclusion of almost every New Year's celebration, partygoers join hands with the person next to them to form a great circle around the dance floor. At the beginning of the last verse, everyone crosses their arms across their breast, so that the right hand reaches out to the neighbor on the left and vice versa. When the tune ends, everyone rushes to the middle, while still holding hands. When the circle is re-established, everyone turns under the arms to end up facing outward with hands still joined. Over the years, “Auld Lang Syne” has taken on a life of its own as musicians put their own spin on the traditional New Year's jaunt. As the jam band Phish returns to Madison Square Garden in New York City for a four-show New Year's Eve run to close out 2012, the band will continue to play their rendition of “Auld Lang Syne” as they have done since 1989. As Phish rings in the...
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