...After Caravaggio’s Sacrifice of Isaac The bible states that in ancient times, Abraham, the father of many nations, was commanded by God to sacrifice his only son and heir, Isaac, for the lands of Moriah and to verify his love and fear for God. As Abraham is about to sacrifice his son, he was interrupted by the angel of the LORD. His willingness to give up his son was enough proof for God and Isaac would live. In the short story After Caravaggio’s Sacrifice of Isaac (written by Rachel Cusk, published in 2003) the main character, Alan, is involved in the same situation as Abraham. Gerte wants Alan to choose between his son Ian or herself. The story takes place in modern day London and the fundamental layout of the story is the narrator Alan reminiscing the instance he almost left his wife Sally for the German teacher Gerte. Alan lived a terribly ordinary life before the birth of his son, Ian. "I looked back at the life I’d lived and thought, how could you have done this and that, how could you have been so ordinary?" (line 53) His wife suffered of what can only be interpreted as a form of depression. She could not stand being near the child when it cried. It made her mad. This caused Alan to take an unpaid leave from his work to take care of his son. One day when walking Ian around London, Alan discovers an art exhibition which fascinates him in an unknown way. He attends the exhibition and finds himself very intrigued by the renaissance artwork. It makes him stop...
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...from a sort of postnatal depression, causing her to not love Ian, in fact she is not pleased about him at all; “his crying made her mad”. Because of this Alan is required to comfort their newborn baby on his own. This does not affect Alan at first. He loves the company of his son Ian, and starts feeling more independent, knowing that he is the incentive for his sons’ upbringing. This unconditional love, Alan is met with from his son, keeps him occupied. But after a period of time, everything appears to be the same in Alan’s’ eyes. Alan starts seeking a passion in life, both in marriage and his everyday life. He starts to find a passion in art, after an excursion to an art museum with his son. Afterwards he joins an art class, where he meets Gerte, an art history teacher from Germany. He finds himself talking to a well-educated person, someone he describes to be the exact opposite of his wife, both physically and mentally. “She was the opposite of Sally, she was very well educated and delicate...
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...very much and is very proud to have a son, but I do not think he really loves Ian as much as he should and expresses. He loves to have a son, but in some ways the son is more a thing to him than an actual person: "(...) his being there was like some kind of pass-port, some bridge to another place." (p.1, l.36). Alan begins forming his identity and living his life through his son. He begins taking an active part in his own and his son’s life and feels that the son is responsible for this positive change in his life. But the son is only indirectly responsible for the change - Alan himself changes because he thinks the son changes him. When Alan meets Gerte he sees something special in her from the first moment. He is very fasci- nated by her, and he looks up to her. She is like a god to him and that is very central in this story. Gerte tests Alan. This test is similar to the test God gives Abraham: Abraham is told to sacrifice his only son in order to show his love and obedience to God in the story about Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac. In that story, Abraham passes the test: He shows God that he is willing to give up his son for God. On this point the text differs from the story about Abraham: Alan also shows that he is willing...
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...After Caravaggio’s Sacrifice of Isaac by Rachel Cusk The main theme in this short story is how to be forced to choose between the unconditionally love between a father-son relationship and a love affair with a grownup. “I was obsessed with her from the start.” Love between a parent and a child does not need attention consisting of flattering words, acts or any other trifles but it is rather based on family bonds which will always differ from other kinds; for the reason that the involved people share the same blood and genes. This kind of relationship can bear a whole lot of pressure; even in most difficult times. There is one thing this kind of love cannot take care of is romance which we only experiences within an adult relationship; between man and woman. The short story is set in present-day London where the narrator called Alan lives an ordinary life with his wife Sally and their son Ian. Sally get’s some kind of depression, it might be a birth depression, right after having Ian which pretty much makes it Alan’s job alone to raise little baby Ian. “Sally couldn’t bear him near her. His crying made her mad;” This decision of Sally’s to not be near her own son gives Alan the opportunity to get about In London and see and explore new things he never thought would make his interest. Alan brings his little son with him everywhere; also in his dreams he dreams – “not the same dream, different dreams, but they’re all sort of similar.” Ian is his little sunshine, his everything...
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...1. Character's Name:Ernestine 2. Scene (Act & scene #): Scene 1 3. Summarize the scene in 3-4 sentences: Ernestine and her sister Ermina just lost their mother and are brought from Florida to Brooklyn by their father. His father devoted into Father Divine then. Given Circumstances 3. Gender: Female 4. Age: 17 years old 5. Place (of the scene): 6. Time (of the scene): 7. Relationship to other character(s) in the scene: Godfrey-- Ernestine's father Ermina---Ernestine's sister 8. Any other important facts we need to know about the character: Character (3-4 sentences each) 9. How would you describe them physically? Ernestine---17 year old young girl looking with African-American dark skin. Has passion in graduation and hates movie house. Godfrey---He is like a stoic. He is aggrieved and stressful to life. He believes in Father Divine. Ermina---She is confident and young. She has the passion of the youth. She occupied well with her sister. 10. How would you describe them vocally? Ernestine---Expresses a young girl who is stereotypes and has racial cliches and as the narrator of the whole. Godfrey---a middle-aged person with deep and tight voice. Acting accurately to show his stoic mood. Ermina---A young girl with self-assuredness and voice is higher and brighter than others. 11. How do other characters describe your character? She goes over many obstable as she grows up, while Godfrey is always a lovely daddy. When he receives a mission from Divne...
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...第十一章 跨文化人力资源管理 第一节 文化的概述 一、文化的含义 文化就是人们关注、探讨感兴趣事物的现象和氛围。 根据人们探讨某个事物人数的多寡则可以把文化分成大文化和小文化。即： 相对于其他文化，人们关注、探讨感兴趣事物的人数多的现象和氛围就是大文化；而人们关注、探讨感兴趣事物的人数少的现象和氛围就是小文化。——摘自中国幸福学研究 文化是人类群体创造并共同享有的物质实体、价值观念、意义体系和行为方式，是人类群体的整个生活状态。 这个定义揭示了几个方面的内容： （1）文化是人类群体整个的生活方式和生活过程。主要成分是符号、价值和意义、社会规范。符号是指能够传递事物信息的一种标志，它在生活中代表一定的信息或意义。文化的存在取决于人类创造、使用符号的能力。价值观是人们评判日常生活中的事物与行为的标准，决定着社会中人们共有的区分是非的判断力。社会规范是特定环境下的行动指南，它影响着人们的心理、思维方式和价值取向、行动。 （2）文化的内隐部分为价值观和意义系统，起外显形态为各种符号，这些符号主要体现为物质实体和行为方式。 （3）对整个人类来说文化是人的创造物，对于特定时间和空间的人而言，文化则是主要体现为既有的生存和发展框架。 （4）文化随着人类的群体的范围划分不同而体现出差异。 二、文化的构成 1、符号 文化的存在取决于人类创造和使用符号的能力。符号是指一群人所认可的任何能有意义地表达其自身之外的事物的东西。所有的文字和数字都是符合，此外，紧握的拳头、美国国旗、十字架也都是一种符号。和原始祖先不同，现代人类可以和他人交流十分复杂的信息——从“我爱你”到关于浩瀚宇宙的技术数据——而且，他们能从他人的经验中学到很多东西。人类拥有这种能力的关键就是符号的使用。通过符号，我们能够理解现实，能够交换和保存复杂信息。简而言之，我们既能创造文化，又能从文化中尝到很多（盖斯菲尔德和米恰诺维茨，1984）。 符号在帮助我们理解诸如“上帝”、“正义”、“爱国主义”等抽象概念时显得尤为重要。由于这类概念往往难以理解，我们总是把它们和我们已理解的事物加以比较。这样，隐藏在我们法律体系之后的理想和情感常常是由一个掌握正义尺度的蒙眼女性来代表。这种符号履行了这样一个重要的功能，即通过把复杂概念秘简单概念联系起来，从而帮助我们最终达到对前者的理解。通过这种方式，符号帮助我们理解现实，并使沟通变得简单。 符号有时和它们所代表的事物很想象。例如，鸟可能代表“自由”，因为在受地球引力受缚的人类看来，鸟儿似乎可以到达它们想要去的任何地方。然而，这样使用符号，可能会影响我们对符号意义的理解。当符号未被理解为自身之外的其所象征的事物时，就会产生许多文化和社会意义上的混淆。符号不仅代表了某种其他事物，而且同时也暗示了对象征事物的态度（戈夫曼，1976）。一些符号承载了如此确定的意义，以至于它们预先就定义好了其所代表事物的社会含义。 举例来说，用白色代表“好”，黑色代表“坏”，这显然会对白人和黑人看待自己和观察对方的方式造成影响。研究人员在一项研究中，用绘图—故事的方法以判断学前儿童的种族歧视倾向。孩子们首先被出示两幅图画，一幅是黑肤色的人，一幅是浅肤色的人。然后，研究者讲述了一个人的故事，孩子们被要求作出判断，这个故事是关于哪一个人——黑肤色还是浅肤色的人的？孩子们倾向于把浅肤色的人和正面故事联系在一起，而把黑肤色的人和反面故事联系在一起。实际上，与黑颜色...
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...Französisch – Vokabeln Basiswortschatz: Abschnitt 1 bis 10: Abschnitt 1 on homme (m) à raison de grand connaître quoi afin de pour, afin que, pour que un quel quelle, qui savoir l'enfant (m) trois une prendre être obligé cinq le néant que naviguer, aller en véhicule quatre pour, afin de et petit venir (25 Vokabeln) man Mensch; Mann à, je, zu groß kennen was damit, dass ein gewisser, einer, irgend einer, irgendwer, jemand; ein, eine, eins der, die, das; welcher, welche, welches; was für ein, welch; wer der, die, das; welcher, welche, welches; wer wissen Kind drei ein, eine, eins fassen, nehmen müssen, sollen fünf nichts dass; als fahren vier für, um, um zu und gering, klein kommen (25 Vokabeln) sein keiner, keine, keines; niemand wo; wohin zwei sechs darüber; da, dort Tag kein, nicht da, weil; denn enden, endigen Fett Basiswortschatz: Abschnitt 1 bis 10: Abschnitt 2 être personne où deux six y journée, jour non vu que, parce que, car, attendu que, puisque se terminer, prendre fin la graisse brun le peuple léger la Chinoise tenir manger, déjeuner le wagon s'appeler la guerre c'est-à-dire, soit le film le thé l'estomac (m) totalement Basiswortschatz: Abschnitt 1 bis 10: Abschnitt 3 pouvoir le décembre le Rhin quotidien, journalier l'Amérique du Sud (f) le pays c'est pourquoi fou à peine, ne ... guère le chat le lapin l'usine (f) la laine l'Angleterre (f) l'examen (m) la colère le caractère après embaucher la gazette le mai le trou l'épingle (f) déjà le mois Basiswortschatz:...
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