Tuesday, August 25, 2020

Heavy Metal Music

Envision, maybe, being encircled by a great many individuals, trusting that the band will come on. You can't inhale on the grounds that the individuals are being pressed into you by their neighbors. You are perspiring, attempting to get all of oxygen you can from the air, while others are bouncing all over, hitting you as they sit tight for the band. At long last, the band goes ahead stage and you are energized, and they start with: (play music here). This, is the thing that substantial metal music is about. I have been tuning in to substantial metal music since I was a newborn child. My first CD was Metallica's Master of Puppets CD that my father let me have. I have explored numerous substantial metal groups as the years have passed by. I know what you are figuring, what does substantial metal music have to do with me? All things considered, metal music is surrounding you. You can stroll down the road and hear somebody's radio playing it. You can hear it in some rap tunes, such as; â€Å"Bring the Noize† by Public Enemy with Anthrax, and â€Å"Let's Go† by Trick Daddy who took the introduction of â€Å"Crazy Train† by Ozzy Osbourne, and put a beat over it. You can even hear it in down home music from Cross Canadian Ragweed as they took a solo by substantial metal guitarist Dimebag Darrell and put it in their tune, â€Å"Dimebag.† Heavy metal music is one of the most replicated classifications of music out there. Today I am going to enlighten you concerning what substantial metal truly is, the start of overwhelming metal, and the effect that overwhelming metal has had on the present society. To start with, what is overwhelming metal music? Dee Snider, the representative of all that is substantial metal, characterizes metal as, â€Å"Drum-beating , bass-blasting , guitar-misshaped , and vocalist belting-music.† That is the overall meaning of overwhelming metal. Substantial metal unites three kinds of music, blues, hallucinogenic stone, and old style music. Early groups included consoles, or organs, into their music, however late groups have left from utilizing the console. Substantial metal for the most part, yet not generally, contains a solitary equation. A drummer, a bassist, a musicality guitarist, a lead guitarist, and a vocalist, who might play an instrument. With this equation, clearly their music is absolutely founded on the instruments. An overwhelming metal drummer utilizes a bigger drum arrangement than most other stone classifications. The artist of the overwhelming metal band is significant, similarly significant as the guitarists. The artists can have an enormous vocal range, similar to that of Ronnie James Dio of the band Rainbow, or they can be smooth like that of James Hetfield of Metallica. The guitarists' high contortion is the way to metal music. This gives it the overwhelming metal â€Å"sound.† Also, in contrast to numerous different classifications of rock, the bassist is essential to the band. It isn't exceptional to hear a bassist toss in his/her own solo into the melody. In general, the band utilizes extremely high volume. The stronger the music, the better. Since you realize what substantial metal is, I will inform you concerning its start. The beginning of metal can be extremely confounding. For example, Deena Weinstein, in her book, Heavy Metal: The Music and Its Culture, acknowledged Black Sabbath for the beginning of overwhelming metal, however this isn't altogether obvious. Carlos M. Pozo, in his book Caucasion Power Blues, composed, â€Å"Blue Cheer's front of â€Å"Summertime Blues† by Eddie Cochrane, is the primary substantial metal song.† â€Å"In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida† by Iron Butterfly is another of the soonest overwhelming metal melodies. At that point, in 1969, came Black Sabbath. At about a similar time as Sabbath, another huge metal band developed. This band passed by the name of Led Zeppelin. Despite the fact that these two groups didn't begin overwhelming metal, they carried it to the general population. Sabbath and Zeppelin are two of the most mainstream rock, not to mention overwhelming metal, groups ever. They confronted a lot of analysis from the outset, yet as more individuals abhorred them, others began adoring them. These individuals were the â€Å"rebels†, the ones that would not like to tune in to their folks since it was their lives, not their folks'. In view of these â€Å"rebels,† overwhelming metal's prevalence has become definitely throughout the years. Despite what their folks stated, they kept purchasing overwhelming metal collections, some of the time they even purchased more than expected, regardless of their folks. This started ascent of overwhelming metal in later years. That is the way substantial metal started, presently the time has come to find out about the effect it has had on society. Substantial metal has drastically affected society today. As indicated by Encyclopedia Metallica, which is an online site that shows news about Metallica, â€Å"All Metallica collections are restricted in Jordan since papers called them â€Å"satanists† and â€Å"devil-worshipers.† People were tuning in to Metallica and devastating things around town, so they needed to boycott Metallica. During the '80s, guardians despised the overwhelming metal music so much, they chose to attempt to get a notice on the collections. This brought about the Parental Advisory sticker on each unequivocal CD you see today. This isn't the main effect that substantial metal music has had. In 1990, substantial metal band, Judas Priest, were sued in light of the fact that the guardians of James Vance, and Ray Belknap accepted that Priest's music contained subtle cues that constrained these two men to end it all. It was discovered that these two men were profoundly self-destructive before discovering Judas Priest, in this way, Priest were discovered guiltless. This is, yet, another circumstance where the guardians despise overwhelming metal so a lot, that they reprimand the groups for the passing of their youngsters. Tragically, this is a repetitive activity taken by the guardians that won't stop until the detest of substantial metal music is gone, which won't occur at any point in the near future. This is the effect that substantial metal has had on society. Substantial metal music has been alive since the '60s. Despite the fact that Black Sabbath are credited with being the primary overall mainstream substantial metal band, they didn't begin it. Overwhelming metal has gotten very well known since it started, and has changed society from the very first moment. Along these lines, today you realized what overwhelming metal music is, about the start of substantial metal, and it's effect on society. Along these lines, I leave you with a statement from AC/DC, â€Å"For those going to shake, we salute you!†

Saturday, August 22, 2020

Development of Legal Protection in EU Courts Dissertation

Improvement of Legal Protection in EU Courts - Dissertation Example Each settled legal framework offers a system for testing the authenticity of the measures embraced by its individual organizations. In the European Union legal framework, given the popularity based deficiency just as the confined administrative elements of the European Parliament, it is of the quintessence that a framework be made to control the activities, choices or benefits appreciated by the European Union establishments. For this situation, the crucial position rests with the European Union Court of Justice, which is considered as an autonomous organization accused of protecting the standard of law inside the Union (Albors-Llorens, 1996).Before the Treaty of Lisbon carried corrections to the European Union, the significant technique in case of legal audit was accommodated in Article 230 EC Treaty, which gave non-advantaged candidates the option to straightforwardly challenge the ridiculous demonstrations of the Union’s foundations, for example, the European Parliament, th e Commission, the Council and the European Union Central Bank. Speculatively, this past component remained as the standard legal audit instrument that was available to people. In any case, in actuality, the chance has been constrained given its prohibitive necessities on the issue of standing conditions for revocation and the exacting translation of the prerequisites of individual worry that was received by the Court in the Plaumann case (Albors-Llorens, 2003), (Note 1). This implies these conceivable outcomes have been prohibitive given the idea of the requirements.... This implies these potential outcomes have been prohibitive given the idea of the necessities on the locus standi conditions, which are extremely severe. Once more, theoretically, they ought to be the essential channel for people to look for while investigating the EU measures (Parfouru, 2007). The prohibitive idea of the activity for cancellation just as its severe understanding by the Court indicate a key hindrance to access by the non-favored candidates to the Court in opposition to the special position delighted in by the Member States and the EU organizations. This off-putting approach has been at the focal point of debate and has been firmly reprimanded by individuals from the legal executive and researchers (Note 2). For example, the enemies of the framework have tested the methodology guaranteeing it disregards the standard of successful legal security (Gormley, 2006). As indicated by them, such prohibitive methodology is deplorable as it prompts refusal of equity. This condi tion is conflicting with the basic protected qualities, remembering the European Convention for Human Rights and Charter of Fundamental Rights, the two of which the EU is based. The activity for invalidation, as accommodated by Article 263 TFEU, is at the point of convergence of the EU legal framework. Its starting point can be followed in the revocation procedures against the unlawful managerial activity as alluded as by the Member States’ legitimate framework. The Article permits non-special candidates, who may include any characteristic or lawful individual, to straightforwardly challenge the illicit measures. This outcomes from the immediate impact, which the EU has as to characteristic and legitimate people just as the Member States. Further, the prohibitive locus standi to bring an activity for cancellation is one of

Monday, July 27, 2020

Dont Hit the Panic Button! - UGA Undergraduate Admissions

Dont Hit the Panic Button! - UGA Undergraduate Admissions Dont Hit the Panic Button! There is a scene from Animal House, where Kevin Bacons character, Chip Diller, is shouting Remain Calm! All is well!, while a panicked mob crushes him as it runs away from a parade gone mad. This is how I feel about this time of year. And at times, the end result is the same, with both of us trampled on the sidewalk, gasping for air. During the two weeks surrounding a deadline, life is hectic in all admissions offices. Applications are swarming in, materials are delivered to us in large mailing bins, emails are flying through our computers, and the lights on the phones are always glowing, showing us the incoming calls. And almost every one of those emails or phone calls is about one thing, Is it there yet? Why isnt it there yet?. The best thing for everyone to do during this time is to remain calm and dont panic. Give UGA (and any other colleges to which you are applying) time to dig out from the onslaught of materials. For our office, I expect that a majority of items that are sent by the deadline will be matched up by about January 27th or so. The one exception I give is if a student applied by using a paper application, as this slows down the process a great deal. So be patient, make sure that the materials were actually sent and have your correct name on them, and relax. Also remember that if multiple items were mailed in together, our office splits things up based upon what they are (transcripts, teacher recs, etc.) for quicker imaging and processing, so if one thing shows up as received and one does not yet, remain calm. And just so you know, our status check is not real-time, but it is updated every night, and I have requested that our technology team also update it every afternoon so students can see more current information. This means you do not have to check it twenty times a day. Go Dawgs, and remain calm ( I just had to say it one more time!).

Friday, May 22, 2020

Copyright Holders - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 7 Words: 2032 Downloads: 4 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Law Essay Type Narrative essay Did you like this example? Introduction Commons now a days is defined as the set of several elements that include â€Å"literature, art, music, film, design, radio, television, software, information and heritage sites†. Commons have been characterized into different classes which are- digital commons and environmental commons. Digital commons as defined by Mayo Fuster is the resources of information and knowledge, which are developed and possessed or distributed among two agencies or people that are freely available to the public. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Copyright Holders" essay for you Create order Public domain refers to those creative works whose rights of intellectual property or commons have been expired or have lost the copyright. These works are now available to public but are unavailable for the non-government agencies to own it. For example the plays written by Shakespeare and the theories or laws formulated by albert Einstein. Opposite of this is copyrighting, which refers to the legal ownership of a specific work by its creator and the creator have rights to use its work publicly and distribute, though for a limited period of time. The work that have been copyrighted to a particular person or an agency is said to be â€Å"under license† or â€Å"with permission†. This essay inter relates these three terms and specifies that how copyright holders enclose the commons and what is its effect on the public. Copyright Term The Australian copyright law establishes the policies and laws for the rights of creators and works of artists. After amendment, Aust ralian copyright law 1968, defines the scope of copyright in the country. There has been a lot of extension in copyright terms throughout 20th century. On 1 may 1969, Australian copyright act 1968 came into existence. The first major amendment occurred in 1974, when the government of Whitlam authorized Copyright Law Committee, headed by Justice Franki, to look over the effect of reprographic reproduction on Australian copyright law. The committee was also given the power of examining the influence of Xeroxing and â€Å"to recommend any alterations to the copyright law of Australia to effect a proper balance of interest between owners of copyright and the users of copyright material in respect of reprographic reproduction†. The other power or work of the Australian Copyright Law is to set the copyright term that is the time interval assigned to an agency or person to have the ownership of commons. â€Å"plus 50† rule was used in Australia before 2004, according to which the copyrighted work or commons was put in the public domain for 50 years after the death of owner. But this law was amended in 2006 and was changed to â€Å"plus 70† that is Putting the work in public domain for 70 years after the death of owner. This â€Å"plus 70† rule is also used by the other countries like United States of America, and the other countries included in the European Union. As per Berne convention, the minimum time in between the death of creator and entering of his work in public domain is 50 years. Crown copyright is not included in this extension from â€Å"plus 70† to â€Å"plus 50†. Moreover, according to â€Å"plus 70† rule- The work is out of copyright if it was published in the lifetime of its creator, who died before January 1, 1955 The work is out of copyright even after 70 years of the creator’s death, if the work was published in the lifetime of its creator, who died after December 31, 1954 The work is out of copyright even after 70 years of its publication, if the work was published after the death of its creator The work is indefinitely open for copyrighting which was never published by its creator. Pictures, audios, movies and other commons are copyrighted for 70 years after their publication. Whereas video and audio broadcasts are open for only 50 years of copyright after the first broadcasting year. The copyright term generally depends or starts, after the creator’s death, from the day of its first broadcast or publication or performance. The period of 70 or 50 years is considered to start from the end of the concerned calendar year. Except for the commons falling under the â€Å"Rule of shorter term†, it is important to note that the country from which the work originates, the country where the work is published or the nationality of the creator are not the key aspects of the copyrighting. Copyright term may differ from country to country. Extension to plus 70 There have been frequent debate regarding the extension of copyright term to â€Å"plus 70† from â⠂¬Å"plus 50†. Many people find this extension of copyright unconstitutional as when the expiry date of copyright comes, the copyright holders demand or bargain the government and mostly extends the right of ownership on existing works, due to this the general public is deprived of the benefit that was due to them under the Australian copyright law and is considered as theft of intellectual property from the general public. When the government does not grant extension to the current copyright holders, then they protest by considering the non-extension of their works as theft. The 70 years of extension to copyright seems to be illogical as most of the owners are dead by then. The extension is done to benefit the family of the owner, who might die before his ownership ends. But this extension of copyright also deprives the future generation and force them to wait a little longer to get the ownership of past work as the work is neither under the ownership of its creator nor it is in the public domain. So people consider the extension as legal theft of their intellectual property. According to section 51(xviii) of Australian constitution, it is under the power of federal parliament to â€Å"copyright commons, patent inventions and designs and trade mark†, without concerning about limiting the time interval of ownership. Moreover, according to section 51(xxxvi), it is under the power of federal parliament to establish policies for â€Å"the acquisition of property on just terms from any state or person for any purpose in respect of which the Parliament has power to make laws†. So it can be said that the copyright extensions to â€Å"plus 70† is unconstitutional unless the general public are properly remunerated. RIP: A Remix Manifesto, which is a documentary investigating the issues of copyright also talks about the copyright extensions of existing works. According to this documentary, with the copyrighting the future open source cinema is becoming less free and to make these societies free government has to limit the tie interval of ownership of existing works. This documentary distinct the copyrighting from the public domain and promotes the free flow of information and art (Galor 2008). Impact of Internet Culture is nothing but the sharing of behaviors, ideas and artifacts among people. This creates a passing of standards from one generation to another. Internet was started for the communication but now affects the way that culture is created and shared. Because of the internet, now culture of various societies can be more easily explored and one can know about one’s culture just through a search engine. So one can learn culture even without experiencing it and he or she can decide if he/she is interested or not on experiencing it. Because of this uniqueness of culture has diminished. So the internet will keep changing the way culture is shared and created with its increasing use. It is important to k eep a look on this effect so that we can limit the negative effects and increase the positive effects. Australian government is working for minimizing the negative effect through Stop Piracy Act and Protect IP Act. Fair Use According to copyright law of Australia it is definitive that legal enforceable creator’s rights of creativity and artistic works under the Australian law have to be done with fair dealing. The copyright scope in Australia has a definition in Australian copyright act in 1968 having application throughout the Australian national law. Designs have to be covered through Copyright Act along with the Design Act. According to legislation of Australian the basis is on the section 51 authority of the copyright law in Australia which is federal and has an establishment through the parliament of Australia. When looking into the past, the copyright law of Australia was followed by copyright law in Britain but now it has a reflection of international standards t hat are found in the convention of Berne as per the Literary protection and Artistic working scenarios and other agreements of International copyright. This also discusses multilateral treaties and most recently consists of the free agreement presented by U.S-Australia agreement. The clear exception to the infringement of copyright in Australia has an emergence under the heading of fair dealing. This concept is somewhat comparative to the concept of fair use in U.s and in Australia is considered as a work used specifically in recognition to something whose copyright cannot be violated. However, fair use has specific range purposes that vary by work type and the possibilities consists of reviewing and criticizing, researching and studying, reporting the news, proceedings of judicial aspects or advice in professional legal dimensions along with parody and satires. For using a fair use, it is important that any of these mentioned purposes are fair. Dependence of what can be termed as f air is on the circumstances that include work nature, the use nature and the use effect on all the commercial markets throughout the working dimensions. There is therefore, a specific divisions are responsible for fair use in Australia. These comprise of exceptions special division applied with the help of computer programs, special exceptions of division in public places and the licenses of statutory framework which must be allowed to be used by schools, universities and also the licensing fee payment set either through copyright tribunal or through agreement. There is also a recognition of temporary copies under the Australian copyright law. These copies are stored under the memory of the computer with a term used as reproduction falling under the exclusive right owner copyright aspects. There are temporary copies exceptions present as well but these are not to be considered. Now, it becomes important to understand that copyright has to be taken care from the perspective of copyri ght. The copyright which is owned by an owner requires the owner to consist of a legal document. This legal document should contain a detail of the first publication and the name of the owner. In addition, the copyrights owned by the government are the ones which do not infringe any copyright if there is an action. The authority here Is only the government. So, if a copyright is owned by the government then it Is not free use until the government mentions this. Not only general public and future generation is working or protesting against the copyright extensions, but some authors also criticize this extension. One of these writers is Lawrence Lessig, who in his book â€Å"The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World† criticizes this extension. According to him the copyrights do help the authors in terms of recognition and reward but long term copyright can destroy creativity and innovation as â€Å"future always builds on the past†. This book also highlights the protests of several organizations that promote the protection of intellectual property (Lessig 2001). Conclusion After going through all the government laws and individual aspects regarding the copyright and extension it can be concluded that general public is against it while current copyright holders are for the extension of copyright. It is clear that copyrighting is not the issue but its extension do suppress the creativity and innovation. After reviewing the â€Å"Building an Australasian Commons: creative commons case studies†, it can be said that the Australian Creative Commons is impressively working for the benefit of public by lobbying for the promotion licenses for free content and policies for open access of information. They are educating Australian government, cultural agencies and educational institutions by their conferences and campaigns. So, more work is required to make the government aware of the negative effect of copyrighting and th e issues related to it (Creative Commons 2013 ). References Building the Australasian Commons: Creative Commons Case Studies, Volume 1. Galor, Brett 2008. RIP: A Remix Manifesto. National Film Board of Canada, EyeSteelFilm. Lessig, Lawrence 2001. The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World. New York: Random House. 1

Friday, May 8, 2020

Enron Scandal - 9449 Words

The Enron scandal, revealed in October 2001, eventually led to the bankruptcy of the Enron Corporation, an American energy company based in Houston, Texas, and the de facto dissolution of Arthur Andersen, which was one of the five largest audit and accountancy partnerships in the world. In addition to being the largest bankruptcy reorganization in American history at that time, Enron was attributed as the biggest audit failure.[1] Enron was formed in 1985 by Kenneth Lay after merging Houston Natural Gas and InterNorth. Several years later, when Jeffrey Skilling was hired, he developed a staff of executives that, by the use of accounting loopholes, special purpose entities, and poor financial reporting, were able to hide billions of†¦show more content†¦By December 31, 2000, Enron’s stock was priced at $83.13 and its market capitalization exceeded $60 billion, 70 times earnings and six times book value, an indication of the stock market’s high expectations about its future prospects. In addition, Enron was rated the most innovative large company in America in Fortune s Most Admired Companies survey.[11] Causes of downfall[edit] Enron s complex financial statements were confusing to shareholders and analysts.[12][13] In addition, its complex business model and unethical practices required that the company use accounting limitations to misrepresent earnings and modify the balance sheet to indicate favorable performance.[14] The combination of these issues later resulted in the bankruptcy of the company, and the majority of them were perpetuated by the indirect knowledge or direct actions of Lay, Jeffrey Skilling, Andrew Fastow, and other executives. Lay served as the chairman of the company in its last few years, and approved of the actions of Skilling and Fastow although he did not always inquire about the details. 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Wednesday, May 6, 2020

Manchurian Candidate †Film Theory Paper Free Essays

string(67) " on the small little television screen at the corner of the frame\." The Manchurian Candidate, adapted from Richard Condon’s novel of the same title, was released in 1962, and directed by John Frankenheimer. Brief Plot Summary The central concept of the film is that the son of a prominent, right-wing political family has been brainwashed as an unwitting assassin for an international Communist conspiracy Thesis Statement The Manchurian Candidate was noted for its breakthrough in cinematography, as the scenes were shot in a creative manner that was new and different in that era. It also made use of different editing techniques to seamlessly piece the story together, along with the use of certain recurring Motifs to effectively deliver the story to the audience. We will write a custom essay sample on Manchurian Candidate – Film Theory Paper or any similar topic only for you Order Now This paper would examine how the groundbreaking use of cinematography, editing help to bring across the theme of surrealism, and delivers a thrilling effect while the motifs help bridge the Theme of The Manchurian Candidate with the use of visual elements. Cinematography The Manchurian Candidate made use of several different brilliant cinematography aspects to bring forward the theme of surrealism and thrill to the audience. According to the Dictionary, the term â€Å"surrealism† refers to â€Å"an avant-garde movement in art and literature that sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind, characterized by the evocative juxtaposition of incongruous images in order to include unconscious and dream elements. † This theme was highlighted in several scenes in the film. Particularly in a scene where Major Marco was having a nightmare, the camera tracked from the end of Marco’s bedroom towards Marco, who was lying on the bed sleeping. The tracking shot ended with a close up of Marco’s face, with his brows furrowed as he began to experience his recurring nightmare. The close up shot of Marco’s troubled face was then superimposed onto his nightmare shot. From the tracking to close up shot, it creates a sense of mystery and suspense, which intrigues the audience and builds up the anticipation. After which it would lead up to the film’s most noted scene- the Ladies in Garden Club scene. In this scene, the director made use of a 360 degrees panning shot to showcase three different points of view- the â€Å"Reality†, the â€Å"brainwashed white man’s imagination† and the â€Å"brainwashed black man’s imagination†. These three different points of view in a dream add up to one big surrealistic nightmare scene. It is also important to note that this scene was considered to be â€Å"notorious† (Chung, 2006, p. 129) during that era, for its unconventional use of camera work. During and after the 1950s, there is an â€Å"increase in the number of dark, provocative and original films. (Mann, 2008, p. 12) and The Manchurian Candidate was one of them. It was â€Å"stylistically ambitious† (Mann, 2008, p. 12) and can be considered a breakthrough in cinematography during that era. This scene alone had to be shot 3 different times, as each individual point of view comprised of different elements and actors. The platoon was capture d and brainwashed into thinking they were attending a ladies horticulture club meeting, when in fact they were present and sitting in a Communist meeting. The camera then does a 360 degrees slow panning shot from the lady speaking, Mrs. Whittaker, to everyone present in the scene, listening to the talk. However, as the camera makes a full round and returns to the start, gone was Mrs. Whittaker, and in her place stood an East Asian doctor giving the Russian and Chinese generals a speech about the brainwashed American soldiers. This panning shot builds up suspense, as the camera slowly pans around the venue, showing that there were only ladies present. It delivered a shock to the audience, who expected to see Mrs. Whittaker after the camera makes a full round, to find out that the lady was gone and replaced by a man instead. This slow panning movement also gave the scene a dream-like quality, which is a characteristic often associated with the theme of surrealism. The scene with the doctor and Communist generals reflected the â€Å"reality† of which the soldiers are unaware of, as they were brainwashed. The camera used a low-angle shot to reveal the amphitheatre filled with Communists. It was positioned behind the soldiers, as if they were looking up to those seated. This is to show that the American soldiers caught were at the mercy of those Generals present, to show authority from those seated above and around the amphitheatre. Even though they are under the mercy of the Communists, the soldiers showed no sign of fear as they were brainwashed into thinking they were facing a group of women instead. Hence the use of camera angle here provides a sort of contradiction to reality, it showed Communist authority even though the soldiers displayed no fear. Another groundbreaking use of cinematography can be found in the scene where Johnny Iselin was confronting the Secretary about the â€Å"number of Communists in the Defense department† with Eleanor Iselin manipulating her husband. In this scene, the Secretary was giving a press conference and Johnny Iselin stood up, and demanded to know why are there communists present in the Defense department. The scene was constructed such that the Secretary was at one end of the room, while Johnny was the other end. Yet they were able to appear in one frame, with the use of juxtaposition. As the press conference was broadcasted live, the confrontation between both parties were filmed and showed on television screen. Whenever the Secretary is in frame, Johnny Iselin would appear on the screen of a small television at the corner of the frame, thus making both parties visible onscreen even though technically, they are at different ends of the room. This use of framing and juxtapose imagery echo them theme of â€Å"surrealism†. Surrealism often uses incongruous juxtapositions to highlight conflicts (Strom, 2003). In one particular scene, the mastermind of this confrontation, Eleanor Iselin, appeared in the foreground, with Johnny in the background, and the Secretary reacting angrily on the small little television screen at the corner of the frame. You read "Manchurian Candidate – Film Theory Paper" in category "Papers" Every action was combined in one frame capturing the whole shot, filled with conflict and movement. This framing brought the tension of the film up a few notches and audiences were able to feel the impending explosion of anger between the characters. The unconventional use of cinematography aspects in this film successfully brings forward the theme of Surrealism, with its â€Å"unusual framings and camera movements† (Strom, 2003, p. 8), which are styles indebted to Surrealism. Editing The different use of editing was also one of the most noted aspects of The Manchurian Candidate. According to Carroll (2003), â€Å"editing, or montage, was generally celebrated as the most important, essential characteristic of cinema† (p. 153). Hence the right choice of editing technique would set the pace and coherency of the film. This would bring us to the editing pace of the film- the long takes versus the accelerated montage. The scene that showcased a long take, happened when in Major Marco’s train ride from Washington to New York. Marco was feeling jittery and nervous, thus he decided to leave his train seat and go to the back of the train for some fresh air. He arrived at the last carriage, and stood with his back leaning against the wall. A woman followed Marco and entered the same carriage. She had observed Marco from before, and decided to follow him into the back. Marco and the woman began to strike up a conversation, with random small talks that made no sense. This whole scene involved no cuts at all, all shot at one go and thus showcasing the aspect of a â€Å"long take†. The long take builds on the tension between the meeting of two strangers, showing the entire conversation between Marco and the woman, despite it being nonsensical and weird. The audience took in the scene at one go, after which it leaves them wondering â€Å"what lies underneath this exchange of words between the Major and this woman? † The long take establishes a fact that this scene is important, as it â€Å"intensifies† a shot (Goldberg, n. d), contradictory to the fact that the content of the scene is random and consist of small talks only. As opposed to a long take, which consists of virtually no cuts, an accelerated montage consists of shots with increasingly shorter lengths. With regards to The Manchurian Candidate, the accelerated montage editing aspect occurs during the â€Å"Convention† scene, where Raymond Shaw was sent on a mission to assassinate the President. In this particular scene, Sergeant Raymond Shaw was instructed by his mother to shoot the newly elected President at the Madison Square Garden, with Major Marco scrambling to stop Shaw from accomplishing his mission. The establishing shot of Madison Square Garden showed Raymond walking through rows and rows of empty tiered seats, arriving at a small room high above the arena. He positioned his rifle as he prepares for his mission to assassinate the elected President while he was giving his speech. As crowds filled the arena, Major Marco struggles to locate Shaw in hopes of stopping him. The whole sequence was edited with the cross-cutting technique. Through cross-cutting, it helps to create tension and delivers the sense of thrill when the audience sees Shaw preparing to fire his rifle, as Marco runs frantically to stop him. From the first few shots of Shaw preparing his rifle and locating his target to Marco searching frantically for Shaw, was edited with shots and cuts that got shorter and shorter. It adopted the technique of Accelerated Montage, which serves to create tension and keep the audience at the edge of their seats. As this is the climax of the film, by using cross-cutting and accelerated montage, the film manages to capture the audience’s attention and builds a highly thrilling and exciting sequence. Motifs The Manchurian Candidate makes use of several motifs in this film to drive home its message and to develop its theme. One of the most glaring motifs used in this film would be the Red Queen, or the Queen of Diamonds. The Queen of Diamonds card had appeared several times in the film, particularly during scenes that involved Raymond Shaw being brainwashed. In this film, the Communists had conditioned Shaw’s brain into receiving commands and fulfilling them like a robot would. However, this brainwash condition can only be activated when Shaw hears the line â€Å"Why don’t you pass the time by playing a little game of solitaire? † After which, Shaw would proceed to take out a stack of cards robotically and began playing. As he plays the game, he would eventually draw out the Queen of Diamonds card, and upon seeing the card it would fully activate Shaw’s brainwashed condition. At first glance, it may seem that the Queen of Diamonds motif is played out to trigger Shaw’s mental condition. However, as the film progresses, the intent of using the Queen of Diamonds began to clear up- that the Queen of Diamonds was linked to Shaw’s mother, Eleanor Iselin and later in the film, his soon-to-be wife, Jocie (Blakesly, 2007). According to Blakesly (2007), the Queen of Diamonds card represented â€Å"an adamant woman, his mother, someone Raymond would rather not see†. During the first few scenes, Shaw admitted that he â€Å"despised and loathed his mother†. It was eventually revealed that Shaw’s mother was also part of the Communist conspiracy, and a woman hungry for political power. Hence, the card that would trigger Shaw’s mental condition was picked out to be the Queen of Diamonds, which signifies his mother and hinted that his mother had a connection with the Communists. As mentioned above, the Queen of Diamonds is also known as the Red Queen. In this case, it represented Communism as this film was shot and based on the Cold War, which was ongoing during that time. Blakesly’s analysis surmises that: Another triggering device for Raymond’s conditioning is when he looks upon the Queen of Diamonds, the Red Queen, with the concomitant relationship of â€Å"red† to the â€Å"Red scare†, the communism from which the left in North America, with rare exceptions, still recoils. (p. 218) Besides being a figure representation of Shaw’s mother, the Queen of Diamonds also took on the representation of Communism. Hence it would make sense to why Shaw would fall into a state of â€Å"brainwashed condition† upon seeing the Queen of Diamonds card- he was being controlled by the Communists, with the card serving as a reminder that Communism took over his mind. Other than the Queen of Diamonds motif, the film also adopted Abraham Lincoln as a motif. The use of Abraham Lincoln ranges from obvious pictures of Lincoln himself, hanging in the Iselin house to a more subtle form, where Johnny Iselin dresses up at Abraham Lincoln in a masquerade party. The Iselins were from the Right-Wing, or Republican party. The use of Lincoln signifies the stand that the Iselins take within political context and also to serve as a kind of contradiction between right and wrong. Abraham Lincoln was a prominent leader of the Republican Party. According to Redding (2008), the film was â€Å"mediating symbolically on the political heritage of Lincoln’s republic among a corrupted public sphere†. Lincoln was used a symbol to represent America, and the director’s portrayal of the Iselins served as a satire of the America politics during that time. Johnny Iselin, the Senator, was portrayed as a drunk, impulsive and rash person. He often confronted the government with issues concerning the communist, when in fact; he is also part of the communist conspiracy to take over the American government. This is a parody of â€Å"McCarthy†, who was a rash and impulsive Senator from the Republican Party. During the time he acted as a Senator, he often appeared drunk and caused a lot of controversy. Thus the portrayal of Johnny Iselin based on McCarthy, and the images of Lincoln all served to fuel the director’s satire on the political situation. During the masquerade party scene, Johnny Iselin dressed up as Abraham Lincoln, a contradiction as he is working with the communists whereas Lincoln was regarded as a righteous politician in the past. To further highlight the contradiction, Johnny’s wife, Eleanor Iselin dressed up as Bo Peep, a character which symbolizes innocence and naivety. However, as mentioned previously, Eleanor was anything but innocent. She worked hand in hand with the communists in order to gain political foothold. Thus, this portrayal also serves to show a contradiction between right and wrong, righteous and evil. Portraits of Abraham Lincoln decorated the Iselin house, and in a particular scene, where Eleanor was confronting Raymond about his love interest with the daughter of a Senator from an opposition party, Lincoln was â€Å"staring† down at the confrontation. This is yet another example of contradiction between right and wrong, the mother being an evil influence was threatening Raymond to give up his love and Lincoln’s portrait in the background serves to remind us light will prevail, as the portrait was hung above of Eleanor as she speaks. The different motifs of this film helped shaped the entire plot and provided audience with clues; when they see the Queen of Diamonds they immediately would know that Raymond Shaw would be brainwashed. It also helped to bridge certain morals or theme of the story with visual elements, like the battle of right and evil was shown through the portayal of the Iselins versus Abraham Lincoln iconography. Conclusion This paper discussed how use of cinematography, editing helped bring across the theme of surrealism, and delivered a thrilling effect while the motifs helped bridge the Theme of The Manchurian Candidate with the use of visual elements. In conclusion, The Manchurian Candidate made use of highly unconventional cinematography and editing aspects that successfully showcased the theme of â€Å"surrealism† and effectively created tension and thrill, for the audience. Not forgetting the effective use of motifs, which helped developed the main theme with the use of visual elements and provoked thought from the audience as they watch the film, while trying to piece the puzzles together. Bibliography * Blakesly, David (2007) The Terministic Screen: Rhetorical Perspectives on Film. Illinois: SIU Press * Carroll, Noel (2003) Engaging the Moving Image. USA: Yale University Press * Chung, H. S. (2006) Hollywood Asian: Philip Ahn and the Politics of Cross-Ethnic Performance. USA: Temple University Press * Goldberg, * Mann, Denise (2008) Hollywood Independents: The Postwar Talent Takeover. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press * Redding, A. F. (2008) Turncoats, traitors, and fellow travelers: culture and politics of the early Cold War. USA: University Press of Mississippi * Strom, Kristen (2003) Resurrecting the Stylite Simon: Bunuel’s Surrealist Film. P. 8 How to cite Manchurian Candidate – Film Theory Paper, Papers

Tuesday, April 28, 2020

Trains Running (August Wilson) Essays - , Term Papers

Trains Running (August Wilson) Trains Running (August Wilson) P.565 Memphis The owner of the diner is waiting for his chance to go back south, and he knows that they got two trains running every day. Wolf A numbers runner who sometimes uses the diner as his office. Risa The diner's waitress and cook. Holloway A regular who speaks out against the constant oppression of African Americans. Sterling Just released from jail, he needs to find a way to make a living. Hambone A man who stands up for what he believes he deserves. West The only wealthy man on stage owns the funeral home across the street. Two Trains Running, set in 1969, is August Wilson's most contemporary play to date. Like most of his plays, it unfolds in a single location--a diner in Pittsburgh. Memphis, the diner's owner, is struggling to get a fair price from the city which is buying up the entire eighborhood for purposes of urban renewal. Memphis' observation that the neighborhood has been emptied of its commercial and human activities gives an ironic and grim spin to urban renewal in particular and the progress of African Americans general. The play asks the question: In the midst of unemployment, death, and a white power structure allowing few alternative, where do you look for salvation. Do you turn to Christianity, as embodies in the wealthy but deceased Prophet Samuel, or do you return to an older African spirituality embodied by the impossibly aged Aunt Ester? Perhaps salvation lays with Malcolm X and the black power movement, or with Wolf and the numbers game of a white Mafia. A host of tragic figures inhabit the diner. Memphis' struggle with the city is essential to his fate of returning south to get back the land cruel taken from his by white men. Sterling--just out of prison--is stymied in his attempts to, by any means possible, support himself. Risa, the waitress, has scarred her legs in an attempt to escape the prison of physical beauty. Finally, perhaps a symbol of them all, is Hambone. Tens years ago he painted the grocer's fence, but was paid a chicken when he felt he had earned a ham. Every day for ten years he has confronted the grocer, requesting and demanding his ham, until by now the only phrases he utters are I want my ham. and He gonna give me my ham. August Wilson's 1992 play Two Trains Running is, in effect, a kinder, gentler version of Spike Lee's film Do the Right Thing. Both address racial tension between blacks and whites in the inner city and the violence that can accompany it, but in the play, these social ills are heard and not seen. The cast of TheatreWorks' current production creates a well-realized, if insular, environment that allows the audience to connect the characters. Wilson has created a compelling story line for each individual, and the fact that most of the stories have happy endings doesn't seem contrived. On the contrary, their successes are representative of African Americans who broke through the color line during the civil rights movement. Even a character like , the diner owner who treats his lone waitress, Risa , as a personal servant, redeems himself through his fight to get the city to pay him what he wants for his building, which is due to be demolished. Memphis plans to use the money to return to Mississippi and confront the white man who ran him off his land decades ago. Memphis' story is at once heartrending and uplifting, as is Abdul-Rashid's reading of it. Michael McFall plays the key role of Sterling, an ex-con whose anger at not being able to get a leg up in the world is tempered by a youthful exuberance. It's the latter quality that allows Sterling to woo Risa, a beautiful young woman who has scarred her legs to keep away men who want her for her body alone. Brembry's Risa is world-weary in the extreme; she communicates mostly through sighs and piercing glances at whoever is yanking her chain at the moment. Sterling and Risa's love story is tender, but McFall is even better when his character befriends Hambone (Don C. Coles), a homeless man. Cheated out of a ham by a white butcher whose fence he painted,

Friday, March 20, 2020

29 Effective Examples of Public Relations Campaigns and Tactics

29 Effective Examples of Public Relations Campaigns and Tactics Public relations spans a broad array of tactics and strategies. As such, what any two PR campaigns looks like in actual practice can be vastly different depending on its goals. From old-school media placements to large-scale event planning to modern digital communication, it often requires an interesting mix of skills and competencies to do well. And that’s probably why you’re here. You know the benefits of doing PR: earning trust, establishing valuable relationships, and building branding awareness, all while collaborating with content and social media marketing, but with lower costs than traditional advertising. Sounds awesome, right? Well, sure it does. But which tactics should you execute? Where do companies start developing plans? And what does effective PR even look like in real life when it encompasses so many things? That’s what you’ll find in this post: 30 examples demonstrating what this time-tested marketing discipline look like in the real world. You’ll find basic stuff like different areas of the business you can explore, plus tons of actual campaigns to help inspire your own strategy. Table of Contents: Definition Basic PR Disciplines Basic PR Tactics Successful PR Campaigns What is ? Its the best all-in-one marketing management platform to organize all your projects and team members. See it in action. Snag Three Free PR Templates This post is full of examples you can borrow ideas from. But, what happens when it comes time to execute your strategy? Grab these free templates to support better execution: PR Plan Template: Press Release Template: AP Style Cheat Sheet: in oneplace. Save 20 hrs this week alone and every weekafter. If youve ever kicked the tires on , nows the time to see what its reallylike. Schedule Your Demo Success! Your download should start shortly. Clean up the chaos with your editorial calendar! With , youll Save time with blogging, social, and email think HOURS every week Schedule your social posts in batches and increase your posting frequency super easily Get your sht together and hold yourself accountable to publishing like the boss you are! Now’s the perfect time to start your 14-day free trial to see for yourself! Start Your Free Trial

Tuesday, March 3, 2020

20 Creative Study Methods to Beat the Studying Rut

20 Creative Study Methods to Beat the Studying Rut Sometimes you simply cant imagine studying another subject for another minute. Youve officially given up and refuse to care anymore. You have taken four final exams already and are looking down the barrel of the shotgun thats going to fire off three more finals any second. How do you progress when the thought of sitting down in front of a pile of books and notes makes you want to scream? How do you move beyond apathy to ensure you get the score you really want on that final or midterm exam? Heres how: you get creative. The following list includes 20 different creative study methods that are sure to help heal you of the study blahs. Read Your Chapter Aloud†¦ As a Shakespearean monologue. And if you really want to make it good, speak the Queens English. Everything sounds better in the Queens English. Try it: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. Sounds better, right? Right.As if you were giving a presidential address. Be sure to have the unmistakable half-fist ready. And Im sure your professor would be happy to give you extra credit if you record this address and put it on YouTube. I am almost positive I heard her saying that yesterday.   In a New Jersey accent. Because, when youre here, youre family. Or else. Play a Game†¦ Like Jeopardy. Convince a really good friend or really interested parent to give you the answers to questions on your study guide. You must provide the questions. Ill take Potent Potables for six, Alex.Like Around the World. Remember that? In a small study group, one person faces off against another and moves around the group until someone beats him or her. Then, that new person moves around the group answering questions. The person who answers the most questions correctly gets a Starbucks gift card! Woo hoo! Draw†¦ Little pictures that represent key ideas in your content. Its easier to remember Maslows Hierarchy of Needs if you draw a banana and a glass of orange juice next to physiological instead of just trying to remember the word alone. Trust me on that one.The same symbols over and over. Circle the main idea in each section. Draw stars next to supporting details in each section. Underline vocabulary words in each section. Draw arrows from causes to effects in each section. Youre honing your reading skills while learning something new. Win-win.A storyboard about the chapter. Reading about the rise of FDR (Franklin D. Roosevelt)? Draw a storyboard that reflects his early political career, the months before his inauguration, and FDRs three-pronged strategy to get elected. Your brain will easily remember the sequence of events much better that way because generally, pictures are worth a thousand word​s. Create†¦ A short story placing yourself in the setting youre studying. Lets say youre learning about Elizabethan England. Or the Civil War. Drop yourself right into a scene and write from first person perspective what you see, hear, feel and want more than anything in the world. Just make sure to make it out alive.A poem related to your topic. Learning Trig? No sweat. The last I heard sin and cosine rhyme. Plus, not all poems have to rhyme. Go free verse on that math. See how many of those terms you can squeeze into some iambic pentameter.A short story following a person that youre learning about. Based on what youve learned about her, what does Mother Teresa do when she discovers a mystery in Kolkata? Incorporate everything youre learning about her into the story. Bonus points if you give the teacher your story for Christmas. Sing a Song†¦ To remember a list. Its truly one of the best ways to remember the Periodic Table of the Elements, although theres no solid reason you should know them cold. Unless, of course, youre a scientist. In which case, youll be getting a quiz later.To get through a particularly tough reading passage. If you sing the passage, it may bring up different phrasing that can help you understand words you may not be getting. Still dont get it? Try one of the summary methods below. Write a Summary†¦ Of the 10 key things you must absolutely remember from the passage on sticky notes. Write them in your own words because theres nothing as silly as remembering someone elses ideas when you have no idea what they mean. Summarize in a way you can understand! Then, put the sticky notes up all around your room or kitchen or bathroom. No one else living in your house will mind. I promise.   Of each paragraph in one sentence, starting at the beginning of the chapter. That little summary of the paragraph is probably the  main idea. Once you have all of the main ideas of the paragraphs, string them together into one little mini-essay. You will be floored how much more you remember of the chapter when you read this way.By turning the chapter headings into questions and then reworking the block of text beneath the chapter headings into answers. Again, use your own words when you write the summaries. Make Flashcards†¦ On apps like Chegg, Evernote or StudyBlue. Many of them will let you add pics and sound, too. Kewl.On 3X5 cards, like your grandmother used. That wasnt an insult. She actually used them. And Grandma knew what she was doing, for your information. By mixing up the kinesthetic action of writing with the visual on the card, your brain learns the info in two different ways. Boom! Teach Someone Else†¦ Like your mom. You know how shes always asking you what youre doing in school? Nows the chance to explain what youve learned in Molecular Biology. Teach her so she really gets it. If you cant explain it in a way she can understand, better hit the books again.Like the people in an imaginary audience. Pretend youre standing in front of a group of thousands who have all shown up (and paid top dollar, by the way) to hear you speak about Romeo and Juliet. Explain the details of this tragedy so anyone listening will understand that Benvolio was Romeos best friend for a reason. Be sure to include the Nurses role, too.

Sunday, February 16, 2020

Determinants Of The Use Of Financial Incentives Essay

Determinants Of The Use Of Financial Incentives - Essay Example Bankers had anticipated a continuous growth in the property market, and loans had been disbursed to people with low creditworthiness to show a growth in the business. Financial products called mortgage-backed securities had enabled financial institutions and investors around the world to invest in the U.S. housing market. Major banks and financial institutions reported losses of approximately US$435 billion as of 17 July 2008, as these securities derived their value from mortgage payments and housing prices. As a result of this crisis, the most revered names on Wall Street have had to eat humble pie. In September 2008, Merrill Lynch agreed to sell itself on Sunday to Bank of America for roughly $50 billion to avert a deepening financial crisis. At almost the same time, while another prominent securities firm, Lehman Brothers, filed for bankruptcy protection, shocking the whole world. The collapse of Bear Sterns hedge funds is another example of the short-sightedness of investment banking. Controlling for CEO pay-performance sensitivity (delta) and the feedback effects of firm policy and risk on the managerial compensation scheme, it is observed that higher sensitivity of CEO wealth to stock volatility (vega) implements riskier policy choices, including relatively more investment in R&D, less investment in PPE, more focus, and higher leverage. We also find that riskier policy choices generally lead to compensation structures with higher vega and lower delta. Stock-return volatility has a positive effect on both vega and delta. C. How investment banks use and report executive compensation schemes Quantitative analysis of a detailed industry-wide survey validates the hypothesis that those occupations where the output is easily identifiable receive higher bonus pay. The proximity of an occupation to the revenue generating activity within the organization is also found to be significant in determining bonus levels, as is job grade within the organization.

Sunday, February 2, 2020

Leadrship Development and business Ethics Coursework

Leadrship Development and business Ethics - Coursework Example dren as they are required to wear specific school shoes for attending schools.  Also children have to walk long distances  in order to  access educational, medical and clean drinking water  facilities.  Shoes  are the focus of special attention  because children deprived of shoes are vulnerable to numerous soil-based diseases like jiggers, hookworm, tetanus and podoconiosis. Hookworm is a universal disease that affects around 576 to 740 million people around the globe. It is a major cause of protein loss and blood loss (anemia) in children. Similarly podoconiosis develops in individuals from being bare feet resulting in a disease known as big foot. It begins in children in teenage and causes severe leg and foot pain. Children with bare feet are also prone to jiggers that cause inflammation and ulcers in the feet. Tetanus is another disease causing acute infection if a bacterium enters through an open wound or injury in the foot. The One for One program operates by acquiring  global partnerships of  humanitarian organizations to identify deprived communities  evaluated on grounds of health, educational and economic conditions. Moreover TOMS shoes make sure that its  involvement does not affect the  local shoe making  businesses  adversely. TOMS also provides supplementary support to cater health and educational issues in children. Children of developing countries are the  main target of TOMS  One for One program. TOMS shoes does not provide a single kind of shoes but a variety of shoes tailor made to meet the size  requirements of children of different ages as well  as fulfill their  diverse cultural needs. In 2012 TOMS,  in collaboration with its sight-giving partner Seva Foundation, also  brought eyewear within the ambit of its product-line. It works on the same line  as  One for One program for shoes and donates a pair of glasses for every pair sold out. It also  encompasses medical treatments, eye examinations and sight saving surgeries for children in

Saturday, January 25, 2020

Speaker Recognition System Pattern Classification

Speaker Recognition System Pattern Classification A Study on Speaker Recognition System and Pattern classification Techniques Dr E.Chandra,  K.Manikandan,  M.S.Kalaivani Abstract Speaker Recognition is the process of identifying a person through his/her voice signals or speech waves. Pattern classification plays a vital role in speaker recognition. Pattern classification is the process of grouping the patterns, which are sharing the same set of properties. This paper deals with speaker recognition system and over view of Pattern classification techniques DTW, GMM and SVM. Keywords Speaker Recognition System, Dynamic Time Warping (DTW), Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM), Support Vector Machine (SVM). INTRODUCTION Speaker Recognition is the process of identifying a person through his/her voice signals [1] or speech waves. It can be classified into two categories, speaker identification and speaker verification. In speaker identification task, a speech utterance of an unknown speaker is compared with set of valid users. The best match is used to identify the speaker. Similarly, in speaker verification the unknown speaker first claims identity, and the claimed model is then used for identification. If the match is above a predefined threshold, the identity claim is accepted The speech used for these task can be either text dependent or text independent. In text dependent application the system has the prior knowledge of the text to be spoken. The user will speak the same text as it is in the predefined text. In a text-independent application, there is no prior knowledge by the system of the text to be spoken. Pattern classification plays a vital role in speaker recognition. The term Pattern defines the objects of interest. In this paper the sequence of acoustic vectors, extracted from input speech are taken as patterns. Pattern classification is the process of grouping the patterns, which are sharing the same set of properties. It plays a vital role in speaker recognition system. The result of pattern classification decides whether to accept or reject a speaker. Several research efforts have been done in pattern classification. Most of the works based on generative model. There are Dynamic Time Warping (DTW) [3], Hidden Markov Models (HMM) , Vector Quantization (VQ) [4], Gaussian mixture model (GMM) [5] and so forth. Generative model is for randomly generating observed data, with some hidden parameters. Because of the randomly generating observed data functions, they are not able to provide a machine that can directly optimize discrimination. Support vector machine was introducing as an alternative classifier for speaker verification. [6]. In machine learning SVM is a new tool, which is used for hard classification problems in several fields of application. This tool is capable to deal with the samples of higher dimensionality. In speaker verification binary decision is needed, since SVM is discriminative binary classifier it can classify a complete utterance in a single step. This paper is planned as follows. In section 2: speaker recognition system, in section 3, Pattern Classification, AND overview of DTW, GMM, and SVM techniques .section 4: Conclusion. SPEAKER RECOGNITION SYSTEM Speaker recognition categorized into verification and identification. Speaker Recognition system consists of two stages .speaker verification and speaker identification. Speaker verification is 1:1 match, where the voice print is matched with one template. But speaker identification is 1:N match, where the input speech is matched with more than one templates. Speaker verification consists of five steps. 1. Input data acquisition 2.feature extraction 3.pattern matching 4.decision making 5.generate speaker models. Fig 1: Speaker recognition system In the first step sample speech is acquired in a controlled manner from the user. The speaker recognition system will process the speech signals and extract the speaker discriminatory information. This information forms a speaker model. At the time of verification process, a sample voice print is acquired from the user. The speaker recognition system will extract the features from the input speech and compared withpredefined model. This process is called pattern matching. DC Offset Removal and Silence Removal Speech data are discrete-time speech signals, carry some redundant constant offset called DC offset [8].The values of DC offset affect the information ,extracted from the speech signals. Silence frames are audio frames of background noise with low energy level .silence removal is the process of discarding the silence period from the speech. The signal energy in each speech frame is calculated by using equation (1). M – Number of samples in a speech frames, N- Total number of speech frames. Threshold level is determined by using the equation (2) Threshold = Emin + 0.1 (Emax – Emin) (2) Emax and Emin are the lowest and greatest values of the N segments. Fig 2. Speech Signal before Silence Removal Fig 3. Speech Signal after Silence Removal This technique is used to enhance the high frequencies of the speech signal. The aim of this technique is to spectrally flatten the speech signal that is to increase the relative energy of its high frequency spectrum. The following two factors decides the need of Pre-emphasis technique.1.Speech Signals generally contains more speaker specific information in higher frequencies [9]. 2. If the speech signal energy decreases the frequency increases .This made the feature extraction process to focus all the aspects of the voice signals. Pre-emphasis is implemented as first order finite Impulse Response filter, defined as H(Z) = 1-0.95 Z-1 (3) The below example represents speech signals before and after Pre-emphasizing. Fig 4. Speech Signal before Pre-emphasizing Fig 5. Speech Signal after Pre-emphasizing Windowing and Feature Extraction: The technique windowing is used to minimize the signal discontinuities at beginning and end of each frame. It is used to smooth the signal and makes the frame more flexible for spectral analysis. The following equation is used in windowing technique. y1(n) = x (n)w(n), 0 ≠¤Ãƒ ¯Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  n ≠¤Ãƒ ¯Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  N-1 (4) N- Number of samples in each frame. The equation for Hamming window is(5) There is large variability in the speech signal, which are taken for processing. to reduce this variability ,feature extraction technique is needed. MFCC has been widely used as the feature extraction technique for automatic speaker recognition. Davis and Mermelstein reported that Mel-frequency cepstral Coefficients (MFCC) provided better performance than other features in 1980 [10]. Fig 6. Feature Extraction MFCC technique divides the input signal into short frames and apply the windowing techniques, to discard the discontinuities at edges of the frames. In fast Fourier transform (FFT) phase, it converts the signal to frequency domain and after that Mel scale filter bank is applied to the resultant frames. After that, Logarithm of the signal is passed to the inverse DFT function converting the signal back to time domain. PATTERN CLASSIFICATION Pattern classification involves in computing a match score in speaker recognition system. The term match score refers the similarity of the input feature vectors to some model. Speaker models are built from the features extracted from the speech signal. Based on the feature extraction a model of the voice is generated and stored in the speaker recognition system. To validate a user the matching algorithm compares the input voice signal with the model of the claimed user. In this paper three techniques in pattern classification have been compared. Those three major techniques are DTW, GMM and SVM. Dynamic Time Warping: This well known algorithm is used in many areas. It is currently used in Speech recognition,sign language recognition and gestures recognition, handwriting and online signature matching ,data mining and time series clustering, surveillance , protein sequence alignment and chemical engineering , music and signal processing . Dynamic Time Warping algorithm is proposed by Sadaoki Furui in 1981.This algorithm measures the similarity between two series which may vary in time and speed. This algorithm finds an optimal match between two given sequences. The average of the two patterns is taken to form a new template. This process is repeated until all the training utterances have been combined into a single template. This technique matches a test input from a multi-dimensional feature vector T= [ t1, t2†¦tI] with a reference template R= [ r1, r2†¦rj]. It finds the function w(i) as shown in the below figure. In Speaker Recognition system Every input speech is compared with the utte rance in the database .For each comparison, the distance measure is calculated .In the measurements lower distance indicates higher similarity. Fig 7. . Dynamic Time Warping Gaussian mixture model: Gaussian mixture model is the most commonly used classifier in speaker recognition system.It is a type of density model which comprises a number of component functions. These functions are combined to provide a multimodal density. This model is often used for data clustering. It uses an alternative algorithm that converges to a local optimum. In this method the distribution of the feature vector x is modeled clearly using mixture of M Gaussians. mui- represent the mean and covariance of the i th mixture. x1, x2†¦xn, Training data ,M-number of mixture. The task is parameter estimation which best matches the distribution of the training feature vectors given in the input speech. The well known method is maximum likehood estimation. It finds the model parameters which maximize the likehood of GMM. Therefore, the testing data which gain a maximum score will recognize as speaker. Support Vector Machine: Support machine was proposed in 1990 and it is one of the best machine learning algorithms. This is used in many pattern classification problems. such as image recognition, speech recognition, text categorization, face detection and faulty card detection, etc. The basic idea of support vector machine is to find the optimal linear decision surface based on the concept of structural risk minimization. It is a binary classification method. The decision surface refers the weighted combination of elements in a training dataset. These elements are called support vectors. These vectors define the boundary between two classes. In a binary problem +1 and -1 are taken as two classes. The size of the margin should be maximized to characterize the boundary between two classes. The below example explains pattern classification by using SVM. In the fig 3(a), there are two different kinds of patterns taken for process. A line is drawn to separate these two patterns. In the fig 3(b),by using a single line the patterns are separated, the patterns are presented in two dimensional space. The similar representation in one dimensional space in the fig 3(c), a point can be used to separate patterns in one dimensional space. a plane that separates these patterns in 3-D space ,represented in the fig 3(d),is called separating hyper plane. . The next task a plane should be selected from the set of planes whose margin is maximum. The plane with the maximum margin i.e. perpendicular distance from the marginal line is known as optimal hyper plane or maximum margin hyper plane as shown in fig 3(f). The patterns that lie on the edges of the plane are called support vectors While classify the patterns, there may exist some errors in the representation, as shown in the fig 3(g), such types of errors are called soft margin. Sometimes ,these errors can be ignored to some threshold value. The patterns that can be easily separated using line or Plane are called linearly Separable patterns .Non-linear separable patterns (fig-j,k,l)are difficult to classify. These patterns are classified by using kernel functions . In order to classify non-linear separable patterns the original data’s are mapped to higher dimensional space using kernel function. CONCLUSION In this paper we have explained about speaker recognition system and discussed about three major pattern classification techniques, Dynamic Time Warping, Gaussian mixture model and Support Vector Machine. SVM will work efficiently on fixed length vectors. To implement SVM the input data should be normalized for better performance. In future, we have planned to implement these techniques in speaker recognition system and evaluate the performance. The performance of the models will also be evaluated by incrementing the amounts of training data. REFERENCES [1] Campbell, J.P., Speaker Recognition: A Tutorial, Proc. Of the IEEE, vol. 85,no. 9, 1997, pp. 1437-1462. [2] Sadaoki Furui., Recent advances in speaker recognition,Pattern Recognition Letters. 1997,18 (9): 859-72. [3] Sakoe, H.and Chiba, S., Dynamic programming algorithm optimization for spoken word recognition, Acoustics,Speech, and Signal Processing, IEEE Transactions on Volume 26, Issue 1, Feb 1978 Page 43 49. [4] Lubkin, J. and Cauwenberghs, G., VLSI Implementation of Fuzzy Adaptive Resonance and Learning Vector Quantization, Int. J. Analog Integrated Circuits and Signal Processing, vol. 30 (2), 2002,pp. 149-157. [5] Reynolds, D. A. and Rose, R. C. Robust text-independent speaker identification using Gaussian mixture speaker models. IEEE Trans. Speech Audio Process. 3, 1995, pp 72–83. [6] Solera, U.R., Martà ­n-Iglesias, D., Gallardo-Antolà ­n, A., Pelà ¡ez-Moreno, C. and Dà ­az-de-Marà ­a, F, Robust ASR using Support Vector Machines, Speech Communication, Volume 49 Issue 4, 2007. [7] Temko, A.; Monte, E.; Nadeu, C., Comparison of Sequence Discriminant Support Vector Machines for Acoustic Event Classification, ICASSP 2006 Proceedings, 2006 IEEE International Conference on Volume 5, Issue , 14-19 May 2006 [8] Shang, S.; Mirabbasi, S.; Saleh, R., A technique for DCoffset removal and carrier phase error compensation in integrated wireless receivers Circuits and Systems, ISCAS apos;03. Proceedings of the 2003 International Symposium onVolume 1, Issue , 25-28 May 2003 Page I-173 I-176 vol.1 [9] Vergin, R.; Oapos;Shaughnessy, D., Pre-emphasis and speech recognition lectrical and Computer Engineering†,Canadian Conference on Volume 2, Issue , 5-8 Sep 1995 [10] Davis, S. B. and Mermelstein, P., Comparison of parametric representations for monosyllabic word recognition in continuously spoken sentences, IEEE Trans. on Acoustic, Speech and Signal Processing, ASSP-28, 1980, No. 4. [11] Sadaoki Furui., Cepstral analysis technique for automatic speaker verification, IEEE Trans. ASSP 29, 1981,pages 254-272. BIOGRAPHIES Dr.E.Chandra received her B.Sc., from Bharathiar University, Coimbatore in 1992 and received M.Sc., from Avinashilingam University ,Coimbatore in 1994. She obtained her M.Phil. In the area of Neural Networks from Bharathiar University, in 1999. She obtained her PhD degree in the area of Speech recognition system from Alagappa University Karikudi in 2007. She has totally 15 yrs of experience in teaching including 6 months in the industry. Presently she is working as Director, Department of Computer Applications in D. J. Academy for Managerial Excellence, Coimbatore. She has published more than 30 research papers in National, International Journals and Conferences in India and abroad. She has guided more than 20 M.Phil. Research Scholars. Currently 3 M.Phil Scholars and 8 PhD Scholars are working under her guidance. She has delivered lectures to various Colleges. She is a Board of studies member of various Institutions. Her research interest lies in the area of Data Mining, Artificial Intelligence, Neural Networks, Speech Recognition Systems, Fuzzy Logic and Machine Learning Techniques. She is an active and Life member of CSI, Society of Statistics and Computer Applications. Currently she is Management Committee member of CSI Coimbatore Chapter. K. Manikandan received his Bsc from Bharathidhasan University, Tiruchirappalli in1998 and received his MCA from Bharathiadsan University, Tiruchirappalli in 2001. He received M.Phil in the area of soft computing from Bharathiyar university, Coimbatore in 2004. He has 12 years of experience in teaching. Currently, he is working as a Assistant Professor, Department Of Computer Science, PSG College of arts and Science, Coimbatore and pursuing PhD in Bharathiar University, Coimbatore.He has presented research papers in National and International Conferences and published a paper in International Journal. His Research Interest is Soft Computing . He is Life a member of IAENG. He has guided more than 4 M.Phil Research Scholars. Currently 3 M.Phil Scholars are working under his guidance. He has delivered lectures to various Colleges. M.S.Kalaivani received her BCA from P.S.G College of Arts and Science, Coimbatore, in 2005 and received her MCA from National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli in 2008.She has 4 years of working experience at software industry. Presently, she is working as a Research Scholar, Department of Computer Science, P.S.G. College of Arts and Science, Coimbatore. Her research interests are Machine Learning and Fuzzy logic.

Friday, January 17, 2020

Interpersonal communication Essay

Interpersonal communication is defined as an interaction between involving two or more participants, providing immediate feedback to each other. It serves a purpose especially in building relationships. Interpersonal communication is a transactional process. It is not a one way activity like a monologue. Rather, it is interactive, and ongoing. In watching the sitcom, Scrubs, communication doesn’t commence when the characters start talking. It starts the moment viewers and actors come face to face in the boob tube. The actors do not convey messages solely through words, but through actions and facial expressions too. For instance, the scrunching face of one actor may already be interpreted by the audience as an expression of disgust or dislike. Interpersonal communication is also ambiguous. The significance of the words articulated is interpreted distinctively by each receiver. The particular line â€Å"well good news is, I don’t have to eat my wife’s cooking anymore, right? † uttered by the patient was understood differently by the pair of doctors standing in his bedside. The female physician laughed so hard because she found it funny, but the male physician furrowed his brows. The understanding of a person may be affected by various factors. His culture, personality, upbringing, gender and even intelligence are just some of the reasons for the disparity in interpretation. The ambiguity of interpersonal communication is also a cause of dispute. In a lover’s feud for example, the female might be fuming mad when his partner chides about her weight. She might take it as a sign that he is not attracted to him anymore. Whereas, the bewildered boyfriend’s initial goal was perhaps to make her less conscious of her body by joking about it. In addition, interpersonal communications have a content and relationship dimension. The meaning of a line or phrase is dependent on the context and the circumstance involved. Just like in the sitcom line mentioned above, where the man commented about his wife’s cooking, the connotation will change if the man is not ill and in bed. For me, what he said was meant to make the hospital mood lighter. But, if he were talking to an attractive woman at a cafe, it might be interpreted as flirting. Interpersonal communication may be viewed as symmetrical or complementary. Symmetry suggests that the behaviour of one person is mirrored by another, while the term complementary refers to contrasting reactions. Both were evident in the sitcom Scrubs. The patient-doctor relationship is usually symmetrical in the show. The physician wants to cure the patient’s sickness, and the patient wants to be treated. Complementarity arises due to the different power positions. The physician, who is an expert on medical care instructs his patient. The patient oftentimes, becomes a passive receiver of information. When the relationship is complementary, there is a chance that the two parties would intensify each other. For instance, when the patient told his doctor that he wanted to get out of bed to see the talent show, the doctor of course declined. The patient looked downcast and ready to protest, but it turned out that the doctor was only kidding him initially. Interpersonal communication is a series of punctuated events. After each statement or idea, there is a reaction. A person does not respond only after a lengthy narrative is finished, but on each word, sentence or paragraph mentioned. In a sitcom for example, viewers do not watch the whole episode and laugh only when it ends. But, they chuckle on each line that they find funny. In addition, the series of reactions, on when to laugh is arbitrarily set by the viewer. I do not find other dialogues ticklish, and thus I do not giggle a bit, even if others do. However, live sitcoms like Scrubs exploit this aspect by adapting to and adopting the viewer’s point of view. Since communication is a transactional process, it is easy to catch the audience’s empathy and adjust to their mood. A laughing spiel is often followed by serious dialogue. Interpersonal communication is inevitable. In a situation where interaction is possible, one cannot not communicate. It is hard not to respond to someone who is conveying a message to you. But, I personally find this point rather contentious. As a television viewer, I sometimes watch simply to absorb information. In watching the weather news, I feel no empathy for what I am hearing. I am simply a passive funnel of ideas. In this sense, the news reporter has given me weather data, but has not elicited any reaction from me. Interpersonal communication is irreversible. Something that has been said cannot be taken back. The meaning of the words that has been transmitted and digested by the other party cannot be reversed. In sitcoms for instance, if viewers are offended by a racial joke, it is hard to appease them. The only way to do it is through a public apology. Interpersonal communication is unrepeatable. The exact line containing exactly the same words can of course be uttered twice, but the underlying situation is constantly changing and there is no certainty that it can be reconstructed. Due to the unrepeatable aspect of interpersonal communication, one has to be aware of himself. At such, one has to be conscious of using strong words, like â€Å"hate† and giving commitments.

Thursday, January 9, 2020

Bending Water with Static Electricity

When two objects are rubbed against each other, some of the electrons from one object jump to the other. The object that gains electrons becomes more negatively charged; the one that loses electrons becomes more positively charged. The opposite charges attract each other in a way that you can actually see. One way to collect charge is to comb your hair with a nylon comb or rub it with a balloon. The comb or balloon will become attracted to your hair, while the strands of your hair (all the same charge) repel each other. The comb or balloon will also attract a stream of water, which carries an electrical charge. Difficulty: EasyTime Required: minutes What You Need Aside from water, all you need for this experiment is dry hair and a comb. The trick is using a comb that picks up charge from your hair. Choose nylon, not wood or metal. If you dont have a comb, a latex balloon works equally well. Water faucetNylon comb or latex balloon Heres How Comb dry hair with a nylon comb or rub it with an inflated latex balloon.Turn on the tap so that a narrow stream of water is flowing (1 to 2 mm across, flowing smoothly).Move the balloon or teeth of the comb close to the water (not in it). As you approach the water, the stream will begin to bend toward your comb.Experiment!Does the amount of bend depend on how close the comb is to the water?If you adjust the flow, does it affect how much the stream bends?Do combs made from other materials work equally well?How does a comb compare with a balloon?Do you get the same effect from everyones hair or does some hair release more charge than others?Can you get your hair close enough to the water to repel it without getting it wet? Tip This activity will work better when the humidity is low. When humidity is high, water vapor catches some of the electrons that would jump between objects. For the same reason, your hair needs to be completely dry when you comb it.