1-What does the FCC do? Discuss it’s current position on media consolidation. 2-Discuss the main elements of the immigration issue. 3-Talk about some of the advantages and disadvantages of federalism. Does this system serve the United States well? Why or why not? 4-Explain the differences between the federalists and Anti Federalist. Why did the anti federalists want a bill of rights? Explain how this country would have been different had they not been successful in their push to add a bill of rights.

1. The FCC (Federal Communications Commissions) is an independent government agency which is responsible for overseeing the television, the radio, and the telephone industries in the USA. It regulates all communications within the US, (wire, cable, or satellite) and as well as international communication which originate and/or end in the US. It abolished the FRC (Federal Radio Commission) in 1934, when the Congress passed the Communications Act of 1934, under Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration. The FCC makes sure that the main audio-visual media in the US is airing content which follows the standards for decency and appropriation, and has the right to revoke the broadcast licenses of TV networks and/or radio stations, if they air inappropriate content.
Aside from this, the FCC also regulates the 9-1-1 service, limits the way companies can advertise their products by using the telecommunication services, and makes sure that all citizens have equal access to the telecommunication service in the US. As of 1934,the FCC has five commissioners with a five year term for each, all appointed by the president of the USA. You can find information about the FCC’s current position on consolidation and ownership rules, as wells as more information about the FCC in general, here.
2. According to recent studies, there are nearly 192 million immigrants in the world, and more than 10 million of them live in America. There are many reason that people might emigrate, which range in complexity. The most common reason that people emigrate is better living and working conditions and opportunities. Another common reason is when the people wish to escape from the unsatisfactory socio-economic and political climates of their home countries.
There are several pros to immigration, which prove beneficial to the US. For instance, most immigrant will agree on taking up jobs that documented citizens of the country wouldn’t or couldn’t do, and they will do it for lower salaries or compensations, while also agreeing to work for longer hours. This might seem exploitative, but it does help the economy, especially if the immigrants have a good educational background and/or good skill sets. Being a country of various races, religions, ethnicities, and nationalities promotes tolerance, understanding, and multi-cultural appreciation.
However, there also some cons to immigration. Citizens may be concerned about illegal immigration and may treat immigrants unfairly, especially if the people living in poverty in the host country receive less benefits than the immigrants. Another problem is the labor exploitation of immigrants, which is very unethical and immoral. Finally, according to many analysts, the main issue with illegal immigration everywhere, and especially in the industrially advanced countries such the US, is the security. All people that immigrate illegally are undocumented. Obviously, these people are not a threat, but having a large number of undocumented people can greatly affect the legislation of the country, and provide a cover and an opportunity for illegal and criminal activities, and even terrorism.
3. Federalism is a federal principle or system of government, which unites several separate states or entities, by allowing them to keep their own political integrity. As such, it has several pros and cons. The main advantages of having a federal mode of political organization is that it promotes and allows diversity. Instead of conforming to one set of rules, principles and policies, each state is entitled to deal with its local problems in their own way. For instance, the political leadership of Michigan wouldn’t necessarily know how to solve local problems in California.
A federal system also provides better political stability because it redistributes the power. The state governments are, essentially, independent from the national government, and the local governments are, to a great degree, independent of the state governments. The national government is merely an oversight and a support system for the state and local governments.
Another advantage of federalism is that it encourages involvement and participation of all people, equally. In the US nearly a million people hold some kind of political power. This is very attractive, as people have families, friends, acquaintances, loved ones, neighbors, and so on, who work in politics, which gives them a sense of security and assurance.
However, there are also several cons to having a federal mode of political organization. For one, it can confuse the population in a way that a citizen of one state in the US might be unknowingly breaking the law of another state in the US. For instance, there are 6 states in the US which allow minors to drink on private property without parental consent, one of them being New Jersey. So if a minor were to drink alcohol in Alabama, for example, he/she would be breaking the law.
Another disadvantage is that people and groups of people may use it to protect their own interests and privileges, which can sometimes be selfish and unfair. For instance, in the past, people who were pro segregation of the whites and blacks, used federalism and their ‘civil rights’ to avoid being prosecuted for racism and discrimination.
Federalism can shake up a country's socio-economic climate and make the people feel unsafe. Because the power is dispersed throughout the country, no one can take full responsibility when, for example, a natural disaster occurs. If a hurricane destroyed a lot of property, no one knows who is responsible and who has to deal with the damage, which further delays the solving of the problem. Also, in a federal state, there is an uneven distribution of the government’s benefits and resources. One state can spend twice as much money on its health system, than another; furthermore, the hospitals in wealthier areas would spend twice as much as the hospitals in poorer areas.
4. You can find a detailed description of the differences between Federalists and Anti-Federalists here. As far as the Bill of Rights is concerned, the Anti-Federalists wanted to add it to the Constitution because it would have limited the power of the Federal government by protecting the citizens’ rights. Essentially, the Anti-Federalists wanted a more limited national government.
https://billofrightsinstitute.org/founding-documents/bill-of-rights/

Please create a card report analysis for "Harrison Bergeron." Please list themes you discovered in this story.

In order to complete this assignment you should first identify the characters. The first character of course is Harrison Bergeron. The story also talks about his parents, George and Hazel. You also have the Handicapper General of the United States, Diana Moon Glampers. Finally you have the announcer and the dancer, who dances and dies with Harrison Bergeron in a final act of defiance.
Another aspect of this card report is tone and style. These are often similar in a piece of writing. This story relies a lot on dialogue, and uses fairly simple language, as it is trying to, in some ways, mimic the handicaps that the characters live with. The story is interrupted by the mental handicaps to give the reader a feeling similar to that of the story.
The tone could be described as sad, though you can also argue that this story is a satire as it is certainly making a political commentary about the way we view differences and the dangers in trying to erase independence and uniqueness.
The irony in Harrison Bergeron comes with the fact that in the end he was forgotten. This story is about an incredible act of defiance and change. Harrison Bergeron goes against all odds and becomes a hero... for only a moment. He is then killed, and even his parents immediately forget about his death and his heroic dance. It's a very sad irony that leaves the reader feeling a little shocked and encourages us to think.
Finally, symbol. You could look at the handicaps as a symbol and talk about the ways that even though these handicaps are meant to completely equalize everyone, in reality you can still tell how strong someone is based on how much weight they carry, or how beautiful they are based on how ugly the mask is. People are different, and there is no way to actually hide that.

How does the title Things Fall Apart connect to the theme of fear?

The motif of fear plays a significant role in the text Things Fall Apart. Since the novel's tragic hero Okonkwo has several significant fears, everything does just what the title suggests: it falls apart.

It was the fear of himself, lest he should be found to resemble his father. Even as a little boy he had resented his father's failure and weakness, and even now he still remembered how he had suffered when a playmate had told him that his father was agbala. That was how Okonkwo first came to know that agbala was not only another name for a woman, it could also mean a man who had taken no title. And so Okonkwo was ruled by one passion —to hate everything that his father Unoka had loved. One of those things was gentleness and another was idleness.

Okonkwo fears that he may be like his father one day, so he continuously sets goals and pushes himself to be more than his father was. He resolves to not be seen as lazy and to always be able to take care of his family. It is Okonkwo's fear of appearing weak like his father that pushes him to kill the young Ikemefuna, a boy from a rival tribe.
Okonkwo also fears change within the Igbo. He loves the traditions and customs of his tribe. He sees the colonizing, white British as the end of his culture as the invade Umofia. The British, who also seem to fear the Igbo way of life, seek to teach them their religion, customs, and traditions. Okonkwo's suicide is an attempt to preserve his culture and represents his fear of letting go of what life in Umofia could be.
Fear in the novel leads to the end of Okonkwo and teach us that we should embrace the differences in cultures and not be afraid of them.

A parent’s love can be described as a double-edged sword, as it has the power to both defend and destroy a child. Explain how this is true in the case of Waverly’s mother.

A parent’s love certainly has the power to both defend and destroy a child.
In the story, the mother clearly loves her daughter. Daily, she shares tidbits of generational wisdom with her daughter. Waverly tells us that her mother is always focused on the future.

My mother imparted her daily truths, so she could help my older brothers and me rise above our circumstances.

To Waverly's mother, success is not dependent on luck. As such, wisdom must be cultivated and used as a tool to engineer one's success in life.
When Waverly's brother receives a used chess set for Christmas, Waverly becomes curious about this foreign Western game. She inquires about its rules, but Vincent (her brother) has little patience for her inquisitive questions.
Waverley's mother encourages her to learn the rules for herself. This is how Waverly comes to excel at chess.

I learned about opening moves and why it's important to control the center early on . . . I learned about the middle game and why tactics between two adversaries are like clashing ideas; the one who plays better has the clearest plans for both attacking and getting out of traps. I learned why it is essential in the endgame to have foresight, a mathematical understanding of all possible moves, and patience; all weaknesses and advantages become evident to a strong adversary and are obscured to a tiring opponent. I discovered that for the whole game one must gather invisible strengths and see the endgame before the game begins.

Seeing her natural propensity for the game, Waverly's mother supports her as she gains new skills. She even defends Waverly when her brothers complain about having to do their sister's chores.

"Is new American rules," said my mother. "Meimei play, squeeze all her brains out for win chess. You play, worth squeeze towel."

By her ninth birthday, Waverly is a national chess champion. Her mother is justifiably proud of her, but a new conflict soon arises. For her part, Waverly resents being used as a means for her mother to "show off." She feels pressured to perform in order to keep her mother's approval. Before she knows it, Waverly begins to apply her recently acquired chess skills to life. She leverages the strategies she has carefully honed to prevail in a power struggle against her mother. This sets up a bitter rivalry between the two.
Even though Waverly's mother initially acts out of love, her obsession with status and success destroys the positive feelings between her and her daughter. Waverly comes to resent the pressure put upon her to excel. She no longer sees her mother's efforts on her behalf as loving actions. Instead of focusing on improving her chess skills and, thus, her prospects for the future, Waverly becomes preoccupied with retaliatory thoughts against her mother. In this way, a mother's love has the power to both defend and destroy her child.

In what ways did the United States seek to influence other nations between 1872 and 1917? How was the United States changed by its relationship with other nations during this period?

Your question extends across a long timeframe, beginning with Reconstruction and ending with World War I. In this time period, the United States had advanced upon large scale industrialization and made a move towards adopting a more imperialist foreign policy. By the end of the time in question, it had gotten itself swept up in one of world history's largest and most destructive military conflicts.
For much of its history, the United States had tried to stay out of European affairs, a position which was perhaps most clearly expressed in the Monroe Doctrine. United States expansion, throughout the first half of the nineteenth century, was entirely continental, as the United States spread from the Atlantic towards the the Pacific. As the United States entered into the industrial age, however, it embarked upon a new era of foreign expansion—this time it was overseas.
It's important to note that imperialism and industrialization are very closely intertwined. Capitalist and industrial economies tend to push for colonization to acquire raw materials as well as access to foreign markets. Therefore, it should not be surprising to find that with industrialization came a change in foreign policy. The interests of Big Business pushed for foreign intervention and so did the writings of military theorists like Alfred Thayer Mahan. The United States, by the close of the century, had modernized its navy and entered war with Spain, gaining Spanish possessions in the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam, as well as setting up a protectorate in Cuba. In doing so, it vastly increased its own economic, military and political reach.
With this came an evolution in foreign policy. Dating back to the Monroe Doctrine, the United States had, for all intents and purposes, defined the entire Western Hemisphere as an area of American interest, but with the turn of the century, we see a new intensity of United States interference in Latin America. Theodore Roosevelt famously issued the Roosevelt Corollary of the Monroe Doctrine, which set the United States up as an intermediary across the entire Latin American world and, later, policies of Dollar Diplomacy would only further extend American claims of hegemony throughout the Region.
At the same time the United States was expanding its influence within Latin America, it was also expanding its influence across the world. In the interest of accessing markets in China, the United States attempted to push Europe to accept the Open Door Policy. It also contributed troops to the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion. Later, in 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt negotiated peace talks between Russia and Japan in order to end the Russo-Japanese War. What we see across this time period is the United States becoming more interventionist, acting as an imperial power to assert its own interests across the world.
By the end of your timeline, Europe is in crisis, swept up in the first World War. I find it interesting that it ends specifically in the year 1917, which was when the United States entered the war. Before this point, the United States had charted a course of neutrality, with opinion divided within the country as to which side the States should take. In any case, you should be aware that the experience of World War I would serve as a key turning point in global history, and that it created with it a severe sense of disillusionment in the decades that followed.
If we were to look towards the 1920s, we'll see the United States pushing more in line with the calls for global disarmament, and as Totalitarian States rose to power, the United States would respond with a much more non-interventionist stance—all the way until the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Who does Nel belong to now according to Sula?

Sula returns to the Bottom after spending time at college and living the big-city life. Her unconventional behavior makes her an object of suspicion in the neighborhood. Rumors abound as to what Sula got up to in the big city. Some have even alleged that she committed the cardinal sin of sleeping with white men.
Sula, however, is unconcerned by local gossip. She demonstrates this by having an affair with Jude, Nel's husband. When Nel catches Sula and Jude in the act, she's furious and distraught in equal measure; she cannot believe that someone who's supposed to be her friend would do this to her. After Jude packs up and leaves for Detroit, Nel takes up a new job as chambermaid in the Hotel Medallion, throwing herself into her work. Sula is surprised and disappointed at this; it shows that Nel is a conformist, "one of them." Nel was one of the reasons why Sula returned home. But now, Sula, blithely indifferent to the emotional suffering she's caused, feels that Nel is lost to her. Nel belongs to the town.

What are your thoughts about the assumption that training programs need to be designed so that students can learn a good deal more about themselves as well as acquire theoretical knowledge?

In the field of education, for example, the idea that a "one size fits all" approach is not very effective has become more and more accepted in recent years. When people are learning something, it needs to matter to them, and it needs to make sense in their own lives and in terms of their own personal and/or professional philosophies. In order to tailor educational programs, the teacher or trainer must look for ways to help students relate new information to their own lives and selves. As a result, the students ought to learn more about themselves in the process.
If the student or trainee is not engaging with theoretical material on a personal, local level, then they are never going to truly internalize it or truly understand it deeply. It is one thing to hear something and another thing to really learn it. One can memorize anything by rote—the organs and their functions within the body, different teaching strategies for reluctant readers, how to recognize and treat someone's depression—but if one does not feel that this information is necessary and important, that it serves some crucial function in one's own life (and, perhaps, others' lives), then how much will this knowledge really be of use?
Theoretical knowledge—information regarding more abstract processes of the mind or problem-solving—is important, certainly. If we are not exposed to new ideas, new ways of thinking critically, and new language with which to describe and explain and analyze our thoughts, then we grow more slowly. However, exposure alone is not effective as exposure paired with a reason to care about this new information and knowledge. The way to achieve this pairing, which makes knowledge feel more relevant and vital, is to appeal to the person and their experiences, values, and goals. Doing this helps the individual to "buy in" to the new material, to accept its importance in their own life, and to find ways to creatively implement that new knowledge in tangible, real-life ways.

What is The Laughter of My Father about?

The Laughter of My Father was written by Jose Antonio Villarreal as a sketch that describes events in the life of a boy named Richard. It is a narrative story that takes a snapshot in time in the boy's life. Richard, a Mexican American, his parents, and a Chilean man (el Brujo) are the main characters in the story. The gravamen of the story is about what Richard learned on a Sunday regarding his father and an intimidating Chilean man. When the man approached him, Richard would be frightened and usually ran away from him.
Richard began to wonder whether the man might be the devil. Richard explained his fear of the man to his parents on a Saturday night. Richard's parents laughed when he confessed his fear. Richard was upset at his parents' reaction, especially since his mother, a devout Catholic, had taught him to watch out for the devil's ways. As a curious young boy, Richard also wondered if God can contain or influence the devil. His parents were concerned about disrespecting God, so they ended that conversation and changed the subject.
The laughter of Richard's father seems to take on special meaning in the story. Whenever his father laughs, it is usually due to his own confidence in his knowledge and wisdom of what he is about to express to Richard next. Richard notices this, and he respects his father for it. For instance, after Richard and Juan Manuel, Richard's father, left the mysterious Chilean man's house where they did some trading, Richard was upset with his father for what he perceived to be cheating the Chilean man, but his father laughed when he reacted to Richard.
In a typical self-confident manner, Juan Manuel told Richard that the price he charged for the stones was a fair and reasonable trade because all parties made a decent profit. So the story's title suggests that Richard remembers what his father teaches him by his laughter, since what his father expresses next is usually an opportunity for Richard to learn, as a curious young boy who is developing his own identity and beliefs.

When did slavery become illegal in Britain?

Slavery came to an official end in Britain in 1833. A bill was passed through the House of Commons and, shortly after, the House of Lords. The bill banned slavery throughout the British Empire. There were a few factors that contributed to the passing of the bill to abolish slavery.
Economically speaking, things had changed with the arrival of the Industrial Revolution in England. Manufactured goods became more of a focus of the economy, while slave-produced agricultural products declined in importance. This meant that slavery was no longer as essential to the British economy as it had been during the 1600s and 1700s.
In addition to the reduced economic importance, slave rebellions proved that it would not be easy to keep slaves in their situation. A successful slave revolt in Haiti led by Toussaint L'Ouverture was followed by slave revolts in other Caribbean territories like Barbados and Jamaica. These revolts led to the idea that slavery was becoming more trouble than it was worth.
Finally, there was also an abolition movement in England to bring slavery to an end. The abolitionists were supported by various Christian religious groups who strengthened their voices.
With these factors considered, the British government began action to end slavery. With the passing of the 1833 bill to abolish slavery, slaves were not, however, immediately granted full freedom. Slaves were to serve an apprenticeship for 6 years. Slave owners were also to be compensated for the loss of their slaves. After protests from the public, who did not approve of the apprenticeship system, the British government ended the apprenticeship system in 1838.
http://abolition.e2bn.org/slavery_111.html

Compare and contrast revolutionary and reform movements in Latin America and China during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. How were their goals and methods similar and different?

First, a quick summary of revolutionary and reform movements in each region, then we will directly compare and contrast them.
For Latin America, reform movements began with the Spanish and Portuguese monarchs with the Bourbon and Pombal reforms, respectively. These reforms encouraged mercantilism and state control, something that the people of Latin American countries were beginning to resent. In addition to this, the creole population (Europeans born in the New World but with increasingly Latin American identities), spurred on with the successes of the Enlightenment, the American, French, and Haitian Revolutions, began to consider independence. When Napoleon invaded Spain, and control of the colonies was questioned, creoles began to fight against Spanish and Portuguese control throughout Central and South American colonies. A majority of these revolutions took place between 1810-1825.
In China, Westerners were starting to challenge Qing dynastic power throughout the nineteenth century. The British began selling opium, a powerful drug, to China in order to control their economies and suppress their people. In an attempt to push British opium out, the Chinese lost, and as a consequence Europeans took over Chinese economies and port cities. One rebellion, the Taiping Rebellion, was led by a Christian Chinese priest who wanted to overthrow the weak Qing government. Taiping saw westernization occurring and took advantage of political instability to rebel, but he was ultimately unsuccessful. Another popular rebellion against the Qing was the Boxer Rebellion, where people tried to overthrow the Qing. The Qing brought the Europeans in to help suppress the rebellion, which was successful, but this only enabled the Europeans to take more control over China. The self-strengthening movement was an attempt by Chinese authorities to bring back an agrarian, isolated model of government, but it was too late. By 1911, nationalist movements fought to remove the Qing, take over China, and westernize.
One similarity between revolutionary movements in Latin America and China was an attempt to break away from European power. Latin America, controlled mainly by Spain and Portugal, and Qing China, fighting primarily against Britain, were subjected to the economic whims of their European aggressors.
Another similarity between the two was that they both saw revolutionary movements that were counter to popular trends. For China, it was the Taiping Rebellion and the Boxer Rebellion. In Latin America, there was a rebellion against the creoles in Peru led by a Mestizo named Tupac Amaru II, who argued that the indigenous and Mestizo populations should have power, not the European-blooded populations. In both cases, internal rebellions challenged the status quo, and those rebellions were crushed.
A difference between Latin America and China would be that Latin America saw political independence in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, while China was never politically conquered by Europeans.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUCEeC4f6ts&t=0s&list=PLLrDJv6kgduAzsLTY0dtQoM_MgoEcspuz&index=8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBw35Ze3bg8

What does the poet Wole Soyinka mean by "dawn's lone trumpeter" in "Death in the Dawn"?

The poem "Death in the Dawn" is a poem that makes a stereotypical comparison that life is a journey. The poem then intentionally leans toward showing readers that the journey is a lot like a road trip in a car, giving the readers several images associated with cars. One of my favorites is the right foot and left line.

The right foot for joy, the left, dread

Generally speaking, the right foot is for the gas pedal, and I believe that most drivers find great pleasure in accelerating. The left pedal is the brake pedal and is generally only slammed on when something bad is imminent.
Despite the poem's emphasis on cars and man's machinery, the poem also doesn't shy away from giving readers some solid animal images and references. The first two stanzas quite obviously list specific animals—dogs and earthworms are referenced.
The lone trumpeter line appears in stanza four, and it is referring to a rooster that "trumpets" out an announcement each morning. The following line's mentioning of feathers helps alert readers to the specific bird species and act.

Every individual fights his/her own war. What are examples of this in Animal Farm?

In Animal Farm by George Orwell, the animals rise up and take the Manor Farm from their human owner, Mr. Jones. The animals then set out to establish an animal utopia by living under the rules of Animalism, which are specific and help guide the animals towards building a good society.
In the novella, some examples of “individual wars” might be:
For Snowball, the individual war is for the truth of Animalism. Snowball believes that all animals should be equal, and he educates them to help Animal Farm grow. He, however, is too popular and does not see the betrayal of Napoleon until it is too late. Despite fighting for the betterment of all animals, he is run off the farm.
For Napoleon, the individual war is one against all who might oppose him. Napoleon might have started with good intentions, but eventually, all of his moves as a leader are to cement his power and squelch resistance. Napoleon eventually leads the farm into becoming a dictatorship, and he becomes like a human: greedy and willing to harm others for personal gain.
For Benjamin, the individual war is one of indifference. Benjamin, who is smart and can read, chooses not to participate in the running of Animal Farm and doesn’t really ever believe in the rebellion but also doesn’t oppose it. For Benjamin, the war with indifference comes to a head when he finally needs to engage, and it is too late. He cannot save his friend, Boxer, who is sold to the glue factory.
For Boxer, the individual war is against his physical limitations. Boxer is not smart, but he believes in the goodwill of the pigs. He continually says, “I will work harder” to compensate for failure after failure on the farm. He eventually loses the war after wearing himself out working so hard and is rewarded by being sold to the glue factory. Ultimately, Boxer doesn’t see the deception coming.
For Muriel and Clover, the individual war is against their forgetfulness. Both animals suspect that the laws of Animalism are being altered, but neither is confident in their memories. It is not until the end that they realize the rules are being changed, but they have ultimately lost their struggle, becoming casualties of the Pig takeover of the farm.

What do Edmund and Antonio have in common? Look at aspects of character and personality traits as well as situational resemblances.

Starting with situational resemblances, Edmund and Antonio are both younger brothers who are angry and jealous that they are not in a position to inherit the titles and lands that rightly go to their respective brothers. Edmund cannot inherit because he is illegitimate, Antonio because he is younger. Both decide to take matters into their own hands and get rid of the people who stand in their way.
Edmund and Antonio are both characters will evil hearts. They are both plotters and planners who follow their own laws rather than adhering to a more universal moral code. When Sebastian ask Antonio about his conscience, Antonio replies,

"Ay, sir, where lies that?"

Likewise, Edmund shows his lack of conscience as he plans his brother's fall and betrays his father so that he can benefit and become earl:

"That which my father loses—no less than all.The younger rises when the old doth fall."

Edmund shows some twinges of conscience as he repents of ordering the death of Lear and Cordelia and tries to stop it. Antonio, however, never feels remorse for what he has done. Both are evil characters who harm others to get ahead. Rather than trying to find success along a different path, both try to take what belongs to someone else.

What are Percy Jackson's character traits, specifically in chapters 1–6?

Percy Jackson is a twelve year old with a humble home life. His classmates at Yancy Academy talk about the exotic locations they plan on traveling to for summer break. In contrast, Percy will have to work over the summer, and he is not even certain where he will go to school come fall. Percy has a hard time in school because of his dyslexia and attention deficit disorder. He was kicked out of six different schools in the past six years, leading him to think that he was a magnet for trouble.
Percy narrates his own story, starting off with a comment that hints at the struggles he would rather have avoided: “Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth and try to lead a normal life.” Everything changes when Percy Jackson discovers he is a half-blood. Whereas before he was a quiet kid just trying not to get kicked out of school, now he finds himself caught between feuding gods, fighting monsters, and learning to survive in a whole new world.
Percy is quick to jump into action. When bullies attack his friend Grover, Percy comes to his rescue. He demonstrates how capable he is when, with some coaching from his mom, he defeats the minotaur. Percy Jackson is a character defined by his bravery as well as his kindness.

Why do they condition babies?

In order for the World State to maintain a completely comfortable, stable society, the State must biologically engineer and condition infants to accept their specified roles in society while simultaneously making them economically productive individuals. The conditioning processes not only result in a passive, obedient population but also influence each individual to become a loyal consumer, which benefits the capitalist economic system. In the World State, infants are subjected to hypnopaedia conditioning as they sleep in order for them to accept and enjoy their given caste. In the Neo-Pavlovian Conditioning Rooms, infants are also conditioned to develop a distaste for nature and books by receiving mild electric shocks when they are presented with flowers and novels. The Director explains that nurturing an affinity for nature in infants is not economically sensible because nature is free and enjoying the natural environment does contribute to the consumption of goods. Literature also encourages lower-caste citizens to improve their social status, which will destabilize the highly-structured, efficient society. The infants are also conditioned to accept and enjoy sex with multiple partners by engaging in erotic play activities in order for them to develop an affinity for free, unrestricted physical interactions when they become adults. Overall, the World State finds it necessary to maintain a stable, comfortable, economically efficient society by biologically engineering infants and conditioning them to become passive, loyal consumers.

Louise Erdrich's novel Tracks is about trauma on a number of levels. After reading the first five chapters of the novel, reflect upon the trauma(s) depicted in their pages. Then, consider the narrators—the characters who tell the stories of the trauma. How do Nanapush and Pauline respond to trauma? What are the similarities and differences in the way each narrator articulates and responds to trauma? Why might Erdrich have chosen to use two narrative voices to describe the traumatic situations of the tribe? What is lost in sharing the narration, and what is gained by this artistic choice? What other observations have you made about these narrations in relation to the trauma(s) of the novel?

Both trauma in general and specific traumas are present in Tracks. Overall, trauma characterizes the environment and times in which all the characters live. The large issue of separation and loss is the most fundamental and widespread trauma. For the Ojibwe Erdrich presents, physical removal from the land, linguistic loss, religious conversion, and dismantled families are among the most significant issues. Another level of trauma that intertwines with all of these is the difficulty, or even impossibility, of remembering. Trauma can come from painful memories or even from the absence of memories, such as of events in infancy or the inability to retrieve what has been suppressed. Along with this, the challenge of recovery—and the confrontation of its impossibility as time passes—are further causes and effects of trauma. In Tracks, specific traumas include rape for one woman and guilt over not stopping the attack for another.
Nanapush, a gifted storyteller, is not only the guardian of secrets but also figures prominently in revealing traumas. Yet the complexity of his character combined with his structural position within the novel mean that he cannot be the source of resolution or the primary agent of healing. He feels his stories as a burden:

I shouldn’t have . . . had to squeeze so many stories in the corners of my brain. They’re all attached, and once I start there is no end to telling.

His narration “begins to integrate Ojibwe trauma into a social narrative memory and, ultimately, to a sense of convalescence,” according to D. A. Barnim (2010), who also sees Nanapush as representing all Native peoples’ collective experience—an experience of hybridity that is inherently traumatic.
Fleur’s position as a survivor of family tragedy, cut off from her people and too young to verbalize memories, is a source of trauma from which she struggles to recover. Her fights for their land and her relations to Nanapush and Pauline further complicate the question of resolution. Fleur’s rape and Pauline’s guilt over not saving her are two traumas that go beyond single life events through their continued consequences. Pauline’s memory is what persists in replaying what she could not repress:

there is nothing more to describe but what I couldn’t block out.

While the two women’s situations are highly distinct and intensely personal, they are also combined into female experience unavailable to the men.
The two narrators complement and contradict each other. The old man and the young woman provide the most obvious contrast, but Erdrich does not indulge in simplistic dualism. Nanapush is not just an Ojibwe elder but also the trickster. Pauline’s youth does not represent a guileless innocence. She is also critical of Nanapush and his ways of knowing and telling:

she hears the old men talk, turning the story over. It comes up different every time, and has no ending, no beginning. They get the middle wrong too. They only know they don’t know anything.

Not using a single narrative may be seen as limiting clarity in following a plot. Both interplaying the competing narratives and twisting the temporal frame aid Erdrich in making the reader aware of the limits of healing over time. They also help the reader understand that the story she tells is not just one story and will be “different every time,” so she could not have reduced it to the perspective of a single narrator.
Source: Barnim, Douglas Andrew (2010). "'Even our bones nourish change'": Trauma, recovery, and hybridity in Tracks and Four Souls. Native Studies Review, 19 (1): 53–66.

I am looking for ideas to help write a thesis statement for Alice Walker's Everyday Use. I'm not looking to focus on the heritage part of the story but more the relationships between Mama and her daughters.

A good way to begin organizing a paper on the relationship between Mama and her daughters is to annotate the story. Mark what Mama has to say about her daughters: how they carry themselves, what is important to them, how they treat her, how they treat each other, what they seem to want from their lives, and how Mama feels about all those descriptions.
A pattern should suggest itself once the annotation is complete. It seems, for instance, that Mama has always understood that Dee was a bit full of herself, but until Dee is so ungracious about helping herself to family heirlooms, Mama is willing to overlook Dee's arrogance. The quilts seem to be the breaking point. A thesis statement for this type of observation could look something like this:

Though Mama has a realistic perspective on both her daughters and is willing to accept them as they are, she draws a hard line when Dee's overreaching is hurtful to Maggie.

Use the annotation to organize the topic sentences that will drive the paragraphs in the essay.

How many people scuffle under the tree? Who does Sheriff Tate find has been killed in the scuffle?

The scuffle took place between Boo Radley and Bob Ewell. Ewell attacked Scout and Jem one night when they were coming home from a Halloween party. He was still hopping mad at Atticus for making him look like a fool on the witness stand during the trial of Tom Robinson, and like the coward he is, he decided to take out his anger on the Finch children. But Bob Ewell's in for a big surprise, as just after he attacks Scout and Jem, Boo comes to their rescue and in the ensuing scuffle, stabs Ewell to death.
The following morning, Sheriff Heck Tate finds Bob Ewell's body slumped beneath a tree; there's a knife stuck into his ribs. At first, it seems that Jem must've been responsible, as he was involved in a scuffle with Bob Ewell when he attacked him; Atticus is even prepared to defend his son in court if needs be. But it soon becomes clear that Boo was the one who killed Ewell and that he did so to protect the Finch children.

Why does Yuki like Mr. Toda?

Yuki likes Mr. Toda because he's more open about his feelings. In this regard, she compares him favorably with the unwelcome seminary students who visit her house. Mr. Toda might not live far from the seminary students at the Japanese church, but in terms of expressing his feelings he might as well be living on another planet. For Mr. Toda has a disarming frankness about him that Yuki finds refreshing. If he likes you, he won't hesitate to let you know. But if you doesn't like you, he also won't hold back.
In the midst of all the pain and upheaval that she's forced to endure, Yuki greatly appreciates such candor. In an increasingly scary world where nothing makes much sense anymore, Mr. Toda provides a much-needed sense of stability and emotional honesty.

How do the characters in Kindred assume the roles assigned them? How do they resist?

In Kindred, the person who has the most difficulty accepting her role in the past is Dana. Although she understands that she must, at the very least, help Rufus stay alive, she finds it morally repugnant to support a white racist and rapist. She feels that she can change him for the better, not wanting to admit the anachronism of that perspective. The intellectual part of her knows that sexual abuse of black women was widespread and that is therefore very likely that her own heritage depends on an incident of rape. Her emotional and moral perspective finds it nearly impossible to accept, and ultimately she must resort to violence to free herself.
Alice, in contrast, is entirely a person of the past, so such an escape is impossible for her. Unable to accept that Rufus is willing to sell their children, she cannot face the prospect of living without them and takes her own life.
Dana’s modern-day husband, Kevin, is perplexed at being dropped into a bygone time when slavery was legal. Despite being a white man married to a black woman, Kevin had not fully confronted his own white privilege. In the past, his role was slave owner. This forced him to admit the benefits of whiteness and to experience the difficult decisions that owners made every day. He cannot become comfortable with the daily realities of his position. Even to speak with Dana, he has to pretend that he endorses a white man’s assumption of having rights of sexual access to black women.

What happens during the meeting of Orlando and Oliver in the forest in As You Like It?

In act 5, scene 2, the brothers Orlando and Oliver meet in the forest. The scene begins with Orlando responding to something that his brother has just told him. We soon understand that Oliver has told Orlando that he has fallen in love with Aliena, who is really, of course, Celia in disguise. Oliver only met Aliena that afternoon, but he has decided to give to Orlando their father's "house and all the revenue" so that he can live a simple life as a shepherd with Aliena. Oliver says that he wants to marry Aliena and asks his brother to give him his consent.
Orlando is at first surprised that his brother has fallen in love so suddenly. His response is full of questions, such as, "Is't possible that on so little acquaintance you should like her?" and "And will you persever to enjoy her?" However, Orlando, after his initial surprise, accepts that his brother is in love and suggests that he and Aliena should get married the very next day. Although he's happy for his brother, Orlando admits that he feels a bit lonely without Rosalind.

How does Crusoe get some barley?

Chapter five of Robinson Crusoe describes the fortunate discovery of barley on the island. In this journal entry, Robinson Crusoe writes of how he found plants growing in a shaded spot where he had previously discarded some corn husks. He is astonished when these plants mature into barley—and not just any barley, but a kind he recognizes as being from England. In fact, he is so surprised to see barley growing in this tropical climate that he takes it to be a miracle that God has made just for him. Crusoe writes that he also discovered a species of African rice, also not something he expected to find here, nearby. This all adds further to the mysterious nature of this island. Crusoe ends up taking several seeds of barley so that he can plant more for the next season.

How should one understand the line, "Howl, howl, howl, howl! O, you are men of stones"?

This line cannot be fully appreciated without picturing what is happening on the stage. Lear enters carrying the dead body of Cordelia in his arms. Everyone is frozen and struck dumb by the sight. When Lear says, "Howl, howl, howl, howl!" he is not addressing the group as a whole but addressing the word "howl" to four separate individuals. They do not move and do not respond because they are frozen, rather surrealistically, in whatever positions they were in when Lear entered. Then when Lear tells these four individuals, "O, you are men of stones," he is describing literally what the audience sees. Not only are the men as motionless as stone statues, but they appear to have no more feeling than statues. Lear says they are "men of stones," not "men of stone," because he wishes to convey the idea that each has been carved out of a separate stone. If Lear entered and simply cried out, "Howl, howl, howl, howl!" it would not only be ineffective but awkward. An actor would find it hard to say the words naturally. But if Lear looks at one person with each utterance of the word "Howl" and if each person fails to react, the four imperative "howls" can be effective. Lear wants somebody to howl, and he can't get anybody to do it. He thinks this is because they don't care about his daughter or his grief, but the opposite is true: they are paralyzed with horror at the sight. They don't know what to say or do. The audience is horrified at the sight, too. They were hoping there might be a chance that Cordelia could be saved at the last moment.

Do you think Mud enjoyed his life with the humans

Mud's life in a circus-themed shopping mall could certainly be a lot worse. Although, the fact that he's counted the days since he's arrived there—all 9,855 of them—should give us some indication that he's not completely happy. After all, you tend not to count the days you spend in a particular place unless you want to get away from it.
Mud—or Ivan as he's now called—barely remembers what life was like before he came to the mall. So living among humans is pretty much all he knows. At the same time he still retains enough of his identity as a gorilla to recognize that the mall is not the best place for him or the other animals. Instead, he figures they'd all be much better off in a proper zoo with ample space and lots of sunlight. Ivan has no understanding of life as a wild gorilla, so he's still thinking in terms of living his life in captivity. But some forms of captivity are better than others, and through the medium of art, he's able to communicate the need to improve living conditions for the animals at the mall.

Compare and contrast the themes, structures, and figures of speech of Edmund Spenser's Sonnet 75 in his Amoretti to Shakespeare's Sonnet 29. Thanks.

I will go through this quickly and hopefully get you started.
Spenser's sonnet 75 celebrates his beloved. He happily writes her name on the "strand," only to have the ocean wash it away. She says she will die one day, and her name will be similarly erased. The poet says no, his verse will immortalize her. The poem's theme is the ability of art to immortalize a person, so that memory of the person continues.
Shakespeare's sonnet 29 also celebrates his beloved. In his case, he is despondent at first as he compares himself to other men and feels they might have more than he does. Then he remembers his beloved and feels so happy that he would not trade places with kings. The theme of this poem is that love is the most valuable possession to have.
Spenser's poem focuses on his desire to immortalize his beloved, while Shakespeare's focuses on the joy and comfort his beloved brings him.
Both poems are sonnets and both follow an ABAB rhyme scheme ending on a final rhyming couplet, so their structures are very much alike.
Spenser uses a metaphor (a comparison not using like or as) to compare mortality to writing a name where it will be quickly washed away by the waves. He also uses alliteration, putting words beginning with the same consonants in close proximity, such as in "die" and "dust." Shakespeare uses simile (a comparison using the words like or as) to compare his joy at thinking about his beloved to a lark's song. He also use alliteration, such as in "like" and "lark" and "hymns" and "heaven's."

Portray the elements of sadness and desolation as depicted by Thomas Hardy in the poem "The Darkling Thrush."

The first two stanzas of "The Darkling Thrush" by Thomas Hardy have a bleak tone which shifts to one of hope for the second half of the poem.
The setting is winter. The surroundings of the narrator are dark and seemingly hopeless. He notes the "spectre-gray" frost, and this connotes a feeling that it is draining the life from the would-be beautiful natural scene. The "tangled bine-stems [score] the sky," suggesting that no life remains in these climbing plants. Instead, they seem broken and are but a skeleton of what they were in another season.
In the second stanza, we learn that the century is dead. There is cloud cover like a "crypt," and the wind seems to cry out in despair about this. The process of germination is "shrunken hard and dry," and the narrator surmises that perhaps every soul on the earth and even in all of nature is as hopeless and broken as he feels in this moment.
There are lots of images here of despair, death, and decay. Thankfully, the narrator is rescued by a thrush whose "full-hearted" song restores his hope. It is worth noting that even in the thrush, the narrator sees the images of hopelessness. The bird is "frail, gaunt," yet he finds reason to rejoice. The narrator finds hope in another creature with reason to despair yet who finds a reason to sing anyway.

The poem that Roderick writes in The Fall of the House of Usher is a lot like what the Usher house used to be. Discuss.

One of the things "The Fall of the House of Usher" is notable for is Roderick's recitation of a poem called "The Haunted Palace." The poem tells a story, setting out in lurid detail the literal and figurative fall of the House of Usher, an old noble family now in a state of permanent decline.
But things didn't always used to be this way. The poem's early stanzas give us a tantalizing glimpse into the House of Usher's glorious history. Then the house—that is to say, the physical building where the Ushers live—was a beautiful, stately palace ruled "in the monarch Thought's dominion."
The palace is used here by Poe as a symbol of the mind, which in the case of the Ushers was once healthy but which has since deteriorated sharply. Back in the good old days the house had "two luminous windows" providing wanderers in that "happy valley" with a sight of the "spirits moving musically." In other words, the Ushers's collective mind was harmonious, rational, and lucid, with a strong connection to the outside world.
Contrast this idyllic picture with the last stanza, when travelers in the valley, through the red-lit windows, can now only see strange, vast forms moving chaotically to a discordant melody. The House of Usher's glory days are now well and truly over; now it has descended so far into madness that the only people who show up at this decaying, ramshackle place are frightened travelers and a "hideous throng" laughing maniacally. How the mighty have fallen!

What is the meaning and setting of the poem "Duende" by Tracy K. Smith?

Firstly, though there is nearly always a subject, there is seldom any single meaning or setting in any poem. Much of the meaning that we find in poetry is subjective and related to our own associations and memories. When we argue what we think a poem is about, we use evidence from the text to support our point.
To help us understand this poem's meaning and potential setting, let's begin with the title. Duende is a noun that Merriam-Webster defines as "the power to attract through personal magnetism and charm." In Spanish, Portuguese, and Filipino folklore, the duende is a ghost or goblin. The term comes from the Spanish phrase dueño de casa, or "owner of the house." Often, the term applies when talking about flamenco music, especially when one wants to describe the magnetism, power, and pure emotion that a dancer gives off during a performance.
In Smith's poem, the object of interest appears to be a flamenco dancer. The music exists in them, "heavy in the throat," but they choose a form other than singing to express it:

They drag it out and with nails in their feetCoax the night into being. Brief believing.A skirt shimmering with sequins and lies.

The reference to "nails in their feet" describes the scraping sound that barefoot flamenco dancers often make. The reference to a flamenco dancer becomes visually clearer with the narrator's description of a "skirt shimmering with sequins." The "lies" may refer to the element of performance in which the dancer is both powerful and seductive, though this display may have nothing to do with who the person is in real life.
In the second section of the poem, Smith refers to a lineage of flamenco dancers:

And not just them. Not justThe ramshackle family, the tíos,Primitos, not just the bailaorWhose heels have notchedAnd hammered timeSo the hours flow in placeLike a tin river, markingOnly what once was.

The speaker wants to connect with that lineage, but language and poetry are her only source of connection, despite their limitations in relation to the more dynamic form of dance:

And I hate to do it here.To set myself heavily beside them.Not now that they've provenThe body a myth, a parableFor what not even languageMoves quickly enough to name.

In the third section, there is some suggestion of a setting:

There is always a road,The sea, dark hair, dolor.

These images are metonyms, or substitutions, for things that we experience during travel—or, more simply, as we journey through life. Dolor means pain or sadness in Spanish. Smith's preference for this term over its English translations is in keeping with her identification with the Spanish culture that has provided the narrator with the experience of flamenco.
It's possible that the narrator is on vacation in a Spanish-speaking place. Another voice, identified in italics, enters the poem at the very end:

They say you’re leaving MondayWhy can’t you leave on Tuesday?

The narrator, we learn, is in some place that is not home. She is asked why she can't stay longer, though this question is "[b]igger than itself" because it suggests possibilities beyond extending a trip. It could mean staying forever, immersing oneself in a culture and language that is not one's own. The latter is already occurring, in fact, as a result of the narrator sprinkling her story with Spanish words.
"Duende" is about the experience of convergence—that is, of seemingly unrelated beings, ideas, and moods coming together to form a new experience and a new idea. This experience can continue indefinitely, which is why the question about staying until Tuesday hovers in the air between the speaker and the intruding voice. That additional voice might also be the narrator's own thought—the little voice telling her to stay on and to become a part of that world, that strangeness, that she fears and loves.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/55522/duende

What is the time period or literary period in "The Knight" by Adrienne Rich?

"The Knight" was first published in Rich's 1963 collection of poems entitled Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law: Poems, 1954-1962. Although this collection of poems was first published in 1963, the poems therein, including "The Knight," were written, as the title indicates, between 1954 and 1962.
In terms of literary periods, the period beginning in 1945, after World War II, is usually described as the postmodern period. Postmodernism is characterized by a critical attitude towards assumed and traditional moral, social, and cultural viewpoints, including traditional attitudes towards gender. In the poem itself, Rich challenges the traditional viewpoint that male weakness and vulnerability is to be repressed, and, if not repressed, ridiculed. The exposed weakness of the eponymous knight in the poem is portrayed as a positive, rather than a negative. In this way, "The Knight" might be considered a postmodern poem.

List various views of apostle Paul's life

Apostle Paul's letters about Jesus' life were written around 50-52 BCE and serve as a record of his views. We know that Paul traveled with Luke as a companion, and had also known Peter, John, and James. One view Paul shared during his travels was his belief that Jesus' teachings were meant for all people, not only the Jewish people. One of the ways he saw to spread the teachings was through the city, a place he was familiar with. For instance, one of the first places he visited was Corinth, a popular trade center populated with merchants, artisans, and common people. One of his famous teachings during this time was from 1 Cor 12:31: "I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily (KJV)." It was meant to show Paul's faith in God and Jesus, but also that he had symbolically "died" to the influences of the material world, like riches, that would steal his attention from his path.
Paul's other main view and teaching centered around the belief that through Jesus all people could be forgiven of their sins without exception. In Romans 5:18, KJV, he wrote: "Therefore as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." In short, through even one act of "righteousness" or goodness, anyone, no matter their station or "unholy" path, could find redemption.
Paul's views directly supported Jesus' message and teaching of unconditional love for all people.

Is it fair to say Herbert Hoover was simply unlucky to be the president at the wrong time, during the Great Depression?

Yes, I would say there is justice in the remark that Hoover was unlucky in his timing. By all reports, he was a decent human being, raised as a Quaker and known for his humanitarian work. He was also a more-than-competent businessman. His character was good, and he didn't want people to suffer.
The Great Depression caught Hoover by surprise. He was an optimist who believed in business, the stock market, and capitalism, and he couldn't truly imagine that such a system would crash. Like many, when the crash did come, he believed the economy would simply right itself and "bounce back."
Hoover's problem, in my opinion, was being formed in the mindset of an earlier time period. He was very conventional and couldn't encompass a crisis of the magnitude of complete economic collapse. The country needed a visionary leader at that interval, such as Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and instead had an everyday president who thought he was going to oversee peace and prosperity. Hoover could never overcome his deeply ingrained beliefs that government should stay small, not intervene in the economy, that charity should be private, and that the business world, even in an extraordinary crisis when its normal mechanisms weren't working, could fix its own problems.

How do we know that Simon and Matrena are kindhearted people?

In Leo Tolstoy’s story, Simon initially shows kindness and compassion when he decides not to turn away from the pale, naked man despite his initial fright. He then shows compassion again by giving the man a coat and boots. When he brings the stranger him into his home, his wife, Matryona, is initially annoyed because her husband had failed to complete all his errands, but she quickly realizes the man is in distress and invites him to eat with them. When she learns of her husband’s kindness in having clothed him, she extends this kindness by giving him more of Simon’s clothes. As the story continues, she support Simon’s decision to have the man—whom they learn is called Michael—stay with them and learn Simon’s trade of cobbler.
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/6157/6157-h/6157-h.htm

How does a tsunami interact with the geosphere?

Let's start with a working definition of what the geosphere is and what it includes. The geosphere is the portion of Earth that includes the Earth's interior, rocks and minerals, landforms, and the processes that shape the Earth's surface. Depending on which layered model of Earth you are using, the geosphere is going to include layers like the crust, mantle, lithosphere, asthenosphere, mesosphere, and core. The geosphere also deals with processes like the rock cycle. Metamorphism, melting and solidification, weathering, erosion, deposition, and burial are all part of the rock cycle and enable the recycling of rocks between sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic states.
The question asks how a tsunami might interact with the geosphere. I see that as meaning that a tsunami can be affected by the geosphere as well as affect the geosphere. First, the geosphere can create the tsunami through plate tectonic movements and the buckling of plates. Once the wave itself is created, it has the potential to reshape land forms. It can level areas of loose soil and sediment. The tsunami continues the natural processes of weathering and erosion. It can create a great deal of runoff, and it can deposit various sediments in locations that wouldn't be possible without the wave's energy.
http://earth.rice.edu/mtpe/geo/geosphere.html

https://scied.ucar.edu/shortcontent/geosphere

Can someone offer me a summary, with some helpful quotations, of the book Laughing Screaming: Modern Hollywood Horror and Comedy by William Paul? I can't source the book myself. If not, or in addition, could you direct me to some other sources that explore the relationship between humor and horror

In his 1994 study, William Paul concentrates on horror and comedy films of the 1970s–1980s era but includes the influence of classics such as those directed by Charlie Chaplin and Alfred Hitchcock. Emphasizing movies that have not won awards, Paul analyzes the relationship between horror and comedy using aesthetic, sociological, and psychological perspectives. The author moves between the two genres, pointing out common features that account for their growing popularity, but also distinguishes between them.
One key feature the highlights is vulgarity, or the “gross out” factor, tying it to established literary tropes such as “inversion,” which celebrates the triumph of the lowest rung of society. Paul argues that films centering on “child monsters” especially disturb us through this type of inversion.

[C]hildren serve . . . as a metaphor for all human evil: evil is simply part of the nature of humankind, and under the right circumstances children will revert to their terrible natures . . . [T]he use of children has a kind of shock value because they conventionally stand for innocence.

Paul points out that it is important to study such films not only because of their commercial success but because audiences disregarded critics’ opinions and demanded more of the same type.

That these movies were considered dangerous at all is not just because they made a lot of money but because, in the process, they endowed the people who patronized them with a kind of power—the power to find pleasure in material that was not only offensive to the elite but also excluded the culture of the elite.

One of the earliest atomic models was suggested by John Dalton. Which statement best reflects his thinking at the time? a) Atoms can be divided into smaller parts. b) Smaller particles are found inside atoms. c) All atoms are exactly the same. d) Atoms are like solid little balls.

The correct answer choice is d): the statement that atoms are like sold little balls best reflects Dalton's thinking at the time.
Dalton proposed that atoms are indivisible and indestructible building blocks of matter. So answers a) and b) are incorrect; the understanding that atoms are in fact composed of other particles came later. Dalton recognized that different chemical elements consist of different kinds of atoms, so c) is also incorrect. (Now, we also know that not all atoms of the same chemical element have to be exactly the same, because the number of the neutrons in the nuclei can vary, creating different isotopes of the same element. However, this does not affect the chemical properties of the element, which depend mainly on the number and configuration of electrons in the atom.)
Dalton also realized, by experimentation, that atoms of different elements can combine in different ways to create different materials (chemical compounds).
Dalton's theory, while somewhat incorrect and incomplete, still serves as a foundation of modern chemistry.
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/introchem/chapter/john-dalton-and-atomic-theory/

What language techniques do the quotes "All men are enemies. All animals are comrades" and "Four legs good, two legs bad" show?

While the above clearly explains, I really appreciated this part because that quote summed up one, and yet two, pivotal points of the story.
That quote is what gives the animals something to separate themselves from the men. It gives them a boundary and then unites the animals by being similar on one side of the statement with no way of being 'in between', no way of allowing one of two legs to be apart of the four-legs "club", or vice versa.
Like TeacherSage said, these quotes use antithesis- using complete opposites to show the characteristics of each side.
The first pivotal part of the story was that distinction, the "us vs them" mentality.
The next key part is where, despite the very firm line, "us" and "them" becoming mixed up when the pigs began breaking the other rules that were designated to separate the two sides. This continues until the final statement, "... from pig to man, and from man to pig ... but already it was impossible to say which was which.”
Finally, with that statement, the story comes full circle with the distinction clear again.

These quotes use the language technique of antithesis. Antithesis is the juxtaposition or putting together of opposites to make a point through contrast. In this instance, animals are contrasted to humans. We learn first that all humans are enemies of animals. Second, we learn that all animals are comrades, or friends. A comrade is a person you are in community with and loyal to.
In the second quote, the four legs of animals (bird wings count as legs so that birds can be included) are contrasted to the two legs of humans. Again, the contrast is stark. There is no room for compromise. Four legs are are a good thing to have, two legs bad. The quote means animals must stick together: they have nothing in common with humans.
These quotes are also examples of antithesis because they use parallel grammatical structure. The parts of each quote are set up identically, following the pattern, first, of "All [blank] are [blank]," and second, of "[blank] legs [blank]." This structure highlights the contrast between animals and humans.
The quotes are also aphorisms, which are statements of wisdom put in a short, memorable way. It is easy for the animals to remember these words, both because the statements are short and simple and because the grammatical structure is parallel. In fact, the sheep will learn to repeat the second quote—"four legs good, two legs bad"—over and over to drown out dissent.

What is Hamlet's dilemma?

Hamlet's dilemma is primarily an internal struggle. After the murder of his father, Hamlet becomes indecisive and confused by the options before him. His indecision is the main conflict in the play, and it leads to his eventual downfall. As the son of the king, it is his duty to avenge his father's murder and reclaim the rightful place on the throne from Claudius. However, it seems to him like his duty to kill Claudius and reclaim the throne is rather drastic, and he ponders the guilt he might feel for taking these dramatic steps.
Beyond that, however, his religious beliefs prevent him from committing murder. He wants desperately to follow God, but his familial responsibilities are urging him to kill Claudius. In the end, he does kill Claudius but himself dies in the act—the decision was his overall undoing.

Prince Hamlet's dilemma concerns his difficult decision to avenge his father's death by murdering his uncle, King Claudius. Toward the beginning of the play, Hamlet is visited by his father's ghost, and King Hamlet explains how Claudius poisoned him in the orchard and instructs Hamlet to avenge his death. Initially, Hamlet vows to avenge his father but hesitates to murder Claudius because he is unsure if the ghost was actually telling the truth or simply the devil attempting to doom his spirit.
Before Hamlet confirms that Claudius committed regicide, he contemplates committing suicide during his famous soliloquy in act 3, scene 1. Hamlet struggles with the decision to commit suicide because he fears that he will doom his soul and is afraid of the great unknown. Even after Hamlet confirms that Claudius murdered his father, he continues to hesitate and passes on the perfect opportunity to assassinate Claudius while he is praying. Hamlet refrains from killing his uncle because he does not want Claudius's spirit to ascend to heaven. Hamlet's hesitation, indecision, and reluctance to avenge his father's death leads to the tragic outcome of the play when the entire royal family is murdered during a fencing match between Hamlet and Laertes.

The title character of Shakespeare's tragedy Hamlet is caught in a state of indecision. The main dilemma that Hamlet faces if of deciding what to do.
His father, the king, is dead. His mother is remarried to his father's brother. A specter that appears to be his father's ghost has told him that this same brother, Hamlet's uncle Claudius, is the one who killed him. To avenge his father, Hamlet will have to kill his uncle. But without any further proof of Claudius's crimes, Hamlet is reluctant to commit regicide and potentially jeopardize his country. There is no right choice, so how can he choose?
Over the course of the play, Hamlet delivers seven soliloquies, during which he is alone on stage and offering the audience a window into his deeply conflicted mental state. Each of these monologues express Hamlet's indecision to one degree or another, the most famous of course being "To be or not to be," in which Hamlet debates the merits of even staying alive at all.

Hamlet's central dilemma is how to avenge his father without further harming his country or the people he loves. While he could exclusively blame his uncle, Claudius, for killing his father (also named Hamlet), the fact remains that his mother, Gertrude, married Claudius only a few months after her first husband's death. Hamlet must wonder if his mother was complicit in the murder itself. He loves his mother, but his moral standards push him to include her in his revenge.
These qualms play out in his indecisiveness. He alternates between carrying out the complicated plan he has set in motion to trap Claudius ("catch the conscience of a king") and worrying so much about the consequences that he can take no further steps ("lose the name of action").
This dilemma plagues him so much that he contemplates suicide as a way to avoid committing murder ("To be or not to be . . .")—not a real solution as it would substitute one sin for another.

Like Shakespeare’s other tragic heroes (Macbeth, Othello, Brutus, and Lear), Hamlet is destroyed not by circumstances but by a flaw in his own character. Introspective and indecisive, he is unable to function effectively as he struggles with a conflict that defies a solution consistent with his sense of honor and morality and with the expectations of his society. Hamlet is honor-bound to avenge the murder of King Hamlet. As the prince of Denmark, he cannot ignore regicide, the most heinous of crimes, and he cannot accept the presence of a usurper on the Danish throne. Additionally, as a son, he must avenge his father’s murder; Hamlet’s rage—and the mores of his society—demand revenge. His course of action seems clear: he must kill the vile Claudius. Hamlet’s religious faith, however, makes his course of action anything but clear, since it forbids murder. Ensnared by his social position, the demands of his conscience, the demands of society, the canons of his faith, and his own thirst for justice, Hamlet is trapped. Even suicide offers no escape, since “self-slaughter” is also a mortal sin. When Hamlet agonizes, “To be or not to be--that is the question,” he finds no acceptable answer.
To let Claudius live is morally wrong, but to kill him is morally wrong, too, and a threat to Hamlet’s own soul. Consequently, Hamlet thinks rather than acts, torturing himself with memories of his beloved father and thoughts of his mother’s incestuous marriage to Claudius. He examines his own conscience, observes and evaluates his own behavior and the behavior of others, and seizes upon one reason after another to delay resolving his dilemma. Hamlet cannot let Claudius escape justice, but he will not act decisively, choosing instead to pursue various clever schemes through which he convinces himself for a while that he is moving toward a solution. Ultimately, Hamlet’s dilemma is resolved, but its resolution is not the consequence of careful thought or personal introspection. When he watches his mother die and Claudius’s plot to kill him is revealed, Hamlet’s indecision ends abruptly. He kills Claudius and then dies.

How did Bradford initially view the Native Americans?

Bradford initially had a very negative view of the Native Americans, much like the majority of settlers in the early colonization period. He assumed that the Native Americans were savages without intellect, civilization, or morality. This viewpoint was helpful in justifying the actions of the settlers at the time, because they felt they were doing a godly service by living among the savages and showing them civilization, which gave them entitlement to the land and wealth of the region.
Over time, however, Bradford grew more respectful towards the Native Americans. His views began to shift from spending more time among them and seeing them learn English. He learned that they were not uncivilized or unintelligent, they simply had a different culture. In the end, this interaction was very beneficial because, through trade, the Native Americans helped provide necessary supplies to get the settlers through the winter.

William Bradford was similar to many of the early settlers in that he viewed the Native Americans very negatively. He saw them as unintelligent and uncivilized savages who were essentially beasts. He was afraid and skeptical of them, fortifying his city against a potential threat or invasion from the Native Americans and refusing to make contact with them for quite some time.
However, this view slowly changed. It took quite a while, and it always remained somewhat condescending, but Bradford saw the benefit of the Native Americans and realized they were not as savage as he initially believed. Bradford found benefit in trading with them and realized they were more intelligent than he initially thought, as they started learning and speaking English. Eventually, his trade with them helped the colony survive, as they had resources that the colonists desperately needed.

William Bradford initially viewed the Native Americans as "savage people who are cruel, barbarious, and most treacherous." He based this on accounts he had read and heard while living in Europe. Thus, when the Pilgrims first arrived in Massachusetts, Bradford was highly fearful of the natives. The population of English was very small, and his people were dying all the time. Bradford had a cannon mounted prominently on the Plymouth plantation fort and insisted that corpses be buried at night so the natives would not know how weak and vulnerable his people were. He hoped to intimidate the Native Americans by projecting more power than his small group really had, and so deter attacks.
But as Bradford got to know the Indians, his views changed somewhat. When an Indian visited them who knew how to speak some English, Bradford realized he could safely trade with the local natives, obtaining badly needed food supplies. He and the other settlers could also learn from the natives how to better survive. Bradford never lost his wariness toward the Indians, knowing how outnumbered his settlers were, but he did enter into peaceful commerce with them.

At first, William Bradford's view of Native Americans is far from flattering, to say the least. He shares the unthinking prejudices of most of his fellow Puritans at that time, regarding the natives as "savage and brutish men." Bradford's initially negative attitude towards the Native Americans is largely an expression of ignorance. He had never actually met any Native Americans when he formed this judgment; he was simply repeating the old cliches from countless New World exploration narratives that were circulating in Europe at that time.
However, once Bradford actually set foot on American soil, his attitude changed somewhat. The Native Americans showed great kindness towards the Puritan settlers, teaching them the rudiments of how to live off the land. Although Bradford doesn't explicitly refer to the natives in a positive light, he no longer appears to harbor the kind of knee-jerk prejudice towards them that he displayed before arriving in the New World.

Consider the setting and its transformation in True West. What happens to the home? What do you think the fire, heat, collection of objects, and overall mess reflect? Does it represent the internal conflict within the characters?

Setting is very important in True West by Samuel Shepard. As the title suggests, the play is set in the West—all the way on the West Coast in California. California is an important choice, because on the one hand, the house is close to flashy Hollywood. On the other hand, the raw desert is nearby. This shows the crossroads between the brothers. They come from different settings, meet in the middle, and merge in some transformation over the course of the play.
The action happens in their mother's kitchen. What do you think of when you think of a kitchen? Perhaps you think of a domestic atmosphere, or being in your mother's kitchen as a child with your siblings. Kitchens are where we cook and eat, so a certain amount of cleanliness comes to mind. It is no accident that the kitchen is destroyed by the end of the play. The clutter makes us think of their cluttered minds and descent into chaos or madness. The destruction of a kitchen suggests destruction of domestic home life. At the end of the play, the home is destroyed. Objects, such as a number of toasters, are piled in. Beer is spilled. The houseplants are dead.
The fire appears at the top of scene eight:

. . . before light comes up, a small fire blazes up in the dark from alcove area, sound of LEE smashing typewriter with a golf club, lights coming up, LEE seen smashing typewriter methodically then dropping pages of his script into a burning bowl set on the floor of alcove, flames leap up . . .

Shepard instructs the light of the fire to be seen first in the darkness, and then when the stage lights come up, we can see that Lee is dropping pages of his script into the flames. In their dialogue, the brothers do not address the fire. They discuss the stolen toasters and move on to making toast, but the fire is not mentioned.
By scene nine, there is

No sound, blazing heat, the stage is ravaged; bottles, toasters, smashed typewriter, ripped out telephone, etc. All the debris from previous scene is now starkly visible in intense yellow light, the effect should be like a desert junkyard at high noon, the coolness of the preceding scenes is totally obliterated.

The heat is physical, but also emotional. The brothers' tempers are heating up.
The setting is very important to Shepard, and he gives detailed notes on precisely how the set should look in the beginning and end of the play.
At the start, he notes,

The set should be constructed realistically with no attempt to distort its dimensions, shapes, objects, or colors. No objects should be introduced which might draw special attention to themselves other than the props demanded by the script. If a stylistic "concept" is grafted onto the set design it will only serve to confuse the evolution of the characters' situation, which is the most important focus of the play.

By the end, their mother even says "I don't recognize it at all," and Shepard leaves us with a final image created through the use of light and sound cues:

They square off to each other, keeping a distance between them. Pause, a single coyote heard in distance, lights fade softly into moonlight, the figures of the brothers now appear to be caught in a vast desert-like landscape, they are very still but watchful for the next move, lights go slowly to black as the after-image of the brothers pulses in the dark, coyote fades.

A final note that sticks out to me regarding the setting is Austin's line about his wife.

She's five hundred miles away. North. North of here. Up in the North country where things are calm.

His wife, not appearing in the play, is "where things are calm," suggesting how wild their location is.
I think the set represents the internal conflict of the characters and the conflict in their relationship as well.

What was the significance of certain individuals toward the civil rights movement?

Emmett Till, Martin Luther King Jr., and Rosa Parks were some of the most notable individuals who gave rise to the movement. Emmett Till's murder started the civil rights movement after two white men murdered him in 1955. A cashier named Carolyn Bryant alleged that Till sexually harassed her at the store she worked in. Her husband and brother later tracked Till down and shot the boy after torturing him and disfiguring his face. Till's mother insisted on an open casket showing to the public, and the press publicized images of his body. Till's horrid murder shocked the nation and sparked the beginnings of the civil rights movement.
Martin Luther's King Jr.'s espousal of nonviolent protest and peaceful integration brought civil rights to the forefront of national dialogue. King also went on television to spread the message and gave passionate speeches that rallied many to his cause. His presence in the movement played a vital role in the peaceful coexistence of people of different races and changed many hearts and minds in the process.
Rosa Parks fostered the movement when she refused to give up her seat to a white man on a bus in 1955. Her defiance and arrest eventually led to the Montgomery bus boycott. Her involvement also inspired many people to join the cause.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Emmett-Till

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Martin-Luther-King-Jr

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Rosa-Parks

What have you heard about genetic testing in the media? For example, has DNA testing played a key role in solving a crime? Determining the paternity of a child? What do you see as the pros and cons of genetic testing in these situations?

DNA testing and profiling has basically revolutionized crime solving around the world. In the early 1980s, DNA testing was very expensive, and it had limited accessibility and accuracy. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, DNA testing and profiling became much cheaper and more developed, and it soon became a standard procedure during all forensic investigations. Thus, many cold cases and crimes which were unsolved for years and even decades were reopened and reexamined using the new DNA testing procedures, and a big percentage of them were solved. Thus, in 1987, a man from Florida who committed rape and sexual assault was the first person that was convicted and prosecuted on the basis of ex post facto DNA evidence.
In forensic investigations, DNA testing is done in two ways: when the suspect is known or identified, DNA technology is used to compare the genetic information of the suspect with the genetic material and evidence found on the crime scene; when the suspect is not known or identified, DNA testing is done to compare the genetic material of the suspect with some known offenders in a database. Aside from being an incredibly helpful and powerful tool for identifying culprits, DNA technology is also used to absolve wrongly accused individuals.
As with many other aspects of forensic investigative techniques, there are also pros and cons with DNA testing and profiling as well. One of the main advantages of using DNA technology in forensic investigations is the fact that even the smallest amount of genetic evidence found on the crime scene can be sufficient to solve the crime and find the culprit. Another advantage is its accuracy; when tested correctly and thoroughly, DNA evidence is 99.9% accurate, as genetic material is unchangeable and unique. This also includes DNA tests done not only for the purpose of aiding a criminal investigation (for instance, a paternity test).
DNA technology is also commonly used in medicine and biological and genetic research, especially when scientists are trying to find or develop a cure for a certain genetic disease.
One of the main disadvantages of DNA testing is the fact that sometimes, the evidence is not conclusive, or it's simply not enough. As with everything else, DNA technology is also prone to human error; a contaminated specimen will be much less accurate and reliable. Thus, in criminal justice, DNA evidence is more often used to exclude suspects than to prove a suspect's involvement in the crime. Another disadvantage is its somewhat controversial history. In order to have a DNA system for identifying people, police departments and the federal government must take samples from everyone; however, not every person is willing to give their own genetic information to the state. Interestingly enough, today, more and more people willingly participate in genetic tests in order to find out more about their heritage or determine their relations to another individual.
Some recent information about DNA testing that I've read on the internet was about a cyber attack on a forensic company which is associated with the UK police; according to BBC,

Eurofins Forensic Services carries out DNA testing, toxicology analysis, firearms testing and computer forensics for police forces across the UK. Its parent company, Eurofins, suffered a ransomware attack on 1 or 2 June, which is under criminal investigation.

This only proves that giving out genetic material can sometimes be dangerous, as all technologies and computerized systems are vulnerable to cyber criminals.
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-48721511

In To Kill a Mockingbird, what is the first gift that appears in the hollow of the tree? What else do they find?

The first gifts Jem and Scout receive from Boo Radley in the knot-hole of the tree are two sticks of Wrigley’s Double-Mint gum. Scout, who finds them, is at first suspicious, especially as the gum is unwrapped from its foil, but once she takes the gum home and sniffs it, she decides it is okay and stuffs it in her mouth.
The next gift is a purple velvet box with two Indian head pennies inside. The box is "patchworked" with folded bits of tinfoil from chewing gum wrappers. The pennies have been polished.
Other gifts include two soap carved figures that represent Scout and Jem, conveying that the gifts are meant for them, and a broken pocket watch on a chain with a knife attached.

How was the Earth's crust formed?

The Earth is a sphere composed of four layers. The innermost layer is the inner core, the center of the planet made of solid metal. The inner core is surrounded by the outer core, which is made of liquid metal. The outer core is surrounded by the mantle, which is made of rock. This rock is molten closer to the outer core and more solid closer to the crust. The final layer of the sphere is the Earth's crust, made of rocks and minerals, which floats on top of the semi-liquid mantle in pieces of various sizes, called the tectonic plates.
How did these layers form? The general theory, known as the "core accretion theory," is that heavy materials left over from the formation of the galaxy were drawn together by gravity into clumps. Earth was one of these clumps, a rough molten blob of heavy elements like iron and nickel. As the young Earth spun in its orbit around the Sun, the heaviest elements of the blob sank to the center, forming the core, while the outer surface of the planet began to cool, forming the mantle and, later, the crust.
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/crust/

https://www.space.com/19175-how-was-earth-formed.html

What were colonial American beauty standards?

Standards of beauty in the American colonies varied and changed over time and from region to region. Therefore, the following answer will be somewhat of a generalization.
Let us start with Puritan New England. The Puritans are known for their stark take on beauty. The Puritans believed that any lavish physical adornment or worldly aesthetics were pure extravagances and a dangerous distraction from the pragmatic necessities of life and worship. Homes sometimes had small embellishments, but simplicity and function were more valued. Clothing reflected this as well. Puritan dress utilized local dyes for coloring and tended to cover the body from head to foot, as unnecessarily exposed parts of the body would have been viewed as unsavory. Puritans did have an appreciation for the beauty of nature, as this was seen as evidence of God's majesty and power.
Notions of beauty in the Middle and Southern Colonies sometimes reflected the relative wealth and diversity of certain colonists in these regions. Wealthy men and women often tried to imitate the fashions of Europe, particularly of London, as a way to showcase their wealth and cultured views. These fashions changed over time to reflect the changing fashions across the Atlantic. The wealthiest were able to import clothing and art from Europe, while most colonists only had access to locally made goods that sometimes attempted to copy European styles.
One standard of beauty that tended to be commonplace throughout the colonies was an appreciation of and desire for unblemished skin. Diseases such as smallpox and measles were common and often left their victims with permanent marks. Being able to boast skin that was free of lesions and scars was evidence of a healthy and privileged childhood. Furthermore, it was desirable for women to have pale skin, as this suggested that they were wealthy enough to avoid working outdoors.
https://www.history.org/history/clothing/intro/clothing.cfm

https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/eudr/hd_eudr.htm

What does Eliza's act of fetching Higgins's slippers symbolize in Pygmalion?

It symbolizes her loyalty and devotion to Prof. Higgins.
Higgins has successfully trained Eliza to be a lady of quality in much the same way that you'd train a puppy to fetch your slippers. Despite her outward demeanor as a duchess, Eliza is still instinctively deferential towards her alleged social superior and so doesn't hesitate to act like Higgins's servant.
But Higgins doesn't show the slightest hint of appreciation for anything Eliza does for him. That includes her astonishing transition from flower-selling guttersnipe to belle of the ball. As far as Higgins is concerned, he and he alone deserves all the credit for that.
No wonder, then, that Eliza angrily throws Higgins's slippers right at him. Her devotion and loyalty have not been acknowledged. From now on, she's determined to be more assertive, less deferential.

In Purgatory, what obsessions drive the Old Man to return with the Boy to the ruined house?

The Old Man in the drama Purgatory, by William Butler Yeats, brings his son in an attempt to save his own mother from the cycle of purgatory she has been stuck in since she died giving birth to the Old Man. On the surface, the Old Man is obsessed with his visions of the most memorable moments from his childhood. It becomes clear to the reader that these “visions” are really just painful memories from the Old Man’s childhood, and the Old Man is obsessed with the thought of expelling them from his thoughts forever.
The story is centered around a conversation that transpires between the Old Man and his son, referred to in the story as “the Boy,” whom he has brought with him to the burned-down house. The Old Man’s own son can’t see the “visions” and becomes increasingly angry with his father. The Old Man continues and tells his son what he sees:
His mother married a man whom others in society considered of low class, as this man did not have the financial stature that the Old Man’s mother did. The Old Man blames his mother for marrying too quickly and consequently leaving him to grow up with such a horrible man.
After his mother died giving birth to him, the Old Man’s father squandered the family’s wealth, became an abusive alcoholic, and forbade his son (the Old Man) to receive an education. We learn that the Old Man had to learn to read from the gamekeeper’s wife, and it becomes clear that he grew up in a very lonely, traumatic household. Eventually he burns down his childhood home with his father in it, appearing to feel guilty. The Boy, however, feels no sympathy and only resents for his father, who couldn’t seem to appreciate the luxurious life he lived.
The Boy resembles his grandfather, eventually driving the Old Man over the edge. Misplacing his hate for his father, the Old Man murders his son. He explains to his mother’s ghost that she is released from purgatory, but ultimately the cycle repeats itself and the Old Man continues to see the visions. This shows readers that the Old Man wasn’t really obsessed with releasing his mother from purgatory but with releasing himself from being stuck in the cycle of pain, resentment, and regret.

Why does Madame Forestier fail to recognize Mathilde?

After losing Madame Forestier's necklace, the Loisels had to take out tremendous loans in order to purchase another such necklace—as they believe her necklace to have contained real diamonds (when it did not). They spent the next ten years working themselves to the bone in order to pay back all the money they borrowed. The narrator says,

Mme. Loisel looked old now. She had become the woman of impoverished households—strong and hard and rough. With frowsy hair, skirts askew, and red hands, she talked loud while washing the floor with great swishes of water.

Mathilde Loisel has had to do a great deal of manual labor, has had to give up her dreams of mixing with the upper crust, has had to give up the servant she once had, and has essentially had to become like a servant herself.

She came to know what heavy housework meant and the odious cares of the kitchen.

Mathilde has washed dishes, done laundry, taken out the garbage, fetched water, done her shopping, haggled with merchants, and in general tried to save every penny she could. Such a life, in addition to being hard on the body, would be quite hard on the mind; worrying about money all the time is incredibly stressful, and stress takes a major toll on a person, both mentally and physically. Therefore, her old friend does not recognize Mathilde because those ten years of hard labor have aged her a great deal more than those same years have affected her friend, who still appears young and beautiful.

When Madame Forestier bumps into Mathilde on the ‎Champs-Élysées, she initially doesn't recognize her. Mathilde appears to have aged prematurely, and her clothes are all haggard and worn. After the unfortunate incident with the lost necklace, Mathilde and her husband had to take out a number of loans to pay for a replacement. This crippled them financially, plunging them into dire poverty. Mathilde, who once had such wonderful dreams about mixing in high society with the social elite, has been forced to work for a living, toiling away each and every day just to make ends meet. This has taken a serious toll on Mathilde's physical health and appearance. She's not the same woman she once was, and so it's not surprising that Madame Forestier doesn't recognize her.

What role does the poet see for himself with regard to his country in "To India My Native Land"?

Henry Louis Vivian Derozio was born in Kolkata, India in 1809. His mother was English, and his father was part Indian and part Portuguese. However, Derozio considered himself to be Indian and was fiercely patriotic towards India, which he perceived to be his homeland. At the age of 17, he began to teach history and literature at Hindu College in Kolkata, but he was eventually expelled for his unorthodox views. He died of cholera in 1831 at the age of 22. Derozio's viewpoints were influential in the Bengali Resistance movement, which opposed the British Empire in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
The sonnet "To India—My Native Land" is the most famous of Derozio's poems. In it, he laments the oppression of his country by the British and expresses dismay that it is "chained down at last" and "fallen in the dust" from its former beauty. The role that the poet sees for himself is to return to the past in memory, bring back "a few small fragments" of the glory that had been India's, and display these memories for his readers. Through his efforts, he hopes the readers will think kind thoughts of his fallen country.

What did Madame Defarge bring to the carriage in A Tale of Two Cities?

In chapter 6, Dr. Manette, Mr. Lorry, and Dr. Manette's daughter, Lucie, step into a carriage set for London. They decide to leave France because France is too dangerous a place for them to stay.
Dr. Manette, once inside the carriage, asks for his shoemaking tools as well as the unfinished shoes he is in the process of making. He says that he learned to make shoes while he was a prisoner in La Bastille. He was in La Bastille for eighteen years and spent much of that time in solitary confinement. Making shoes was his way of keeping his mind occupied.
At this point, Madame Defarge momentarily stops knitting and goes to fetch, and then brings to the carriage, the shoemaking tools and unfinished shoes that Dr. Manette was asking for. Dr. Manette, imprisoned for so long, still thinks that he is in prison.

Examine The Battle of Books as an allegory.

In literary terms, an allegory can be described as a poem or story with a hidden meaning. In Swift's satirical work The Battle of the Books, the underlying meaning isn't especially well-hidden. Behind the literal battle of the books (fought out in the confines of a gentleman's library) lies the then-current argument about which epoch's literature was superior—ancient or modern. Swift comes down firmly on the side of the ancients. This was, after all, the position of his noble patron, Sir William Temple, and as Sir William's humble servant, Swift valiantly goes into bat for him.
Within the overall allegory there's a brief digression that is itself an allegory—an allegory within an allegory, if you will. This is the tale of the spider and the bee. The spider, who lives in the corner of one of the library's upper windows, curses a bee for carelessly destroying his intricately spun web. The bee responds by saying that he's doing nature's bidding by buzzing about from place to place, whereas the spider does nothing but sit around all day, spinning vast webs out of himself and his plentiful supply of "Dirt and Poison."
The point that Swift is making here is that the ancient authors, like the bee, gather their materials from nature, specifically human nature, in writing their enduring works of literature. Whereas modern authors, like the spider, draw upon themselves and their own narrow subjective experience of the world.
By drawing upon nature, the ancients were able to produce timeless works whose continuing relevance transcends the specific historical epochs in which they were written. As human nature is universal, Swift would argue, works of art grounded in a thoroughgoing fidelity to nature evince the same quality, allowing them to speak with authority to successive generations of men in different times and places.
However, the moderns cannot hope to aspire to such a happy condition. As their work is largely of a subjective, individual quality, it is destined not to endure beyond the period in which it is written. Hence the superiority of the ancients over the moderns in this epic battle of the books.

What is the thesis statement of the article "The Myth of the Latin Woman"?

A thesis statement for Judith Ortiz Cofer’s article “The Myth of the Latin Women” could be expressed like this: The author is the product of a Latin American culture which is continually misinterpreted, misunderstood, and reduced to stereotypes by the mainstream culture of the West.
The majority of the article is taken up with examples of this misunderstanding and stereotyping, beginning with a British man who drunkenly serenaded the author with a song from West Side Story on a bus while she was spending the summer studying at Oxford. Even in a foreign country, while studying at a prestigious university, the Latin American stereotype had followed her.
The author gives numerous instances of times when her style of dress has been misinterpreted or regarded as inappropriate. At her high school Career Day, students were told to come dressed for a job interview. However, Cofer writes:

It quickly became obvious that to the barrio girls, "dressing up" sometimes meant wearing ornate jewelry and clothing that would be more appropriate (by mainstream standards) for the company Christmas party than as daily office attire.

The flamboyant and colorful style of dress which was normal in Latin American culture was regularly misinterpreted “as a come-on” by employers and men on the street. The image of the Latin woman as a “sexual firebrand” is also used by advertisers, further embedding the idea in mainstream culture and increasing the stereotyping and harassment faced by Cofer and women in her community. Although Cofer has been luckier than most, she has still been subjected to frequent stereotyping, including being mistaken for a waitress at her first public poetry reading. She writes that:

Every time I give a reading, I hope the stories I tell, the dreams and fears I examine in my work, can achieve some universal truth which will get my audience past the particulars of my skin color, my accent, or my clothes.

I think the thesis statement for this article could be encapsulated in the phrase “you can take the girl out of Latin America, but you can’t take the Latin American out of the girl.” It’s a stereotypical phrase, but Cofer’s intention in this essay is to show that the culture of a very rich and familial nation like Latin America is very hard to be rid of, even when coming to a new country.
Cofer analyzes some of the ways in which this can be difficult or cause culture shock for some of these people when they come to America. One particular way that this happens is with dress and relational norms. It is common for people to date relatively young and also to wear bright colors and more revealing clothing due to the culture and to the heat of their native islands. This can lead them to be categorized as promiscuous when it is more of a cultural difference that is difficult to shed for the people who immigrate to the United States.

The essay "The Myth of the Latin Woman" is a powerful statement addressing stereotypes placed on Latin women, focusing especially on the Puerto Rican girls Judith Ortiz Cofer grew up with.
This essay discusses the way Latin women are perceived by mainstream American culture in depth. As an example, Ortiz Cofer analyzes the difference in dress. She talks about why girls dressed differently in Puerto Rico and what it was like to be judged and questioned for this in the United States.
She also talks about some of the central stereotypes that are put on Latin women, especially by the media. Latinas are often sexualized and presented as the "fiery lover," or else they are reduced to a domestic worker who can hardly speak English.
You could pull a few different thesis statements from this piece. One way to think through this is to ask yourself, "What is Ortiz trying to say here?"
I think one theme of her essay is that "Latina women deal with these stereotypes all their lives." She is trying to show what she has overcome and share her experience of being different with the reader.

I think Cofer's own thesis statement comes at the end of the essay's first paragraph:

you can leave the Island, master the English language, and travel as far as you can, but if you are a Latina, especially one like me who so obviously belongs to Rita Moreno's gene pool, the Island travels with you.

She argues that depictions of Latinas in mainstream (i.e., white) American culture convey the idea that Latin women are either sexual objects or servants, and she says that a fundamental misunderstanding of Latin cultural values and customs is largely to blame. Therefore, I think a good thesis might read as follows: Judith Ortiz Cofer argues in her essay "The Myth of the Latin Woman: I Just Met a Girl Named Maria" that myths concerning Latinas pervade mainstream American culture as a result of a critical misunderstanding of Latinx cultures and their values.
You can then analyze, for example, the anecdotal evidence Cofer provides regarding the more provocative clothing often worn by Latinas as a result of the protection they are afforded "on the island" by the laws of a "Spanish/Catholic system of morality and machismo whose main rule was: You may look at my sister, but if you touch her I will kill you." Further, the hotter climate means that smaller items of clothing are more practical for staying cool. In the United States, bright colors and visible skin are often perceived as invitations for sexual advances (which, actually, says something pretty huge about rape culture in this country—another potential thesis and essay topic).