What are the advantages of giving up color?

I puzzled over this question when I first read this novel, too. One of the immediate benefits with the inability to see color is that it would make racial discrimination (or preference) almost impossible. While citizens in Jonas's society may note differences in eye shape or shades of hair color, they can't really discern enough to note differences in races. People couldn't favor blondes with blue eyes (as an example from stereotypical American culture) because they really couldn't tell the difference.
Another benefit would be simply giving people one less thing to worry about. No one would care, for example, about whether his friend received a red bike while he himself was given a red bike, thus lessening the conflict between individuals. People would not need to deliberate between different colors of clothes, because they can't tell the difference. Therefore, colorblindness lessens the daily stress of individuals.
Since we appreciate the quality of color, it's hard to imagine not having it at all. But since they have never experienced it, citizens in Jonas's society simply don't know what they are missing.

Why, according to Hamlet, might it be better, "To grunt and sweat under a weary life"?

Quite simply, Hamlet is saying it's better to stay in this life with all its problems and sorrow because there is no way of telling what the next life has in store for us:

To die, to sleep;
To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub.
And in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil
Must give us pause.

In the age of exploration during which he lived, Shakespeare's metaphor of death was, and is, strikingly appropriate. Who, Hamlet asks, would continue with this weary life

But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscovered country, from whose bourn
No traveler returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?

If the play has a central point at which all its themes converge, this may be it. Hamlet's immediate problem is the revenge he feels compelled to carry out against Claudius. But apart from this he feels a general revulsion against life itself. His attitude is one most people can identify with, but only at our worst times. For Hamlet, it is a kind of ongoing fear of life, but it is balanced by his fear of death, and the result is that he's trapped in a kind of limbo from which there is no escape.

At first, how does Crooks respond when Lennie mentions his dream to him? How and why does this response change?

At first, Crooks is deeply skeptical of George and Lennie's dream; he thinks the whole idea of him and George owning their own farm is just a fantasy. Over the years he's lost count of the number of men he's encountered with the exact same dream, and none of them have ever been successful. As someone who occupies the very lowest rung on society's ladder Crooks has years of bitter experience of what the world's really like. For him, it's a place of endless hard work, exploitation, and deep-seated racial prejudice. The very idea of being optimistic in such a climate is just incomprehensible to him.
Later on, Crooks briefly revises his initially hostile assessment in response to the goading of Curley's wife. One day she comes into the bunkhouse uninvited and starts mouthing off at Crooks, Lennie, and Candy. As an African American, Crooks is reluctant to answer back to a white woman, as he knows there could be serious consequences. But after some more goading from Curley's wife, he finally snaps and angrily lashes out, kicking away the nail keg on which he's been sitting. He then launches into a violent tirade at Curley's wife, in which he passionately defends the other men and their dream, claiming that they'll go get some land of their own even if she gets them fired. But after Curley's wife threatens him with a lynching, Crooks immediately goes back to his default position of subservience. He also snaps out of the fantasy he briefly harbored of joining with the other men and owning land of his own. In order to protect his injured pride and dignity, he claims that he wouldn't want to go to such a place anyway.

What role did the Puritans play in the Salem Witch Trials?

It was the Puritans who were behind the Salem Witch Trials. At that time, Salem was a Puritan settlement, a Calvinist theocracy run on the basis of a narrow interpretation of Scripture. At that time, just about everyone believed in the existence of witches, so it wasn't difficult to convince the God-fearing folk of Salem that they were lurking around every corner.
As die-hard Calvinists, Puritans were especially amenable to belief in witchcraft, as they also believed that man had been utterly and irredeemably depraved by the Fall, when Adam and Eve defied God by eating of the Tree of Knowledge. Thanks to our original ancestors, man was steeped in sin and it was only by the freely given grace of God that he could possibly be redeemed. Given the intensity with which such beliefs were held, it wasn't a huge stretch for the average Puritan to believe that outwardly respectable people, even clergymen, were secret practitioners of the diabolical arts.

Who is Ambika in The Vendor of Sweets?

The Vendor of Sweets deals with the tensions of modernization in India playing out through the tensions between Jagan and his son Mali. Ambika died long ago from a brain tumor. Her death, it's suggested, was due in part to Jagan's insistence that she use only natural remedies. Mali blames his father for her death and embraces modernization.
The extended flashback to Ambika and Jagan's marriage also suggests he neglected her and that she was unhappy for years, especially before she had a son. Jagan makes clear that he views proper Hindu marriage as a man ruling over his wife. This is how he treats Ambika, and he is frustrated with Mali for straying from this model of relationship when he refuses to rule over his partner, Grace, and doesn't even marry her according to Hindu customs.
Narratively, Ambika serves to flush out Jagan as a character and draw out the tensions between him and Mali. In many ways she represents the harm caused by the kind of traditionalism Jagan embodies and a push towards modernization for her son.

I am creating a criminal profile on Frankenstein's creature: What does the creature look like? How does he carry himself? How does he dress? How does he speak, any speech impediments? Where was the creature born and raised? What was the time period in which the creature lived and how did this affect his thinking and actions? What were the creature's motivations and why? Were there any redeeming qualities about this creature? What were his personality flaws? What did they stem from and how did they affect the choices he made? What does the creature hold dear? Does the creature have his own secrets? Who is the creature's contemporary counterpart?

To help with your assignment, you may want to take another look at chapter 5. This is the chapter where Victor brings the creature to life.
Victor tells us that he tried to make the creature beautiful by building it with proportional limbs and appealing features. When the creature first opens its "dull yellow" eyes, Victor provides us with a horrifying description:

His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.

Victor runs and does not see his creation again until chapter 10. He perceives

the figure of a man, at some distance, advancing towards me with superhuman speed. He bounded over the crevices in the ice, among which I had walked with caution; his stature, also, as he approached, seemed to exceed that of man.

In the next few chapters, Victor converses with the creature, and we get to hear his story from his own perspective. You should review these chapters, as they give insight to the creature's motivations and explain how he learned to talk and interact with others.
The creature is able to speak eloquently with Victor because he learned how to speak by observing and listening to Felix and Agatha. Any time he interacts with humans, they are frightened by his appearance. This certainly has an effect on the creature.
I think the creature's attempt to help the family in the cottage shows redeeming qualities. I also think it's important to consider that he was created, not "born," and was not properly raised by his creator. We can trace his personality flaws back to his experiences in life, or lack of.
I hope this helps with your criminal profile!

What are some examples of deception and lies in Hamlet?

William Shakespeare's Hamlet explores many rich themes and motifs, but its exploration of deception runs especially deep.
The appearance of King Hamlet's ghost carries with it several noteworthy points regarding deception. The ghost explains to the prince that Claudius—Prince Hamlet's uncle and the late King Hamlet's own brother—was his murderer. The ghost says that Claudius did this deed with the help of the prince's mother, Gertrude. Claudius used the "witchcraft of his wit" to seduce Gertrude, despite her marital vows to the late king.
The ghost despairs, stating that he was a dignified husband and upheld his marriage vows to Gertrude. He asserts that Gertrude lacked the fidelity and honesty that he possessed in their marriage (he refers to her as "a wretch whose natural gifts were poor / To those of mine") and notes that his brother killed him by pouring poison down his ears, which may be a nod to the lies told to him by his wife and brother.

Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,And in the porches of my ears did pourThe leperous distilment . . .

In an interesting twist, Prince Hamlet is quite deceptive in this play as well. Famously, Hamlet feigns insanity to justify his odd behavior as he copes with the emotional toll and careful responsibility of avenging his father. Perhaps Hamlet is "fighting fire with fire," so to speak, or perhaps Shakespeare seeks to complicate the classic role of the tragic hero by showing that even heroes who act with caution and virtue aren't above employing deception.