The largest bakery

IntroductionGREGGS is the largest bakeshop retail merchant in UK. The historical company foremost founded by John Gregg in 1939, and opened its first store in 1951. After about 60 old ages enlargement, it becomes a nutrient land supplying big scope of fresh nutrient for 5 million clients every hebdomad in over 1,400 net stores. During this period, a little bakeshop store became a nutrient giant with to the full developed distribution centres providing freshness and quality nationally. Meanwhile they besides faced obstruction on their manner to multinational. The failure in Belgium is a warning of their enlargement. As the purpose to decide the impact from economic recession, 10 Belgium stores were resolutely closed in last twelvemonth. The study analysis GEREGGS ‘ public presentation in 2008 from their one-year study, and measure its attraction of investing.Fiscal PerformanceBased on the Amalgamate Income Statement ( line 1 Appx. 1 [ Page 5 ] ) , the entire gross revenues ended 27 December 2008 increased by 7.1 % to & A ; lb ; 628.2 million ( compared to & A ; lb ; 586.3 million in 2007 ) , including a 4.4 % rise of like-for-like gross revenues growing. At the same clip, the distribution and merchandising costs rocketed from & A ; lb ; 278.7 million ( 2007 ) to & A ; lb ; 306.6 million ( 2008 ) , by 10 per centum. On the contrary, the net income before revenue enhancement reduced from & A ; lb ; 49 million to & A ; lb ; 45.1 million ( Line 9 Appx.1 [ Page 5 ] ) , a decrease of 7.8 % excepting belongings additions, restructuring costs and exceeding pension recognition, which is non really satisfactory but still acceptable under such fortunes, the clients are delicate and losing assurance. Meanwhile, the operat ing net income dropped by 2.6 per centum to & A ; lb ; 48.6 million ( 2007: & A ; lb ; 49.9million ) . Partially for the ground of the higher Significant addition in energy and ingredient costs therefore more dearly-won of the distribution and merchandising. From the figures above, 23.6 per centum of its hard currency flow contributed to assets. 41 net stores freshly set up in 2008, which are somewhat more than 34 in 2007. Second, the P/E ratio in 10.5 % is still acceptable during the vulnerable economic period of planetary crisis. Third, as a company supplying fresh nutrient, the stock list turnover was keeping at a typical high degree. What ‘s more, the working capital of company is lower than favourable line, nevertheless it dues to the low stock list and to the full usage of hard currency. Finally, the ROA and ROE ratio were keeping singular at 15.4 % and 23.0 % severally. As a investor, GREGGS is an perfectly attractive pick.PositionHarmonizing to the appraisal of GREGGS ‘ fiscal public presentation, a satisfactory consequence was obtained. The entire gross rocketed above 7 per centum, although the net net income is somewhat declined compared with 2007. The economic crisis created series of concatenation actions to the c ompany ‘s day-to-day operation. Since the significant additions in natural stuffs, a higher cost of gas, electricity and fuel straight impact on production and distribution. Meanwhile indirect effects besides raised the cost throughout the supply concatenation. What ‘s more, the increasing cost of ware affected the cost of its indispensable constituents of merchandises, such as flour, meats, wheat, and so on. In order to cover the impact of planetary rising prices, GREGGS improved their efficiency and made accommodation on selling monetary value. Although it is a manner to keep gross, a hazard of disputing clients ‘ trade name trueness merged from such action. Obviously they conquered it good by effectual work on quality, freshness, gustatory sensation and friendly service. From the figures of last Chapter, the Quick ratio besides named Acid trial is a portion of measuring liquidness in short term. It indicates if a company has adequate short-run buttockss to cover its current liabilities. A favourable figure in most of industries is 1:1, but for a nutrient company running under a tight liquidness ( Acerb trial: 36.7 % ) is besides a common happening. Another portion is long term, which is besides called Gearing ratio, measures the relationship between long term liabilities and stockholders ‘ equity. 19.3 % ( Appx.2, Cal. 19, P12 ) is an acceptable degree for stockholders, the involvements on long term debts is controlled to some extent. The company was besides engaged on betterment of their methods of bring forthing nutrient. For a long clip, GREGGS bakeshop made a bulk of its merchandises under its ain formulas, therefore a considerable regional fluctuation. In the last twelvemonth, they implemented a programme in order to consolidate their merchandises. By the terminal of 2009, 80 per centum of merchandises would be harmonized across the state. At the same clip, they responded effectual on clients ‘ demand. Set repast on lower monetary value and inventions of new spirit were introduced to consumers. Equally good as welcomed pieces such as hot sandwiches and pesto baguette would be expanded into more net stores. Besides the chief service they provided, GREGGS made a singular part on societal duty. Firstly it provided a favourable working environment and competitory intervention to employees. They provide scope of public assistances such as, private medical intervention, psychological advisers, and wagess for people. Second, a scheme named ‘ Making a Difference to Communities ‘ is good performed. The GREGGS ‘ Trust founded in 1987 was still running good on roll uping financess to back up local charity. In 2008, they raised and distributed & A ; lb ; 1.8 million assisting local communities. The GREGGS Breakfast Club is supplying free, healthy nutrient for over 6,000 primary school kids. The activities of bettering their merchandises help GREGGS with its selling place, and the repute from taging a difference to communities helps them with their societal positon. Based on the company ‘s satisfactory public presentation on fiscal place, the sensible mark of following twelvemonth would be good accomplished.Cash FlowTake a glimpse at the Cash Flow statement ( Appx.1 Page 7 ) , ( 49 ) hard currency generated from operations was & A ; lb ; 44 million, a 28.6 % decrease by & A ; lb ; 62 million ( 2007 ) , & A ; lb ; 41 million is contributed to ( 50 ) acquisition of belongings, works and equipment compared with & A ; lb ; 42 million in 2007, and ( 59 ) cyberspace hard currency from funding activities was & A ; lb ; 36 million ( 2007 ) to & A ; lb ; 15 million ( 2008 ) . First of wholly, 56.5 % of financess obtained from operations and finance activities were used in investing. Harmonizing to company ‘s program in 2009, there will be an enlargement of net stores. The proportion will travel up. On the other custodies, 7.1 per centum of its hard currency flows were generated from gross revenues. Compared with 10.5 % ( 2007 ) , the increasing cost of natural stuffs contributed to this difference. Last of all, the operations Cash Flow to Current Liabilities Ratio was 96.8 % in 2007, reveals less hard currency influxs therefore more investing of capital.Decision and RecommendationTo sum up, as the biggest nutrient retail merchant, it suffered a respectable impact from increasing universe rising prices. Without inquiry, the twelvemonth 2008 is a important point at GREGGS flight, where they accomplished an acceptable public presentation. In the following twelvemonth, a program of simplifying operations and doing farther enlargement is good prepared. A s figures mentioned before, GREGGS was keeping a comparatively high volume of stock list to equilibrate the impact of lifting cost of stuffs. Under the economic background is unbending up, it would be better to runing at low stock list. Their first measure of fiscal accomplishment in 2009 is a 3.2 per centum of addition in entire gross revenues and a 1.0 per centum of like-for-like gross revenues growing by 7th March, 2009. Sing the conditions influence on their gross revenues, it is a sensible aim. However they underestimated the recovery of the economic position and consumers ‘ assurance.MentionsGreggs Annual ReportDun & A ; Bradstreet Industry and Financial Consulting Services.Industry Norms and Key Business Ratios. Murray Hill, NJ: Dun & A ; Bradstreet Industry and Financial Consulting Services, 2002.Investopedia Dictionary. 14 May 2003. & A ; lt ; hypertext transfer protocol: //www.investopedia.com & gt ; .How do I measure a company ‘s fiscal public presentation? Rollins College Olin Library. & A ; lt ; hypertext transfer protocol: //tars.rollins.edu/olin/businessresearch/fin_perform/index.shtml & gt ;

Developmental perspective to bullying Essay

Researches have found that the nature of bullying and victimisation changes with age and differs by gender as well. It is also found that previous experiences influence the likelihood that children will become bullies and/or victims. The type of aggression and the relationship context for the aggression change as the child grows and development occurs. A general guideline can be prepared for the type of aggression and the target of aggression that emerge in different stages of development of children. (Pepler, D. , 1999) Figure 3: Type of aggression by developmental stage (Pepler, D., 1999) A Social- Ecological Systems Perspective on Bullying Social –ecological system perspective looks at bullying in terms of influence from multiple environments. Figure 4: A social-ecological framework of bullying among youth (Espelage, D. L. et al 2004) This perspective is based on the understanding that bullying does not occur in isolation. According to this principle, bullying is a phenomenon that is encouraged or inhibited as a result of the complex relationship between the different entities, namely, the individual, family, peer group, school, community and the culture. As shown in figure-1, the individual is at the centre of the social ecology. The individual involved may be a victim, bully, bully-victim or bystander. Individual factors influence the participation in bullying through different actions or inaction. An example is how the individual gender mediates the engagement in bullying. The bully, bully-victim, or bystander, all could exist in a family. This points to how the family can influence bullying behaviours. The bullying behaviour between the siblings can influence the development of bullying or victimisation in the individual at school. The social ecology includes other entities such as peers and the school as well. The social environment at school also influences bullying and victimisation. If an individual attends a school where a bullying climate exists, it is likely to be involved in bullying either as a bully, victim or any other role. The peer group often influences how the individual is likely to behave in terms of bullying. If the individual’s peer group supports bullying, then the individual is more likely to engage in bullying behaviour. The community extends the environment of the school to other areas that the individual uses. The community consists of school, peer group, family, and the individual apart from other roles that the individual interacts in day-to-day life. The culture consists of the general norms, beliefs and practices that could either support or inhibit bullying of individuals. The ecological-systems theory is based on the principle that all individuals are part of an inter-related system that consists of several roles and entities, but keeps the individual at the centre and looks at how the other entities affect the individual from the perspective of bullying. This model was put forward by Bronfenbrenner (1979). It puts forth the nature of human interaction and behaviour and how it is inter-related to other systems. According to this theory, the child is an inseparable part of a social network that consists of inter-related systems. These systems can be categorised into four: micro system, meso system, exo system and macro system. These different systems are inter-related to each other and the child is at the centre of these systems and actively involved in the interplay of these systems. The micro system pertains to the child’s relationship with one system such as home, classroom or playground. It depicts the child’s interaction with others as well as other’s reaction to the bullying behaviours. It also includes the status of the child in the bully/ victim continuum at any point of time. The micro system takes into account the interaction between the bully, victim, bully-victim or the bystander and the social environment. This can either encourage the bullying behaviour or restrict it. The meso system involves the congruence of two or more environments that are relevant to the individual. An example of such environments is home and school. It includes the inter-relationship between these systems. The exo-system consists of influences from other contexts that are related to bullying. An example of this context is the effect of a school district’s anti-bully policy or even the involvement of parents in the school system. The macro system involves the influence of broader entities such as the society in general. It looks at the attitudes of the society towards the bullying behaviour. This theory provided framework for prevention and intervention techniques that can be derived from it. It also helps to measure the effectiveness of these programs by looking at it from different perspectives. It provides framework for collection of data from multiple informants who are in different sub-systems using different methods. The model also can be effectively used for assessment. This is because each individual or the school or the environment is different. Any intervention or prevention program need to take into account this peculiarity. It also provides a framework for different programs that are applicable to different sub-systems such as individual-focussed program, family-focussed program and system-focussed program. (Espelage, et al, 2004).

Gloak's Safe-Action Advertisement Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Gloak's Safe-Action Advertisement - Essay Example The guy in the add looks like has military. Hes ex Drill Instructor at Marine Corp. He has military clothing on that civilian wear He narrates how a thug tried to kick upon the front door of house; while he was successful in opening the front door, what lied ahead of him became one of his worst night mares ever. The customer expresses his amazement at the tenacity with which a loaded Gloak protected him and his family. This is one of the many amazing stories that Gloak intends to collect through this promotional campaign. At the bottom center of the page, the Gloak spokes person asserts how she hears these remarkable stories every other day. The on-lookers are prompted to send in their stories of Gloak on Facebook page of Gloak and get a chance to appear in a Gloak ad. The paper will elaborate on the advertisement, its appearance, the target market that it is intended for, it’s branding through the advertisement, the ethos pathos and logos. It will critique the advertisement i n greater depth over its strengths and weaknesses. The Gloak ad speaks to consumers in various ways –both direct and in-direct. Through the given story, the ad speaks to the customer by telling him the gun will protect him no matter what the circumstances are. No matter how drastic the situation or how tough the encounter, Gloak will protect them.

Electricity Industry in the U.S Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Electricity Industry in the U.S - Essay Example Coal is the leading electricity generating source. In 2013, 39.1% of electricity was generated using coal. Natural Gas was second with 27.4%. The nuclear source contributed to 19.4% of the total electricity generated in that year while renewable sources like solar and wind generation had 12.9%. Other sources of electricity had the least percentage of only 1.2%. Compared to the same data recorded in 2006, the share controlled by natural gases had dropped dramatically from 70%. Nuclear energy was contributed to 20% in 2006 while renewable energy rose from 3% in 2006. However, the percentage contributed by coal was not shown in 2006. Hence, it could be assumed that a coal production is a form of electricity generation in the US. The electricity industry in the U.S is comprised of several companies and stakeholders that offer services through electricity generation, transmission and distribution. Other industrial players are domestic and commercial market operators besides product sales personnel. A survey conducted in 1996 showed that there were at least 3200 utility firms engaging in power distribution. Among the 3200 firms, at most 1000 engaged in electricity generation (Only ten were government owned while the rest were private enterprises) (Blume, 2007, p. 83). In the US, electricity transmission is carried out under the supervision of independent system operators and regional transmission firms. The electricity transmitting organization focusses at offering equity services rather than being profit oriented. These utilities and organizations are controlled by public institutions, for example, Department of energy that generates electricity policies and Environmental Protection Policies that develop environmental policies.

Social Media Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 1

Social Media - Essay Example (2008). (Ed.). IPod and philosophy: iCon of an ePoch. Wittkower D.E. (2008) explains philosophy as a concept that is all about the study of philosophical ideas and their related concepts as applied within a timeframe. In the current times, philosophical perceptions have changed as influenced by the rapidly and ever changing transition in the social media industries. History has proved that initially, artistic/ design merits were largely independent of functionality and productivity. This, with events, has been sidelined as attractive designs are currently perceived as working better and are easier to use. The varied aspects of iPod device, a portable audio player as Wittkower describes it, has philosophical characteristics that creates very close link and therefore greatly influencing the cultural practices of its users in the sense of a new venue for philosophy electronic books, a device of community or isolation among its users. In his book, Wittkower expresses that the new technol ogical inversion used in the development of iPod is a symbolic improvement and creation of change as is and will ever be experienced in the media industry. Inductively, the use of iPod is seen and experienced to unanimously present both the old and young minds as equal in its use by considering such an invention in design and an innovation in technology as a resultant of rapid information, communication, and entertainment technologies to them (users) as individuals, technologically advanced society, and the unique cultural practices in this twenty-first century. The concepts of philosophy and iPod are intertwine with a core relationship of mediation that explains the extent to which this technology together with its users-everyday’s lives and the general economy are dependent; a... In his book, Wittkower expresses that the new technological inversion used in the development of iPod is a symbolic improvement and creation of change as is and will ever be experienced in the media industry. Inductively, the use of iPod is seen and experienced to unanimously present both the old and young minds as equal in its use by considering such an invention in design and an innovation in technology as a resultant of rapid information, communication, and entertainment technologies to them (users) as individuals, technologically advanced society, and the unique cultural practices in this twenty-first century. The concepts of philosophy and iPod are intertwine with a core relationship of mediation that explains the extent to which this technology together with its users-everyday’s lives and the general economy are dependent; a true significance of change. IPod technology has to its highest levels exploited the application of emotions in engagement of its users' experiences , and the seemingly intensified interplay that exists between non-purposeful and purposeful interactivities. In summary, the sole reason of ensuring all the three design aspects is that aesthetically well done designs help users to work even better.

Teaching strategies to students with severe disabilities who are Research Paper

Teaching strategies to students with severe disabilities who are second language learners - Research Paper Example This paper shall discuss the various strategies which can be applied by the teacher in order to effectively teach students with severe disabilities who are also second language learners. Body Learning impaired students refer to students who have been diagnosed with learning disabilities, disabilities which are ranging from processing deficits (input, integration, storage, or output) (Rathus, 2010). It also includes function impairment, developmental dyslexia, dysphagia, aphasia, as well as low IQ scores. These impairments often imply that the students are not performing well in school and may be even delayed in their studies (Rathus, 2010). Second language students are those students who are in the process of learning a second language. More often than not, they may be immigrant students trying who are not native English speakers. The challenge in this case is how the teacher can communicate with the second language students, especially those students who are learning impaired. The t eacher must develop strategies in order to manage the challenges in teaching these students. Schools are institutions which represent the richness and diversity of culture and languages, including customs and traditions. For most students, parents, and other educators, establishing ways by which to instruct all children effectively and meaningfully is considered a professional and pedagogical responsibility (Lopez-Reyna, 2002). Specifically, ways to manage the knowledge which many people have established from the bilingual and special education fields have also been established by various academicians. Crucial to the process of teaching children is to secure a thorough understanding of his or her learning based on his or her specific learning skills, weaknesses, and needs (Wagner, et.al., 2005). There is a need to secure a complete and informal evaluation in order to ensure that the teacher understands what the child knows, and what he already understands. The primary assumption on learning is that there is also a need to secure a strong sense of a student’s language, his home setting, his values, and his previous experiences in his current or previous school (Lopez-Reyna, Birnbaum, 2002). There are eight principles which are considered effective in teaching English language learners (Gersten and Jimenez, 1994). These principles include the need to secure higher order thinking opportunities as well as expectations, including the higher level of involvement in one’s own learning, experiences, and cultural diversity. Suggestions on the use of mediation via visual organizers and modelling the application of appropriate resources have also been made. Support for the application of collaborative and cooperative learning has also been advocated (Calderon, et.al., 2011). A determination on which language to use for learning impaired students has often been posed. Even as the benefits of ensuring instruction in a child’s primary language has been seen in terms of general education settings, it is not clear how the learning should unfold for learning impaired students (Lopez-Reyna, 2002). Using English can be a challenge because it would take years to master the language for second language learners. In effect, teaching academic skills to students in their native language seems to be the more effective method of teaching

Position paper about what does Yemen think should be done about Syria Research

Position about what does Yemen think should be done about Syria - Research Paper Example It is important since it transformed the Yemeni government for the better of its economy and welfare of the citizens. Yemen is situated in Southwest Asia. It borders Saudi Arabia and Oman whose current occurrences affect its political activities with the trade between them taking a critical role in the politics of Yemen. Egypt is one of its allies while Iran is a foe. Yemen economy has feeble national integration with an immense population growth amid differences between the South and North of the nation. Yemen’s GDP is $1460 below other countries such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iran. Yemen became a UN affiliate in 1947. It is a member of UNDP, IOM, USAID and UNIDO. It has signed the WTO agreement with US among others with Saudi Arabia. Syria is an Arab country whose peace has been damned by the Arabian spring. Most of its citizens initiated protests, demanding for various grievances, including restoration of civil rights, halting of a position of emergency initiated in 1963 and political reforms. This situation of turbulence has affected the countries’ economy and government detrimentally. The Arab spring, as brought about by the recurrent protests and riots against poor governance in the Arab countries, has inculcated unrest in Syria, among other Arab countries such as Yemen. The protesters claim the government does not take care of unemployment, corruption, poor economy and constitutional alterations. The upsurge of violence in Syria seems to ensue even as more citizens demise in their fight for rights among other grievances. Principally, this has resulted from Assad’s reluctance to consider the demands by the citizens (Liberdom). Additionally, Syria records a deteriorating economic freedom index due to the upsurge and poor governance. If the Syrian government does not initiate peaceful democratic processes to hoist its

Contract Law assignment question Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Contract Law assignment question - Essay Example When the execution of the contract was considered the duty of the promise under legal and contractual means will come under consideration. This is dealt under 1. legal duty, 2. duty arises from the contract, 3. the duty arised from the contract. According to the UK law commission recommendations the consideration of the duty must not be against the law and public policy. This point is derived from the traditional law. Under common law the term consideration is a controversial requirement for the contracts. This is considered controversial because this is not necessary in civil law systems and it is considered in law of obligations and the contexts involving the criminal offences. This controversial thing was introduced in the law because, both the parties that entered into a contract will bargain and this bargain will come to the fore or disappears when any one breaches the contract. So, in that context, if the situation does not come under civil law the consideration term is taken f or perusal. This is for avoiding unnecessary or unintentional advantage for other party. In the case of Eastwood v. Kenyon the guardian of a young girl raised loan for her education. This is in the intention of improving her marriage prospects. After her marriage the court held that the husband need not pay the loan as the loan raised for the education of the girl was a past consideration. Two parties can enter into a future contract regarding sale and purchase. When a person is having enough goods that he can sell. for reasonable profit after a certain time and a person who wants to make profit by buying certain goods after a period of time can make a future contract. The supplier must sell the goods by

The relationship between organizational design and service behaviors Essay

The relationship between organizational design and service behaviors in the hospitality industry - Essay Example Literature suggests that customers are the most important stakeholders in the hospitality industry as all operations carried out primarily focus on gratifying the customers’ needs. As the name indicates, providing service profitably to people with consistence in quality and creating an atmosphere to make every individual feel exceptional forms the hallmark of the hospitality industry (Hogan 2008). It is said that this industry is itself a part of a larger group of industries called travel and tourism industry and together hospitality and tourism make up the largest industries in the world (Walker 2009, p. 4). As one of the biggest and fastest growing industries in the world, a vast amount of research is done as yet to evaluate the implications of organizational structure and service behaviors on the growth and success of this industry. â€Å"The hospitality industry includes the tourism lodgings, the catering companies, as well as the food and beverage departments operating w ithin the lodgings† (Kapiki 2012, p. 2247). In addition to this, other sources suggest that the transportation services which include airlines, cruises, and trains, retail stores, and recreational event planning also makes up giant blocks of the hospitality industry (Kasavana & Brook, 2007). ... helps in managing a smooth experience from check-in to billing (Reinhart 2012) and enables the employers to create a right impression on the community. It not only aids different organizations to maintain long-term success but also guides them to competitively struggle in the fierce marketplace as a way of meeting the customers’ dynamic preferences. Not only is the organizational design or structure the main factor influencing the organizational innovation (Lavado cited in Heydarinejad, Boushehri & Delfani 2011, p. 145) but also there is a growing need to incorporate flexible and organic structures where the personnel is especially trained to treat a diverse customer line and is given empowerment to participate in decision-making processes (Daft cited in Heydarinejad, Boushehri & Delfani 2011, p. 145). In the highly competitive present times, scrutinizing a range of organizational designs and approaches is critically important to retain success by any organization operating in the hospitality industry as a way of facing the competition and addressing the ever-growing demands of the customers (Caruana et al. cited in Heydarinejad, Boushehri & Delfani 2011, p. 145). Regarding the importance of service behaviors in the hospitality industry, it is claimed that â€Å"hospitality employees have the ability to affect the human experience by creating powerful impressions that may last a lifetime† (Walker 2009, p. 4). This is because since hospitality staff is under direct responsibility to serve people from diverse backgrounds, the customers’ future behavioral intentions are affected by the treatment they receive as they continue to get a taste of what the business is all about and how it is handled every time the staff interacts with them (Reinhart 2012). This essay

Obesity caused by Bulimia Nervosa Research Paper

Obesity caused by Bulimia Nervosa - Research Paper Example Eating disorders take various forms among individuals. One of the rampant instances of eating disorders that translate into obesity is binge eating. Binge eating is a behavior among obese individuals whereby they adopt eating habits that involve eating in the night. Community studies conducted revealed that binge-eating rates are high among obese eating adults as opposed to normal weight adults. There are also other factors influencing binge-eating habits. Psychological factors such as depression and anxiety affect the eating habits among individuals. Psychologically affected individuals result into adopting binge eating habits as a means of overcoming psychological stressors (Barbour 34). Another eating disorder rampant among obese individuals is emotional eating. Over eating comes as a response to the negative emotional states among individuals. Considering the fact that over eating is among the leading factors in the promotion of obesity among individuals; emotional eating constan tly leads to over eating and hence obesity among individuals. Community studies have confirmed that emotional eating is wide spread among obese adult individuals. The emotional distress among the obese individuals comes because of low morale and will power to overcome their current state of obesity. Therefore, obese individuals result into emotional eating and hence increase their levels of obesity (Kelly 78). External eating is another eating habit that promotes the prevalence of obesity within the community.

Meaning of life, Life Essay Example for Free

Meaning of life, Life Essay Suffering is an inevitable part of life. We all live in this big labyrinth of suffering. Th only way out of the labyrinth is death. † To live is to suffer, to survive to find meaning in the suffering. Few peopl e actually commit suicide to liberate themselves form suffering. Most people find meaning or purpo se for their life so that they have the motivation to live on. Some think that suffering make them wis er, some think that suffering is a test of faith, there will be rewards for them in the after life if they c an endure the suffering on earth. Some people couldnt understand but keep going on with their life for their loved ones. Some people keep themselves busy to dodge from the question. My view on this question is that suffering does not make life any more or any less meaningful. Beca use as an atheist, I believe that there is no God, the Universe does not have a divine plan for us. Tha t the existence of life is just purely a miraculous accident. When we die, we stop existing. The time we spend on Earth will not amount to anything in an afterlife in another dimension. Therefore, life i s inherently meaningless, with or without pain and suffering. Human are powerless in the face of m eaninglessness . The only way we can deal with life is to embrace the fact that there is no intrinsic va lue in life. We can only create our own meanings. One can create meaning of life with or without su ffering. But since suffering is an inseparable part of our life, it more or less give us insights on mean ing of life. Dr. Bernard Rieux can best exemplifies my point of view. When the plague got out of control and O ran was placed under quarantine, it didn’t stop the doctor form battling the plague, fighting the war t hat was doomed to fail. At this point, many would wonder what is meaning of of the doctor’s action s when they are all in vain. The answer can be found in a dialogue he shared with Tarrou. Tarrou asked the doctor why he was so committed to fighting the plague if he does not believe in G od. The doctor replied that whether or not God exist is irrelevant and he didn’t have the time to thin k about what waits him in the future and what will come out of his actions. The only thing he knew that there were sick people suffering and they needed to be cured. Even though he admitted that his struggles against death would only be temporary victories and that the plague was what he referred as an†endless struggle†, he said that this was not the reason to give up struggle. From the dialogue, we can see the doctor was aware of the intrinsic meaninglessness of his life, bec ause he said he wouldnt waste time to think about the existence of God and what his action will lea d to him. If he deemed his life has inherent meaning, he should have thought about the above questi ons. Thought he considered that his life is inherently meaningless, the plague gave me the meaning. The meaning lies in the other people. The doctor was fully aware that his attempts at lifting people out of misery is an impossible task as more and more people became infected and die. And there were no effective cure. Basically, his sitti ng around and doing nothing or wearing himself off to save the patients might just possibly lead to s ame outcome. However, the doctor did not stop his work in face of his powerlessness to alter the situation. Becaus e under this situation, he was left with only two choices, ignore it or act on it. There was no third op tion. The doctor chose the later one because he couldnt bear to see people suffer and doing nothing about it. It’s meaningless to battle the unwindable battle against the plague. It was not defeating the plague that gave meaning to the doctor. It was the people gave him meaning. It was his compassion for others that keep him going in times of suffering. From the case of Dr. Rieux and his battle against the plague, we can see similarities in the real worl d. The plague is like the amoral universe, and Dr. Rieux represents all the human beings. We are po werless in face of the meaningless of life, just as Dr. Rieux was powerless in face of the plague. But we do have a choice, we can create meanings for ourselves just as Dr. Rieux has learnt from sufferin g and found meanings in helping people. Winston Smith from 1974 1984 somewhat share some similarities with Dr. Rieux in terms of action upon the unchangeable, though he was not such a noble and heroic person as Dr. Rieux. In his case, the unchangeable was the Big Brother. Winston Smith lived in a state where every moves, every wo rds ands every thoughts he made were monitored by the Party. In the instance of living in an extrem e state where even having disloyal thought against the party is in violation of law. The meaning of li fe for Smith was not to start a revolution and topple the party, and change the system entirely. Thou gh Smith had thought about it and desired it to happen. Deep down he believed that it was impossibl e to achieve the goal and sooner or later he would be arrested by the Party. Nevertheless, he set out t o challenge the limits of the Party. He kept a diary which has† Down with the Big Brother† written o n it over and over again. He had an forbidden affair with Julia. Also he joined the Brotherhood whic h he believe is the enemy of the Party. I think the meaning for Smith did not lie in being the hero. What was important for him was to stay as human as possible. Through the rebellious acts against the Party in his own ways, he got to keep his spirit and his human side. That was the meaning he could find for himself. Despite the fact that he was completely compromised at last when he was brought into Room 101, where he was tortured to an extreme degree and indoctrinated to cure his â€Å"insaneness†. He was com pletely broke and dehumanised. His passionate hatred towards the Big Brother turned into absolute l oyalty and love. He should not be blamed for betraying Julia and not upholding what he believed in the first place in such extreme conditions. After all, he did try to rebel against the Big Brother even t hough deep down he knew he couldn’t do anything to overthrow the Big Brother. Dr. Rieux and Winston Smith resolved the question of meaning through their rebellious acts against the plague and the Big Brother. There are people who find suffering itself reveals the meaning of lif e. Father Paneloux is a good example to illustrate this point of view. In his first sermon addressing t he plague. He said that the plague was a punishment by God. That it was the result of the sin of all c itizens. He criticised the people for not attending church and repenting for their sins. Therefore the p lague was reminder of God’s power and the Oran residents should start to change their habits and st art to fear God again. Unlike Dr. Rieux, who is an atheist, Father Paneloux based his life and work on his christian faith. F rom a Christian point of view, everything happens on earth has purpose and fit into the grand plan o f God. Therefore, it was his job to make sense of the suffering of the plague so that he and the peopl e listening to him will be able to endure and continue to believe in God. From his interpretation of s uffering, the meaning of life for Father Panels was more easily understood than Dr. Rieux and Winst on Smith. The meaning of life was really simple, that is to serve and honour God in his will. Though he changes his view on suffering drastically after witnessing the death of an innocent child. He did not view suffering as a punishment anymore. He said that the reason why a innocent child sh ould suffer was not something that human would necessarily understand no matter how hard they tri ed. They just had to keep in mind that it was God’s will. One must keep his faith and God and find t he good in bad situation. In spite of a changing tone, the meaning for Father Paneloux remained the same- to serve God. To conclude, life itself is inherently meaningless. Not even religion can provide an universal answer to the meaning of life. There are no answers for that and never will be. Suffering does not make one’ s life meaningful. But through suffering one might find meanings in life and live a meaningful life. Wu Ngai Ching, Ivy 20189319 Grade: 21/25 ? 19/25 (due to 2-day late submission) Comments: ?Ivy – In terms of the main thesis of the essay, you’ve done a good job delineating your own atheist view on the meaning of life and drew 3 examples from the 2 works to discuss what m ight be the meaning of life for them. Your argumentation is quite right and your analysis of e ach of their reaciton and thoughts on this difficult question is right on. ?However, you simply â€Å"narrated† through the whole essay without really giving detailed or c oncrete evidences from the book. I wish you could provide some passages or quotes from se veral particular moments in the book to clearly illustrate your point. This is one of the ways t o demonstrate that you’ve actually done the reading, and that is also what we’ve been doing in class – making your point across by providing specific passages/instances in the book as c oncrete evidence. So please remember to do so for your final paper!

History of the Concept of Hegemony and Power

History of the Concept of Hegemony and Power The concept of hegemony is notoriously difficult to quantify both in concrete political terms and in a less tangible philosophical manner. Moreover, in a world increasingly divided upon religious as opposed to ideological lines, the concept of hegemony has suffered from a certain crisis of relevance whereby it would seem that the preponderance of resources has indeed become the central precept for the paradigm per se; whereby, furthermore, economic and cultural imperialism have united to ensure the dominance of one geo political system within the international order in the vacuum created by the dissolution of ideology and the triumph of multi national capitalism. Yet all is not quite as it seems in the modern international sphere. Current events have a distinctly repetitive feel but, at the same time, the international relations landscape is changing and re configuring its boundaries with such rapidity and vigour that definitions and sweeping statements are deemed, correctly, to be o ut of place concerning any particular sphere of international relations. Certainly, the broader subject of hegemony and inter state communication is of utmost importance in the comprehension of the new world order, though keeping track of new theories is an essentially difficult, contradictory experience, particularly at the dawn of the twenty first century. As Benno Teschke (2003:1) explains in the opening chapter of his book, The Myth of 1648, the entire subject of contemporary international relations theory is in a constant state of flux, inspired by the death of the nation state and the advent of post modernity. â€Å"The classical Westphalian system, rooted in the primacy of the modern, territorially bounded sovereign state, is being replaced by a post territorial, post modern global order. The old logic of geopolitical security is being subordinated to geo economics, multi level global governance, or the demands of a multi actor international civil society. A fundamental transformation in the structure of the international system and its rules of conflict and co operation is unfolding before our eyes.† For the purposes of the essay, it will be necessary to analyse the concept of hegemony from its origins to see how it has evolved over time and where its relevance might lie within todays post structuralist society, taking a chronological view so as to see how its conceptual meaning has altered along the way. It will likewise be necessary to examine international economic realities and histories as well as political instances of hegemony to highlight the essential duality between continuity and change – in other words, how the past might help us to better understand the present and the future, yet also how the current world order presents unique problems that were of no relevance in the past, which necessarily makes an overall academic judgement more problematic. First a definition of hegemony must be attempted. Within the context of this essay, it is extremely important to comprehend the inherently different strands of hegemony: political, military, economic and cultural. Even more noteworthy is the general interchange that is apparent between the above factors – politics merges with economics and military helps to define any given national culture, which, in turn, means that hegemony is very difficult to quantify in the essentially narrow conceptual terms of simply a preponderance of resources. It will be shown that, throughout recorded history, nations and states have used a combination of factors to control other states, all designed to increase the security of the region and underwrite the strength of the dominant geo political power. Each nation and state that has enjoyed a period of relative dominance has chosen, either through external circumstances that have been thrust upon the rulers or via a conscious, calculated ideologica l choice, to use one of the above themes of hegemony to perpetuate its power base. When a group of people takes control over the fate of another it is never via only one of the above strands – political, military, economic or cultural. Rather, there always exists a concoction of more than one of the dominant conceptual themes to achieve the sum of hegemony and though much has changed throughout the course of history, this central precept remains difficult to ignore. The key player in any discussion pertaining to hegemony and the preponderance of resources has to be the state. Certainly, as far as G. John Ikenberry (1986:53) is concerned, the interaction between any given domestic and international political economy has always been at the epicentre of international relations theory and the comprehension of the rule of empire and state elites lies in understanding the ultimate power that the state has always possessed. â€Å"As administrative and coercive organisations, states are embedded in complex political and economic environments and have a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence. Although they vary considerably, they have several elements in common. All states make exclusive claims to the coercive and juridical control of particular territories, and they also make special claims to the definition and representation of broad national interests.† In conceptual terms, hegemony is best understood as the expression of societys ruling classes over the majority of the nation or state over whom they propose to rule. Gramsci (1971:328), the interwar international relations academic and political prisoner who spent his final years behind bars in Mussolinis Italy, describes hegemony as, â€Å"a conception of the world that is implicitly manifest in art, in law, in economic activity and in all manifestations of individual and collective life.† Gramsci here describes cultural hegemony, which was of particular relevance when he was writing in the 1930s, in a world that was dominated by ideological concerns. This type of hegemony and cultural control is a constant political reality that has been a feature of culture and society since the first recorded migrations of man. Never has hegemony as an ideal simply been confined to the realms of natural resources and economic might; it has always been an intangible equation of political power expressed through the elite of any particular nation, state or empire. The much celebrated Athenians, for example, made hegemony an everyday feature of the ancient world, whereby people were defined via their status within the broader Greek political and cultural hierarchy. The Greeks underscored their cultural ideal of hegemony with language and politics, especially the concept of citizenship, which remains a key feature in the study of political and cultural hegemony today. The United States today uses its visa system, for example, to differentiate between alien visitors from within the wider plates of the hegemony that it has created. In the ancient world, Plato and Aristotle grouped the various bands of hegemony together to form what they saw as civilisation. Therefore, to be an Athenian Greek was to be a civilised member of the hegemony of the nascent nation state; to be a barbarian was to be an uncivilised member of the outposts of society, the parts where hegemony had hitherto failed to penetrate as a paradigm and as a cultural and economic force. This phenomenon has since been mirrored in the twenty first century with President Bushs with us or against us stance to global terrorism, where hegemony is once again used as the primary force in the perpetuation of the dominant military, political and economic power of the epoch. Ancient cultures used the acquisition of foreign resources to underline their superior military and cultural power, although it should be noted that the technology and logistics did not then exist to ensure the movement of goods and services across inter state borders so that the preponderance of resources could not become the only outlet of hegemony as a concept. The Middle East trade route, for instance, remained a largely autonomous cultural, political and economic region in spite of the combined power of the Greek and Roman Empires, curtailing efforts at building an Empire from the sole premise of a sound economic base. Therefore, in the ancient world, hegemony meant much more than a preponderance of resources. It implied tangible political and citizenry rights and access to a pre defined status quo that was welded by the elite members of the state and continually updated and re defined by the men and women who had access to power within the machinations of the state. Indeed, the central role of the human actors within the state system remain as relevant today as they were in the ancient world and to dismiss their relevance as secondary to the preponderance of resources would be to misinterpret the dynamics of inter state governance. Individual diplomats, ministers, parties and politics will always have a bearing on the future of both international relations as well as the concept of hegemony where economic resources are only one factor in a much larger pyramid of political and economic concerns. It thus becomes apparent that hegemony must co exist with the broader notion of empire, which is itself constructed upon the solid foundations of economic dynamism garnered through the procurement of resources. The notion of empire altered irrevocably during the dawn of modern history where industrialisation proved to be the catalyst for the significant, seismic shift in the view of hegemony as cultural, economic and political benchmark. The nineteenth century was indeed a watershed in terms of the re drawing of the conceptual parameters of hegemony. The Victorian era saw the traditional European empires of France, Belgium, Britain and Germany use their vast military and economic superiority to carve up the undeveloped world amongst each other with the procurement of raw materials and economic resources utilised as the main motivation for extra territorial action. Without doubt, it is at this juncture in world history that the preponderance of resources becomes the pre eminent factor in the power of hegemony and cultural imperialism. The Scramble for Africa, for instance, constituted a devouring of the worlds finest natural resources and raw materials; resources that were unavailable in Europe were discovered in seemingly endless abundance in Africa and the poor political and social infrastructure of the indigenous tribes meant that, militarily, it was a case of simply buying off the key local decision makers and men of influence to ensure European preponderance of locally based economic wealth. Furthermore, unlike the false promise of El Dorado that hampered the conquistadores in Latin America, the lure of previously unimaginable wealth in Africa was the determining factor behind the unprecedented and swift carving up of the African continent. The impulse for hegemony, in this instance, was therefore the possibility of individual accumulation of economic empire as well as the broader national acquisition of another nations indigenous wealth. Charles Tilly (1985:172) explains how the extraction of resources from local producers and traders in Africa was the most important development for the edification of European hegemony in the undeveloped world and for the structure of the contemporary world order today. â€Å"The quest inevitably involved them in establishing regular access to capitalists who could supply and arrange credit, and to imposing one form of regular taxation or another on the people and activities within their sphere of control.† Industrialisation was therefore the central difference between nineteenth century views of imperial hegemony and that which was witnessed in the ancient and medieval worlds. Resources became, for the first time, the main concern of empire builders. This period in world history is also important for what it implies about the motives of the European leaders and rulers who embarked upon their scramble for Africas resources. What is immediately noticeable when reading the primary sources of these explorers was the way in which they attempted to hide their true (economic) motive from view. The first British travellers to the dark continent promulgated the view that the Europeans were on a civilising mission to save the Africans from a life of pagan sin. Moreover, they said, their religious and missionary zeal would inevitably rub off on the political and economic mood of the continent so that, in effect, the Africans would wish to copy their European partners in order to better help thems elves in the long term; politically, economically and socially. To achieve this end, the Europeans thus tied the notion of political territorial acquisition to the preponderance of resources by controlling the mechanisms of the fledgling states as well as the production of raw materials and natural resources. The nineteenth century partition of the undeveloped world by the most powerful industrial states of the age thus left a legacy that is of the utmost relevance for the topic of hegemony in todays twenty first century society. As economic resources become increasingly scarce in the contemporary world, the major Western powers must find ways of securing the holding of resources while covering up the raw economic reasons for doing so. One can see, as Chomsky and Vidal attest, a certain similarity between the contemporary US symptom of national security and the war on terror and the Victorian ideal of a missionary zeal. Significantly, both propaganda spins fail to recognise that the preponderance of resources is the real reason why these states have found themselves fighting foreign wars and stationing troops so very far from their own national borders in the recent past. Of added significance was the fact that the Victorian experimentation with imperialism showed, for the first time, how a state might achieve supreme power with resources and capital based outside of the national territorial borders. Susan Strange (1988:2) sees this as the most important step in the development of true imperial hegemony in the West; the point where a modern nation has the ability to dictate key economic policy far beyond its own national, geo political borders. â€Å"The location of productive capacity is far less important than the location of the people who maker the decisions on what is to be produced, where and how, and who design, direct and manage to sell successfully on a world market.† At this point it makes sense to shift the focus of our investigation from a broader viewpoint of historical instances of hegemony to a dissection of the most important contemporary topic within the confines of the essay title. The key contemporary actor within the study, without a doubt, must be the United States, the source of the preponderance of twenty first century economic resources and the still the most potent post modern military force on the planet. As the eminent British historian, E.H. Carr (1992:292), writing on the eve of the Second World War, testified, hegemony is a by product of realism; an essentially Darwinist view of politics that suggests a discernibly detectable survival of the fittest in international affairs. The unassailable American hegemony of the post modern age is best understood within this wholly realist context. â€Å"To attempt to ignore power as a decisive factor in every political situation is purely utopian. It is scarcely less utopian to imagine an international order built on a coalition of states, each striving to defend and assert its own interests.† Since 1945 the USA has built its empire upon the twin pillars of the military and its insatiable consumer economy, even going so far as to re model the state to the tune of the desires of the political economy. The National Security Act (1947), for example, which oversaw the formation of the CIA, was the first in a long history of decrees and acts designed to ensure the longevity of the republican model and the destruction of all of its ideological enemies in the process. Gore Vidal (2004:95 96) explains the dynamic nature of American national security policy, post 1945, a policy that deemed aggression as the best form of political and economic defence. â€Å"When Japan surrendered, the United States was faced with a choice: either disarm, as we had done in the past and enjoy the prosperity that comes from releasing so much wealth and energy into the private sector, or maintain ourselves on a fully military basis, which would mean a tight control over our allies and such conquered provinces as West Germany, Italy and Japan.† It is important to understand that Washington wishes its control of the globe not to be limited to its dominance of world economic resources; rather, hegemony, as it is understood in 2005, is a varied political, economic and cultural phenomenon that wishes to export the very ethos of the United States as well as importing the wealth generated by the nations pre eminent economic position. To date, the United States has used language, technology and the military to acquire its vast array of economic resources and likewise uses its dynamic corporate ethic to underpin the strategies of the imperial national government. Therefore, to see the preponderance of resources as the only specific aim of American hegemony in the twenty first century is to miss the point entirely. As previously outlined, the American government understands the essential interplay between the various features of hegemony. Certainly, the USA has used economics as its basis for the extension of power witnessed since 1 945 but the ideology of the most awesome capitalist country on the planet has been held in place via the spread of its symbolic features to every corner of the globe (except, of course, for large swathes of the Middle East, which is a source of much of the antagonism between the two diametrically opposed sections of the new global economy). Various international relations commentators have noted the way in which imperial America uses brand names such as MacDonalds and Nike to increase the economic and cultural hegemony of the US Empire, leaving fast food restaurants and designer clothes chains as castles by proxy. As Chomsky (2003:13) succinctly puts it: â€Å"The goal of the imperial grand strategy is to prevent any challenge to the power, position and prestige of the United States.† Theories have abounded concerning the so called decline of American hegemony, largely circulating since the oil crisis in the 1970s, which first highlighted the fragility of the preponderance of key natural resources in the post modern world. Susan Strange disagrees fundamentally with international relations commentators such as Nye, who see Americas decline as an inevitable by product of the notion of both hegemony and Empire, essentially dictating that from Rome to Byzantium to Britain any attempt to secure global pre eminence must end in the destruction of that political and economic model. She argues that the USA is a unique case that shows no signs of the fragmentation that beset its historical precedents. Essentially, this means that US notions of hegemony are not solely tied to economic factors pertaining to the preponderance of resources; its survival and indeed growth rests upon the fact that the USA ideal of hegemony is far more flexible than many critics give it credit f or. As Cox (2005:21) underscores, the issue of American hegemony entails far more than a swelling of the national treasury at the expense of extra territorial economic resources. â€Å"One of the more obvious objections to the idea of a specific American empire is that, unlike the real empires in the past, the United States has not acquired, and does not seek to acquire the territory of others. This in turn has been allied to another obvious objection: that the United States has often championed the cause of political freedom in the world. How then can one talk of empire when one of the United States obvious impulses abroad has been to advance the cause of national democracy and self determination?† The issue of hegemony in contemporary times is further hampered by the ambiguity and uncertainty that surrounds the ultra contentious geo political and economic topic of globalisation. Not only have scholars found globalisation extremely difficult to define but it also poses unique problems of conceptual bracketing. It is supposedly an economic question (intrinsically tied to the preponderance of resources) yet in practice, globalisation appears to be little more than an extension of American political hegemony, namely the spread of democracy to every reach of the globe as the initial platform on which to launch a visionary global hegemony. Whereas the nineteenth century European empires formulated the concept of the preponderance of natural resources as the most vital step on the way to the establishment of their brand of hegemony, the Americans in the twenty first century have used technology, particularly their corporate dominance of new media and the Internet to strengthen their dominant position in the world economy. Globalisation therefore is tantamount to Westernisation, which is itself a direct descendent of Americanisation. According to Sinclair et al (2004:297), â€Å"world patterns of communication flow, both in density and direction, mirror the system of domination in the economic and political order,† and in this way it can be shown how US hegemony is built upon sterner raw materials than the mere preponderance of economic resources. Indeed, logic dictates that if the USAs global hegemony was only standing upon the prevalence of resources, then its position would be nothing like as contentious as it is in the broader world order, constituting the front line of the new global disorder, as Robert Harvey describes it. Indeed, Harvey (2003:455) already views the concept of global hegemony as outdated, requiring five separate but interconnecting strands of economic and politic pro action to keep the status quo alive in the future. â€Å"These then are the five great areas of change necessary to avoid a state of global political economic anarchy: the establishment of superpower policing to combat terrorism and to prevent conflicts breaking out all over the world, through an efficient system of regional alliances and deterrents, backed up by the threat of major superpower intervention; the widening and deepening of global democracy; the regulation of the global economy through co operation between the three economic super states of the next few decades – America, Europe and Japan – in co operation with regional groupings of the rest of the world; a gigantic government primed stimulus for demand and development in the three quarters of the developing world untouched by globalisation; and reform from within of the capitalist corporation.† Conclusion The analysis of hegemony and power bases throughout history shows that the prevalence of resources is but one factor in a multi faceted chain of command that requires a strong military and political infrastructure as well as a flourishing economic base to prevail. The upsurge in interest that the topic of hegemony has generated in recent years has been due to the power of the worlds one remaining superpower alone. Hegemony has become synonymous with Americas quest for global dominance and various commentators have cited the contemporary â€Å"war on terror† as nothing but a smokescreen for the increasing garnering of resources, particularly oil in the Middle East. Indeed, Vidal (2004:7) compares the â€Å"war on terror† to a â€Å"war on dandruff†; such is his confusion over what the notion actually means. There is no doubt that it is this perceived neo imperialism that is at the heart of the current negativity surrounding the concept of hegemony and its continued association with solely (Western) economic motives. However, it should be noted that a significant change in the global order is currently under way, one in which the Americans will have to broker what Strange (1988:17) refers to as a series of â€Å"New Deals† with autonomous international states in order to remain a leading economic force. The advent of China, in particular, as the twenty first centurys most potent consumer and industrial society will undoubtedly challenge the very ideal of American and Western hegemony and will necessarily require a re drafting of the USAs preponderance of resources. Hegemony must, in effect, adapt to a discernible duality and spirit of inter state co operation that the concept has not known in the past. The concept of hegemony therefore has value far beyond the preponderance of res ources as the evolving concept of globalisation is in the process of emphasising. As globalisation begins to take hold as an economic, cultural and political reality, the effects of hegemony will be felt in all areas of the world that wish to be part of the dissolution of the concept of the nation state and the embracement of a new political and economic world order. History of the Concept of Hegemony and Power History of the Concept of Hegemony and Power The concept of hegemony is notoriously difficult to quantify both in concrete political terms and in a less tangible philosophical manner. Moreover, in a world increasingly divided upon religious as opposed to ideological lines, the concept of hegemony has suffered from a certain crisis of relevance whereby it would seem that the preponderance of resources has indeed become the central precept for the paradigm per se; whereby, furthermore, economic and cultural imperialism have united to ensure the dominance of one geo political system within the international order in the vacuum created by the dissolution of ideology and the triumph of multi national capitalism. Yet all is not quite as it seems in the modern international sphere. Current events have a distinctly repetitive feel but, at the same time, the international relations landscape is changing and re configuring its boundaries with such rapidity and vigour that definitions and sweeping statements are deemed, correctly, to be o ut of place concerning any particular sphere of international relations. Certainly, the broader subject of hegemony and inter state communication is of utmost importance in the comprehension of the new world order, though keeping track of new theories is an essentially difficult, contradictory experience, particularly at the dawn of the twenty first century. As Benno Teschke (2003:1) explains in the opening chapter of his book, The Myth of 1648, the entire subject of contemporary international relations theory is in a constant state of flux, inspired by the death of the nation state and the advent of post modernity. â€Å"The classical Westphalian system, rooted in the primacy of the modern, territorially bounded sovereign state, is being replaced by a post territorial, post modern global order. The old logic of geopolitical security is being subordinated to geo economics, multi level global governance, or the demands of a multi actor international civil society. A fundamental transformation in the structure of the international system and its rules of conflict and co operation is unfolding before our eyes.† For the purposes of the essay, it will be necessary to analyse the concept of hegemony from its origins to see how it has evolved over time and where its relevance might lie within todays post structuralist society, taking a chronological view so as to see how its conceptual meaning has altered along the way. It will likewise be necessary to examine international economic realities and histories as well as political instances of hegemony to highlight the essential duality between continuity and change – in other words, how the past might help us to better understand the present and the future, yet also how the current world order presents unique problems that were of no relevance in the past, which necessarily makes an overall academic judgement more problematic. First a definition of hegemony must be attempted. Within the context of this essay, it is extremely important to comprehend the inherently different strands of hegemony: political, military, economic and cultural. Even more noteworthy is the general interchange that is apparent between the above factors – politics merges with economics and military helps to define any given national culture, which, in turn, means that hegemony is very difficult to quantify in the essentially narrow conceptual terms of simply a preponderance of resources. It will be shown that, throughout recorded history, nations and states have used a combination of factors to control other states, all designed to increase the security of the region and underwrite the strength of the dominant geo political power. Each nation and state that has enjoyed a period of relative dominance has chosen, either through external circumstances that have been thrust upon the rulers or via a conscious, calculated ideologica l choice, to use one of the above themes of hegemony to perpetuate its power base. When a group of people takes control over the fate of another it is never via only one of the above strands – political, military, economic or cultural. Rather, there always exists a concoction of more than one of the dominant conceptual themes to achieve the sum of hegemony and though much has changed throughout the course of history, this central precept remains difficult to ignore. The key player in any discussion pertaining to hegemony and the preponderance of resources has to be the state. Certainly, as far as G. John Ikenberry (1986:53) is concerned, the interaction between any given domestic and international political economy has always been at the epicentre of international relations theory and the comprehension of the rule of empire and state elites lies in understanding the ultimate power that the state has always possessed. â€Å"As administrative and coercive organisations, states are embedded in complex political and economic environments and have a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence. Although they vary considerably, they have several elements in common. All states make exclusive claims to the coercive and juridical control of particular territories, and they also make special claims to the definition and representation of broad national interests.† In conceptual terms, hegemony is best understood as the expression of societys ruling classes over the majority of the nation or state over whom they propose to rule. Gramsci (1971:328), the interwar international relations academic and political prisoner who spent his final years behind bars in Mussolinis Italy, describes hegemony as, â€Å"a conception of the world that is implicitly manifest in art, in law, in economic activity and in all manifestations of individual and collective life.† Gramsci here describes cultural hegemony, which was of particular relevance when he was writing in the 1930s, in a world that was dominated by ideological concerns. This type of hegemony and cultural control is a constant political reality that has been a feature of culture and society since the first recorded migrations of man. Never has hegemony as an ideal simply been confined to the realms of natural resources and economic might; it has always been an intangible equation of political power expressed through the elite of any particular nation, state or empire. The much celebrated Athenians, for example, made hegemony an everyday feature of the ancient world, whereby people were defined via their status within the broader Greek political and cultural hierarchy. The Greeks underscored their cultural ideal of hegemony with language and politics, especially the concept of citizenship, which remains a key feature in the study of political and cultural hegemony today. The United States today uses its visa system, for example, to differentiate between alien visitors from within the wider plates of the hegemony that it has created. In the ancient world, Plato and Aristotle grouped the various bands of hegemony together to form what they saw as civilisation. Therefore, to be an Athenian Greek was to be a civilised member of the hegemony of the nascent nation state; to be a barbarian was to be an uncivilised member of the outposts of society, the parts where hegemony had hitherto failed to penetrate as a paradigm and as a cultural and economic force. This phenomenon has since been mirrored in the twenty first century with President Bushs with us or against us stance to global terrorism, where hegemony is once again used as the primary force in the perpetuation of the dominant military, political and economic power of the epoch. Ancient cultures used the acquisition of foreign resources to underline their superior military and cultural power, although it should be noted that the technology and logistics did not then exist to ensure the movement of goods and services across inter state borders so that the preponderance of resources could not become the only outlet of hegemony as a concept. The Middle East trade route, for instance, remained a largely autonomous cultural, political and economic region in spite of the combined power of the Greek and Roman Empires, curtailing efforts at building an Empire from the sole premise of a sound economic base. Therefore, in the ancient world, hegemony meant much more than a preponderance of resources. It implied tangible political and citizenry rights and access to a pre defined status quo that was welded by the elite members of the state and continually updated and re defined by the men and women who had access to power within the machinations of the state. Indeed, the central role of the human actors within the state system remain as relevant today as they were in the ancient world and to dismiss their relevance as secondary to the preponderance of resources would be to misinterpret the dynamics of inter state governance. Individual diplomats, ministers, parties and politics will always have a bearing on the future of both international relations as well as the concept of hegemony where economic resources are only one factor in a much larger pyramid of political and economic concerns. It thus becomes apparent that hegemony must co exist with the broader notion of empire, which is itself constructed upon the solid foundations of economic dynamism garnered through the procurement of resources. The notion of empire altered irrevocably during the dawn of modern history where industrialisation proved to be the catalyst for the significant, seismic shift in the view of hegemony as cultural, economic and political benchmark. The nineteenth century was indeed a watershed in terms of the re drawing of the conceptual parameters of hegemony. The Victorian era saw the traditional European empires of France, Belgium, Britain and Germany use their vast military and economic superiority to carve up the undeveloped world amongst each other with the procurement of raw materials and economic resources utilised as the main motivation for extra territorial action. Without doubt, it is at this juncture in world history that the preponderance of resources becomes the pre eminent factor in the power of hegemony and cultural imperialism. The Scramble for Africa, for instance, constituted a devouring of the worlds finest natural resources and raw materials; resources that were unavailable in Europe were discovered in seemingly endless abundance in Africa and the poor political and social infrastructure of the indigenous tribes meant that, militarily, it was a case of simply buying off the key local decision makers and men of influence to ensure European preponderance of locally based economic wealth. Furthermore, unlike the false promise of El Dorado that hampered the conquistadores in Latin America, the lure of previously unimaginable wealth in Africa was the determining factor behind the unprecedented and swift carving up of the African continent. The impulse for hegemony, in this instance, was therefore the possibility of individual accumulation of economic empire as well as the broader national acquisition of another nations indigenous wealth. Charles Tilly (1985:172) explains how the extraction of resources from local producers and traders in Africa was the most important development for the edification of European hegemony in the undeveloped world and for the structure of the contemporary world order today. â€Å"The quest inevitably involved them in establishing regular access to capitalists who could supply and arrange credit, and to imposing one form of regular taxation or another on the people and activities within their sphere of control.† Industrialisation was therefore the central difference between nineteenth century views of imperial hegemony and that which was witnessed in the ancient and medieval worlds. Resources became, for the first time, the main concern of empire builders. This period in world history is also important for what it implies about the motives of the European leaders and rulers who embarked upon their scramble for Africas resources. What is immediately noticeable when reading the primary sources of these explorers was the way in which they attempted to hide their true (economic) motive from view. The first British travellers to the dark continent promulgated the view that the Europeans were on a civilising mission to save the Africans from a life of pagan sin. Moreover, they said, their religious and missionary zeal would inevitably rub off on the political and economic mood of the continent so that, in effect, the Africans would wish to copy their European partners in order to better help thems elves in the long term; politically, economically and socially. To achieve this end, the Europeans thus tied the notion of political territorial acquisition to the preponderance of resources by controlling the mechanisms of the fledgling states as well as the production of raw materials and natural resources. The nineteenth century partition of the undeveloped world by the most powerful industrial states of the age thus left a legacy that is of the utmost relevance for the topic of hegemony in todays twenty first century society. As economic resources become increasingly scarce in the contemporary world, the major Western powers must find ways of securing the holding of resources while covering up the raw economic reasons for doing so. One can see, as Chomsky and Vidal attest, a certain similarity between the contemporary US symptom of national security and the war on terror and the Victorian ideal of a missionary zeal. Significantly, both propaganda spins fail to recognise that the preponderance of resources is the real reason why these states have found themselves fighting foreign wars and stationing troops so very far from their own national borders in the recent past. Of added significance was the fact that the Victorian experimentation with imperialism showed, for the first time, how a state might achieve supreme power with resources and capital based outside of the national territorial borders. Susan Strange (1988:2) sees this as the most important step in the development of true imperial hegemony in the West; the point where a modern nation has the ability to dictate key economic policy far beyond its own national, geo political borders. â€Å"The location of productive capacity is far less important than the location of the people who maker the decisions on what is to be produced, where and how, and who design, direct and manage to sell successfully on a world market.† At this point it makes sense to shift the focus of our investigation from a broader viewpoint of historical instances of hegemony to a dissection of the most important contemporary topic within the confines of the essay title. The key contemporary actor within the study, without a doubt, must be the United States, the source of the preponderance of twenty first century economic resources and the still the most potent post modern military force on the planet. As the eminent British historian, E.H. Carr (1992:292), writing on the eve of the Second World War, testified, hegemony is a by product of realism; an essentially Darwinist view of politics that suggests a discernibly detectable survival of the fittest in international affairs. The unassailable American hegemony of the post modern age is best understood within this wholly realist context. â€Å"To attempt to ignore power as a decisive factor in every political situation is purely utopian. It is scarcely less utopian to imagine an international order built on a coalition of states, each striving to defend and assert its own interests.† Since 1945 the USA has built its empire upon the twin pillars of the military and its insatiable consumer economy, even going so far as to re model the state to the tune of the desires of the political economy. The National Security Act (1947), for example, which oversaw the formation of the CIA, was the first in a long history of decrees and acts designed to ensure the longevity of the republican model and the destruction of all of its ideological enemies in the process. Gore Vidal (2004:95 96) explains the dynamic nature of American national security policy, post 1945, a policy that deemed aggression as the best form of political and economic defence. â€Å"When Japan surrendered, the United States was faced with a choice: either disarm, as we had done in the past and enjoy the prosperity that comes from releasing so much wealth and energy into the private sector, or maintain ourselves on a fully military basis, which would mean a tight control over our allies and such conquered provinces as West Germany, Italy and Japan.† It is important to understand that Washington wishes its control of the globe not to be limited to its dominance of world economic resources; rather, hegemony, as it is understood in 2005, is a varied political, economic and cultural phenomenon that wishes to export the very ethos of the United States as well as importing the wealth generated by the nations pre eminent economic position. To date, the United States has used language, technology and the military to acquire its vast array of economic resources and likewise uses its dynamic corporate ethic to underpin the strategies of the imperial national government. Therefore, to see the preponderance of resources as the only specific aim of American hegemony in the twenty first century is to miss the point entirely. As previously outlined, the American government understands the essential interplay between the various features of hegemony. Certainly, the USA has used economics as its basis for the extension of power witnessed since 1 945 but the ideology of the most awesome capitalist country on the planet has been held in place via the spread of its symbolic features to every corner of the globe (except, of course, for large swathes of the Middle East, which is a source of much of the antagonism between the two diametrically opposed sections of the new global economy). Various international relations commentators have noted the way in which imperial America uses brand names such as MacDonalds and Nike to increase the economic and cultural hegemony of the US Empire, leaving fast food restaurants and designer clothes chains as castles by proxy. As Chomsky (2003:13) succinctly puts it: â€Å"The goal of the imperial grand strategy is to prevent any challenge to the power, position and prestige of the United States.† Theories have abounded concerning the so called decline of American hegemony, largely circulating since the oil crisis in the 1970s, which first highlighted the fragility of the preponderance of key natural resources in the post modern world. Susan Strange disagrees fundamentally with international relations commentators such as Nye, who see Americas decline as an inevitable by product of the notion of both hegemony and Empire, essentially dictating that from Rome to Byzantium to Britain any attempt to secure global pre eminence must end in the destruction of that political and economic model. She argues that the USA is a unique case that shows no signs of the fragmentation that beset its historical precedents. Essentially, this means that US notions of hegemony are not solely tied to economic factors pertaining to the preponderance of resources; its survival and indeed growth rests upon the fact that the USA ideal of hegemony is far more flexible than many critics give it credit f or. As Cox (2005:21) underscores, the issue of American hegemony entails far more than a swelling of the national treasury at the expense of extra territorial economic resources. â€Å"One of the more obvious objections to the idea of a specific American empire is that, unlike the real empires in the past, the United States has not acquired, and does not seek to acquire the territory of others. This in turn has been allied to another obvious objection: that the United States has often championed the cause of political freedom in the world. How then can one talk of empire when one of the United States obvious impulses abroad has been to advance the cause of national democracy and self determination?† The issue of hegemony in contemporary times is further hampered by the ambiguity and uncertainty that surrounds the ultra contentious geo political and economic topic of globalisation. Not only have scholars found globalisation extremely difficult to define but it also poses unique problems of conceptual bracketing. It is supposedly an economic question (intrinsically tied to the preponderance of resources) yet in practice, globalisation appears to be little more than an extension of American political hegemony, namely the spread of democracy to every reach of the globe as the initial platform on which to launch a visionary global hegemony. Whereas the nineteenth century European empires formulated the concept of the preponderance of natural resources as the most vital step on the way to the establishment of their brand of hegemony, the Americans in the twenty first century have used technology, particularly their corporate dominance of new media and the Internet to strengthen their dominant position in the world economy. Globalisation therefore is tantamount to Westernisation, which is itself a direct descendent of Americanisation. According to Sinclair et al (2004:297), â€Å"world patterns of communication flow, both in density and direction, mirror the system of domination in the economic and political order,† and in this way it can be shown how US hegemony is built upon sterner raw materials than the mere preponderance of economic resources. Indeed, logic dictates that if the USAs global hegemony was only standing upon the prevalence of resources, then its position would be nothing like as contentious as it is in the broader world order, constituting the front line of the new global disorder, as Robert Harvey describes it. Indeed, Harvey (2003:455) already views the concept of global hegemony as outdated, requiring five separate but interconnecting strands of economic and politic pro action to keep the status quo alive in the future. â€Å"These then are the five great areas of change necessary to avoid a state of global political economic anarchy: the establishment of superpower policing to combat terrorism and to prevent conflicts breaking out all over the world, through an efficient system of regional alliances and deterrents, backed up by the threat of major superpower intervention; the widening and deepening of global democracy; the regulation of the global economy through co operation between the three economic super states of the next few decades – America, Europe and Japan – in co operation with regional groupings of the rest of the world; a gigantic government primed stimulus for demand and development in the three quarters of the developing world untouched by globalisation; and reform from within of the capitalist corporation.† Conclusion The analysis of hegemony and power bases throughout history shows that the prevalence of resources is but one factor in a multi faceted chain of command that requires a strong military and political infrastructure as well as a flourishing economic base to prevail. The upsurge in interest that the topic of hegemony has generated in recent years has been due to the power of the worlds one remaining superpower alone. Hegemony has become synonymous with Americas quest for global dominance and various commentators have cited the contemporary â€Å"war on terror† as nothing but a smokescreen for the increasing garnering of resources, particularly oil in the Middle East. Indeed, Vidal (2004:7) compares the â€Å"war on terror† to a â€Å"war on dandruff†; such is his confusion over what the notion actually means. There is no doubt that it is this perceived neo imperialism that is at the heart of the current negativity surrounding the concept of hegemony and its continued association with solely (Western) economic motives. However, it should be noted that a significant change in the global order is currently under way, one in which the Americans will have to broker what Strange (1988:17) refers to as a series of â€Å"New Deals† with autonomous international states in order to remain a leading economic force. The advent of China, in particular, as the twenty first centurys most potent consumer and industrial society will undoubtedly challenge the very ideal of American and Western hegemony and will necessarily require a re drafting of the USAs preponderance of resources. Hegemony must, in effect, adapt to a discernible duality and spirit of inter state co operation that the concept has not known in the past. The concept of hegemony therefore has value far beyond the preponderance of res ources as the evolving concept of globalisation is in the process of emphasising. As globalisation begins to take hold as an economic, cultural and political reality, the effects of hegemony will be felt in all areas of the world that wish to be part of the dissolution of the concept of the nation state and the embracement of a new political and economic world order.

Strategies for an Inclusive Classroom Setting

Strategies for an Inclusive Classroom Setting Robyn Clark Contents Introduction Explanation of key terms Literature Study Gender Roles Cultural and Racial Identity Example of cChecklist Written Report on findingsFindings School A School B Suggestions Resources Introduction Explanation of key terms Anti-bias Oxford Dictionary gives the definition of bias as â€Å"[the] inclination or prejudice for or against one person or group, especially in a way considered to be unfair†. Thus, anti-bias is an approach implemented to ensure that bias does not occur in any context in the classroom environment. â€Å"In an anti-bias classroom, children learn to be proud of themselves and of their families, to respect human differences, to recognize bias, and to speak up for what is right† (Derman-Sparks Edwards, 2010: 5) Identification According to Gestwicki (2014:261) identification is the process of imitating or adopting ideas of admired individuals. Diversity Diversity refers to a range of different things. In the context of this paper, it refers to differences in the following aspects cultures, learners, learner’s backgrounds, languages and ability groups. Multi-cultural Multi-cultural education is an adaptive process that incorporates Education the idea that all learners have equal opportunities in school, regardless of their gender, sexual orientation, social class, and ethnic, racial or cultural characteristics (Banks, 2013: 1) Gender Identity Awareness of gender in biological terms that an individual is either male or female Prejudice Prejudice is defined as a â€Å"judgement or opinion, against or in favour of a person or thing formed beforehand or without due examination of the facts† (Lemmer, Meier van Wyk, 2012: 31). Stereotypes According to Oxford Dictionary, a stereotype is defined as a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing. A stereotype is when one creates â€Å"mental cages in order to place people items or events into conceptually specified groups† (Lemmer, Meier van Wyk, 2012) Culture Culture is a multi-faceted concept, composed of many interrelated aspects, all of which have an influence on the teaching and learning process. According to Coetzee, van Niekerk Wydeman (2008) cultures are processes of social and human interactions; embrace a body of knowledge; dynamic, creative and continuous processes; continuously modified over time and every culture has its own system of values, beliefs, norms and attitudes. Race Race refers to a group of people who are grouped together or classified according to a common physical characteristic, such as the colour of their skin. Racial / Cultural Identity Understanding of one’s racial or ethnic understanding (Gestwicki, 2014: 262) Literature Study An anti-bias approach to education aims at developing a sense of self-awareness in each individual, fostering a sense of appreciation, tolerance and understanding for the differences between children and cultures, and highlighting the similarities between them. Instilling an anti-bias approach is particularly important in Early Childhood Development. There are four core goals of anti-bias education, namely; children demonstrate self-awareness, confidence, family pride, and positive social identities; each child expresses comfort and joy with human diversity and is able to use accurate language to describe human differences as well as form deep human connections; children increasingly recognize unfairness and are able to describe unfairness, understanding that unfairness hurts; and children will demonstrate empowerment and the skills to act, with others or alone, against prejudice and/or discriminatory actions (Derman-Sparks Edwards, 2010). Anti-bias includes bias relating to gender, race, culture, religion, disability, age and language. This approach aims at incorporating different cultures fully into the environment in an inclusive, integrated and on-going process, avoiding superficial representations, isolated and trivial representations., and patronizing events (Gordon Browne, 2014:259). Children as young as two years old begin to notice differences in race and gender, as well as form categories and classifications about the world, and people, around them (Gordon Browne, 2014 : 258). During their early years, children begin to develop socially and emotionally. Identification, the process in which a child imitates an admired individual in their environment, takes place during these formative years, and is a key step in a child’s development, particularly pertaining to personality and social development. According to Gestwicki (2014: 261) the identification process is related to issues of acquiring gender or sex-role identities, acquiring cultural or racial identities as well as developing a sense of self-confidence and personal competence. For optimal learning, children derive meaning from what is being taught by connecting the new knowledge with what they already know. Thus it is crucial that each child’s own cultural or family reference is reflected in their learning environment. A child’s experiences â€Å"are embedded in the social exchange within their own cultural groups and their frame of reference, which reflect[s] the shared meanings and experiences of those groups† (Meier Marais, 2012:130) Gender Roles During their Early Childhood years, children begin to form their gender identities. A gender identity is composed of two different aspects; an awareness of sexual identity, such as whether they are male or female biologically, and an awareness of sex-role behaviour. Sex-role behaviour, often determined by the culture, is the different roles and behaviours of the two genders. A child seeks to understand what being male or female means, and learns about the different roles through observation and asking questions. Before the age of four, children often engage in gender neutral games, wherein boys and girls play together comfortably. Thereafter, children tend toward gender-specific forms of play, and choose to play with children of the same sex (Gestwicki, 2014:261). Children learn about their gender roles through observation and imitation of those in their immediate environment. Thus parents and teachers, and the way in which they encourage gender roles and model specific gender charac teristics and behaviour also have a profound influence on the child’s gender role perceptions. Their perceptions of gender role are also influenced by the media, and stereotyping in their immediate surroundings and society. In order to steer clear of gender stereotyping in the classroom, teachers need to be mindful of their words and actions in the class that could be perpetuating gender stereotypes (Gordon Browne, 2014:124). In a predominantly female environment, such as early childhood education programmes, one needs to aware of the behaviour they model, and ensure that the environment, materials, examples used, as well as expected behaviour are fair and non-bias, and cater to boys too. Although there are developmental differences between the genders, in the rate of maturity, as well as the rate of physical growth, there are â€Å"no significant differences between girls and boys intelligence and reasoning behaviour† (Gordon Browne, 2014: 124). Consequently, teache rs should not hold unequal expectations for the genders, as this inhibits the child’s ability to reach their full potential (Meier Marais, 2012: 139). In order to avoid gender based bias, teachers need to be actively involved in self-reflection and be engaged in a constant state of awareness of their expectations and the behaviour they are emulating, and the effect these expectations and behaviours have on a child’s growth and development. During a child’s formative years, the child is in the process of forming a healthy gender identity, and the teacher is actively involved in aiding in this development. According to Gestwicki (2014:274) teachers facilitate this development when they answer child’s questions about their bodies and themselves in a factual manner. Teachers also offer experiences and scenarios that challenge stereotypes of gender behaviour as well as organise the children’s environments to encourage cross-gender play. Teachers should also be mindful of language and images in books, and teaching materials, to ensure diversity in work and home life is portrayed. It is also essential that teac hers work closely with learner’s families, and are aware of the possible cultural influences that could influence a parents views on non-traditional gender roles. It is important to maintain open communication to avoid tension, and to better understand and be respectful of the child as well as their family and background. One also needs to be actively challenging child’s stereotypical words or actions, and â€Å"[t]eachers [RC1]intervene with immediate and follow-up activities to counter [the] cumulative, hurtful effects of these messages† (Derman-Sparks Edwards, 2010). A healthy gender identity is very important to a child’s development, and it is during their formative years that this identify is formed and moulded. It is the teacher’s ethical responsibility to provide an environment and classroom-culture that is free from bias and stereotypes. The teacher should be actively trying to eliminate bias, and to intervene when children use actions or comments that are stereotypes or bias. It is important that a teacher remain mindful of their own perceptions of gender roles and actively model behaviour and language that is free from bias and stereotypes. Cultural and Racial Identity Creating an anti-bias environment that conveys a genuine respect for all diversity fosters positive attitudes towards cultural and racial identities. It is crucial that the core aims of an anti-bias approach (Derman-Sparks Edwards, 2010) are achieved, and the structures and processes are in place to effectively achieve these aims. South Africa is a multi-faceted and diverse country, with multiple different cultures and races. Diversity however â€Å"not only constitutes groups such as ethnic, race, language and religious groups† (Lemmer, Meier van Wyk, 2012: 19) but also the range of personal differences between the individuals within the different ethnic groupings. In the classroom setting, each teacher and child is a unique individual, with unique and â€Å"distinct set of beliefs, values and attitudes to form a complex and unique classroom culture† (du Plessis, Conley du Plessis, 2007). Culture is a complex human phenomenon, and in the multi-cultural education per spective, â€Å"culture can be viewed as a composite of significant and interrelated aspects, all of which have specific significance for the teaching-learning process† (Coeetzee, van Niekerk Wydeman, 2008:117). Unfortunately there are learners that enter the class with preconceived prejudices that they have picked up from their home environment or immediate surroundings. According to the SAHRC report of racism in schools, â€Å"[l][RC2]earners approach schools with the prejudice imbued in their home environments† and it is necessary to â€Å"transform the minds of learners†. It is not only parents attitudes that instil a sense of prejudice in young children’s lives; other sources include â€Å"school, classmates, siblings and the media† (Lemmer, Weier van Wyk, 2012:32). As some children are entering the classroom with prejudices, it is essential that the teacher is proactive and actively deals with those prejudices and stereotypes as and when they arise. It is important that the teacher acknowledges and respects the different cultures in their class, and ensures that this respect is incorporated in all aspects of the daily programme. It is the teacher’s r esponsibility to ensure that the all interactions, materials and experiences convey respect for all people. It is important to bear in mind that education is a â€Å"powerful agent of cultural transmission and preservation† (Coeetzee, van Niekerk Wydeman, 2008:118). According to Gestwicki (2014: 277) teachers must be aware of what is included or excluded in the classroom environment, as this is a clear reflection of what is valued by the educational institution and teachers. A lack of respect for the varying cultures in the class, or a serious cultural alienation could lead to cultural isolation, cultural erosion, learning problems, behaviour problems, conflict and communication problems (du Plessis, Conley du Plessis, 2007:152). Young children are aware of cultural and racial differences, and their perceptions of these differences and different cultures are developed and moulded during their pre-school years. According to Gestwicki (2014: 262) children, by the age of four, are aware of their racial or cultural identity and have absorbed attitudes, negative and positive, towards their own and other’s identities. Thus it is crucial that young children are taught to respect one another’s differences, enjoy and cherish human diversity, as well as use accurate and non-bias or stereotypical language for human differences (Derman-Sparks Edwards, 2010). Although differences between individuals and cultures are discussed, the similarities between them are also emphasised and celebrated. Children learn to identify with one another through their similarities and to respect their differences. Teachers should create a classroom environment that will â€Å"allow optimal learning in a climate of safety, car e and acceptance† (Coeetzee, van Niekerk Wydeman, 2008:119). Children feel accepted in a classroom community when they see themselves, their families and their cultural background reflected in every aspect of their school day. â€Å"All children and families have a sense of belonging and experience affirmation of their identities and cultural ways of being† (Derman- Sparks, 2010) To ensure anti-bias in their classrooms, and to make sure that their class and curriculum reflects the plurality of their contemporary society, teachers must ensure that all pictures and books realistically portray the diversity in the class, and give a realistic and well-rounded view of different cultures, avoiding stereotypes and over simplification (Gestwicki, 2014:276). They should endeavour to provide toys, materials and activities throughout the class that children can identify with, that represent their various families as well as the â€Å"major groups in the community and nation† (Gestwicki,2014:278). Content about different ethnic groups should to fully integrated into the curriculum, and should occur regularly and naturally, not as an appendage to the curriculum. Different cultures should be discussed in depth and holistically, and teachers should maintain open and constant communication with parents and families to ensure that they too fully understand the children ’s backgrounds in their class. Parents should be fully involved, and invited to school regularly to share songs, stories or traditions of their cultural and language background (Gestwicki, 2014:278). Language Religion Disablity Language Example of checklist Facility: _________________________________________ Address: ________________________________________ Manager: ________________________________________ Telephone Number: _______________________________ SECTION A SECTION B Interview questions Interviewee: ______________________________Interviewer: ____________________ Position: _________________________________Time: _________________________ How does your selection process work? What process do you use to divide your classes? Collectively, do your staff speak / understand a range of South African languages? What is your school’s language policy? How do you ensure each child’s unique family is reflected in the classroom? Do you consider your facility open and non-bias towards all families? Including gay-lesbian families, single parents, cross-cultural families and adoptive families? How does your curriculum reflect the diverse nature of our society? How do you communicate with the learners families? What is your policy regarding learners with physical disabilities? How do you deal with different religious holidays? Do you do Bible stories in your Morning Ring? Are the meals you prepare catered to all religions / cultures? Do you cater for gender differences in your educational activities and art activities? How do you deal with bias, racism or stereotypes in the classroom or on the playground? Do you consider your facility to be anti-bias? Participants Name: ________________________Signature_________________Date: __________ Name: ________________________Signature_________________Date: __________ Name: ________________________Signature_________________Date: __________ Written Report on findings School A School B Suggestions Resources Banks, J. A. 2013. An Introduction to Multicultural Education. 5th Edition. Pearson: New Jersey Coetzee SA, Van Niekerk EJ Wydeman JL. 2008. An Educators Guide to Effective Classroom Management. First Edition. Van Shaik: Pretoria Deiner, P. L. 2010. Inclusive Early Childhood Education: Development, Resources Practice. 5th Edition. Wadsworth Cengage Learning Derman-Sparks, L Edwards, J. 2010. Anti-Bias Education for Young Children and Ourselves. National Association for the Education of Young Children. Washington, DC. Du Plessis, P; Conley, L du Plessis E. 2007. Teaching and Learning in South African Schools. First Edition. Van Shaik: Pretoria Gestwicki, C. Developmentally Appropriate Practice : Curriculum and Development in Early Education. 5th Edition, International Edition. Wadsworth Cengage Learning Gordon, AM and Browne, KW. 2014. Beginnings and Beyond. Foundations in Early Childhood Education. 9th Edition. Boston: Ally Bacon Lemmer, E. M; Meier, C van Wyk, J.N. 2012. Multicultural Education: A manual for the South African teacher. Second Edition. Van Shaik: Pretoria Meier C Marais P. 2012. Educational Management in Early Childhood Development. Second Edition. Van Shaik: Pretoria Mittler, P. 2000. Working Towards Inclusive Education: Social Contexts. First Edition. David Fulton Publishers: 2000 Recchia, S.L Lee, Y. 2013. Inclusion in the Early Childhood Classroom: What Makes a Difference? First Edition. Teachers College Press: New York Vally, S Dalamba, Y. 1999. Racism, racial integration and desegregation in South African public secondary schools. A report on the study by South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC). Johannesburg: SAHRC Department of Education (2011). Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement Grades R-3 English Home Language. Pretoria: Department of Basic Education Department of Education, National Protocol for Assessment, Gr R -12 (CAPS). Pretoria: Department of Basic Education [RC1] [RC2]?