Poisonwood Bible Character Analysis Essay

In the book The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, the narration is done by five of the main characters: Orleanna, Rachel, Leah, Adah, and Ruth May Price. When analyzing the narrative led by Leah Price, a 14-year old tomboy, the reader may notice her progression from a young girl who idolizes her father and loves him more than anyone else, into a rebellious young woman who despises her father. Some of Leah’s more prominent characteristics are her compassion and devotion. These characteristics are portrayed from the very beginning when Leah follows her father around even saying that, â€Å"I know he must find me tiresome, yet I still like spending time with my father very much more than I like doing anything else† (Kingsolver 36). In that context, Leah is still a young girl, who basically worships her father and does everything he does, loves everything he loves, but he does not give her anywhere near that much love in return. This is also evident on pages 41-42; she goes on about how awesome her father is and how admirable he is, almost justifying her idolizing him. Also, Leah states that â€Å"His devotion to its progress, like his devotion to the church, was the anchoring force in my life throughout this past summer† (64). These things are very important because it shows just how much Leah’s persona is affected by her father, also how influential he is on her beliefs (with emphasis on religion). After one has read the book The Poisonwood Bible and begins analyzing the text, one may notice that in the first part, there are events between the females of the Price family, and the father. In Book One, Genesis, in Leah’s narrative, starting on page 64, she describes a situation where her and her sisters were accused of teaching Methuselah (their parrot) a bad word. Going on to page 68, it appears that the girls were not actually responsible, but the emotionally jarring part is in the second paragraph of that page when she says, â€Å"Once in a great while we just have to protect her,† and Leah goes on to explain how her mother is chastised by her father, for â€Å"sins of womanhood.† Consequently, it seems as though these happenings were just the flint and steel of a fire in the making, most apparently in Leah. The first notion of rebellion starts on page 101, Leah’s narrative, but the strike is on page 115 when she announces, â€Å"For the first time ever I felt a stirring of anger against my father for making me a white preacher’s child from Georgia.† This strike failed to start a sustainable fire, as obviously when she goes with her father to Leopoldville, and actually says upfront, that she and her father â€Å"have patched things up.† Also when she explains to Mrs. Underdown how her father knows what’s best â€Å"in the sight of the Lord,† and that they were all â€Å"privileged to serve.† In this case, it is two steps forward, away from her father, but one step back. Leah’s next big step forward comes in Book Three, The Judges, when she begins to truly doubt her father: If his decision to keep us here in the Congo wasn’t right, then what else might he be wrong about? It has opened up in my heart a sickening world of doubts and possibilities, where before I had only faith in my father and love for the Lord. Without that rock of certainty underfoot, the Congo is a fearsome place to have to sink or swim. (244) Kingsolver uses imagery, so the reader might begin to see what Leah is seeing, and relate to her statements; her doubtful mind of her father could be very easy for readers to understand, maybe not all are able, but those who are may create an attachment to this character. People might say that the world is a place full of lies, deceit, and pain. Others might say that truth, justice, and happiness are just as common, or need to be. Leah has a strong sense of justice, and she believes that her father provides just that, but then she starts asking, â€Å"What if he’s wrong?† and that opens her mind to imagine her father, who was everything she believed was good and right in the world, her idol, as someone who isn’t so great after all; he made a mistake. As a result of this, she rebels, and starts turning away from her father. â€Å"Leah is the cause of all our problems†¦Leah would rare up and talk back to Father straight to his face†¦Leah always had the uppermost respect for Father, but after†¦ they voted Father out, she just plumb stopped being polite† (335). That quote is from Rachel’s narrative in Book Four, Bel and the Serpent; she continues to explain how Leah’s rebellion against their father began when she tried to go hunting with the men. Eventually, Leah’s contempt toward her father caused her to leave behind everything she loved because he loved it, mainly her religion. She continued was always very intelligent, and she grew up and became a teacher, but she was still a tomboy at heart, and she was still devoted, not to her father, but to her husband instead. Leah Price, a 14-year old tomboy who once idolized her father completely, became a woman married to a man of Kilanga, who opposed her father; she no longer believed in the God of her father, she live d among the people of Africa and married an African man. She was no longer a duckling to her father, but her own complete person who had her own opinion and beliefs and independence.

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buy custom She Loves a Challenge essay 1. The four stages of team development included: (a) solving employees private issues; (b) solving employees collective issues; (c) implementation of new rules and motivation; (d) the continuity of the system, promoted by old workers with changed models of collective action. According to Tuckmans teamwork theory, they can be defined as forming, storming, norming, and performing respectively (The Happy Manager, n.d.). The first stage included one-to-one sessions with each employee that was aimed at revealing personal motives and principles of interaction with the rest of the staff. The director explained the above-mentioned as a difficult start with the purpose of changing personal attitudes. The second stage required the confrontation of employees altogether to ensure revealing, discussing and eliminating the basis for future confrontations. The aim of this stage was explained clearly and honestly. The director agreed that it was an extremely difficult task, but it was also of crucia l importance for future collective interaction in a positive way. The next stage was about the implementation of the new rules, which excluded potential threats of conflict behavior. The rules were explained in a strict manner, though by motivation of the staff followed it. Overall, this stage of team development is characterized as implementing new principles of collective conduct, shifting accents from I/me to us/we. The director reasoned that unity of action and thought at work provides a positive-thinking environment that enhances the productivity. The last stage was the succession of a new paradigm of collective action. This time, old employees with brand new model of cooperative interaction were sharing it with individuals that wanted to fit this system. Thus, the circle of succession was closed and the new model became fixed and permanent. 2. In this case, the directors strategy affected team spirit and team work. These notions are different because team spirit mainly means the characteristic of psychological atmosphere of the staff, whereas teamwork is the process of collaborative completing the task in order to achieve the set goal (How to Build, n.d.). If every individual from the staff shares collective values and appreciates the views of ones colleagues without confronting them, such staff can be characterized as the one that has team spirit. Organizations can experience serious troubles while lacking team spirit. Even a well-organized and planned venture may fail its objectives without the commitment of the team behind it. Building team spirit is about engaging the emotions of the team members (How to Build, n.d.). In its turn, team-work is the process affected by the existence of the team spirit. When every individual trusts his or her colleagues, it will assist an effective teamwork. Thus, a team is more than a group of people, aimed at the achievement of a collective goal. It is a group of people, which strength is based on the relationships among team members. Members of such group are interdependent. An ideal team is characterized by the feedback and communication behaviors of its members, their behavior and conduct courtesies, and their ways of approaching tasks and problems (Nazzaro Starazzabosco, 2009). This particular case has stressed team spirit in order to change it and improve the characteristics of the teamwork. 3. MBWA is a practice of team building that has full name as Management By Wandering Around, or Management By Walking About. This concept includes approaches aimed at active interaction of a director or a staff manager with his or her team. Experts say this practice can increase the potential of a team through the influences on staff approachability, trust, business knowledge, accountability, morale and productivity (Management By Wandering Around, n.d.). All in all, this practice makes a director an active member of the life of ones staff, providing him or her with persistent contact with the team. In connection to the studied case, such choice of a management approach by the director serves as evidence that she is an open-minded person, willing to take part in daily life of her team and be able to assist it whenever there is a need. The case also serves as an example of great teambuilding skills the director has. Judging from the presented case, one may assume the results of the ab ove-mentioned approach were extremely productive as it was supported by the evidence. The director observed positive effect of her methods of teambuilding: employees seemed to become closer together, all sources of confrontations were excluded, and the staff worked according to the new principles of work. 4. Dr. Shaheen used various methods for motivating her employees. Her usual accent was on the unproductiveness of selfish behavior while being a part of a team. The behavior of the director in this sense goes along with McClellands theory of learned needs. According to this approach, a person is led by three motivation factors in ones life: achievement, affiliation, and power (McClellands Human Motivation Theory, n.d.). Dr. Shaheen first referred to achievement, stating that the team is to successfully achieve its tasks and be productive. Then, she shifted to affiliation, applying to the fact that hand-in-hand work provides a great experience of cooperation. Power was mentioned the last, insisting that a united team can achieve greater goals than a usual group of people. Thus, the director used a comprehensive method of motivating her team. Another positive fact about her approach is that she did not try to motivate the team with money. Motivation by material things has a short-term perspective, but more important goals and challenges need a ground that is more stable than finance. More than that, the question of difference in wages may lead to confrontation of one member of a team with another. If I happened to be a consultant observing Dr. Shaheens performance, I would advise her to conduct sociometric studies from time to time. I believe that this procedure would add more objective information concerning the relations inside the team because sociometric measurement methods give insights about an individuals social competence and standing within an examined group (Busse, 2009). Such analysis would make it possible to ensure minor corrections in the attitudes of team members towards each other. Buy custom She Loves a Challenge essay

Art History: Traditional and Contemporary Essay artist, art, painting

Today, society call many â€Å"works† produced by individuals and call themselves artist, but is it really art? If you were to try to determine a definition for the word: art, you would find it to be an elusive word. I recently observed a landscaper cut and shop a pine tree which had overgrown in size. Although, some would say the pin... ...know it will go eventually the way of the west. Art is important to learn and to appreciate while we have the means to do so. Incorporating all of the elements which make for traditional or modernistic art is in the hands of this generations and like the mentors of yesterday, today we need to look around us for the next Rembrandt or Picasso. Tomkins, Calvin. Time Life Library of Art: The World of Marcel Duchamp. New York: Time Incorporated, 1966. Print Coughlan, Robert. Time Life Library of Art: The World of Michelangelo. New York: Time Incorporated, 1966. Print Getlein, Mark. Living with Art. 10th ed. New York: McGraw Hill, 2011. Print Lynton, Norbert. The Story of Modern Art. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 2008. Print Eimerl, Sarel. Time Life Library of Art: The World of Giotto. New York: Time Incorporated, 1966. Print

Expansion & growth is the topic to write about Essay

Expansion & growth is the topic to write about - Essay Example Later, in the 16th century, California became under the control of Spanish and British colonizers. Gradually, the settlers began to control the indigenous population. The Bear Flag Revolt in the year 1846 in California is symbolic of the rebellious attitude of the settlers and the formation of California Republic. The California Gold Rush (say, between1848 and1855) is another major period in the history of California. During this period, the influx of immigrants in search of gold changed the distribution of population in California. Later, the Compromise of 1850 led to the formation of California as a free state within the United States of America. Earlier than European colonization, California was sparsely populated because the Native Americans used to settle in different areas of California. The European settlement resulted influx of immigrants and rapid urbanization. To be specific, the California Gold Rush or the influx of gold-seekers resulted in the rapid urbanization of California. The small settlements in California rapidly transformed into towns and cities. Now, California enjoys the largest gross state product (GSP) among the states within the United States of America. Ignacio Gonzalez stated that â€Å"In February 2001, California’s unemployment rate dropped to 4.5 percent, the lowest level since the late 1960s† (351). The growth in GSP is most important because it represents the expansion and growth of California. In the present condition, the Californian economy depends upon international trade and commerce. Transportation facilities in California consist of the network of roads (freeways, expressways and highways), airways (commercial and general aviation), seaports (for example, Port of Los Angeles) and rail lines (intercity rail lines, light rail systems etc). Summing, the expansion and growth of California from a small settlement area to a free state and its development is interconnected

Management Accounting Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Management Accounting - Essay Example In the ABC approach, the costs are computed based on the activities and not on the labour or machine hours. Each activity has a cost driver attached to it and the ABC system utilises this cost driver to distribute the costs among the products (12 Manage, 2008). When the ABC Costing approach was followed, the profit margin per unit for Parrot was recorded as  £ 87.09 and that for Toucan was computed as  £ 63.88. In this case, the difference of profit per unit amounts to only  £ 23.21. ABC system indicates that the profit from Toucan is actually higher as opposed to the absorption costing system. Also, the cost drivers indicate that the M/C setup takes up a high amount of costs as the overheads. Hence it is made evident that the number of setups has to be reduced. This will result in higher profits for Bird Gardens (Cokins, 2001). In order to analyse the efficiency and to increase the profits of the company, it is essential to follow the ABC

Human Resource Planning and Forecasting Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Human Resource Planning and Forecasting - Essay Example *Granny Toy Company must also make sure that the strategy of the business is linked with the performance of its employees. The Company may also allow employees to design the objectives for the Company because it is then that they will be able to develop a better understanding of the goal and will work accordingly to accomplish it. This will also result in improved performance of the employees. * Granny Toy Company must try to work hard to retain the talented workforce of the Company, as the employees are considered to be an important asset of the company. For this purpose the Company must design an effective compensation and benefit plan for its employees. *The flexible environment provided by the Company to the employees also affects the staffing process. The environment of the Company must be easily adaptable i.e. it should be flexible enough that new employees can easily adjust in it. *When new employees are being hired by the Company for their expansion and additional products it is important that the Granny Toy Company gives them enough time to develop their skills and adjust in the organizational environment. They must train them with the skills essential for the position they are about to cover. Sometimes time can be an essence for Granny Toy Company. In such a case it will be effective that the company selects employees with the required skills within the organization i.e. the internal supply of employees, as it will save a lot of time and will reduce the HR cost. *The external environment forecasting (Event based forecasting) may also impose certain impact on staffing needs of the competitors existing in the industry. *Some legal factors such as certain laws related to the labor and some socio economic factors such as the number of women working in the respective industry etc. may also affect the staffing process of Granny Toy Company; therefore the company must foster

Adaptive Market Hypothesis and Behavioural Finance

Adaptive Market Hypothesis and Behavioural Finance An Essay on the Relationship between Andrew Lo’s Adaptive Market Hypothesis and Behavioural Finance 1.0  Introduction When in 1936, Keynes compared financial markets to a beauty contest where competitors had to guess who the most popular choice would be, he did not imagined that economists would become fascinated with the contest for explaining the efficiency or inefficiency of that market. Indeed, the global financial crisis of 2008 brought to bare the bitter rivalry between traditional finance theorists and their behavioural counterpart over the realism of assumptions explaining competitive market equilibrium, rational choice theory and rational expectations. Prior to the crisis, the dominant view in mainstream economics and finance (as exemplified in the assumptions of efficient market hypothesis) had been that: individuals are broadly rational, risk averse, maximize their expected utility of wealth, and follow the tenets of subjective probability theory. Hence, the capital market is seen as perfect and generating financial returns which are unforecastable. To put it more aptly in the words of Fa ma (1970), â€Å"prices fully reflect all available information†, an idea that has come to be known as market efficiency. However, the fallout from the financial crisis saw a bourgeoning interest in behavioural economics due mainly to the failings of traditional economic theory to explain many observed market anomalies. Behavioural economists pointed out a number of basic logical mistakes in the efficiency reasoning, which they attributed to behavioural biases and cognitive limitations, which are universal to human decision-making under uncertainty. Some of the documented biases cited in Lo (2004) include overconfidence, loss aversion, overreaction, psychological accounting, herding, miscalibration of probabilities, hyperbolic discounting and regrets. Accordingly, the behaviourists opine that these biases provided evidence that markets are not only inefficient, but that its participants are often irrational. Herein lies the intellectual crux of the debate, which has continue to shape the study and practice of economics and finance. Indeed, while some economists may want to uphold their firm beliefs in market efficiency and rationality, others may as well seek alternative approaches in behavioural finance. Between these two approaches, however, there may be economists who seek for a compromise. This is where Andrew Lo classic work on the adaptive market hypothesis readily falls in. This essay proceeds as follow; section two explain the Adaptive Markets Hypothesis, its theoretical postulations and relationship with behavioural finance, section three critically examine this relationship, and section four concludes the essay. 2.0The Adaptive Markets Hypothesis (AMH) Explained Andrew Lo’s adaptive market hypothesis was based on evolutionary principles of competition, mutation, reproduction and natural selection in biology. Lo, in his 2004 seminal article on the Adaptive Market Hypothesis, suggests that â€Å"individual makes choices based on past experience and their ‘best guesses as to what might be optimal, and they learn by receiving positive or negative reinforcement from the outcomes, (and) if they receive no such reinforcement, they do not learn.† Thus, the AMH implied that investor behaviours such as overreaction, loss aversion, overconfidence, and other behavioural biases are constructed and shaped by a dynamic interplay between investors’ internal cognition and their external environment that then produces evolutionary traits, in which heuristics develop, transform, boom or die out depending on the market settings. As an example, if a market setting is stable, heuristics is likely to yield an optimal or rational choice for investors. While an unstable market environment characterized by risks and uncertainties, yield various forms of behavioural biases. In such instances, ‘rational’ decisions are always evolving as investors’ develop a new set of heuristics in reaction to a changing market environment. These views was developed further by Lo (2005), where he highlighted the main propositions of the AMH to include that: Individuals act in their own self-interest. Individuals make mistakes. Individuals learn and adapt. Competition drives adaptation and innovation. Natural selection, shapes market ecology. Evolution determines market dynamics. In this context, Andrew Lo’s AMH can be said to revolve around three main processes of heuristics development, learning, and an adaptation process of decision making, whose combined impacts on financial institutions help determine market efficiencies, and the waxing and waning of investment products, industries, and even individual and institutional fortunes (Lo, 2005). 2.1The Adaptive Market Hypothesis and Behavioural Finance The uncertainty associated with efficient market hypothesis had led behavioural finance scholars to offer a departure from fully rational behaviours in finance models to behavioural biases or heuristics amongst investors that arguably explains human decision makings under uncertainty. Indeed, most empirical literature on behavioural finance have explained well-recognised market anomalies which contrast standard finance theories. Some of these studies include Kahneman and Tversky (1979), Bernard and Thomas (1990), Benartzi and Thaler (1995), Mehra and Prescott (2008), etc. however, none of this literature was able to present a coherent alternative model that could match the dominancy of standard finance literature. Fama (1998) aptly capture this non-coherence in their arguments when he said, â€Å"a problem in developing an overall perspective on long-term return studies is that they rarely test a specific alternative to market efficiency, instead the alternative hypothesis is vague, market inefficiency.† Thus, Andrew Lo’s AMH was one main attempt at providing a philosophical and theoretical foundation for behavioural finance. Indeed, one stated objective in Lo’s 2004 classic article was to reconcile understandings from efficient market hypothesis with behavioural finance and psychology. Like behavioural finance, AMH explains loss aversion, equity price premium, overreaction, momentum based trading strategies, and other heuristic driven biases by the fact that in a dynamic market environment, investors develop new sets of mental frames or heuristics to solve various economic challenges. Specifically, using Herbert Simon’s notion of bounded rationality, Lo (2004) pointed out that the presence and persistence of behavioural biases can be best understood when we appreciate the fact that cooperation, competition, market-making behaviour, general equilibrium, and disequilibrium dynamics are all adaptations designed to address certain environment challenges for the huma n species and then view these forces from the lens of evolutionary biology. Besides, Lo posits that fear and greed – which behaviourists often cite as a basis for irrational decision making are the products of evolutionary forces and adaptive behaviours that enhance the odds of survival. In this situation, emotions may be seen as an incentive system that determines investors’ behaviour and prompt them to engage in a cost-benefit analysis of various investment plans available to them. Consequently, there are no fixed rules for evaluating trading strategies as depending on market conditions, investors can engage in trade; truncate it at various points and observe the consequences of their actions. For example, where investors are timely in their investment decisions, they come back and dominate the market; if on the other hand, they are poor in market timing, they are easily eased out of the market. Hence, according to Lo supposition, market efficiency can-not be appraised in a vacuum, because is extremely context dependent and dynamic, thus resu lting in a cycle of a mental frame selection process in which investors grow, mutate and thrive or face extinction (Lo, 2004). Moreover, under the AMH, market strategies evolve to adapt to an ever changing market environment, and is driven by profit opportunities, which according to Lo, is the main source on which market participants depend for their survival. One other main aspect of behavioural finance which the AMH shed light on is the existence of arbitrage opportunities. According to Lo, arbitrage opportunities appear and disappear due to adaptive responses to a changing market environment. In this fashion, investors adapt to match new economic challenges, by developing new heuristics that are necessary to evaluating any investment strategy and which in turn depends upon its survival value. Although profitability and risk reduction values are also important factors to consider, Lo pointed out that these factors come after investors have undergone this fundamental market test. So what are the implications of the AMH for efficient markets and behavioural finance? Lo (2004) briefly outlines these implications to include that The equity risk premium are non-constant over time, but changes according to the recent path of the stock market. Risk/reward relations are nonlinear and non-stable. Arbitrage opportunities exist from time to time Investment strategy, waxes and then wane depending on the environment Adaptation and innovation are keys to survival Survival is the only objective that matters. 3.0AMH or EMH? An evaluation Fama (1998) emphasize that any alternative model to market efficiency ought to follow standard scientific rule, and should itself be potentially rejectable by empirical tests. Thus, in evaluating the relationship between AMH and behavioural finance, it is essential to consider an empirical test of how AMH differ significantly from the efficient market hypothesis (EMH), which the behaviourists seek to discard. While various tests of market efficiency had been designed over the years using standard financial models in EMH, tests of AMH are relatively few given that the hypothesis has yet to become part of the mainstream of financial economics. However, an increasing number of studies had reported results which seems consistent with the AMH. Some of these studies include Neely, et al (2009) and Kim, et al (2011). Whereas Neely, et al (2009) found some regularities in profit opportunities that appear and disappears in a foreign exchange market, Kim, et al (2011) found strong evidence tha t return predictability is driven by changing market conditions. These findings implied that testable implications of AMH can be done by testing how the level of efficiency in a market varies significantly over time. Furthermore, another possible way to conceptualise a test of the AMH may be to investigate whether investment decisions are made based on selectivity and market timing since evolutionary principle implied that natural selection shapes market ecology. In this context, Hoffman, et al (2013) found some evidence of market learning during the financial crisis. As a matter of fact, conventional econometric tests for market efficiency using formal asset pricing models such as Sharpe 1964 CAPM and Merton’s 1973 discrete time version of ICAPM would have been relevant alternative models to investigate these testable implications of AMH. Therefore, rather than see Lo’s AMH as a behavioural alternative to market efficiency, it is better regarded as another strand of efficient market hypothesis. 4.0Conclusion This essay has discussed the adaptive market hypothesis and examined its relationship with behavioural finance. We conclude that whereas the AMH offers a philosophical foundation for analysing various behavioural anomalies described by behavioural finance, its theoretical underpinning however, reflects that of the efficient market hypothesis. References Benartzi, S., and Thaler, R., (1995), â€Å"Myopic loss aversion and the equity premium puzzle†, Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 110: 73-92. Bernard, V., and Thomas, J., (1990), â€Å"Evidence that stock prices do not fully reflect the implications of current earnings for future earnings†, Journal of Accounting and Economics, vol. 13: 305-340. Fama, E., (1970), â€Å"Efficient Capital Markets: A Review of Theory and Empirical Work†, Journal of Finance, vol. 25(2): 383–417. Fama, E., (1998), â€Å"Market efficiency, long-term returns, and behavioral finance, Journal of Financial Economics, vol. 49(3): 283-306. Hoffman, A.I., Thomas, P., and Joost, M.E., (2013), â€Å"Individual investor perceptions and behaviour during the financial crisis†, Journal of Banking and Finance, vol. 37(1): 60-74 Kahneman, D., and Tversky, A., (1979), â€Å"Prospect theory: An analysis of decision under risk†, Econometrica, vol. 47: 263–291. Kim, J., Lim, K., and Shamsuddin, A., (2009), â€Å"Stock return predictability and adaptive markets hypothesis: Evidence from century-long U.S. data†, Unpublished. Lo, A., (2004), â€Å"The Adaptive Markets Hypothesis: Market Efficiency from an Evolutionary Perspective†, Journal of Portfolio Management, 30th Anniversary Issue; 15-29 Lo, A., (2005), â€Å"Reconciling efficient markets with behavioural finance: the adaptive markets hypothesis†, Journal of Investment Consulting, vol. 7(2): 21-44. Mehra, R., and Prescott, E., (2008), â€Å"The equity premium: ABC’s Handbook of the Equity Risk- Premium†, North Holland, Amsterdam: The Netherlands. Merton, R., (1973), â€Å"An intertemporal capital asset pricing model†, Econometrica, vol. 41: 867–887 Neely, C., Weller, P., and Ulrich, J., (2009), â€Å"The Adaptive Markets Hypothesis: Evidence from the Foreign Exchange Market† Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, vol. 44(2): 467-488. Sharpe, W., (1964), â€Å"Capital asset prices: a theory of market equilibrium under conditions of risk†, Journal of Finance, vol. 19(3): 425-442