The Road Not Taken Essay Example for Free

The Road Not Taken Essay Every adult faces challenges and life-altering decisions. In â€Å"The Road Not Taken† by Robert Frost this dilemma is brought to life. The character in the poem has free will to choose whichever path he wants. He is completely unaware of what his choice will bring but he leaves it to chance. He knows he has to make a choice and that it is impossible to know whether or not it is the right choice. He knows that no matter what his choice is he will always wonder what his life would have been like had he chosen the other path. In reality there is no right or wrong path. There are only decisions and outcomes. The theme of decision making in this poem takes a â€Å"seize the day† approach. No matter the outcome the traveler knows he still must make a decision and make the best of it. The setting of the poem takes place in the woods. The character is standing there studying a forked path. It is ironic that both paths are seemingly the same, they are both intriguing to the traveler and he wishes that he could travel them both. The forked path is symbolic of life and all of its many choices that must be made. Just as the character is unaware of what his choice may bring, outcomes of adult choices do not always turn out as expected. The title of the poem â€Å"The Road Not Taken† is significant. The poem is named after the path that was ultimately not chosen, leaving the reader to believe to think it was written with regret. In stanza 4 the regret is brought to light with a metrical device. â€Å"Sigh† is an onomatopoeia that emphasizes the characters regret or relief. That one word makes the reader want to go back and reread the poem to make sure the theme is understood. The traveler is either regretting his decision that he made or he is relieved that he made the best choice for himself. It is left up to the reader’s interpretation to discover what the poet was trying to say. Some other metrical devices used are imagery, symbolism, personification, rhyming, alliteration, and allegory. The reader is presented with imagery in â€Å"two roads diverged in a yellow wood† and again in â€Å"And both that morning equally lay in leaves no step had trodden black†. This gives the reader something to visualize. Personification is used in â€Å"because it was grassy and wanted wear. † A road cannot produce a feeling to want wear. The rhyme scheme of ABAAB in this poem produces interest and makes for an entertaining read. Alliteration is used when the poet writes â€Å"wanted wear†. Allegory presents itself when the poet writes about the two paths when his ulterior message is about choices. All of the devices used in the poem support the poets overall theme. Out of all of the â€Å"roads† faced in life the roads not chosen to take have just as much impact as the roads that are chosen. There is no way of knowing the outcome of a decision unless you make the decision and see what happens. You may be happy with that choice, or you may sigh and wish you had made a different choice. Some of the choices you make are final, the poet makes light of this when he writes â€Å"I doubted if I should ever come back†. It is as if he knows that he will not ever be returning to â€Å"The Path Not Taken†. The poet allows the reader to come to their own imaginations, ideas, and outcomes in this poem. This is a poem that can be interpreted many different ways.

Essay --

Dear President, As you very well know, climate change is one of the biggest challenges of the current age. While few countries in the area are able to work on mitigation and adaption, The Republic of Congo has been diligent in passing laws that can further preserve our planet. I am writing this letter to talk about what positive impacts have come from the recent laws set in place, as well as advise a plan for furthering the mitigation of climate change in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Two new laws have been passed stating that the removal of any natural resources from the rainforest, including trees and minerals, is permanently banned. Timber and mining companies may no longer operate in the rain forest. In addition, to decrease the poaching of animals and trees in the rainforest, a drastic increase in the penalties for poaching will be issued and the consequences are up to and including potential life in prison. Also a large increase in the funding of efforts to prevent poaching and capture poachers has been set in place. In retrospect to the new laws put into place, there will be pros and cons of the effect that the law has on the Ba’aka people, the logging and mining workers, the poachers of bushmeat and ivory, and congolese environmentalists. The Ba’aka peoples nomadic lifestyle is less damaging to the rainforest environment because it allows the group to move without over-exploiting the local game and forest resources. Most African forest people spend much of the year near a village where they trade bush meat and honey for manioc, produce, and other goods. In contrast when there was an allowance of poaching and removal of natural resources, the Ba’aka people ran low on the bushmeat and found the forest inhabitable due t... ... due to the law, they can bring about a rich future and help teach the native people how to utilize their resources to the highest ability. The con that this law has on the environmentalists is now they have less funding from the government to support their research because more money is going into the prevention of poaching. This could harm the conservation process of environmentalists because they need funding in order to sustain the ecosystem. I am writing this letter today to ask for your consideration in the funding of environmental conservation in the rainforests of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Please consider the facts that I have laid out, together we have the ability to raise awareness within the community to help lessen the environmental impacts that ultimatley induce climate change. Thank you for your time and attention. Sincerely, Hayley Kievman

Compare and Contrast two major theories of Social Inequality – Can Inequality be eliminated?

A major theory of inequality is the one propounded by Karl Marx who argues that social inequality is not natural but stems from the construction of the unfair capitalist system. Marx sees the workers or the proletariat as being exploited for their labour by those that own the means of production Marxists see social inequality as manifested in the fact that workers do not benefit from the wealth that their labour produces instead Marx claims that they are 1'pauperized'. The poorer working classes get poorer whilst the rich enjoy getting richer this is illustrated by income inequalities all over the world; the poorest 20% of people in the USA have seen their incomes fall by 19% whilst the top 5% saw their incomes rise, in Australia the richest ten per cent of the population owns about half the nation's wealth in the USA its over two thirds. A limitation of Marx theories on inequality is that it only focuses on economic inequality. Many sociologists would agree with Marx that economic inequality is the most significant form of inequality at the moment whilst acknowledging that economic inequality and social inequality, as we live in a modern multi- cultural capitalist country are inextricably linked and are affected significantly by gender, racial, religious and ethnic inequality. Ethnic background is both an indicator and factor of social inequality. In Australia for example, Aborigines are over represented in the working class as well as underclass and under-represented in the top stratification of earnings and class. Social inequality thus seems to be a consequence of ascribed status: of the status that our skin colour our gender and/or our social class confers on us. Arguably there is scope for social mobility in our current system as our ascribed statuses can be overshadowed by our achieved status especially as we are not generally ascribed to a lower cast iron status at birth that prevents social mobility (unlike the untouchables in the caste system in other cultures) Theoretically we can ascend the social ladder, however low we start, as there is equality of opportunity. This is the view propounded by functionalists such as Davis and Moore. Our achievements in our meritocratic system determine the social position that we hold. Davis and Moore acknowledge that there are perhaps socially unequal jobs yet they are all important for society to function. Thus to maintain society each role needs to be filled so ‘effective role allocation' is an essential functional perquisite. However as some jobs require more skills and training than others there is a need for differing social and financial incentives to entice people to undergo extensive training and take up such jobs. Davis and Moore assert that role allocation and thus people's socio-economic status is fair as it is based on merit, those in the top roles earning the most are those that are best equipped for their role. Whilst Marx sees the current system as exploitative Davis and Moore see it and the inequality that accompanies it as legitimate and functionally advantageous to society. Such a theory though, does not take into account gender and racial inequalities or concepts such as culture capital old boys club and the glass ceiling The culture capital theory suggested by sociologist Pierre Bordieu explains that the education system prises and is geared toward the culture of the middle and upper classes thus those from a working class background find that the skills and knowledge derived within their culture is ‘devalued' and they therefore do not have equal opportunities to excel academically which of course restricts their employment choices and socio-economic position in the future. We can see therefore that inequality is institutionalised, as Marx alludes to in the labour market, and that education is perhaps the first agent of stratification. M. Tumin has also criticised Davis and Moore by condemning their notion of functional importance as questionable and too vague. It ignores the differential of power. According to Tumin differences in pay and prestige will be affected by, and often reflect differences in the relative power of groups and individuals in the labour market rather than the job's actual functional importance. Therefore differences in pay can actually be more a reflection of the relative strength of the workers' union and bargaining potential rather than of functional importance e.g. coal miners and farm labourers. Davis and Moore suggest that inequality is universal as it can be identified in all societies. Such views would suggest that inequality is not eliminable. Marxists ideas contradict this view. Marx claimed that inequality could be eliminated with the development of class consciousness and the abandonment of capitalism however the Soviet communism model proved that in the modern world this was untenable. Equality came at a high price- by the collapse of communism in 1989 equality had come to mean people simply had equally low living standards. Economic and social equality came at the expense then, of basic human rights, the sociologist Peter Saunders stated socialist societies are2 ‘always more repressive than the capitalist ones since they must get people to fulfil their role without the incentive of economic rewards.' However it is clear that the Soviet system was successful in reducing and even eliminating inequality in many spheres of life. Even if it didn't respect human rights in all cases, it guaranteed basic needs such as housing employment education medical care and even holidays. 3The satellite states had embraced capitalism after communism expecting to reap the economic benefits of a capitalist system in fact, living standards actually fell. Russia, after communism rapidly transformed from an almost standardized society to one that was plagued by socio-economic polarisations, according to Goskomstat, the income ratio between the wealthiest 10% of the population and the bottom 10% was about 4:1 in 1990 by 1996 it had sky rocketed to 13:1. Women's rights have also regressed significantly in Russia currently approximately 80% of the unemployed in Russia are women. Such evidence seems to support a Marxist framework of inequality as not inevitable but sustained by a capitalist system. Marxists claim that a capitalist society is maintained through divide and rule. Thus when a class ‘stopped being a class in itself and started being a class for itself' then the group could recognise their inferior social position, class solidarity would develop as the class recognised their shared interests and goals and they would then act together to displace the bourgeoisie. However because inequality is so multilayered class divisions are easy to maintain as differences in gender and race also generate inequality thus even if class differences were eliminated these would persist and perhaps increase. Blackness has historically been classed as inferior, perceived inferiority has been harmful since those who see themselves as superior usually hold the legal power and status in the society and can therefore cement in law the inferiority of the blacks or other ethnic groups. Loury calls for4 ‘major structural remedies to speed up progress toward racial equality' which will in turn reduce the economic inequality that ethnic minority groups face. The New right perspective argues that social inequality has persisted throughout the ages; Saunders states that ‘there has never been a completely egalitarian society'. Every society has its male and females, rich and poor it's big and small and it's old and young. In this absolute sense there is some truth to the assertion that some degree of inequality is inevitable. However inequality itself is unequal it varies with time and culture which validates the theory that inequality is socially constructed and thus can be eliminated. In Britain granted we have moved from the stark extremes of inequality of slavery in imperial Britain but only to an ‘acceptable' economic and social inequality that is institutionalized within our capitalist system, unequal access is built into the structures that support and maintain our contemporary society. It can be argued that the current degree of inequality is not advantageous to society and a reflection of unequal talents in society as Davis and Moore claim nor is it an inevitable product of the capitalist system as Marxists argue; it is a matter of choice. Through the lax way we regulate corporations compared with the harsh regulations placed on workers unions, how we distribute the tax burden and how we set wages. We limit the power of workers thus limiting their socio-economic position.

Depression And Its Effects On Teens - 1268 Words

Everyone feels depressed at some time in their lives, whether the cause may result from illness, the loss of a family member, a decrease in grades and so on. These tribulations and many more are natural causes of feelings of sadness and lamentation. It is normal to feel distressed about a loss or failure. However, for a number of people, that feeling of dejection repeats for months, years, or, if left untreated, even a lifetime. An estimated 350 million people of all ages suffer from depression. Of these affected, one in eight teens suffer from this disease (World Health Organization, para. 1). Depression is an attenuating disease, affecting teens at an increasing rate, and it is essential for one to know what teenage depression is, how depression affects teenagers and what can be done to prevent it. Depression in teens is a mental health condition that causes a continuous feeling of sadness over a prolonged period of time and a loss of interest in activities. This state of being aff ects how the teenager thinks, feels and behaves, which causes emotional, functional and physical complications. Symptoms of depression in teens include sadness and hopelessness, anger or hostility, periodical crying, withdrawal from social surroundings, loss of interest in activities, and changes in eating and sleeping habits (Mayo Clinic, n.D. para. 2). Because depression found in adolescents and teens is not as high as in adults, teen depression is not properly diagnosed. In other words,Show MoreRelatedThe Effects Of Teen Depression On The Brain1272 Words   |  6 PagesThe Effects of Teen Depression Depression is not just a facade created by emotional individuals. It is an actual occurring problem within the brain, primarily in teens. Anyone dealing with depression can explain that it is more than a feeling of sadness or loneliness. It is an agonizing pain that is sometimes hard to explain, which lasts for months and sometimes years. Although depression may start as an emotional state, it progresses to a more complex dilemma and begins to affect you in everyRead MoreThe Negative Effects Of Teen Depression1117 Words   |  5 PagesTeenage depression Teen depression ultimately impacts this society generation . Recognizing the signs and diagnostics that could prevent teenagers with this mental illness. , Be aware there are several different types of depression . Teens from one or more types. Teenage depression is becoming a problem in today’s society. However, Depression, it’s a mood disorder that causes persistent feelings of sadness and lost of interest also called clinical depression, it’s affectsRead MoreNegative Effects Of Teen Depression1437 Words   |  6 PagesTeen depression ultimately impacts this society generation . Recognizing the signs and diagnostics that could prevent teenagers with this mental illness. , Be aware there are several different types of depression . Teens from one or more types. Teenage depression, it’s becoming a problem in today’s society. However, Depression, it’s a mood disorder that causes persistent feelings of sadness and lost of interest also called clinical depression, it’s affects how you feel , think , andRead MoreTeen Depression : Causes And Effects Of Teenage Depression1074 Words   |  5 PagesTeenage Depression Hopeless, lonely, insecure, empty, suicidal; these are all words that people hope never come out of a teenager’s mouth, but sadly they do often. Many teenagers struggle with depression on a daily basis. The severity of depression ranges anywhere from crying every night to attempting suicide. About 3.5 million teenagers suffer from depression and about 3 million of them think about committing suicide each year (Martin 6). 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