Goree Island Book Review Essay Example

Goree Island Book Review Essay Example Goree Island Book Review Paper Goree Island Book Review Paper Review: Goree Island: Island of No Return, Saga of the Signares by Richard Harrison Goree. Gold Leaf Press, Mt. Clemens, MI. 1996. Often times a search for family history can lead to confusing twists and turns or shocking revelations. In the case of Richard Goree, the search for his family’s past led to a novel with much important knowledge for the rest of the world. Goree Island is a story revealing the importance of signares in economic success during the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and colonial period in Africa. Elevating themselves to respected and revered statuses, these mulatto women were considered the grease that kept the European (particularly French) economic machines moving. During the colonial period in Africa, mulatto (half white/half African) women came to power as the go-betweens for traders by utilizing their lighter complexion to initially gain a level of inherent trust. When an incoming trading ship ported at Goree Island, the French stationed there would send these women, signares, to the important shipmen on board in hopes that the gift of the company of these women would put them in a better mood to trade. : Throughout the years these women became vital to the success of the French at Goree Island. In a course about the history of African women the signares are bound to come as up as an essential part of the slave trade era. However, one of the main points of this book was primarily on everyday life and interactions between signares and other individuals; including their effects on the island’s economy, social and diplomatic relationships and ceremony. When Goree Island was a high traffic port for trading, the most important activities surrounding a ship’s arrival would be centered around the signares. When word of an incoming English ship came in to Monsieur de Drouin, he was extremely concerned about the incoming shipmen’s impressions of their signares. Without the involvement of these signares it is unknown how the transactions would have gone, but what is known is the length of preparations that were made to ensure their visitors were pleased and in return were generous in trade. Sasha and Helene-Marie, both Mothers of the signares at different times, were given the privilege of slave labor to build a stone parlor for their entertaining purposes. This was completely out of the ordinary for French society, however exceptions to the French rules were made daily for the signares, as shown by Andre Bruie’s conversation with a newly arrived factor. â€Å"They have the connections [signares]. So, if the rules don’t provide for them, then the rules must at least give them room to do what they do best† (115). The importance of signares was not underestimated in Goree Island and is evidenced by the French’s willingness to budge on previously unfathomable aspects of life, race relations. Another main point of this book is that the signares were not simply handed their positions but they were acquired through hard work and cunning. The aforementioned stone parlor was earned by Helene-Marie through an invention that was adapted by the French in their prisons on the island. After asking for permission to use slave labor, Bruie responded to her â€Å"she could have the men do it if she could secure them and still give them room to do the work. Then I laughed and dismissed the idea, she came back one week later with this† (116). He was referencing a collard invention that Helene-Marie devised in only one week. This shows that the signares were innovative enough to have created their own opportunities and acquire the position they are in by their own actions. The greatest contribution to helping understand the signares life choices was an early interaction between Helene-Marie and a young Sasha. Sasha inquired if Helene-Marie ever asked for anything in return from the European men they visited. Helene-Marie scolded Sasha for asking such a question and continued to enforce the fact that they are to expect nothing in return and to be obedient to their guests. This dialogue between the two is important to understanding that from a young age the signares were trained for their future. Once the signares had established their position on the island it was important to teach the young mulatto women and future signares their roles at a young age because often times it was unknown how young they were going to be requested by the traders. One of the things I would have liked to have added in this book would have been stories of interactions between the signares and the visiting traders. It was shown on more than one occasion that signares can become emotionally attached to their traders so there has to be some sort of poignant connections happening between them. These exchanges would also provide additional insight on how the signares were able to climb to the social position they have achieved.

The X-files essays

The X-files essays As the end credits flashed and the haunting notes of the title theme resonated, reverberated and eventually vanished in the depth of my mind, I sat back and sighed. My body tingled with excitement as a broad smile swept across my 12 year old face. I had just discovered my two true heroes Special Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully of the FBI.My meeting with The X-files had occurred through a chance channel surfing one Thursday night. Little did I know that, that one episode would turn me into a religiously devout X-phile and change the way I saw the world forever. Mulder and Scully have undoubtedly been two of the most significant fictional characters Ive come across. I chose to speak of the two of them together as it is hard for me to imagine one without the other.Like reason and intuition they go hand in hand in understanding and discovering the fascinating enigmas that are out there. My emulation of them has gone beyond the oversized coats I used to wear when I was 12, for they truly have influenced the way I looked at myself and the universe. Mulder, the brilliant, intuitive and sensitive, maverick with an eidetic memory who graduated top of his class at Oxford and threw aside a fast moving career in the FBI to dig through what others regarded as trash in the basement. Scully, the equally brilliant ,pragmatic ,scientist who despite being a M.D. chose instead the challenging rigors of the FBI to make a place for herself in a male dominated profession. Week after week they pursued relentlessly the most bizarre and nebulous conundrums that the universe could conjure with a continued passion, despite the many dangers, lies,dead ends and loop holes that they encountered. Who wouldnt be inspired by two such amazing individuals?! In them I saw a curiosity that often dies down in individuals as they grow up. A curiosity and zeal to look beyond the pettiness of life, and at the larger pict...

The Best Way to Write a Creative Brief (Includes Templates)

The Best Way to Write a Creative Brief (Includes Templates) Marketing projects can sometimes be a challenge to get off the ground. Everyone has a different vision for what the campaign should be, what the creative will look like and what the objectives are. Not doing your prep work on the front-end can mean you might go too far down the wrong path, which means†¦ Wasted time†¦ Lost money†¦ And disgruntled clients. So what’s a marketer to do? Create a clear creative brief before the work begins, of course. If this leaves you scratching your head, have no fear. You’ll find everything you need in this post, including how to create an effective creative brief, nine examples to model after, and free templates to get your project off the ground. Three Creative Brief Templates + Your Projects = Success Start off by downloading our free creative brief templates. This kit includes three different templates you can use to write effective creative briefs the easy way (in Word, Excel, and Powerpoint format). Grab ’em free below. Then, keep reading to learn how to use them effectively.Why You Need a Creative Brief A creative brief helps clarify expectations between your team and the project’s stakeholders. Not having one increases the likelihood of missed deadlines and means a heck of a lot more time wasted on making sure everyone is on the right track. The creative brief serves as the documentation for the project’s objectives and how you’re going to achieve success- the â€Å"what† and â€Å"how†, essentially. Marketing teams need to focus carefully on ROI to prove our worth. Creativity is often overlooked in this equation. As evidenced by the thrown together creative briefs copied and pasted from old campaigns. Doesn’t it seem odd that you’re willing to spending a bunch of money on a project, but not spend more than 5 minutes making sure your project is set up for success? Reason 1: Define the Scope and Help Avoid Scope-creep The creative brief says a lot about what the project is, but it also provides insight into what the project isn’t. For example, let’s say your creative brief outlines a project to redesign your website’s blog.   The scope of this project is clear- you’re not setting out to re-design any other area of the site. This avoids what we call scope-creep. Scope-creep can be compared to the â€Å"might as-wells†. â€Å"If we’re redesigning the blog, we ‘might as-well’ redesign the about us pages, too.† This can be especially difficult if your project is on behalf of a client. You, as the Project Manager, need to make hard decisions about whether you need to adjust the cost and risk the client getting upset, or eat the cost and hurt your profitability. Your creative brief can help you avoid this conundrum. Collaborating with your client or team at the beginning helps prevent misunderstandings about deliverables and gives you a document to reference if scope-creep arises. Reason 2: Clarify the Project’s Timeline Most projects have a definitive delivery date, so it’s a good idea to include a timeline in your creative brief. Marketing teams juggle multiple projects at once, which means it can be a challenge for individuals to manage everything on their plate. It’s important for Marketing Managers to value their team member’s opinions regarding realistic timelines and workloads. Gain input while formulating the creative brief or use something like ’s Team Management Dashboard to make sure timelines are realistic. Use ’s Team Management Dashboard to Set Realistic Timelines There’s nothing more frustrating as a Marketing Manager than (unsuccessfully) trying to stay on top of what everyone on your team is working on. Our Team Management Dashboard replaces lengthy meetings and email chains required to chase down updates. Use the dashboard when outlining your creative brief to visualize realistic timelines based on everyone’s *actual* workload. Need to re-prioritize? No Sweat. Simply reshuffle workloads with the drag and drop functionality. Everyone will be able to see their updated tasks in real-time. Sayonara, spreadsheets. What Can the Team Management Dashboard Do For Your Team? What to see how the Team Management Dashboard can get your team organized and never miss a deadline? Schedule a demo with our team to find out more. Reason 3: Mitigate Confusion and Answer Questions Have you ever been pulled into a project and felt confused about the who, what, where, when, and why? Or maybe those questions have lingered in your mind throughout the duration of the project? (Let’s be honest, we’ve all been a part of a marketing project that has felt a little half-baked.) The process of writing the creative brief itself helps you work through strategic questions that may otherwise go unanswered. Likewise, everyone involved in the project will have a clear idea of what’s going on and can understand the project’s reason for existence. Which makes your job as the de facto Project Manager a lot easier. Questions about timeline? Check out the creative brief. Questions about target audience? Creative brief. Questions about process? You guessed it... creative brief. BOOM. You’ve just saved some time by not having to re-answer the same questions over and over again. Elements of a Great Creative Brief Creative briefs can vary slightly in what they actually contain. Some opt for more information; others are more condensed. Here’s a running list of items you may consider including in your brief. Project Summary Describe the project in one or two sentences. Boil it down to the basics. This gives everyone who might come into the project (at any point in time) a high-level understanding of what the project is. It also makes it easier to iterate on the project down the road. â€Å"E-commerce research project intended to attract small business owners wanting to launch their own e-shop.† Target audience Outline who you’re trying to reach with the campaign. This can be simply a certain user persona or it can be a demographic outline. This is important as it gives the project member an idea of who they’re talking to/ designing for. â€Å"Small business owners and ‘makers’ that are currently selling on Etsy, farmer’s markets, etc.† Problem What problem is the project trying to solve? Why do you need to do *this* project? This narrows down why the project exists and why the company needs to do this particular project. â€Å"{Insert company name} is finding it difficult to convince designers, makers, small business owners etc. of the benefits of creating their own webshops rather than selling via Etsy. This report will provide {the company} with original data to use throughout the year and will highlight the benefits of setting up an e-commerce site.† Goal   Why are we doing this project? Make sure your goals are measurable and avoid setting too many. Stick to your one metric that matters. â€Å"The primary goal is to increase interest in using {company platform} as the go-to e-commerce platform. This will help position {company name}   as the best solution for setting up an e-commerce website. We will create a comprehensive research report that aims to convert 5,000 new paid users by the end of 2019.† KPI How will success be measured? This sets the stage for how you will know if your project was successful or not. It also helps you understand if the project should be repeated. â€Å"This report will be measured based on the number of new accounts generated from gated downloads.† Process What are the general steps we must follow to finish the project? This is a good outline that can become a task template once the project kicks off. It also is a good way for each team member to visualize where they fit into the project. Write survey questions Distribute survey Analyze data Write content for the report Design PDF Prepare promotion strategy Measure Individuals/Teams Involved Who do you need to get this project done? This serves as a reminder to everyone that they need to be involved in order for the project to get off the ground. â€Å"PR, Graphic Design, Social Media, Analytics, Content Marketing, Email Marketing† Timeline What is the due date for this project? Every project needs to have a start and end date†¦ they can’t drag on in perpetuity. This makes it easier for people to plan their workloads and get things finished on time. â€Å"End of Q2 2019† Budget How much can you spend on this project? This can either be a client’s budget or internal resources that are dedicated. You can also think of this in terms of hours devoted to this project. $25,000 How to Write a Great Creative Brief Aside from including the right information, there are a couple things you should also think about when compiling a creative brief. Be Specific You want your creative brief to clear enough that anyone can understand the project. A vague creative brief will often produce results that fall far short of expectations. When a creative brief misses the necessary specifics, significant revisions often arise which makes for a frustrating process for all involved. Set S.M.A.R.T Goals Setting S.M.A.R.T goals help put your project on the fast track to success. An example of a S.M.A.R.T goal might be: â€Å"We will create a comprehensive research report that aims to convert 5,000 new paid users by the end of 2019.† The goal is specific by identifying that you want to help drive new paid users. It’s measurable because your team will be able to tell if you hit your 5,000 increase paid users or not. It’s attainable based on previous benchmarking for similar campaigns. The task is relevant because it’s contributing to the company’s bottom line. Finally, the task has a time limit to see if the project was successful or not. The Operative Word is Brief The creative brief is exactly what it says†¦ brief. It doesn’t need everything and the kitchen sink. Offer an abridged summary that can be easily digested. It shouldn’t be TL;DR. You don’t need to link to a dozen planning spreadsheets, email chains, and related documents.   Chances are those supporting documents won’t even be looked at, so don’t waste your time.

Macrroeconomics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Macrroeconomics - Essay Example These factors often influence each other. As opposed to microeconomics, which is mainly concerned with actions of individual factors such as consumers, firms and how consumer behavior determines quantities and prices in specified markets, macroeconomics is broad in scope. It is, therefore, aimed at providing an understanding of the causes and consequences of changes in national incomes as well as understanding the major determinants of economic growth (Marshall 10). Macroeconomists have developed a variety of models that tend to explain the relationships between the various economic factors. These models have been helpful to governments and large corporations in developing and evaluating their economic policies as well as business strategies. As such, macroeconomics covers a variety of concepts. However, the three major concepts and variables are output, unemployment and inflation (Marshall 15). With regard to output and income, national output refers to the total value of everything that is produced within a given country in a specified period of time. This output generates income. Thus, output and income are generic terms used interchangeably as they are deemed to imply the same thing (Marshall 17). In macroeconomics, output is measured by Gross Domestic Product (GDP). On the other hand, unemployment is measured by the rate of unemployment. It refers to the percentage of people who lack jobs in the labor force of a given economy (Marshall 19). Thus, unemployment may be categorized into various types based on the different causes. For instance, classical unemployment occurs when wages are so high that employers become unwilling to hire more workers. Similarly, frictional unemployment occurs when workers take too long to find a job, so they experience long periods of unemployment. Another type is structural unemployment. It is when people become unemployed as a consequence of a myriad of factors such

Examine the use of animal imagery in modern short stories and their Essay

Examine the use of animal imagery in modern short stories and their symbolic significance - Essay Example In addition, the degree to which a character is related to the animal in question may have some impact on the characteristics that are brought out in each. A nanny closely related to a busy parakeet might cause both woman and animal to take on stronger characteristics of nagging and cleanliness, for instance. A man closely related with his bulldog might also seem to be watchful, noisy and largely for show. What is interesting about this use of animal imagery in stories is the way in which this relationship develops to bring out specific characteristics in both animal and character. Two stories that provide a great deal of insight into this relationship are Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis and Larissa Lai’s Salt Fish Girl. Although the story takes up less than 100 pages, Franz Kafka’s story Metamorphosis lends itself to a wide variety of interpretations as it uses the image of the cockroach to emphasize attributes of its main character. From its small size to a brief summary of its events, there doesn’t seem to be all that much to the story itself upon first glance. The story follows the experiences of Gregor Samsa after he wakes up one morning to find himself turned into a giant bug in his own bed. As he reveals himself to his family and his employer, it becomes obvious that this change is not meant to be a figurative change on the part of the author, but is also a physical change. Although the family continues to care for him, providing him with food and water and cleaning his room once a day, Gregor becomes more and more detached from them, eventually finding it difficult to keep track of what has been happening around him. His room becomes dirtier, his family becomes less attentive a nd he becomes less concerned with their welfare in connection with his own. As his sister and mother move his personal furniture out of his

Technology is Bad for Us Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Technology is Bad for Us - Essay Example These are only a small fraction of the numerous reasons why technology has been considerably harmful to the lives and wellbeing of the people whom it affects. While it has had a reasonable number of positive effects on the lives of these people also, it seems that if health and the emotional wellbeing of people are priorities for a society, the negative effects outweigh the positive effects. One major reason, which is widely accepted throughout every part of the world, is that the increasing technology is affecting the health of people negatively. This is a fact, which has a significant impact on any country or city, where the people experience a significant influence of technology in their everyday lives. This occurs mainly because technology offers people several alternatives to physical exertion. The people, whose ancestors used to walk for miles to get from any location to the next, have the luxury to drive themselves. This ease has facilitated their lives so much that they hesit ate to distances, which require ten-minute walk. Even these ten minutes seem a lot to spare to someone who is living in the fast-moving world of today, a world, which has speeded up immensely due to the rise of technological advancement. Nevertheless, even those people who do not work under the pressure of deadlines and time constraints choose to take this shortcut to travelling, simply because it is the easier, more convenient option. This has led to a very serious problem amongst the people of today, which is obesity and high cholesterol, each of which are avoidable only if one is in the habit of physically exerting themselves daily, whether by exercise, sports or simply walking the distances they need to travel (Kates, Hohenesmer and Kasperson, pp. 402-460). The obesity one sees in the developed countries today is something, which was not so common just a few decades ago. This in itself is proof that technology has had an adverse effect on the wellbeing of people. There are also several other aspects of technology today, which encourage people to choose convenience over hard work, simply due to the ease with which the relevant technology is available. An example of this phenomenon is how people choose to send emails, text messages and call people rather than going to visit them or using a slightly less convenient method of communication, such as writing a letter. This, on the surface of it, is a large advantage of technology, as it is an example of the several ways in which technology makes our lives more efficient and speedy. However, people pay a large price in terms of the negative effect this has on the relationships between people. There was once a time when one would make an effort to meet their family occasionally, if living separately, in order to maintain the relationship, and embellish the bond that exists between them. This has, however, been dismissed from the list of priorities as people have learned to replace a heartfelt meeting with a twenty -minute phone call. The level of intimacy in the interactions has decreased due to this reason, as people do not value meeting in person as much as they used to. Friends, who would keep in touch by meeting occasionally and catching up with each other, are now content with exchanging a few words through text message or Facebook wall posts. One can compare this substitute for live meetings to substituting fresh vegetables for canned food. While the content of both the meetings and the text messages

Apple and the iPod Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Apple and the iPod - Case Study Example Competitiveness in terms of the creation of an advantage for a company emanates from having in place and or developing competitive strategies to achieve that end. In the fast paced world of corporate operations companies cannot afford to stand pat on their developments, and or market positioning as its competitors are always seeking to gain market share through acquiring customers as well as retaining their own brand franchise. The pace of technological change, along with fast changing consumer wants, needs, and desires represents a serious challenge that must be planned for as well as implemented. To fully appreciate the context of this examination, one needs to understand that innovation is defined as "the introduction of something new a new idea, method or device (Merriam Webster Online, 2008). Within a corporate mode, this is not a process that can or does happen overnight, it is a corporate culture that emanates from the top of the leadership structure, and is fostered by an atm osphere that prides new ideas and directions (Tidd et al, 201, p. 228). In helping us to understand the context of innovation in a corporate setting Degraff and Lawrence (2002, p. 2) tell us that creativity is a fundamental part of innovation, and in that sense, today's corporations need to be more creative than in the past as a result of the competitiveness of globalisation, and the increased sophistication of consumers who can access the Internet to compare and analyse products. The information age has heightened the stakes in the consumer arena, thus companies must respond in the product segment of their business. In providing us with a further illustration of this new business climate Degraff and Lawrence (2002, p. 2) advise "Creativity, in short, is the core of all the competencies of an organization because creativity is what makes something better or new". The preceding is a core facet of innovation, which also includes new approaches to the creation of products, maintaining active communication with customers to understand the dynamics of their w ants, needs and desires, and then translating this into innovative products (Degraff and Lawrence, 2002, p. 2). The preceding areas have been covered as they represent important considerations in the study of innovation on