Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Essay -- Poet Persuasive Argumentative Poet

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow A Fellow’s Long Worth How does one describe a poet when he has already described himself with his own words? Although Henry Wadsworth Longfellow isn’t popular, he is such a poet. As described by Arnold Bennett, Longfellow is "the chief minor poet of the English language." Among a harsh lineup of critics, however, they claimed he fell short of literary. This is quite the contrary. Longfellow attended Bowdoin college, near Portland, Maine where he was born and raised. The college offered him the newly formed position as chair of modern languages. "Two things are striking about this event: the informality of the academic approach to language studies and the obvious natural gift that Longfellow possessed" (Fuller 3). Traveling throughout Europe before settling into his new job (as well as during numerous trips after), Longfellow practically learned the languages by osmosis. He could speak splendid amounts of French, Spanish, Italian, German and some Scandinavian. After leaving Bowdoin, he later taught at Harvard University. At this time, his pen began to constantly scratch prose and poetry. After almost twenty years as a professor, Longfellow retired and devoted himself to his craft of poetry. After tasting random stanzas and meters of Longfellow’s work, it is easy to identify his tone: uplifting, positive and somewhat glowing. Along with his shorter pieces that evoke positive feelings, Longfellow also tells stories with his longer poetry. He used lyrical verses to describe, weave and introduce new characters or feelings. From the poem "The Skeleton in Armor" to "Paul Revere’s Ride," Longfellow opened up worlds with his words, whether as real as the Revolutionary War, or as mystic as Nordic my... ...t, overall, passion was underneath his skin. As he wrote in "Michael Angelo: A Fragment," "The fever to accomplish some great work that will not let us sleep. I must go on until I die." It is unfair that Longfellow isn’t praised more as an American poet, especially with a backpack heavy with accomplishments. His hike through the literary world was rugged, but his perseverance left readers with kind, unassuming meter and lyric. Works Cited Fuller, Edmund. Introduction. Poems of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1967. 1-13. Untermeyer, Louis. Introduction. The American Poets: Longfellow. By Henry Wadwsworth Longfellow. New York: The Heritage Press, 1943. ix-xv. Wagenknecht, Edward. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: His Poetry and Prose. New York: The Ungar Publishing Company, 1986.

Basic approaches to the study of cultural diversity Essay

With rapid scientific and technological progress, advanced means of communication and transport, more and more people travel abroad, and the range of purposes they tend to achieve, enlarged as well. Many people now travel to share organizational and business experience, study abroad to come back home, many people travel just to see and study cultural background of other countries, some of them come to other countries with peace missions. Unfortunately, political and economical conditions in many countries of the world make many people move abroad as immigrants or refugees. But, regardless of the travel purposes, the notions of cultural contact and cultural shock are relevant for all categories of travelers. (Hoerder) Before examining this phenomenon it’s necessary to give a strict definition of it. At first, it’s necessary to mention that there are some titles to define this phenomenon: â€Å"cross cultural relations†, â€Å"between society culture-contact†, â€Å"cross-cultural interaction† etc. Here is the definition of this phenomenon provided by Bochner: â€Å"between society culture-contact refers to individuals who travel beyond their countries of origin for a particular purpose and for a specified period of time, and the relationships they establish with members of the host society†. (1986, p. 23) There are also some necessary terms used to describe these relations, for instance â€Å"sojourner†. This term is used to refer to â€Å"culture travellers, indicating that they are temporary visitors intending to return home after achieving their aims†. (1986, p. 33) On the contrary, people of the visited society are called â€Å"host-society members†. It’s evident that changing society background in any case demands some contact on personal level, when the representatives of various societies interact. From the part of sojourner it demands much effort to integrate into unusual social and cultural patterns. This may cause stress, especially in the case of immediate and unexpected transition, and this condition is defined by the specialists as â€Å"culture shock†. (Bochner) Cultural identity conflicts are usually called intractable, and thus they are not possible to be resolved through the traditional approaches. The frames of the individual identity are extremely influenced by the cultural identity and cultural surrounding. The differences in culture often become the ground for the cultural conflict, as the difference in cultural ideas and preferences may be taken by the other side as not simply an outrageous idea, but ridiculous and unreal understanding of the world. For the better cultural communication it may be suggested, that the attitudes towards other cultures should be more tolerate. The cultural ideas and beliefs expressed by the representatives of the other culture should not be taken as unreal or unacceptable. Differences in culture between people will always exist, and thus for the more effective communication it is important to understand and accept the significance of the traditions, which are valued by the other culture, as well as try to better explain the traditions into which the newcomer would wish to assimilate. However, and what is more important, it is not allowed to break the cultural identity of the person; the difference in cultural views does not mean they are wrong. The issue of cultural identity was always urgent, and with the growing opportunities for migration, this issue will not soon lose the necessity of being discussed. However, it is important to understand one thing in relation to cultural conflicts: the differences between cultures should not and won’t be erased; they should be treated with tolerance. There are some concepts and approaches used to investigate the nature of this phenomenon. They are as follows: regional comparison, holocultural analysis, controlled comparison, and coding. Regional comparison was worked out by Driver and Kroeber. This approach lies in determination of cultural classification and then making assumptions about the processes of interconnection in the limits of one region of culture. Holocultural analysis is also called worldwide cross-cultural analysis. He was worked out by Tylor, Sumner, Keller and Murdock. Levinson describes it as a study â€Å"designed to test or develop a proposition through the statistical analysis of data on a sample of ten or more

Substance Abuse An Individual s Life - 1608 Words

Substance abuse can be very detrimental to an individual’s life. According to the World Health Organization, substance abuse is defined as, â€Å"the harmful or hazardous use of psychoactive substances, including alcohol and illicit drugs† (2015). It does not matter what type of substance a person abuses, any one of them can alter one’s perception, judgement, and physical control, which leads a person being destructive in the future. If a person is fully dependent on a substance, by the time they withdraw it can cause a lot of issues such as, vomiting, shakiness, constantly worrying, hallucinating, and much more. Abusing any type of substance can start at any age but it usually begins early in childhood. Many children who are placed in foster†¦show more content†¦Throughout the foster care system, substance abuse is a very common problem that many people are not aware of. There have been several studies over the years regarding the foster care system on substance abuse. Vaughn and colleagues (2007) stated that â€Å"Forty-five percent of foster care youth reported using alcohol or illicit drugs within the last six months; 49% had tried drugs sometime during their lifetime and 35% met criteria for a substance use disorder.† The statistics found show a large amount of drug use within the system. Children who enter the system seem to be abusing drugs more heavily compared to children who are not in the system. There was another study within the foster care system that conducted a study on 406 children and found that, â€Å"Marijuana was the most frequently used substance, with 46% of foster youth having tried it at some point in their lives with a mean age of 13.1 years for first use. There were no gender differences in terms of use of these substances, with the exception of marijuana, which females were slightly less likely to use. Overall, almost half of the sample (49%) had tried some sort of illicit substance in their life time† (Vaughn, Ollie, McMillen, Scott, Munson, 2007). The main reason children get placed into a foster care system is often due to substance abuse. A study on infants conducted by Clinician Mcnichol revealed that † the stated reason for placement was as follows: