Tarnished gold Some of the great Olympics cheat Essays - Sports

Tarnished gold: Some of the 'great' Olympics cheats Faster, higher, farther...sneakier? From non-disabled Paralympians to rigged fencing foils and badminton players intent on losing - here's our guide to the Olympians who fell far short of the high Olympic ideals... Guy Adams @ guyadams Wednesday 1 August 2012 11:00 BST Tarnished gold: Some of the 'great' Olympics cheats An official threatens Greysia Polii and Meiliana Jauhari of Indonesia and Jung Eun Ha and Min Jung Kim of Korea with a 'black card' disqualification In the long history of Olympic cheating last night's effort (or rather lack of it) by badminton players at Wembley Arena is a little unusual. Rather than attempting to win through the employing of devious methods the players from China and South Korea, in fact, appeared to be attempting to lose in order to manipulate a draw. The farcical scenes that saw players booed, jeered, disqualified and then reinstated - have today led to the launching of disciplinary proceedings against the four players. The fiasco began when Chinese top seeds Wang Xiaoli and Yu Yang started to show little interest in beating Koreans Jung Kyung- eun and Kim Ha- na to finish top of Group A. Coming second would have meant avoiding compatriots and second seeds Tian Qing and Zhao Yunlei at least until the final. Tian and Zhao had been sent off their natural path to the final as second seeds by defeat to Denmark's Kamilla Rytter Juhl and Christinna Pedersen earlier in the day. The Koreans responded to China's antics by copying them and referee Thorsten Berg emerged to warn all the players and subsequently disqualify and reinstate them. Though the desire to lose may have been unusual, mendacity, manipulation and outright cheating at the Olympic games are nothing new... Ben Johnson, Seoul, 1988 There were drug cheats before, and there have been drug cheats since. But it took the downfall of Ben Johnson to demonstrate the apparent ubiquity of banned substances at the very highest level of sport. On the evening of 24 September, the Canadian sprinter set a new world record of 9.79 seconds in the men's 100m final, lifting his hand in triumph as he crossed the finish line ahead of arch rival Carl Lewis and Britain's Linford Christie, in what a BBC commentator declared "the greatest sprint race in history". Three days later, it became the most tarnished. Johnson was stripped of his medal, and had his record expunged after a sample of his urine tested positive for stanozolol , an illegal steroid. He initially denied cheating, but later confessed - arguing that drug use was endemic in top-tier athletics. In a way, he had a point: six of the eight finalists in that famous 100m race were at some point in their careers tainted by association with "juicing", and several, like him, served bans. But no one fell further, or harder, or more publicly than Ben Johnson. And somehow, the Olympic ideal would never feel quite the same. Boris Onischenko , Montreal, 1976 At the height of the Cold War, when Olympic sports were a cipher for political clashes between East and West, the heavily- favoured Russians took on second- favourites , Great Britain, in the fencing leg of the Modern Pentathlon. Onischenko , who had won silver in the previous two Games, and was desperate to go one better, easily dispatched the UK's Danny Parker. Then he won a baffling bout against Adrian Parker, in which the electronic scoreboard registered a hit, despite an apparent lack of contact between Onischenko's epee and Parker's body. Next up was Jim Fox, a British Army captain. Early in their bout, the scoreboard once more lit up, suggesting a Soviet triumph. But Fox, who was sure he'd taken evasive action, was having none of it - and demanded an examination of his opponent's sword. "I thought the weapon was faulty," he later recalled. That was only the half of it. Buried beneath the leather handle, judges discovered an intricate wiring system designed to register a "hit" when a small button was pressed. "It was a real engineering job," said Mike Proudfoot , the British team manager. "Not just a ham amateur's effort. They had

Walt Disneys Racial Segregation and Gender Separation essays

Walt Disney's Racial Segregation and Gender Separation essays Since the early part of the twentieth century, Walt Disney Pictures have strived to bring to life the legend, folk and fairy tales of some of the most famed authors through the creative use of language and imagery. These stories with all their fantastical elements and revolutionary imagery helped draw interest from young and old alike. Walt Disney aspired to not only offer a delightful entertainment experience, but also to provide some relevant moral education. Through the media of the motion picture, Walt Disney preached as its agenda to strengthen and improve the quality of life in post World War II America. It was their mission to present an ideal image of what was believed to be the model American family unit. The overwhelming moral of each and every Walt Disney picture was the coming together of this family unit. We can see the apparent reality of their agenda in movies such as Beauty and the Beast, and Snow White. With this agenda, however, we see some fatal characterist ic flaws. It is apparently clear that through this agenda Walt Disney Pictures promotes negative stereotypes, while attempting to label, degrade, and pigeonhole individuals of race and gender. This allows Walt Disney Pictures to impress upon people of weak character and engrave in society a social conception of intolerance towards those of both race and gender. The moral of each Walt Disney Picture is inherently good in nature, however, we see that it is the accompanying language and imagery in the course of the storyline which is the media for providing a negative image of race and gender. Walt Disney Pictures are influenced by and based upon the great fairy tales written by people such as Charles Perrault, and the Grimm brothers. This adaptation of these fairy tales allows Walt Disney a visual license and an artistic imagination to present the ideals and morals of these famed authors. Since the character dialogue is obeye...

Financial Management Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Financial Management - Term Paper Example It is considered as the largest and leading company that brews perfected beer with a volume of 49.2% share of beer sales (Anheuser-Busch InBev, 2008). In terms of volume of brewing it was considered as third in the world’s leading distributors of beer before it was acquired by In Bev in 2008 July and the merger was completed in November 2008. Based on revenue it was considered as the top notch in its industry. It operates 12 branches (breweries) in the United States of America and 17 other branches overseas. The products best known are Budweiser, Busch, Michelob, Natural light, Ice. In Bev: In Bev on the other hand was the second largest brewery in the world. While its core business is beer, it also deals in the soft drink market as well. It is a merger of Am Bev and Interbrew. Its headquarters was in Leuven, Belgium where Anheuser Busch is now located. It had approximately 86,000 employees who managed the day to day activities like production and supply of finished products ( beer and soft drinks) around the world (Anheuser-Busch InBev, 2008). Before the merger with Am Bev, Interbrew was the third largest brewing company in the world by volume. In Bev had many operations in over 30 countries across the Americas, Europe and Asia pacific. Description of merger The merger between Anheuser Busch and In Bev created the global leader in beer followed by SAB Miller Company. It is also one of the top five Companies that produce commercial products like beer. In Bev was the second largest brewer in the world while Anheuser Busch was the largest brewing Company in the United States of America and also had the highest revenue or returns in investment (Anheuser-Busch InBev, 2008). Type of merger: This merger is a vertical merger or acquisition due to the fact that Anheuser Busch and In Bev are in the same level of operation, production and organization. The two companies also produce similar products like Budweiser. In Bev and Anheuser Busch were in the same product ion level because they produced many beer types resulting in a vertical merger. The merger amid the 2 organizations is a responsive merger, acquisition, takeover because it has a situation in which a target company’s management and board of directors agree to be acquired by another Company. In this case In Bev taking over Anheuser Busch. Here a public offer of stock or cash was made by In Bev and the board of directors of Anheuser Busch Company was publicly approved the buyout terms. They may be subject to regulatory or shareholder approval. Competitors: The major competitors that Anheuser Busch in Bev faces are the following: - Carlsberg, Heineken, SAB Miller Carlsberg is the fourth largest Company in the world. They have major markets in Asia and Europe with Northern Europe acquiring the largest markets of beers produced by Carlsberg. Their products or brands are many, over 500 to be exact (McShane, Sampson and Restrepo, 2008). Carlsberg does not only deal with beer alone, it also deals in soft drinks like coca cola whose production occurs in Denmark and Finland. Beer and soft drinks are the major products that help Carlsberg in achieving their desired returns in investment thereby realizing their initial objectives. These are some of the factors that help this thriving Company attain the fourth position when it comes to production and supply of products around. Brands differ significantly in

Translating children's books Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Translating children's books - Essay Example Consisting of four main parts, the first, analyses the translation of children's literature. The second, language aspects will be shown. The third, discusses translation strategy. Following this, the conclusion will summarize the key points in the essay. Translation is simply transformation, a form of adaptation trying to fit a new metaphor with the original (Biquenet & Schulte 1989: 2). Translation is understood as a semantic or linguistic concept. It is seen as part of a transfer mechanism - the process by which textual models of one system are transferred to another. In the process, certain results are produced within the target system, which relate in various and complex ways to products of the source system. The final product from translation is the result of the relationship between a source system and a target system, a relationship that is itself determined by a certain hierarchy of semantic constraints. While viewing translation as part of a transfer process, it must be noted that it is not just translations of texts from one language to another, but also the translations of texts from one system to another - for example, translations from the adult system into the children's. Also children's literature should be understood as belonging to the polysystem of entire literature which consists of both adult and children's literature; hence the transfer from one system to another becomes more crucial (Shavit 1986). The behaviour of translating children's literature is determined by the position of children's literature within the literary polysystem. In transferring the text from the English to Japanese we must consider overall constraints and also innovations in language. Historically language has always evolved throughout the centuries no matter what language we discuss. Many languages borrow words and phrases from other languages. English is especially guilty of this phenomenon. Thus old words, no longer in use, are replaced by newer more contemporary ones. For example classic texts such as Robinson Crusoe and Gulliver's Travels, use old style English language and phraseology which were appropriate in their time. In translation, much has to do with the translators overall motives and methods he or she may employ. Whether to faithfully reproduce the original text to the target using similar phraseology to the original, or adapt the original text by using modern semantic in the target language is a decision the translator needs to make. There is one major problem when translating for children over translating for adults. Like other translations, it is anonymous. But while literature written for children is acknowledged, the translation part of it is not acknowledged. Children's translators are not seen as people possessing their own childhood experiences and child images which they are unable to escape from. Child image is a complex issue based on each individual's personal history and also something that is common in

The garden that climbs the stairs and national theater concert hall Research Paper

The garden that climbs the stairs and national theater concert hall - Research Paper Example Sustainable development in form of landscape art is a dynamic process, which enables all people to realize their potential and improve their quality of life in ways, which simultaneously protect and enhance the earth’s life support systems. Blanc acknowledges the impacts that landscape art can have on the environment or place and are committed to reduce these by putting up measures and creativity to assist in doing so. In trying to achieve this, Blanc has identified key performance indicators that will assist in their commitment. One of those indicators is to reduce CO2 emissions from existing bad environment and surroundings as well as distribution center’s by at least 50% by 2020, against a baseline of 2006 (Abraham, 180). The second is to reduce CO2 emissions from the new stores by 50% by 2020 against the baseline of 2006. To realize these goals, Blanc knew that major changes had to be adopted in the the National theatre concert hall, and for that reason the landscapers decided to form a garden climbing up which covered the full spectrum of environmental sustainability skills. The aim of the garden could have been to deliver a theatre hall that reduces the impacts on the environment, whilst offering a robust, balanced and operational store. This core team researched, designed and specified a brand new national theatre concert hall (Carron, 12). Gill Smith, who was the leader of the Environmental Sustainable Team at Scott Wilson facilitated the production of the Environmental Sustainability Statement. For the project, two sites were elected which were fundamentally similar. By doing this a base line store was to be built at Gorton in Manchester and a trial Environmental store was to be built at Cheetham. The stores are of similar size and experience similar climatic condition. The only variables are the environmental initiatives within the Environmental Store (Kibert,

The Threat Of Natural Disasters To Cambodia Environmental Sciences Essay

The Threat Of Natural Disasters To Cambodia Environmental Sciences Essay A Discussion on Building Resilient Communities, A Case Study of Cambodia. All through the 20th century, cities of the world have grown in size and importance, with an estimate of about half of all people living in urban areas and their numbers are expected to rise to at least 60 per cent by 2030 (UNHSP, 2002). Ironically, while cities are of vital importance as economic engines, hubs for transportation and communications, cultural centers and homes to the majority of the earths people, they are particularly vulnerable to natural and environmental hazard impacts. During the 1990s, losses from natural disasters were more than four times greater than during the 1950s, with more than 500,000 fatalities and over $1 trillion in damages (Walter, 2003). The existence of multifaceted and cascading hazards in Cambodia has occurred in time past causing large destructions. These hazards that occur are most times unavoidable but their impact could be reduced if the necessary circumstances are put in place. Managing natural and environmental hazards is essential because they pose significant threat to the human populace, carrying the potential to disrupt economic and social activities, cause substantial damage to property and even kill people. The best form of addressing such situations is to make the necessary investigations and preparations for emergency response when (before and after) these hazards occur. Basically, building resilient cities are an act of preparation for the inevitable natural hazards. Cambodia is located in the tropical zone, Southeast Asia, about 10-13 degrees north of the equator. Its climate is dominated by the annual monsoon cycle with its alternating wet and dry seasons, making it warm to hot throughout the year. It covers an area of about 181,035 square kilometres and is divided into 24 provinces as seen in figure 1. It is bordered to the North by Thailand and Laos, to the East and South by Vietnam, and to the South and Southwest by the Gulf of Thailand. Most of Cambodias land is relatively flat with vast tracts of land given over to rice production. Annual rainy season commences in July, with flooding occurring between September and December. During the monsoon season, Cambodia experiences flash floods usually after heavy rainfall. The provinces of Battambang, Kampong Chnang, Kampong Speu, Kampong Thom, Kampot, Kandal, Pursat and Rattanakiri are regularly hit by flash flooding. The second type of flood, the much slower but prolonged flooding, is caused by the overflow of Tonle Sap River and Mekong tributaries, inundating the provinces of Kampong Cham, Kratie, Kandal, Prey Veng, Stung Treng, Svay Rieng and Takeo. In 2000, Cambodia saw the worst flooding in recent history, with a total estimated damage of USD150 million. It affected more than three million people in 22 of the 24 provinces of the country, displacing 85,000 families and killing 182 (ECHO, 2008). Drought in Cambodia is characterized by loss of water sources caused by the early end or delays in expected seasonal rainfall. The traditional drought/lean season is between the months of August and November. Although not as severe as floods in terms of impact, it severely affects farming productivity especially among rice growing communities who rely solely on rain or river-fed irrigation. Low agricultural yield due to extended drought has increased indebtedness of families and contributed to widespread food shortages. The worst drought incident in 2002 had affected two million people and incurred a total damage of USD 38 million, (ECHO, 2008). No one can stop natural disasters. However, we can reduce the impact of natural disasters on the physical and the socio-economic losses in society. It is notable that victims of disasters mainly come from the least wealthy and influential; those in unsafe houses and engaged in more dangerous activities, who have limited options and entitlements. In any case, university students killed in school annual graduation or new born babies in health care facilities are especially disturbing aspects of the aftermath of disasters. Surely, these places should put safety issues first. Due to environmental degradation and human activities, natural hazards have been persistent. The Mekong flood in 2000 gave Cambodia the most terrible incident in the last 70 years, causing both socio-economic and physical damages. According to the official report of the National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM) (2006), the floods affected about 3.4 million people with 347 fatalities, 80 percent of which were children. Moreover, schools and other infrastructures such as hospitals, houses, and pagodas were seriously damaged, with a total estimated loss of US$161 million. Again, floods hit Cambodia in 2001 and 2002, damaging approximately US$36 million and US$12 million respectively. In 2001, the floods killed 62 people while in 2002 the floods killed 26 (40 percent of whom were children), and many schools were destroyed. Figure 1.Map of Cambodia with Provinces cambodia-map-provinces.jpg Because many Cambodians depend upon subsistence agriculture for their source of revenue, they are particularly vulnerable to suffering hunger, poverty, or even the loss of life, when such disasters hit. This vulnerability has increased in recent years because of a series of almost consecutive annual disasters that have not allowed people the opportunity to recover from previous floods or droughts. The Royal Government of Cambodia and other stakeholders, including NGOs and the donor communities, have been increasing cooperation to allow for joint responses to the needs of the affected population when disasters strike. The overall goal is to ascertain and address the root causes of vulnerability to disasters. There is thus a need to identify and prioritize areas that are prone to natural disasters, and areas in which the population suffers most when disasters strike. Flood affected areas, rice dependency, and food security are considered when determining areas that should be prioritised for flood related interventions. The extent to which each an area is affected by flood waters, depends on rice production, and incapability to manufacture enough food to feed itself during flood years are taken together to classify areas into different levels of precedence. Two major types of flood were identified in Cambodia: Flash floods which result from heavy downpours upstream on the Mekong River which affect the provinces along the Mekong River and in the southern areas of the country. Central area floods are large floods that result from a combination of runoff from the Mekong and heavy rains around the Tonle Sap Lake. The waters affect the areas around the lake, but also flow heavily down the Tonle Sap River and the lower portion of the Mekong to flood the southern provinces. The first priority area is rigorously affected by any type of flood, the second a rea is only affected by the big central area floods, and the third area is only affected by flash flooding of the Mekong. These three priority areas are shown in figure 2. Figure 2: Flood Prone Communes image7_02.png The method applied to define areas vulnerable to drought is similar to that discussed ealier. The concern evaluate include: drought affected areas, rice dependency, and food security. Areas were defined as highly rice dependent if more than 80 percent of households are fully engaged in rice production. Food insecurity was measured as above for the drought year of 1998. Definitions for three levels of priority were again developed. First priority areas are defined as those with low precipitation and NDVI, high rice dependence, and food insecurity in 1998. These are areas where droughts are likely, and where they will have the most terrible consequences. Second priority areas have the same criteria as the first priority communes, but were not food insecure during the 1998 drought year. Third priority communes have low precipitation and NDVI, and are thus drought prone, but are neither highly rice dependent nor food insecure. The three levels of priority communes are presented in figure 3. Figure 3 Drought Prone Communes image7_03.png Vulnerability well-meant is the exposure and sensitivity to livelihood shocks and risks. Risks are the combination of the probability or frequency of occurrence of a defined hazard and the magnitude of the consequences. Natural hazards often cannot be prevented, and if they materialize, can generate a shock that affects households and communities in both predictable and unpredictable ways. Vulnerability is only to some extent determined by the type of hazard, while it is mainly determined by social systems and power (Wisner et al. 2006). The degree of vulnerability depends on the nature of the risk and a householdà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢s resilience, or ability to recover after shocks. Vulnerability can be lessened by reducing exposure to risks of shocks that affect many people (e.g., frequent droughts) or shocks that affect individuals or households (e.g., the death of the household head) and increasing the householdà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢s ability to manage sho cks. However, chronically food-insecure households often are not resilient to shocks and are continuously vulnerable. The government in Cambodia has initiated poverty reduction policies that attempts to reduce poverty, increase food security and thus reduce vulnerability of poor households. The concept of vulnerability links the relationship that people have with their environment to social forces and institutions and the cultural values that sustain or contest them. Vulnerability refers to the totality of relationships in a given social situation producing the formation of a condition that, in combination with environmental forces, produces a disaster. Disaster, risks and outcomes are socially produced at the intersection of a complex and dynamic range of hazard and vulnerability patterns, associated with underlying social, economic, territorial and political processes operating in specific locales. The concept of vulnerability links general political economic conditions to very particular environmental forces to understand how basic conditions such as poverty or racism produce susceptibilities to very specific environmental hazards. Vulnerability, thus, integrates not only political economic, but environmental forces, defined in terms of both biophysical and socially constructed risk. The working definition provided by Blaikie et al. is currently among the most utilized: By vulnerability we mean the characteristics of a person or group in terms of their capacity to anticipate, cope with, resist, and recover from the impact of a natural hazard. It involves a combination of factors that determine the degree to which someones life and livelihood is put at risk by a discrete and identifiable event in nature or in society(1994:9). The DIPECHO project was implemented in partnership with three local NGOs for the period of 15 months (from 15/02/2007 to 14/05/2008) in three operating provinces. The project activities centre of attention primarily is on the poorest and most excluded community members, identified as being particularly vulnerable to disaster, including women and children, poor farmers, fishery communities, landless people, ex-Khmer rouge soldiers, displaced people, wage labourers, people living with or at risk from HIV and AIDS, Vietnamese minority groups, and people with disability. The total number of direct beneficiaries identified through the project was recorded as 15153, (ActionAid International, 2006). The project aim is to build the capacity of community members and local authorities in 48 target villages in the project areas in the three provinces to better understand and prepare for recurring flood and drought by implementing the following strategies: Organise and build competence of the local community Create and strengthen institutional systems at the village and commune level Working in alliance with other actors and government on disaster risk reduction programmes Advocating on Disaster Risk Management (DRM) issues and influencing the concerned officials and institutions Capacity building of the existing institutions, communes and the various organs of the National committee on disaster management at commune, district, province level Conducting a detailed vulnerability analysis, developing village level disaster plans and formulating commune disaster risk management plans The following were the outcomes on the completion of the project: The capacity of Commune Committees for Disasters Management and Village Development Committees was enhanced to analyse their vulnerability and actively prepare their communities for the risks of flood and drought. Increased availability of Disaster Preparedness knowledge and skills across community members in target villages. Reduced vulnerability to disaster through small-scale disaster preparedness and mitigation initiatives carried out at the village community level. Formal structures and network of partnerships for community-based disaster risk management in Cambodia (CBDRM) comprise of an approach that builds upon existing capacities and coping systems of communities to jointly plan and apply appropriate and durable reduction and disaster preparedness plans. The strategy involves the participation of local actors, particularly vulnerable communities, who actively work to identify causes of vulnerability and actions to mitigate the impact of vulnerability from these natural disasters. Furthermore, the strategy aids communities towards long term capacity to adapt. With recurring drought and flooding and threats from other natural disasters in Cambodia, CBDRM is seen as a pacesetter in reducing massive loss of life, property and livelihood. The Cambodian government considers CBDRM as an essential part of its rural development program to alleviate poverty (ActionAid International, 2006). The major purpose of sustainable development is to generate and preserve flourishing ecological, social and economic systems. There exists an intimate link between these systems as humans can transform the ecological system and they also depend on it for food, wealth and security. Human actions can severely affect the ability of the ecosystem to perform its natural functions with adverse consequences for vulnerability, human life and security. Several case studies have helped shed more light on the connection between resilience, sustainability of social ecological systems and diversity (Berkes and Folke, 1998). Resilience basically refers to the degree of shock that concerned system can endure and stay within a given state. It can also be the degree to which the system concerned can organize itself or build capacity for learning and adaptation. It has been argued that two components of any given system affect its resilience, one being its adaptive capacity which is directly related to its heterogeneity and broadly equivalent t the diversity of its institutions and assets available in social systems. The second is its robustness and this refers to the properties of a given system that allow it accommodate disturbance without additional adaptation. Resilience and robustness refer to the capacity of the system to accommodate disturbance without losing functionality. Disaster management style or procedure can destroy or build resilience depending on how the community concerned organises itself in response to management actions. Building societal resilience requires understanding of ecosystems that incorporates knowledge of local users (Olsson and Folke, 2001). Structured Scenarios and active adaptive management have been recognized as fundamental to building resilience. Circumstances are used to envisage option future scenarios. Applying this action, resilience building strategies can be acknowledged and applied within the framework of sustainable development. The probability of sustainable development is improved by management for resilience in a dynamic world full of astonishments. Sustainable development is a pattern of resource use aimed at meeting human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present but also for future generations. It brings together the concern for carrying capacity of natural systems and social challenges faced by humanity. It is now clear that sustainable development that regard the impact of manà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢s activities on the natural environment and attempts to reduce damage to the natural environment is the key to poverty reduction, environmental security and management and mitigation of weather and water related hazards. It basically targets resource poor and landless communities especially in the coastal regions because of population density, rapidly declining natural resources, work and income security and a high level of vulnerability to these hazards. With the understanding that environmental degradation can be tackled by knowledge and technological empowerment of the resource poor, illiterate rural man and women, the major aim of these programmes is to blend technological frontier with local knowledge in order to provide an integrated orientation to technological development and dissemination. As local communities confront the impacts of glacial melting, rainfall fluctuation, flooding and drought, they will need support to strengthen their capacity to withstand these changes and increase their resilience to the effects of a changing climate on international waters. Rivers, lakes and coastal ecosystems are increasingly being impacted by deforestation, land degradation, poor water management, and aquatic species loss as well as changes in fisheries habitats, water scarcity and floods or droughts precipitated or exacerbated by climate change, making communities more socially, economically and physically vulnerable. Local communities have shown, through ecosystem restoration, integrated water resources and coastal management and development that these activities can help communities associated with international waters increase their resilience to climatic variability and future effects of climate change. While in some cases it may be too early to gauge the adaptation success of local projects since it may entail preparing for future climate events and impacts, this publication provides some examples of how communities have successfully conserved their resources, restored their ecosystems, reduced their vulnerability and improved their livelihoods and increased their resilience to environmental threats and climate change in international waters. Resilient communities are far less vulnerable to hazards and disasters than less resilient places. For this assumption to be validated and useful, knowledge of how resilience is determined, measured, enhanced, maintained, and reduced is vital (Klein et al., 2003). It is not obvious what leads to resilience within coupled humanà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬environment systems or what variables should be utilized to measure it. Because of the multidimensional nature of resilience and its different component parts, a broad model of resilience has yet to be empirically tested at the community level (Cumming et al., 2005). CONCLUSION The existence of a growing incidence in the occurrence of natural hazards can be accredited to a multifaceted world where increase in population is present. Vulnerability are ever-increasing in communities due to human activities. However, climate change and sea level rise may be accountable for augmented occurrence of some of these hazards. Globalization also spreads the cost of natural hazards going beyond the borders of the country directly affected. Technological and science based progress in our pursuit to understand natural hazards, applications and technological responses have clearly been insufficient. Response to disaster happen mostly after the event and so much is required to be put in place to sustain research and draw up programmes for risk assessment, recommend countermeasures, build and strengthen resilience in communities at risk. Researchers and disaster managers need to work hard to ensure vigorous knowledge takes a essential role in policy development. In this, loc al communities will be more resilient to natural and environmental hazards

Glory :: Movie Film Review Glory Essays

Glory Glory captures the heroism of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw and the first black regiment in the Civil War, the Massachusetts "Fighting" Fifty-fourth. An extremely talented cast and crew earned three Academy Awards (cinematography, sound and supporting actor) and five nominations for their work in Glory. The outstanding cinematography, sound, score and acting recreate the events leading up to the Union attack on Fort Wagner on July 18th 1863. Matthew Broderick portrays the young Bostonian abolitionist Col. Robert G. Shaw who takes command of the Fifty-fourth, following the Emancipation Proclamation. Shaw along with Cabot Forbes (Cary Elwes) leads a band of ex slaves, servants and other black volunteers including a rebellious runaway slave Trip (Denzel Washington), Shaw's educated childhood friend Thomas Searles (Andre Braugher), and a former grave digger Rawlins (Morgan Freeman). Together these men face the adversity of a racist Union Army, struggling to prove themselves worthy of their government issued blue uniforms. After months of training and exploitation for physical labor, the Fifty- fourth gains the opportunity to fight in an attack on Fort Wagner on the beaches of South Carolina. Poised to dispel the belief that blacks would not be disciplined under fire, the Fifty-fourth leads the almost suicidal attack on Ft. Wagner. There Col. Shaw valiantly falls and the Fifty-fourth, suffering great losses, displayed the courage that persuaded the Union to enlist many more black soldiers. Matthew Broderick delivers a noteworthy performance in the role of Col. Shaw, which Leonard Maltin calls his most ambitious part. In an interview for the New York Times, Broderick spoke of his method acting, "The first step [in preparing for the role of Robert Gould Shaw in Glory] was to try to learn as much as I could about the real person. That was mostly from letters, photographs, descriptions and a poem by Emerson. The thing I had to do was bring myself into that situation. I didn't want to be an imitation of what I thought Shaw must have been like." Broderick's acting talent has been noted on Broadway as well as in films. Broderick won a Tony Award for his performance in "Brighton Beach Memoirs" in 1983, a year after his film debut in Max Dugan Returns. (Maltin, 102) But it was his role as a computer hacker in War Games and his role as a handsome young teen touring Chicago in Ferris Bueller's Day Off that alerted moviegoers to his talent. Denzel Washington has received critical acclaim for his role as Trip (as well as an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor). Denzel commented on the role of Trip in an interview with the New York Times.