Black People and South Africa Essay Example for Free

Black People and South Africa Essay The movie invictus portrays a very controversial issue that has been presented throughout history in many ethnic groups and is seen in societies up to these days. The apartheid is clearly pictured in the movie through many of the attitudes and actions that people take towards the other race they live in their day by day. What is more, Mandela constitutes one of the most important figures in South Africa, especially for the black race as he ? liberated them?from the apartheid. From those days Mandela has been recognized worldwide as a major symbol of the rainbow nation; a reality of distinction between the black and the white people and its establishing differe nces. In the movie, it is highly represented the context in which two different races coexist, and how such a popular sport as rugby can actually create a powerful bond between two races, stimulating a feeling of companionship and unity for the population . For instance, one of the most significant examples seen in the movie is that about the rejection towards Nelson Mandela as a color person when he was first elected as president of the republic of South Africa. The staff of the presidential house, for example started to resign at the very moment it was officially proclaimed that the new president, who had been 27 years in prison for the conflict of the segregation, was a color person. Besides all the differences the two races had in the 1990? s, such as economic standards, prohibition in public places, and extremely opposite ideologies , the Spring Boks which were the most popular rugby team, reached the goal to give an end to the Apartheid. This does not only concern the social, as well as political, and ec onomical issues, but rugby also serves as an emotional trigger to what represents the unity, compassion and sets free the passion to reinforce a country. As the Spring Boks managed to win the World Cup, which was firstly asked by the president, the country started to be a better one, a country which had day by day less and less differences between the two races that were facing each other for more than 10 years. The feeling of rejection towards being in the same room with a colour person was vanished, the passion that both ? nations? had achieved for the South African rugby team was found in each of the African member, and what is more, the strength that the country accomplished by the power that Mandela had towards his family, the South African population. The equality that had been formed between the different races was totally represented in the movie in all the aspects of the population, from the economic Maria Eugenia Traibel Senior III West Social Studies Invictus Essay position, to the social, political and ideological one. This can be demonstrated with many situations that were demonstrated in the movie Invictus. On the one hand, I could express the changes in the social aspects with a punctual situation that besides it was shown in the movie, it was a situation tha t was lived in South Africa every day, this one is associated with the prohibition of access of public places such as bathrooms, rugby and football fields, and the feeling of being in the same room with a person of a different race. The social rejection that the population felt towards the black people, and the feeling of revenge that the colour people felt towards the white ones, was such that they couldn? t speak to each other. From the ideological aspect, I could say that it was one of the aspects that were mostly shown especially through the rugby. The black people couldn? t stand or see the symbol of the spring Boks, as it represented to them the segregation, the apartheid, even the children who were given clothes as a gift because they couldn? t have them, they didn?t accept the Spring Boks t-shirts, it made them feel revenge and fear. But as Nelson fought for having a rainbow nation through the rugby, colour people started to change their minds and support their country as they didn? t do before. They lea rned to play the sport; they waved the Spring Boks flag and the South African one and also shared the passion for the game with all the African population. The distrust that the white people had towards Nelson Mandela made a twist when he went directly to the important symbol of them, the rugby. All he learned about the other culture was while he spent time in prison, the strategies that he used to make a better country all came to him with the time, and with the 27 years that he had to think while he was alone in his cell. All in all, the movie Invictus is a great demonstration of the history of apartheid that the Republic of South Africa suffered, and also how the powerful symbol of it, Nelson Mandela, fought to reach the end of it, and to reinforce the country, so they could have a rainbow nation, a nation with equality in their lives.

morality vs. reality :: essays research papers

Morality vs. Reality The story "Battle Royal" is the key in understanding and seeing the relationship between morality and reality. The characters in this story, namely the grandfather and his grandson, reveal to us their individuality, principles, morals, and ethics doing so they unfold a map that reveals their mental reality. Because their principals, morals and ethics reveal to us their mental reality, then their mental reality discloses the reality of the society in which they live in. The young boy’s journey toward the light (truth) is started a long time ago. However in the beginning he is unable to get on the right course, due to the wrong advice he is given by different people; he says it as "All my life I was looking for something, and every were that I turned someone tried to tell me what it was. I accepted their answers too, though they were often in contradiction" (448). Each time that he accepts their advice he is little by little pushed off the right track. It is not until he realizes that he is searching for himself, and instead of asking others questions, he needs to ask the questions to himself. Once he discovers whom to turn to, he begins a long and difficult journey in which he realizes that he is a unique person, he puts it as, "I am nobody but myself."(449). This means that he is unique and he is who he is, black. However before he comes to this enlightenment he discovers that he is an "invisible man"(449). He marks himself invisible because in the society in which a person is unheard and unseen by others is invisible. At that point the boy’s problem is clear. He is a black boy in a White men's world, in which he is not seen or heard. Yet he still does not know what to do about it, well at-least not until he hears his grandfather’s words to his father: Son, after I'm gone I want you to keep up a good fight. I never told you, but your life is a war and I have been a traitor all my born days, a spy in the enemy's country ever since I give up my gun back in the Reconstruction. Live with your head in the lion's mouth. I want you to overcome'em with yeses, undermine'em with grins, agree'em to death and destruction, let'em swoller you till they vomit or burst wide open Learn it to the younguns(449)

Is Booking Travel over the Internet Causing the Decline of High Street Travel Agents? Essay

Is booking travel over the internet causing the decline of high street travel agents? During the decade leading up to 2007, ways of buying tourism products as changed a lot. Ten years ago people choosing a holiday more often than not a package holiday, by going to the travel agent and choosing one from a number of brochures and after chatting with the travel agent. Many people still chose this method but a lot more people are buying packing holidays, more people now buy online, or over the telephone, through teletext. People tended to find it cheaper to and more flexible to buy their flights from one internet site, their accommodation from another and book a hire car with another site, rather than buying a package holiday out of a tour operator’s brochure. They are not always financially, protected when booking travel separately. Holidaymakers are â€Å"turning their backs on the traditional high-street travel agent in favour of booking trips online†, reports sundayherald. com. Between 2000 and 2004 there was an 11% drop in the number of bookings made at travel agents, with only 47% of overseas holidays now being reserved through a high street travel agency, according to figures from market researchers Mintel. Many people book breaks by phone, and just 31% of overseas trips were booked in person in 2004,† says the report. â€Å"The research shows that traditional sun, sand and sangria package holidays are the main type of trip booked on the high street, with just one in five d omestic trips booked at travel agencies. Richard Cope, international travel analyst at Mintel, reportedly said consumer confidence in the internet was driving people away from booking in person. â€Å"Mintel’s research shows that almost one in five UK holidays are now booked online, with consumers becoming increasingly confident about making their own travel arrangements. † Mintel figures also indicated that, overall, more holidays are being taken. In 2004 65% of British people went on holiday, compared to 62% in 2000. Some 44% of holidaymakers now take more than one holiday a year, up 14% since 2000. Altogether, Britons took 43 million holidays abroad in 2004. http://www. m-travel. com/news/2005/10/number_of_booki. html Technological changes within tourism surround several different factors from medical advances to the innovative space tourism. Similar to tourism, technology is an ever changing and sometimes unstable business. Better communication, transport and safety have encouraged new consumers to the industry. Improvements in water supply, medicine and knowledge have meant areas are opened up which were not possible before technological advances. In today’s society in which a consumer wants easier, quicker and cheaper service only technology has helped tourism fulfil the customers demand. Another massive effect on tourism is the rapid increase in online booking that has given consumers more opportunity to make a holiday. Through technological advances, online booking has been one of the biggest factors in affecting tourism, leisure and recreation in today’s world. There were 37,600,000 Internet users in the United Kingdom (representing 62. % of the population) in March 2007, according to Internet World Stats. This was up by 144. 2% compared to 2000. (Internet World Stats, March 2007) and a new Google Survey has shown that surfing the web has topped watching television as Britain’s favourite past time. On average residents in the UK spend 164 minutes online every day compared to 148 minutes watching television (Daily Mail, Friday 10th March 2006). This shows how much the internet is now an integral part of life and has had an effect on other aspects influencing the tourism business. More and more people are now booking their holiday on the internet, as many people are looking for a better priced deal than they’re being offered by their travel agent. Both holiday and airline bookings have not dramatically rose in sales from the travel slump of 2001-02 due to the massive consequences of September 11th and the threat of terrorism which has increased (it saw similar slumps although smaller after the Madrid bombings and 7/7 terrorist attacks). The Iraq war, the SARS/bird flu epidemics and very consistent hot European summers have persuaded the usual long haul travellers to stay at home. This has seen a loss in sales and therefore profits causing one of the hardest aviation crises of the industry. The number of job cuts that were announced in 2003/04 was well over 100,000 according to BBC News, November 2005. Routes had been slashed and several European carriers were barely clinging to life. The turmoil in the industry went from Aer Lingus to XL Airways, but times were changing and the industry needed something new. Survival tactics started to emerge and online travel started to show evidence of bucking this gloomy trend. The Interactive Media in Retail Group (IMRG), as cited in a May 21, 2002, Financial Times article had cited for many years that online spending was increasing and predicted it to triple at the end of the decade. Looking at e-commerce data overall, the firm counted travel as the biggest online sector, followed by electronic products and apparel. IMRG also said British shoppers were buying larger and more expensive goods online, such as furniture and kitchen appliances. This showed a large gap in the sub-market that needed to be exploited. Online Travel Spend ($bn) Europe N. AmericaU. K 20002. 4 6. 4 0. 20015. 8 11. 00 1. 8 200212. 7 18. 7 3. 7 Source: Datamonitor At the start of the boom these were seen as survival tactics by the airlines and the government also pushed for more progress in online booking to make the travel industry more prosperous. The economic realities forced travel companies to be more efficient in running their business. Websites, for example were able to promote the latest ticket prices, particularly at a time when they were being slashed on a day-to-day basis which was used to tempt travelers back into the air. Similarly travel sites e-mailed a wide ustomer base with relative ease to promote special deals. It is seen as the cheapest method of booking a holiday, the LogicaCMG (a marketing body) has said that phone bookings typically cost about ? 30 to service. By contrast net bookings cost around 75p. One of the biggest online travel sites Expedia, took an initial knock from 11 September, but then saw its transaction volumes recover by 80-85% during October. â€Å"Like every travel company, we experienced a downturn, but we then recovered a lot more quickly than the traditional industry† said James Vaile, managing director of Expedia in the UK. Online travel sites are also well positioned to exploit the recent procrastination by consumers in booking holidays. People are booking later than usual in recent years and the internet is seen as the obvious and natural place to hunt down last-minute bargains. As this bar chart shows travel sales online rose rapidly from 2006-2007 and it is expected to continue to rise to over $30 billion. The consumers weren’t only using the internet to book their holidays but also to research and gain knowledge of the destinations they wanted to go to. The search engines were flooded with searches over cheap flights, accommodation and new destinations (as shown in the rankings). From the bar chart below it shows that web-search is the preferred method of obtaining travel information with it being preferred nearly twice as much as personal recommendation, the second most preferred method. This is then followed by TV programmes, but the travel agents became the fourth option of consumers to collect travel information. Web-searches are high due to people liking to make their own decisions at their own pace and this can’t be done in travel agents where they are pushed, poked and pressured. This is unpleasant for the consumer and has changed the trend in which consumers went to travel agents for advice, whereas now they would rather use the internet. As this pie chart to the left shows the internet has had a huge impact on the booking of a holiday, with 79% of all booked holidays using the internet in the process. Also, the internet has seen a large increase in the number of â€Å"last minute† business as many tourists feel it is better-placed and they can search for the best priced, most suitable holidays or excursions. Furthermore, since the growth of the internet, online advertising has been used as a huge marketing tool, where holiday and travel providers can target large quantities of potential customers and keep advertising costs low. This has also been used to great effect as they appear to be a successful method and an efficient way of gaining business from the wallet-conscious consumers, whereas high street advertising receives less notice. Moreover, the internet has caused the high street travel agencies to close, therefore creating job losses within the businesses. This is mainly due to the fact that more people are booking direct with the holiday providers, thus cutting out the middle man and saving money by doing the research and booking themselves. This is usually done by using the internet or telephone booking where the overhead costs are much lower as an outlet has to be staffed and incur running costs such as electricity bills and also because of the larger volumes of people that are able to access the service. A recent example of this is was in 2001, when Airtours, the UK’s largest tour operator had to cut one-in-seven of its high street branches in an effort to return to profitability. According to finance director David Jardine, around 120 shops going under the name â€Å"Going Places† were closed as the business stated that they were finding there was an â€Å"increasing trend in customers wishing to book direct†. On the other hand, online companies such as Expedia. com have seen their profits on the rise over the past few years as would be expected, although they had not anticipated such a large growth. For the last three months of 2001, Expedia saw its net income surge to $19m according to BBC News, compared with a loss of $2. 6m in the same quarter of 2000 and also the firms evenues were in excess of $80 million for 2001, over double that for 2000, showing how quickly it has established itself as an efficient internet booking service. So in conclusion online booking for travel has dramatically changed tourism in the world. It has provided a less time consuming, cost effective and an overall efficient/productive method in organising tourism which has seen triggered a rapid rise in sales. Airlines are now recovering after effects that were unforeseen. BAA Limited, formerly the British Airport Association said seven UK Airports handled a total of 11. m passengers in August 2006 making it a record summer with the highest number of passengers ever recorded over a two month period. BAA also revealed here was a 6. 8% increase in passenger traffic for the 12 months to August 31st 2006. Bigger discounts and better security could tempt more people to book holidays online, a LogicaCMG survey (http://news. bbc. co. uk/1/hi/technology/3939035. stm) found. However, the future of online booking although seen as prosperous can also turn, but due to the recovery in airline business they are starting to hit back. Prices are starting to rise and now you must book early to get the best price. The same survey revealed that online discounts were still not high enough to tempt potential customers onto travel websites and that the process was still too complicated for some consumers. A serious issue with online booking is the fear of fraud. Consumers are not convinced that any personal and financial information they hand over would be kept secure by online travel shops and this is slowing the potential growth that could occur otherwise. The Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA) sees the online travel market having a long way to go before it replaces high street travel agents. ABTA estimates that by the end of 2007 online travel will be 17% of the UK’s ? 28bn travel market but this growth will only occur if trends continue as it relies on steadily growing numbers of people happy to book holidays online and as well as improvements in technology and the creation of better websites by travel firms. Issues over security, faults and complications need to be solved if this method of booking is to prosper.

Brass Alloys and Their Chemical Compositions

Brass is any alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with zinc. In some cases, copper with tin is considered ​a type of brass, although this metal historically has been called bronze. This is a list of common brass alloys, their chemical compositions, and the uses of the different types of brass. Brass Alloys Alloy Composition and Use Admiralty brass 30% zinc and 1% tin, used to inhibit dezincification Aich's alloy 60.66% copper, 36.58% zinc, 1.02% tin, and 1.74% iron. Corrosion resistance, hardness, and toughness make it useful for marine applications. Alpha brass Less than 35% zinc, malleable, can be worked cold, used in pressing, forging, or similar applications. Alpha brasses have only one phase, with face-centered cubic crystal structure. Prince's metal or Prince Rupert's metal Alpha brass containing 75% copper and 25% zinc. It's named for Prince Rupert of the Rhine and used to imitate gold. Alpha-beta brass, Muntz metal, or duplex brass 35-45% zinc, suited for hot working. It contains both ÃŽ ± and ÃŽ ²' phase; the ÃŽ ²'-phase is body-centered cubic and is harder and stronger than ÃŽ ±. Alpha-beta brasses are usually worked hot. Aluminum brass Contains aluminum, which improves its corrosion resistance. It's used for seawater service and in Euro coins (Nordic gold). Arsenical brass Contains arsenic and frequently aluminum and is used for boiler fireboxes Beta brass 45-50% zinc content. It can only be worked hot, produces a hard, strong metal that is suitable for casting. Cartridge brass 30% zinc brass with good cold-working properties; used for ammunition cases Common brass, or rivet brass 37% zinc brass, standard for cold working DZR brass dezincification resistant brass with a small percentage of arsenic Gilding metal 95% copper and 5% zinc, softest type of common brass, used for ammunition jackets High brass 65% copper and 35% zinc, has a high tensile strength and is used for springs, rivets, and screws Leaded brass Alpha-beta brass with an addition of lead, easily machined Lead-free brass As defined by California Assembly Bill AB 1953 contains "not more than 0.25 percent lead content" Low brass Copper-zinc alloy containing 20% zinc; ductile brass used for flexible metal hoses and bellows Manganese brass 70% copper, 29% zinc, and 1.3% manganese, used in making golden dollar coins in the United States Muntz metal 60% copper, 40% zinc, and a trace of iron, used as a lining on boats Naval brass 40% zinc and 1% tin, similar to admiralty brass Nickel brass 70% copper, 24.5% zinc, and 5.5% nickel used to make pound coins in the pound sterling currency Nordic gold 89% copper, 5% aluminium, 5% zinc, and 1% tin, used in 10, 20, and 50 cents in euro coins Red brass American term for the copper-zinc-tin alloy known as gunmetal considered both a brass and a bronze. Red brass usually contains 85% copper, 5% tin, 5% lead, and 5% zinc. Red brass may be copper alloy C23000, which is 14 to 16% zinc, 0.05% iron and lead, and the remainder copper. Red brass also may refer to ounce metal, another copper-zinc-tin alloy. Rich low brass (Tombac) 15% zinc, often used for jewelry Tonval brass (also called CW617N, CZ122, or OT58) copper-lead-zinc alloy White brass Brittle metal containing more than 50% zinc. White brass may also refer to certain nickel silver alloys as well as Cu-Zn-Sn alloys with high proportions (typically 40%+) of tin and/or zinc, as well as predominantly zinc casting alloys with a copper additive. Yellow brass American term for 33% zinc brass