ShantanuT01/DACTYL-Pretraining huggingface dataset:
Introduction “A pale, frail-looking, sad-eyed man with hair that expressed much more than last night’s pillow struggle… I remember the first thing I thought was, ‘Get some Sleep,” writes Johnny Depp, a long time associate actor of Tim Burton, in his forward to Burton on Burton (Burton, Salisbury and Depp, Burton on Burton x). The image that Depp puts forth is that of a man-child who inspires through his camera, images of gothic landscape and images of demonic clown along with the Dickensian downheartedness and loneliness of a socially unaccepted protagonist as in Edward Scissorhands, Sleepy Hollow, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory . Burton in his work puts forth an absolute mess and as self-described as “happy-go lucky manic-depressive” (Breskin), in the same way, like his physical description penned down by Johnny Depp. Tim Burton has brought forth a style of films that transcends conventional genre and explanations (Burton and Fraga vii). In his first short film, Vincent , Berton recalled the tale of a young man who dreamed of becoming a prince but was trapped in his suburban home, the story of a fairy tale gone wrong. This shows his love for the queer and the odd. Laurent Tirard points out that Berton “grew up fascinated by vampires, zombies, and cheap horror films,” which created an everlasting influence on his romanticizing with the “weirdness as embodied by all sorts of hilariously marginal creatures” (Moviemakers’ master class: private lessons from the world’s foremost directors 91). Berton is particularly definite in portraying these magical creatures and he almost becomes the spokesperson of the queer. His movies are visual poetry that shows the beauty behind the demonic and the beast-like creatures. Burton himself confessed that the ideas he gets are a “little too dark” that represents his personality’s “negative side” (Tirard 94). So how far are the ideas and images reflected in the films created by Berton reflects the real him, and how has come out of the influence of his upbringing and childhood. Alternatively, is it that Berton sees things in a dark, gothic, manner, almost like a vision that renders a novel portrayal of the comic book characters or those from classic texts? Burton’s genius as a creator is skillfully described by Johnny Depp as “an artist, a genius, an oddball, an insane, brilliant, brave, hysterically funny, loyal, nonconformist” (Burton, Salisbury and Depp xii). These qualities penned down by Depp about Burton are true and are reflected in his films. In this paper, an attempt is made to understand Burton as a rebellious and nontraditional artist and filmmaker. This paper is a study of the life and work of Tim Burton. The paper tries to understand what Burton spoke through his films and how and why he was influenced to make such dreamlike (almost nightmarish) movies that transcend viewers into a gothic paradise of satire, horror imagery, and a post-mod
Introduction Public administration can be described as the study or a field of practice or occupation. Politically, public administration describes or defines how the various branches of the government strategize and implement policies. Government involvement in the public sector can be either directly on indirect. When the government is involved directly, it employs public members to serve as employees for the benefit of the general population, while indirect involvement of the government would be when the government hires private contractors to carry out some of the stipulated public policies. It also involves how public quarter organizations are categorized and managed, how the federal government and the cities, states and towns work hand in hand to attain their development goals in the interest of the people. In legal terms, public administration means the ability to implement legislation in regulating the behaviors of different individuals provide job opportunities, goods and services to the citizens. The American public administration is one among the most admired administration in the world. Many countries seek solution to their administrative problems from gathering facts compiled from the American Public Administration, however this does not mean that America is all perfect in ensuring that the public administration sector is always having smooth endeavors instead they also have challenges that they seek solution to. A Constitution dilemma Public administrators are not only concerned with the management of public policies but also have some influence in the political field which they end up sometimes being dominant in political issues. In America, according to many people’s view is that politics and administration should be totally separated from each other but this is not the case especially when presently only well organized administrations which are able to cope with the issues generated from all aspects can be seen as survivors and be regarded as the best. The public officials who
Whenever history is trying to conceal something from the mankind in the depth of its wisdom, there are always the people who dare to take a glimpse on the truths that are hidden from the rest of the world. These were called the crusaders, and the fame of theirs was spread all around the world, as they went on to face the future adventures and unravel the mysteries that the world was full of. However, the merciless history tells us that thee events were far from being the truth. In fact, the Arab world is still a land uncharted to the Europeans, and the crusades that were undertaken to subdue the Arabs to the European culture were not what they are being told today. Maalouf shares the facts that speak what people have never heard of before. The Europeans are used to take the crusades that they have been reading about in the books in history and have heard of as they listened to some historians – European historians, to be more precise – and, as a result, the opinions formed on the suggested topic do not delight with their diversity. It seems more than clear to an average man – not the one who has been entangled into this history, whose roots are the roots of the Muslim people – that the crusaders had all the rights to invade the territory of Palestine and search for the people of different religious beliefs (Saracens, as they wee called, they were said to pose an immense threat to the rest of the world with their beliefs and their way of living a life, their customs and traditions, as well as their culture in general). This was considered fair and just to the people of the Medieval Europe, and they supported the crusaders as far as they could – in fact, the former were heroes in the eyes of the Western savage world. The mistakes of the history and the people who have made their tribute to its being written and read a complete lie, from the beginning till the end. The Muslim world that the crusaders have been chasing and trying to wipe from the face of the Erath once and for all was not the aggressor, as it was supposed before, but the victim, as it turned out not so long ago according to the studies held in this direction by a famous scientist Amin Maalouf. As the writer out it himself, The basic idea of this book is simple: to tell the story of the Crusaders as they were seen, lived, and recorded on ‘the other side’ – in other words, in the Arab camp. Its context is based almost exclusively on the testimony of contemporary Arab historians and chroniclers. (Maalouf 11) The author has found the materials and data that can contradict the knowledge that the Europeans – and, in fact, the Asians as well – have got so
Existentialism, unlike cubism, surrealism, or impressionism, was not a French creation. The pioneers of existentialism were mostly Germans, Danes, and Spaniards. However, the credit of the present popularity of the philosophy rests mostly to the French writers. Mostly existential literature has been scarred with the brand of being pessimistic and abstract. Existentialist literature is often characterized by the absurdity of the existence of man, and how a man often dwells on the ugly and dark sides of things. Further, existentialist literature contends that life is more often than not is marked by pain and misery. These literature are often found to demonstrate scathing anger vented against God or Fate, and constantly denouncing the existence of either. This essay argues that existentialist literature, usually adorned with fear and pessimism, is a place where one demonstrates indifferent or escapist protagonists. The paper will first discuss various existentialist literature and then analyze Albert Camus’s The Stranger as an existentialist novel. Before we start an inquiry into existentialist literature, it is essential to understand what is existentialism as a philosophy. Existentialism as philosophy begins from the point of individual existence. Everything in and around man stems from this single, beginning idea. Hence, the potent of the idea is that the philosophy is based on the individual and not the universe. Existentialist thought and philosophy are based in the literary vein as those by Nietzsche Kierkegaard. The fundamental questions that an existentialist asks are – who and what I am and how I shall live my life. These basic questions reverberate in the novels and literary creations of the existentialist genre. The existentialist novel does not paint a rubicund picture of life. The protagonists of the novel are often indifferent and accept the sordidness of life with an unusual complacency. Nothing is depicted with intensified or glorified energy like evil in the works of Proust or love in novels of Lawrence. Instead, existentialist literature aims at describing the man at his basest instincts. The beginners of the existentialist school of thought were Balzac and Baudelaire (Peyre 21). The ideals of existentialism could have been observed in writings of Sophocles and Seneca who have often described the “nothingness” of man after their “brief existence” (Peyre 21). From these writers, we may pass on to more modern writers like Fredrick Nietzsche, Franz Kafka, and William Faulkner, who were the pioneers of the tradition of existentialists as we know today. Existentialist literati like Sartre, Borges, Kundera, Pamuk, and others have followed similar depiction of the life that is pessimistic and desolate, and the protagonists are escapist cynics. The novel The Str
Introduction Every organization has its own competitive strategies. However, these strategies cannot work without a strong organizational culture. Organizational culture has the advantage of increasing employee commitment to the firm. In addition, it enables the organization to define its strategies effectively. This is essential as it ensures successful execution of activities necessary for achievement of organizational goals. Organizational culture is also important in maximizing production through employee motivation. This is particularly significant to human capital whose value is maximized by the right organizational culture. In essence, organizational culture forms an integral part of management competency. While these attributes can be achieved through implementation of the right organizational culture, determining an effective culture is quite difficult. This paper will explore corporate culture, its roles in organizations and the factors that influence its implementation (Senge, 2006, p. 55). Organizational culture encompasses concepts such as assumptions, values, beliefs, artifacts and behaviors, among others. It, therefore, works to reduce variability in the workforce. This allows for easier control and shaping of staff behavior. In essence, it defines the distinct character of an organization since it varies from one organization to another. Culture, therefore, plays a crucial role in organizational setup. Organizational culture connects employees together and ensures efficiency in execution of activities. Moreover, communication is essential for implementing the right culture. In addition, when the right culture is implemented, employees are usually motivated to maximize production. In this regard, it is necessary that the right communication framework is put in place to achieve desired objectives. Furthermore, motivation is a central factor in determining an organization’s competitiveness (Andreas, 2006, p. 159-172.) Motivation Motivation can be defined as the urge to do something. For instance, organizations with motivated staff enjoy their work. This improves both efficiency and quality of production. Moreover, it saves time and creates opportunity for innovations. Motivation is essential to every organization. In fact, when employees are motivated, they are able to create as well as implement inventive ideas. Strong identification is important in enabling employees to be part of the organization. This gives them a sense of belonging, which is significant in entrenching spirit of unity in the team. Besides, their sense of innovation can only be achieved if the organization embraces innovative norms. Interestingly, these norms can only be achieved through implementation of strong organizational culture. Motivation is usually derived from effective organizational culture. Organizational culture is essential in creating commitment among employees. This strengthens their motivation to achieve organizational goals. Motivation is a very significant factor in organizations because it affects returns. When employees are not motivated then organizational objectives cannot be achieved
Introduction The spread of the coronavirus disease has led to global, crushing turning points, to an acceleration of the crisis of human lifestyle, relations, and production. It exposed the boundaries of a secure, social, geopolitical, technological, and industrial model. That moment radically turned the world upside down, plunged it into chaos and instability, forcing it to reconsider the entrenched laws and principles. There are many guesses about its appearance, and there is still no single answer to this question. Certainly, COVID-19 is an urgent problem requiring adjusting existing common opinions, ideas, and knowledge, searching for guilt and salvation. COVID-19 is a well-designed field for implementing sociological research. More precisely, the COVID-19 pandemic can be the grounding context for research on risk factors, individualism, globalization vs. glocalization, structural inequalities, and so forth. Indeed, that kind of research on the coronavirus pandemic has mushroomed since 2020. One of the main features of that period, which has interested me, is the increasing influence of social inequalities on society. World Economic Forum reported that pandemic highlighted the unequal access to healthcare and different outcomes of disease progression (Myers). Another major issue is the digital divide. Although almost all people have changed their workplace to an online mode during the pandemic, many workers did not have access to technologies and stable Internet connection to work at home (Myers). Consequently, people from underdeveloped countries where the Internet connection quality is low cannot compete with people with decent Internet penetration (Myers). Therefore, it can be said that the social side of the pandemic is different health indicators and cases of infection between different social groups depending on class, gender, race, and ethnicity. Another problem of the COVID-19 pandemic is an unequal distribution of coronavirus vaccines. Researchers from Duke University report that 53% of all vaccines are held by the richest countries, while 92% of the poorest countries will not achieve a 60% vaccination rate until 2023 or later (Mirza and Rauhala). Due to the fact that rich countries buy all the early doses of vaccines in advance, humanitarian initiatives like Covax cannot implement all the planned initiatives. The inequalities and social disparities of the COVID-19 will be the main topic of this research. Further Research Analysis The most important part of all preliminary work
Introduction Karl Marx played a crucial role in Philosophy by propounding what is expected of communist leadership, thus making the communist manifesto a very popular document in the 20 th Century. The questions that this paper is going to grapple with is whether the issues were only representative of what happened then and not at all the mirror of what was to happen later. Communist Manifesto and social issues Though the communist manifesto clearly elaborates what a communist organization intends or should do, the manifesto has proved to go well beyond this. In fact he expose has presented issues that actually show the genesis of the communist and socialist thought. According to Marx, history is rife with issues of class struggle. He felt that society is full of groups antagonizing each other for either social or perpetuation of their selfish ideals. Thus, there is deep rooted struggle between the haves and the have-nots, the slaves and their masters, the proletariat and the bourgeoisie etc. Actually, one can easily see that what the manifesto set out to obfuscate was the capitalist leadership as far as social relations were concerned. Also the reason why the manifesto could be said to be based on reaction to events then is the fact that society was faced by exploitation. Marx and Engels did greatly succeed in mirroring the society then. The social matters that border on material have been elevated as ones that will eventually give birth to a revolution. Competition in society is something that is inherent. For Marx this urge to rule and remain above others is something that has made those with control of the means of production to wish to remain there while riding on the backs of the laborers. It is against this awakening that the manifesto candidly declares, “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles” (Wootton 798). The Manifesto, nonetheless, has made the proponents of revolutions all over to clearly make them aware of their oppression. Thus, it can be said to have assisted in the development of class consciousness, something that members of society grapple with everyday, though silently, most of the time. This could be well orchestrated to enable them to abolish this expression through making sure that that class society is made to disintegrate. Private property is an issue the manifesto dwells upon. The primary issue of the manifesto is the vagaries in which the bourgeoisie subject and subjugate the proletariat, all in the struggle for private property. Private property is an issue that clearly affects the society even today. But what one wonders is whether the situation lies in the total abolition of it as the manifesto proposes. The communist manifesto unequivocally declares that for there could be other prudent ways through wh
Mean, Median, and Standard Deviation The first procedure of examining the soda amounts contained in bottles would require calculating the mean deviation. The mean deviation for ounces in the bottles would be calculated by summing every ounce measurement for every bottle and then dividing the sum by the number of bottles examined (which is thirty). Adding up the measured amount of soda contained in each of the sample bottles gives a result of 467.12 ounces. This sum divided by the number of bottles (30) results in 15.57 ounces. This is the determined mean deviation. The problem with calculating mean deviation, however, is that the typical outcome for each of the measured samples. There may be an outcome that highly differs from the rest of the data, which will result in mean deviating becoming much less precise. The median deviation is an alternative that provides a more accurate deviation. Basically, an even number of outcomes presents an opportunity to take two middle outcomes and calculate the median deviation in the same fashion as the mean. The two middle outcomes for bottle samples are 15.88 and 15.37 ounces. Dividing those by two (which is the number of selected outcomes) equals 15.63 ounces. This is the determined median deviation. Standard deviation is designed to demonstrate how the measured data is spread in both directions (minimum and maximum). To calculate standard deviation, one would first need to calculate the mean which is already done. The next step would require subtracting the mean from each of the selected outcomes (ounces of soda in bottles). The according results must then be separately squared and summed. Next, the result is divided by the number of outcomes minus one. This determines the variance. Standard deviation is calculated by extracting the square root of the variance. After the standard variation is determined, it must be separately added to the mean and subtracted from it. This will give us both the lowest and highest extremities of measurements. Calculations resulted in a standard deviation of 0.3. Thus, the minimum extremity is 15.57 – 0.3 = 15,27 and the maximum extremity is 15.57 + 0.3 = 15,87. Confidence Interval and Hypothesis Test The confidence interval is where the true value of the measurements is detected. Basically, the confidence interval
The two cases namely Initech and Coffee Bean describe two contrasting working environments that are defined by different leadership practices. Based on the leadership practices employed by Initech, as revealed through the interview conducted with Peter Gibbons, one of the company employees is demoralizing to the workers. Therefore, it has resulted to decreased productivity among the workers. On the other hand, the leadership system that the Coffee Bean management uses boosts the morale of the workers. Therefore, it increases their productivity while steadily reducing their turnover at the same time. This paper aims at analyzing the management and leadership practices as described in the contrasting cases of Initech and Coffee by evaluating how each case affects the productivity of the workers. The only source of motivation for the workers at Initech, as revealed by Peter, is the fear of being hassled by numerous bosses or even losing of job. The working environment is such that success is gauged by looking at how one looks busy rather than the actual work that is performed, as well as how perfectly it is done (Hughes et al., 2005, p. 378). Workers in this scenario just appear at work for formality. They only strive to achieve what is required of them. Workers tur8nover in environments such as Initech is very high, as a worker will move as soon as he or she gets another job in a situation that is more encouraging. For instance, a worker such as Peter will not hesitate to move elsewhere if the chance presents itself. As he claims, while questioned by the efficiency experts, he is not lazy but simply unmotivated. Management systems that do not encourage dialogue between the workers and the managers or leaders are simply tyrannical and oppressive (Zalenik, 1997, p. 71). The worker does not feel free, as there is always a feeling that the management is against him or her. This happens to be the case at Initech where questioning the authorities is considered a taboo. Innovation and creativity are limited in these situations, as the workers simply prefer to keep any useful information to themselves rather than voicing it. In most cases, managers who restrain their workers do so for fear of being corrected or by simply being ignorant. The organizations end up losing a lot when it comes to ideas that should have otherwise been contributed by the workers. On the other hand, the case of Coffee Bean provides an organizational environment that would have facilitated the maximum performance of people such as Peter Gibbons. The environment is very encouraging to both clients and the workers. Therefore, this makes everyday encounters motivating. The management at Coffee Bean has realized the importance of leadership practices that aim at motivating the workers, which is contrary to the Initech approach. Workers at Initech get their incentives in the form of threats while the efforts of the workers at Coffee Bean are well appreciated. The FISH management training employed at Coffee Bean, which emphasizes fun at the workplace, is very effective since it makes the work experience interesting and liberal to the workers