Elements of Dance Essay Example for Free

Elements of Dance Essay After reading the handout about tribal dances and ceremonies, I learned a lot of interesting things I never knew before. I guess the fact that I havent taken a dance class ever before and wasnt taught too much about dance in grammar school or high school, I was ignorant to how important and how influential ritual dances are within a society. Dancing is an activity that can be dated as far back as the Stone Age, when people first existed on this planet. Not only that, ritual dances can be found in almost every culture today. In some areas of the world, dancing is a way of life. It can be used for a variety of reasons such as; Fertility rituals, Initiation rituals, Rituals of the Hunt and Animals, Healing and funeral rituals, and War and Weapon rituals. Rituals are traditional clusters of actions. They are performed for the most part to cast magical spells and to influence gods and spirits. Rituals are also passed down from generation to generation. The ritual dance that my group performed last Tuesday in class was titled War and Peace. It started off violent with an intense fight scene and ended with everyone being brought back to life and coming together with the linkage our hands, representing peace. With everything going on in the world right now, we thought it was an appropriate ritual dance to do because the point of it was to show how we must not kill each other. We must come together, figure out our differences and make peace. This ritual would be considered a specific ritual, which has a specific one-time purpose. The purpose obviously being the end of the terrorism thats going on and the prevention of a war. The other type of ritual the handout talks about is a cyclical. A cyclical is repeated each year or season. An example of this would be a rain dance that a tribe might do during a dry season when their crops need water. It seemed to me that the other two ritual dances did in class were probably cyclicals. They seemed as though they were dances that could be used over and over again as opposed to our ritual that had a one-time purpose. Another interesting fact I found out while reading was how sound plays such a crucial role in a ritual dance. It said that the drummer is the main music maker, and it is thought that the gods are spoken to, through drums. Since we practiced our ritual dances in class without a drumbeat, it was a real drastic change when Dave provided a beat for our final dance, making it much easier to keep a rhythm. Another important topic talked about in the article that had to do with our dance in class was Sexual roles. It said that men usually have the roles in a ritual dance dealing with war and the womens role most often deal with the caring for the bodies of the dead. This was also true for our dance we performed in class. Me and Mike started of the ritual dance with a fight symbolizing war, and the dance ended with one of the girls from our group bringing us back to life. In conclusion of this paper, I would like to say that I actually am glad we were assigned our ritual dance, I had fun. Now that I have finished this paper, I have a better understanding of what ritual dance really is.

Does College Help :: essays research papers

College or technical schools are supposed to be the gateway to higher paying careers, but most are not all that they are cracked up to be. The standards and goals that society wants met are continually not being met by the students today. Also, many higher learning facilities lack the funds to provide positive learning environments for students. For these reasons and many more are keeping the students of today from benefiting fully from schools.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Society today has to make some new choices for the students of tomorrow, choices that will carry them into the next millennium. Society can either “lower standards so that everybody “passes'; in a way that looses all meaning in the real world'; or “ raise standards and then meet them'; (Barber 479). I personally believe in raising our expectations and doing whatever is needed to meet them. Our countries standards are among the lowest in the world and “ at the same moment as we are transferring our responsibilities to the shoulders of the next generation, we are blaming them for our own generation’s most conspicuous failures'; (Barber 472). Every election year the candidates use something about education as one of their platforms, but few ever carry through with them once they are elected. Most education bills die in congress in some shape or another and the ones that actually make it through congress, are usually ineffective because t hey have been changed and modified to the point of ineffectiveness.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Also, many of the learning facilities today lack the funding to provide adequate, positive learning environments for students. Underpaid teachers and professors who “ make less than accountants architects, doctors, lawyers, engineers, judges, health professionals, auidiors, and surveyors'; and thus many student disregard teachers as role models. If people see someone who can score touchdowns or dunk a basketball making millions while their teachers are scraping bottom to survive, then how can an educator possibly motivate them to learn (Barber 470). Many people chase after their “dreams'; of money instead of seeing the reality of learning. Although society today rates an education as one of their top priorities, they still allow learning facilities to become broken and run down. Like animals, children and adults file into buildings with bad floors, horrible plumbing, leaky roofs and ceilings, and pack into desk, usually 35+ per educator. Today the gove rnment spends $35,000 a year to keep someone behind bars and only a fraction of that to keep them in school (Barber 475).

Women in the Early 19th Century

The American experiment that began as a Republic after ratification of the Constitution created political, social, and economic participation for its citizens, but not for women. The status of women in the early 19th century was shaped by economic considerations, religious beliefs, and long-held notions of female inferiority. While poor, laboring women suffered the most, the characteristics of inequality were evident in all social classes. The Proper Role of Women in the Early RepublicThe early 19th century experienced a shift, at least for women in the urban centers of the Northeast, from the household economies that reflected an agricultural society to the necessity of linking female responsibilities with their husband’s careers. For lower class women, this meant supplementing family income by working either in early industrial mills, as domestic servants, or vending on city streets. Upper middle class women focused on social endeavors tied to their husband’s employme nt and continued social upper mobility.This included supervising servants, facilitating parties, and raising the children. Women who voiced any political activism were frowned upon. Perhaps the only place a woman might venture such opinions was around the dinner table. Above all, women were equated with virtue and purity. Middle and upper class women devoted time to helping charities that sought to alleviate the plight of the poor, especially widows and abandoned mothers with children. They worked with Protestant missions and labored to save poor women from prostitution.Due to the cult of female purity, they were viewed as being the best teachers, the â€Å"moral guardians† of society. Women in the Working Class In the early 19th century, many Northeast cities, especially port cities, saw an increase in crude mass production industries, as in the first textile mills. One result was the use of poor class women working for cheap wages, often to augment their husband’s me ager incomes. Some poor women left the cities during periods of harvest to assist farmers needing cheap laborers.Others earned meager sums vending on city streets. Still others worked in the growing sewing trades or as domestic servants. Single mothers, however, were often forced to rely on the Almshouses and the various charities geared toward the poor. Widows had a particularly difficult time. Historian Christine Stansell, in her 1986 study of New York women 1789 to 1860, writes that â€Å"widowhood was virtually synonymous with impoverishment. † Another result of the changes in female status was the slow decline in birthrates.Historians John D’Emilio and Estelle B. Freedman state that, â€Å"Economic interest encouraged some families to have fewer children. † They demonstrate a possible correlation of the rise of industrialization and the decline of agricultural pursuits with steadily lowering birthrates throughout the 19th century. Impact of Protestant Theol ogical Shifts By the early 19th century, Protestantism had discarded earlier notions of man’s relationship to God. This was particularly true of the Calvinist principle of predestination.Religion focused on an individual relationship with God and placed on man a greater sense of controlling one’s destiny. These views were being shaped by Transcendentalism as well as the emphasis on personal commitment coming out of the Second Great Awakening. Such views had a direct impact on sexuality and lowering birthrates. Sexuality was no longer simply a loveless act of procreation. Thus, families limited the number of children based on their economic situation. Still, the changing attitude was not universal and men and women had numerous children, especially in rural, farm areas.Lucretia Mott, an early advocate of women’s rights, for example, had six children. Female Status in the Early 19th Century Although the expectations of women in the early 19th century were shifting , their status within a patriarchal society remained the same. Politically, they were powerless. Job opportunities were severely limited. Because of the social expectations that tied female dependence on men, single women and widows were the most vulnerable. Even upper middle class women were doomed to conform to patterns of daily life that were dictated by their husbands.

Cities Of London 1550-1625 And London - 1344 Words

Cities of London 1550-1625 (including Stratford-upon-Avon, Oxford and London) What was the era of 1550-1625 like in England? Elizabethan Age The Elizabethan Age (1558- 1603) is an epoch in English history, remembered as a renaissance of classical ideals, naval triumph against the Spanish (which at the time were disliked and considered a rival kingdom) and international expansion. This generated a great wave of English nationalism. The era is marked by the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603), and is often hailed as the Golden Age of England. Stuart Period The Stuart Period (1603-1714) started with the ascension of James VI of Scotland (thus being the first king of the United Kingdom) and ended with the ascension of George I (from the House of Hanover). The age consisted of radical politics and intense religious conflict. The age included an extremely bloody civil war. Where was William Shakespeare born? What were the conditions of that particularly city? William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon in what is now Warwickshire. Stratford-upon-Avon referred to the town Stratford that was upon the River Avon, and the roman road that crossed the river was the Salt Road to Alcester. Stratford-upon-Avon was a small country town a hundred miles northwest of London, a journey of four days on foot during the Elizabethan period. Majority of the locals living in Stratford-upon-Avon earned their living by farming. By 1564, there were approximately 2,000 inhabitantsShow MoreRelated The Decline of the Holy Roman Empire Essay3137 Words   |  13 PagesProtestants and Catholics was unreachable, legal action against the Lutheran states was to be taken, hopefully not provoking united resistance in the Protestants (McElwee 118). Unfortunately, on December 22, 1530, representatives of Protestant princes and cities met at Schmalkalde to discuss defense measures. As Charles hesitated, dividing attention between Protestantism and the Turks, The Sc hmalkaldic League perfected its organization. The bitter rivalry between Lutherans and Zwinglies, which had causedRead MoreRethinking Mercantalism Essay15042 Words   |  61 Pagesits implications for imperial development. â€Å"In the Middle Ages,† Andrews explained in prose far less turgid than Schmoller’s or Heckscher’s, â€Å"men’s lives and ambitions had been largely bounded by the geographical limits of their feudal lordships, city-states, municipalities, communes, manors, and other local institutions and their activities had been mainly restricted to the affairs of groups and neighborhoods.† â€Å"But later,† Andrews recounted, â€Å"during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,Read MoreSeminar-Report-on- Optical Fiber Communications7997 Words   |  32 Pagesapplications. The first practical all-glass fiber was devised by Brian OBrien at the American Optical Company and Narinder Kapany (who first coined the term fiber optics in 1956) and colleagues at the Imperial College of Science and Technology in London. Early all-glass fibers experienced excessive optical loss, the loss of the light signal as it traveled the fiber, limiting transmission distances. In 1969, several scientists concluded that impurities in the fiber material caused the signal