The Tramp

NO PLACE FOR A WOMAN The Australian author Barbara Baynton had her first short story published under the title â€Å"The Tramp† in 1896 in the Christmas edition of the Bulletin. Founded in Sydney in 1880, the Bulletin was instrumental in developing the idea of Australian nationalism. It was originally a popular commercial weekly rather than a literary magazine but in the 1890s, with the literary critic A. G. Stephens as its editor, it was to become â€Å"something like a national literary club for a new generation of writers† (Carter 263).Stephens published work by many young Australian writers, including the short story writer Henry Lawson and the poet â€Å"Banjo† Paterson and in 1901 he celebrated Miles Franklin’s My Brilliant Career as the first Australian novel. 2 †¦ Stephens deemed her â€Å"too outspoken for an Australian audience† (Schaffer 154). She was unable to find a publisher in Sydney willing to print her stories as a collection a nd it was not until 1902 that six of her stories were published in London by Duckworth’s Greenback Library under the title Bush Studies. It was, on the whole, reviewed favorably.She subsequently published a novel, Human Toll, in 1907 and an expanded collection of stories in 1917. Yet, although individual stories were regularly included in anthologies of Australian literature, by the time of her death in 1929 she was better known as an antique collector and her collected stories were not reprinted until 1980. 3 Until the advent of feminist criticism in the 1980s, Baynton remained a largely forgotten figure, dismissed as a typical female writer who did not know how to control her emotions and who was unable to put her â€Å"natural talent† to good use.As late as 1983 Lucy Frost could talk of â€Å"her unusually low level of critical awareness† (65) and claim that she â€Å"relies †¦ on instinct †¦ In order to write well she needs to write honestly out o f intuitive understanding. †¦ As art it makes for failure† (65). For a long time reading the implicit in Baynton’s stories consisted in identifying the autobiographical elements and attempting to piece together her true life. She notoriously claimed, even to her own children, to be the daughter not of an Irish carpenter but of a Bengal Lancer and in later life tried to conceal he hardship of her childhood and early married life. The stories were read as â€Å"true† accounts of what it was like for a poor woman to live in the bush at the end of the nineteenth century. This paper argues that far from being a natural writer whose â€Å"talent does not extend to symbolism† (Frost 64), Baynton is a sophisticated writer who uses obliqueness simply because this was the only form of criticism open to a woman writer in Australia at this time. The apparent inability of readers to engage with the implicit in her stories stems from an unwillingness to accept her vision of life in the bush. In order to understand Baynton's technique and why earlier readers consistently failed to interpret it correctly, it is important to replace her stories in the context of the literary world in which she was working for, as Brown and Yule state, when it comes to reading the implicit: â€Å"Discourse is interpreted in the light of past experience of similar discourse by analogy with previous similar texts† (65). In 1901, the year of federation and the height of Australian nationalistic fervor, A. G.Stephens wrote: What country can offer to writers better material than Australia? We are not yet snug in cities and hamlets, molded by routine, regimented to a pattern. Every man who roams the Australian wilderness is a potential knight of Romance; every man who grapples with the Australian desert for a livelihood might sing a Homeric chant of history, or listen, baffled and beaten, to an Aeschylean dirge of defeat. The marvels of the adventurous are our d aily common-places.The drama of the conflict between Man and Destiny is played here in a scenic setting whose novelty is full of vital suggestion for the literary artist. (Ackland, 77) 5 Women are conspicuously absent in this description of Australian life as they are in the work of Henry Lawson whose stories have come to be seen as the ‘perfect’ example of nationalistic writing. In the titles of his stories women, if they exist at all, are seen as appendages of men: â€Å"The Drover’s Wife,† â€Å"The Selector’s Daughter. They are defined at best by their physical characteristics: â€Å"That Pretty Girl in the Army,† but more often than not are specifically excluded: â€Å"No Place for a Woman† or reduced to silence: â€Å"She Wouldn’t Speak. † In the texts themselves the narrators are either anonymous or male and male mate-ship is valued above marriage. In Lawson's most well-known stories the bush is a destructive forc e against which man must wage a constant battle. The landscape, perhaps predictably, is depicted in feminine terms either as a cruel mother who threatens to destroy her son or as a dangerous virgin who leads man into deadly temptation.Men survive by rallying together and are always ready to help a â€Å"mate† in distress. Women are left at home and are shown to be contented with their role as homemaker: â€Å"All days are much the same to her †¦ But this bush-woman is used to the loneliness of it †¦ She is glad when her husband returns, but she does not gush or make a fuss about it. She gets him something good to eat, and tidies up the children† (Lawson 6). Baynton's stories challenge this vision of life in the bush in a number of ways: the majority of her protagonists are female; the real danger comes not from the bush but from the men who inhabit it. From the very beginning, Baynton’s stories were subject to a form of male censorship since Stephens h eavily edited them in an attempt to render the implicit conventional and thereby make the stories conform to his vision of Australian life. Few manuscripts have survived but the changes made to two stories have been well documented. In 1984 Elizabeth Webby published an article comparing the published version of â€Å"Squeaker’s Mate† with a typescript/manuscript held in the Mitchell Library.She noted that in the published version the structure has been tightened and some ambiguity removed by replacing many of the pronouns by nouns. More importantly, the ending has been changed and, since endings play such a crucial role in the understanding of a short story, this has important repercussions on the whole text: The new, more conventionally moralistic ending demanded a more actively brutal Squeaker and a more passive, suffering Mary. So traditional male/female characteristics were superimposed on Baynton’s original characters, characters designed to question such s exual stereotypes.As well, the main emphasis was shifted from its ostensible object Squeaker’s mate, to her attacker and defender; instead of a study of a reversal of sex, we have a tale of true or false mateship. (459) 7 Despite these changes the text's conformity to the traditional Australian story of mate-ship which the Bulletin readers had come to expect remains superficial. The title itself is an ironic parody of Lawson's story titles. The woman is defined by her relationship to the man but the roles are reversed. The man has become the effeminate â€Å"Squeaker,† the woman the masculine â€Å"mate. As in Lawson's stories the male character's words are reported in passages of direct speech and the reader has access to his thoughts while the woman's words are reported only indirectly: â€Å"†¦ waiting for her to be up and about again. That would be soon, she told her complaining mate† (16). However, and this is an important difference with Lawson's sto ries, in Baynton's work the text deliberately draws attention to what is not said. For example when Squeaker leaves her without food and drink for two days: â€Å"Of them [the sheep] and the dog only she spoke when he returned† (16), or again: â€Å"No word of complaint passed her lips† (18).By the end of the story the woman has stopped speaking altogether and the reader is deliberately denied all access to her thoughts and feelings: â€Å"What the sick woman thought was not definite for she kept silent always† (20). The main character is thus marginalised both in the title and in the story itself. The story is constructed around her absence and it is precisely what is not said which draws attention to the hardships of the woman's life. 8 A similar technique is used in â€Å"Billy Skywonkie. The protagonist, who remains unnamed throughout the story, is not even mentioned until the fourth paragraph where she is described as â€Å"the listening woman passengerâ €  (46). She is thus from the start designated as external to the action. Although there is a lot of dialogue in direct speech in the story, the protagonist’s own words are always reported indirectly. The reader is never allowed direct access to her thoughts but must infer what is going on in her mind from expressions like â€Å"in nervous fear† (47) or â€Å"with the fascination of horror† (53).Despite the awfulness of the male characters, the decentering of the protagonist makes it possible for readers unwilling to accept Baynton’s views on life in the bush to accept the explicitly stated opinions of the male characters and to dismiss the woman as an unwelcome outsider. 9 The most significant changes to the original stories, and those about which Baynton apparently felt most strongly since she removed them from the text of Bush Studies, concern the story now known as â€Å"The Chosen Vessel. † This story, as many critics have remarked, is a ve rsion of â€Å"The Drover's Wife† in which the â€Å"gallows-faced swagman† (Lawson 6) does not leave.Lawson's text states repeatedly that the wife is â€Å"used to† the loneliness of her life, suggesting even that it is easier for her than for him: â€Å"They are used to being apart, or at least she is† (4). Baynton's character, on the other hand, dislikes being alone and the story shows the extreme vulnerability of women, not at the hands of Nature, but at the hands of men. 10 Baynton originally submitted the story under the title â€Å"When the Curlew Cried† but Stephens changed this to â€Å"The Tramp. † Once again his editorial changes deflect the reader’s attention away from the female character.By implicitly making the man rather than the woman the central figure, the rape and murder are reduced to one ‘episode’ in the tramp’s life. Kay Schaffer underlines (156) that this attempt to remove the woman from the story is also to be found in the work of the critic A. A. Phillips. For many years he was the only person to have written on Baynton and his article contains the preposterous sentence that her major theme is â€Å"the image of a lonely bush hut besieged by a terrifying figure who is also a terrified figure† (150).As Schaffer rightly points out, it is difficult to understand how any reader can possibly consider that the man who is contemplating rape and murder is a â€Å"terrified figure. † 11 As was then the convention, both the rape and murder are implicit: She knew that he was offering terms if she ceased to struggle and cry for help, though louder and louder did she cry for it, but it was only when the man’s hand gripped her throat that the cry of â€Å"Murder† came from her lips. And when she ceased, the startled curlews took up the awful sound, and flew wailing â€Å"Murder! Murder! over the horseman’s head (85). 12 Stephen’s delibera te suppression of two passages, however, means the reader can infer a very different meaning to events than that intended by Baynton. The Bulletin version omits the scene in which Peter Henessey explains how he mistakenly thought the figure of the woman shouting for help was a vision of the Virgin Mary. The only possible reading in this version is that the horseman was riding too fast and simply did not hear her calls: â€Å"She called to him in Christ’s Name, in her babe’s name †¦ But the distance grew greater and greater between them† (85).Baynton’s original version leads to a very different interpretation: ‘Mary! Mother of Christ! ’ He repeated the invocation half unconsciously, when suddenly to him, out of the stillness, came Christ’s Name – called loudly in despairing accents †¦ Gliding across a ghostly patch of pipe-clay, he saw a white-robed figure with a babe clasped to her bosom. †¦ The moonlight on the g leaming clay was a ‘heavenly light’ to him, and he knew the white figure not for flesh and blood, but for the Virgin and Child of his mother’s prayers.Then, good Catholic that once more he was, he put spurs to his horse’s sides and galloped madly away (86-7). 13 By clarifying what is going on in the horseman’s mind, Baynton is implying that patriarchal society as a whole is guilty. This interpretation is confirmed by the fact that the woman does not exist as a person in her own right in the eyes of any of the male characters. Her husband denies her sexual identity: â€Å"Needn’t flatter yerself †¦ nobody ‘ud want ter run away with yew† (82); the swagman sees her as a sexual object, Peter Henessey as a religious one.Taken individually there is nothing original in these visions of woman but their accumulation is surprising and ought to lead the reader to consider what place is left for a woman as a person. 14 Stephen's second omission is a paragraph near the beginning of the story where the reader is told: â€Å"She was not afraid of horsemen, but swagmen† (81). This sentence is perhaps one of the best examples of the way the implicit works in Baynton's stories. The presupposition, at the time widely accepted, is that horsemen and swagmen are different.Explicitly asserting the contrary would have been immediately challenged and Baynton never takes this risk. Only with the story's denouement does the reader become aware that the presupposition is false, that both horsemen and swagmen are to be feared. 15 The other technique frequently used by Baynton is that of metaphor and metonymy. According to Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni: â€Å"le trope n'est qu'un cas particulier du fonctionnement de l'implicite. †¦ Tout trope est une deviance et se caracterise par un mecanisme de substitution – mais substitution de quoi a quoi, et deviance de quoi par rapport a quoi† (94;109).Readers of Bus h Studies have all too often identified only the substitution, not the deviance. 16 In her detailed analysis of â€Å"The Chosen Vessel† Kay Schaffer examines the significance of the last paragraph of the story in which the swagman tries to wash the sheep’s blood from his dog’s mouth and throat. She is particularly interested in the last sentence â€Å"But the dog also was guilty† (88). Most readers have seen this as a simple, almost superfluous statement, whose only aim is to underline the parallel between man and dog: the man killed a woman, the dog a sheep.Schaffer on the other hand sees here a reference to the first paragraph: â€Å"but the woman’s husband was angry and called her – the noun was cur† (Baynton 81). She analyses the metonymic association of woman and dog and argues that the woman’s dog-like loyalty to a husband who abuses her is open to criticism since as a human being she is capable of making decisions for h erself. According to Schaffer's reading: â€Å"Her massive acceptance of the situation makes her an accomplice in her fate† (165). 17Most readers do identify the woman’s metaphoric association with the cow as a symbol of the maternal instinct but Schaffer again goes one step further and argues that since the woman is afraid of the cow she is consequently afraid of the maternal in herself but in participating, albeit reluctantly, in control of the cow, her husband’s property, she also participates in maintaining patriarchal society and therefore: â€Å"Although never made explicit in the text, by metonymic links and metaphoric referents, the woman paradoxically is what she fears.She embodies ‘the maternal’ in the symbolic order. She belongs to the same economy which brings about her murder† (165). 18 The baby is rescued by a boundary rider, but this does not mean that motherhood emerges as a positive force in the story. Baynton’s title â€Å"The Chosen Vessel† implies that the abstract concept of the maternal can exist only at the cost of the woman by denying the mother the right to exist as a person: The Virgin Mary exists only to provide God with his Son, a wife is there to ensure the transmission of power and property from father to son.At the end of Baynton’s story even this reverenced position is denied women: â€Å"Once more the face of the Madonna and Child looked down on [Peter] †¦ ‘My Lord and my God! ’ was the exaltation ‘And hast Thou chosen me? ’ Ultimately Schaffer argues: If one reads through the contradictions, woman is not guilty at all – she is wholly absent. She takes no part in the actions of the story except to represent male desire as either Virgin or whore †¦ She has been named, captured, controlled, appropriated, violated, raped and murdered, and then reverenced through the signifying practices of the text.And these contradictory prac tices through which the ‘woman' is dispersed in the text are possible by her very absence from the symbolic order except by reference to her phallic repossession by Man. (168) 19 In a similar way Baynton's use of sheep as a metonym for women and passive suffering is often remarked upon but is seen as little more than a cliche.This view is justified by referring to â€Å"Squeaker’s Mate† where the woman is powerless to stop Squeaker selling her sheep, many of which she considers as pets, to the butcher and to â€Å"Billy Skywonkie† which ends with an apparently stereotypical image prefiguring the â€Å"meaningless sacrifice† (Krimmer and Lawson xxii) of the woman in â€Å"The Chosen Vessel†: â€Å"She noticed that the sheep lay passive, with its head back till its neck curved in a bow, and that the glitter of the knife was reflected in its eye† (Baynton 60).Hergenhan does go slightly further by arguing that this is also an example of Ba ynton’s denial of the redemptive power of the sacrificial animal (216) but when the collection as a whole is considered, and the different references are read in parallel, the metonym turns out to be far more ambiguous. 20 In â€Å"Scrammy ‘And† the knife is clearly not a dangerous instrument: â€Å"The only weapon that the old fellow had was the useless butcher’s knife† (41, my italics). Even more significantly in this story the reflection of the moonlight in the sheep’s eyes is sufficient to temporarily discourageScrammy: â€Å"The way those thousand eyes reflected the rising moon was disconcerting. The whole of the night seemed pregnant with eyes† (38). Far from being â€Å"innocent† creatures the sheep are associated with convicts: â€Å"The moonlight’s undulating white scales across their shorn backs brought out the fresh tar brand 8, setting him thinking of the links of that convict gang chain long ago† (42). Nor are sheep seen to be entirely passive: â€Å"She was wiser now, though sheep are slow to learn† (44). 21 In this respect the symbolism of the ewe and the poddy lamb is particularly interesting.The old man claims that this is the third lamb that he has had to poddy. He accuses the ewe of not being â€Å"nat’ral† (34), and having a â€Å"blarsted imperdence† (30). The narrator, on the other hand, describes her as â€Å"the unashamed silent mother† (30). What is being challenged is not her motherhood but her apparent lack of maternal instinct. Once the shepherd is dead, the ewe is capable of teaching her lamb to drink suggesting that it is in fact the man who prevents the maternal from developing. This would seem to be confirmed by the repeated remark that men insist on cows and calves being penned separately.Thus apparently hackneyed images are in fact used in a deviant way so as to undermine traditional bush values. 22 In much the same way, Bay nton’s cliches also deviate from expected usage. For example in â€Å"Scrammy ‘And† the old shepherd sums up his view of women as: â€Å"They can’t never do anythin’ right, an’ orlways, continerally they gets a man inter trouble (30). † By inverting the roles of men and women in the expression â€Å"getting into trouble† the text suggests that values in the Bush are radically different to elsewhere. Something which is confirmed in â€Å"Billy Skywonkie† where the narrator reflects: â€Å"She felt she had lost her mental balance.Little matters became distorted and the greater shrivelled† (55). 23 Similarly the apparently stereotypical descriptions of the landscape in fact undermine the Bulletin vision of Australia. In â€Å"Billy Skywonkie† the countryside is described as â€Å"barren shelterless plains† (47). Were the description to stop here it could be interpreted as a typical male image of the land as dangerous female but the text continues; the land is barren because of â€Å"the tireless greedy sun† (47). In the traditional dichotomy man/woman; active/passive the sun is always masculine and like the sun the men in Bush Studies are shown to be greedy.Although never explicitly stated, this seems to suggest that it is not the land itself which is hostile but the activities of men which make it so. Schaffer sees a confirmation of this (152) in the fact that it is the Konk’s nose which for the protagonist â€Å"blotted the landscape and dwarfed all perspective† (Baynton 50). In Baynton’s work women are associated with the land because both are victims of men. 24 The least understood story in the collection is undoubtedly â€Å"Bush Church†: Krimmer and Lawson talk of its â€Å"grim meaninglessness† (xxii) and Phillips complains that it is â€Å"almost without plot† (155).It is perhaps not surprising that this story should be the m ost complex in its use of language. Of all the stories in the collection â€Å"Bush Church† is the one which contains the most direct speech, written in an unfamiliar colloquial Australian English. These passages deliberately flout what Grice describes as the maxims of relevance and manner – they seem neither to advance the plot nor to add to the reader's understanding of the characters. 25 Most readers are thrown by this failure to respect conversational maxims and the co-operative principal. Consequently they pay insufficient attention to individual sentences.Moreover, the sentences are structured in such a way as to make it difficult for the reader to question their ‘truth’ or even to locate their subversive nature. As Jean Jacques Weber points out, the natural tendency is to challenge what the sentence asserts rather than what it presupposes (164). This is clearly illustrated by the opening sentence: â€Å"The hospitality of the bush never extends to the loan of a good horse to an inexperienced rider† (61). Readers may object that they know of occasions when a good horse was loaned to an inexperienced rider but few realise that the assertion in fact negates the presupposition.Baynton is not talking here about the loan of a horse but is challenging one of the fundamental myths of life in the bush – that there is such a thing as bush hospitality. 26 Once again a comparison with Lawson is illuminating. Lawson's anonymous narrator says of the Drover's wife: â€Å"She seems contented with her lot† (6). In â€Å"Bush Church† this becomes: â€Å"But for all this Liz thought she was fairly happy† (70). Although semantically their meaning is similar, pragmatically they could not be more different.It is not the anonymous narrator but Liz who is uncertain of her feelings and feels it necessary to qualify â€Å"happy† by â€Å"fairly. † More importantly the presupposition, â€Å"but for all t his,† deliberately leaves unsaid the extreme poverty and the beatings to which Liz is subject. 27 Susan Sheridan, talking of Baynton’s novel Human Toll, says: â€Å"the assumption that it is autobiographical deflects attention from the novel’s textuality as if the assertion that it was all ‘true’ and that writing was a necessary catharsis could account for its strangely wrought prose and obscure dynamics of desire† (67).The same is true of her short stories. By persisting in reading her as a â€Å"realist† writer many readers fail to notice her sophisticated use of language. Perhaps because none of the stories has a narrator to guide the reader in their interpretation or because the reader has little or no direct access to the protagonist’s thoughts, or because of the flouting of conversational maxims and the co-operative principal, sentences are taken at face value and all too often little attempt is made to decode the irony or to question what on the surface appears to be statements of fact.Hergenhan queries the success of a strategy of such extreme obliqueness: â€Å"It is difficult to understand why Baynton did not make it clearer as the ellipsis is carried so far that the clues have eluded most readers† (217), but it should be remembered that, given the circumstances in which she was trying to publish, direct criticism was never an option for Baynton. What is essential in decoding Baynton’s work is to accept that it is not about women but about the absence of women who are shown to be victims both of men in the bush and of language. The Tramp NO PLACE FOR A WOMAN The Australian author Barbara Baynton had her first short story published under the title â€Å"The Tramp† in 1896 in the Christmas edition of the Bulletin. Founded in Sydney in 1880, the Bulletin was instrumental in developing the idea of Australian nationalism. It was originally a popular commercial weekly rather than a literary magazine but in the 1890s, with the literary critic A. G. Stephens as its editor, it was to become â€Å"something like a national literary club for a new generation of writers† (Carter 263).Stephens published work by many young Australian writers, including the short story writer Henry Lawson and the poet â€Å"Banjo† Paterson and in 1901 he celebrated Miles Franklin’s My Brilliant Career as the first Australian novel. 2 †¦ Stephens deemed her â€Å"too outspoken for an Australian audience† (Schaffer 154). She was unable to find a publisher in Sydney willing to print her stories as a collection a nd it was not until 1902 that six of her stories were published in London by Duckworth’s Greenback Library under the title Bush Studies. It was, on the whole, reviewed favorably.She subsequently published a novel, Human Toll, in 1907 and an expanded collection of stories in 1917. Yet, although individual stories were regularly included in anthologies of Australian literature, by the time of her death in 1929 she was better known as an antique collector and her collected stories were not reprinted until 1980. 3 Until the advent of feminist criticism in the 1980s, Baynton remained a largely forgotten figure, dismissed as a typical female writer who did not know how to control her emotions and who was unable to put her â€Å"natural talent† to good use.As late as 1983 Lucy Frost could talk of â€Å"her unusually low level of critical awareness† (65) and claim that she â€Å"relies †¦ on instinct †¦ In order to write well she needs to write honestly out o f intuitive understanding. †¦ As art it makes for failure† (65). For a long time reading the implicit in Baynton’s stories consisted in identifying the autobiographical elements and attempting to piece together her true life. She notoriously claimed, even to her own children, to be the daughter not of an Irish carpenter but of a Bengal Lancer and in later life tried to conceal he hardship of her childhood and early married life. The stories were read as â€Å"true† accounts of what it was like for a poor woman to live in the bush at the end of the nineteenth century. This paper argues that far from being a natural writer whose â€Å"talent does not extend to symbolism† (Frost 64), Baynton is a sophisticated writer who uses obliqueness simply because this was the only form of criticism open to a woman writer in Australia at this time. The apparent inability of readers to engage with the implicit in her stories stems from an unwillingness to accept her vision of life in the bush. In order to understand Baynton's technique and why earlier readers consistently failed to interpret it correctly, it is important to replace her stories in the context of the literary world in which she was working for, as Brown and Yule state, when it comes to reading the implicit: â€Å"Discourse is interpreted in the light of past experience of similar discourse by analogy with previous similar texts† (65). In 1901, the year of federation and the height of Australian nationalistic fervor, A. G.Stephens wrote: What country can offer to writers better material than Australia? We are not yet snug in cities and hamlets, molded by routine, regimented to a pattern. Every man who roams the Australian wilderness is a potential knight of Romance; every man who grapples with the Australian desert for a livelihood might sing a Homeric chant of history, or listen, baffled and beaten, to an Aeschylean dirge of defeat. The marvels of the adventurous are our d aily common-places.The drama of the conflict between Man and Destiny is played here in a scenic setting whose novelty is full of vital suggestion for the literary artist. (Ackland, 77) 5 Women are conspicuously absent in this description of Australian life as they are in the work of Henry Lawson whose stories have come to be seen as the ‘perfect’ example of nationalistic writing. In the titles of his stories women, if they exist at all, are seen as appendages of men: â€Å"The Drover’s Wife,† â€Å"The Selector’s Daughter. They are defined at best by their physical characteristics: â€Å"That Pretty Girl in the Army,† but more often than not are specifically excluded: â€Å"No Place for a Woman† or reduced to silence: â€Å"She Wouldn’t Speak. † In the texts themselves the narrators are either anonymous or male and male mate-ship is valued above marriage. In Lawson's most well-known stories the bush is a destructive forc e against which man must wage a constant battle. The landscape, perhaps predictably, is depicted in feminine terms either as a cruel mother who threatens to destroy her son or as a dangerous virgin who leads man into deadly temptation.Men survive by rallying together and are always ready to help a â€Å"mate† in distress. Women are left at home and are shown to be contented with their role as homemaker: â€Å"All days are much the same to her †¦ But this bush-woman is used to the loneliness of it †¦ She is glad when her husband returns, but she does not gush or make a fuss about it. She gets him something good to eat, and tidies up the children† (Lawson 6). Baynton's stories challenge this vision of life in the bush in a number of ways: the majority of her protagonists are female; the real danger comes not from the bush but from the men who inhabit it. From the very beginning, Baynton’s stories were subject to a form of male censorship since Stephens h eavily edited them in an attempt to render the implicit conventional and thereby make the stories conform to his vision of Australian life. Few manuscripts have survived but the changes made to two stories have been well documented. In 1984 Elizabeth Webby published an article comparing the published version of â€Å"Squeaker’s Mate† with a typescript/manuscript held in the Mitchell Library.She noted that in the published version the structure has been tightened and some ambiguity removed by replacing many of the pronouns by nouns. More importantly, the ending has been changed and, since endings play such a crucial role in the understanding of a short story, this has important repercussions on the whole text: The new, more conventionally moralistic ending demanded a more actively brutal Squeaker and a more passive, suffering Mary. So traditional male/female characteristics were superimposed on Baynton’s original characters, characters designed to question such s exual stereotypes.As well, the main emphasis was shifted from its ostensible object Squeaker’s mate, to her attacker and defender; instead of a study of a reversal of sex, we have a tale of true or false mateship. (459) 7 Despite these changes the text's conformity to the traditional Australian story of mate-ship which the Bulletin readers had come to expect remains superficial. The title itself is an ironic parody of Lawson's story titles. The woman is defined by her relationship to the man but the roles are reversed. The man has become the effeminate â€Å"Squeaker,† the woman the masculine â€Å"mate. As in Lawson's stories the male character's words are reported in passages of direct speech and the reader has access to his thoughts while the woman's words are reported only indirectly: â€Å"†¦ waiting for her to be up and about again. That would be soon, she told her complaining mate† (16). However, and this is an important difference with Lawson's sto ries, in Baynton's work the text deliberately draws attention to what is not said. For example when Squeaker leaves her without food and drink for two days: â€Å"Of them [the sheep] and the dog only she spoke when he returned† (16), or again: â€Å"No word of complaint passed her lips† (18).By the end of the story the woman has stopped speaking altogether and the reader is deliberately denied all access to her thoughts and feelings: â€Å"What the sick woman thought was not definite for she kept silent always† (20). The main character is thus marginalised both in the title and in the story itself. The story is constructed around her absence and it is precisely what is not said which draws attention to the hardships of the woman's life. 8 A similar technique is used in â€Å"Billy Skywonkie. The protagonist, who remains unnamed throughout the story, is not even mentioned until the fourth paragraph where she is described as â€Å"the listening woman passengerâ €  (46). She is thus from the start designated as external to the action. Although there is a lot of dialogue in direct speech in the story, the protagonist’s own words are always reported indirectly. The reader is never allowed direct access to her thoughts but must infer what is going on in her mind from expressions like â€Å"in nervous fear† (47) or â€Å"with the fascination of horror† (53).Despite the awfulness of the male characters, the decentering of the protagonist makes it possible for readers unwilling to accept Baynton’s views on life in the bush to accept the explicitly stated opinions of the male characters and to dismiss the woman as an unwelcome outsider. 9 The most significant changes to the original stories, and those about which Baynton apparently felt most strongly since she removed them from the text of Bush Studies, concern the story now known as â€Å"The Chosen Vessel. † This story, as many critics have remarked, is a ve rsion of â€Å"The Drover's Wife† in which the â€Å"gallows-faced swagman† (Lawson 6) does not leave.Lawson's text states repeatedly that the wife is â€Å"used to† the loneliness of her life, suggesting even that it is easier for her than for him: â€Å"They are used to being apart, or at least she is† (4). Baynton's character, on the other hand, dislikes being alone and the story shows the extreme vulnerability of women, not at the hands of Nature, but at the hands of men. 10 Baynton originally submitted the story under the title â€Å"When the Curlew Cried† but Stephens changed this to â€Å"The Tramp. † Once again his editorial changes deflect the reader’s attention away from the female character.By implicitly making the man rather than the woman the central figure, the rape and murder are reduced to one ‘episode’ in the tramp’s life. Kay Schaffer underlines (156) that this attempt to remove the woman from the story is also to be found in the work of the critic A. A. Phillips. For many years he was the only person to have written on Baynton and his article contains the preposterous sentence that her major theme is â€Å"the image of a lonely bush hut besieged by a terrifying figure who is also a terrified figure† (150).As Schaffer rightly points out, it is difficult to understand how any reader can possibly consider that the man who is contemplating rape and murder is a â€Å"terrified figure. † 11 As was then the convention, both the rape and murder are implicit: She knew that he was offering terms if she ceased to struggle and cry for help, though louder and louder did she cry for it, but it was only when the man’s hand gripped her throat that the cry of â€Å"Murder† came from her lips. And when she ceased, the startled curlews took up the awful sound, and flew wailing â€Å"Murder! Murder! over the horseman’s head (85). 12 Stephen’s delibera te suppression of two passages, however, means the reader can infer a very different meaning to events than that intended by Baynton. The Bulletin version omits the scene in which Peter Henessey explains how he mistakenly thought the figure of the woman shouting for help was a vision of the Virgin Mary. The only possible reading in this version is that the horseman was riding too fast and simply did not hear her calls: â€Å"She called to him in Christ’s Name, in her babe’s name †¦ But the distance grew greater and greater between them† (85).Baynton’s original version leads to a very different interpretation: ‘Mary! Mother of Christ! ’ He repeated the invocation half unconsciously, when suddenly to him, out of the stillness, came Christ’s Name – called loudly in despairing accents †¦ Gliding across a ghostly patch of pipe-clay, he saw a white-robed figure with a babe clasped to her bosom. †¦ The moonlight on the g leaming clay was a ‘heavenly light’ to him, and he knew the white figure not for flesh and blood, but for the Virgin and Child of his mother’s prayers.Then, good Catholic that once more he was, he put spurs to his horse’s sides and galloped madly away (86-7). 13 By clarifying what is going on in the horseman’s mind, Baynton is implying that patriarchal society as a whole is guilty. This interpretation is confirmed by the fact that the woman does not exist as a person in her own right in the eyes of any of the male characters. Her husband denies her sexual identity: â€Å"Needn’t flatter yerself †¦ nobody ‘ud want ter run away with yew† (82); the swagman sees her as a sexual object, Peter Henessey as a religious one.Taken individually there is nothing original in these visions of woman but their accumulation is surprising and ought to lead the reader to consider what place is left for a woman as a person. 14 Stephen's second omission is a paragraph near the beginning of the story where the reader is told: â€Å"She was not afraid of horsemen, but swagmen† (81). This sentence is perhaps one of the best examples of the way the implicit works in Baynton's stories. The presupposition, at the time widely accepted, is that horsemen and swagmen are different.Explicitly asserting the contrary would have been immediately challenged and Baynton never takes this risk. Only with the story's denouement does the reader become aware that the presupposition is false, that both horsemen and swagmen are to be feared. 15 The other technique frequently used by Baynton is that of metaphor and metonymy. According to Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni: â€Å"le trope n'est qu'un cas particulier du fonctionnement de l'implicite. †¦ Tout trope est une deviance et se caracterise par un mecanisme de substitution – mais substitution de quoi a quoi, et deviance de quoi par rapport a quoi† (94;109).Readers of Bus h Studies have all too often identified only the substitution, not the deviance. 16 In her detailed analysis of â€Å"The Chosen Vessel† Kay Schaffer examines the significance of the last paragraph of the story in which the swagman tries to wash the sheep’s blood from his dog’s mouth and throat. She is particularly interested in the last sentence â€Å"But the dog also was guilty† (88). Most readers have seen this as a simple, almost superfluous statement, whose only aim is to underline the parallel between man and dog: the man killed a woman, the dog a sheep.Schaffer on the other hand sees here a reference to the first paragraph: â€Å"but the woman’s husband was angry and called her – the noun was cur† (Baynton 81). She analyses the metonymic association of woman and dog and argues that the woman’s dog-like loyalty to a husband who abuses her is open to criticism since as a human being she is capable of making decisions for h erself. According to Schaffer's reading: â€Å"Her massive acceptance of the situation makes her an accomplice in her fate† (165). 17Most readers do identify the woman’s metaphoric association with the cow as a symbol of the maternal instinct but Schaffer again goes one step further and argues that since the woman is afraid of the cow she is consequently afraid of the maternal in herself but in participating, albeit reluctantly, in control of the cow, her husband’s property, she also participates in maintaining patriarchal society and therefore: â€Å"Although never made explicit in the text, by metonymic links and metaphoric referents, the woman paradoxically is what she fears.She embodies ‘the maternal’ in the symbolic order. She belongs to the same economy which brings about her murder† (165). 18 The baby is rescued by a boundary rider, but this does not mean that motherhood emerges as a positive force in the story. Baynton’s title â€Å"The Chosen Vessel† implies that the abstract concept of the maternal can exist only at the cost of the woman by denying the mother the right to exist as a person: The Virgin Mary exists only to provide God with his Son, a wife is there to ensure the transmission of power and property from father to son.At the end of Baynton’s story even this reverenced position is denied women: â€Å"Once more the face of the Madonna and Child looked down on [Peter] †¦ ‘My Lord and my God! ’ was the exaltation ‘And hast Thou chosen me? ’ Ultimately Schaffer argues: If one reads through the contradictions, woman is not guilty at all – she is wholly absent. She takes no part in the actions of the story except to represent male desire as either Virgin or whore †¦ She has been named, captured, controlled, appropriated, violated, raped and murdered, and then reverenced through the signifying practices of the text.And these contradictory prac tices through which the ‘woman' is dispersed in the text are possible by her very absence from the symbolic order except by reference to her phallic repossession by Man. (168) 19 In a similar way Baynton's use of sheep as a metonym for women and passive suffering is often remarked upon but is seen as little more than a cliche.This view is justified by referring to â€Å"Squeaker’s Mate† where the woman is powerless to stop Squeaker selling her sheep, many of which she considers as pets, to the butcher and to â€Å"Billy Skywonkie† which ends with an apparently stereotypical image prefiguring the â€Å"meaningless sacrifice† (Krimmer and Lawson xxii) of the woman in â€Å"The Chosen Vessel†: â€Å"She noticed that the sheep lay passive, with its head back till its neck curved in a bow, and that the glitter of the knife was reflected in its eye† (Baynton 60).Hergenhan does go slightly further by arguing that this is also an example of Ba ynton’s denial of the redemptive power of the sacrificial animal (216) but when the collection as a whole is considered, and the different references are read in parallel, the metonym turns out to be far more ambiguous. 20 In â€Å"Scrammy ‘And† the knife is clearly not a dangerous instrument: â€Å"The only weapon that the old fellow had was the useless butcher’s knife† (41, my italics). Even more significantly in this story the reflection of the moonlight in the sheep’s eyes is sufficient to temporarily discourageScrammy: â€Å"The way those thousand eyes reflected the rising moon was disconcerting. The whole of the night seemed pregnant with eyes† (38). Far from being â€Å"innocent† creatures the sheep are associated with convicts: â€Å"The moonlight’s undulating white scales across their shorn backs brought out the fresh tar brand 8, setting him thinking of the links of that convict gang chain long ago† (42). Nor are sheep seen to be entirely passive: â€Å"She was wiser now, though sheep are slow to learn† (44). 21 In this respect the symbolism of the ewe and the poddy lamb is particularly interesting.The old man claims that this is the third lamb that he has had to poddy. He accuses the ewe of not being â€Å"nat’ral† (34), and having a â€Å"blarsted imperdence† (30). The narrator, on the other hand, describes her as â€Å"the unashamed silent mother† (30). What is being challenged is not her motherhood but her apparent lack of maternal instinct. Once the shepherd is dead, the ewe is capable of teaching her lamb to drink suggesting that it is in fact the man who prevents the maternal from developing. This would seem to be confirmed by the repeated remark that men insist on cows and calves being penned separately.Thus apparently hackneyed images are in fact used in a deviant way so as to undermine traditional bush values. 22 In much the same way, Bay nton’s cliches also deviate from expected usage. For example in â€Å"Scrammy ‘And† the old shepherd sums up his view of women as: â€Å"They can’t never do anythin’ right, an’ orlways, continerally they gets a man inter trouble (30). † By inverting the roles of men and women in the expression â€Å"getting into trouble† the text suggests that values in the Bush are radically different to elsewhere. Something which is confirmed in â€Å"Billy Skywonkie† where the narrator reflects: â€Å"She felt she had lost her mental balance.Little matters became distorted and the greater shrivelled† (55). 23 Similarly the apparently stereotypical descriptions of the landscape in fact undermine the Bulletin vision of Australia. In â€Å"Billy Skywonkie† the countryside is described as â€Å"barren shelterless plains† (47). Were the description to stop here it could be interpreted as a typical male image of the land as dangerous female but the text continues; the land is barren because of â€Å"the tireless greedy sun† (47). In the traditional dichotomy man/woman; active/passive the sun is always masculine and like the sun the men in Bush Studies are shown to be greedy.Although never explicitly stated, this seems to suggest that it is not the land itself which is hostile but the activities of men which make it so. Schaffer sees a confirmation of this (152) in the fact that it is the Konk’s nose which for the protagonist â€Å"blotted the landscape and dwarfed all perspective† (Baynton 50). In Baynton’s work women are associated with the land because both are victims of men. 24 The least understood story in the collection is undoubtedly â€Å"Bush Church†: Krimmer and Lawson talk of its â€Å"grim meaninglessness† (xxii) and Phillips complains that it is â€Å"almost without plot† (155).It is perhaps not surprising that this story should be the m ost complex in its use of language. Of all the stories in the collection â€Å"Bush Church† is the one which contains the most direct speech, written in an unfamiliar colloquial Australian English. These passages deliberately flout what Grice describes as the maxims of relevance and manner – they seem neither to advance the plot nor to add to the reader's understanding of the characters. 25 Most readers are thrown by this failure to respect conversational maxims and the co-operative principal. Consequently they pay insufficient attention to individual sentences.Moreover, the sentences are structured in such a way as to make it difficult for the reader to question their ‘truth’ or even to locate their subversive nature. As Jean Jacques Weber points out, the natural tendency is to challenge what the sentence asserts rather than what it presupposes (164). This is clearly illustrated by the opening sentence: â€Å"The hospitality of the bush never extends to the loan of a good horse to an inexperienced rider† (61). Readers may object that they know of occasions when a good horse was loaned to an inexperienced rider but few realise that the assertion in fact negates the presupposition.Baynton is not talking here about the loan of a horse but is challenging one of the fundamental myths of life in the bush – that there is such a thing as bush hospitality. 26 Once again a comparison with Lawson is illuminating. Lawson's anonymous narrator says of the Drover's wife: â€Å"She seems contented with her lot† (6). In â€Å"Bush Church† this becomes: â€Å"But for all this Liz thought she was fairly happy† (70). Although semantically their meaning is similar, pragmatically they could not be more different.It is not the anonymous narrator but Liz who is uncertain of her feelings and feels it necessary to qualify â€Å"happy† by â€Å"fairly. † More importantly the presupposition, â€Å"but for all t his,† deliberately leaves unsaid the extreme poverty and the beatings to which Liz is subject. 27 Susan Sheridan, talking of Baynton’s novel Human Toll, says: â€Å"the assumption that it is autobiographical deflects attention from the novel’s textuality as if the assertion that it was all ‘true’ and that writing was a necessary catharsis could account for its strangely wrought prose and obscure dynamics of desire† (67).The same is true of her short stories. By persisting in reading her as a â€Å"realist† writer many readers fail to notice her sophisticated use of language. Perhaps because none of the stories has a narrator to guide the reader in their interpretation or because the reader has little or no direct access to the protagonist’s thoughts, or because of the flouting of conversational maxims and the co-operative principal, sentences are taken at face value and all too often little attempt is made to decode the irony or to question what on the surface appears to be statements of fact.Hergenhan queries the success of a strategy of such extreme obliqueness: â€Å"It is difficult to understand why Baynton did not make it clearer as the ellipsis is carried so far that the clues have eluded most readers† (217), but it should be remembered that, given the circumstances in which she was trying to publish, direct criticism was never an option for Baynton. What is essential in decoding Baynton’s work is to accept that it is not about women but about the absence of women who are shown to be victims both of men in the bush and of language.

Egyptian Architecture

Egypt: Art and Architecture Architecture The great architectural achievements of the past are built of stone. Stone quarries supplied the large blocks of granite, limestone, and sandstone that were used for building temples and tombs. Architects planned carefully as building was done without mortar, so the stones had to fit precisely together. Only pillars were used to sustain short stone supports. At the temple of Kara, a ramp of adobe brick can be seen leading to the top of the temple wall.Such ramps were used to allow workmen to carry stones to the top of structure and allow artists to decorate the tops of walls and pillars. Pillars were built in the same way. As height was added, the ground was raised. When the top of the pillar was completed, the artists would decorate from the top down, removing ramp sand as they went along. As soon as a pharaoh was named, construction on his tomb was begun. Tomb building continued throughout his life and stopped only on the day on which he die d.As a result, some tombs are very large and finely decorated, while other tombs, like that of King Tutankhamen, are small because he ruled as a pharaoh for such a short time. The architecture was based upon perpendicular structures and inclined planes since there was no tutorial assistance except the strength and balance of the structure itself. For this reason, the square and the plumb-line were very important tools. One of the most notable and lasting achievements of the Ancient Egyptians are their pyramids. The size, design, and structure of the pyramids reveal the skill of these ancient builders.The pyramids were great monuments and tombs for the kings. The Egyptians believed that a king's soul continued to guide affairs of the kingdom even after his death. To ensure that they would continue to enjoy the blessings of the gods, they preserved the pharaohs body through the mummification process. They built the pyramids to protect the pharaohs body, the pyramid was a symbol of hop e, because it would ensure the pharaohs union with the gods. The largest pyramid in existence is the Great Pyramid built by King Cheeps (Chuff) at Gaza.The Great Pyramid measures 481 feet high, by 775 feet long at each of its four bases. Other notable pyramids include the Step Pyramid built for King Sore, and the pyramid built for King Hunt, that was a transition between the step pyramid and the smooth sided pyramid we know today. The art of the Egyptians reflects every aspect of their lives. Depicted in tomb and temple drawings are scenes of everyday living, models of people and animals, glass figures and containers, and Jewelry made from gold and semi-precious stones.The wall and pillar drawings are perhaps the best known. In these drawings, it can be seen that people are going about the everyday business of baking, fishing, boating, marketing, and meeting together in family groups. Such drawings were also used to help the deceased to live forever by giving them all of the instruc tions they would need as they met the gods on their way to eternal life. The good deeds were recorded ND the art that surrounded their mummified body was to help their spiritual self in solving the problems related to life after death.Pictures of food, clothing, servants, and slaves could be used by the deceased Just as the real things were used by the person when living. A variety of perspectives is often combined in Egyptian art; however, the side view is the most often seen. The artists used bright colors of blue and red, orange and white to develop pictures that tell of the life of the deceased individual. The artist would first sketch a design on a piece of pottery, and if the sign was satisfactory, it would be sketched on the wall with charcoal. Colors could then be used to fill in the completed picture.Paints were made from naturally occurring minerals and artificially prepared mineral substances. Paint brushes were sticks with fibrous wood with frayed ends. Walls were covere d with mud plaster, then with lime plaster. By the time of Rammers II, artists were able to shade colors to achieve a layered effect. Wall paintings were then protected by a thin layer of varnish (the composition of which is still not known). Sculptors were important artists in Egypt. Statues were made of kings, queens, scribes, animals, and gods and goddesses.Frequently, human and godlike attributes and symbols were combined. The work of the artist was seen in other media as well. Alabaster, a white and translucent stone, was often used for making vessels and containers. Pottery was made of ceramics and clay. Pottery glazed with minerals was used to make beads, amulets, pendants, and other Jewelry. A vivid blue glaze was very popular during the reign of Rammers II. Craftsmen made glass for inlayer designs and for some containers. Workers were able to make articles out of lead, gold, silver, and copper.Such metals were used to make pins, tweezers, razors, axes, knives, spears, sculp tures, and Jewelry. The stability of the government during the reign of Rammers II allowed the skills of the artist and architect to flourish. Religion was often the subject of Egyptian literature. Prayers and hymns were written in praise of the gods. The most important book was â€Å"The Book of the Dead. † This book contained over 200 prayers and magic formulas that taught the Egyptians how to reach a happy afterlife. The Egyptians also wrote adventure stories, fairy tales, myths, love stories, poems, proverbs and quotes. Egyptian architecture Ancient Egyptian Architecture The Egyptians have survived for thousands of years, and are considered to be the hallmark of human civilization. They are the first known culture to have a stable society for such a long period of time. The reason their society was so stable is because they all believed in the same thing, which was that the gods were the first priority and that their pharaoh was a man who ascended to the level of a god. Another reason that the Egyptians survived for so long was because their architectural prowess was unmatched for thousands of year by any other civilization.Not only do buildings and statues show us how great the Egyptian kingdom was, but it also gives us and enormous amount of insight into their culture and what they valued; and what they valued above all, and what drove them to build such monumental feats of architectural achievement was the afterlife. The afterlife was the sole reason many of Egypt greatest building were made, such as the early Masters , the Pyramids, the Valley of the Kings, and much more.In Egyptian culture the gods were closely tied in with the afterlife as they decided whether or not you could pass through to the other side, so fittingly the Egyptians also build huge temples to honor their gods. All Egyptians architecture was created with a purpose, whether it be to please the gods or their kings. The Egyptians were also very avid sculptors they sculpted life size representations of their nobility and kings in their prime. Studying these sculptures and their architectural achievement can give the modern world amazing amounts of insight into their culture.The Egyptians were so obsessed with the afterlife that they built special tombs to insure that the dead kings or nobleman's body would not be tampered with. The early Masters were Just a functional way of burying their kings and nobility in safe place that would insure their safe passage into the afterlife. They were built on the west side of the Nile River, w hich to them was a symbol of death; it was the place where the sun fell into the underworld. (COM) They were not meant to be very grandiose as they were only a rectangular building with sloping sides.They meant to be functional. Inside the burial chamber of the Master was the preserved body of the death along with tangible items from their lives such as pets, food, and furniture. They even went as far as to bury the nobleman's or kings slaves along with the body so they have someone to serve them in the afterlife. To make the afterlife seem even more like real life the architects even had artists paint the walls of the burial chamber with real life events.All these factors such as the slaves, food, and material good make it clear that the Egyptians not only respected the afterlife but it almost seems like they looked forward to it. The masters were very functional but they were not fit for a god, which was the status that the pharaohs and kings of Egypt had achieved, so the Egyptian s replaced he masters with the pyramids. These were the functional equivalent of the masters, but they were grand enough to hold the body of a god. The most well know pyramid is The Great Pyramid of Cheeps (Chuff).This is the largest of the three pyramids of Gaza and home to Chuff. His tombs is massive, but he is the only one in the entire tomb. This further reinforces the idea that the pyramids were built for gods, they were so grand that no one else was worthy enough to be laid to rest in it. Even Chuff's wives were not allowed to be buried in his pyramid. They were buried in masters near his tombs. This along with the idea that Chuff was considered to be a god could also show that women were not as highly regarded as men were in ancient Egypt.The pyramids where not only a place worthy to bury a god, but they were also a place that is worthy of praise by any architect, mathematician, engineer, or astronomer of the modern era. Chuff's pyramid was the tallest standing structure in t he world for thousands of year, not only that, but it is also the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient world that is still standing. Along with those accolades the Pyramids of Gaza are also perfectly aligned with the stars. All these things give a lot of insight to into what the Egyptians valued other than Just the gods and afterlife.Without math and science the Egyptians would not have survived for as long as they did or been capable of building such amazing structures. It is easy to conclude that they thought very highly of math, particularly geometry to put so much effort into the subject; so much effort in fact that their knowledge of the subject would be unmatched for thousands of years. Along with geometry the Ancient Egyptians valued astronomy, if they did not they would not have bothered to align the structures they build with the stars.This interest astronomy could be because they associated their god with the heavens and paid tribute to them by building their struc tures in accordance with the sky, but there could also be a much simpler answer; they could have built the pyramids that way simply because they could and to show any other civilization that they were superior. Whatever the answer may be the pyramids not only showed the modern world where the Egyptians buried their kings, but it also taught them a great deal about what they cared about in terms of education.The Egyptians were not only great architects but they were great sculptors. The best example would be The Great Sphinx at Gaza. This along with an amazing feat of Architecture is an equally amazing piece of art. The Great Sphinx of Gaza is an anthropoids, which meaner that it has the body of a lion and the head of a human, in this case the head of a pharaoh. Like most buildings made by the Egyptians the Sphinx is a tribute to the pharaoh as well as the gods, but this building had a specific purpose.It was built behind a temple and was intended to guard the temple. This gives us a clue into how the Egyptians perceived their gods. The Egyptians didn't hint of their gods as distant deities that ruled over them, but they thought that the resided in the world with them, and by building the Sphinx of Gaza they thought that a god would reside in the Sphinx itself and protect the temple. The sphinx doesn't only appear in sculptures but it also appears in many paintings as well.In most painting, like the one shown below, the sphinx is shown as a fearsome creature that is fighting and destroying its opponents. Many archeologist think that the sphinx was representative of the pharaoh and if this is true it can further explain why the Egyptians people were so loyal to their king. Another thing we can infer from this picture and the countless other paintings and sculptures of the human and animal hybrids is what the Egyptian culture thought about animals. They Egyptians regarded animals very highly and associated them with power and strength.This is evident when you beg in to pay attention to how the Egyptians depicted their gods, for example Anabas who was the god that watched over the dead and the mummification process was depicted with the body of a man and the head of a Jackal. Another example is Amman Ra the sun god who watched over all the other gods supposedly had the body a man and the head of a falcon. The Egyptians greatly respected the power of animals and that maybe the reason that their gods and pharaohs where often associated with animals.Egypt is known for their colossal architecture, but that is not the only place that we can learn about their society from. Their minor sculptures can also tell us a great deal about how they their society functions and society was structured. For example the amount of information that can be gathered from this subculture is staggering. To begin with there were hundreds of sculptures exactly like this found in the Egyptian ruins, and the age of hose sculptures varied by hundreds of year.This meaner th at whatever these sculptures are trying to say is very meaning to the Egyptian people. The first thing you notice when you begin to examine the statue is the man's stance. He has one leg in front of the other indicating that he is moving forward. This shows that the men were the leaders of society in Egypt. With further examination you notice that the woman's shoulder is behind the man's, almost as if she is hiding behind him for protection, which indicates that it was a man's duty of protect any woman in his life whether it be his wife or sister.You can also infer what the men and woman looked for in spouses and what the ancient Egyptian society valued. For the men they had to be physically strong and fit as represented in the sculptures. The women had to be fit and slim as well, which is different from most ancient cultures, who wanted their women to be bigger to ensure that she could birth healthy babies. Studying the sculptures left behind by the Egyptians is a great was of lear ning about their society. The Ancient Egyptian society is the greatest society that has ever existed.The debility in their culture was because they all believed in the same thing and hey all acted according to their beliefs. They also built their architecture according their beliefs, the pyramids being the best example. It shows how they treated their kings who was also considered a god. It is also a great metaphor for their society. The base of the pyramid represents the slave and tip represents the pharaoh, and the middle represented the nobility and working class. It is information and representation like this that allows us to envision what their society and culture was like.

Witness report 3 Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Witness report 3 - Research Paper Example This served as an encouragement to the audience because I told them that making a choice to surrender their life to Christ was the best way to enjoy His love and sacrifice. However, I made it clear I would not force them to make the choice, and they were free to make their decision when they were ready because God’s timing is the best timing. I told them that receiving Jesus Christ as their savior was a personal choice, and whoever chose to do so would marvel and share in the great love of our Father in heaven. They would suffer no more from worldly afflictions as they would see life from in a new perspective as a child of God (Westcott 2003, 64). Some of the listeners had their objections as they commented that they were not sure of love and freedom it would bring. My answer to them was that faith was what they needed as I quoted Hebrews 11:6. At the end of my witness, I asked for those interested in giving their to life to God to step forward and pray with me as they professed their acceptance of God’s love and will upon their lives. A few of them came, and we prayed together, and they accepted to live in the light of the word of

Legal regulatory , and etical issues Research Paper

Legal regulatory , and etical issues - Research Paper Example One of the infamous instances I had witnessed was the discrimination of black employees by the MacDonald Incorporation. Despite the claim that McDonald is a discrimination-free organization, its franchisee Michael Simon of West Virginia was taken to court for discriminating against its employees purely on their racial background (Loevy, 2011). It was alleged that the company had indiscriminately fired 10 black employees who had earlier been exposed to discriminatory practices such as perpetual insults and sexual harassment. Rather than hurling abusing words like ‘bitch,’ ‘hot Mexican’ and ‘ghetto’ to these blacks, they were improperly touched and compelled to have sexual affairs with their white supervisors (Burstein, 2005). This was an act of discrimination that directly violated Equal Employment Opportunity Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act which outlaws workplace discrimination and advocate for equal treatment of employees. In my capacity as a leader, I would like to recommend that such unfortunate incidents can be eliminated by providing legal education to all the departmental heads and informing them on the angers of such violations (Branch, 2008). Besides, as a leader, I would act as a role model by creating a discrimination-free working environment for everyone else to

Which theory(ies) of persuasion in advertising are the most, or least, Essay

Which theory(ies) of persuasion in advertising are the most, or least, persuasive - Essay Example riety of functions with their advertising campaigns which include informing the public regarding their products and services, persuading the public to purchase their products and services, creating a brand image for their products and services, and reminding the public regarding their products and services (Sutherland & Sylvester, 1993, pp. 20-28). Hence, the main objective of businesses through advertising campaigns is to gain maximum business and earn maximum revenue by selling to more customers or selling more of their product to existing customers. Businesses tend to do this by attempting to persuade customers to perform in the way that the business sees desirable. Accordingly, businesses must take a sequence of steps and use various persuasion theories in order to convince customers to act in the manner the business deems desirable (Odih, 2007, pp. 40-48). Businesses use a variety of theories and appeals in order to engage commercials within their advertising activity. The three main types of advertising appeal that businesses use includes humor appeal in which businesses make funny adverts in order to appeal to consumers and show a light-hearted image of their company and products/services, sex appeal in which businesses use attractive content to appeal to the customer’s sexual preferences, and logic appeal in which business provide appropriate logic for purchasing or using their product/service (Odih, 2007, pp. 51-56). Businesses use a combination of theories in order to engage the customer into their advertising activity. Some theories claim to be more effective than others in attracting customers towards a product/service. The first thing that is essential for an organization to consider is the audience that they are catering to. There may be various types of people with differing personalities within their audience. Hence, it may be rather difficult to appeal to each of the different personalities individually and target the various types of people

The Holy Ghost Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

The Holy Ghost - Essay Example In addition, once all the members were seated, they started clapping their hands and singing together. Besides, as the congregation is singing and worshipping, the pastor stands up and addresses the congregation; he invites all those who are not filled with the Holy-Ghost to come forward to receive an impartation. Eventually, the services move into a session of prayer; members of the congregation stand and make known their prayers and concerns. Additionally, the congregation breaks out into diverse kinds of prayer including lying on the floor, standing still, and convulsing uncontrollably. The documentary is a testament of what many individuals consider as the ministry of the Holy Spirit, a strange paradox. On the one hand, there are very little theological works on the ministry of the Holy Spirit; there is only a small reference to the issue in connection with the Trinity. On the other hand, over the last two decades, there has been an increasing interest and manifestation of the mi nistry and work of the Holy Spirit, especially in many non-denominational churches in America. The documentary is an example of the Pentecostal movement and subsequent series of the charismatic faiths that led many individuals to a new awareness of the ministry of the Holy Spirit and His spiritual gifts in the lives of Christians. The ministry of the Holy Spirit just as the documentary demonstrates revolves around the work of the Holy Ghost, especially in the lives of believers; the spiritual gifts such as faith healing.

United State foreign policy towards Middle East Essay

United State foreign policy towards Middle East - Essay Example US has been accused of having inconsistent and incoherent foreign policy towards Middle East. The relation of United States government and the Middle East can be dated to a thousand years and since this period it has used various foreign policies in this region. Oren admits that the America’s failure to be clear and honest about its own motives, as much as its serial failure to interpret the Middle East as often befuddled relations with the region (Oren,pp.341). This paper explores the reasons for United States inconsistent foreign policy towards Middle East with a close reference to the text book power, faith, and fantasy: America in the Middle East 1776 to present. Combating Threat from Middle East and Adjacent Regions. The threat posed by Saddam Hussein in Iraq was fantastical and not real until the American forces hit the ground there. United states through its foreign policy seek to protect itself from Middle East threats while at the same time helping to safeguard the li ves of native people in the region. For example United States government has adopted different foreign policies in Iran and Iraq and also in Israel and Palestine. The United States foreign policy that is pegged on the pillars of deterrence, containment and preemptive strikes on terrorism and alleged terrorism attacks has been inconsistent and incoherent in Middle East.It has stressed force and sanctions and absence of nuclear weapons in Iraq and Iran while at the same employing diplomacy in Israel and Palestine and this has created a rather disparity and inconsistency in the foreign policy. (Parmar,pp.204). Pursuit of National Interest United States foreign policy is usually based on the national interest but in the Middle East, the pursuit encompasses overlapping, conflicting and inconsistent economic, political and strategic interest. Domestic influences usually determine the United States foreign policy and it is balanced by the interest of America and the greater good of mankind . Different political regimes in the United States also have their foreign policy blue prints and this has seriously led to the inconsistency of these policies towards Middle East. For example Democrats and Republicans have had different foreign policies towards Middle East once they are in power. There is usually more debate within the administration of United States government and the national security on foreign policy and it normally leads to contradictory, incoherent and inconsistent policy towards Middle East. Supply of Oil United States has depended on foreign crude oil for a long time and these imports are majorly from Middle East countries. Because of the massive petroleum reserves in the Middle East United States government has developed policies that are seen to be inconsistent and incoherent about the region. In view of this and the challenge posed by hostile domestic population, United States government has adopted an increasingly inconsistent policy in regard to the Mi ddle East region. The foreign policies are formulated in a careful strategy so as to wield acceptance from the Middle East masses and in the long run receive constant supply of crude oil. The need for secure flow of Middle Eastern oil into the United States economy has led to special relationship. The Middle Eastern countries especially Saudi Arabia has the largest deposit of oil reserves in the world but at the same time they are marred by instability. This instability is mainly caused by political regimes which are authoritarian. United States government through its foreign policy is supporting these political regimes in the Middle East in order to secure constant flow of oil (Rosati and Scott,pp.35). As a result, the United States government has preserved the status quo politics in the Middle East particularly in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf sheikdoms. One of the major reasons for the inconsistent foreign policy in the Middle Eas

Sufism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Sufism - Essay Example It is most of the time the basic understanding of Sufis that each situation is an element and the will of God and at the same time the developing of bad feelings as to why it happened is not correct. The main objective of all Sufis therefore is to prevent the entry of all negative attitudes brought about by worldly temptations, including a belief of personal identity, and to value and respect the existence of God (Qushayri 5). Sufis teach in individual set-ups, as the student of the leader is characterized as essential for the development of the student. They make wide utilization of stories, parables, and poetry, and it is stated by Sufis that implications can only be attained through a procedure of searching what is right, and learning of the personal identity. Even though concepts and theories differ among various Sufi sects, Sufism in its entirety is initially concerned with direct individual experience, and as such may be considered similar to different types of religious sects like Buddhism and Christianity (Ernst 6). The founders of different Sufi principles most of the time utilized symbolical language which was hard to be decoded by an ordinary individual to understand these principles (Shah 5). This utilization of symbolical and hard to understand language and the presence of various implications by individuals who possessed inadequate knowledge in Muslim teachings or Sufism itself result to the rejections and disapprovals being cast over the authenticity of Sufism as a component of Muslim tradition. In addition, some sects arose that categorized themselves above Allah and portrayed Sufism as a process of intervening the principles of Islam in order to be saved immediately. This was rejected by modern experts. B. Sufi leaders have established various specific chants and activities into their teaching grounds (Lings 6). The symbolical and often absurd language utilized by Sufis in their teachings when deciphered by ignorant individuals opens channels for various misinterpretations and chaos. Conclusion While Sufism has evidently caused widespread rejections and disapprovals among experts and religious sects all over the world especially the Muslims, Sufism still has the right to exist as an independent body of knowledge no matter how chaotic or confusing their teachings may be. Perhaps, the only time Muslim governments should intervene with stopping Sufism is when there is a clear and serious violation of the rule of God and therefore Sufis must be held accountable. But until that situation happens, there is no valid reason why Sufism must be eradicated from this world. After all, their teachings all point to worshipping God as the Savior and Creator. Utmost respect must still be

Satoro Tanaka and Mrs. Hitara Importance in David Masumoto's and Pico Essay

Satoro Tanaka and Mrs. Hitara Importance in David Masumoto's and Pico Iyer's and Texts - Essay Example In Harvest Son Masumoto mentions how his interaction with a buckwheat farmer Satoro Tanaka comes to affect him profoundly, and how he develops a fondness for the farmer. Pico Iyer is a British-born, American-raised eminent writer of Indian descent who decided to settle in Japan. His essay â€Å"Our Lady of Lawson† is about his experiences in Japan as a foreigner who refuses to succumb to the pressure to indulge in native Japanese food. He talks about a convenience store he frequently visited and the effect it had on him, especially the interaction between him and the convenience store manager, Mrs. Hirata. The two stories therefore share the common theme of two foreigners analyzing two different characters in Japan. Discussion In Harvest Son, Masumoto forms a close attachment to a local buckwheat farm and its farmer, Satoro Tanaka, while in Eat, Memory: Our Lady of Lawson, Pico Iyer experiences the same emotional attachment to a local convenience store, Lawson’s, and it s proprietor, Mrs. Hirata. Several similar themes run through both of these narratives, starting from the similarities between both authors. First and most important, both Masumoto and Iyer can be considered as â€Å"wild† children, belonging everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Masumoto is a Japanese-American while Iyer was born in England but has been raised in the United States of America. Masumoto has journeyed back to the land of his ancestors to reconnect with their native heritage while Iyer has chosen Japan as his country of settlement. They are considered, as Masumoto puts it, â€Å"strangers†. Iyer writes of the sense of alienation due to something as basic as his entrenched American eating habits and lack of love for Japanese food; â€Å"my housemates in Japan simply shrug and see this as ultimate confirmation -- me dragging at some lasagna in a plastic box while they gobble down dried fish -- that I belong to an alien species† (Iyer, pg.1). His l ove of the convenience store further serves to solidify his characterization as an outsider who refuses to fit in, even though he insists that his love for Japan is real and on a deeper level. Having lived in the country for 12 years, he should still not be typecast as an alien, yet somehow, he still is. This he attributes mostly to his refusal to conform to Japanese food and his standing firmly by convenience-store meals. It can therefore be said of both of them that they are attempting to fit into their homeland’s culture, and understand and identify with their people. Masumoto identifies with Satoro Tanaka’s buckwheat farming while Iyer points out the specific attributes and values he considers â€Å"Japanese†: It's no easier to understand Japan in Western terms than it is to eat noodles with a knife and fork. Yet it has been evident to me for some time that the crush of the anonymous world lies out in the temple-filled streets; the heart of the familiarity, the communal sense of neighborhood, the simple kindness that brought me to Japan, lies in the convenience store.(Iyer, pg.2). The convenience store, and specifically, Mrs. Hitara, or Hitara-San, as Iyer refers to her in formal Japanese, comes to embody these values: And yet, in the 12 years I've lived on and off in my mock-California suburb, the one person who has come to embody for me all

The Use of 5S in Aviation Industry Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

The Use of 5S in Aviation Industry - Essay Example ver, the lean system does not only improve the products of the company but also the morality and commitment of the employees (â€Å"Clean and Safe,† 2007; Ramamoorthy, 2007; Levantar, 2012). Relatively, companies that adopted the lean manufacturing systems established the 5S program as the procedure for making the manufacturing environment safe and clean (â€Å"Clean and Safe,† 2007; Levantar, 2012). Particularly, Ramamoorthy (2007) defined 5S program as a â€Å"process designed for planned organizing and standardizing the workplace† (p. 12). Accordingly, the 5S method is a substantial and essential process in implementing the lean manufacturing system in order to acquire and regulate orderly, clean and secure work environment. In relation to this, aerial industries have implemented the 5S program in order to conform to the process of lean manufacturing system. Consequently, this current paper will determine on how aviation industries can implement the 5s process in order to achieve effective and efficient lean manufacturing system. The sortation process is the procedure of segregating and isolating required tools and equipments that are essential in creating a particular product within the work environment. Accordingly, this process involves inventory of materials or tools that are needed and getting rid of those that are not necessary for the work environment. (â€Å"Lean Thinking,† n.d.). In relation to this, the sortation process can be implemented within aviation industries through determining the important equipments and materials in creating aircraft carriers. For example, aviation industries uphold the importance of safe, secure, and functional operating systems, controlling systems, hydraulic systems, fire protection systems, cargo loading systems, flight guiding system, emergency system, oxygen system, electrical system, and water system. Moreover, it is important for an aircraft to have secured and firmed doors and windows that are insulated, well and

Pathophysiology of Obesity Essay Example for Free

Pathophysiology of Obesity Essay The composition of this research paper will concentrate on the topic about the pathophysiologic condition of the disorder called obesity. Thus, this would focus in the said topic to determine the functional changes that go along with such type of disorder that is seen to have developed as one of the prominent health problem in the society. Moreover, the paper would work in rendering fundamental information that is seen essential to further understand the condition of obesity. In addition to this, this research would also deal with the key areas that are seen to be of major concern with regard to battling and preventing obesity. Nonetheless, this holds on the purpose in rendering definite and essential information about obesity. The following will be discussed: †¢ A Brief Background: Obesity †¢ Pathophysiology of Obesity †¢ Causes of Obesity †¢ Medical Treatment and Nursing Intervention At the end of the paper, in intends to render facts and information about the pathophysiology of the obesity. Likewise, the completion of this research paper is also set to provide clear and evident information with regard to the possible medical treatments and nursing interventions that could be done to be able to battle and prevent obesity. A Brief Background: Obesity It can be said that the discussions over the subject of obesity is normally overlooked as one of the major health issues that is in need of accorded attention. Normally, the society would describe obesity as a state wherein an individual with such condition is seen to be ridiculous for having such abnormal and fatty body. In a sense, obesity must be regarded as a serious condition in which it is seen to be one of the most prominent health disorders that if not properly handled it can result to numerous severe health complications in the body. In general, obesity is characterized as a chronic condition that involves excessive amount body fat (Goroll, 2006). Although body fat is necessary for storing energy, heat insulation, shock absorption, and other essential functions, the normal amount of body fat should only be between 25-30% for women and 18-23% for men (Goroll, 2006). Thus, women with excessive body fat with over 30% and for men with over 25% body fat are already considered obese (Goroll, 2006). Moreover, the obesity is also seen to be one of the escalating health conditions in the society wherein the numbers of people with such disorder are rapidly increasing (â€Å"Obesity,† n. d. ). In the United States, the obesity has already reached epidemic extent in which it is seen that one in every three Americans is obese (â€Å"Obesity,† n. d. ). Thus, obesity, as a serious health condition, is also seen to be rapidly increasing in the global society that the occurrence of obesity has practically doubled up from the year 1991 up to 1998 (â€Å"Obesity,† n. . ). Pathophysiology of Obesity With the fact that obesity is a significant health threat, the extra weight or the excessive fat is inclined to create extraordinary stress in all parts of the body (â€Å"Causes, incidence, and risk factors,† n. d. ). Thus, the occurrence of obesity normally incorporates negative developments in the body that are seen as the acquisition of serious illnesses and raises the risk of individuals to having diabetes, kidney disease, heart disease, and stroke and gallbladder disease (â€Å"Causes, incidence, and risk factors,† n. . ). Obesity also creates ill-health conditions such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol that are normally seen among the adults, which is now believed to be seen in the children that are obese (â€Å"Pathophysiology of obesity,† n. d. ). In addition to this, the obesity also increases the risk of individual to acquire certain types of cancer. Also, obese individuals are seen to be more inclined to develop osteoarthritis and sleep apnea (â€Å"Pathophysiology of obesity,† n. d. ). Likewise, the obesity or the excessive fat is often accompanied by several symptoms such as breathlessness, tiredness, back pain, sweatiness, arthritis, menstrual disorders, poor sleeping and depression (â€Å"Pathophysiology of obesity,† n. d. ). Also, obesity increases the probability of myocardial infraction and heart failure (â€Å"Pathophysiology of obesity,† n. d. ). Hence, it is seen that biggest probable impact of obesity in health, more especially with that of the elderly, is the diversity of its effects with other systems in the body (â€Å"Pathophysiology of obesity’† n. d. ). Causes of Obesity In most circumstances, the majority of medical researchers agree that a combination of excessive calorie consumption and a inactive lifestyle are seen to be the primary causes of obesity (â€Å"Obesity,† n. d. ). Thus, the increased of food consumption is normally attributed as genetic, medical or psychiatric illness (â€Å"Obesity,† n. d. ). Likewise, it is also said that the other probable causes of obesity are hereditary influences, overeating, diet high in simple carbohydrates, slow metabolism, and frequency of eating, physical inactivity, medication such as antidepressants and psychological factors such as severe emotional distress (â€Å"Obesity,† n. . ). Moreover, in the review that is done in the year 2006, it is said that the most probable factors that have contribute in the rise of obesity are seen to be the cause of insufficient sleep, endocrine disruptors, decreased rates of smoking, increased use of medication that leads to weight gain, pregnancy at a later age, intrauterine and intergenerational effects, positive natural selection of people with a higher BMI (â€Å"10 Factors in Rise of Obesity,† n. d. ). Medical Treatment and Nursing Intervention Treatment through the help of a physician is seen to be necessary in obesity, more especially during the times wherein the person’s own efforts to lose weight is not working and when it is seen essential that simultaneous medical conditions make it vital for an obese person to lose weight (â€Å"Medical Treatment for Obesity,† n. d. ). Thus, prescription of medications may seem as necessary for those having people with obesity-related health problems (â€Å"Medical Treatment for Obesity,† n. . ). In addition to this, the prescriptions of over-the-counter supplements are also considered as essential in the medical treatment of obesity that could helpful for the people in effort to lose weight (â€Å"Medical Treatment for Obesity,† n. d. ). Behavioural strategies are also used in the treatment of obesity that could help modify dietary habits and increase activity levels of obese people (â€Å"Medical Treatment for Obesity,† n. . ). Likewise, psychotherapy for eating disorders with the therapist is also seen essential in the treatment process of obesity that may also require medication (â€Å"Medical Treatment for Obesity,† n. d. ). On the other hand, it is seen evident that the other probable nursing intervention that could be done to battle obesity is having a healthy and active lifestyle through the presence of exercise. As such, the involvement through healthy exercises is indeed helpful in treatment of obesity as these activities are good in burning calories and other excess fats in the body. In addition to this, a good healthy diet is also seen as another nursing intervention for obesity in which eating healthy foods with balanced diet are essential in maintaining and achieving healthy body. Nonetheless, the modified personal discipline with regard to adverse eating habits is also seen as probable nursing intervention for obesity. Conclusion  With the above written facts and information about the pathophysiology of obesity, it is seen evident that choosing such topic in this research paper is indeed significant and helpful for the people, more especially among the individuals with such condition, as this provides factual data of the probable negative results that comes with obesity. As such, this research paper also provides factual gathering of information in battling and treating obesity. Nonetheless, it is seen evident that the issue of obesity is one of the serious health problems that are in need of proper attention.

The Ethical Implications of the Current Government Drone Strike Polices Essay Example for Free

The Ethical Implications of the Current Government Drone Strike Polices Essay Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) first made their appearance in 1919 when Elmer Sperry, who also invented the gyroscope and autopilot, attacked a captured German ship with the first UAV loaded down to with explosives((U. s. army unmanned, 2010). At the time this was a revolutionary weapon, but if we fast forward 80 years from the time of that experiment, UAVs became a common and prolific part of the modern battlefield. Although there is little debate as to the legality of their use on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan, in recent years there are been much debate as to the role they should play in the larger American declared Global War on Terror or GWOT. While the government believes that it is acting in the best interest of the American people, more and more scholars and foreign governments are questioning the legality and ethical implications of the current UAV polices governing strikes outside of Iraq and Afghanistan. UAVs first saw action in the opening days of the GWOT in Afghanistan and during its first year of action UAVs attacked approximately 115 targets. This took place just shortly after Hellfire air-to-surface missiles were test fired and approved for use on Predator UAVs. When the war began in Iraq in 2003 UAVs were there helping to overthrow Saddam Hussein’s government and destroy military targets. Drones were utilized in either a direct support role of ground troops in an overwatch capacity with the ability to assist in command and control and the second in a hunter-killer capacity where the UAVs searched for targets (Callam, 2010). The role of UAVs in Iraq and Afghanistan in these roles was seen no differently than the use of traditional aircraft, but their use was quickly expanded beyond what has traditional been seen as the battlefield. The program and its policies drew criticism and questions related to international law. It was not long after UAVs were weaponized that the CIA saw the potential of their use internationally. On November 3, 2002, after the Air Force rejected the mission over legal concerns, the CIA attacked a vehicle in Yemen with a UAV killing all six passengers (O’Connell, 2010). The difference between theses strikes and the ones conducted by the military lies in the fact that the military was striking targets in a recognized warzone while the CIA was operating over the sovereign territory of another nation. The UN Commission on Human Rights noted that this was done with the consent of Yemen and they had the, â€Å"responsibility to protect their citizens against the excesses of non-Sate actors†¦ actions must be taken in accordance with international human rights and humanitarian law. Further, in the opinion of the Special Rapporteur, â€Å"the attack in Yemen constitutes a clear case of extrajudicial killing. † (Jahangir, 2003). Another stark example of the drone program involves the hunt for Baitullah Mehsud who was the leader of a militant group in Pakistan that attacked a police academy in that country. Five months later he was targeted and killed in an UAV attack in northwest Pakistan, but it was not the only strike carried out in an attempt to kill him. In fact, sixteen other strikes were used in a failed attempt to kill one man and in the process between 207 and 321 other people were killed (Callam, 2010). The large difference in the number of people reportedly killed is due in large part to the methodology used in determining how many people were killed (Beswick, 2010). Currently it is known that the United States has carried out UAV attacks in at least six countries including Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen. In addition to their expanded area of use their numbers have grown exponentially from 167 in 2002 to approximately 7,000 in 2010 (Deri,2012). The number of attacks has grown as well. According to the New American Foundation, between 2004 and 2007, 9 strikes were carried out in Pakistan. While that number has since fallen, it was as high as 118 strikes in 2010. The US military now trains more UAV pilots than traditional pilots and according Committee on Oversight and Government Reform no private entities are developing new manned aircraft (Deri,2012). While there is no question the use of these weapon systems is legal in countries where there is combat that meets the definition of armed conflict under international law such as Afghanistan, but their use in countries like Pakistan depends on how terrorism is classified. Previously, the government considered terrorism a crime and responded though diplomatic means and law enforcement procedures. It was not until the bombing of embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that the government responded to terrorism with military action by firing missiles at targets in Sudan and Afghanistan. In this case the government invoked the right to self defense in accordance with Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations (Maggs, 2005). After the government began the drone attacks over countries they were not in direct conflict with, the UN Special Rapporteur Christof Heyns submitted a report to the UN Human Rights Council with concerns over, â€Å"the lack of transparency regarding the legal framework and targeting choices. † He requested information from the government and they declined to provide any official response to the UN, but cited a statement made by a government legal adviser named Harold Hongju Koh. Mr. Hongju Koh stated in a speech to the Annual Meeting of the American Society of International Law in 2010 that there are a number of legal bases to justify the use of targeted killing. He stated that, â€Å"As a matter of international law, the United States is in an armed conflict with al-Qaeda, as well as the Taliban and associated forces, in response to the horrific 9/11 attacks, and may use force consistent with its inherent right to self-defense under international lawâ€Å" According to that statement, the government no longer believes terrorism is a crime, but now considers it as being part of an armed conflict. Acts of terrorism are not limited to the United States and al-Qaeda is active in other countries such as the United Kingdom, these other countries do not consider themselves at war with al-Qaeda. Sir Christopher Greenwood a British Judge on the International Court of Justice believes that, â€Å"In the language of international law there is no basis for speaking of a war on Al-Qaeda or any other terrorist group, for such a group cannot be a belligerent, it is merely a band of criminals, and to treat it as anything else risks distorting the law while giving that group a status which to some implies a degree of legitimacy† (O’Connell, 2010). Why would the government change it view that terrorism is a crime to an act that has taken place during armed conflict? If they still considered it a crime, the government actions would be dictated by the Constitution and international law. Specifically, the Fifth Amendment which states that no person shall be, â€Å"deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law† and International Human Rights laws which also prohibits the killing of individuals without any judicial process. Abiding by these laws would severally limit the government’s ability to combat terrorism due to the remote locations and unfriendly locations many of the leaders operate out from. Being an American citizen does afford you any protection under the current counterterrorism target selection process either. Attorney General Eric Holder on March 5th of this year stated that if any Americans are working with al-Qaeda it is legal to place them on a capture/kill list. He stated that, Some have argued that the president is required to get permission from a federal court before taking action against a United States citizen who is a senior operational leader of Al Qaeda or associated forces, this is simply not accurate. ‘Due process’ and ‘judicial process’ are not one and the same, particularly when it comes to national security. The Constitution guarantees due process, not judicial process† (Savage, 2012). According to the statement by Mr. Hongju Koh, there are two main justifications that the government is using to rationalize the program of targets killing. The first is that we are in armed conflict with al-Qaeda and the second is that we are acting in self defense. While there is no official definition of armed conflict, The International Law Association Committee on the Use of Force studied the court cases and laws surrounding this issue and found in their final report that there are two â€Å"essential minimum criteria†¦ the existence of organized armed groups† and those groups must be, â€Å"engaged in fighting of some intensity†(Gardam, 2010). Al-Qaeda has a weak command and control structure and its organization has been described as nothing more than a â€Å"diffuse network of affiliated groups†, ruled more by ideology than anything else(Brahimi, 2010). The government has also stated time and again stated that al-Qaeda command and control is diminished and while dangerous are a weak organization. These facts lead to the conclusion that al-Qaeda is in fact not an â€Å"organized armed group† and the War on Terror is not so must a war against a organization, but a â€Å"war of ideas† as stated by Paul Wolfowitz former Deputy Defense Secretary. The second justification is that we are acting in self defense under Article 51, which allows the use of military force in response to an attack. Mary Ellen O’Connell a leading international law researcher pointed out in her paper titled â€Å"Unlawful Killing with Combat Drones†, that The International Court of Justice ruled that the right to self-defense must only result from, â€Å" an attack that involves a significant amount of force† (O’Connell, 2010). Also, when acting in self defense, the level of force used must take into account such things as collateral damage and the loss of innocent life. As shown in the hunt for Baitullah Mehsud, little respect for human life has been shown on behalf of the government. While terrorist attacks can be spectacular and attention grabbing, they are never sustained actions involving â€Å"a significant amount of force†, therefore the drone strikes should not be considered actions taken in self defense. In conclusion it would seem that the government use of drones overseas fails to meet the standards for self defense or actions taken during armed conflict. It would seem as indicated by the UN’s report on Human Rights that large parts international community question the legality of targeted killings by UAVs. The United States is leading the way in both drone technology and it use around the world, and they are failing to lead the way and set an example. In the future the government may find other countries using drones in ways they regard as illegal using the United States prior conduct as part of their justification.