3 Erroneous Uses of Scare Quotes

3 Erroneous Uses of Scare Quotes 3 Erroneous Uses of Scare Quotes 3 Erroneous Uses of Scare Quotes By Mark Nichol Rules are made to be broken, but more often they are made to be followed, because violation of those rules, in writing as in any other human endeavor, often leads to unintended consequences. One case is the careless use of quotation marks for emphasis. Scare quotes, as quotation marks employed for this purpose are called, are often used to call out nonstandard or unusual terms, or merely to introduce a word or phrase. However, although this strategy used to be common, scare quotes have taken on a new role that has largely, at least among careful writers, supplanted the old technique: Now, they are better employed to convey derision, irony, or skepticism. For example, a writer who describes how â€Å"the institute offers workshops in ‘self-awareness therapy’† is widely presumed not to be gently preparing the reader for the appearance of an unfamiliar phrase; more likely, they are calling attention to what they feel is preciously New Age-y terminology. Meanwhile, the statement â€Å"The Pentagon’s strategy of ‘pacification’ certainly did make things quieter in the neighborhood† comments on the evasive military euphemism, while â€Å"The ‘new’ model strikes me as less sophisticated than the old one† calls attention to an unjustified adjective. Here are three types of superfluous usage of scare quotes: 1. The astronomers reported Tuesday that they had combined more than 6,000 observations from three telescopes to detect the system of exoplanets. Exoplanets is a term that has only recently entered the general vocabulary, but neologism is not a criterion for use of scare quotes; simply introduce the word, define it, and move on: â€Å"The astronomers reported Tuesday that they had combined more than 6,000 observations from three telescopes to detect the system of exoplanets.† (In the article from which this sentence is taken, a definition of exoplanet follows the statement.) 2. They engaged in listening exercises and musical analysis so as to better understand the musical DNA of their favorite songs. If you use an established term in an unfamiliar but analogous sense, trust readers to make the connection; don’t bracket the term in scare quotes: â€Å"They engaged in listening exercises and musical analysis so as to better understand the musical DNA of their favorite songs.† 3. So-called â€Å"notification laws† require businesses to notify customers when certain unencrypted customer data is improperly accessed. Never employ scare quotes around a term introduced by the phrase so-called. Yes, you may want to signal to readers your dissatisfaction with the term, but so-called performs that function, so scare quotes are redundant: â€Å"So-called notification laws require businesses to notify customers when certain unencrypted customer data is improperly accessed.† Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Punctuation category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:30 Religious Terms You Should Know20 Pairs of One-Word and Two-Word FormsNarrative, Plot, and Story

Body ownership

Body ownership Body Ownership The sense of one’s own body has been a subject of debate among researchers for many years. It is argued to be a very specific type of knowledge, illustrated as being a non-conceptual and somatic (e.g., Kant, 1781/2003; Bermu ´ dezas cited in Lango, et al., 2007). It has been argued that this type of knowledge, often referred to as ‘‘embodiment† (Arzy, Overney, Landis, Legrand, 2006), or ‘‘corporeal awareness† (Berlucchi Critchley, 1979) is compulsory, to experience various types of sensory information (Kant, 1781/2003; Johnson, 1987; Lakoff, 1987; Merleau-Ponty, 1945/1962; Piaget, 1937/1954 as cited in Lango, et al., 2007). In other words, one has to have some sort of knowledge of one’s own body in order to experience emotions and sensations. It has been argued that gaining this type of knowledge is crucial for formation of personal psychological identity (Cassam,1997; Edelman, 2004). Rubber hand illusion allows for the manipulating the brain into perceiving an external object- the rubber hand, as being a representation of the body (Tsakiris &Haggard, 2005). Self awareness has been argued to be mostly represented by the sense of the body ownership. Moseley( et al., 2008) provoked the rubber hand illusion and demonstrated one of rubber hand illusion’s effects- taking ownership of an artificial counterpart- which leads to decrease in the temperature in the real hand. They found that this phenomenon was limb-specific, in other words similar effect have not been found to occur in the not stimulated hand. They argued that this is phenomenon is demonstrating that physical self and the physiological regulation of self are closely linked in the top down manner to an individual’s body awareness. It also seems likely that if body awareness is disrupted by cognitive processes, that might lead to changes in the body temperature regulations, in the rubber hand illusion case, making it de crease. This therefore leads to conclusion that if an individual’s starts perceiving and artificial body part it will have an effect on the rest of the body (Moseley, 2008). Body ownership has been argued to be a sort of knowledge that that your body belongs to you, and is constantly there, is a basis for the aspect of self-awareness. Individuals suffering from for example schizophrenia, autism, epilepsy, neuropathic pain, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia have been found to have a disturbance in their body ownership. These disorders have also been found to have a connection to the disruption of the body temperature regulations (Moseley, 2008). Moseley (et al., 2008) has demonstrated that such disruption in the body ownership can be a consequence of a Rubber Hand Illusion. RHI consequences in participant’s perception that the touch they are experiencing is actually an effect of the stimulation given to the rubber hand. That consequence in participant’s taking an o wnership of the rubber hand. Additionally, Moseley (et al., 2008) found that there was a positive correlation between the vividness of the rubber hand illusion experience and the decrease in the skin temperature in the adequate hand. This suggests that the more an individual experiences the RHI the more will the temperature in their hand decrease.

Behavior Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Behavior - Case Study Example In general, Clawson begins by talking about insecurities about self and the world around that start to develop when individuals do not get what they expect and/or are used to (p.3). Childhood experiences have a deep impact on individuals’ behavior and expectations. When individuals do not get what they believe is their right, it affects them negatively. To understand people for the way they behave, this article explains that most of the times behavior is defined by the individual’s experiences of their childhood. The learning obtained from this aspect is that it is not required for one to feel offended or betrayed because of somebody’s behavior that was not as expected; instead, it would be better to understand why that person behaved the way he/she did. It is more often due to some problems or challenges the other person might be facing, which he/she is unable to express. These problems are being referred to as â€Å"holes† in personality by Clawson (p.3) . Clawson further adds that it is important to move on instead of clinging to the issues that left us dissatisfied. When we decide to move on, we free our mind of negative thoughts and feelings, which is important for our wellbeing. Clawson talks about memes, which can have significant impact on our beliefs. Memes are mental building blocks that determine our behavior as they shape our beliefs; however, these memes are temporary. So, it is important to identify memes and not allow these memes to affect relationships because of their impact on persons’ behavior. A very important learning in general is that our actions or reactions to the happenings around us are purely because of our choice and are not because of any external influence (p.9). So, if we choose to be happy we can, and if we choose to be negative affected by the circumstances, we can. So, all negative feelings are because of our own choice, which can be controlled through thoughtful approach to the difficult time s of life. Our personal set of Values, Assumptions, Beliefs and Expectations (VABE) determine our view of the world and circumstances rather than the reality of the circumstances. These VABEs vary with every individual, culture, country and religion. These VABEs determine the behavior of individuals (Clawson, p.14). In a family, it is important to learn that what we learn and experience as children, up to an age of 10, determine our values in later life even if the situations completely change. So, it becomes important as to what the parents, guardians, teachers etc instil in children through behavior and observation that would eventually determine their life values. Moreover, it is important to keep in mind that our behavior is influenced by our actions, thoughts, feelings and physiology (p.10). Memes are also important because these memes will have a significant impact on children’s beliefs and behavior. Family is the first source of memes in an individual’s life and determine the lifestyle (Renshaw, p.11). Clawson’s article provides numerous points of learning for leaders. Firstly, leaders have the responsibility of influencing and motivating followers towards accomplishing a desired task (Pierce, p.257). In these contexts, for leaders, Clawson (p.5) justifies that it would be ideally impossible to effectively lead with expectations of being able to completely influence their followers. This is because all individuals’

The Idea Of Multiversity Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

The Idea Of Multiversity - Essay Example Kerr has emphasized the historical evolution of the American from teaching-based to research-based. Kerr opines that the multiversity put more emphasis on research as opposed to earlier universities that focused on teaching. The transition from traditional universities to multiversity as emphasized was a massive transformation process and involved the combination of numerous models, ideas and traditional from early universities. As highlighted in the preceding paragraph, before the advent of the term and concept of multiversity, the idea and use of the university as advanced by earlier scholars was different. The following statement neatly encapsulates the meaning, vision, and idea of the university as envisioned by Cardinal Newman in the earlier centuries. â€Å"The university is the high protecting power of all knowledge and science, of fact and principle, of inquiry and discovery, of experiment and speculation; it maps out the territory of the intellect †¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Kerr 2). It is easy to tell from the above expression that Newman pursued the idea of the university that was biased towards liberal knowledge. The distinctive feature of the university during the period of Newman and other scholars su ch as Plato was pursuit and transmission of fundamental truths, institutional autonomy, and instruction at an advanced level. Newman defended and propagated the faculty oriented liberal education and advanced the idea of a university to comprise of a small community of professors and students (Kerr 2). This clarifies why the eighteenth century universities were trivial and limited to predominantly disciplines and ability, the main objective of the traditional university program as suggested by Newman was knowledgeable advancement and alignment, according to Newman, the university was supposed to be an academic cloister (Kerr 1). Furthermore, other

The Effect Of Third Party Candidates In Presidental Elections Essay exa

The Effect of Third Party Candidates in Presidental Elections Although citizens of the United States have the opportunity to vote for many different offices at the national, state, and local levels, the election of the president of the United States every four years is the focal point of the American political process. The American political system has maintained a two- party system since its inception. Political scientists argue that a two-party system is the most stable and efficient means of running a democratic nation as a mono-party system leads toward tyranny, and a multi-party system creates over- diversification and gridlock (Mazmanian 6). The Constitution of the United States does not in any way limit the structure of the political system to two parties. In fact, there has been no presidential election where there were only two candidates; however, third-party candidates are rarely represented in a majority of the states, and those that were on the ballot in a majority of states have never been successful. However, on a few occasions, third party candidates have been able to make a significant impact on the presidential election process such as George Wallace in 1968 and H. Ross Perot in 1992. Through nineteenth century there was little deviation from the traditional two-party system. Until then, political candidates were utterly dependant upon the political infrastructure of an established party for their campaigns. Until the development of mass media technologies, including radio and television, political candidates had no direct means of communicating with the public and were thus dependant on the communications systems of the major parties. Thus, third party movements lacked the capabilities to run an effective campaign against the major parties. However, mass media has changed the scope of the election process and brought about the demise of the major political parties (Robinson 147). Candidates who run a television dominated campaign have hurt their parties in a number of ways. The media specialists who manage such campaigns tend to be loyal to a candidate rather than to the candidate's party; as a result, the campaign supports a single candidate and not the entire ticket of the party. In addition, the heavy reliance on television allows a candidate to reach voters directly, thereby weakening the traditional function of the party as an info... ...eed, Ross Perot and George Wallace had a profound effect on the outcome of the elections they participated in, but Perot had a more lasting effect. Ross Perot proved to the world that it is quite plausible for a completely independent candidate to "walk into center stage and steal the show" (Robinson 141). With the decline of the political parties and their role in the campaign process, the possibilities for more successful independent candidates can only increase. Eventually an independent will go farther than swaying the outcome. One day an independent will win. Works Cited Brown, Gene. H. Ross Perot: Texas Billionaire. Vero Beach: Rourke Enterprises, Inc, 1993. Goldman, Peter and Tom Mathews. "The Manhattan Project". Newsweek (Special Election Issue) November/December, 1992. pp.40-57 Jackson, David. "3rd party chances gauged" Dallas Morning News. November 5, 1992. Mazmanian, Daniel A. Third Parties in Presidential Elections. New York: Franklin Watts, 1974. Murr, Andrew. "Superhero". Newsweek (Special Election Issue) November/December, 1992. pp.70-77. Robinson, James W., ed. Ross Perot Speaks Out. Rocklin: Prima Publishing, 1992. .

Life of Pi book

In the book, Life of Pi[1], Yann Martel proposes many religious differences, and similarities from religions located around the world. These questions ask such things as, is it possible to be a multi-religion person? Are all religions different? How are some religions the same? Life of Pi was written in 2002 and is a fascinating story of how a young man, Pi Patel, makes it in a world with his own personal beliefs. He adopts the three major religions of the world being Hinduism, Christianity, and Islam.Life of Pi is a very questioning book at times and has the capability of persuading nonbelievers to re-evaluate their religious thought process and beliefs. After reading this book you will be comfortable in the knowledge that you will have on other religions, and just may judge them differently. One of the questions that surfaces in this book is â€Å"can a person believe in more than one religion? † The author uses the Christian, Islam, and Hindu religions all in one character to represent the different struggles that Pi Patel is facing within him self, just as animals were used as symbolic representation for people in the first story. As for the question itself, a person cannot believe in more than one religion at a time. This is shown when the three holy men meet Pi in the park and they argue over his religious practices. While arguing Pi’s father reminds the three holy men that â€Å"there is freedom for practice of whatever religion in this country†[2]. The holy men screamed in unison, â€Å"Yes! Practice-singular†[3]. This point supports how even the three major holy religions of the world believe that you can only have one. However, it is possible for people to change religions throughout their lives. As religions are faith based through personal convictions that come from within, you have purpose in what you believe, and therefore are only able to believe in one at a time. To say you believe in Christianity and Hinduism would be like saying you are both a communist and a progressive conservative, which are different philosophies. You have to choose one religion or another, just as in this story you need to believe the first story or the second story, and you cannot believe that both of these events occurred. A person cannot believe two tales of the same legend. The second story with people resembles culture within North America and how everything in the North American world is looked at as bare facts. Most people only believe things that they can see with there own eyes, or feel with there own hands. Starting from our education as children, to jobs in adulthood, knowledge of bare facts measures how much we are capable of doing. In math you add numbers that have relevance to our society, in science pre-determined experiments with actions or re-actions occur, as well as predictions and conclusions. Everything MUST have an answer. If there is a topic to which we do not have an answer we dig for scientific answers, and refuse to accept folk tales or stories from higher powers. In an area of the world with steadily declining religious numbers[4], we need to exercise our faith and imaginations. We all need to have an open and searching mind like that of a younger child. Pi Patel shows just how blunt and â€Å"factual†[5] North America people are by telling the second story, including the murder of people on a lifeboat. Murder is something we can all relate to, thus making the second story â€Å"the right story†[6] to most people. After the second story of realism, many people feel the first story to be a waste of time, showing again just how North American people struggle to explore the imaginative or symbolic side of things. Everybody justifies their respective view by saying, â€Å"that’s not even possible†[7] or â€Å"I’d have to see it to believe it†[8]. The first and second story connects in a way of showing resemblances between the two major religions of the world, Christianity and Islam. The purpose of this is to show how alike Islam followers are to Christian followers. They share most of the same religious views, with very minor differences in stories of interpretations. They also share many of the same characters, such as Jesus, who is God’s son. Jesus sends messages from God and heals people in Christianity, and in Islam a prophet shares the word of God. These two parts in the story show just how different the two religions are, yet are so similar. The first story also shows how, in the eastern world, the people are much more imaginative, by using Hindu and its animals to add a twist to create the first story. It uses the animals to also describe the real people that were on the boat such as the Orangutan, Pi’s mother. In Hindu a person who is caring and involved in religious studies has the possibility of becoming a monkey after death[9]. Pi’s mom was a very caring person who was against the eating of the zebra, or the young sailor. A zebra is looked at as an honest, friendly, and creative person because of his stripes[10]. By using these animals he is trying to show just how North American culture is so bare factual. This story parallels our own personal internal struggles as well as the struggles of different cultures and religions in the world. We begin to understand we have to ultimately face and deal with our own struggles, allowing us to come to terms with our own beliefs, where we are at in our own lives and how we fit into our culture. This story could be interpreted with different meanings by different people, but ultimately causes the kind of thought that moves us forward in terms of who we will become. The purpose of this story is to show the similarities of some religions, and also to show that the things that are different, are not so different after all. This is a book attempting to change minds on religious discrimination and indifferences.Reference http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_prac2.htm

Glory Review - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 4 Words: 1128 Downloads: 7 Date added: 2018/12/27 Category History Essay Type Book review Level High school Topics: Civil War Essay Film Analysis Essay Movie Essay Did you like this example? The American Film, Glory of 1989, is based on the actual historical story, of the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, seen through the eyes of the commanding officer Gould Shaw who was a white officer during the American Civil War. The story is told by Kevin Jarre the author of Glory who was walking in Boston and came across a Civil war memorial, and this became the inspiration forGlory. The war was characterized by both white and black soldiers. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Glory Review" essay for you Create order The officers were the white while the African Americans were the soldiers. The central theme as I observed in the film is racism and discrimination and biases attitude from the whites towards their fellow black soldiers. Amongst these officers, Colonel Shaw was unlike his fellows who were racist and devoted most of the time training the African-Americans how to fight restlessly in the civil war. The blacks were more than determined to fight for their country and more so against injustices. The whites doubted or didnt believe in the blacks making good soldiers or submitting to the discipline of the war, but the likes of Fredrick Douglas believed in the chance of winning for the black regiment. The Glory therefore openly exposed different and multiple aspects of civil war as it occurred. It displayed the cruel realities that the soldiers went through during the war. The film also revealed how man to man fights was brutal and barbaric as practiced during the civil war. For instance, the 54th exposed one of the bloodiest action in the war which was an uphill attack in a muddy terrain running against a Confederate fort in Charleston. This attack was somewhat suicidal having the battlefield strategies involving the black troops being disciplined by matching into the contemptuous fire. The 54th soldier remained strong enough as well as disciplined till the end of civil war. In my opinion, the purpose of Glory was to expose the victory and courage of the soldiers in the war who fought against racism, prejudice and discrimination and later achieved their goals. Although the back regiment was unskilled, they gave their best to provide the Norths with a victory on proving to be real heroes. Watching Glory, I am convinced that the director Edward Zwick, brings outs a lot of lessons that we can draw from the movie. It gives a clear historical description of the experience of the soldiers in the war. Racism had been a real challenge that the blacks faced, and he brings out this aspect in the film. For instance, there was a decision that was made to pay the blacks less than the whites. They were not believed to be good enough to fight in the civil war, and more so the civil war was against slavery in the south where the blacks had been enslaved. Therefore the black soldiers through the help of Shaw, they gave the best, they fought, bleed and died as they fought against these forms of discrimination. It is also clear that as much as racism was intense a few like Shaw were ready to the unit with the blacks to end slavery which I believe is one its strength. Glory therefore brings out a clear experience of the civil war. It displays the courage the soldiers had to win the figh ts despite dealing with prejudice from their fellow white soldiers. The zeal Gould had as a commander to help the black soldiers gets to question why they were much different in the relationship between the soldiers and the difference in how the slaves were treated. Was the slavery and racism attitude intense only in the southern region? Ironically, the northern abolitionists were antislavery, but the film does not consider the blacks as equal to the whites through the way they were treated in the film which I believe is a weakness. In my opinion, the movie unfolds the true historical experiences during slavery because the southern economy was highly based on cotton and the political leaders were therefore against antislavery as they needed cheap labor that could only be provided by the blacks. They, thus, had to fight their way through this prejudices as shown by the 54th regiment. They had been considered inferior. The film as it was experienced by the blacks projected the fact th at the blacks had to be paid less and also did not deserve to be trained in the war. Though Shaw was biased towards the blacks, with time he relied on the blacks were no different from them and offered them full support to get admiration and glory. Watching Glory, I am left with the mixed feeling, why because the story is primarily about the blacks, but their top leader or officer is a white. We had to see the blacks through the 54th white commanding officer and not the other way. Well, I believe the reason to these could be because the whites were considered the superior race against the blacks or could the blacks be in a land that is not theirs? Were their zeal self-determined or the commander instilled the enthusiasm in them? In my opinion, it bothered me that being a film centering their focus on the black regime then, the blacks should have been the leading actor and more so as a commander. Again, I wonder could that be possible if the blacks did not know how to fight and needed training. This makes me conclude that the purpose of the 54th was to indicate and show the public that slavery and civil war was a blacks journey to fight. Sadly, the fact is, the blacks only saw themselves in the eyes of the white, and since the b lacks were the ones just suffering under the white regime, then the perception of the whites towards the black is what had to change, for slavery, racism and other forms of prejudice to change. Having the director giving the movie in a more focus of the blacks but seeing it through the eyes of the white, I think he could have given us a different view like white seeing the blacks through their(black) eyes and this also proved to be a weakness. Compared to other war films, Glory brings out the other aspects apart from war and training like comradeship and togetherness, courage and the zeal to achieve goals without giving up. It is one of the best films that shows a true history of the civil war as given in the books. It instils a change in the minds of the public on their views towards the black as equal members of the society. Glory therefore is one of the strongest movies and a valuable movie in giving a clear description and understanding the experiences of the civil war.