Development Aid Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Development Aid - Essay Example Such countries began to borrow capital from other well to do rich countries to start developing their own economies and thus began the concept of Development Aid. There has been a lot of monetary transfer between the poor countries and the developed countries with regard to the development aid. Development Aid was made mandatory by the United Nations in the year 1946 to ensure that the countries which were destroyed and affected adversely during the World-War II, to recover from their state. The concept of providing Development Aid was to help the third world countries recover from their poverty and help them come on to the path of progress. Development Aid was meant to be the means of maintaining a peace accord between two rival countries affected by war for quite some time. Development Aid helps countries to develop and progress instead of sliding back into the stages of conflicts and war. Development Aid also termed as foreign aid was meant to promote improvement in economic growth of the third world countries and to bridge the gap between the poor and rich. ... r the domestic economy were taken up by a new breed of development economists who argued that investment in less developed countries could be stimulated by injections of cash from overseas. The logic of this new development theory was simple: investments are determined by savings - and savings are determined by per capita income. Since poor countries have low incomes and accordingly, low savings, they are caught in a 'vicious circle of poverty': they experience a 'low-level equilibrium trap' where higher income does not lead to increased saving but only results in higher population growth. Thus, it was argued, investment financed by foreign aid will dissolve this vicious circle and connect the less developed countries to the virtuous circle of productivity and growth. Pros and Cons Good Governance is the latest term being used for the diplomatic as well as the bilateral issues of Development Aid. Good Governance is a term which is very common amongst the general public with regard to Development Aid; mostly hearing at public speeches or through some media like the television, the newspaper, etc. Good Governance as told is like a diplomatic and bilateral condition in multi aid proposals (O'Neill, 1997). Bilateral issues in multi-aid proposals include the two countries coming to a common understanding between each other, signing some pacts which would have to be followed in the following times after the pacts have been signed. Many people and governments are of the opinion that Good governance is an integral concept and entity to improve the flow of aid thereby proving to be a bolster to the economic growth of a country as well as a means to alleviate poverty from that particular country. Many have different views about good governance which might mean different things

Are Human Activities Contributing to Climate Change Research Paper

Are Human Activities Contributing to Climate Change - Research Paper Example Since then, man has been moving forward in terms of technological advancement but overlooking the damages it is causing to the Earth’s atmosphere. The greenhouse gases, which occur naturally, absorb the thermal infrared and warm the Earth’s temperature by 63 degrees Fahrenheit. This whole process is known as the Greenhouse Effect. The main greenhouse gases that are present in the Earth’s atmosphere are carbon dioxide, water vapour, methane, nitrous oxide and the ozone. (Maslin, 2007) Carbon dioxide and other green house gases such as methane are added to the earth’s atmosphere by the burning of fossil fuels. Previously, the carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere were in balance but today, human activities are releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere at an increasingly high level. The earth’s vegetation has not been able to take in and absorb the excess of carbon dioxide and thus, the atmospheric level of CO2 has increased. Fossil fuels are burnt to create energy for humans in the form of heat, electricity and gas. Apart from making our lives easier, it has also emitted enough carbon dioxide into the atmosphere to cause climate changes. Through the Earth’s natural cycle, large amounts of carbon dioxide are released in and out of the atmosphere annually and so the CO2 levels remained in balance throughout. However; scientists have confirmed that human activities add around 7 billion tonnes of CO2 into the earth’s atmosphere which ends up upsetting the balance. According to research, the trees and the oceans only absorb half of the carbon dioxide present in the atmosphere. The remainder stays in our environment for as long as 100 years. Carbon dioxide is created from fossil fuels through the form of heat and gas. It is also released in natural processes like decay of organic matter. Apart from that, trees release CO2 into the atmosphere but due to deforestation, the absorption of this gas has

Artwork Essay Example for Free

Artwork Essay The â€Å"Self-Portrait with a bandaged ear† by Vincent Van Gogh and â€Å"The Two Fridas† by Mexican painter Kahlo Frida are depicting the artists’ deep hurt and emotional breakdown at losing their special person in life. However, the portrait â€Å"The Two Fridas† is representing the artist’s conflicting psychological mind more into details and straightforward than Vincent Van Gogh’s self-portrait â€Å"The Bandaged Ear. † In â€Å"The Two Fridas,† she uses various actions and clear setting to help viewers the theme of painting easily. The background is filled with the agitated clouds on the stormy dark sky and it obviously reflects her inner pain. Frida who sits on the left side portrays rejected Frida by her husband Diego Rivera. On the right, it represents loved and respected Frida by him. The two Fridas hold hands each other as if loved Frida tries to join unloved Frida’s suffering. It also implies her only companion is herself since she was six years old. She was isolated from other people due to her health problems. In â€Å"The bandaged ear,† Van Gogh pierces the viewer’s feeling using the facial expression rather than actions. His pale and thin face like Jesus Christ in a late medieval painting and every brushstroke that he made on the canvas tells his pitiful presence at the time. In fact, it is not easy to catching the purpose of the Japanese painting on the wall behind Van Gogh. For late 18th century, European artists considered the traditional Japanese art as a utopian aestheticism. So, he uses the Japanese painting for representing his lost paradise. Frida utilizes many symbolic and striking objects to illustrate her turmoil. The two hearts express her pain. The abandoned Frida’s heart is dying while the other Frida’s heart is whole. The unloved Frida is holding the surgical pincer to cut off a vein that travels through both Fridas’ hearts. Frida tries to stop the flow of blood from loved Frida on the right. Therefore, the blood is dripping on her white dress and it is the sign of danger of bleeding to death. In addition, her white dress is ripped open and it refers her broken relationship between Diego. Van Gogh simply uses fewer objects than Frida’s portrait. In combination of wearing a bandage across his ear to under his chin and his sallow skin imply his health condition is unwell. He may be shivering inside because he wears a coat and hat. Frida Kahlo has been associated with the surrealist movement which is the most influential movement in early 1900’s. This movement is influenced by Sigman Freud and Karl Max and they are well known psychologists. The surrealists believe the conscious mind repress the power of imagination so they are willing to depict their unlimited imagination. They expose the uncensored feeling as if in a dream. Also, they use many different kinds of symbols and colors to make art more details and straightforward. Unlike surrealist Frida, the impressionist artist Van Gogh conveys the subject of his art by demonstrating the techniques of loose brushstrokes that barely forms the figure and it makes his piece sort of like a sketch or â€Å"unfinished painting. He uses not many different colors but instead he focuses on putting shadows or highlights in color. Both of great self portraits portray the artists’ mental and physical collapse in their own stylistic and unique techniques. However, Kahlo Frida’s painting is easier to analyze the subject of artwork than Van Gogh’s painting. Because, she chooses varieties of symbols and colors to express her strange and violent imaginations and it definitely helps viewers easy to define her painful heart through her painting.

Advertising consumption

Advertising consumption Introduction: With the rapid development of technology, the way people advertise and consume has changed gradually. In the other words, technology is increasing the capacity and practices of consumption and providing more platforms for advertising. Some people argue that it might lead to weak social organisation and solidarity, however, the influence of technology on peoples daily life is inevitable. Take online shopping for example, it is magnificently affecting the traditional consumption habits. More and more consumers are getting used to purchasing online instead of high street shopping. This essay is going to observe how technology has expanded the scope of advertising and the spaces of consumption practices in terms of online shopping. Besides, critical evaluation will be carried out to verify the accuracy and effectiveness of the observation. Analysis: Holt D. (1995) pointed out that the act of consuming is a varied and effortful accomplishment underdetermined by the characteristics of the object. Any products can be typically consumed in a range of different ways by different consumers. Therefore, it is essential to analyse how online shopping is influencing the consumption practices of consumers. Consumption Practices: First of all, online shopping brings us a convenient, fast and time-saving consuming atmosphere, and this is considered to be the major concern of middle class who work eight hours in average, and they dont have much time to spend on shopping. Hence, they treat time like gold, and wish to buy everything they want as short as a few minutes. In traditional shopping pattern, consumers need to spend a large number of energy and time on selecting and comparing various goods in different high street stores. The information about the products often vary due to the misinterpretation of salesmen. Besides, there are always restricts of time and place. Take Newcastle city centre for example, most shops on Northumberland Street close before six oclock. People who work until six will not be able to do any shopping during the weekdays, and the people who live in suburbs where there is no shopping centre nearby will have to waste an hour or more on the way to city centre and back. Online shopping perfectly solves the problem. Shopping can be easily completed within a couple of clicks in anytime and anywhere as long as the customers have internet access. Itunes is a successful online software and platform that provides consumers a convenient way to buy their favourite music. Sometimes, people dont wan to buy the whole album. Instead, theyd like to listen to some specific tracks by different artists. Itune totally satisfy these consumers by offering download of every single track of various artists with a little amount of expenses, and it is really time-saving just a couple of clicks, then the track will be downloaded automatically and ready in a flash of time( depends on the speed of Internet service providers). Secondly, the advantage of online shopping on products price is obvious to obtain, and price is always the most important factor for consumers to consider. Online sales compared to traditional stores, it doesnt require any physical store. Besides, online sales are able to contact directly with upstream suppliers and ask them to send the products to customers when necessary. Hence, no self-storage facilities will be used to store goods so that the cost of logistics and storages can be minimised. In the other words, the total cost of online sales is much lower than the average cost of physical store sales. In addition, online bidding is getting more and more popular as consumers can get the products in an unbelievably low price from time to time. A typical example of online bidding is ebay. Therefore, the retail price online is relatively lower than traditional physical stores, which will be expected to attract more customers. Special promotion or sale will be another reason to shop online. For instance, there is 20% student discount occasionally throughout catalogues on the official website of Topshop/Topman when the customers make the purchase online, meanwhile there is only 10% discount in store for students, and this also reflects the advantage of online shopping on price. After all, no people are willing to pay more for something that is exactly the same. In addition, online shopping provides consumers more comfortable and pleasant shopping atmosphere. During the process of shopping, some consumers require the feelings of pleasure rather than the products themselves, and many of them have experienced various attitudes from different salesmen in physical stores. Those salesmen usually approach customers with smile when they step in the stores and recommend a number of products to the customers when browsing the shop, However, the smile on their faces will fade away with time as the customers dont show any interest on the products they recommend. Most consumers will not be pleased by the way the salesmen persuade them to make the purchase, instead, they want to shop in a Comfortable and pleasant mood. In contrast, those who have shopped online will find consumption via online shopping is a lot easier. They are always free to click on the products they are interested and able to compare different products as often as they want. Besides, they can make the purchase, save the products for later or leave the products without the interference from salesmen by simply clicking on the web pages. Take ASOS for example, customers can quickly find the clothes they want by narrowing down the search results. Besides, these clothes can be displayed in 360 degree, and can be even viewed by real models catwalk what can hardly be seen in physical stores. Furthermore, online shopping brings a customised products consuming platform for the customers who have special requirements. More and more products need to meet the consumers imagination to meet the needs of individual consumers with the development of society. The choices by consumers may no longer be practicalness of the products, but more needs to reflect the values of their own. How to make the products innovative and stimulate curiosity of consumer has become a crucial problem the product developer must consider. Many products sold in online stores can not be found in any physical shopping malls or stores. These unique products usually emphasis on trendy and interesting . They are customised to meet the requirements of every single customers. In online stores, costumers can find a range of special products which are beyond our imagination, from nails to laptops, from furnitures to clothes, every product involved in our daily life can be customised meet peoples needs. For instance, customers will be able to customise their laptop, mobile phone and even gaming consoles by altering their colours on a website called Colourware. There is a wide range of colours to choose and the front, trim or back of your digital devices can even be altered in different colours. Moreover, The prices of these luxury products in the traditional physical stores are relatively more expensive than online boutiques. Online shopping brings the opportunities to get famous brand products with a reasonable price for those label lovers who can not afford the price. As mentioned before, price is the most important factor that consumers should consider. For these people who need to purchase luxury products to show their status and prestige, they think certain products with famous brand will improve the quality of life, and reflects the social status at the same time. There is also another way to satisfy customers vanity, if they can afford these luxury products neither online nor in store : rent them. They dont need spend a lot on these famous labels as better solution is going to save them a great amount of money. In a website called Rent Luxury Bags ,customers can find most luxury bags theyve been dreaming of, and they can rent these bags in a reasonable price. Additionally, these bags can be rent from four week up to a year. Last but not least, all customers are able to put their personal belongings online and sell or trade them as second hand products. In the other word, everything can be commodity as long as the demand of these products exists. Take E-bay for example, millions of second hand products are updated everyday on this online trading platform. Sometimes, it is the only way to get the products when the brand new one is no longer in stock. Advertising: As more and more consumers are getting used to online shopping, advertising is also transforming from offline to online. A great number of online shopping websites are cooperating with social network websites,search engines and email service providers such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, Bing, Hotmail etc in order to maximise the online exposure. When searching a keyword on search engine, all the hyperlinks of relevant products will be listed on the first page of search results, and all the relevant websites who have paid advertising fees to the search engine will be popped up on the advertisement column. Similarly, a range of products with hyperlinks will be recommended on your profile page of Facebook or Twitter according to users search history. To put it in different words, advertisement of online shopping websites can be seen everywhere once you get online. The individual owners of small websites are mainly making money through the website advertising alliance. the form of web advertising alliance was invented by Amazon in 1996. The advertising mode of Amazon advertising alliance is CPS (cost per sell), which means the amount of advertising income will depend on the actual sale figures on the online shopping website. With the moderate acceptance and recognition of CPS advertising mode by consumers , online shopping advertising has gradually become the major advertising method, and the revenue of online shopping advertising is increasing in a magnificent speed . More and more sites have been dug to a online shopping advertising market in order to get a share of this new market. There have been a range of online shopping advertising-based mode to promote different sites. Since online shopping has a large number of users, these owners of small websites also gained sustained, reliable and stable income. Cash back websites are becoming popular among online shopping consumers. Once the users make successful purchases through the links provided by the cash back websites, the online shopping websites offer these cash back websites all or part of the sales commission in the form of cash or points to users. The main advantages of cash back websites in one word is cheaper, as they save more money for the consumers, and the maximum savings may be up to 30%. This is a better way for those consumers who make the purchases online regularly. More importantly, these cash back websites are promoting more than 3000 retailers toward consumers at the same time. The most successful example in UK is Quidco. It is obvious to notice the online retailers on the frontpage of Quidco, such as play.com ebay, orange and so on. As consumers browse Quidco to find the cash back deal for their favourite products, the products on other online retailers have also been browsed. In addition, price comparison websites are another essential way to promote online retailers. A number of relevant products will be picked from different online retailers and listed from lowest price to highest price for the consumers to choose once the keyword is typed in. Price Grabber can be taken as the representative of these websites, and any products from appliances to wines can be search and compared in order to find the cheapest products for customers. Simultaneously, the online retailers who sell cheaper products will be exposed to more customers. It is also a practical online shopping advertising mode that offers users an alternative shopping experience. Furthermore, professional online shopping navigation sites are born to promote various online retailers or physical shops and focus on a certain area such as books, restaurants or travels. These websites publish free of coupons, offers, discounts , promotions, free shipping, and other shopping information about some specific websites or shops regularly. They are capable of gathering a large number of online retailers and physical stores and reorganize them in different categories. The updated information about these retailers can be spreaded to potential customers. These potential customers can reach the product or service pages they are interested in by simply clicking the links the navigation sites provide, and it saves a lot of time for the consumers. These professional navigation sites are practical online shopping advertising mode, and they provide a simple, easy, clear way to shop online. For instance, My Voucher Codes provide a wide range of promotional codes, e-vouchers or discount codes , which will offer consumers a discount or money off the listed retail price of many goods, at a variety of different online UK retailers. Moreover, online retailers can be exposed via products review sites. This type of sites mainly focus on film, television, books or restaurants, and guide users to make a purchase through the comment on a particular commodity by other consumers. The interaction between customers on these sites are relatively strong, and it will provoke potential customers to buy the products online shopping customers via the feedbacks from other users in order to achieve the promotion. Students will be expected to be the largest group of potential users of this kind of site. Evaluation: April 2009, the European Commission in Brussels hosted the first summit of European consumers, the them of the meeting is the opportunities and challenges in digital age. A copy of Euros statistics on online shopping was released during the meeting. These data were from family, personal use of information and communication technology survey in twenty seven European countries. According to the statistics on Euro Online Shopping Industry Report(2009), about one-third of customers in European countries have the experience of making the purchase online in 2008, the most popular consumptions online are tourism and clothing . In 2008, the individual consumers between the ages of 16-74, about 32% of the purchase or order through the network are personal goods or services. In recent years, the proportion of individuals online shopping steady growth (in 2004 was 20% in 2006 to 26%, 30% in 2007.) Basically speaking, all EU member showed a growth in online shopping. The majority of the 27 European countries, the most frequent consumer groups in online shopping is 25-34 years (representing the number of age 47%), while in Malta, Slovenia, Slovakia and Bulgaria, age group of online shopping is 16-24 years old. In the 16-24 years old and 35-44 year-olds, online shopping is increasing moderately, the percentage is as high as 41% and 40%. In the 45-54 year-old ,55-64-year-old 65-74 years old, the online shopping rate gradually decreased, respectively, 31%, 20% and 9%. In 2008, the most products and services consumed online are travel and holiday products (14% of individual consumers have purchased or ordered such products in the past 12 months), followed by clothing and sporting goods (13%) Books and magazines (12%), household items or event tickets (both 11%), film and music products (9%), electronic products (8%). In Denmark, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and Finland, more than half of consumers conducted online shopping. 16-74 year-olds, over 59% of the Danish people have the experience of online shopping, meanwhile in UK is 57%, 56% in the Netherlands, Germany and were 53% in Sweden , 51% in Finland. Among European Union countries, travel clothing and sporting goods occupy the highest proportion in Finland, these two were 31% and 27%, the highest proportion in purchasing of books and magazines is in Luxembourg (29%), purchase rate of home supplies and the highest proportion of electronic products in Germany were 26% and 18%, the highest percentage of purchase event tickets is in Denmark (28%), purchase products, movies and the United Kingdom occupies the highest proportion of music purchase (24%). Based on the online shopping statistics in the UK for November 2009 and February 2010 quarter (Harris G, 2010), the top ten e-commerce sites for that quarter are: Amazon.co.uk, Argos, Play.com, Apple Computer, Amazon.com, Tesco, Marks Spencer, John Lewis, Next and Easyjet. Among these sites above, most of them have been massively exposed via a range of online shopping advertising. The more these online retailers promote, the more customers will be. Besides, the comments about their products on product review sites are mainly positive, and this will have the influence on potential customers decision making. For those companies who have physical stores like Tesco, Marks Spencer or John Lewis, online shops have increased their share in online shopping industry, and customers now can enjoy the products from them anywhere and anytime. Although these companies have been existing for years, a number of customers would still like to purchase their products in an alternative and convenient way. According to the analysis by Redfern A. (2007), the UK online advertising industry has spent over  £2,015.8 billion pounds for the full year of 2006, occupied approximately 11.4% share of the UK advertising industry. This indicates the growth of online shopping advertising is affecting advertising industry and motivate more companies to establish online shops and promote their products in an alternative way. Besides,  £30.2 billion pounds have been spent online during 2006, and 19.7 million people are used to shop online in the UK, spending shopping basket of  £652 each in the past couple of months in average. It is assumed that by the end of 2011, 32 million domestic consumers will start their first shopping online, and the value of commodities they purchase online will be around 52 billion pounds in 2011. Hence, the amount customers spend online will be expected to double in five years, and more people will be persuaded to make the purchase online by the regular consumers who have been doing online shopping for a long time. Conclusion: In conclusion, technology did expanded the scope of advertising and the spaces of consumption practices. It is changing peoples life in every possible way, and is challenging traditional advertising and consumption practices. The revolution of shopping from physical stores to online retailers is inevitably taking place, and choices for online shopping advertising is moderately increasing. It is expected that more consumers will start shopping online and dont need to spend great amount of time on searching for the products they are interested in the future. On the contrary, these products will be able to find the consumers via online shopping advertising.

Essay --

Human Trafficking Human trafficking which is commonly referred as â€Å"modern-day slavery† is a trade in humans in the form of prostitution, sexual exploitation, forced labor or even for the extraction of organs. Here in this country, people are being abducted, bought, and sold like slaves to be forced into all forms of servitude. The U.S Department of Justice stated that â€Å"human trafficking has become the second fastest growing criminal industry — just behind drug trafficking — with children accounting for roughly half of all victims† (Baldas, Human trafficking a growing crime in the U.S). It is not only happening in the States but it is also a worldwide phenomenon. To think that human trafficking may be happening even in our own neighborhood, for us being unaware as we go about our daily lives is unimaginable. Human traffickers generate billions of dollars per annum by victimizing countless people all around the world. Human trafficking is illegal in any way or anywh ere as it is a massive violation to human rights. People may still wonder that how can human trafficking still exist in the 21st century. There are various causes that make adults and children vulnerable to exploitation. However, human trafficking does not exist mainly because of the victims’ vulnerability to exploitation. Instead, just like drugs and arms trafficking, human trafficking is a market-driven industry which is based on the principles of supply and demand. Joyce Hart stated that â€Å"when there is a demand for services, human traffickers will eagerly fill it with slaves or very low-cost workers† (26). It is a highly sophisticated and organized crime industry with low risk and high profit, which are the main two factors that cause its demand to thrive. When the i... ...he 21st century, it is also expanding. Everyone should do their part in order to prevent more people being exploited and protect them. One of the main reasons that many of these traffickers are not being prosecuted is because a lot of victims are too traumatized or terrified to testify against their own abusers. Therefore, â€Å"police and criminal justice staff need standard working procedures to guarantee the physical safety of victims, protect their privacy and make it safe for them to testify against their abusers† (UNODC). Even for normal citizens, there are also ways to help fight against human trafficking such as contacting respective authorities if knowing of a potential human exploitation, changing purchasing options, or start a fundraiser and donate the funds to an anti-trafficking organization. These people need our help and together we can make a difference.

INDOPCO :: essays research papers

The INDOPCO case in 1992 provided some guidelines concerning capitalization for the taxpayer. In the case, the Supreme Court ruled that expenses directly incurred in reorganizing or restructuring a corporate entity for the benefit of future operations are not deductible. The court also held that investment banker fees, legal fees, proxy costs, and SEC fees incurred by a target corporation in a friendly takeover must be capitalized if the takeover produces significant future benefits. The taxpayer would rather expense the costs as this would give them a deduction on their taxes. Capitalizing these costs also increases their income, increasing the amount of taxes they have to pay. Thus, the IRS encourages capitalizing costs whenever there is a question as to what method to use. Originally the taxpayer had more of an advantage because the ruling was left open to much interpretation and the IRS was rather lenient concerning the future benefits. The Supreme Court just said that determining future benefits is undeniably important in determining whether a future expense should be capitalized. There have now been rulings where the IRS has become more aggressive in dealing with future benefits. The IRS realizes that companies will expense anything they can to reduce their tax burden. Even costs that would be incurred while investigating the expansion of a company’s existing business should be expensed if they are connected to an event that produced a significant long-term benefit. The only way they can be expensed is if the acquisition proves to be an unsuccessful one. The INDOPCO ruling also leaves open the question as to what directly incurred means. Companies were left to decide whether to capitalize a cost that was incurred to secure a benefit that extended beyond the current year, even though the transaction was not one in which a specific, identifiable asset was acquired. If it was determined the cost provided a significant long term benefit, the cost was a capital cost, and if not the cost was a period expense. Now, with the additional rulings, the IRS is the ones â€Å"dancing in the street†, because companies are forced to capitalize more costs, bringing in more revenues for the government. I think the decision was a good one in the sense that there needed to be some clarification as to what costs should be capitalized and which ones need to be expensed.

Music in Education Essay

Music can affect the body in many health-promoting ways, which is the basis for a growing field known as music therapy. However, you can use music in your daily life and achieve many stress relief benefits on your own. One of the great benefits of music as a stress reliever is that it can be used while you conduct your regular activities so that it really doesn’t take time away from your busy schedule. Music provides a wonderful backdrop for your life so that you can find increased enjoyment from what you’re doing and also reduce stress from your day. Music still tells a story, we know just have many genres to satisfy the cultural and social tastes of our modern society. Hip Hop is a genre of music that has significantly grown the last couple of decades. Its increased popularity has brought it to the forefront of globalization. Technological advances have made it easy for Hip Hop to spread out globally. This occurrence of globalization is a key example that as our cultural borders are broken down by technology, our own cultural and social practices become fluid. Although there are many positive and negative comments about the globalization of Hip Hop, it is a reflection of the growing phenomenon occurring all over the world. Hip hop originated in the South Bronx of New York City in the 1970s. The term rap is often used synonymously with hip hop, but hip hop can also be described as an entire subculture (â€Å"Hip Hop†, 2004). The term Hip Hop is said to have come from a joke between Keith Cowboy, rapper with Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, and their friends (â€Å"Hip Hop†, 2004). Although Hip Hop was created on American soil, it’s influences are global. It can be said that Hip Hop might be a result of ethnic globalization. Hip Hop has roots in African, Caribbean, and Latino culture (â€Å"Hip Hop Globalization and Youth Culture†, 2005). Spoken word, which is still popular today is also an influence in Hip Hop music and culture. Spoken word is a style of poetry spoken in a rhythmic fashion. Hip Hop ranges from rap music, to B-boy dance. It was a platform to empower ethnic youth without violence. Hip Hop in the beginning was essentially still an underground subculture. It was popular with many ethnic communities but it was not popular in the mainstream music industry. This all changed with the band Blondie and their song â€Å"Rapture†. â€Å"Rapture† is one of the first rap song’s to reach the top of the charts in mainstream pop music. Although Blondie is a punk/rock band, they were the proper catalyst to give Hip Hop the mainstream attention it deserved. Hip Hop has changed since it’s birth in the 1970’s. Hip Hop is now apart of the mainstream music scene. It is not uncommon to see artist from different genres collaborating with Hip Hop artists. It is also not uncommon to see Hip Hop music and culture in movies, television shows, and commercials. In the past you would only see people from ethnic communities wearing Hip Hop clothing, now all races including Asian, Caucasian, etc have accepted the Hip Hop style. The subject matter has also changed. In the past Hip Hop lyrics focused on political and societal frustrations, now Hip Hop lyrics steer more toward provocative content. Hip Hop subject matter consists mostly of the aspirations of wealth, sex, drug use, and criminal activity. During the beginning years the age of the Hip Hop listener was wide spread. It ranged from teens to even adults in their 50’s. Although Hip Hop still has an adult audience, it is now more geared toward younger audiences. Younger listeners are more likely to purchase Hip Hop music and paraphernalia, than the older audience. Music has always been a great healer. In the Bible, we learn about how David played the harp to help ease his severe depression of King Saul. Music is a significant mood-changer and reliever of stress, working on many levels at once. Many experts suggest that it is the rhythm of the music or the beat that has the calming effect on us although we may not be very conscious about it. They point out that when we were a baby in our mother’s womb, we probably were influenced by the heartbeat of our mother. We respond to the soothing music at later stages in life, perhaps associating it with the safe, relaxing, protective environment provided by our mother. They say that math is the universal language, and while that may be true, music has traits to it that even the casual listener should but may not always recognize as universal, literally and figuratively. Moreover, music is beneficial to the musician’s and the listener’s health and well-being. Music is everywhere, and it can be made and enjoyed by anyone, any animal, and any living thing, in its own way. The universe itself has a sense of rhythm, melody and music. Everyday speech has a lilt that can be called some kind of music. In nature, without the white noise of civilization in the background, the sounds of the trees, the water, and the air can all be called music. And animals, birds in particular, have their own sense of melody in the sounds that they make and use to communicate with each other. Music comes in so many various forms that it reflects, in a way, the diversity of the languages spoken and written on the planet. Whether it be classical music, pop, gospel music, country music or whatever pleases the ear, there will always be a kind of music for everyone, and it can come in any language. They say that learning and listening to music makes one smarter. As studies show, music makes the musician use his mind in a way that develops and maintains good mental health. Music is an art and a science; anyone who learns any bit of musical theory will know that music has a particular structure, while still allowing for creative freedom. Reading music and playing an instrument causes the musician to use both sides of his brain at once – the mathematical side, and the artistic side. Learning to understand a staff of music and the symbols written on it is akin to learning a scientific or mathematical formula. Applying the formula to the instrument at hand takes plenty of practise to do well, but once it is learned, it does not easily fade away. Developing and maintaining musicality, on the other hand, is partly talent and partly practise, much like other art forms like drawing, dancing and singing. Music is a great well for emotions. The same art form that puts babies to sleep can release anger and sadness, encourage joy, and sooth stress. To the Romantics, music was the purest of art forms because it connects directly with emotions (The New Penguin Book of Romantic Poetry, 47), during a time period that produced composers that are still well known today. David wrote many psalms while he watched sheep. And even though he was not always a favourite of King Saul, David’s playing would comfort the king (1 Samuel 16). Music brings people together. It is understood that before modern technology, live music was a natural form of entertainment, and people were considered accomplished when they learned to play instruments. Music can create a good atmosphere and encourage a good mood that relaxes people whether they are actively listening to it or not. That is part of the reason why it is ideal for parties, weddings, funerals, and other such gatherings. Music is universal. It is calming, gentling, entertaining, inspiring and healthy. It helps maintain good mental health and a balanced emotional state. It is a gift from God that anyone can learn, appreciate and enjoy. Hip Hop proves to be the voice of the people that may not be able to speak for themselves in conventional ways. Globalization has allowed many people who would not have the means to speak up, to be able to take center stage. Many believe that globalization will be the end of individuality and creativity.