Overview of The History of Sexuality

The History of Sexuality is a three-volume series of books written between 1976 and 1984 by French philosopher and historian Michel Foucault. The first volume of the book is titled An Introduction while the second volume is titled The Use of Pleasure, and the third volume is titled The Care of the Self. Foucault’s main goal in the books is to disprove the idea that Western society had repressed sexuality since the 17th century and that sexuality had been something that society did not talk about. The books were written during the sexual revolution in the United States. Thus it was a popular belief that up until this point in time, sexuality was something that was forbidden and unmentionable. That is, throughout history, sex had been treated as a private and practical matter that should only take place between a husband and a wife. Sex outside of these boundaries was not only prohibited, but it had also been repressed. Foucault asks three questions about this repressive hypothesis: Is it historically accurate to trace what we think of sexual repression today to the rise of the bourgeois in the 17th century?Is power in our society really expressed primarily in terms of regression?Is our modern-day discourse on sexuality really a break from this history of repression or is it a part of the same history? Throughout the book, Foucault questions the repressive hypothesis. He does not contradict it and does not deny the fact that sex has been a taboo subject in Western culture. Instead, he sets out to find out how and why sexuality is made an object of discussion. In essence, Foucault’s interest does not lie in sexuality itself, but rather in our drive for a certain kind of knowledge and the power that we find in that knowledge. The Bourgeois and Sexual Repression The repressive hypothesis links sexual repression to the rise of the bourgeoisie in the 17th-century. The bourgeois became rich through hard work, unlike the aristocracy before it. Thus, they valued a strict work ethic and frowned upon wasting energy on frivolous pursuits such as sex. Sex for pleasure, to the bourgeois, became an object of disapproval and an unproductive waste of energy. And since the bourgeoisie were the ones who were in power, they made the decisions on how sex could be spoken about and by whom. This also meant they had control over the kind of knowledge that people had about sex. Ultimately, the bourgeois wanted to control and confine sex because it threatened their work ethic. Their desire to control talk and knowledge about sex was essentially a desire to control power. Foucault is not satisfied with the repressive hypothesis and uses The History of Sexuality as a means to attack it. Instead of simply saying that it is wrong and arguing against it, however, Foucault also takes a step back and examines where the hypothesis came from and why. Sexuality in Ancient Greece and Rome In volumes two and three, Foucault also examines the role of sex in ancient Greece and Rome, when sex was not a moral issue but rather something erotic and normal. He answers questions such as: How did sexual experience come to be a moral issue in the West? And why were other experiences of the body, such as hunger, not subject to the rules and regulations that have come to define and confine sexual behavior? Source: SparkNotes Editors. (n.d.). SparkNote on The History of Sexuality: An Introduction, Volume 1. Retrieved February 14, 2012. Foucault, M. (1978) The History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An Introduction. United States: Random House. Foucault, M. (1985) The History of Sexuality, Volume 2: The Use of Pleasure. United States: Random House. Foucault, M. (1986) The History of Sexuality, Volume 3: The Care of the Self. United States: Random House.

Life Along the Silk Road Essay - 1425 Words

Life Along The Silk Road During the outward-looking rule of Chinas Tang dynasty (seventh-ninth century C. E. ), sophisticated people in northeastern Iran developed such a taste for expensive, imported Chinese pottery that they began to imitate it in great quantity for sale to people who could not afford the real thing. And in northern China there was a vogue for beautiful pottery figurines of camels laden with caravan goods or ridden by obviously non-Chinese merchants, musicians, or entertainers. Non-Chinese camel figurines found in Mesopotamia carry loads that duplicate the distinctive appearance of the loads on the Chinese figurines. So it is clear that by the time of the rise of Islam in the seventh century, contact across the Silk†¦show more content†¦Ã¢â‚¬Å"†¦these [camels] protectors of the hot winds with their fur†¦Ã¢â‚¬  and â€Å"†¦foretellers of gust winds as they stuck their snouts in the sand whenever a gust of wind picked up †¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Whitefield 146). Camels afford us one glimpse of how this system came into being. The two-humped or Bactrian camel was native to central Asia and Iran and was used as a domestic animal from at least the third millennium BCE. onward. The one-humped camel was native to Saudi Arabia. Physically the two species share resistance to thirst and to hunger, which probably explains the survival of both of these comparatively defenseless species in regions too arid or barren to support many predators. They differ, however, in their resistance to heat. The two-humped camel has a long, shaggy coat during the winter and molts in the spring; one-humped breeds have much less hair in their torrid native climate of Arabia (Oliver). It is reasonable to assume that two-humped pack camels were used from the beginning by travelers along the Silk Road. Once they got to Mesopotamia, however, they must have suffered terribly from summer heat. Yet summer was the most likely time of arrival because the several-month journey from northern China usually began in the fall, when the camels were in best condition after a summer of grazing (William/ Spielvogel 251). Of course, it must have been evident to traders that Mesopotamia had its own camel, the one-humped animal herded inShow MoreRelatedEssay on Life Along the Silk Road1306 Words   |  6 PagesSusan Whitfield writes Life along the Silk Road based on character stories occurring between the eight and tenth century, all living at different times. She writes this history for several reasons. First, she writes it to change the negative perception of the history of Central Asia that we know through the annals of its neighbors. By explaining the history of the region through the eyes of its own occupants, it rids the history of any distorted views from neighboring civilizations. She uses theRead MoreLife Along The Silk Road By Susan Whitfield1345 Words   |  6 PagesIris Huang Yan Liu History 181: Asian Civilizations 1 24 October 2017 No peace without a princess In the book, Life along the Silk Road by Susan Whitfield, accounts of individuals living along the Silk Road were reconstructed to provide readers the personal experiences each faced. Focusing on The Princess’s Tale chapter, it tells a story of a woman named Taihe, an imperial princess, who was chosen to fulfill a promise to a Uygur khagan. It was tradition to send off a princess to another kingdomRead MoreContinuity and Change-over-Time: Silk Road Trade 200 B.C.E.-1450 C.E.847 Words   |  4 PagesThe Silk Road is a trading route on the continent of Eurasia that stretches from the vast coast of China all the way to Eastern Europe. The trade route was at its greatest use from 200 B.C.E. to 1450 C.E. The society that began the Silk Road was the Han Dynasty in China in approximately 200 B.C.E. 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Statement of Motivation Free Essays

My purpose for seeking a bachelor Degree in Istanbul aydin is to expand my knowledge of theory and research methods as it pertains to education. I especially want to fine-tune my research skills as I feel that the importance of gaining research skills is imperative to becoming a lifelong learner and developing intellectual self-actualization as I prepare myself for a career in Education. I realize the importance of gaining credibility among my future colleagues and people that I will be serving in the field. We will write a custom essay sample on Statement of Motivation or any similar topic only for you Order Now Even though I have chosen dynamics as my field of specialization, I am keeping my mind open to other areas of my course program so that I do not limit myself. I am currently studying a 3 month Turkish language course in Antalya, turkey. And am looking forward for a new and fantastic challenge in Istanbul aydin university, it been one of my lifelong dream is to study in an affiliated and amazing university and I believe Istanbul aydin is one of them. Moreover, I have wanted to study media and communication ever since my father shared with me some of his published engineering articles. I have always been a hard worker and have shown that I can handle a diverse work load incorporating work and college into college into my schedule. I am a hard-working and determined person, and I am ready for a new leap in my career. I will work hard in hope that the quantity of the effort I put in will result in high quality knowledge. The fact is that the best possible supervisors and a highly competitive atmosphere are necessary for this quality. The only reasonable decision for me was to aim for such a place. All this gives me the motivation to apply to Istanbul aydin University. How to cite Statement of Motivation, Papers

Business Transformation Management Methodology

Question: Discuss about the Business Transformation Management Methodology. Answer: Introduction: Transformational plans are implemented in an organization thereby providing them better facilities and strategies for improving the future growth of the firm. It helps in diagnosing the opportunities that the firm could enhance, thereby providing them with the scope to achieve its vision and objectives. Transformational planning is coordinated with the organizational change, which helps in imposing new and altered business processes or procedures (Gollenia, 2016). It helps in accepting the sponsors of the related systems. The main objective of the transformational changes being implemented in an organization is to transfer knowledge and skills thereby enabling the users to adopt the new vision, mission, and systems and to identify the minimum sources of resistance to the changes. Semco is an industrial machine manufacturing company with its headquarters in brazil. This company manufactures machine pumps for shipbuilding industry. During the recession era of 1980, the company had faced some tough situations where the company had typical hierarchical management structures with a patriarchal figure as a leader (Mintzberg, 1994). The organization had set some rules and regulations that had the control; over every aspect of the activities undertaken in the firm. The founders son Richard Semler had undertook the responsibility of managing the organization and returning back its prosperity as before. In order to do so, he had strategically framed some transformational plans for the firm. He aimed at radically transforming the organization thereby dealing with consistent poor performance (Maresco York, 2005). According to the transformational plan that had been undertaken by Semler, he had dismissed all the top management heads and had dismantled the layer of managers in the firm. It reduced the hierarchy of the firm from seven to three. He eliminated the job titles that were used by the employees in the organization, and had rotated the position of chief operating officer among the workers in a span of 6 months. The organization had aimed at maintaining transparency in the salaried that were paid and the workers were given the opportunity to set their own working hours according to their convenience. The organization had accepted diversification rather than the maintenance of heavy reliance on the industry. The transformational plan that has been implemented by the organization is universally applicable. It is quite motivating and attention seeking dor the workers. These kinds of plans show its total dependency and the importance of the workers that the firm holds. It helps in maintaining the sustainability of the firm and raiding the loyalty of the workers towards the firm. There are three forms of motivations achieved by the workers of an organization, which helps them in sustaining their trust towards the firm. These categories of motivational theories could be named as content theories, process theories and reinforcement theories of motivation. The content theories of motivation help us to understand human needs and the response of people with different needs. The process theories of motivation offer additional insights into how people give meaning to rewards and then respond with various work-related behaviours. The reinforcement theory of motivation focuses attention on the environment as a major source of rewards and influence on human behaviour. According to the case study of Semco, it could be stated that the company had quite efficiently implemented the transformational changes, which had helped the firm in regaining their old profit aspects. Richard Semler had implemented various strategies that would positively affect the workers of the organizations. These facilities were considered as an important tool for the firm to regain the organization from its deceased state and thereby sustaining growth in the market. According to the three categories of motivational theories, the company had implemented the content theories where, Semco had followed Herzbergs Motivational Theory, Mcclellands Human Motivation Theory, Maslows Hierarchy Of Needs Theory and ERG. Under Herzbergs Theory Of Motivation, it could be stated that the theory deals with the factors which maintains the cause for job satisfaction. Under this context, it has stated that there are two factors, which sustain the satisfaction to be attained from jobs in an organ ization. These two factors are motivators and hygiene factors(Park, 2013) . Motivators deals with the positive access of work that are acknowledged by the works , whereas, hygiene deals with the status, job security, salary , benefits and other facilities to be enjoyed by the workers. Semco had undertaken this theory by removing the middle managers of the organization. The work was settled among the workers, where it was under their responsibility to produce better products using innovative and cost effective techniques. Secondly, it provided the workers with the choice of settling their own salary. This shows that the firm had followed the theory, fulfilling both the two factors for the workers. Mcclellands human motivation theory deals with three dominant motivating factors, affiliation, achievement and power. This theory suggests that in a diversified organization, it is very important to motivate the employees based upon their expectations (Miner, 2015). Semco had been able to i mplement these criteria where it provides the availability of reward systems, empowerment plan system and the independence of the workers to set their own salary. These two theories have been quite vital in supporting the strategic plans undertaken by the organization. According to Maslows Hierarchy Of Needs Theory, a particular pattern of psychological, safety, belongingness, esteem, self actualization and self transcendence have been taken into consideration (Lester, 2013). It states that according to the complexity of the human brain, this theory had been developed which helped in acknowledging the likelihood of the people thereby identifying the basic forms of motivation the company need to implement. Semco had evaluated Maslows Hierarchy Of Needs Theory, thereby analysing the most important factors for the workers of the firm. These factors are transformed into extra benefits, services, reliability, and job satisfaction. Among the listed factors, the major factors selected by the firm are psychological needs, love and belonging towards the family and self-transcendence. The ERG Theory under motivational needs have been implemented by altered further. It aims at providing the basic requirement and necessities. It has three dominant characterist ics of existence, relatedness and growth (L?z?roiu, 2015). Semco had been quite crucial in maintaining the factors to affect the reliability of the workers towards the firm. Semco has granted the opportunity to its workers to discuss the main matters of the organization, thereby disposing the manuals of the previous regime. It provided its workers with the opportunity to include their own ideas and innovative measures of production. He empowered his workers with a negotiated salary along with a percentage of the companys profit. The existing structure of Semco was a part of the bureaucratic design where a bureaucracy can be described as a form of organisation based on logic, order and the legitimate use of formal authority. Its distinguishing features include a clear-cut division of labour, a strict hierarchy of authority, formal rules and procedures, and promotion based on competency. Semco had been facing various kinds of tensions that could have been solved and handled in a better way. Hence, a transformational change for such existing scenario of the firm was necessary. One of the most important sources of tension in the existing structure was the organizational structure. Semco was considered as a typically hierarchical management structure with a patriarchal figure as leader. The organization had a core management layer of seven steps, where the managers had been experiencing a fixed position. By following this method in the company, the lower level workers and members of the firm had been facing sever e issues with the management team. While taking a particular decision regarding the well-being of the firm, the workers were not included. Various levels of managers were given the authority of making plans for the firm. By implementing the transformational change over the structure of the organization, Semler had provided the incentive for the firm to implement variations in the organization with lesser complications (Birkinshaw, 2015). The second source of tension with the existing structure of the firm was related to the various job titles and maintenance of non-transparency in salaries. Bureaucracies become unwieldy and rigid in nature, which needs to be implemented from the high authorities of the organization (Gollenia, 2016). Various job titles in the organization, makes the organizational structure complicated and distributive. There is a los of unity among the members of the firm. Along with the job titles, there had been narrow span of control of the firm, where only the management team was responsible to take decisions. By implementing the transformational change, Richard Semler had been able to overcome the issue of job titles by eliminating them. It had even maintained the transparency over the salaries provided by the firm (Neubert, 2016). The salaries were written on the blackboard thereby not providing any scope for the workers to feel de-motivated. It provided the workers with the title of associates in the organization, where it had given them the opportunity to frame their own groups depending upon their needs, choose their own package of salaries, and shift time for work. Transformational changes undertaken by an organization is considered to be adhered to certain changes that would be totally opposite to the past structure of the firm. These changes prove to improve the current situation of the firm, along with some risks to be inferred. The risks that are associated with the transformational changes for the organization must be adhered to, so that it does not alter the motive for such changes in the company. The changes that were undertaken by Richard Semlar in Semco were quite different from the normal business practices that had some associated risks with it. One of the most important risk associated was the change in the management structure of the firm. Tough it had reflected positively in the well being of the organization, yet, dismissing all the top management of the organization might pose severe risk. The senior management team were solely responsible for the past decisions that had been taken. These past decisions and their experience migh t have been helpful in implementing the plans. The second risk associated to the change plan transparency in income. With the transparency in income of all the partners, counsellors and associates in the firm, there was a possibility of de-motivating the workers in spite of motivating them. Transparency without a clear salary policy generated by the firm poses certain threats to the well being of the firm (Wang, 2016. ). The third risk-associated with the transformational plan had been the implementation of empowerment plan in the company. According the plan, the workers of the firm had the authority to enjoy certain percentage of the companys profit along with their salaries. This plan had given them the incentive of working better for their organization. Semler himself was not sure regarding the success of the empowerment plan. Though the plan had affected the company in a sustainable and positive manner, yet, with a slight change in the views of the workers, the plan would have been quite abrupt in nature (Hayes, 2014). The workers might have been over confident regarding the importance provided to them, thereby posing a threat for the firm to function negatively. Semco has been one of the ideal companies that had been positively affected by transformational changes. It had quite beneficially implemented the changes, which existed in the firm. In order to manage the firm better, there must be a provision for motivating the people with respect to the diversified nature. Reference Birkinshaw, J.., 2015. What Lessons Should We Learn From Valves Innovative Management Model?. Journal of Organization Design, pp.4(2), pp.8-9. Gollenia, L.A.., 2016. Business Transformation Management Methodology.. Routledge. Hayes, J.., 2014. The theory and practice of change management.. Palgrave Macmillan.. L?z?roiu, G.., 2015. Employee Motivation and Job Performance.. Linguistic and Philosophical Investigations, pp.(14), pp.97-102. Lester, D.., 2013. Measuring Maslow's hierarchy of needs.. Psychological Reports, pp.113(1), pp.15-17. Maresco, P.A. York, C.C.., 2005. Ricardo Semler: Creating Organizational Change Through Employee Empowered Leadership. Resource document, Academic Leadership Online Journal, available at: https://www. newunionism. net/library/case, 20.. Miner, J.B.., 2015. Organizational behavior 1: Essential theories of motivation and leadership. Routledge. Mintzberg, H.., 1994. The fall and rise of strategic planning. Harvard business review., pp.72(1), pp.107-114. Neubert, M.J.a.D.B.., 2016. Developing sustainable management theory: goal-setting theory based in virtue.. Management Decision, pp. 54(2), pp.304-320. Park, S.C.a.R.S.Y.., 2013. An empirical investigation of end-users switching toward cloud computing: A two factor theory perspective.. Computers in Human Behavior, pp.29(1), pp.160-170. Van der Voet, J.., 2014. The effectiveness and specificity of change management in a public organization: Transformational leadership and a bureaucratic organizational structure.. European Management Journal, pp.32(3), pp.373-382. Wang, Q.., 2016.. The Choice of Salary Transparency.