Jane Eyre Book Report

Jane Eyre Book Report The main character of the book is Jane Eyre (round character). The book follows her through her troubled childhood and life as a young woman. She is a gentle and intelligent girl, but she has no confidence in herself because she is raised by her aunt who does not love her. She has no family and is completely unprotected by social position. When the novel begins, she is an isolated, powerless ten-year-old girl who lives with her aunt and cousins who dislike her. As the novel progresses, she grows in strength. Jane Eyre slowly develops from an unhappy young girl learning the hardships of life, into a happy and contented woman. At the end of the novel, she has become a powerful, independent woman living together with the man she loves: Mr. Rochester. Charlotte Brontà « was born in 1816 in Thornton in Yorkshire, England. She was the third child of Patrick Brontà « and Maria Branwell and was soon followed by her brother Patrick Branwell in 1817, her sister Emily in 1818 and her sister Anne in 1820. Her father was a poor English clergyman and was eccentric and abusive. In 1821 the family moved to Haworth, after her father find work at a church there. In the same year her mother dies of cancer. In 1824 Charlotte and three of her sisters were sent to study at the Clergy Daughters School at Cowan Bridge. The conditions at the school were poor and they were treated with inhuman severity. The Lowood School in Jane Eyre was based on this school and Miss Scatcherd in the novel was based on the manager of the school. A fever broke out at the school and the girl returned home, but two of the sisters, Maria and Elizabeth, died of tuberculosis. The experience of Cowan Bridge and the loss of her sisters had an effect on Charlotte. With their father not communicating much with them and having no real contact with the outside world, the children spent their time reading and creating their own imaginary worlds. When Charlotte was nineteen years old, she became a teacher. But because of her bad health, she had to give it up. She later worked watching over the children of wealthy families as a governess. But the people treated her poorly, so she had to give this up too. She decided then to attend a language school in Brussels with her sisters Emily and Anne and fell in love with a married professor at the school, but she never fully admitted the fact to herself. After returning to Haworth in 1844, Charlotte Brontà « became depressed. She was lonely and felt that she lacked the ability to do any creative work. She discovered that both of her sisters had been writing poetry, as she had. They decided to publish selected poems of all three sisters; in 1846 a collection of their was published under the pseudonyms of Currer (Charlotte), Ellis (Emily) and Acton (Anne) Bell. Charlotte contributed 19 poems. Then they decided to each write a novel and to publish them. Her sisters novels were accepted for publication, but Charlottes first novel The Professor, based upon her Brussels experience, was rejected and was not published until after her death. Charlotte Brontà «s second novel, Jane Eyre, was published in 1847. It became the most successful book of the year and it was translated into most of the languages of Europe. Despite her success as a writer, Charlotte Brontà « continued to live a quiet life in Yorkshire. In 1854 she married Arthur Nicholls, a man who had once worked as an assistant to her father, but she died within a year of their marriage on March 31, 1955. Summary. Jane Eyre is a young orphan being raised by Mrs. Reed, her cruel, wealthy aunt. A servant named Bessie provides Jane with some of the few kindnesses she receives, telling her stories and singing songs to her. One day, as punishment for fighting with her bullying cousin John Reed, Janes aunt imprisons Jane in the red-room, the room in which Janes Uncle Reed died. While locked in, Jane, believing that she sees her uncles ghost, screams and faints. She wakes to find herself in the care of Bessie and the kindly apothecary Mr. Lloyd, who suggests to Mrs. Reed that Jane be sent away to school. To Janes delight, Mrs. Reed concurs. Once at the Lowood School, Jane finds that her life is far from idyllic. The schools headmaster is Mr. Brocklehurst, a cruel, hypocritical, and abusive man. Brocklehurst preaches a doctrine of poverty and privation to his students while using the schools funds to provide a wealthy and opulent lifestyle for his own family. At Lowood, Jane befriends a young girl named Helen Burns, whose strong, martyr like attitude toward the schools miseries is both helpful and displeasing to Jane. A massive typhus epidemic sweeps Lowood, and Helen dies of consumption. The epidemic also results in the departure of Mr. Brocklehurst by attracting attention to the insalubrious conditions at Lowood. After a group of more sympathetic gentlemen takes Brocklehursts place, Janes life improves dramatically. She spends eight more years at Lowood, six as a student and two as a teacher. After teaching for two years, Jane yearns for new experiences. She accepts a governess position at a manor called Thornfield, where she teaches a lively French girl named Adà ¨le. The distinguished housekeeper Mrs. Fairfax presides over the estate. Janes employer at Thornfield is a dark, impassioned man named Rochester, with whom Jane finds herself falling secretly in love. She saves Rochester from a fire one night, which he claims was started by a drunken servant named Grace Poole. But because Grace Poole continues to work at Thornfield, Jane concludes that she has not been told the entire story. Jane sinks into despondency when Rochester brings home a beautiful but vicious woman named Blanche Ingram. Jane expects Rochester to propose to Blanche. But Rochester instead proposes to Jane, who accepts almost disbelievingly. The wedding day arrives, and as Jane and Mr. Rochester prepare to exchange their vows, the voice of Mr. Mason cries out that Rochester already has a wife. Mason introduces himself as the brother of that wife a woman named Bertha. Mr. Mason testifies that Bertha, whom Rochester married when he was a young man in Jamaica, is still alive. Rochester does not deny Masons claims, but he explains that Bertha has gone mad. He takes the wedding party back to Thornfield, where they witness the insane Bertha Mason scurrying around on all fours and growling like an animal. Rochester keeps Bertha hidden on the third story of Thornfield and pays Grace Poole to keep his wife under control. Bertha was the real cause of the mysterious fire earlier in the story. Knowing that it is impossible for her to be with Rochester, Jane flees Thornfield. Penniless and hungry, Jane is forced to sleep outdoors and beg for food. At last, three siblings who live in a manor alternatively called Marsh End and Moor House take her in. Their names are Mary, Diana, and St. John Rivers, and Jane quickly becomes friends with them. St. John is a clergyman, and he finds Jane a job teaching at a charity school in Morton. He surprises her one day by declaring that her uncle, John Eyre, has died and left her a large fortune: 20,000 pounds. When Jane asks how he received this news, he shocks her further by declaring that her uncle was also his uncle: Jane and the Rivers are cousins. Jane immediately decides to share her inheritance equally with her three newfound relatives. St. John decides to travel to India as a missionary, and he urges Jane to accompany him as his wife. Jane agrees to go to India but refuses to marry her cousin because she does not love him. St. John pressures her to reconsider, and she nearly gives in. However, she realizes that she cannot abandon forever the man she truly loves when one night she hears Rochesters voice calling her name over the moors. Jane immediately hurries back to Thornfield and finds that it has been burned to the ground by Bertha Mason, who lost her life in the fire. Rochester saved the servants but lost his eyesight and one of his hands. Jane travels on to Rochesters new residence, Ferndean, where he lives with two servants named John and Mary. At Ferndean, Rochester and Jane rebuild their relationship and soon marry. At the end of her story, Jane writes that she has been married for ten blissful years and that she and Rochester enjoy perfect equality in their life together. She says that after two years of blindness, Rochester regained sight in one eye and was able to behold their first son at his birth. [1] Personal evaluation. I think Jane Eyre is a very good novel, for its great theme, its moving plots and its happy ending. The story develops in a way that holds your interest as Jane meets Mr. Rochester and the secrets of Thornfield Hall are revealed. The characters are very realistic written and its an exciting story, so I can recommend this novel to other people. [1] = http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/janeeyre/summary.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Eyre http://summarycentral.tripod.com/janeeyre.htm http://www.shmoop.com/jane-eyre/summary.html http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/janeeyre/facts.html

Industrial Production and Capitalism Drivers of Social Change

Industrial Production and Capitalism: Drivers of social change in history Ho Xin Qian Louise In this essay, I will illustrate why industrial production and capitalism were major causes of social change in history by stating three main arguments. Firstly, I put forth the case that industrial production and capitalism have changed the role and nature of markets in history. In doing this, I trace how the market has become the central system of social coordination via market instruments, encompassing even the elements of industry like land, labor and money.In exemplification, I explain how industrial capitalism has brought about the rise of mass production and mass markets, enabling the market system to expand its influence. Secondly, I will illustrate how industrial capitalism has changed the social relations of production, as well as the social organization of work, resulting in class struggle and socio-economic stratification in history. Lastly, I touch on the changes in norms and cul ture within institutions due to industrial production and capitalism.For the purpose of this paper, I define industrial production as production brought about by mechanized technology and industrious labor in centralized locations. Capitalism is defined as a system of profit making commerce made possible by the usage of money, decentralized circulation of capital and the market exchange of commodities. I use the term industrial capitalism to denote the amalgamation of both forces. The Role and Nature of Markets in History It is my contention that industrial production has changed the role and nature of markets in history, placing it in the centre of society and economy.It is true that industrial capitalism presupposes the existence of a market system. However, the market system was never the dominant system of social control until the development of isolated markets by mercantilist means, and subsequently the transnational interaction and proliferation of markets into a market econo my, brought about by industrialization in the 18thC. It is due to this transcendence of boundaries and displacement of market activity that gives rise to the â€Å"market† as an abstract mechanism.According to Polyani, before the rise of markets, the society organizes itself via systems of redistribution, house-holding and reciprocity, of which operates on non-economic motives like social prestige and kinship (Polyani 1944: 46-58). After the rise of markets with long distance and local trade, markets have started to take on a more important role in providing necessities; however, they did not function for a majority of the population, who were still dependent upon common exchange and subsistence systems.Thereafter, mercantilism created isolated national markets which consolidated local economic activity and increased trade. However, it was not until the Industrial Revolution in the mid 18thC that the market system became the main driver of social change across different count ries through the creation of mass markets. The industrial revolution has brought about new forms of technology and power, transformed modes of production and created factories as centralized locations for mechanized production to take place.Mass production techniques like specialization, standardization, time-discipline, rational capital accounting and centralization allow for production costs to decrease with volume, thus generating a high amount of output, providing goods more cheaply than one could have done outside of the factory. As a result, people buy their essentials from these mass markets rather than produce by themselves. Also, they produce solely for the market, deriving income to purchase other goods in the circulation of commodities.Moreover, with industrial capitalism, the market mechanism has also come to allocate factors of production such as land, labor and money, which according to Polyani were not real commodities, but merely have exchange value because they beco me privately owned by use of legal contracts and sales (Polyani 1944: 68-76). Since then, mass markets have come to synchronize most economic activities like consumption, production, distribution and even finance in the most efficient fashion (Swedberg 2005:238-240).These markets become far reaching and displaced in light of industrial capitalism because of communicative and transport technology, the mobility of money and relations of free trade, which re-defined the notion of markets from a place to an abstract network of actors across national boundaries. Also, the nature of markets has changed from being state-controlled to being self-regulating. The market system becomes the center of economic and social life as it coordinates most economic activities not by state regulation but by economic instruments like the price mechanism, supply and demand aggregates.Social Relations of Production and Organization of Work Industrial capitalism has, with the change in material means of prod uction, brought about a change in the social relations of production and organization of work. In capitalistic societies, instead of directly interacting with nature in production, human beings depend on each other by exchanging their assets in place of producing for subsistence. Hence, they inevitably enter into social relations of production between those who own the means of production (capitalist) and those who do not but are economically compelled to sell their labor power (worker) for wages.In the circulation of capital, surplus value can be derived from the difference between capital invested and capital retrieved because capital (such as land, factory and machinery), only when combined with labor, transforms products to sell for higher exchange values, thereby generating surplus value and profit. This circulation of capital is durable because capitalists aim to invest their capital to make even more profits while workers can only increase their wages by working harder or by investing in their skills.Since then, the relationship between capitalists have become increasingly competitive due to the drive for profits while the worker-capitalist relation has replaced family (sexual division of labor) as the primary relation of production. According to Marx, as the ownership of means of production is exclusive and alienable, the society becomes separated into two distinct classes – the bourgeoisie (capitalist) and the proletarian (or worker), where between them is a relationship of domination and exploitation.Marx observed that the capitalists tend to exploit the workers by privately appropriating the surplus value produced by the workers, giving them much less than the use value of their time and effort invested in production (Marx 1848: 23). Also, the exploitation goes further by manifesting itself in the working conditions of factories, where workers were forced to work for long hours and children were also engaged as child labor. The exploitation a nd domination over workers exists because of the profit motive of decreasing costs and increasing revenue, as well as the fact that workers have less argaining power over their jobs than their employers. Capitalism has also re-defined the social organization of work by the formation of labor markets and complex division of labor. Prior to the onset of industrial capitalism, work was just defined as any effortful activity which attributes use value to commodities. However, with industrial capitalism, the formation of labor markets constituting workers, employers, jobs and networks is possible, and they function to allocate labor resources and allow capitalists to negotiate labor price and working conditions.Here, there is a clear demarcation of what is considered paid â€Å"work† and what lies outside of the labor market in the informal economy. Within the labor market, the exchange value of labor depends on the quantity and quality of labor, which denotes different labor proc esses and skills. The differentiation in wages is due to the complex division of labor brought about by industrial capitalism.Unlike the simple division of labor, where society is categorized into different occupations as in craftmanship, the capitalistic industry has a tendency to control and divide the mass production process into many simple tasks which all unskilled workers are capable of accomplishing. Workers are subdivided into different capabilities and made to specialize in simple tasks to be able to perform quickly and productively. This organization of work greatly improves the efficiency of the system, bringing costs down with more units of production.As seen in the Fordist model of mass production, workers as such are being â€Å"deskilled† and made interchangeable to the extent that they can be fired or hired according to production requirements (Womack 1990: 19-46). Thus, the market value of such menial labor is very low as opposed to professions (doctors) and skilled labor (technicians). The way work is being socially organized into skilled and unskilled labor has thus brought about socio-economic stratification in production relations. Marx has criticized this form of organization as being â€Å"alienating†, especially for the menial workers.As workers are being made interchangeable by the subdivided nature of production process, their labor is being looked upon only as a commodity, at their employer’s disposal. The worker loses control over his produce, the work process and his ability to creatively express himself. Moreover, their menial labor becomes cheapened in the process of unemployment and labor surplus. On the other hand, professionals are able to safeguard their interests by exclusive job administration channels, keeping their wages high due to marketable specialized knowledge.As a result, socio-economic stratification has also become defined by consumption relations such as occupational prestige and status group s. Norms and Culture Lastly, it is clear that industrial capitalism has brought about important changes in norms and culture. Most explicitly, industrial capitalism has changed the culture of work in the society. Prior to this time, work was characterized by disparate tasks that one is required to do in the day, and is oriented to what is necessary to be attended to. There is little divide between work and life.In industrial-capitalistic societies, work is characterized by a series of jobs which need to be synchronized in terms of sequence and speed. Time-discipline is important for work in the capitalist economies because productivity and time are highly correlated (Thompson 1967, 60:61). People are expected to use time allocated for work efficiently and solely for work. As the stimulus for work has changed from subsistence to wage incentives, there is potential of increasing wages by putting in more effort put into work.Thus, as competition for jobs and within jobs increase, peopl e are pushed to work harder and longer in their jobs. Also, in the 18thC, industrial capitalism has led to the trend of rapid urbanization due to rural urban migration and international migration in seek of factory jobs. This has led to a major restructuration of society within countries like England, where the working class poor tend to congregate near the city centre for employment and the more affluent middle class tend to decentralize away from these city centers, where living conditions are bad.The result is a case of socio-economic polarization within cities, where differences in standards of living are stark between gated communities and urban slums. In all, industrial capitalism tend to generate disparate levels of wealth and poverty amongst the working and capitalist classes. Lastly, industrial capitalism is likely to produce changes in habits and lifestyle which are oriented towards the market. The culture of consumerism is prevalent in many industrial and post-industrial societies, brought about by both producers and consumers.Producers aim to increase the capital return from their investment by either catering to existing needs or by creating new needs and wants. With the use of marketing strategies and production technology, they are able to sell their products at a high profit margin. Consumers, on the other hand, are faced with the proliferation of goods and services available at competitive prices. With the wages they have earned, they are able to afford more goods at a lower price. In all, this paper contends that industrial production and capitalism are major drivers of social change in three ways.Firstly, industrial capitalism has changed the role and nature of markets in history, from an auxiliary mechanism to the main instrument of social coordination. Secondly, industrial capitalism has revolutionized the social relations of production, from humanity’s struggle with nature to dependency on each other. It has also changed the social organization of work, by re-defining what is work and by organizing work into skilled and non-skilled categories with varying consequences. Thirdly, industrial capitalism has influenced the norms and culture of society through â€Å"industriousness†, urbanization and consumerism. (1991 Words)

Research Design And Methods For Advanced Nursing Practice

Research Design Methods for Advanced Nursing Practice N633 Critique #3 Introduction and literature review Strengths identified are that the introduction identified the specific problem quickly â€Å"without using valuable journal space to outline a very broad problem area† (Pyrczak, 2013, pg. 34). The factual statements that the authors presented included cited sources. Pyrczak advises that â€Å"researchers should avoid making statements that sound like facts without referring to their source† (Pyrczak, 2013, pg. 40). The specific purpose was clearly stated and found in the last sentence of the introductory paragraph. Weaknesses identified included that the authors demonstrated the problem area but there were no statistics included in the†¦show more content†¦165) but did not give a number to indicate how much lower these rates were. With improved statistical backing, I felt like the introduction would have had a greater impact on the reader when initially examining it. Sample The sampling method used was nonprobability, convenience sampling. This was inferred. The sample size was the 80 nursing staff located on this particular medical-surgical unit. These 80 staff members were recruited, 37 did not participate and 43 agreed to participate with a participation rate of 54% (Kalisch et al., 2015, pg. 170). Only 16 participants truly completed the study by completing the pre and posttests. The attrition rate for this study was 62.8%. I do not feel like this was a representative sample of the population. Many facilities utilize LPNs as well as RNs and NAs. To be more representative, there should have been additional facilities used in this study to increase the sample size. Different facilities may have different combinations of teams as well. The sample for the study was not even representative of the unit. While they do not give a specific breakdown of exactly how many RNs and NAs are on staff for this unit, one can assume that there would be more than only 5 NAs. There was not a large participation of the NAs, who play a vital role in patient care in regards to discussion of the nursing team. According to the percentages, the

How to Write a Narrative Essay Perfectly

How to Write a Narrative Essay