“Common Fire – Leading lives of Commitment in a Complex World” is an influential book whose meaning is traced by an absolute equilibrium between research and narration. It is the vision and the inspiration that it provides to the reader that makes it more than just a book to read in order to get credit for a class. The title of the book itself is powerful by putting “common” and “fire” together. The books suggests, previously to reading the first page that we should all be aware, concerned of what’s “burning” around us and take action. The book gathers brilliant life stories belonging to real people who are deeply committed to serving public and common goods. The four authors/educators give a practical, non-fictional meaning to serving the commons, by illustrating actual good acts of people who envision themselves as citizens “at home in the …show more content…
The purpose of the authors’ research that borders the book is precisely what the title suggests: understand how certain people dedicate their lives to complex new commons. The authors select over 100 individuals whom they interview in order to address this matter. Throughout the whole book, the authors will create an exchange between themes developed in the interviews, and storytelling to communicate varied interviewee vision about each theme. The themes also give the name of each chapter, called simply: Community, Compassion, Conviction, Courage, Confession, and Commitment. The authors illustrate the fact that the individuals living a life of commitment in the new commons will also reflect these themes accordingly in their daily behavior, seeing their commitment as their greatest purpose and self-definition, not as an additional activity undertaken in parallel with their family and professional
In Richard Wunderli’s Book Peasant Fires: The Drummer of Niklashausen, Wunderli presents idea of “Enchanted Time.” The idea of “Enchanted Time” centers on Holy Days such as Advent, Carnival, Lent, Easter, and Walpurgisnacht where men and women could worship and celebrate their religion, as well as, feel closer to God, the angels, and the saints who resided in the “powerful realm.” Hand Behem and all other Europeans believed in this separation of realms, and in Peasant Fires Behem and the other peasants used these enchanted times to “make an appeal to supernatural forces to find justice for their discontent and meaning for their misery.” (Wunderli) Through the dissection and summation of Lent and Walpurgisnacht the concept of “Enchanted Time”
The Armenian genocide ruins Vahan Kenderian’s picture-perfect life. Vahan is the son of the richest Armenian in Turkey and before the war begins, he always has food in his belly and a roof over his head in the book Forgotten Fire by Adam Bagdasarian. Life is absolutely quintessential for Vahan, until the war starts in 1915, when he endures many deaths of his family, losses of his friends, and frightening experiences in a short amount of time. He is a prisoner of war early in the book and is starved for days. As he goes through life, he is very unlucky and experiences other deaths, not just the deaths of his family. Vahan ultimately becomes the man his family would want him to be.
Act 1 of Mr. Burns was the only act in the play that places it characters in a casual setting. It was easy to decipher the type of characters the actors were portraying in the scene. For example, the actor who played a meek character ported this by taking up as little space as she could and crouching behind objects. Also, two characters were pretty intimate with each other. They cuddled around the fire when discussing the probability of a power plant shutting down and shared soft smiles with each other. I felt that the characters were allowed to be themselves in this scene compared to the other acts. In Act 2, the characters were at work that called for them to have a professional mindset, even though they were familiar with each other. The
The title of this essay “Silence and the Notion of the Commons” gives the same idea of people as programmable and unprogrammable similar to the idea seen in the Matrix. Whereas programmable people, who are the commons, are the people inside the matrix they are also known as the sheep, the people that believe in everything they are told. The unprogrammable people, who are the silence, are the people outside of the matrix. Ursula Franklin uses a variety of techniques in order for the audience to fully understand her message, and to inform them of the topics discussed in her essay, as is particularly apparent in paragraph 5 of her essay “Silence and the Notion of the Commons.”
In the case, “Facing a Fire” prepared by Ann Buchholtz, there are several problems and issues to identify in determining if Herman Singer should rebuild the factory due to a fire or retire on his insurance proceeds. I believe that this case is about social reform and self-interest. I think that Singer needs to ask himself, what is in the firm’s best economic interests. There are several things to question within this case, what should Herman Singer do and why, should he rebuild the factory or begin retirement, if he rebuilds, should he relocate the firm to an area where wages are lower and what provisions, if any, should Singer make for his employees as well as for the community?
As terrible as the Great Chicago Fire was to the city of Chicago back in 1871, the lessons learned from this disaster and the reconstruction that followed from the ashes and rubble actually helped turn Chicago into one of the great cities in the United States. This paper will examine what happened and why, what the leaders of Chicago learned from the experience, and how the will and spirit of the people of Chicago along with financial support from a sympathetic nation and beyond forever changed the city of Chicago for the better.
“The Tragedy of the Commons” written by Garret Hardin explains how the human population is degrading the environment. When Hardin refers to commons he is talking about a resource that is owned by no one and used by a group of people. Some examples of commons include the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the oceans we fish. The tragedy is that people don’t look at the bigger picture; the over use of commons for our own personal benefit leads to the destruction or extinction of these commons. For example if one fisherman wants to fish the oceans as much as possible that’s fine, but now imagine if every fisherman wants to fish the oceans as much as they can, this is one example of a common being destroyed by the human population. The fishing lab we did the other day is a good example Tragedy of the Commons. Every student was placed into groups of four, each group received a bowl (which represented the ocean,) and 20 M&M’s (which represented 20 fish; salmon.) Ms.Engen told the class it was a competition but what she did not say is that if we catch all our “M&M’s” we will not receiv...
Disasters can be so impactful; some can forever change the course of history. While many at the time thought this story would soon pass, and with it all the potential bad publicity, the story of the Triangle fire spread quickly, and outraged many people. On a beautiful spring day in March 1911 when 146 workers lost their lives, a fire would prove it could do what years of reformers had failed to do, get the government on the side of the workers. I would argue that the fire largely impacted the country. Specifically, the Triangle Fire ended up changing New York’s interconnected political and economic scene, and spurred on the creation of stricter safety codes. For the first time owners would hold responsibility for their actions. Max Blanck and Isaac Harris; being indicted for manslaughter was proof of this. Social change seemed to be spurred as well; the general public and newspapers would come back the workers of New York. Large institutions would suffer as well. Tammany Hall would be feared less and less by waves of new immigrants. The largest change brought about by the blaze would be legislation. Twenty-five bills, recasting the labor laws of the state
Wade “The Management of Common Property Resources: Finding a Cooperative Solution propose that collective action is the most effective solution to the tragedy of commons. Moreover, it is cheaper than government intervention and privatization but will it work? Many argued that it is not possible for ind...
When applying it to our daily lives we see that we are more likely to deem a person ‘good’ or ‘generous’ if they spared their time to go and work with displaced people from war struck regions of the world out of compassion and the need to give back to the society, as oppose to those who go only because they feel it is their duty.
“A Wall of Fire Rising”, short story written by Edwidge Danticat, presents one man’s desire for the freedom and also, the gap between reality and fantasy which is created by the desire. Two different perspectives of evaluating the life bring the conflict between the Guy and Lili who are parents to the little guy. Throughout the story, the Guy implies that he wants to do something that people will remind of him, but Lili who is opposing to the Guy, tries to settle the Guy down and keep up with the normal life that they are belong to. The Guy is aggressive, adventurous and reckless while Lili is realistic and responsible. The wall of fire is the metaphorical expression of the boundary where divides two different types of people. One is for the people who accept their position and try to do the best out of it, and the other for the people who are not satisfied with the circumstances and desires to turn the table. Through this essay, I am going to reveal how the contradiction in an unwise idealist’s attitude and his speech, and also how it drove the whole family into a horrible tragedy as well.
Ostrom, Elinor. 1990. Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
The Tragedy of the Commons “is a problem that occurs when individuals exploit a shared resource to the extent that demand overwhelms supply and the resource becomes unavailable to some or all” (Wigmore, 2013, August). He explains if by using an example of herdsman caring for their cattle in a common land owned by others. Everyone in the land have the same number of cattle they are allowed to have. If one herdsman was being self-centered things and had more cattle because he was thinking of his needs would then damage the community by “overloading it, erosion set in, weeds take over, and he loses the use of the pasture. He would just worry about his goals now and not the overall outcome which not only affected him, but the other herdsmen as well. (Hardin, 1974,
Ostrom (1990). Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. Cambridge University Press.
Volunteering enables an individual to make a positive impact on his or her community, while empowering the individual to better his or her life. This summer, I had the opportunity to volunteer at many diverse locations. From the hospital to the local library, I truly value my experience and treasure everything it has thought me. Volunteering lets us experience and learn things that we otherwise would not have learned; volunteering opens doors for us that we may not have been able to open before. Volunteering provides us with guidance and tolerance which we may use in the future to aid us in our decisions. At first glance, volunteering may seem to only benefit those who are helped, but on a deeper level, one can realize that volunteering benefits the volunteer as much as, if not more than, those who are helped. Not only does volunteering make a difference in one’s community, but it also helps the volunteer become a smarter, happier, friendlier and more caring individual.