Traditional Chinese Culture And Chinese Marriage Theology Religion Essay

Traditional Chinese Culture And Chinese Marriage Theology Religion Essay Marriage is an important part of life. Different cultures have their own tradition to celebrate this big event. Through understanding the traditional customs of marriage, we could learn more about the nations culture and values. In this essay, features of traditional Chinese marriage will be introduced and we will look at how Chinese Culture and traditional values are involved and influence the traditional Chinese marriage culture. Introduction First of all, we should have some brief understanding on some basic traditional values about families and the ancient Chinese society. In traditional Chinese culture, the family units are the basic units of the society which forms the nation. When the family units are well-ordered, the society will then become well-organized and eventually form a harmonious nation. And for thousand years, Confucianism has a very deep influence to Chinese culture and has significant impact in different aspects of the Chinese society. Confucianism is a philosophy which emphasizes on the moral ethics of peoples behaviours in daily life. It is a set of moral and ethical rules or ideas that dictate how a person should behave. It plays a key role in forming the social norms of the Chinese society (Yu 69). Patriarchal Society and values Traditional Chinese families are clan and patriarchal based. A clan is composed by descendants of the same ancestors and families which inherit the same surname. A clan emphasis greatly on kinship and blood relationship, they are regarded as an extension and the continuity of the family. Traditional family always put the clans interests above personal interests and personal honor as the clans honor and shame are closely related to one self. These values play a significant role in traditional Chinese marriage culture. Marriage in WuLun (à ¤Ã‚ ºÃ¢â‚¬ Ãƒ ¥Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ «) In Confucianism, one of ethical and moral rules on the individuals and social interaction is WuLun (à ¤Ã‚ ºÃ¢â‚¬ Ãƒ ¥Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ «) . WuLun indicates the five major relationships within a society. The Five Relationships are King to subject, Father to son, Husband to wife, Elder brother to younger brother and Friend to friend (Yu 94). Maintaining good relationships will stability and prosperity of the society and embrace the whole nation to live in harmony. One of the relationships which I would like to mention is Husband to wife, in other words, it is about marriage. To the Confucians, marriage is important to both the clan and the society. The marriage not only symbolizes the joining of two individuals but also the joining of two families with different surnames. Therefore, marriage can act as a medium to connect different families and clans to form a society and even nations. To certain extent, a good relationship of marriage is believed to bring harmony to the society and the whol e world is a big family. Arranged Marriage and matching For traditional Chinese marriage, lots of constraints were also attached with. First of all, a marriage is always pre-arranged by parents, but not based on the couples love and own choice. One of the reasons is that the marriages are usually associated with political reasons and benefits. But the most important one is that the marriage is a major family event and it is a matter of the clan, therefore the marriage must be decided by the parents and individuals must subject to eldership. Brides and grooms will only see or know each other until the wedding day comes ( Gu 137). Moreover, as the Chinese said, Bamboo door to bamboos one, wood door to woods one. To choose an ideal partner, the wealth and social status of the family must also take into consideration. To the male side, the marriage is directly affecting the prosperity and the reputation of their family in the future. The fame of the family and social status of the family is extremely important in traditional Chinese value. People would tend to look for potential families who had similar or same social status as they were to marry with. Therefore a boy who comes from a wealthy family will never be permitted by his parents to marry a girl from a poor family. Confucians emphasize on Li à §Ã‚ ¦Ã‚ ® Li, or the rites, are the guidelines for people to behave properly. It emphasizes respect to others and surroundings through rules and ceremonies. The ideas of Li are closely related to ethics, human nature and social order in society. Li is essential and favourable to society because it encourages and reminds people to aware and fulfills their responsibilities towards others. Three Letters Six etiquettes à ¤Ã‚ ¸Ã¢â‚¬ °Ãƒ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ºÃ‚ ¸Ãƒ ¥Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã‚ ­Ãƒ §Ã‚ ¦Ã‚ ® Marriage also has guidelines and rites to follow and procedures are written down in the Book of Rites. Each of the complex procedures has its own symbolic meaning and part of the essential processes in traditional Chinese wedding are the Three Letters Six etiquettes. The Three Letters are the betrothal letter, gift letter and the wedding letter. These letters are the formal documents with the meaning of engagement, gift and confirmation of the marriage. The Six etiquettes are proposal, assessing birth date, presenting betrothal gifts, presenting wedding gifts, setting a wedding date, and finally the wedding ceremony (Chinese Social Customs). Proposal: After the parents of the male side choose a girl, they would then find a matchmaker and her role is to propose and present the male familys request to the girls family and parents. Birth date assessment: If the brides parents did not oppose to the marriage, the matchmaker would ask the birth date and hour of the bride to ensure the couples compatibility. If there were signs of conflicts between the numbers, which is believed to bring disasters to both families, then the proposed marriage will abandoned immediately. Presenting betrothal gifts: After both of the birth dates and hours were approved, the bridegrooms family would ask the matchmaker to arrange and present betrothal gifts to the brides family along with the betrothal letter. Presenting wedding gifts: The bridegrooms family would send wedding gifts formally to the brides family. Gifts usually include tea, beans, oranges, pomegranates, bridal cakes, coconuts, wine, red hair braids, lilies and many other delicacies, each with symbolic meaning in the wedding and the gifts can also show the familys wealth Setting a wedding date: An auspicious date is select for the wedding ceremony. Ceremony: On that day, the bridegroom departs his own home and play loud and cheerful music along the way to the brides home. During the wedding ceremony, both bride and groom have to stand side by side and make three bows. Three bows is the most important rites in the ceremony. The first bow is made to the Heaven and Earth and ancestors. The second bow is to parents and the third one is to each other. (Chinese Wedding traditions) From the above wedding procedures Three Letters Six etiquettes, two main traditional Chinese values can be observed. First, under the Confucian worldview, Chinese believe that the world is structured by sancai (Heaven, Earth and Human) and they all share the same nature and this nature is characterized by harmony. Confucian considers people and nature as a whole and any confrontation with the nature will destroy the harmony. Therefore, assessing birth dates and hours for choosing the correct bride and setting an appropriate wedding date is to avoid any confrontation between the nature and human. Choosing the right bride and right date can avoid any disasters from happening and prevent bad luck, and the marriage is then considered as auspicious, which brings good fortune. Second, the ceremonies show the significance of filial piety. Amongst the 100 virtues, filial piety come first. Filial piety can be referring to full respect and unquestioning obedience to parents. But it is more than that. Confucians consider filial piety as the most important virtue and must be shown not only towards to parents and elders, but also the dead. Reverence for ancestors and worship them is also part of the filial piety. People believe that the ancestor in heaven will bring peace and happiness to the clan descendants. Filial piety, by extension, is showing respect to the past and to the whole nation. We could see this virtue easily from the Three Bows in the wedding ceremony. The wedding ceremony takes place at the family hall because it is an important event for the family, the clan and ancestors. The three bows first shows great respect to the nature and then show filial piety to ancestor and parents. And in another ceremony, tea ceremony, the new couples have to kneel down while serving tea to parents and elder in order to show filial piety to them (Katie). Male superiority in Chinese traditional family As mentioned earlier, the traditional Chinese adopted Patriarchy. It is a social system that male is central to both family and society, and where men hold authority and power over children and women. It shows the higher status of male than female, in terms of power and marriage. In traditional Chinese society, men were thought to be the one to continue on with the family line. For this reason, men had a higher status than women in both family and society, as they were the powerful ones who could lead and organize the whole family, even to sustain the continuity of the family (Lan, Peng, Mei 126 ) For women, they were only being characterized as assisting men in traditional family; they had relatively low social status by then. The saying A woman lacking in talent and learning is virtuous shows the difference between men and women, which womens role would only be a stay-home mother who takes care of the rest and breed. Inheritance of the family line is the most important Under the influence of patriarchy, another reason for having marriage is to give birth to the next generation, as the major role of women back then. In order to successfully give birth to a boy, men would get married with more than one wife, which were allowed in the traditional society. It was not being seen as problematic because having children and sustaining a family was vital for all in the old times. In the other hand, this also shows the low status of women in traditional Chinese society. The seven reasons for divorce can best illustrate the phenomenon. The seven reasons is a list of behaviors for which a man would be justified in divorcing his wife. The most concerned one criterion in relation to the continuity of family would be the third one a woman could be divorced if she did not bear a child. People see family as the most important element in society. Although womens social status was relatively low, they had played an important role in giving birth to children. This was also their mainly function in a marriage life. That is why if a woman is incapable of carrying a child, the meaning to the marriage to her husband would be gone. So men could use such reason to marry another wife or divorce the wife who couldnt give birth to a child. Conclusion Lots of Chinese traditional culture and values are found in the culture of Chinese marriage. For traditional Chinese marriage, the benefits of families were always more important than individuals. The traditional Chinese marriage was pre-arranged between parents of two families. And traditional Chinese marriage involves lots of complex procedures. Among them, they shows the great emphasis on rites (Li) in Chinese traditional culture and among the rites and the rules, we could easily observe one of the most important virtues filial piety. Children should always respect parents and ancestors. Traditional Chinese people also emphasis on maintain harmony with the nature, they believed that human and nature were united, that is why the new couples have to bow to the Heaven and Earth first during the Three Bows. In Patriarchal society, male are superior to female and the inheritance of the family line is significantly important. To do so, male can get married with multiple wives and divorc e any wife that couldnt give birth to child. (Word Count:2020)

Ancher Public Trading Essay -- Business Management Memo Essays

Ancher Public Trading TO:  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Board of Directors FROM:  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Learning Team A consultants DATE:  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  August 22, 2005 SUBJECT:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Sarbanes-Oxley recommendations As consultants for Ancher Public Trading (APT), Learning Team A would like to discuss the implications of the Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) legislation. This memorandum provides a brief history of SOX ¡Ã‚ ¦s creation, explains the relationship amongst the FASB, SEC and PCAOB, describes the pros and cons of SOX, assesses the impacts of SOX, and lists ethical considerations of SOX. History of SOX - the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 is legislation in response to the high profile financial scandals, such as seen with Enron and WorldCom. The purpose of this act is to protect shareholders and the general public from accounting errors and fraudulent business practices. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act introduced stringent new rules to protect investors by improving the accuracy and reliability of corporate disclosures made pursuant to the securities laws. Sarbanes-Oxley is not a set of business practices and does not specify how a business should store records; rather, Sarbanes-Oxley defines which records are to be stored and for how long. A.) The relationship among the FASB, SEC and PCAOB „ «Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  SOX is administered by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The SEC sets deadlines for compliance and publishes rules on requirements. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is the department to which all publicly-traded companies, effective since 2004, are required to submit annual reports of the effectiveness of their internal accounting controls. The SEC has broad authority over all aspects of the securities industry. This includes the power to register, regulate, and oversee brokerage firms, transfer agents, and clearing agencies. Along with them, is the FASB. „ «Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), is a professional standards board created by accountants to establish Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), which are the accounting standards used by accountants in the U.S. The GAAP reporting method makes it possible for investors and regulatory authorities to accurately determine an organization's financial results. „ «Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) was created to oversee the activities of the auditing profession. Specifically to oversee t... ... Line56 ,Retrieved August 17, 2001. Retrieved on 8/19/2005, from http://ww.line56.com/articles. Hein, M. (2002). The Sarbanes Oxley act of 2002 effects sweeping changes to the U.S. federal securities laws. Retrieved on August 21, 2005, from www. www.gtlaw.com. Hyatt, J. (2005). Birth of the ethics industry. Business Ethics Online, The magazine of corporate responsibility. Retrieved on 8/19/2005, from www.business-ethics.com. Johnson, C. (2005). Pros and cons of accounting rules weighed Sarbanes Oxley - more   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  audits, accountability. San Francisco Chronicle on the Web. Retrieved August 17,   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  2001, from gin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/05/05/BUGJBE3DQ71.html. Leporte, G. (2007). Chief of the office of small business policy at the U.S. sSecurities and Exchange Commission. Retrieved on August 17th, 2005, from http://accounting.smartpros.com . Linsley, C. (2003). Auditing, risk management and a post Sarbanes-Oxley world. Review of Business. Solomon, Deborah. (March, 2005) Accounting Rule Exposes Problems But Draws Complaints About Costs. Wall Street Journal. Wallace, S. (2005). Only the ethical need apply. The Christian Science Monitor. March 30, 2005 edition.

Africa During Colonialism

Africa of course, would be colonized by the many Europeans. However, a lot of African groups/colonization would start too. They would start and older ones would be expanded. The slave trade had decreased due to British pressures and so Africa started trading more of other items with the rest of the world. This same thing was happening in Asia and the Middle East too. In South Africa, the Zulu kingdom would be formed, and in Western Africa, an Islamic caliphate, Sotto Caliphate would be formed. Many of these civilizations were being formed by a bunch of African peoples around the continent.At first, In Southern Africa, there were the Unsung people, Just farmers and cattle herders that existed for a very long time. Soon, however, a drought would strike, hurting their agriculture. This caused the end of the Unsung people. A military genius and leader, Shake Zulu would take control and create a new civilization, the Zulu people, who, compared to all other tribes In Southern Africa, was t he most powerful and formidable, because of its strict military drills and practice and they even used ox-hide shields. The Zulu warriors expanded their kingdom, by attacking many other tribes andInvading them, taking their cattle, children and women. Parts of the Zulu, they split off making their own military bands and they too did the same thing as the Zulu. Soon, this made so many new kingdoms going up all the way to Lake Victoria. As this increased, so did the number of refugees and terrified, depressed people from these To stop the Zulu tribe's growth and power, two kingdoms formed, Swaziland to the north and Lesotho to the east, which was made up of many refugees who came to those mountains there. Both Lesotho and Swaziland exist today.Shake successfully made a national identity and a nation in just 10 years of rule. He took all the young people in the nation and split them into deferent groups, called regiments, based on age. These people of the regiment lived with each other and they all celebrated Shake. Etc. They celebrated his rule and they were all heavily disciplined. Cow herds were a measure of wealth in this kingdom. Meanwhile, in the Western Savannah of Africa, there was a big religious struggle. Islam was prevalent over there. However, that was only In the cities and trade areas, ND not in the rural areas.The rural areas still followed regular customs. At first, Islam allowed people to mix their older beliefs with Islam. Now however, Psalmists started denying this idea of allowing them to have their customs and wanted them to follow pure Islam. They made a â€Å"holy war†, called Jihad, which made Assaults take over many rural and other new lands where they enforced Islamic laws and spread the religion. These Islamic retorts first took place in the Hausa states to northern Nigeria. A leader in the Hausa states, Susann Dan Food, called a lot of the kings there, unbelievers of religion or Islam and led people away from god.He led a Jihad on the King of Gobi, overthrowing him. A lot o f Muslims Joined to gather to spread Islam and spread it all around Hausa. All this Islam would come together to make a caliph under the capital city of Sotto, called the Sotto Caliphate. The Sotto Caliphate became a center for teaching Islam and reform. It added many new centers, quickly, to teach Curtain and Islamic subjects to boys. Many people were attracted to it because of the Sotto library, which was pretty huge. Muslims ere allowed people to follow their own religion but had to pay a special tax.They were not allowed to do their tribal dances and rituals and any who opposed the spread of the Jihad were killed, slaved or converted. The Sotto caliphate sent off tons of slaves for the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, mainly women and children. Slaves mainly farmed, and so this allowed women to actually leave the home this time. Sotto not only sent a lot of slaves, but it also had a lot of slaves in itself too. In fact, it had more slave s than any other American commonly. Napoleon would come and fight in Egypt. This would last in Egypt as a great triumph for the Europeans and a great loss for the Egyptians.After Napoleon left Egypt from his losses, Muhammad All took rule. Muhammad All took rule of Egypt. He modernized and industrialized Egypt, making it follow a lot of the Western styles. He increased trade of Egypt. He brought a lot of education to Egyptians, and allowing them to replace the old aristocracy. He replaced all the European experts and sellers of products with Egyptians. However, one bad thing was, that he made a burden on the peasants to give military and labor service. The army and Egypt was making its own textiles, paper, weapons, military uniforms.Seeing this western movement, many groups in Egypt, of Islam mixed with this Western Culture. For example, European technical manuals were translated to Arabic. Small was the grandson of Muhammad All. He was more keen on westernizes than All. But his eff orts, in the end, would Just create a bunch of Egyptian debt to French and British banks. At first, in his first 10 years of rule, it was all good with a lot of wealth thanks to increased trade, more exports, new irrigation annals, railroads 800 miles, postal service and Cairo.However, after the American Civil War, exports went down again and debt would be one of the reasons for French and British partial occupation of Egypt. Ethiopia was Christian for 1 500 years. They too were trying to modernize themselves. Ethiopians Emperor, Terrors II of Ethiopia was the one who first started Westernizes and ordered a lot of weapon purchases from Europe and also encouraged some local maturating. One time, they even made cannon that could shoot a half ton shell with the help of Protestant missionaries.However, they tried to get some more weapons by holding British officials hostage and demanding for weapons, but the British would end up actually invading Ethiopia. Terrors would commit suicide t o prevent capture. Then the British would withdraw, and then King Haynes would take the throne. King Haynes took over a lot of the lost land of Ethiopia, except for one major land part, Shoo Kingdom, ruled by King Moonlike. The beginning events of Rupee's scramble for Africa were when France took over Algeria. Algeria originally was a major supplier of olive oil and grain to France.They even gave them grain to Napoleon to take over Egypt. Now, France still owed them for this and several disputes took place. The new French government wanted to show nationalism with an easy overseas victory. However, the struggle for Algeria would go on for 18 years, even after French government would be overthrown again. Bad al- Qatar was an Algerian holy man who led them against France but he would die, weakening and nearly ending their 18 year struggle. However, conflict in the mountains would take place for 30 years. Settlers would then come in and kill off 140,000 people.

Overpopulation We Must Figure It Out For Save The World...

Overpopulation: We Must Figure It Out to Save the World It may not be something you think about often, but human population growth is a big issue in our world today and this problem needs to be solved in the future to save our planet. Overpopulation is a condition that will be in effect if the population exceeds the carrying capacity on Earth. The carrying capacity is the peak population that can sustain human life on Earth. It is uncertain what Earth’s carrying capacity is for the human race because of our technological advances and such, but we need to solve this issue before we do find out our carrying capacity in a catastrophic way. There are many different aspects that contribute to overpopulation and a heavily populated Earth causes a lot of problems. I believe that this issue is solvable along with many other people, but it will take a lot of effort to tackle this problem. 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