History of the Aztec Empire :: Pre-Columbian History Culture

History of the Aztec Empire The center of the Aztec civilization was the Valley of Mexico, a huge, oval basin about 7,500 feet above sea level. The Aztecs were formed after the Toltec civilization occurred when hundreds of civilians came towards Lake Texcoco. In the swamplands there was only one piece of land to farm on and it was totally surrounded by more marshes. The Aztec families somehow converted these disadvantages to a mighty empire known as the Aztec Empire. People say the empire was partially formed by a deeply believed legend. As the legend went, it said that Aztec people would create an empire in a swampy place where they would see an eagle eating a snake, while perched on a cactus, which was growing out of a rock in the swamplands. This is what priests claimed they saw when entering the new land. By the year 1325 their capital city was finished. They called it Tenochtitlan. In the capital city, aqueducts were constructed, bridges were built, and chinapas were made. Chinapas were little islands formed by pilled up mud. On these chinapas Aztecs grew their food. The Aztec Empire included many cities and towns, especially in the Valley of Mexico. The early settlers built log rafts, then covered them with mud and planted seeds to create roots and develop more solid land for building homes in this marshy land. Canals were also cut out through the marsh so that a typical Aztec home had its back to a canal with a canoe tied at the door. In the early 1400s, Tenochtitlan joined with Texcoco and Tlacopan, two other major cities in the Valley of Mexico. Tenochtitlan became the most powerful member of the alliance. Montezuma I ruled from 1440 to 1469 and conquered large areas to the east and to the south. Montezuma's successors expanded the empire until it extended between what is now Guatemala and the Mexican State of San Luis Potosi. Montezuma II became emperor in 1502 when the Aztec Empire was at the height of its power. In 1519, the Spanish explorer Hernando Cortes landed on the East Coast of Mexico and marched inland to Tenochtitlan. The Spaniards were joined by many of the Indians who were conquered and forced to pay high taxes to the emperor. Montezuma did not oppose Cortes because he thought that he was the God Quetzalcoatl. An Aztec legend said that Quetzalcoatl was driven away by another rival god and had sailed across the sea and would return some day. His return was predicted to come in the year Ce Acatl on the Aztec Calendar.

Essay --

Samantha Rangel Professor Soma de Bourbon FYS 156/Technology and Society 15 November 2013 Serial Killer Everyone has heard or read about serial killers at one point in their lifetime. Serial killers are known to be dangerous psychotic people who enjoy killing. They are not known for being loveable towards their victims, they are brutal and have no regrets to what they do. One serial killer in particular was very brutal and has had a lot of fame around the world. Whenever someone hears the name Jack The Ripper, they wince at the thought of knowing what he did. Now a days they even have shows portraying Jack The Ripper. He is a widely known serial killer for the killing of five women. The police never identified Jack The Ripper, so no one has any idea who Jack The Ripper is. Jack murdered five women, prostitutes, and he horribly mutilated them between August 31- November 9, 1888 in Whitechapel, England (East End London). The investigators of the case believed that Jack might have had surgical knowledge due to the fact that three of the five women had their internal organs removed. Throu ghout Jacks killings there were hundreds of letters sent to the police and many of those letters hinted that they were Jack The Ripper or they were suggestions for ways to catch the Ripper. The police always disregarded those letters because they thought it was a waste of time reading over silly letters until one day three letters stood out of the bunch. The police believed that Jack The Ripper wrote them himself because they had specific details on how the women were being killed and they even said things like, â€Å" Yours truly, Jack The Ripper, Don’t mind me giving the trade name.† (casebook.org/ripper_letters) The three letters were â€Å"Dear Boss† (Sept... ...Most serial killers do have OCD which is obsessive compulsive disorder which is when you have to have things go a specific way or else you think everything is going wrong, so organized serial killers will most likely have this disorder. Having multiple personality disorder is when you have two personalities; one is your normal self which serial killers most likely use to cover up the fact that they are killers. Depression, anxiety, and panic attacks are triggered by the kind of things the serial killer goes through, so for depression the serial killer could get it from having a non-loving family, Anxiety can come from the struggles that the serial killer faces. Panic attacks can come from having too much anxiety. Serial killers are dangerous and very sick people. Most of them don’t realize they are doing something wrong because they could be severely mentally sick.

Conflict in Organisations

To what extend do you accept the view that conflict is an inevitable feature of management and organizational behaviour? Suggest how management can attempt to avoid the harmful effects of conflict. Introduction All organizations, by their very nature, have built in conflicts Conflict is seen as an inherent feature of organisations and induced, in part, by the very structure of the organisation. The causes might stem from individual characteristics, interpersonal factors, communications, behavior, structure and previous interactions. Conflict, per se, is not necessarily good or bad but an inevitable feature of organisational life and should be judged in terms of its effects on performance. Even if organisations have taken great care to try to avoid conflict it will still occur. Conflict will continue to emerge despite attempts by management to suppress it. † J Mullins Pge 490. A more recent view of conflict is the interactionist perspective, which believes that conflict is a pos itive force and necessary for effective performance.This approach encourages a minimum level of conflict within the group in order to encourage self-criticism, change and innovation, and to help prevent apathy or too great a tolerance for harmony and the status quo. Conflict Defined Conflict is defined as an incompatibility of goals or values between two or more parties in any relationship, combined with attempts to control each other and antagonistic feelings toward each other (Fisher, 1990). The incompatibility or difference may exist in reality or may only be perceived by the parties involved.Nonetheless, the opposing actions and the hostile emotions are very real hallmarks of human conflict. Main Causes Of Conflict In Organisations Differences in Goals: In an organisation, functional departments or sub units become specialised or differentiated as they develop different goals, tasks and personnel. Although the overall organisational goal is agreed upon, such specialisation or di fferentiation leads to conflicts of interest or priorities.For example in a firm involved in manufacturing certain products, the sales and marketing department might want low prices to attract more customers or to gain a bigger market whilst the production department might want higher prices on those products to meet the production cost. Limited resources: Competition for limited resources is also a factor for conflict. The classic example here is the normal budgetary requirements that usually exceed available funds. This is probably the most prevalent and familiar source of conflict at the TRB.Departments request more than what the budget can sustain. For example, replacement of obsolete laboratory equipment by the analytical services Division against the refurbishment of the tobacco curing barns by the Field Services Division. Departments fight to get preference as Heads of Departments attempt to present their problems as the most pressing and urgent. Communication barriers: This arises when two individuals or groups are unable to express themselves, verbalize their needs, state their case adequately, provide logical and structured argument, or listen effectively.Miscommunication and misunderstanding can create conflict even where there are no basic incompatibilities. Lack of communication skills often results in confusion, hurt and anger, all of which simply feed into the conflict process. Language barriers and socio-cultural backgrounds can inhibit the intended meaning of a particular message. Perception differences or differences in the value system: Parties may have different perceptions as to what are the facts in a situation, and until they share information and clarify their perceptions, resolution is impossible.Self-centeredness, selective perception, emotional bias, prejudices, etc. , are all forces that lead people to perceive situations very differently from the other party. Because of this perception variation, people tend to value reality differ ently. As perceptions become a person’s reality, value judgements can be a potential source of conflict. Ambiguity – the ambiguous purposes and objectives, the imprecision in establishing tasks, authority and responsibility of some jobs and compartments, lack of clarity in transmitting decisions or the deformed presentation of reality are causes of conflict at TRB.Management sets unclear policies. These can cause much argument, confusion and wasted resources. When rules and standards are also inequitably applied e. g. one set for management and another for the workers, the credibility of management regarding its value system can be significantly undermined. At TRB, the policy states that work starts at 0700hrs. Some managers adhere to this policy together with the bulk of the employees, but others do not. The earliest that they are seen at work is at 0745hrs. No action is taken against them, but if lower level would dare to do the same, they will suffer the consequence s.Interdependent work activities: Wherever the input to one process is dependent on the output from another before the finished product is complete, the potential for conflict is high. The Accounts Department at TRB depends on the stock take figures that the Business Development Department among other departments submit at the end of each month. How, BD personnel have their own priorities that occupy them. The BD team may not particularly be aware of Accounts’ deadlines and as such the moment Accounts tries to hasten their stock take process, and a conflict arises.Unclear job boundaries: These result in employee confusion and criticism of one another, as well as management, and are extremely counterproductive. Responsibility for tasks is abrogated and it becomes virtually impossible to determine accountability. There is Business development as a department and on the other hand there is a interdepartmental committee called the PR and Marketing Committee. The leaders of these two groups, the AGM Business Development and the PR and Marketing Chairperson (a Head of the Plant Health services Division) are always in conflict as they sometimes duplicate tasks often, using different methodologies.Some tasks are left undone or imperfect because of the diffusion of responsibility. These causes show that management might be to blame for some of the conflicts emanating mainly from communications and structure but has nothing to do with the individual characteristics and previous interactions. There is affective conflict i. e. one which refers to inconsistencies in interpersonal relationships, which occurs where organizational members become aware that their feelings and emotions regarding some of the issues are incompatible. Members would end up focusing on reducing threats and increasing their power to the neglect of work productivity.This has a negative effect on both organizational members and the organization itself. Members become resentful, negative, irritab le and suspicious. Group performance and group loyalty are also impeded as the members are antagonistic to each other and have high levels of stress and anxiety (Rahim 2002). There is also substantive conflict i. e. where people disagree on their task or content issues. This occurs when there are disagreements among group members about the content of the tasks being performed, including differences in viewpoints, ideas and opinions (Jehn 1995).This has a positive effect on group performance if it is moderate as it stimulates discussions and debates which usually lead to more efficient ways of performing the tasks. Such debates lead to a better understanding of the issues resulting in more informed decisions. It has been found to be more effective among groups that are involved in non-routine tasks than in those carrying out standardized activities. However, like affective conflicts, they usually diminish group loyalty, job satisfaction, and workgroup commitment (Jehn 1995).The chall enge for management is to maintain a level of substantive conflict so as to increase group performance but reduce affective conflicts avoid job dissatisfaction. Negative Effects of Conflict The negative effects of conflict are that communication breaks down, individual needs are not heard or met, creativity is stagnated and relationships with others usually deteriorate. Therefore, organizations which don't encourage the effective resolution of conflict will usually have lower staff morale, strained relationships, higher levels of fear and tension among staff and lower productivity. This has a negative effect on both organizational members and the organization itself. Members become resentful, negative, irritable and suspicious. Group performance and group loyalty are also impeded as the members are antagonistic to each other and have high levels of stress and anxiety (Rahim 2002). Management can attempt to resolve these harmful effects of conflict through the following methods and a pproaches. Effective Resolution of Conflict According to J. A. F. Stoner and R. E. Freeman, the three most frequently used conflict resolution methods are dominance or suppression, compromise and integrative problem solving.The methods differ in the extent to which they yield effective creative solutions to conflict. There are various methods and approaches to conflict resolution but this paper shall evaluate the effectiveness of the above three methods under different approaches. Dominance and Suppression Method The dominance and suppression methods usually suppress conflict rather than settle it, by forcing it underground and they create a win-lose situation in which the loser usually gives up and ends up in a disappointed and hostile state.Dominance and suppression can occur in the following ways; Forcing / Coercing: this is a tendency to punish or reward the other party to agree with one’s position. This is a power orientated, assertive and often uncooperative approach wh ere the interests of one individual or group are put ahead of other individuals’ or groups’ interests. This approach is most suited when quick decisions are to be made, say in an emergency, or as a last resort to resolving a long standing conflict.Smoothing; smoothing is a common tendency to emphasize common interests while minimizing or suppressing perceived differences. It is a more diplomatic way of suppressing conflict. The approach can help protect more important matters by giving up on less important matters and this gives an opportunity to assess the situation at a later stage from a different angle and in a different environment. The disadvantage is it can be abused by some employees taking advantage of the accommodating nature of the other employees.Avoidance; is the tendency to withdraw from conflict situations or remain neutral. This approach defers, sidesteps or simply does not address the conflict at hand. Another form is refusal to deal with the conflict by stalling and repeatedly postponing action. This can be applied where the potential costs of resolving the conflict outweigh the benefits of its resolution or when it is not the right time to address the conflict. Compromise; through compromise, managers try to resolve conflict by convincing each party in the dispute to sacrifice some objectives in order to gain others.It is suitable when goals are moderately important and decisions need to be made quickly. This approach is common in organizations, particularly in resolving employee-employer conflicts, for example, wage negotiations where employees may require a 20% increment and the employer offers 10%, the parties may eventually agree to compromise and settle for 15%. Integrative problem solving This method involves creating a shared goal that cannot be attained without the cooperation of each of the conflicting parties. Intergroup conflict is converted into a joint problem solving technique.Together, parties to the conflict try to solve the problem that has arisen between them. Instead of trying to find a compromise or suppressing the conflict, the parties openly try to find a solution they can all accept. There are three different methods of integrative conflict resolution methods namely consensus, confrontation and use of sub-ordinate goals. The major drawback is that this strategy is time consuming and requires an environment where parties can build mutual trust. Conclusion Conflicts are inevitable in any organization. A modest level of conflict can e useful in generating better ideas and methods, inspiring concern and ingenuity, and stimulating the emergence of long-suppressed problems. Thus I strongly agree and support the view that conflict is an inevitable feature of management and organizational behavior. Conflict management strategies should aim at keeping conflict at a level at which different ideas and viewpoints are fully voiced but unproductive conflicts are deterred. If conflicts are not man aged properly, they can be damaging, as they waste a lot of energy and time, and invoke tension, which reduces the productivity and creativity of those involved.A manager should be able to see emerging conflicts and take appropriate pre-emptive action. The manager should understand the causes creating conflict, the outcome of conflict, and various methods by which conflict can be managed in the organization. In this context, the manager should evolve an approach for resolving conflicts before their disruptive repercussions have an impact on productivity and creativity. Therefore, a manager should possess special skills to react to conflict situations, and should create an open climate for communication between conflicting parties.REFERENCE De Bono, E. 1985. Conflicts: A Better Way to Resolve Them. London: Harrap. Eggert, M. A. and Falzon W. , 2003, The Resolving Conflict Pocketbook, Management Pocketbooks Filley, A. C. 1975. Interpersonal Conflict Resolution. Glenview IL: Scott, For esman Mullins,L. J. (1999) Management and Organisational Behaviour. Pitman Publishing Putnam, L. L. ; Poole , M. S. , 1987. Conflict and negotiation, in Jablin, F , Putnam, L. , http://www. nmmu. ac. za/documents/theses/LourensAS. pdf

Confusion – personal writing

Rosie ran a brush through her copper-gold, long, silky hair and smiled contentedly. After a touch of lip-gloss was applied she was satisfied with her reflection, so she grabbed her jacket and bounded down to where her Mother was waiting. â€Å"Okay honey?† her Mum asked smiling. â€Å"Yes, fine thank you Mum.† Rosie replied cheerfully. Rosie was adopted as a child and lived with her mother and adoptive brother in a renovated house in Yorkshire. Her Mother was single and Rosie had never had any contact with her natural parents. Rosie loved her life, she was seeing a lovely guy and her Mum and her were just going to the local shopping center were she was going to meet up with him. Rosie and her Mum, Nicola drove down the motorway in their Renault. It was a beautiful day, Rosie thought to herself as she gazed at the deep, blue sky making shapes in her mind out of the puffy, white candyfloss like clouds. Suddenly her head was thrown sideways against the window and a loud screeching filled her ears. Then all the noise, all the visions were gone and Rosie felt strangely peaceful. Rosie opened her eyes and all she could see was white. She tried to sit up but her head hurt so much she slumped back down again. From that position she tried to figure out her surroundings. She was looking straight upwards at a plain, white ceiling without a blemish on it. She slowly and painfully turned her head and was faced with a blue curtain. To puzzled to be panicked she tried to figure out where she was. She didn't have long to wait. The blue curtain was yanked backed and an extremely harassed looking man looked in. â€Å"Let me see my daughter, where is she?† he was saying. â€Å"Please sir you're disturbing the patients,† a nurse was telling him worriedly. â€Å"Oh thank goodness!† said the strange man and started hugging Rosie. At first Rosie was to shocked to respond and then she pushed him away with all the strength she could muster. â€Å"What do you think you are doing?† Rosie spluttered. â€Å"Darling, what's the matter? What's wrong?† the man asked Rosie, and then turning to the nurse he repeated, â€Å"What's wrong? Why doesn't she recognize me?† â€Å"I'm sorry, she's been through a lot. She needs some rest, please come back later when things are a bit clearer to her.† â€Å"What do you mean?† the strange man demanded, his voice rising, â€Å"This is my only daughter lying here, I need to be with her.† † I realise you must be anxious but the best thing you can for your daughter now is to let her rest, so please I must ask you to leave.† Reasoned the nurse. The man seemed to be fighting a battle with himself to control his emotions. It looked like he won and he seemed to use a lot of self-restraint as he said, â€Å"Fine, I'll see you later Jenny, and just remember Daddy loves you.† Then he walked out. â€Å"Try and get some rest dear.† Soothed the nurse, and then she followed him, shutting the curtain as she left. Jenny lay back, a million thoughts running through her head at once.

Louis XI of France Essay

Machiavelli’s suggestion that a ruler should rule like both a lion and a fox is exemplified to very different degrees with the monarchs Isabella and Ferdinand of Spain, and Louis XI of France. Isabella and Ferdinand were strong, ferocious leaders who implemented local and state level authority impressively. They also cleverly established a guilded appearance as religious figures connected through diplomatic alliance to the Catholic church. They follow Machiavelli’s suggestion to the T. Louis XI of France, tells a different tale. Although he was known as the â€Å"Spider King†, infamous of his scheming, he was cleverly created footholds in the capitalistic realm of his country. His greatest downfall was his lack of foresight, and sheepish tendencies toward reclusiveness and isolation. Isabella and Ferdinand were supreme rulers. They established extreme, and savage local authorities that suppressed violence in their local city levels. They also brutally enforced the reconquista, the exile of Jews and Muslims. This gave them the appearance of being fierce, and proud. They were able to properly govern their people, protecting them from violence also keeping Catholicism at its prime. Isabella and Ferdinand were also considerably sly and clever as well. They created the appearance that they were extreme religious fanatics, while in actuality they were not. This granted them support from their followers, and also allowed them to create alliances with the Catholic church. With such alliances like Pope Alexander, they were able to gain footholds with the choosing of the bishops not only in Spain, but also in the new American Hispanic territories. It can alos be taken into consideration that Isabella and Ferdinand were able to also put the crown at the center of their government by training men of the middle class in Roman law, so that they were capable of ruling on a royal council, removing all outside nobility and aristocratic influence. Yet again, another fox like move. Louis XI of France tells a different tale. He promoted many new industries for France. This includes the silk and weaving at the Lyons and Tours. By doing this he created a capitalistic gain in his part of the continent. It welcomed new craftsmen from all over to draw monetary gain into his country. It was a very clever and â€Å"fox like† move. Again Louis of France was known for is commercial treaties that he created and welcomed with England, Portugal, and the towns of the Hanseatic League. By doing this he created economic alliance with these areas. He was capable creating unestablished but relevant ties to both these areas. It created a constant supply and demand to also aid France’s finances. Without making it known, England and Portugal had the potential to become economically reliant on France, and it’s new industries. Yet another â€Å"fox like† attribute. Unfortunately what Louis XI had in â€Å"fox like† qualities, he lacked in â€Å"lion like† ones. Because of this he was often marked with the term â€Å"Spider King† and known for his scheming ways. He was also criticized for not being nobel or brave when it came to the country’s infantry. He disbanded it, and instead hired Swedish mercenaries instead. You can imagine how terrible this looked upon himself, not supporting France or its capabilities. Because of this, Louis XI of France was made to look a coward. As it has been established, Ferdinand and Isabella are extraordinary examples of Machiavelli’s suggestion. They were both militarily fierce, but also well admired through they involvement in the church, making them effective rulers. Louis XI on the other hand, was less fortunate. Because he leaned too heavily toward one side, it can be seen that he was often a less effective ruler. Although his economic power was admirable, his lack of integrity and support for his own country is seen as cowardly. It is said that he was considered a reclusive and isolated man, and few mourned his death.

E-Commerce for Government Organizations Term Paper

E-Commerce for Government Organizations - Term Paper Example In addition, security services and solutions frequently established ineffectual results or damaged performance. Therefore, the overall historical documentation of Government information technology plans is away from competence (FIPR, 2011). Moreover, new technology based security solutions like public-key arrangements and digital signatures framework hardly ever offer the advantages declared by their supporters to commerce discipline or the government. On the other hand, more and more people think that innovative technologies will facilitate public control to gather an extraordinary volume of data and information regarding people. In addition, improved competence, safety and exploration effectiveness has too been employed as explanations for the attack over people security and confidentiality. However, in presence of all these dangers the use of e-commerce for the government organizations is rising (FIPR, 2011), (Turban, Leidner, McLean, & Wetherbe, 2005) and (Slyke, Belanger, & Comu nale, 2004). This paper discusses the use of e-commerce for government organizations. The basic aim of this research is to analyze the importance of e-commerce to government organizations as well as problems that may arise and thereafter it will offer possible solutions.Evolution of Governmental E-commerceConventionally, governments have paid attention on supporting e-commerce for the improvement of rules and policies intended to corroborate or control private web based company plans (Blakeley & Matsuura, 2001). Matsuura, 2001). Additionally, this National Framework regarding the governmental services for the ecommerce enables the progress of internationally operating societies those are offering novel prospects for companies to sell abroad to earn foreign exchange. In addition, at the present there are nationwide structures those are offering great corroboration in form of open as well as protected business dealings for the small, medium and large size companies, to do business wit h Governments and other companies. In this scenario, the Governments purchase from thousands of dealers and this national structure will offer a way for customers to access business services as well as valuable products on a single platform all through the nation. Moreover, in both personal and public areas, the utilization of IT tools and applications is minimizing the expenditures as well as improving the performance and quality of B2B dealings. Furthermore, with the arrival of more lucrative and easy to use technologies this procedure has improved to a great extent (Australian Procurement and Construction Council Inc., 2011). Therefore, considering this framework in the United States, the national administration has performed several

Research manuscript critique Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Research manuscript critique - Assignment Example This study sought to establish how much time the mentor and the mentee spend together, the issues they discussed, where they met, as well as the services and information that the mentees received from the mentors (Blinn-Pike et al, 1998). Data obtained from the research was to be used in conceptualizing a theory of governing the mentor-mentee relationship. Being a mixed method approach, the researchers collected both quantitative and qualitative data. The sample size consisted of 20 mentors who were volunteers. They were required to fill in contact forms that had both quantitative descriptive question and qualitative paths that required the mentors to describe the experience. The descriptive questions used to collect the quantitative data centered on the amount of time spend with the mentee, issues discussed between the mentee and the mentor, and the services provided by the mentor to the mentee. Subsequent data analysis of both qualitative and quantitative data followed. The mixed method approach enabled the researchers to approach the research question from different perspectives (Blinn-Pike et al, 1998). The results obtained can be used to develop a theory that will govern the mentor and mentee relationship. This was a quantitative study that sought to outline the significance of language and cultural education on the secondary achievement of Chinese-American and Korean-American students. This study was designed to understand how language and cultural education contributed to the performance of these students. This was after a clear indication that Chinese-American students who withheld their language and cultural education registered better grades in school. Therefore, the author sought to highlight the specific contribution of language and cultural education in propelling children from these ethnic groups to success. It had been noted that students of these ethnic groups who tried to become integrated into the American culture were not as successful as