Alien from another Universe-ity

This unit’s Learning Journal focuses on creating an Abstract for your own paper. Remember, keep your Abstract to under 250 words and keep it in APA format along with keywords listed at the end. This will be one of the final steps in creating your research paper. It is also the first thing a reader will see, so make the Abstract as strong as you can.

The thesis:

While pets can transfer parasites and cause allergies, it is still good to adopt them because they can help to survive psychological traumas and leverage stress. People become happier even when they see animals on the screen. Pets can make us jollier and more confident, as well as less nervous, and those who own pets experience fewer negative emotions in total.

In your own words, write a one paragraph response to this question: What makes a good abstract?

Research is an integral part of higher education in any specialty. Therefore, it is very important for us to understand what parts it consists of and, in particular, how to write them correctly. According to SPS (n.d.), you can get a glance at the research and a brief overview of what it is about when you read its abstract. Usually, the abstract is the first thing that the examiners look at when they make their initial judgment.

For this unit’s Written Assignment, you will review the story you chose and answer the following questions in complete sentences, as provided for use by Cumbria University

1. What is the title of the text and what is the text about?

The name of the story I chose for this written assignment is “The Monkey’s Paw” by W.W. Jacobs. In this text, Mr. and Mrs. White’s friend, Sergeant-Major Morris, shows them a mummified monkey paw. An old fakir put a spell on the paw, and now it can fulfill three wishes. Desires are always granted with monstrous consequences as a punishment. At the suggestion of his son, Mr. White is flippant about getting the £200 he wants, even though he thinks he already has everything he wants. The next day, Herbert leaves for work at a local factory and dies as a result of a terrible accident.  After that the employer pays the desired £200 to the family, fulfilling their wish. A week after the funeral, Mrs. White, distraught with grief, forces her husband to use a paw to resurrect Herbert. Reluctantly, he does so despite having a bad feeling. An hour later there is a knock on the door. While Mrs. White, in a desperate situation, wants to open the door, Mr. White, horrified by the “thing outside”, takes out the paw and says his third wish aloud. The knock suddenly disappears. Mrs. White opens the door and finds that no one is there. She cries with grief and disappointment (Jacobs, 1902).

Find your own study to examine this week. Do not use either of the studies in this week’s discussion assignment. For your Learning Journal, you are to fill out the following form. Remember, use complete sentences and proper APA In-Text Citation and References. This will help you with your critical reading skills and your ability to research.

1. What is the title of the text and what is the text about?

The title of the text I examined this week is “The Five Monkeys Experiment & Its Lessons for Your Organization”, and the result of this study gives us an idea of how our society often works. As part of a scientific experiment, five monkeys were placed in a cage, in the middle of which there was a ladder leading to a bunch of bananas at the top. When one of the monkeys started to climb for bananas, the researchers sprayed all the monkeys from the cage with ice water for five minutes. The same thing happened with the second attempt, and the third time the monkeys themselves grabbed the “cellmate” and did not allow her to touch the stairs. After that, the scientists replaced one of the monkeys, while never punishing them with water again, and sometime later all the monkeys in the cage were replaced. Nevertheless, even without knowing the reasons for their actions, they attacked those who wanted to eat bananas and climbed the ladder (ProServeIt, 2018).

Your Learning Journal this week will focus on the APA In-Text Citation and Reference style. After reading the story, ‘Araby’ you will submit a one-paragraph analysis on your response to this story. To support your perspective on this piece you will include one quote from the story and paraphrase a small part of the story. You will include all proper APA In-Text Citations and References.

Through first-person narration, we are immersed at the beginning of the story in the dreary life of the people on North Richmond Street, which seems to be illuminated only by the enthusiasm and imagination of children, who are gathering during the winter months, playing “till [their] bodies glowed” (Joyce, n.d., Para 3). But although these boys make a career in the neighborhood in a very childish way, they are also interested in the world of adults. For example, the main character, the young boy, becomes interested in his friend’s sister. One rainy evening, the boy retires to a silent, dark living room and expresses his feelings to her: “I pressed the palms of my hands together until they trembled, murmuring: “O love! O love!” (Joyce, n.d., Para 6).

This week we read an article and a short story. It seemed to me that both of them were informational in nature. But while the article was written more concisely and restrained, the short story was written in a more pleasant manner with smooth transitions and was easier to read, since the language of the narrative seemed more lively.

Both texts are related to the events of September 11. It’s always been a little hard for me to read the news because of their style. Therefore, for this assignment, I decided to consider a short story given to us for reading.

“Fear & Loathing in America” is a short story written by Thompson, which covers the events of September 11, but at the same time gives us his personal perspective. He doesn’t only describe what happened in detail but also adds something personal there. For example, he mentions that he was “writing about sports” (Thompson, n.d., para 1). You can feel, what mix of negative emotions is going through the whole narrative – uncertainty, fear, anxiety, uneasiness, and tension. When the author mentions that in this war there is no guarantee to win even if you spend a lot of resources (Thompson, n.d., para 10), you can realize that this sentence can be used to describe everything in our lives literally. Even though this short story was written so many years ago, it is still relevant and many of the ideas from it can be applied to recent events.

For this discussion assignment, you will take the speech you’ve read and briefly tell the class about it. What about the speech stood out for you? Do you think you know the author better after reading the speech? Keep in mind to add your own original thoughts with analysis. Also, if you quote or paraphrase, you must include the proper APA Citations.

This week I decided to study and analyze Charlie Chaplin’s speech in the film “The Great Dictator” in more detail. By a hilarious coincidence, I recently watched this movie and was amazed at what important issues it raised. Despite the fact that the film was shot a long time ago, the work of Charlie Chaplin still remains relevant – I laughed to tears, and afterward advised my family and friends to watch this movie, too.

          But let’s get back to the speech itself. It appeared in the climactic scene of the work. A simple Jewish barber, who was mistaken for Hinkel – the great dictator – makes a speech that shocked a huge number of people. Here we see the theme of society’s inaction and a call for action, we see the repeated ridicule of totalitarian leaders and criticism of the mechanical consciousness of the rulers, we see a call for other values, instead of the newly appeared “machines” and “speeds”, we see criticism of war and violence. The speech bears the stigma of a defender of freedom, while it is not entirely clear whether the author is slipping from liberalism to anarchism. The film is much deeper than we can imagine, and Chaplin applies meaning after meaning in several layers, trying to think both anti-capitalist and anti-totalitarian, suggesting that we talk not only about freedom but also about forms of resistance to power and illusions in democracy (Charlie Chaplin, n.d.).

This week you will discuss either the Immunization study or the Stanford Prison study. You will tell your fellow classmates about the harm caused by the study, and what you think could have been done by the scientists, the media, and the public to avoid or fix the harms caused.

            This week I read the article about the connection between the MMR vaccine and autism – more precisely, about the fact that such data was fabricated and there is no such connection. During my life, I have heard many times from various young parents that mandatory vaccination exposes their children to a high risk of developing various diseases and autism. I also heard that the chance of such an outcome is extremely low, but for the first time, I came across an article revealing where such rumors originally came from.

            To tell the story short, in 1998 The Lancet medical journal published an article claiming that the MMR vaccine may cause developmental disorders and behavioral regression (Rao & Andrade, 2011, para 1). This study caused a lot of harm to society because many parents became scared of vaccinating their children. For example, In England and Wales the rate of MMR vaccination fell by almost 10% in the period from 1996 to 2002 – no wonder it led to a much higher number of measles cases (Encyclopedia of the Environment, n.d., para 6).

This week’s discussion assignment will let you tell your classmates what story you selected, give a short summary and why you liked or disliked it. You will also use at least One paraphrase (With proper APA In-Text Citations) and One quote (With proper APA In-Text Citations); you will also include the APA style Reference at the end.

The story I chose is one of the most famous and beloved works of the English writer William Wymark Jacobs – The Monkey’s Paw. A story in which the writer pushes the tension to an almost unbearable limit. Readers are introduced to the White family, relaxing in their comfortable living room, a house located in the suburbs. A storm is raging outside the windows, the weather is cold and vile when the guest, sergeant-major Morris, comes and brings with him a monkey’s paw, which has magical properties. The old guest claims that according to the spell, the paw must fulfill three wishes three times – to three different people. However, he also warned his friends that the price for the desire could be terrible (Jacobs, 1902). As expected, the family was skeptical about these words, as well as the very possibility of the fulfillment of desires by a certain magic monkey’s paw.