The effects of child labor in India

The effects of child labor in India Child labor has been a constant menace plaguing Indian society for centuries. As the Indian economy develops at a dramatic pace to become one of the worlds future economic superpowers, it is becoming extremely important to protect the future generation of this country, which are undoubtedly the children. Child labor holds a disgusting picture in todays India. India tops the list in the world of having the highest number of child laborers, under the age of 14, of about 100-150 million out of which at least 44 million are engaged in hazardous jobs (Larson, 2004). Even though the Indian Constitution prohibits children younger than 14 to be employed in any occupation or hazardous environment, child labor exists in this country (Ram, 2009). They often work for long hours in hazardous and unhygienic environment and receive meager pay (Forastieri, 2002). These young children deserve to be educated and benefit from their childhood rather than work at early age and face abuse. The Indian gove rnment should enforce their law of prohibiting child labor to eliminate this problem. It is extremely important to tackle this menace if childrens rights are to be protected and a vibrant, mentally strong and educated youth is to be ensured for the future. To begin with, child labor is a gross violation of human rights. Firstly, it violates the constitutional law of India (Ram, 2009). Secondly, it also violates the UNICEFS 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child whose article 32 include[s] the childs right to freedom from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the childs education, or to be harmful to the childs health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development (UNICEF, 2001, p. 6). Moreover, the International Labour Organisation (ILO)s Convention number 182 also aims at eliminating child labor (Fyfe, 2007). Due to the lack of enforcement of law by the Indian government, the 100 to 150 million children are not getting the national and universal human rights they are entitled to. When the thought of childhood comes to our mind, images like children playing and running around in school uniforms emerge. However for child laborers in India, its images of factory smoke, wounded fingers, and abuse that emerge. These children work for long hours inhaling smoke, working with dangerous machines, and facing abusive employers. The labor market in which these children work, the [labor] supply exceeds demand, and, therefore, they lack bargaining power with the balance always tilted in favor of the employers leading to exploitation (Mishra, 2000, p. 56). Also, since children are more vulnerable compared to adults and in weaker positions to negotiate, they face further mistreatment, abuse and get paid less. Some are even abducted, sold into labor and are forced into servitude with no hope of getting out (Schmitz, Traver, Larson, 2004). When children start working at such a young age and undergo through the above mentioned abuses and economic exploitation, it negatively affects their emotional and physical capabilities (Larson, 2004). In one case, a 10 year-old girl named Mina had her fingers almost worn to the bone because of working many hours rolling cigarettes for a beedi (rolled cigarettes) company (Larson, 2004). In the same beedi industry, another girl narrated that her work was not only hard but it was also painful for her to sit and continue for hours without any break to achieve her target of 3000 beedis per day, for a meager wage of 3 rupees per day. Surprisingly, an adult can hardly make 2500 beedis in the same time (Mishra, 2000). In Child Labour in India, Mishra (2000) mentioned a disheartening case of a 12-year old boy in a matchbox factory. The boy complained that his employer would beat him for minor mistakes and insult his parents in a filthy language which would cause him a lot of pain since it was no fault of theirs. He also said: My employer used to put a match box on my neck in order to bend it down sufficiently to concentrate on the work. This prevented me from raising and turning my head on either side. I was beaten several times by him for having raised and turned my head. The turning of my head was very well indicated by the fall of the match box from my neck. Sometimes he beats me with the help of a wire in an unkind manner. (p. 71) Companies find it profitable to use child labor because it helps them produce at lower costs and the innocent children can be trained to do dangerous work under unsafe and unsatisfactory conditions. Many children in India who are child laborers work in industries such as glass-blowing, matchsticks, fireworks and also the carpet-making industry (Larson, 2004). An example of the terrible working conditions can be seen in the fireworks industry. Factories labeled as D grade are legally binded not to employ more than 22 people in their factory. However, many of such factories employ around 20 to 150 people, including children! The D graded match box factories are legally allowed to produce at most 80 units of matchboxes but they produce upto 100 to 300 units (Mishra, 2000). These firms are breaking legal rules and the Indian government should step in to enforce their laws. Poverty-stricken parents in India who borrow loans often give their children to their debtor so that he can exploit the children by making them work and help in paying off the debt. The meager pay these children receive is not enough to cover up the amount of money to be repaid for the loan. In addition to this, the interest on the loan keeps increasing, which increases the repayment amount, and then the working child takes many years to pay off the debt (Larson, 2004). It is often pointed out that child labor helps pull people out of poverty by offering a source of income and survival for a poor family (Larson, 2004). However, this income comes at a huge cost as they are abused for work which affects their present and future life. An example can be seen above in the way children are abused as collateral for loans. The constant abuse child laborers have to go through in exchange for a small amount of income makes their life not worth living.It does not make much of a difference whether the child is earning money while working in a hazardous job or not, since every type of work involves a degree of stress. Hazardous work cripples the health, psyche, and personality of a child, and non-hazardous work causes forms of deprivation such as denial of access to education and denial of the pleasurable activities associated with childhood (Mishra, 2000, p. 14). Therefore, the child laborer who is working at a young age to earn some amount of income for his fa mily also does not get educated, which makes him unfit to grow up and get a well paid, decent job in the future. Child labor can even start a cycle as an uneducated illiterate parent will also start sending his young child to work as a child laborer, who in turn will also grow up uneducated, and use his child also as a source of income. Therefore, the Indian government should make an effort to enforce their child labor law in order to save these children, break this vicious cycle and protect its future generations. Having a formal education is the birth right of every child in this world. But child labor has stolen this right from these 44 million children. These children in India who are involved in child labor are not able to have time to go to school due to the intense and long working hours. According to the International Labour Organizations report, Child labour leads to reduced primary school enrolment and negatively affects literacy rates among youth (ILO, 2008). The report also found strong evidence that in a situation where school and work was combined, school attendance falls as the number of hours at work increases (ILO, 2008). This goes on to prove that working children in India involved in labor struggle to attend school due to their harsh and exploitive working hours which causes them continuous fatigue. As India has the highest level of child labor in the world, it is due to this reason that Indias rank in the Education Development Index (EDI) is a disappointing 102nd out of the 129 countries in the index (UNESCO, 2009). The EDI measures a countrys performance on universal primary education. High level of child labor in a country is often related with its low and unsatisfactory performance on the index (ILO, 2008). The Indian government should start enforcing their law against child labor so that these children can go to school easily. A working child also often gets deprived of having a bright and lively childhood due to lack of leisure activities. In a research conducted by Dr. D.V.P Raja, Founder and Director of the Madurai Institute of Social Sciences in India, more than 90% of the working children who were interviewed stated that they do not have enough leisure to play and engage in other recreational activities. This startling finding signifies that these children spend virtually all their waking hours working and are thereby totally denied any of the excitement and pleasures of childhood (Mishra, 2000, p. 48). The interviewees also stated that while at work, they did not acquire or learn any new skills. This goes on to say that the impact of child labor on the development and creative side of the child is quite disturbing. These children do not find their work enjoyable but rather than that they find it difficult and boring; but, however, they still continue to stick with these jobs because they dont have a choice nor do they find any other suitable alternative for them (Mishra, 2000). The government of India should now wake up and save these children before more of them become victims of a lost childhood. The problem of child labor has done enough damage to the lives and health of many innocent children in India over centuries by stealing away their many rights. It is now evident that child laborers are heavily losing out on all fronts and are becoming terribly incompetent to live future life as child labor negatively affects their mental, emotional and psychological capabilities .Child labor should be brought to an end now. It is high time that the Indian government starts taking this issue seriously and starts enforcing its own constitutional law against child labor so that Indias present and future generation of young citizens have their rights protected and are able to live their lives healthy and secure.

Censorship on the Community Essay

The Effect of Censorship on the Community and People in the Novel â€Å" Fahrenheit 451† The Novel Fahrenheit 451 exploited censorship and all the negative thing that can occur when a society is censored. There were many examples in this novel. In the Novel Guy Montag finds out that censorship is a big part of his community and realizes that has a negative effect and need to be abolished before it changes humans for good. â€Å"If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you’ll never learn.†(Ray Bradbury). This quote is stating that since books are censored and people in Montag’s area cannot read, they will not gain intelligence. They are hiding their ignorance by refusing to read books. Books hold information and many things that can open someone’s eyes to the world to understand it. In this novel there are no books aloud, and if a citizen has a book or books, the books are burned to ashes inside the home. The community lives in fear of fir efighters. Montag is a firefighter who loves burning books, at first, but then runs into a stranger who changes his perspective. As Ray Bradbury said â€Å"we were putting one foot in front of the other†(Ray Bradbury). That is exactly what the Clarisse was doing when she ran into Montag. Clarisse doesn’t believe in all the censorship and act different from the rest of the future community. She doesn’t believe in the books, the schools, and the television programs being censored. The television programs keep people away from the books and the schools teach students that books are bad and not needed. The schools also censored what the kids were able to do and the activities they participated in. Society lives in fear in the novel Fahrenheit 451. Towards the middle of the novel, the fire fighter, Montag realizes that censorship is wrong and starts collecting books on his own. He soon starts going against society and all the censorship. He starts reading the books and tries to get his wife to read them as well. Soon the fire fighters turn on him and make him burn don’t his own house. This shows the censorship causes distrust, fear, injustice, and the breaking of bonds on a society. After he burns his own house, he ends up killing his boss because of how he acts and Montag realizes that his boss might actually want t die. The censorship has killed society. It causes violence, ignorance, wars, and people who live in fear or cowardly. Many civilians are violent and commit suicide also no one seems to care because it has become normal. No one seems to care about others and society is in a cave. In Conclusion censorship has a terrible effect on the community in Fahrenheit 451. All the extra problems and violence is unneeded. It is all caused by the deep cave that censorship brought the place into. The only way the help is by reading the books so the spread of knowledge can occur. The community is always on the brink of war with jets flying around and bomb shelters everywhere. The effect of censorship doesn’t lead to anything good, and is always going to end up with a bad ending. The Novel Fahrenheit 451 shows a perfect example of what censorship does to a society. The school becomes a violent place and the people that are supposed to help people stop caring. Plus all the serious things are taken for nothing as it becomes a casual normal thing for people to harm themselves or commit suicide. Censorship is terrible and shouldn’t be able to happen anywhere. Everyone should be able to have their own views and opinions on a wide variety of topics. The more people express their ideas the more the world will grow and knowledge will spread. People will become wise, more intelligent, and more willing to learn what other people have to share. This Novel is the perfect example of censorship is a terrible thing. Work Cited Bradbury, Ray D. † Fahrenheit 451.† Ray Bradbury | Books. Harper Collins, 2001. Web. 20 Sept. 2012. . â€Å"Bradbury On Fahernheit 451.† Interview by Haper Collins. RayBradbury. Haper Collins, 2001. Web. 20 Sept. 2012. . Bradbury, Ray. â€Å"Fahrenheit 451 Quotes.† By Ray Bradbury. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2012. .

Invention and Tradition

Adaptations are widespread and universal. Adaptation problems – content, structure, and intertextual politics. Hutcheon wishes to consider adaptations as lateral, not vertical. One does not experience adaptations successively starting from the original work, rather the works are a large collection to be navigated. One might see an adaptation before the original. Hutcheon also wishes to view adaptations as adaptations, not as independent works. Three ways of story engagement: telling, showing, and interactivity. Adaptations also dominate their own media.The most heavily awarded films are adaptations. Hutcheon suggests that the pleasure of adaptation from the perspective of the consumer comes from a simple repetition of a beloved story with variation. To borrow Michael Alexander’s term, adaptations are palimpsestuous works, works that are haunted by their adapted texts. Hutcheon wishes to avoid resorting to fidelity criticism, which originates in the (often false) idea th at the adapters wish to reproduce the adapted text. There are many reasons why adapters may wish to adapt, which can be as much to critique as to pay homage.There are three dimensions to looking at adaptations: as a formal entity or a product, as a process of creation, or as a process of reception. Adaptation is simultaneously a process and a product. Hutcheon distinguishes between adaptations and sequels and fanfiction. Sequels and fanfiction are means of not wishing a story to end. This is a different goal than the recreation done by adapting a work. There is a legal term to define adaptations as â€Å"derivative works†, but this is complex and problematic. Adaptation commits a literary heresy that form (expression) and content (ideas) can be separated.To any media scholar, form and content are inextricably tied together, thus, adaptations provide a major threat and challenge, because to take them seriously suggests that form and content can be somehow taken apart. This rai ses another difficult question: what is the content of an adaptation? What is it that is actually adapted? One might consider this to be the â€Å"spirit† or â€Å"tone† of a work. Adapting a work to be faithful to the spirit may justify changes to the letter or structure in the adaptation. In my perspective, the content of adaptations is (or should be) the world of the adapted text.Hutcheon specifically addresses videogames and how they engage in activity beyond problem solving. She suggests that if a film has a 3 act structure, then gameplay is only the second act. Excluding the introduction and the resolution, gameplay is tied up with solving problems and working to resolve conflicts. Games adapt a heterocosm: â€Å"What gets adapted here is a heterocosm, literally an â€Å"other world† or cosmos, complete, of course, with the stuff of a story–settings, characters, events, and situations. † (p. 14) A game adaptation shares a truth of coherence w ith the adapted text.The format may require a point of view change (for example, in the Godfather game, where the player takes on the role of an underling working his way up). Other novels are not easily adapted because the novel focuses on the â€Å"res cogitans†, the thinking world, as opposed to the world of action. This is a point that I would disagree with Hutcheon’s assessment, I think that even the thinking world of a novel abides by rules and mechanics, that these mechanics may be simulated or expressed computationally, but they may not be suited to the conventions of action and spatial navigation popular in games right now.Hutcheon notes that some works have a greater propensity for adaptation than others, or are more â€Å"adaptogenic† (Groensteen’s term). For instance, melodramas are more readily adapted into operas and musicals, and one could extend that argument to describe how effects films tend to get adapted into games. This may be due to the fact that there are genre conventions that might be common to both media. Adaptation may be seen as a product or a process, the product oriented perspective treats it as a translation (in various senses), or as a paraphrase. The product oriented perspective is dependent on a particular interpretation.As a process, it is a combination of imitation (mimesis) and creativity. Unsuccessful adaptations often fail (commercially) due to a lack of creativity on behalf of the adapters. There is a process of both imitating and creating something entirely new, but in order to create a successful adaptation, one must make the text one’s own. There is an issue of intertextuality when the reader is familiar with the original text. But there can become a corpus of adaptations, where the subsequent works are adaptations of the earlier ones, rather than the adapted text itself. This as been the case of texts which have had prolific series of adaptations, such as Dracula films (Hutcheonâ₠¬â„¢s example), as well as Jane Austen’s works. These works are â€Å"multilaminated†, they are referential to other texts, and these references form part of the text’s identity, as a node within a network of connected texts. A final dimension is the reader’s engagement, their immersion. Readers engage with adaptations with different mdoes of engagement. â€Å"Stories, however, do not consist only of the material means of their transmission (media) or the rules that structure them (genres).Those means and those rules permit and then channel narrative expectations and communicate narrative meaning to someone in some context, and they are created by someone with that intent. † (p. 26) Adaptations are frequently â€Å"indigenized† into new cultures. When texts supply images to imageless works, they permanantly change the reader’s experience of the text. For example, due to the films, we now know what a game of Quiddich looks like (and du e to the games, we now can know tactics and strategies), or what Tolkien’s orcs look like.

Gender Roles And Power Issues - 2393 Words

A fresh university graduate looks for a job in the journalism industry. A number one fashion magazine in New York provides this opportunity as an assistant to the editor. The experience completely flips her life around, and changes not only her appearances but also starts affecting her personal relationships. The end of the film sees the character move away from the fashion industry and into a traditional newspaper agency. The two main characters present in The Devil Wears Prada are the fashion editor, Miranda Priestly, played by Meryl Streep, and the assistant, Andrea Sachs, played by Anne Hathaway. There sub-characters such as Andrea’s boyfriend, Andrea’s father, and Miranda’s husband that play key roles in both Andrea’s and Miranda’s†¦show more content†¦Gender stereotypes â€Å"reflect percievers’ observations of what people do in daily life† (Eagly and Steffan, 1984) and remain if perceivers continue to observe a certain group engaged in specific activities, which then turn into assumptions that the group is able to perform such tasks. When it comes to gender roles, Heilman (2001) suggests that there are two roles that either gender can possess, agentic or communal. Agentic behaviour is usually associated with men, and portrays the idea of being achievement orientated and taking charge (Solomon, Bamossy, Askegaard, and Hogg, 2013). Additionally, leadership and manager attributes such as, problem solving, risk taking, and being active are associated with an agentic, masculine figure (Heilman, 2001). Women, on the other hand, show communal attributes that are associated with care taking, helpful, and relationship orientated. Sczesny’s work (2003) introduced the common assumption that managerial positions are male dominated, â€Å"think manager – think male†, and crisis situations are associated with females (Haslam Ryan, 2007). An issue that many women still face in the corporate world is the glass ceiling NEED TO EXPAND Power and gender are common topics in movies and is especially prevalent in The Devil Wears Prada (Lee, 2006). The character of Miranda radiates power and Cunneen (2006) sees Miranda as a figure of