The Us Containment Policy History Essay

The Us Containment Policy History Essay Power extension has always been a subject that fascinated me. There are countless ways in which groups of individuals can maintain interests of their communities and protect them from possible threats. This phenomenon has been known to the humanity ever since the first human got off the tree and straightened up. The more sophisticated tools we started using, the more dangerous the threat has become. First armies were created, followed up by intelligence services and counter-intelligence services investigating threats both foreign and domestic. By means of diplomacy, diversion, espionage, and violence mighty rulers were trying to guarantee national security by influencing the circumstances on different levels think of Vaticans interference in French politics via Cardinal Richelieu or Charlemagnes orders to execute thousands and convert the others forcefully into Christianity during the Saxon Wars. This concept remained unchanged for centuries and reached its peak in the 20th century, materializing in three terrifying wars of which one is also known as the Cold War. For me as a person interested in power extension is the latter an episode that cannot be overemphasized. For this reason I decided to devote my PWS to it. However, originally intending to write as much as possible about the Cold War and the mutual American and Russian relations precisely, I had to delimit the subject in order to comply with the quantitative requirements laid upon me. By means of a selection I chose the aspect of the Cold War which I found by far the most interesting, namely the basic assumptions of the post-war American politicians of how to prevent the communism from spreading, also known as the containment policy (derived from contain to keep something under control), and the political and military actions of the American Administration in which these communism-countering ideas can be recognized. In my paper, being as a matter of fact a written work of reference based on numerous sources, I will try to answer the question of how successful the containment policy invented and applied by the American policymakers in the years 1945-1949 turned out to be and to what degree it prevented the communism from spreading. Despite the subject concerns a short period of five years there is much to be written. It is never easy when it comes to explaining political decisions and therefore it is highly necessary to mention the underlying grounds, of which the gradual development led to the measures in question. So will my paper begin with the description of the primary reasons resulting in the introduction of the containment policy. Having described the latter I will focus on what I personally consider as the core of my work a summary of deductions concerning the Soviet post-war point of view written down by a high-rank diplomat working in the American Embassy in Moscow. The summary to be found in chapter 3 depicts concisely the direction that was to be given to the American foreign policy in response to the Soviet spreading ambitions. Theory and planning, however, are often not sufficient to bring the expected change. Real action is also required and so it must be addressed to in my paper in order to make the story complete. Chapter 4 will outline the efforts the US policymakers made as far as the application of the containment policy on the European political arena is considered. A careful and critical reader will find amongst lines the answer on how successful the containment proved to be. The chapter also leaves an open path for those who will attempt to imagine what the current world would look like if there were no communism-countering measures or individuals ready to devote their life to protection of democratic values. I find it necessary to mention that I wanted this PWS to be a challenge and some sort of test of my language skills since I am not a native speaker of English and my level of it is far from proficiency. I didnt choose the easiest way out which was writing this paper in Dutch a language I am much more familiar with. Instead I decided to use the opportunity to learn English vocabulary and grammatical constructions which I might not have memorized if I hadnt written it in the way I had. Before you continue reading I truly want you to know that it is not my intention to lay any idealistic beliefs upon you. On the contrary, I hope my paper will help you understand the past, which is after all necessary in order to live consciously in the present and create a future not based on ignorance of not knowing what the events taking place are caused by. Enjoy your journey back in time! Chapter 2: What were the primary reasons for the mutual distrust resulting in the introduction of the containment policy? The first section of this paper will throw some light on the background of the containment policy and, as a matter of fact, The Cold War itself. A proper comprehension of this part is necessary in order to answer the main question. After the very last tanks ceased firing and the Second World War ended, many realized how terribly destructive the war had been. It had materialized in thousands of destroyed cities and generations of young men who lost their lives in combat, not to mention civilians and their continuous fear for their lives. Many of the survivors were looking brightly at the future which was expected to bring about precious peace and prosperity. Unfortunately, only a few were aware of the threat that was about to arise. The Teheran Conference To be fully able to give a constructive answer to the question in the title we have to go back in time to 1943, from November 28 up to December 1 to be precise. The Teheran Summit was the first of the conferences held between all the members of the Big Three, giving shape to those that were about to be held within the next years. Allied leaders representing the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union pulled together in the Capital of their ally, Iran, to discuss measures that were necessary to overpower the common enemy. Apart from setting up a strategy that included synchronized operations to be undertaken from multiple directions, the Big Three agreed that they shall seek the cooperation and active participation of all nations, large and small, whose peoples in heart and mind are dedicated, as are our own peoples, to the elimination of tyranny and slavery, oppression and intolerance[1]. This encouraging press release was definitely an important sign of taking a step forward into creating some kind of an international organization that would avoid imperfections of its predecessor, The League of Nations. Preventing aggressive tendencies of any sort would be its major goal. Next to the certainty of participation of the Soviet Union, the United States and the United Kingdom in the project the question of any role that China and France should play came up. Odds enough the Chinese politicians had not been informed about the proposed understanding at that point of time as result of their disability to form a stable government. Thanks to the Churchills telegram sent to Roosevelt we can surely as shooting state that the British Head of State was more than willing to ignore his early reluctance concerning China if the American president kept pushing on their engagement. As regard to France, it is believed that Roosevelts strong antipathy towards De Gaulle might have been a factor why Frances involvement was not taken seriously at that point of negotiations. After all, the maintenance of peace by controlling, disarming, preventing from rearming in secret and, if necessary, a blockage against a country and its bombardment seemed to be accepted by each of the Heads of State. A press release saying We await the day, when all nations of the world will live peacefully, free of tyranny, according to their national needs and conscience [1] gave a deceptive impression of a complete cooperation. The question of resetting Polish boundaries, brought up by the Russian delegation (consisting of Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Defence Minister Klimentii Voroshilov), wasnt solved so easily. It was to become one of the most difficult discussion points which would dominate the Yalta Conference and caused first dents in the mutual trust between the Soviet Union and the other two allies. The Yalta Conference The second meeting of all three members of the Great Alliance was announced in January 1945. It became quite obvious that the issue of boundaries couldnt remain unresolved any longer after the Russian forces had entered on Polish soil nearly a year before on January, 2. The necessary solution was hoped to be found, as stated by Churchill, in the worst place in the world [2] Crimean Yalta. It must be mentioned that each of the participants of the summit held between February 4 and 11 was in the first place, quite logically, trying to maintain the interests of their own country. For the sake of this thesis the main bottlenecks connected to prospective mutual relations will be worked out in detail. These three completely different approaches can be summarized as follows: Winston Churchill mainly interested in the European arena and the French role in the occupation of Germany Franklin Delano Roosevelt agreement on the Far East and setting up a sort of organization of united nations Marshall Stalin the Polish question being a matter of great importance for the Soviet Union. Furthermore an interest in becoming a sphere of influence where the Soviet superiority would be accepted. The compromise about the United Nations came more easily than Roosevelt had ever expected. The deadlock on the voting procedure of the United Nations, about the right of veto to be precise, had been overcome and the number of Soviet republics, which were to participate, had been decreased from sixteen to at least two. Stalins postulates narrowed down to the issue of setting the Polish eastern frontiers at the Curzon Line a demarcation line that was proposed at the Paris Peace Conference as the eastern boundary of Poland excluding the city of Lvov with its huge percentage of Polish citizens. [3] The extremely complicated negotiations between the three Heads of State and both Polish governments (one in-exile and the second set up by the Russians) led to the adoption of the controversial Curzon Line. Stalins spreading intentions, except for the plausible argument of necessity to possess one more ice-free harbour, were perfectly described by Marshall Stalin himself to Ernest Evin, the British Foreign Secretary, saying: The United Kingdom had India and the Indian Ocean in her sphere of interest; the United States China and Japan; the USSR had nothing To guarantee the freedom of elections and establishment of democracy according to Western terms, the Big Three ratified the Joint Declaration on Liberated Europe that promised peoples liberated from the domination of Nazi Germany and the peoples of the former Axis satellite states of Europe to solve by democratic means their pressing political and economic problems'[4]. Nevertheless, the declaration above mentioned turned out to be completely meaningless as history has shown. Due to its conditional implementation and lack of binding commitments there was no legal force upon signatories to maintain the agreement. However, no violations of the Yalta agreements by Stalin were suspected at this point of time, as stated by Churchill. The impression I brought back from the Crimea, and from all my other contacts, is that Marshal Stalin and the Soviet leaders wish to live in honourable friendship and equality with the Western democracies. I feel also that their word is their bond. I know of no government which stands to its obligations, even in its own despite, more solidly than the Russian Soviet Government. I decline absolutely to embark here on a discussion about Russian good faith. It is quite evident that these matters touch the whole future of the world. [5] According to Professor Arthur Schlesinger signing the declaration by Stalin was a diplomatic blunder which became obvious just a month after the Big Three gathered in Yalta. The meetings, which were supposed to determine the best Polish democratic leader, eventually proved to be an excellent way for Soviet secret police to reach the prominent members of the former Polish resistance and make them disappear, despite the promised Soviet guarantee of immunity. It didnt take a long time before Churchills initially credulous account of the agreement transformed into the opposite conviction. By 13 March he sent a telegraph to Roosevelt with a statement that the Heads of State were in the presence of a great failure and an utter breakdown of what was settled at Yalta [6]. Twelve days later the British prime minister described the situation on the West-East border as an iron curtain, which is slowly descending. The following quotation illustrates just how dramatically the developments in the European arena were becoming. If the German people lay down their weapons, the Soviets, according to the agreement between Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin, would occupy all of East and Southeast Europe along with the greater part of the Reich. An iron curtain would fall over this enormous territory controlled by the Soviet Union, behind which nations would be slaughtered.'[7] In the meanwhile the messages exchanged between Stalin and Roosevelt, who were increasingly becoming the two bigger players in the Big Three, were full of mutual accusations of jeopardizing the vulnerable accord. The Potsdam Conference The Polish matter reached a dead end. How things developed couldnt be witnessed by Roosevelt, who died on 12 April 1945. His successor, Harry Truman, once vice-president under Roosevelt, was expected to continue the policy towards the Soviet Union initialized by Roosevelt. However, it became obvious from the beginning that the mild approach, continuously applied by his predecessor, wasnt Trumans favourite style of work. The Potsdam Conference, lasting from July 17 to August 2, aside of being a permanent confirmation of previously made agreements, became Trumans first significant opportunity to influence the US-USSR relationship, mainly because of its nuclear undertone. The US presidents decision not to fully inform Stalin about the rapid progress concerning the construction of an atomic weapon correctly delineates the prospective Trumans policy of hostility and inscrutability towards The Soviet Union. A mentioning of a new weapon of unusual destructive force [8] did not specially bot her Stalin, who was already in 1943 informed about an atomic weapon allegedly built in the West. Russian atomic project did not accelerate until Japan was bombed twice in September 1945. The order, given by Marshal Stalin to Igor Kurchatov, a leading Russian physicist, sounded more or less The balance has been destroyed. Provide the bomb (* No firm evidence of this record has remained until now but the sense of the message is kept unchanged). Chapter 3: What was the containment policy based on? In this paragraph I will briefly describe the major political events that gave shape to what is now understood as the containment policy. President Harry Truman, despite being known of his unyielding personality, lacked experience in foreign affairs and could hardly do without a number of political analysts. These happened to be influenced by the opinions of George F. Kennan (to be seen on the right hand), the prominent USSR specialist in the State Department and the charge daffaires at the American Embassy in Moscow, whose role in the process of the containment policy coming into life cant be over-emphasized. On February 22, 1946 he sent a long analysis of Soviet post-war outlook to his colleagues in the Capitol in Washington. https://blogs.princeton.edu/mudd/files/mt/images/kennan.jpg The so-called Long Telegram, of which the most relevant points are summarized below, became one of the major documents that the containment policy was based on. George F. Kennan [9] A brief characteristic of the Soviet point of view, according to the propaganda machine -The geographical and political surrounding of the USSR by capitalistic nations will eventually result in a battle for the economical leadership in the world, which will be also crucial for the fate of socialism/communism and capitalism. -Any actions, activities and happenings abroad which seem to correspond with the Soviet interests to a certain degree should be supported. In the long run the differences between capitalist countries will become too powerful to be overcome in a peaceful manner. No opportunity may be missed to turn the internal conflict into a communistic revolution. The background of the mentality The premises do not represent the point of view of an average Russian. The ordinary citizen, on the contrary to what is stated by the officials, is more than willing to contact the outside world and live peacefully. It must be kept in mind that the party is the villain The basic assumptions of the Russian propaganda machine pre-date the World War II, which makes it irrelevant and nothing more than incorrect (spoken in terms of 1940s). The premises are as much as necessary for the Russian party in order to deter Soviet citizens coming in contact with technically and economically more advanced West which might prove the fallibility of the communism/socialism. Steps that will be undertaken on the official (diplomatic) level -Increasing the outsiders perception of strength of the Soviet military arsenal and industrial development as much as social cohesion is a significant part of the national policy. On the other hand attempts will be made to conceal imperfections and weaknesses of the system. The efforts to extend Soviet political power will materialize themselves into territorial claims on the official level only after finishing unofficial preparations. Soviet participation in international organizations (as United Nations) serves only the pragmatic purposes of expanding the Soviet political influence on the international arena and reducing operational ability of others. United Nations are not seen as an instrument for a stable and peaceful world society based on interests of all nations. Even on the official level the Soviet Union will attempt to sabotage the relations between Western states and their (former) colonies in order to clear the path for the Soviet participation in policymaking. -Soviet politicians, while being abroad, will be urged to follow the strict diplomatic protocol with emphasis laid on good manners in order to increase the impression of the Soviet prestige. Suspected activities on the unofficial level, i.e. on level for which the Soviet administrations do not take responsibility I feel obliged to remark on the incredible importance of the following section. The contained statements are these that the Truman Administration (and any other following until the end of 1980s) had mostly to deal with. Actions on the unofficial level will be first of all directed to foreign organizations, movements, societies and governments that are regarded as susceptible for, what the party asserted, the Russian sense of nationalism and Marx ideas of equality. The left-wing activists, officially members of Western Labour Parties, were encouraged to work on underground lines and were intensively instructed by politicians in Moscow. A diversity of organizations and associations, such as racial, feministic or religious societies, is highly exposed to penetration. Even the subdivisions of the Orthodox Church located abroad are at risk of being penetrated. George Kennan states that organizations above mentioned will be solely used in fields of their expertise, e.g. influential orthodox activists would jeopardize any thinkable actions of Protestant politicians. Further explanations follow: Increasing industrial and social unrest and stimulation of all possible forms of disunity will result in undermining operational potential of the western states and breaking off the national confidence. In countries forced into colonial relationships outstandingly cruel actions will be undertaken to destroy relatively good relations with (former) mother countries. Simultaneously extreme left-wing parties will be preparing for not necessarily legal taking-over of political power. -Governments obviously not agreeing with the Soviet foreign policy will be kept under pressure in order to cause their eventual removal from office. Every imaginable activity will be undertaken in order to provoke the most powerful Western states against each other. Conclusions for the US Government Soviet power, not schematic in character, doesnt work by strict plans and doesnt take unnecessary hazards. It is extremely responsive to logic or force and therefore it can easily pull back and mostly does when facing a strong opposition. So, quoting Kennan, if the adversary has sufficient force and makes clear his readiness to use it, he rarely has to do so. [9] The next point the author makes has to do with the Western degree of cohesion, firmness and muster. Success of the Soviet Union, as for being the weaker force, depends to some extent on the mentioned factor. Another factor that is relatively easy to deal with is the Soviet propaganda. The destructive and generally negative character of it can be opposed by a sort of intelligent and constructive programmes. In the conclusion the author states that a calm and unprovoked recognition of the hypothetically dangerous movements must be the governments very first step. Furthermore the public education should play a bigger role. The fear of unknown can be overcome by informing the citizens about the Russian reality. After all it would result in improvement of social cohesion and make the society less vulnerable to threats from both outside and inside. Finally Kennan brings up the significance of formulating a constructive and positive picture of the sort of world the US policy makers would like to see. It is not enough to urge people to develop political processes similar to our own. Many foreign peoples, in Europe at least, are tired and frightened by experiences of past, and are less interested in abstract freedom than in security. They are seeking guidance rather than responsibilities. We should be better able than Russians to give them this. And unless we do, Russians certainly will. [10] The reaction of the Russians wasnt immediate. Nearly seven months later, on September the 27, the Soviet Ambassador to United States, Nikolai Novikov, sent a note to the highest officials of the Soviet Union that was nothing but an analysis of the Kennans Long Telegram and the US post-war foreign policy towards the Soviet Union in general. These became accessible for outsiders after the publication in Foreign Affairs magazine of the so-called X Article in July 1947, being as a matter of fact an adjusted version of the original analysis of Kennans. Novikov concluded that the American outlook is predominantly characterized by the drift towards the worlds supremacy and as well economical as military leadership. Amongst others he stated that the plans of establishing more than 480 naval bases, American mainland signalize intense intentions of hostility towards the Soviet Union. By the end of 1946 the political situation between the US and the SU reached its lowest point since the end of the Second World War. Western politicians were little by little abandoning their hope for the cooperation with the Russians and the Kennans prophecy was slowly becoming the reality. How the US officials reacted and what measures they took in order to deter foreign government representatives from embracing communism will be properly described in the following paragraph. Chapter 4: What efforts did the US government make to materialize the containment policy and with what result? The Truman Doctrine The Truman Administration received multiple signals from its British Ally about the gradually increasing difficulties of His Majestys Government to provide on-going financial help to Greece and Turkey the two states the United Kingdom had been supporting for years and which found themselves standing on the edge of a democratic collapse. In an official note dating to February 21, 1947 British informed Washington of their inability to support the mentioned states and requested for a takeover of their economical obligations. Trumans reaction came into history as the Truman Doctrine. In his speech to a joint session of Congress of March 12, he emphasized the moral obligation of the American state to provide assistance to the peoples of Greece and Turkey in order to establish a democracy and restore the authority of the government. In regard to Greece the President stated that the British aid issued in the preceding years wasnt sufficient to supply the weak and not able to operate indepe ndently army and fight communist insurgents dislocating the Greek state. Turkey, on the contrary, didnt need financial assistance so desperately at that point of time. Nevertheless due to a historic background of Greece and Turkey being stubborn rivals for decades it was necessary to split the money equally in order to avoid future claims of injustice or, even worse, anti-Western tensions. Truman concluded that the US Government was the only institution in the world able to prevent Greece and Turkey from becoming what the totalitarian states in the period of the Second World War were regimes of minorities getting their path clear by means of violence and suppression. I find it interesting to mention that the presidential Congress speech is also known as the Trumans containment speech. Clark Clifford (Trumans advisor), asked in 1972 about the nickname, said: we were concerned about preventing Soviet control of larger areas of the world than they already controlled [11]. Although the word containment wasnt even said once by Truman in his speech, the measures supposed by him concentrated on opposing the activities mentioned in the fourth point of Kennans Long Telegram namely the actions of the Soviet party conducted on unofficial level. Greek communist freedom fighters were not powered by Marxs ideals but by Stalins money and military arsenal. As result of it the most of the $338 million sent by the United States to Greece was spent on military equipment. The concept of supporting European nations economically, drafted in March 1947 and perfectly outlined by the President Truman in his Congress speech, was just a momentary restoration programme, which had to prevent Greece and Turkey from falling into the hands of communism. How this financial aid, meant only for the time being, transformed into a long-term supportive programme will be depicted in the following section. Marshall Plan The Marshall Plan, although originally not intended to be a part of the containment policy as stated in the May 23 report of the Policy Planning Staff, became a significant step forward taken by the American Administration, influence and actions of which were gradually becoming more visible on the international political arena. The Policy Planning Staff (PPS), created by George Kennan at the request of the Secretary of State George C. Marshall, was given the task of, taking a long term, strategic view of global trends and framing recommendations for the Secretary of State to advance U.S. interests and American values.'[12] In the context of the European Recovery Program, as the so-called Marshall Plan was officially known, it came down to investigating multiple possibilities of supporting financially the European communities in order to solve their war-caused economical problems and bring them to the level of self-sufficiency. To avoid sceptical publicity criticizing Americans for th eir interventionism in European affairs, aid would be exclusively launched if the formal initiative came from Europe. Besides it was required that the program would evolve on the Old Continent and that its leaders would take the fundamental responsibility for it, while the US would limit themselves to a supportive program of such an undertaking by financial means. Knowing the tensions between the US and the Soviet Union, Kennan and the other members of the PPS didnt want the European Recovery Program (ERP) to be a reason for the further isolation of East from West. Although speculating on Soviet reluctance, the inventors of the Marshall Plan included in their project the participation of the Eastern nations in an early stage. By leaving the door open the American policymakers could verify the Soviet attitude towards the plan, which eventually would give proof of their good or bad faith. Kennan and his co-workers were convinced that this offer would not remain without response, since economical co-operation of Soviet satellite countries with the US would result in weakening of Soviet control in these states. On June 5 1947 the first signals concerning the Marshall Plan were sent out to the outside world. The Harvard speech of Secretary Marshall, being an announcement of conditions and proposals above mentioned, didnt meet much of approvement at the other side of the Iron Curtain. Already after a couple of multipartite conferences the Soviet delegation under wings of Molotov turned down the negotiations. According to the diary notes of Vincent Auriol, the French president at that time, Molotov said amongst other things that the project would divide Europe [13] which testified the bad faith of the Soviet party. The September speech of Soviet deputy foreign minister Andrei Vyshinsky to the United Nations General Assembly was its final confirmation. He stated that the Marshall Plan was a firm violation of the 11 December 1946 resolution of the United Nation, which declared that distribution of economic resources by a state may not be used as an instrument of political pressure. According to Vishinsky the Russian government saw the European Recovery Project as an attempt to put European states in American sphere of influence and to intervene in their internal affairs. In Soviet opinion the plan would result in splitting Europe into two antagonistic blocs, of which the Western one, led by the United States, would develop a certain hostility towards democratically ruled Eastern European countries and the Soviet Union in particular. The splitting up of the Russians gave the American politicians an opportunity to give the aid programme a hoped-for direction. As stated by Michael J. Hogan, an adviser to the US Department of State, the Marshall Plan was about to become a protective measure to counter the Soviet threat and serve as an extension of the containment policy [14]. Â  Unlike Soviet satellite states, which dropped off under pressure of the Soviet Union, the sixteen Western neighbours gathered at a conference in Paris, which lasted from July 12 up to September 22, and was intended to give shape to the financial requests that would be presented to the Americans. Unfortunately due to disunity of the European leaders concerning the final amount that would be asked for and their unwillingness to shift part of political responsibilities to a collectively created international body, which was known as the Committee of European Economic Cooperation (CEEC), Kennan and his Policy Planning Staff did not receive an acceptable report. There are a huge number of details concerning the Marshall Plan being brought to life, which I would like to work out narrowly. Unfortunately I have to limit

Gender Identity Paper Essay

The determination of gender identity is much deeper than whether a person is born a male or a female. The exact identifier that separates gender identity is currently unknown but researchers believe that genetics, hormones, reproductive organs, biological, and environmental factors all play a role in distinguishing a person’s gender identity. A person’s physical gender and their sense of gender are formed at two different times in two different parts of the body. A person’s gender is whether they are born male or female, but the way they identify themselves may be the opposite, which is not uncommon and has occurred since the beginning of time. In culture males are known to be the stronger, more aggressive sex, while females are the fairer, more nurturing sex. Usually, by the age of four, individuals have identified their gender identities aside from what gender they were born as physically. Throughout this paper, I will discuss the biological factors of gender i dentity (nature), environmental factors (nurture), and the role between hormones and behavior, and how these interactions all affect the determination of one’s gender identity. Gender identification begins to develop while the fetus is in the beginning stages of development. Between weeks six and twelve of gestation is when the fetus begins developing reproductive organs and that is when the fetus takes on the role of male or female. Hormones are produced in both the nervous system and the endocrine system and are transported through the blood stream. Specifically, hormones are chemicals that combine and respond to certain cell receptors. Hormones like testosterone and androgen are mainly found in the male gender while estrogen is mainly found in the female gender. Testosterone is a contributing factor to behaviors like aggression. â€Å"Gender identity, an individual’s self-awareness of maleness or femaleness, and gender role, are programmed for the child within his mother’s womb,† (Institute of Medicine, 2006). Evidence has shown that the female gender is likely to excel in verbal skills and muscular coordination when their production of estrogen is high rather than when it is low. For men, they are stronger and more aggressive when their testosterone levels are high and they are able to perform better in actions that require physical performance. The nature side of the theory relies on prenatal hormones that modify the brain and peripheral tissue and the development of male or female external genitalia. Although a person may have a certain physical gender, their gender role is the adoption of masculine or feminine behavioral traits that are appropriate for that specific sex. Gender identity differs from the gender role because it is an individual’s personal sense of sex, which is not necessarily their physical gender. There are multiple stages from childhood to adulthood when hormones are present that are identifiable of a specific gender. The pituitary gland (or hypophysis) secretes many hormones during puberty including adrenocorticotropic hormones, growth hormones, gonadotrophins, prolactin, and thyroid stimulating hormones. Gonadotrophins, which include luteinizing and follicle stimulating hormones, stimulate sex hormone production in the ovaries or testes and also lead to egg and sperm maturity. Prolactin stimulates milk production and adrenocorticotropic hormones stimulate the adrenal glands to secrete steroid hormones like cortisol. All of these hormones play a major role in sexual development and an individual’s determination of gender identity. Environmental factors of gender identity arise as soon as the individual is born. Everything from a female child wearing a pink dress to a male child having a sports themed blanket can play a role in their gender identity. Sociologists believe that by the age of five years old, females show a preference for dolls, arts and crafts, and playing dress up while males prefer cars, blocks, tools, and outdoor play. â€Å"The environment has a direct relation to personality traits, because characteristic adaptations are always involved in expression,† (Nature over Nurture, 2000). At a young age, children who are taught that traits and activities are appropriate or inappropriate for them to perform because of their gender tend to absorb those teachings and are influenced by them later in life. For example, young girls who are raised believing boys are innately better at sports than girls, may disclaim their interest in sports and go on to believe they are not good at them without pract icing them to their full potential. Both males and females have proven to be great athletes but if at a young age, a girl is told she will never be as good as a boy she may never give sports and athleticism a chance. Young children learn by observations, if a young girl witnesses her mother performing the acts of a man then she will repeat those acts and believe that is what is appropriate for her. The same goes for the male gender, if a little boy observes his father doing something that a woman is more likely to do like sewing or interior decorating then that is what the little boy will believe is expected of him upon adulthood. â€Å"For instance, the way in which one educates children, how children in institutions such as orphanages are raised, and the kinds of day-care are considered optimal have all been influenced by one’s understanding of the interaction of biology and environment regarding gender identity,† (Kowalski & Westen, 2005). The previous statement is very true because children observe many things that one may never think would make any difference but in reality they do. Nature factors include everything from what kind of parents raise the child, what roles they perform, the culture, and even the color of paint on the child’s walls all make a difference in the child’s personal gender identity. I believe that between nature and nurture and their influence on gender identity, nature has a greater influence. For example, if a perfectly healthy little girl with no hormone disorders is raised with a single father and only brothers with no immediate influence of females, she is more likely to become a tomboy and take on the gender identity that resembles that of her father’s or brothers’. The same reference goes for a boy raised with a single mother and only sisters with no immediate influence of a male figure in his life. Matthew Wolfe-Meyer makes a valid point when saying, â€Å"nature and its contestation is a dominant strategy†¦ unfortunately nurture fails to receive similar scrutiny and culture is more often used as an explanatory device than deeply interrogated for its logistics.† Often times when a child is going through puberty and takes on the role of the opposite gender, many people jump to the hypothesis that there may be something wrong with their hormones or a chemical imbalance but before jumping to that conclusion, they should look at their home life, how was the child raised, what was their environment like and from there they will find many answers. All children naturally comply with the demands of their internal sense of gender without effort. If the child becomes confused with their gender then they often refer to behaviors of adults near them and they learn what actions are appropriate for them relatively quick. Environmental factors bear a critical amount of effectiveness in gender identity but because environmental factors are ever changing, it proves that the nurture theory is a substantial factor. Currently, psychologists and researchers do not know the exact causes of gender identity and individuals taking on the opposite roles. But there are many factors that support both sides of the nature versus nurture argument. The male and female genders each have differences in many areas both physical and emotional but neither is â€Å"better† than the other. By the age of four years old each child already has an idea of who they are and what gender they belong to. Gender confusion is normal but most children are able to look at parents or acting influences in their lives and see what the appropriate actions are for their gender. Nature versus nurture has and will continue to be a strong argument. References: McCrae, R. R., Costa, P. r., Ostendorf, F., Angleitner, A., HÃ…â„¢ebà ­Ã„ kovà ¡, M., Avia, M. D., & †¦ Smith, P. B. (2000). Nature over nurture: Temperament, personality, and life span development. Journal Of Personality And Social Psychology, 78(1), 173-186. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.78.1.173 Matthew Wolf-Meyer. (2007). Complexities: Beyond nature and nurture. Anthropologica, 49(2), 325-327. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/214174663?accountid=35812 Money, J. (1971). Differentiation of gender identity and gender role. Psychiatric Annals, 1(4), 32-37,42-43,8-9. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/894195162?accountid=35812 (2006). Institute of medicine (us) committee on assessing interactions among social, behavioral, and genetic factors in health. Washington DC: National Academies Press (US). Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK19934/

Flotation Method in Archaeology

Archaeological flotation is a laboratory technique used to recover tiny artifacts and plant remains from soil samples. Invented in the early 20th century, flotation is today still one of the most common ways to retrieve carbonized plant remains from archaeological contexts. In flotation, the technician places dried soil on a screen of mesh wire cloth, and water is gently bubbled up through the soil. Less dense materials such as seeds, charcoal, and other light material (called the light fraction) float up, and tiny pieces of stone called microliths or micro-debitage, bone fragments, and other relatively heavy materials (called the heavy fraction) are left behind on the mesh. History of the Method The earliest published use of water separation dates to 1905, when German Egyptologist Ludwig Wittmack used it to recover plant remains from ancient adobe brick. The widespread use of flotation in archaeology was the result of a 1968 publication by archaeologist Stuart Struever who used the technique on the recommendations of botanist Hugh Cutler. The first pump-generated machine was developed in 1969 by David French for use at two Anatolian sites. The method was first applied in southwest Asia at Ali Kosh in 1969 by Hans Helbaek; machine-assisted flotation was first conducted at Franchthi cave in Greece, in the early 1970s. The Flote-Tech, the first standalone machine to support flotation, was invented by R.J. Dausman in the late 1980s. Microflotation, which uses glass beakers and magnetic stirrers for gentler processing, was developed in the 1960s for use by various chemists but not extensively used by archaeologists until the 21st century. Benefits and Costs The reason for the initial development of archaeological flotation was efficiency: the method allows for the rapid processing of many soil samples and the recovery of small objects which otherwise might only be collected by laborious hand-picking. Further, the standard process uses only inexpensive and readily available materials: a container, small-sized meshes (250 microns is typical), and water. However, plant remains are typically quite fragile, and, beginning as early as the 1990s, archaeologists became increasingly aware that some plant remains split open during water flotation. Some particles can completely disintegrate during water recovery, particularly from soils recovered in arid or semi-arid locations. Overcoming the Shortcomings The loss of plant remains during flotation is often linked to extremely dry soil samples, which can result from the region in which they are collected. The effect has also been associated with concentrations of salt, gypsum, or calcium coating of the remains. In addition, the natural oxidation process that occurs within archaeological sites converts charred materials which are originally hydrophobic to hydrophilic—and thus easier to disintegrate when exposed to water. Wood charcoal is one of the most common macro-remains found in archaeological sites. The lack of visible wood charcoal in a site is generally considered the result of the lack of preservation of the charcoal rather than the lack of a fire. The fragility of wood remains is associated with the state of the wood on burning: healthy, decayed, and green wood charcoals decay at different rates. Further, they have different social meanings: burned wood might have been building material, fuel for fire, or the result of brush clearing. Wood charcoal is also the main source for radiocarbon dating. The recovery of burned wood particles is thus an important source of information about the occupants of an archaeological site and the events that happened there. Studying Wood and Fuel Remains Decayed wood is particularly underrepresented at archaeological sites, and as today, such wood was often preferred for hearth fires in the past. In these cases, standard water flotation exacerbates the problem: charcoal from decayed wood is extremely fragile. Archaeologist Amaia Arrang-Oaegui found that certain woods from the site of Tell Qarassa North in southern Syria were more susceptible to being disintegrated during water processing—particularly Salix. Salix (willow or osier) is an important proxy for climate studies—its presence within a soil sample can indicate riverine microenvironments—and its loss from the record is a painful one. Arrang-Oaegui suggests a method for recovering wood samples that begins with hand-picking a sample before its placement in water to see if wood or other materials disintegrate. She also suggests that using other proxies such as pollen or phytoliths as indicators for the presence of plants, or ubiquity measures rather than raw counts as statistical indicators. Archaeologist Frederik Braadbaart has advocated the avoidance of sieving and flotation where possible when studying ancient fuel remains such as hearths and peat fires. He recommends instead a protocol of geochemistry based on elemental analysis and reflective microscopy. Microflotation The microflotation process is more time consuming and costly than traditional flotation, but it does recover more delicate plant remains, and is less costly than geochemical methods. Microflotation was used successfully to study soil samples from coal-contaminated deposits at Chaco Canyon. Archaeologist K.B. Tankersley and colleagues used a small (23.1 millimeters) magnetic stirrer, beakers, tweezers, and a scalpel to examine samples from 3-centimeter soil cores. The stirrer bar was placed at the bottom of a glass beaker and then rotated at 45-60 rpm to break the surface tension. The buoyant carbonized plant parts rise and the coal drops out, leaving wood charcoal suitable for AMS radiocarbon dating. Sources: Arranz-Otaegui A. 2016. Evaluating the impact of water flotation and the state of the wood in archaeological wood charcoal remains: Implications for the reconstruction of past vegetation and identification of firewood gathering strategies at Tell Qarassa North (south Syria). Quaternary International In pressBraadbaart F, van Brussel T, van Os B, and Eijskoot Y. 2017. Fuel remains in archaeological contexts: Experimental and archaeological evidence for recognizing remains in hearths used by Iron Age farmers who lived in peatlands. The Holocene:095968361770223.Hunter AA, and Gassner BR. 1998. Evaluation of the Flote-Tech machine-assisted flotation system. American Antiquity 63(1):143-156.Marekovic S, and Ã…  oÃ… ¡taric R. 2016. A comparison of the influences of flotation and wet sieving on certain carbonized legume and cereal remains. Acta Botanica Croatica 75(1):144-148.Rossen J. 1999. The Flote-Tech flotation machine: Messiah or mixed blessing? American Antiquity 64(2):370-372.Tanker sley KB, Owen LA, Dunning NP, Fladd SG, Bishop KJ, Lentz DL, and Slotten V. 2017. Micro-flotation removal of coal contaminants from archaeological radiocarbon samples from Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, USA. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 12(Supplement C):66-73.

Quotes by Audre Lorde, Black Feminist Lesbian Activist

Audre Lorde once described herself as a black-lesbian feminist mother lover poet. Born to parents from the West Indies, she grew up in New York City. She wrote and occasionally published poetry and was active in the 1960s movements for civil rights, feminism, and against the Vietnam War. She was a critic of what she saw as feminisms blindness to racial differences and fear of lesbians being involved. She attended Hunter College in New York from 1951 through 1959, working at odd jobs while also writing poetry and earned a masters degree in library science in 1961. She worked as a librarian through 1968, when her first volume of poetry was published. During the 1960s she married Edward Ashley Rollins. They had two children together and divorced in 1970. She was with Frances Clayton, who she met in Mississippi, until 1989 when Gloria Joseph became her partner. She continued her outspoken ways, especially through her poetry, even during her 14-year struggle with breast cancer. Audre Lorde died in 1992. Feminism I am a Black Feminist. I mean I recognize that my power as well as my primary oppressions come as a result of my blackness as well as my womaness, and therefore my struggles on both of these fronts are inseparable. For the masters tools will never dismantle the masters house. They may allow us temporarily to beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change. And this fact is only threatening to those women who still define the masters house as their only source of support. What woman here is so enamored of her own oppression that she cannot see her heelprint upon another womans face? What womans terms of oppression have become precious and necessary to her as a ticket into the fold of the righteous, away from the cold winds of self-scrutiny? We welcome all women who can meet us, face to face, beyond objectification and beyond guilt. For women, the need and desire to nurture each other is not pathological but redemptive, and it is within that knowledge that our real power I rediscovered. It is this real connection which is so feared by a patriarchal world. Only within a patriarchal structure is maternity the only social power open to women. The failure of academic feminists to recognize difference as a crucial strength is a failure to reach beyond the first patriarchal lesson. In our world, divide and conquer must become define and empower. Every woman I have ever known has made a lasting impression on my soul. Every woman I have ever loved has left her print upon me, where I loved some invaluable piece of myself apart from me—so different that I had to stretch and grow in order to recognize her. And in that growing, we came to separation, that place where work begins. Advocating the mere tolerance of difference between women is the grossest reformism. It is a total denial of the creative function of difference  in our lives. Difference must be not merely tolerated, but seen as a fund of necessary polarities between which our creativity can spark like a dialectic.   The love expressed between women is particular and powerful because we have had to love in order to live; love has been our survival. But the true feminist deals out of a lesbian consciousness whether or not she ever sleeps with women. Part of the lesbian consciousness is an absolute recognition of the erotic within our lives and, taking that a step further, dealing with the erotic not only in sexual terms. Poetry and Activism Without community, there is no liberation. When I dare to be powerful—to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid. I am deliberate and afraid of nothing. Who I am is what fulfills me and what fulfills the vision I have of a world. Even the smallest victory is never to be taken for granted. Each victory must be applauded. Revolution is not a onetime event. I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. Life is very short and what we have to do must be done in the now. We are powerful because we have survived. If I didnt define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other peoples fantasies for me and eaten alive. For women, then, poetry is not a luxury. It is a vital necessity of our existence. It forms the quality of the light within which we predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change, first made into language, then into idea, then into more tangible action. Poetry is the way we help give name  to the nameless so it can be thought. The farthest horizons of our hopes and fears are cobbled by our poems, carved from the rock experiences of our daily lives. Poetry is not only dream and vision; it is the skeleton architecture of our lives. It lays the foundations for a future of change, a bridge across our fears of what has never been before. Our poems formulate the implications of ourselves, that we feel within and dare make real (or bring action into accordance with), our fear, our hopes, our most cherished terrors. Attend me, hold me in your muscular flowering arms, protect me from throwing any part of myself away. Our visions begin with our desires. Our feelings are our most genuine paths to knowledge. As we come to know, accept, and explore our feelings, they will become sanctuaries and fortresses and spawning grounds for the most radical and daring of ideas—the house of difference so necessary to change and the conceptualization of any meaningful action. The sharing of joy, whether physical, emotional, psychic, or intellectual, forms a bridge between the sharers which can be the basis for understanding much of what is not shared between them, and lessens the threat of their difference. It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences. In our work and in our living, we must recognize that difference is a reason for celebration and growth, rather than a reason for destruction. To encourage excellence is to go beyond the encouraged mediocrity of our society. If our history has taught us anything, it is that action for change directed against the external conditions of our oppressions is not enough. The quality of light by which we scrutinize our lives has direct bearing upon the product which we live, and upon the changes which we hope to bring about through those lives. Each time you love, love as deeply as if it were forever / Only, nothing is eternal. I write for those women who do not speak, for those who do not have a voice because they were so terrified, because we are taught to respect fear more than ourselves. Weve been taught that silence would save us, but it wont. When we speak we are afraid our words will not be heard or welcomed. But when we are silent, we are still afraid. So it is better to speak. I realize that if I wait until I am no longer afraid to act, write, speak, be, Ill be sending messages on a Ouija board, cryptic complaints from the other side. But the question is a matter of the survival and the teaching. Thats what our work comes down to. No matter where we key into it, its the same work, just different pieces of ourselves doing it. My Black womans anger is a molten pond at the core of me, my most fiercely guarded secret. Your silence will not protect you! For we have been socialized to respect fear more than our own needs for language and definition, and while we wait in silence for that final luxury of fearlessness, the weight of that silence will choke us. We tend to think of the erotic as an easy, tantalizing sexual arousal. I speak of the erotic as the deepest life force, a force which moves us toward living in a fundamental way. The learning process is something you can incite, literally incite, like a riot. Art is not living. It is the use of living. My anger has meant pain to me but it has also meant survival, and before I give it up Im going to be sure that there is something at least as powerful to replace it on the road to clarity. Hopefully, we can learn from the 60s that we cannot afford to do our enemies work by destroying each other. There are no new ideas. There are only new ways of making them felt. Racism The energies I gain from my work help me neutralize those implanted forces of negativity and self-destructiveness that is White Americas way of making sure I keep whatever is powerful and creative within me unavailable, ineffective, and non-threatening. You have to learn to love yourself before you can love me or accept my loving. Know we are worthy of touch before we can reach out for each other. Not cover that sense of worthlessness with I dont want you or it doesnt matter or white folks feel, Black folks do. Black women sharing close ties with each other, politically or emotionally, are not the enemies of Black men. In discussions around the hiring and firing of Black faculty at universities, the charge is frequently heard that Black women are more easily hired than are Black men. As I have said elsewhere, it is not the destiny of black America to repeat white Americas mistakes. But we will, if we mistake the trappings of success in a sick society for the signs of a meaningful life. If black men continue to do so, defining femininity in its archaic European terms, this augurs ill for our survival as a people, let alone our survival as individuals. Freedom and future for blacks do not mean absorbing the dominant white male disease. As black people, we cannot begin our dialogue by denying the oppressive nature of male privilege. And if black males choose to assume that privilege, for whatever reason, raping, brutalizing, and killing women, then we cannot ignore black male oppression. One oppression does not justify another. But, on the other hand, I get bored with racism too and recognize that there are still many things to be said about a Black person and a White person loving each other in a racist society. Black writers, of whatever quality, who step outside the pale of what black writers are supposed to write about, or who black writers are supposed to be, are condemned to silences in black literary circles that are as total and as destructive as any imposed by racism. Intersectionality There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives. Theres always someone asking you to underline one piece of yourself—whether its Black, woman, mother, dyke, teacher, etc.—because thats the piece that they need to key in to. They want to dismiss everything else. We are African women and we know, in our bloods telling, the tenderness with which our foremothers held each other. Black women are programmed to define ourselves within this male attention and to compete with each other for it rather than to recognize and move upon our common interests. I am who I am, doing what I came to do, acting upon you like a drug or chisel or remind you of your me-ness as I discover you in myself. Only by learning to live in harmony with your contradictions can you keep it all afloat. When we create out of our experiences, as feminists of color, women of color, we have to develop those structures that will present and circulate our culture. We cannot continue to evade each other on the deepest levels because we fear each others angers, nor continue to believe that respect means never looking directly nor with openness into another black womans eyes. I remember how being young and black and gay and lonely felt. A lot of it was fine, feeling I had the truth and the light and the key, but a lot of it was purely hell.