From the Paper
"Culture in India has a peculiar association with the religious traditions of India. The dominant and archaic "faith", Hinduism, acts upon the national culture, which in turn influences the various religions, including Hinduism itself. The Bactrian Greeks, the Moghuls, and the English have all come and gone, but none have been able to fundamentally alter the relationship and influence Hinduism has on Indian culture. The values and beliefs of ancient Hindus have existed in the subcontinent since the beginning of prehistory and have tempered all religions that have been borne in or transported to India. We find almost perfect equality of women in Buddhist philosophy....Why is there such hypocrisy within these religions? Why do they advocate one thing and exercise another? "

Tags:hindu, sati, muslim, islam, tradition, religion

From the Paper
"The world of myth, symbolism, and ritual is a world of metaphor that explains the human story. It is a story of the relationship between the known aspects of the natural world and the unknown dimensions of that same natural world. The known aspects of the natural world are the ones that humans have immediate contact with. These known aspects encompass the sense-related and material realities of the surrounding environment. Included in this known world is the landscape, the vegetation, the animals, and the human inhabitants of the region. The unknown aspects of the natural world are the ones that lie within the scope of the human senses but do not originate in the immediate and material world. ...."

Tags:america, ancient, art, latin, mesoamerica, ritual, ruins, symbolism

From the Paper
"By using new and updated material from the archaeological field, combined with the recent studies done in the field of linguistics, Coe has been able to create a plausible 'history' of the Maya people, while at the same time creating a new model that portrays a very complex social and economic system not believed to have existed in earlier research. Coe's revised edition also dispels the notion that the complex centers were primarily used for religious or priestly functions. Coe instead sees these centers as also being the hub for politics, trade, and social functions. Added to this history are the artistic forms expressed in the Maya Murals, burial sites, architecture, ceramics, clothing and dated monuments, all of which gives insight as well as documentation to the lives and movements of the humans that inhabited the many areas of Mesoamerica as early as eleven to fourteen thousand years ago. By tracing the various art forms displayed on these archaeological items along with the decipherable hieroglyphic writings, Coe has been able to offer a realistic progression of the Maya civilization through its Pre-Classic, Classic, and Post-Classic eras. Included in this progression is the outside influences of different languages and styles of artistic expression, whether these influences came through the process of trade, exchange, or war. But before Coe examines these three stages of Maya development, he first explores the possible human lifestyle prior to these stages, thus setting the stage for the development of the obvious and intricate architecture that is found in Mesoamerica today."

Tags:america, ancient, latin, mesoamerica, myth, ritual, ruins, symbolism

Abstract
This essay looks at the modern Republic of Turkey and human rights abuses of the Kurdish people and suggest measures the Turkish government should take in order to be eligible to join the EU.

From the Paper
"Since the 1920's, the Turkish response to expressions of Kurdish identity whether it was PKK terrorism or any nonviolent actions such as publishing Kurdish newspapers " has often been excessive, resulting in violations of the most basic human rights. Right after the establishment of modern Turkey, in 1924, Ataturk banned all Kurdish schools, publications, associations and any use of the Kurdish language"."

Tags:expression, freedom, human, islam, kurds, life, minorities, public, religion

Abstract
This paper examines the relationship between culture and identity. Language, religion and aesthetics are used to show how culture gives a people their identity. The paper is written from an African perspective with the help of books written by African authors.

From the Paper
"According to the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, culture is the customs, beliefs, art, music and all the other products of human thought made by a particular group of people at a particular time. Culture can also be defined as a configuration of learned ideas and solutions to conflicts in human society. Culture can be divided into two namely material culture and non-material culture. "

Tags:aesthetics, art, language, music, religion, sociology

Abstract
This paper examines the culture of the Hopi people with a focus on their history the problems the Hopi now face regarding acculturation into American culture.

From the Paper
"The Hopis were first contacted by foreigners when Spanish conquistadors discovered their villages in 1540. In 1629, Spanish missionaries began to settle on Hopi land and tried in vain to convert the Indians to the Catholic faith. In protest, the Hopis joined with neighboring tribes facing the same persecution in the Pueblo Rebellion of 1680, causing the destruction of several Spanish missions throughout the southwest. When the Spanish returned to conquer the Rio Grande pueblos nine years later they did not venture as far west as Hopi territory. The Hopis lived virtually unbothered for more than a century until they became part of the United States at the end of the Mexican War in 1848. As Americans began to settle the southwest, the question of land rights arose. In 1882 President Chester A. Arthur established a 3,863-square-mile reservation for the Hopis (Hieb 1994). Now under U.S. government control, a culture that had remained practically unchanged for centuries began to feel the strong influence of an encroaching and far bigger society called America. "

Tags:acculturation, american, globalization, hopi, native, culture, tradition, custom

Abstract
This paper deals with how music is used symbolically in James Weldon Johnson's "Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man," and the ways in which the narrator, consciously or unconsciously, involves music in his decision-making processes.

From the Paper
"Probably one of the most integral elements to the story of James Weldon Johnson's Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man is music. At almost every point in the novel where there is emotional peak, music is involved in the decision-making process in some way. This is especially true in relation to the narrator's own emotions, which are seldom the focus of the story except when highlighted by talk of music. In fact, music could be argued to be the key to the narrator's personal fulfillment, a fulfillment which he is unable to realize by the end of the novel due to his own much glossed-over shortcomings."

Tags:coloured, fulfillment, happiness, james, johnson, music, weldon

Abstract
This paper takes a look at racism-- what it is and what is the root of its power.

From the Paper
"Racism is leftover baggage from the slave trade and slavery. In the year 2002 there are people who believe that there is no longer any racism and there is only one race, the human race. Many of the people that accept these views as true, that it is only the human race, are a part of the majority group in the United States, which are white people. The majority group of people uses the ideology of racism to justify the injustices that are set upon the minority groups. A few of the injustices that they try to justify are how people differentiate between the Black community, versus the White community, in terms of the job opportunities and the types of training that are received. Therefore, racism is based on ideology or belief systems."

Tags:sociology, black, white, slavery, injustice, minority, group, ideology, minority

Abstract
This paper explains that the antagonistic view regarding the phenomenon of Jihad is too shallow, inaccurate and unreasonable. The author explains that it is a grim fact that these views prevail as opposed to the true meaning of Jihad. Endnotes.

From the Paper
"The inception of every single religion has experienced forces working against its expansion. Consequently, there have been instances where most major religions have had to use force in order to survive, prevail or exist at all for that matter. We can look up the Christian crusades or the Samurai war crimes or the Six-day war between Israel and the Arabs or even the kamikaze pilots of the Shinto faith and the list goes on and on. Although we cannot discount the political and social undercurrents involved in these wars, anyone with little common sense can arrive at the conclusion that the core basis of these wars was religion. Islam is no exception in this regard. History, especially from the western perspective is riddled with the Muslim conquests of Spain and India. Islam (at least in the west) has been labeled as the modern version of barbarianism. This dim sightedness is a result of several factors originating from the Muslims themselves and eventually developing into the increasingly popular concept that Islam in essence is the Mecca of le diable a quatre. If we take a closer look at the Muslim warfare, one word that comes up every time is Jihad. "

Tags:islam, jahada, muhammed, arab, muslim, religion, non, violent

Abstract
This paper shows how the biography of Malcolm X by author Alex Haley helped the author understand the true derivation of racism.

From the Paper
" The constant references to racism by Malcolm X made me curious about the concept of race. I discovered that almost 200 years ago, Johann Friedrick Blumenbach, a German naturalist and the founder of Anthropology, decided to use differences in head shape and skin color to classify mankind into five different races. Although there has never been any scientific evidence to support "racial inheritance" by blood type, mankind has clung to Blumenbach's concept of people being of different races."

Tags:african, allah, american, anthropology, black, blumenback, color, discrimanation, elijah, equality, god, islam, mecca, mohammed, muslims, nation, nationality, peace, race, racism, Haley, religion, skin, slavery