Sustainable Development And Its Definitions

Sustainable Development And Its Definitions Sustainable development was defined by (Brundtland, 1987) as a development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own need. Economists generally accepted and supported Brundtland definition of sustainable development. Pearce barbier (blueprint for Sustainable Economy, 2000) also defines sustainable development as development that last. They also said that future generations should be entitled to at least the same level of economic well-being as is currently available to the present generation. It can also be defined as meeting human fundamental needs while preserving the life-support systems of the planet Earth. This is a scientific perspective on the sustainable development relation between nature and society. The main pillars of sustainable development are: Economic development Social development and Environmental development The United Nations 2005 World Summit Outcome Document refers the above pillars as the interdependent and mutually reinforcing pillars of sustainable development. There has been an indigenous controversy over the main pillars of sustainable development through various International Forums such as United Nation Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues and the Conversion of Biological Diversity that there are four pillars of sustainable development which they called the fourth one , Cultural development. Also, The Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity (UNESCO, 2001) further detailed the concept by saying that the cultural diversity is as necessary for humankind as biodiversity is for nature. This basically becomes one of the roots of development understood not simply in terms of economic growth, but also as a means to achieve a more satisfactory intellectual, emotional, moral and spiritual existence. The universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity stated that Cultural diversity is the fourth policy area of sustainable development. This image represents the schemes of sustainable development. Source (Wikipedia encyclopedia on Sustainable Development). Barriers to achieving sustainable development in developing countries. Sustainable development has been widely promoted as a holisticconcept which aims or targets to integrate social, economicand cultural policies to ensure high-quality growth. However, there are barriers combating the implementation of sustainable development in developing countries. These barriers are: Economic / financial barriers Social barriers Political barriers HIV and Injecting Drug use Poor monitoring and evaluation system Institutional barriers Cultural barriers Trade barriers Poverty and disease Climate change Economic and financial barriers: Economists observed that the dominating development model tends to focus on economic growth as precedence rather than peoples rights or welfare, and environmental processes and limits. Various contributors supported economic growth coming first in developing countries, especially least-developed countries (LDCs), and concluded that investment in environmental protection should be left to a later stage of development, essentially accepting environmental degradation to meet immediate needs. In other words, there was a controversy by other researchers saying that the future generations ability to enjoy an acceptable standard of living would be on shambles if due attention were not immediately paid to social and environmental aspects as well as economic. This they said requires shift in the worldview from treating the environment as part of the economy to treating the economy as part of the environment; strategically this means the economy should be adapted to ensure environmental services are maintained. Some contributors recommended developed capitalist societies to act quickly to become more sustainable. Other researchers underscored the imperative for developing countries not to follow the western models of unsustainable development. Three basic constraints to financing sustainable development (SD) are: Competing priorities for limited resources, particularly in LDCs Undelivered pledges made at the international conferences to finance SD. Externalities, such as increased oil prices, conflict, and natural disasters that alter the development priorities of many countries. Initiatives to overcome economic and financial barriers In other to achieve economic growth without threatening social development and environmental resources, new and different vehicles for growth must be oriented to different country situations. Governments should be responsible for market-led problems with incentive for the private sector to become problem-solvers, and not polluters. There is need to shift the incentive and motivating structure for farmers around the world. Policies makers should promote agricultural production that is based on significantly higher labor inputs per area and significantly more diverse production streams. There is need to reform the calculation of economic growth and removal of weapons-related cost from GDP would provide a strong indication of relative spending toward sustainable development to politicians. Justifying the need to abandon linear system of industrial production based on total exploitation of natural resources, over production, and waste generation in favor of a circular system of production using clean technologies and the elimination of waste resources. Social barriers Population growth, paired with unsustainable consumption and production patterns among the wealthy, are the biggest social challenges to achieving sustainable development in the world and developing countries. Absent of a significant change in human behavior, sustainability will not be potential. There are other social barriers which are: The marginalization of the poor and entrenched inequities Limited awareness about sustainable development Environmental issues among both politicians and the wider public fragmented civil society Inadequate interaction between civil society and government Insufficient incentives to for the private sector to pursue sustainable development Initiatives to overcome the social barriers. Need for stronger policies to address income disparity and population growth. The introduction of programmes to create awareness and build capacity in the field of sustainable development among the general public can assist to the change in behavior and lifestyle that is needed to achieve sustainability. Efforts to increase scientific capacity will take place within a context of different funding patterns (which involves philanthropic foundations, business, and governmental and intergovernmental bodies), environmental concerns, and research orientations. Governments must foster their relationships with NGOs and other civil society organizations. Also , civil society must take on a great role in policy making and implementation. Participation of civil society in social programmes and related decision making process would ensure accountability; this will help in creating condition for receiving financial aid or UN assistance. Concrete partnership among national and local governments, the grassroots, private sector, civil society and development actors should be developed. Political barriers: Inadequate economic, social and environmental methods for policies, plans and projects are the major barrier combating the implementation of sustainable development in developing world. Researchers believed that governments are stuck in the old development paradigm ,emphasizing economic growth and believing that industrial countries have made no significant effort to change their patterns in production and consumption, thereby threatening global resources. To meet sustainable development objectives requires genuine political and institutional will at all levels of government in all countries, developed and developing. Nevertheless, Corruption, ineffective government and weak inactive law enforcement are hindrances to achieving genuine sustainability. Moreover, lack of information and relevant data availability, limited capacity of policy and decision-makers were identified as reasons for the limited cooperation of governments. The outcome of the discussion by the World Summit on Sustainable Development that was held in South Africa in 2002 was that sustainable development has not been able to evolve out of its environmental roots and that greater focus on climate change may be pulling the issue towards a purer environmental direction rather than integrating sustainable development perspective. They also warned that SD is being replaced by climate change on the political agenda, leaving the rest of the sustainable development agenda forgotten. Lack of coordination to integrate the three pillars of sustainable development has been a major challenge at all levels. At the global level, the United Nations failed to join together its efforts to promote a genuinely sustainable development. Campaigns for integrating many factors are themselves not harmonized, but try to meet different purposes at different times. It was noted that the sectionalized approach to the MDGs has dissolved the broader context of development, and MDG 7 on sustainable development has been largely neglected in favor of other goals rather than being a basis for achieving the rest of the MDGs. More consistent policies to support SD are needed at the international level, including within the United Nations system. At the regional level, regional agreements on SD and mechanisms for their implementation are not stable. There was an agreement that, at national level, a multi-disciplinary approach to governance is needed rather than the persisting tendency for different line ministries, departments and agencies to act without a clear framework for coordination across sectors. Sectorial systems of governance create and perpetuate silo thinking and behavior. It was observed that there is basically no effective national forum for strategic planning on pro-poor economic growth, social development, environment and climate change for developing countries. For instance, inCentral Asia, it was noted that few countries have policies linking environment, poverty, trade and social development, that few environmental policies target equity or poverty issues, and health policies are still mainly formulated in isolation without blending to related sectors. Also at the institutional level, responsibility for the implementation of sustainable development is generally assigned to the Ministry of Environment, Environmental Protection Agency or the tantamount, which traditionally receive little attention and a insufficient budget. Environmental agency would find it difficult to take a balanced approach to economic growth, social development and environmental protection. Poor community involvement was noted as a final major political barrier to achieving sustainable development goals. A top-down approach by centralized authorities often imposes projects and programmes on local governments. Moreover, policy making and implementation does not take into consideration the grassroots need or involve the lower levels of government. Initiatives to overcome political barrier In combating political barrier, sustainable development strategies must be streamlined, but also applied with more severity. The need for environmental institutions to blend and work with other (non-environmental) institutions. Also all ministries must cooperate and work together to achieve an integrated sustainable development for their countries. Stringent efforts should be directed to encroach structural problems that deform both developmental and environmental prospects by focusing on key injustices, notably in trade, environment and climate change. There should be an analytical work on advanced financing for SD. Poverty and environment linkages must be undertaken to further incorporate economic, social and environmental factors. Basic components like sensitization of political leaders, private sector involvement, and participation of local communities need to be concrete in developmental approach. Capacity-building is also necessary across the board. Progress in sustainable developmental goals involves strong, innovation-driven science and technology policies. HIV and Injecting Drug Use Poverty and disease in relation to HIV and Drug Use frustrates the implementation of sustainable development in many developing countries. In many developing countries, HIV epidemics between injecting drug users (IDUs) are preceding larger epidemics in the broader population. Notwithstanding recent expansion of responses, within individual countries, these tend to be several years behind the pace and scale of the actual epidemic. These are factors closely linked to development. The current policy environment makes it difficult for community-based programmes to prevent HIV between injecting drug users. Deficiency in policy dialogue between sectors of government responsibility for reactions to HIV and drug use There is an economic, social and political breakdown which leads to increase in drug injecting, needle sharing and, consequently HIV. Inadequate community capacity, in terms of skills, resources and experience to respond to HIV among IDUs. Injecting drug users, especially women, being demonized for their drug use, rather than supported, placing them at particular risk of both human rights abuses and HIV infection Donor agencies and countries alike failing to recognize the long-term threat to development posed by HIV and injecting drug use. Initiatives to overcome HIV and Injecting Drug Use UNDP and partner agencies, especially UNAIDS and UNDCP, are in a unique and appropriate position to take the lead in the planning and implementation of responses in the following areas: Policy dialogue and reform Programme development and monitoring Creating awareness and understanding of the development implications of HIV and IDU Powering community capacity to respond Addressing gender considerations Responding to legal , ethical and human right issues Also there is need to implement the MDGs in all developing countries especially on reducing poverty and ensuring good health. Poor monitoring and evaluation systems A basic problem is lack of specific targets (globally, nationally and at local level), measurement and data to track progress, resulting in a lack of information available to decision-makers. It is suggested for strengthening monitoring and evaluation of sustainable development strategies in order to establish a dynamic improvement process, with an objective of increasing their effectiveness. It is recommended that governments should turn up deeper and assess the socio-economicimpacts of developmental projects, rather thanthe outcomealone. Initiatives to overcome poor monitoring and evaluation systems Co-ordination of data within which the vast amount of data can be easily accessed. Countries specific knowledge bases are needed to guide decision making. This is a comprehensive mechanism for monitoring the outcomes of interventions that feeds into subsequent planning processes. National research and development systems need to be strengthened, as well as south-south and south-north knowledge sharing and management. Institutional barriers Institutional barriers as a result of lack of institutional experience to operate all the mechanism of democratic system has been combating and frustrating sustainable development in many developing countries. Since the end of the civil war, developing countries have made a striking movement towards democratic capitalism as the operative model of governance. Moreover in making that transition, many countries discovered that they lack institutional experience to operate all the mechanism of democratic system. They discovered that they have never witness free and fair elections with a full ballot of candidates from multiple parties. In other hand, they were not prepared to run a parliament, also not prepared to have journalists and broadcasters looking at the problems of government in a very public way. Initiatives to overcome institutional barrier Generating enough scientific capacity and institutional support in developing countries is particularly urgent as they are most vulnerable to the multiple stresses arising from rapid, simultaneous changes in social and environmental system. USAID and other governmental donors have facilitated institutional building to help these countries to help these countries fix all the mechanism operating in an open democratic society. Sponsoring democratic programs, introducing new approaches to crisis management and conflicts analysis to assist opposing parties in resolving their peacefully and within the framework that a democratic system provides. Trade barriers Basically developing countries find the EUs strict food safety requirements disruptive to trade. In addition to sanitary standards, new technical product specifications and industrial norms might obstruct the exports of developing countries .The EU introduced a series of directives varying from technical specifications for cars, weighing machines and toys, to the compulsory labeling of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), eggs and voluntary eco-labels. In addition to Community standards, there are regulations at the member-state level. However the level to which this continual flow of new standards helps to restrict imports from developing countries is not properly known. It is clear, however, that WTO notification leads to protests by developing countries .Some of the developing countries expressed their concern, regarding new EU directives on discarded electronic apparatuses proposed by the Commission in 2000 Initiatives to overcome trade barriers Trade liberalization including the removal of existing distortion in international trade must be pursued to support sustainable development policies in developing countries. Sustainable development requires a dynamic international economy and an open, equitable, secure, non-discriminatory and predictable multilateral trading system to support sound domestic economic and environmental policies in both developed and developing countries. Trade and environment should be reciprocally supportive in the pursuit of sustainable development. Conclusion In achieving sustainable development, the 3pillars of SD should be integrated. Progress in sustainability will require fostering problem -driven , interdisciplinary research; building capacity for research; creating coherent system of research planning , operational monitoring , assessment , and application; and providing reliable long term financial support. The need to generate adequate scientific capacity and institutional support in developing countries is particularly urgent as they are most vulnerable to multiple stresses that arise from rapid, simultaneous changes in social and environmental systems. REFERENCES Achieving Sustainable Development, an e-journal of the U.S Department of State.April 2002, volume 1, Num 1. Barbier, E.,1987.The Concept of Sustainable Economic Development.Environmental Conservation, 14(2):101-110 Promoting trade for sustainable development by UNCTAD Secretariat (www.unctad.org/en/docs/tdxibp10_en.pdf) Pearce, D., A. Markandya and E. Barbier,1989.Blueprint for a green economy,Earthscan, London, Great Britain UNDP, 2006. Making Progress on environmental sustainability. Lessons and recommendations from a review of over 150 MDG country experiences (www.undp.org/fssd/report) Summary of e -discussion on achieving sustainable development, April 2008. (http://www.undg.org/docs/8885/eDiscussion-on-Achieving-Sustainable-Development.htm) Sustainability science , science 292.5517 (April 27 ,2001):p 641. Working together towards SD (http://www.oecdwash.org/DATA/DOCS/working_together.pdf) World Summit Outcome Document 2005,World Health Organization, 15 September 2005

How does John Steinbeck use language in different ways in “Of mice and men?” Essay

John Steinbeck uses language in different ways throughout the story. It creates imagery and helps you understand the story even better. Also it indicates differences in characters and the setting of the story. Steinbeck uses non-standard English for dialogue. Lennie is portrayed to be a slow childish character; he acts like a child asking George lots of questions about there ‘dream’. Lennie repeats this quite a lot â€Å"George how longs it gonna be till we get the rabbits?† This is Lennies dream to have rabbits, and Steinbeck repeats this dream it’s a kind of rhythm throughout the book. Also Lennie is more of a listener he doesn’t speak much to other characters apart from George unless he has too. He asks George frequently to â€Å"tell† him â€Å"about that place† where they are planning to move to when they have enough money, Lennie listens to George as though he was a parent or guardian and gets excited while George tell him. This gives us the impression that George looks after Lennie and keeps him safe. Steinbeck makes George seem rather parent like. George is a talker, he tells the story of him and Lennie moving away to a place of there own often to Lennie. We get the impression that George sometimes gets rather sick of Lennie as he repeats things and asks George to tell him â€Å"the story† we can see this by â€Å"I jus’ tol’ you, jus’ las’ night† this is wrote in an American way of speaking, he uses imagery as when you read this you say it to yourself in your head and you can imagine the way George is speaking. Also George seems to swear quite a lot and mainly towards Lennie where he calls him a â€Å"crazy bastard† this use of profanity and pronunciation portrays George to be rather uneducated, we can expect this as Steinbeck was a farm labourer for a time. The story was set in the 1930’s black people where very disrespected and used for slaves in these days. Also they wouldn’t be referred to as ‘black people’ it would be much more racial as we can see from what they call Crooks â€Å"nigger†. When crooks addresses Slim he calls him â€Å"Mr slim† none of the other characters address him in this way, this shows us that he has respect for Slim and that he believes Slim is a man of importance rather like the boss. Slim is portrayed to be â€Å"almighty† we get the impression that Slim is looked up to by the other men, they respect him and when they need answers or advice it is usually Slim to whom they turn to. As when Curley and Lennie fight it is Slim who everyone turns to. George asks him â€Å"Slim will we get canned now?† This shows he has power and the men believe he can take authority in situations like this. Steinbeck makes the characters dialogue very brief and it lacks detail they say what is necessary without detail, whereas when Steinbeck is describing a character or a place he uses descriptive language and Standard English, also he uses American dialect for certain words. Throughout the book there is few long sentences he uses short sentences. The way he describes places and characters is very different to the dialogue, he uses imagery in both but in different ways in dialogue he uses the shortening of words and there simple ways to help us imagine, whereas in his exposition he describes things in much detail and uses colours effectively. Also for certain words he uses an American dialect to replace them.

Is Google Making Us Stupid Essay

In his article, â€Å"Is Google Making Us Stupid,† Nicholas Carr, a former executive editor of the Harvard Business Review and a member of the steering board for the World Economic Forum’s cloud computing project, criticizes the overall impact of the internet, as a whole, on the human process of thought, comparing his past level of conception to â€Å"a scuba diver in a sea of words† whereas his current understanding simply â€Å"zip[s] along the surface† (Carr 68). Carr targets the prominent internet search engine as the black sheep for web user’s dwindling in capacity to comprehend and concentrate on high-brow literature. However, due to the fact that the objective of the corporation is to ultimately be monetarily successful, Google’s approach to providing proficient, while immediate, information is not based upon their own preference, but rather that of its’ consumers. Based on trends on college campuses, Scott Carlson, a journalist for The Chronicle, finds the number of students using libraries has drastically decreased over the years, using the convenient â€Å"‘virtual library’† at their disposal instead (Carlson 1). This infers research found on the internet is the same, and or suffice to that acquired from a hard-back encyclopedia, periodical, etc. Therefore, while I agree with the general trend of decreased absorption Carr suggests, the internet still contributes to human potential for critical, deep thought through the application of habituation and the numerous online resources offering the equivalent of any printed scholarly work. My inclination to agree with Carr’s theory is solely based on his reference to the work of Maryanne Wolf, a developmental psychologist, who elicits that the skill of deciphering symbolic characters into an understood language is not instinctive (Carr 69). Instead, in parallel to any activity one would like to develop themselves in, â€Å"practicing the craft of reading play[s] an important part in shaping the neural circuits inside our brains† (69). The many interruptions encompassing the internet, such as info-thickets, e-mails, headlines, blog posts, etc., undermine the brains’ ability to transfer newly learned information into your long-term memory. Multitasking by attempting to read bits and pieces of a handful of information online is not beneficial and rather proves to be a less efficient way of preserving knowledge. According to the Social Science Research Network, in a study of the brain’s ability to process various data, switching mindsets proved to incite mental exhaustion. By analyzing the affects of these assorted changes in five separate experiments, the researcher found that â€Å"switching mindsets is an executive function that consumes self-regulatory resources and therefore renders people relatively unsuccessful in their self-regulatory endeavors,† simply concluding that it is in one’s best interest to â€Å"try to change hats as infrequently as possible† (Hamilton 10). Like muscle memory, the brain retains its ability to understand complex literature material only if training, or reading, is continuous. Yet, skipping out on the workouts of â€Å"immersing [oneself] in a book†¦or getting caught up in the narrative† will overtime deteriorate this strength, depreciating a powerful recollection into a weak grasp (Carr 67). Though I concede that skimming online undermines one’s effort behind scholarly reading, I still insist that the internet provides more benefits than detriments. The nature of technology, in general, broadens our potential to change our environment and has historically provided the power for civilizations to develop. From the late 21st century to the present the World Wide Web has been that force and statistics show its presence directly draws a parallel to an improvement of our brainpower. According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, seventy six percent of technology stakeholders and critics disagree with Carr and accept the statement: â€Å"people’s use of the Internet has enhanced human intelligence; as people are allowed unprecedented access to more information they become smarter and make better choices† (Anderson 1). While thirty two percent of professionals, like Association for Computing Machinery U.S. Public Policy Councilman Gene Spafford, think â€Å"most writing online is devolving toward†¦quick, throwaway notes with abbreviations and threaded references,† the overwhelming majority agrees that by 2020 the internet will have boosted and advanced our ability to comprehend, inscribe and exchange knowledge (Anderson 10). These statistics are vital because they shed light on the long term positive effects of Google and the Internet, altering the premises people have established prior to research. The argument of advertisements being distracting and undermining the reader’s focus is a valid point. Carr describes these commercials as overwhelming â€Å"the medium’s content with hyperlinks, blinking ads, and other digital gewgaws,† which scatter our interest and distribute our attentiveness (Carr 71). However, the law of habituation refutes this theory, stating that our response toward a stimulus lessens with increased exposure. According to the Harris Poll, sixty three percent of U.S adults completely ignore banner and search engine advertisements and ninety one percent ignore nearly all commercialized announcements (Braverman 1). The perception Carr creates of ads, specifically hyperlinks, is misleading for he depicts the internet user to have very little say, if any, and is often coerced into utilizing the resource. In reality, rather than â€Å"propelling you toward [related works],† they merely serve as suggestions used at the expense of the consumer (Carr 67). What Carr does not draw attention to throughout his article is the fact that internet tools, like cookies, and hyperlinks, are solely approaches supporting the web’s convenience. Therefore, a correlation may exist between the surfing of the internet and lower reading comprehension and concentration levels, but there is no way to measure an online reader’s intent and correspond it to the depth of what they read. Carr is mistaken because he overlooks the serving nature of the internet and attempts to draw parallels between Google and Taylorism. The â€Å"industrial choreography† of Taylorism suggests that in order to achieve maximum results, an individual system of work must be established (71). By drawing this comparison, he utterly disregards human ingenuity, depicting internet users as cookie cutters following â€Å"the perfect algorithm† to suit our requests (72). As Peter Norvig, Google Research Director, conveys, â€Å"Taylorism shifts responsibility from worker to management, institutes a standard method for each job/Google does the opposite, shifting responsibility from management to the worker, encouraging creativity in each job† (Anderson 2). While Carr presents a suitable case to support his dilemma, his tendency to prove the null hypothesis of Google is overly pessimistic. His argument that the long term influence of the internet on our comprehension and concentration will be damaging is blemished. Although researching online may not be traditional, exposure to information we intentionally choose to look at only leads to obtained knowledge we did not know before. I italicize intentionally to make a point: the medium of information people use is based on their preference. When discussing reading over scholarly literature versus scanning for a quick answer, the fact is both are optional at the disposal of the consumer. In response to advertisements being distracting, not only are there web sites containing few, if any, but humans generally ignore them as well. Thus, if it were definitively true that the intelligence Google provides was overall harmful, the blame could not be put on the corporation. Instead, the people whom the business adhere to are at fault. Because of these reasons, and the strong correlation between the internet’s unlimited amount of knowledge and improving intellect, Google and the Web as a whole are large contributors to human potential. Works Cited Braverman, Samantha. â€Å"Are Advertisers Wasting Their Money?† PR Newswire. Harris Interactive, 3 Dec. 2010. Web. 23 Sept. 2012. Carr, Nicholas. â€Å"Is Google Making Us Stupid?† The New Humanities Reader. Ed. Richard E. Miller and Kurt Spellmeyer. 4th ed. Boston: Wadsworth, 2012. 67-74. Print. Carlson, Scott. â€Å"Technology As Students Work Online, Reading Rooms Empty Out –Leading Some Campuses to Add Starbucks.† The Chronicle. The Chronicle, 16 Nov. 2001. Web. 23 Sept. 2012. Hamilton, Ryan, Kathleen Vohs, Tom Meyvis, and Anne-Laure Sellier. â€Å"Being of Two Minds: Switching Mindsets Exhausts Self-Regulatory Resources.† Social Science Research Network. Social Science Electronic Publishing, 18 Dec. 2010. Web. 23 Sept. 2012. Rainie, Lee, and Janna Anderson. â€Å"Future of the Internet IV.† Pew Internet & American Life Project. Pew Research Center, 19 Feb. 2010. Web. 23 Sept. 2012.

Julia Ward Howe Biography

Known for: Julia Ward Howe is today best known as the writer of the Battle Hymn of the Republic. She was married to Samuel Gridley Howe, educator of the blind, who was also active in abolitionism and other reforms. She published poetry, plays and travel books, as well as many articles. A Unitarian, she was part of the larger circle of Transcendentalists, though not a core member. Howe became active in the womens rights movement later in life, playing a prominent role in several suffrage organizations and in womens clubs. Dates:  May 27, 1819 - October 17, 1910 Childhood Julia Ward was born in 1819, in New York City, into a strict Episcopalian Calvinist family. Her mother died when she was young, and Julia was raised by an aunt. When her father, a banker of comfortable but not immense wealth, died, her guardianship became the responsibility of a more liberal-minded uncle. She herself grew more and more liberal—on religion and on social issues. Marriage At 21 years old, Julia married the reformer Samuel Gridley Howe. When they married, Howe was already making his mark on the world. He had fought in the Greek War of Independence and had written of his experiences there. He had become the director of the Perkins Institute for the Blind in Boston, Massachusetts, where Helen Keller would be among the most famous students. He was a radical Unitarian who had moved far from the Calvinism of New England, and Howe was part of the circle known as the Transcendentalists. He carried religious conviction in the value of the development of every individual into work with the blind, with the mentally ill, and with those in prison. He was also, out of that religious conviction, an opponent of slavery. Julia became a Unitarian Christian. She retained until death her belief in a personal, loving God who cared about the affairs of humanity, and she believed in a Christ who had taught a way of acting, a pattern of behavior, that humans should follow. She was a religious radical who did not see her own belief as the only route to salvation; she, like many others of her generation, had come to believe that religion was a matter of deed, not creed. Samuel Gridley Howe and Julia Ward Howe attended the church where Theodore Parker was minister. Parker, a radical on womens rights and slavery, often wrote his sermons with a handgun on his desk, ready if necessary to defend the lives of the runaway slaves who were staying that night in his cellar on their way to Canada and freedom. Samuel had married Julia, admiring her ideas, her quick mind, her wit, her active commitment to causes he also shared. But Samuel believed that married women should not have a life outside the home, that they should support their husbands and that they should not speak publicly or be active themselves in the causes of the day. As director at Perkins Institute for the Blind, Samuel Howe lived with his family on campus in a small house. Julia and Samuel had their six children there. (Four survived to adulthood, all four becoming professionals well known in their fields.) Julia, respecting her husbands attitude, lived in isolation in that home, with little contact with the wider community of Perkins Institute or Boston. Julia attended church, she wrote poetry, and it became harder for her to maintain her isolation. The marriage was increasingly stifling to her. Her personality was not one which adjusted to being subsumed in the campus and professional life of her husband, nor was she the most patient person. Thomas Wentworth Higginson wrote much later of her in this period: Bright things always came readily to her lips, and a second thought sometimes came too late to withhold a bit of a sting. Her diary indicates that the marriage was violent, Samuel controlled, resented and at times mismanaged the financial inheritance her father left her, and much later she discovered that he was unfaithful to her during this time. They considered divorce several times. She stayed, in part because she admired and loved him, and in part because he threatened to keep her from her children if she divorced him - both the legal standard and common practice at that time. Instead of divorce, she studied philosophy on her own, learned several languages - at that time a bit of a scandal for a woman - and devoted herself to her own self-education as well as the education and care of their children. She also worked with her husband on a brief venture at publishing an abolitionist paper, and supported his causes. She began, despite his opposition, to get more involved in writing and in public life. She took two of their children to Rome, leaving Samuel behind in Boston. Julia Ward Howe and the Civil War Julia Ward Howes emergence as a published writer corresponded with her husbands increasing involvement in the abolitionist cause. In 1856, as Samuel Gridley Howe led anti-slavery settlers to Kansas (Bloody Kansas, a battlefield between pro- and anti-slavery emigrants), Julia published poems and plays. The plays  and poems further angered Samuel. References in her writings to love turned to alienation and even violence were too clearly allusions to their own poor relationship. When the American Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act—and Millard Fillmore as President signed the Act—it made even those in Northern states complicit in the institution of slavery. All U.S. citizens, even in states that banned slavery, were legally responsible to return fugitive slaves to their owners in the South. The anger over the Fugitive Slave Act pushed many who had opposed slavery into more radical abolitionism. In a nation even more divided over slavery, John Brown led his abortive effort at Harpers Ferry to capture arms stored there and give them to Virginia slaves. Brown and his supporters hoped that the slaves would rise in armed rebellion, and slavery would end. Events did not, however, unfold as planned, and John Brown was defeated and killed. Many in the circle around the Howes were involved in the radical abolitionism that gave rise to John Browns raid. There is evidence that Theodore Parker, their minister, and Thomas Wentworth Higginson, another leading Transcendentalist and associate of Samuel Howes, were part of the so-called Secret Six, six men who were convinced by John Brown to bankroll his efforts which ended at Harpers Ferry. Another of the Secret Six, apparently, was Samuel Gridley Howe. The story of the Secret Six is, for many reasons, not well known, and probably not completely knowable given the deliberate secrecy. Many of those involved seem to have regretted, later, their involvement in the plan. Its not clear how honestly Brown portrayed his plans to his supporters. Theodore Parker died in Europe, just before the Civil War began. T. W. Higginson, also the minister who married  Lucy Stone  and Henry Blackwell in their  ceremony asserting womens equality  and who was later a discoverer of  Emily Dickinson, took his commitment into the Civil War, leading a regiment of black troops. He was convinced that if black men fought alongside white men in the battles of war, they would be accepted as full citizens after the war. Samuel Gridley Howe and Julia Ward Howe became involved in the  U.S. Sanitary Commission, an important institution of social service. More men died in the Civil War from disease caused by poor sanitary conditions in prisoner of war camps and their own army camps than died in battle. The  Sanitary Commission  was the chief institution of reform for that condition, leading to far fewer deaths later in the war than earlier. Writing the Battle Hymn of the Republic As a result of their volunteer work with the  Sanitary Commission, in November of 1861 Samuel and Julia Howe were invited to Washington by President Lincoln. The Howes visited a Union Army camp in Virginia across the Potomac. There, they heard the men singing the song which had been sung by both North and South, one in admiration of John Brown, one in celebration of his death: John Browns body lies amouldering in his grave. A clergyman in the party, James Freeman Clarke, who knew of Julias published poems, urged her to write a new song for the war effort to replace John Browns Body. She described the events later: I replied that I had often wished to do so.... In spite of the excitement of the day I went to bed and slept as usual, but awoke the next morning in the gray of the early dawn, and to my astonishment found that the wished-for lines were arranging themselves in my brain. I lay quite still until the last verse had completed itself in my thoughts, then hastily arose, saying to myself, I shall lose this if I dont write it down immediately. I searched for an old sheet of paper and an old stub of a pen which I had had the night before, and began to scrawl the lines almost without looking, as I learned to do by often scratching down verses in the darkened room when my little children were sleeping. Having completed this, I lay down again and fell asleep, but not before feeling that something of importance had happened to me. The result was a poem, published first in February 1862 in the Atlantic Monthly, and called Battle Hymn of the Republic. The poem was quickly put to the tune that had been used for John Browns Body —the original tune was written by a Southerner for religious revivals—and became the best known Civil War song of the North. Julia Ward Howes religious conviction shows in the way that Old and New Testament Biblical images are used to urge that people implement, in this life and this world, the principles that they adhere to. As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free. Turning from the idea that the war was revenge for the death of a martyr, Howe hoped that the song would keep the war focused on the principle of the ending of slavery. Today, thats what Howe is most remembered for: as the author of the song, still loved by many Americans. Her early poems are forgotten—her other social commitments forgotten. She became a much-loved American institution after that song was published -- but even in her own lifetime, all her other pursuits paled besides her accomplishment of one piece of poetry for which she was paid $5 by the editor of Atlantic Monthly. Mothers Day and Peace Julia Ward Howes accomplishments did not end with the writing of her famous poem, The Battle Hymn of the Republic. As Julia became more famous, she was asked to speak publicly more often. Her husband became less adamant that she remain a private person, and while he never actively supported her further efforts, his resistance eased. She saw some of the worst effects of the war—not only the death and disease which killed and maimed the soldiers. She worked with the widows and orphans of soldiers on both sides of the war, and realized that the effects of the war go beyond the killing of soldiers in battle. She also saw the economic devastation of the Civil War, the economic crises that followed the war, the restructuring of the economies of both North and South. In 1870, Julia Ward Howe took on a new issue and a new cause. Distressed by her experience of the realities of war, determined that peace was one of the two most important causes of the world (the other being equality in its many forms) and seeing war arise again in the world in the Franco-Prussian War, she called in 1870 for women to rise up and oppose war in all its forms. She wanted women to come together across national lines, to recognize what we hold in common above what divides us, and commit to finding peaceful resolutions to conflicts. She issued a  Declaration, hoping to gather together women in a congress of action. She failed in her attempt to get formal recognition of a Mothers Day for Peace. Her idea was influenced by Ann Jarvis, a young Appalachian homemaker who had attempted starting in 1858 to improve sanitation through what she called Mothers Work Days. She organized women throughout the Civil War to work for better sanitary conditions for both sides, and in 1868 she began work to reconcile Union and Confederate neighbors. Ann Jarvis daughter, named Anna Jarvis, would of course have known of her mothers work, and the work of Julia Ward Howe. Much later, when her mother died, this second Anna Jarvis started her own crusade to found a memorial day for women. The first such Mothers Day was celebrated in West Virginia in 1907 in the church where the elder Ann Jarvis had taught Sunday School. And from there the custom caught on—spreading eventually to 45 states. Finally the holiday was declared officially by states beginning in 1912, and in 1914 the President, Woodrow Wilson, declared the first national  Mothers Day. Woman Suffrage But working for peace was also not the accomplishment which eventually meant the most to Julia Ward Howe. In the aftermath of the Civil War, she, like many before her, began to see parallels between struggles for legal rights for blacks and the need for legal equality for women. She became active in the  woman suffrage movement  to gain the vote for women. T. W. Higginson wrote of her changed attitude as she finally discovered that she was not so alone in her ideas that women should be able to speak their minds and influence the direction of society: From the moment when she came forward in the Woman Suffrage Movement ...  there was a visible change; it gave a new brightness to her face, a new cordiality in her manner, made her calmer, firmer; she found herself among new friends and could disregard old critics. By 1868, Julia Ward Howe was helping to found the New England Suffrage Association. In 1869 she led, with her colleague  Lucy  Stone, the  American Woman Suffrage Association  (AWSA) as the suffragists split into two camps over black versus woman suffrage and over state versus federal focus in legislating change. She began to lecture and write frequently on the subject of woman suffrage. In 1870 she helped Stone and her husband, Henry Blackwell, found the  Womans Journal, remaining with the journal as an editor and writers for twenty years. She pulled together a series of essays by writers of the time, disputing theories that held that women were inferior to men and required separate education. This defense of womens rights and education appeared in 1874 as  Sex and Education. Later Years Julia Ward Howes later years were marked by many involvements. From the 1870s Julia Ward lectured widely. Many came to see her because of her fame as the author of the  Battle Hymn  of the Republic; she needed the lecture income because her inheritance had finally, through a cousins mismanagement, become depleted. Her themes were usually about service over fashion, and reform over frivolity. She preached often in Unitarian and Universalist churches. She continued to attend the Church of the Disciples, led by her old friend James Freeman Clarke, and often spoke in its pulpit. Beginning in 1873, she hosted an annual gathering of women ministers, and in the 1870s helped to found the Free Religious Association. She also became active in the womans club movement, serving as president of the New England Womens Club from 1871. She helped found the Association for the Advancement of Women (AAW) in 1873, serving as president from 1881. In January 1876, Samuel Gridley Howe died. Just before he died, he confessed to Julia several affairs hed had, and the two apparently reconciled their long antagonism. The new widow traveled for two years in Europe and the Middle East. When she returned to Boston, she renewed her work for womens rights. In 1883 she published a biography of Margaret Fuller, and in 1889 helped bring about the merger of the AWSA with the rival suffrage organization, led by  Elizabeth Cady Stanton  and  Susan B. Anthony, forming the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). In 1890 she helped to found the General Federation of Womens Clubs, an organization which eventually displaced the AAW. She served as director and was active in many of its activities, including helping to found many clubs during her lecture tours. Other causes in which she involved herself included support for Russian freedom and for the Armenians in the Turkish wars, taking once again a stand that was more militant than pacifist in its sentiments. In 1893, Julia Ward Howe participated in events at the Chicago Columbian Exposition (Worlds Fair), including chairing a session and presenting a report on Moral and Social Reform at the Congress of Representative Women. She spoke at the to the  1893 Parliament of the Worlds Religions, held in Chicago in conjunction with the  Columbian Exposition. Her topic, What is Religion? outlined Howes understanding of general religion and what religions have to teach each other, and her hopes for interfaith cooperation. She also gently called for religions to practice their own values and principles. In her last years, she was often compared to Queen Victoria, whom she somewhat resembled and who was her senior by exactly three days. When Julia Ward Howe died in 1910, four thousand people attended her memorial service. Samuel G. Eliot, head of the American Unitarian Association, gave the eulogy at her funeral at the Church of the Disciples. Relevance to Womens History Julia Ward Howes story is a reminder that history remembers a persons life incompletely. Womens history can be an act of remembering—in the literal sense of re-membering, putting the parts of the body, the members, back together. The whole story of Julia Ward Howe has not even now, I think, been told. Most versions ignore her troubled marriage, as she and her husband struggled with traditional understandings of the wifes role and her own personality and personal struggle to find herself and her voice in the shadow of her famous husband. Im left with questions to which I cannot find answers. Was Julia Ward Howes aversion to the song about John Browns body based on an anger that her husband had spent part of her inheritance secretly on that cause, without her consent or support? Or did she have a role in that decision? Or was Samuel, with or without Julia, part of the  Secret Six? We dont know, and may never know. Julia Ward Howe lived the last half of her life in the public eye primarily because of  one poem  written in the few hours of one gray morning. In those later years, she used her fame to promote her very different later ventures, even while she resented that she was already remembered primarily for that one small accomplishment. What is most important to the writers of history may not be necessarily the most important to those who are the subject of that history. Whether it was her peace proposals and her proposed  Mothers Day, or her work on winning the vote for women—none of which were accomplished during her lifetime—these fade in most histories beside her writing of the  Battle Hymn of  the Republic. This is why womens history often has a commitment to biography—to recover, to re-member the lives of the women whose accomplishments may mean something quite different to the culture of their times than they did to the woman herself. And, in so remembering, to respect their efforts to change their own lives and even the world. Source Hungry Heart: The Literary Emergence of Julia Ward Howe: Gary Williams. Hardcover, 1999.Private Woman, Public Person: An Account of the Life of Julia Ward Howe from 1819-1868: Mary H. Grant. 1994.Julia Ward Howe, 1819 to 1910: Laura E. Richards and Maud Howe Elliott. Reprint.Julia Ward Howe and the Woman Suffrage Movement: Florence H. Hull. Hardcover, Reprint.Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory: A Biography of Julia Ward Howe: Deborah Clifford. Hardcover, 1979.Secret Six: The True Tale of the Men Who Conspired with John Brown: Edward J. Renehan, jr. Trade Paperback, 1997.