Gullah is an African-American language,
mainly spoken along the Southeastern coast of the United States, especially on
the Sea Islands off the coast of South Carolina. The word is also used for people who speak the
language. Ancestors of people who were
brought from West Africa to the West Indies and to America as slaves speak
Gullah today. The language merges
elements from a number of West African languages with elements from English. Gullah has survived largely because of the
geographic isolation of many of its speakers, although the number of people who
speak Gullah is steadily declining as a result of increased contact with other
communities. During the late 17th
century, West Africans who worked as slaves on sugar plantations in the West
Indies developed pidgins. A pidgin is a
simplified language that serves as a means of communication among people who
have no common language, such as the plantation owners and their slaves. Other mixed languages, called Creoles, spoken
in Jamaica, Barbados, and on other islands, influenced the pidgins used in the
West Indies. Beginning in the early 18th
century, many of the slaves were brought from the West Indies to plantations in
the American colonies, where their language was further influenced by the
English dialects of Scottish and Irish settlers. From these various influences, Gullah
developed. Linguists consider Gullah a
Creole-—that is, a pidgin that has become the native language of a group. Like other Creoles, Gullah has a grammatical
consistency and uniform structure, although regional variations exist. Gullah attained Creole status during the
mid-18th century, when the children of people brought from Africa as slaves
learned Gullah as their first language. Gullah’s
vocabulary derives primarily from English, while much of the underlying grammar
has a West African foundation. However,
some African-derived words in Gullah have entered English, including goober,
meaning "peanut" in the Kimbundu language; tote, meaning
"carry" in Kikongo; and hoodoo, meaning "bad luck" in
Hausa. Like many West African languages,
Gullah relies on short, loosely connected sentences that lack many of the
prepositions, conjunctions, adjectives, participles, and adverbs that tie
sentences together in English. Gullah
speakers express different meanings by varying tone and pitch and by using
nonverbal gestures such as body language. Listeners infer relationships between
sentences from individual usage and context. Gullah is spoken with a rolling rhythm and
closely resembles the sounds of Krio, a Creole spoken in Sierra Leone. It incorporates many complex idiomatic
expressions whose meanings may not be readily apparent from their individual
components. For example, the expression
"`E onrabble ‘e mout’ tummuch" literally means, "he unraveled
his mouth too much," or "he was too talkative." Although African American Vernacular English
(AAVE) also has some features of West African languages, AAVE and Gullah differ
in speech patterns and vocabulary. Moreover, whereas Gullah is a Creole, AAVE
is considered a dialect-—that is, a version of a standard language that differs
from that language in pronunciation, grammar, or vocabulary.
The Academy of American Poets, created in
New York City in 1934, awards prizes and fosters the reading of poetry. Link to the 2013 recipients of the Academy of
American Poets Prizes at: http://www.poets.org/
Tokyo’s successful bid to host the 2020 Olympics made much of plans to
re-use venues built for Japan’s last Summer Games. But for Kohei Jinno, redevelopment means
eviction again — just like in 1964. While
much of Japan celebrated Tokyo’s victory at the recent meeting of the
International Olympic Committee in Buenos Aires, 79-year-old Jinno was cursing
his luck. In 1964, his home and business
were torn down to make way for an Olympic park around the main stadium for the
Tokyo Games. Now he has been told he
must move again to make way for the stadium’s redevelopment and expansion in
time for 2020. “I don’t want to see the
Olympics at all,” Jinno said. “Deep
inside, I have a kind of grudge against the Olympics.” The first Tokyo Games marked Japan’s arrival
as a modern country with a roaring economy. It was a chance for Tokyo to shine. Futuristic Olympic venues shot up all over
Tokyo as a bullet train was built, along with a metropolitan highway network
and an airport monorail. The energy and
symbolism could not be missed: Japan had
risen from the ashes of World War II. The
2020 edition is sparking another orgy of infrastructure investment, albeit on a
smaller scale, but still providing a boon to the construction industry. The capital plans to spend around ¥400
billion ($4 billion) on Olympics-related facilities, including the athletes’
village and media centers. Of 35 Olympic
sites in Tokyo, 20 will be newly built — mostly on the fast developing
waterfront — for such sports as swimming, basketball and hockey. Roads will be built or repaired at a cost of
$5.5 billion. Some 85 percent of the
venues will be within 8 km of the $1.1 billion Olympic Village, which will be
build on landfill not far from the upscale Ginza district. Shigemi Sato
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/09/15/national/two-time-evictee-bears-olympic-size-grudge/
In the last two years Peru has over taken Colombia as the number one distributor
of counterfeit United States money.
According to official reports from both Peru and the United States there
has been $103 million in fake American dollars seized in Peru over the past
decade. The Peruvian fake dollar is much
harder to discover among real bills because the Peruvian counterfeiters go the
extra mile and finish their bills by hand and not with the use of an inkjet
printer. The US is only shipped $100 bills, these
bills are easily circulated into store where clerks are not as vigilant about
spotting a fake. Other bills like 10's
and 20's are sent to countries neighboring Peru. Beginning in the early part of 2010 there
have been 296 arrests in
connection with Peruvian counterfeit American bills. Global Post says only two-percent of the
counterfeit bills remain in the United States.
The fake bills are often laundered out and turned into gift cards making
them legitimate forms of currency. The
Peruvian counterfeiting operation has grown so large it has been described as
better and more profitable than the cocaine business. http://www.latintimes.com/articles/8061/20130905/peru-1-source-counterfeit-money-much-more-us-dollar.htm
The most
important base you need to know for computer organization is base 2. We also call this binary, since binary means two valued. The second most important base is base 16 (or
hexadecimal), and the third is base 8 (octal). Beyond that, you don't need to know the other
bases. Definitions:
bit A single binary
digit, that can have either value 0 or 1.
byte 8 bits.
nybble 4 bits.
word 32 bits halfword 16 bits
doubleword 64 bits
The definition of "word" isn't set. It has usually referred to the number of bits used in a register. These days, typical registers store 32 bits. However, already 64 bit architectures are being built.
http://www.cs.umd.edu/class/sum2003/cmsc311/Notes/Data/bitBytes.html
Food and politics
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2003: French fries in the House of
Representatives' cafeterias will now be known as "freedom fries" as
part of a Republican protest at France's opposition to a war on Iraq. Republican
representative Bob Ney, whose committee is in charge of the eateries, said
the action was "a small but symbolic effort to show the strong
displeasure of many on Capitol Hill with the actions of our so-called ally,
France". French toast from now
on will be known as "freedom toast". The move - following the lead of a North
Carolina restaurant - reflects the anti-French sentiment among some lawmakers
who feel President Jacques Chirac is betraying the US by opposing its policy
on disarming Iraq. France has said it
will use its veto to block a second UN resolution to allow war to commence with
Iraq. In February, a fast food restaurant called Cubbie's in
Beaufort, North Carolina renamed its French fries "freedom fries"
also in protest at France's anti-war stance. The owner, Neal
Rowland, said he got the idea from similar protest action against Germany
during World War I, when sauerkraut was renamed liberty cabbage and
frankfurters became hot dogs. http://www.utexas.edu/courses/stross/ant393b_files/freedomfries.htm
In 2006, the House cafeteria menus
were changed back without any announcements.
2012: When The Daily Currant, a
"cross between The Onion, and The Daily Show,".reported that Michelle Bachmann wanted falafel
and other jihadi foods banned from school lunches, the story got picked up
and many people thought that it was real.
The Daily Currant is an English language online satirical newspaper that covers global
politics, business, technology, entertainment, science, health and media. Our mission is to ridicule the timid
ignorance which obstructs our progress, and promote intelligence - which
presses forward.
Q. Are your
news stories real? A. No. Our stories are purely fictional. However they are meant to address real-world
issues through satire and often refer and link to real events happening in
the world. http://dailycurrant.com/about/
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