Saturday, January 25, 2020

Film Analysis: South of the Border

Film Analysis: South of the Border South of the border- Film Analysis Social media has been a great influencer in this present reality. This current generation has been depending so much on the social media to the extent of believing all the things they have been reporting. Recently, a certain new report of a local station about the ‘mysterious disease’ immediately got the attention of the people. The said province in which the disease was found is Pangasinan. After a few moments, a hashtag trended, people were tremendously scared concluding that a prediction was fulfilled. This is an example of how mass media has fed informations to its audiences. Later on, they found out that it was a skin disease which can be cured. Facebook, twitter and instagram are just some of the social networking sites that communicate news and most of the Filipinos are subscribed to them. Imagine how fast these news travel just by clicking the post or tweet button. That button has been an empowerment for an ordinary person to tell the world what is happening. Soc ial media, specifically, the current news programs are the source of our knowledge regarding the current economic status of our country, current social issues which affect our country and other aspects related to the Philippines. A primary reason why Filipinos are really into social media is that they want to be updated and be a part of the hot issues. The film â€Å"South of the Border† exhibits how the mass media influenced the minds of the people. At the start of the film, newscasters are telling the audiences that a certain dictator chews coca everyday. They were pronouncing it like cocoa and considered it as a joke. They said that the leader was a drug addict. Hugo Chavez is the president of Venezuela. He won the 1997 presidential race to a Ms. Universe, in the film the race was coined the Beauty and the Beast. Even though he was imprisoned, the Venezuelan people still believed and elected for him. He aims to fight against corruption and economic inequity. He did what he can to fulfill his promises to the people of Venezuela. However, the US government announced that they are concerned about Venezuela and controlled the media, mostly private media. A businessman in Venezuela is believed to be fit for the position. Chavez claimed that the US government has 3 motives. One of which is oil. Second and third are Saddam and I raq respectively. As shown in the film, Venezuela is the third largest supplier of petroleum. A coup for Chavez was formed. The media and other known printing press have been communicating false information about Chavez. Many people died due to numerous killings. Chavez was captured and imprisoned. A new leader is seated but it is believed that he is a puppet of the US government. The prices of oil and petroleum products, as described in the film, dramatically went down. Hugo Chavez went back to his position due to the insistent public demand of his supporters even the military. The newspapers, news stations and other well-known media companies apologized for the false statements they released. The director, also the narrator and interviewer, Oliver Stone visited other countries in the Latin America. He went to Bolivia and met the president, Evo Morales. Coca leaves is different from cocaine, contrary to what the US citizens believe. Coca will be a drug if it is mixed with other chemicals. Oliver Stone even chewed a few leaves of coca. This product of Bolivia is like a stimulant similar to caffeine. Next stop is Argentina with Cristina Kirchner. In Argentina, there have been five presidents who ruled in just two weeks. She is also the only female leader among the presidents of the Latin America. Her husband, Nestor Kirchner is the ex-president of the Argentina. She shared that unemployment and poverty in Argentina is spread all over the country. his husband also shared that Bush claims that war is the answer to revitalize the economy. Fernando Lugo in Paraguay was also interviewed by Stone. He is a bishop who entered the politics. Another country that he visited is Brazil. Lula da Silva is the president of Brazil. What he wants is for them to be treated equally. He shared that Argentina and Brazil have been trading in their own currency. He also told Stone that all their debts are paid off. The second to the last country Stone visited is the Cuba ruled by Raà ºl Castro. And last but certainly not the least, Ecuador. Like what Silva said, Rafael Correa also aspires for equality. He is worried about the military base of the US in Ecuador. It is quite amusing that a filmmaker would have the courage to do things like this. He aimed to let the people know what kind of leaders these people are. Who are they, really? Are they really dictators? Are our perceptions about them true? What is the current status of each government? Stone showed their point of views regarding the media perceptions about them. The film exposes several issues regarding the conflict between Bush and the Latin American presidents. Hugo Chavez is greatly emphasized on the film. Those presidents in the south are friends. Kirchner even showed a picture of them during an inauguration. This film basically emphasizes the media’s role to what happened to these countries and their presidents. Mass media has been showing and telling a lot of audiences about what is happening in these countries. Graber (2009) claimed that mass media are â€Å"powerful guardians† to people because Americans believe that media should inform them about the current h appenings in the government. During the coup of Chavez, mass media is the main influencer to the behavior of the Venezuelans. They have been feeding the people’s minds with false information about Chavez. The New York Times even apologized for their statement during the coup. Stone described these events as ‘deeply troubling’. At one point, the US government hosted the people involved in the coup, and then they were not involved in the coup. They also stated that there was a resignation not a coup. This, for me, is entirely confusing. The first issue introduced is about the use of drugs by Chavez. The reporters told the audiences how the â€Å"dictator† chewed coca leaves from Bolivia. They referred to him as a drug addict. This is a case in which the media showed how they communicated false information. As I have mentioned in the summary above, coca is just a stimulant like caffeine. They also called Morales as â€Å"Evil Morales† during news segments or frames. These informations are fed to the minds of people. Eventually, these affect the views of people. For the lack of decipher, people will believe what newscasters say, whether truth or not. Chavez in our country is somehow like our late president and now a mayor of Manila, Joseph Estrada. He captured the minds of the people in his presidency. With a slogan of ‘Erap para sa masa’, poor people developed the like for him. They loved him for being concern with the poor. He gave them hope. But after being impeached on the second People Power Revolution, he still won the mayoral election in Manila. Why is this happening? Are we even looking back in the past? I think these are because of our power to speak; the freedom we have empowers us to create our own version of the truth. But this is absurd; each and every one of us deserves and has the right to know the truth, the real truth. We need to decipher whether the media are telling the truth or they are hiding something from us. Another issue present in the film was about the global capitalism. As stated by Robinson (2008), â€Å"The US state is the key instrument of the global capitalist system reproducing, or seeking to reproduce, the global capitalist system and defend the interests of global capital over national capital, and over the globally repressed and exploited sectors and those that would oppose the global capital system† (p. 9). The price of petroleum in Venezuela is relatively high during the time of Chavez but went down after he was imprisoned. This is the primary motive why they hated Chavez. The Bush administration wanted the oil residue in Venezuela since it is a major source of some of their refineries. The lowering of prices in Venezuela will give way to global capitalists. They will import low prices for petroleum which is definitely good for them, obviously. Another controversy is in Bolivia wherein they prevent people from getting water from rain. The water prices are expensive a nd the monopoly of water is getting concerned about people getting water for free. These are just some of the examples of the growing capitalism in this world. We are surrounded with capitalists aiming for the betterment of their business, some, not considering the fact about poverty and other social issues. In the Philippines, Meralco and Maynilad are some examples of monopolists. Recently, there is an issue regarding the increase of prices in the power supply. Many people are complaining about the current increase. Capitalists’ main goal is to have profits and to increase their wealth. The president of Argentina, Kirchner also the former first lady, is the only female person interviewed among the Southern American continent. She claimed that women are always asked about their clothes, jewelries and other things but men are never asked about the same things. Well, media is one of the reasons why we have this notion about women. Sometimes, they show unrealistic and wrong view of women in the society. Women are always described and shown as fashionable, bossy, pushy and extravagant. Men are never like that. In sociology, this is a feminist view. In this certain part inequality arises. Another reason is that maybe because we live in a patriarchal type of community. This gender inequality must be put to a stop. As a woman, this inequality reflects the current perception of people on women. Social media and mass media itself is pervasive enough to affect and influenced the views of people regarding women and their function in the society. The president of Brazil told Stone in his interview that they were worthless; Americans are worthy same with the Europeans but not them. The Marxist view of Sociology shows that there are two classes the oppressed and the oppressor. In this case the oppressed is the Latin America. There is inequality between them. Lula just wants to be treated equally as the United States. There is a growing gap between the US government and the Latin American government. As I view the role of social media or mass media to influencing the views of people to the presidents of the South America, I wondered if the mass media in our country behaves like them. Are our local networks and print media controlled by our government? Are they somehow feeding us false statements regarding the social issues? Do they have biases on the social issues present in this country? These questions are running on my mind right now. According to Gitlin (2003), people are pressed to depend on media too much to bear with the change in this world. My fellow Filipinos are consistently watching news, listening to radio programs and opening their social networking sites accounts. Due to that, they are being updated every hour of the day. The media always create a notion about everything. This information is being fed to us and then creates a so-called truth. The media can also fool and confuse our minds just by showing us ads and commercials. We are now trapped in a world which is shaped by the media. And we are living in a world full of lies, though I am not saying that all that we know are lies. But generally speaking, the media has contributed a lot of benchmarks and notions in our world. They can manipulate our minds. You can fool some of the people all of the time or all of the people part of the time, but you cant fool all of the people all of the time. -Fidel Castro. References: Gitlin, T. (2003). The Whole World is Watching: Mass Media in the Making Unmaking of the New Left. California, United States of America: University of California Press. Graber, D. A. (2009). Mass Media and American Politics (8th ed.). United States of America: SAGE. (Original work published 1980). Haris III, W. E. (2010, October 6). South of the border documentary film review. Retrieved from http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_61299.shtml Reuters (2007, October 28). Fidel Castro pokes fun at George W. Bush. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/10/28/us-cuba-castro-idUSN2843263920071028 Robinson, W. (2008). Understanding global capitalism. The development round table series, 1-26.

Friday, January 17, 2020

Jeepney Racing

Most of the rules are chosen to reflect what the real-world consequences would be of each player action and decision. Abstract games cannot be completely divided from simulations and so games can be thought of as existing on a continuum of almost pure abstraction to almost pure simulation. [1] Technologies such as smart phones have always been a great entertainment and past time to man. In the beginning, cellular phones are used for communication such as making calls and messaging capabilities. As the time goes by, the innovation of cell phones added more PDA-like features and even computer like.The result was the smart phone. Mobile applications are becoming popular when it comes to features. There are many people who are into gaming on their mobile phones, because it is more portable than Personal Computers and Laptops. Mobile Applications now exist in smart phones. [2] There are lots of games genres available now in the market, and one of them is a strategy simulation game. It att empts to copy activities from real world in the form of a game for some purposes like tutorial, exercise, training, analysis or prediction.Jeep Racing is a Strategy simulation game that can be played in single or multi- player game. We will use some Metro manila landmarks for the background of the game. It will load and unload passengers in order to gain points but the player should follow the traffic rules and regulation. It will cause a deduction to the points if he commits any traffic violation. In multi-player game, the first player to finish the goal wins. Project Description According to the article of Nellie entitled Jeep: Blessing or Curse?He stated that jeep nowadays instead of being the blessing that it had been in the past 60 years, has become an archaic relic of the past, an invention that had its day, and should be encased in a museum of Philippine history. Due to lack of discipline and knowledge f and obedience to traffic rules and regulations and signs, it is the main cause of the horrible Metro Manila traffic. [4] The project introduces a game about how being discipline drivers and passengers would help each and every one of us.The player should follow all the Traffic Rules or else he/she will have a violation and deduction from his points. The player should also follow the maximum capacity of passenger. There will be a specific Jeep bay for loading and unloading of the passengers. Project Objectives: General objective To develop a strategy simulation game, multi-player and single-player for android hat foresees the possible effect of traffic when not following rules and regulation and at the same time inform the players the current traffic situation here in metro manila.Specific objective To provide information to the players about importance and meaning of traffic road signs by showing banners periodically. To inform the drivers and passenger on what are the possible effect of traffic in different situations. Target Audience The project's tar get audience will be the passengers of the Jeep and those people who owned a public and private vehicle. Our target audience will be people king 17 and above. The group decided with the age of 17 and above, because these are the people who usually use Jeep as their transportation in school, works and etc.In these ages, the group can provide the importance and meaning of traffic road. Significance of the Study Due to traffic problems in the Philippines that becoming worst everyday especially when it's rush hour, the group have decided to develop a game wherein the users would be able to identify some of the causes of traffic. The users would be able to realize how important being a discipline Filipino and how one Filipino can change meeting really big in his/her small action such as being a good follower to the traffic rules, regulations and signs.Jeep Racing was mainly created to provide information for drivers and passengers about the traffic rules and regulation. Users of this gam e will not only have fun playing but also be knowledgeable what to do in different situations when they are in the road. Scope and Limitations The game will be developed on an Android platform using Construct 2 on 2- Dimensional graphics. The game will be made to give information to the players especially to the passengers and drivers about the traffic rules and regulation.It can be played in a single player and multilayer game mode. In single player mode, the goal of the player is to get as many scores as he can by loading and unloading passenger without committing Accidents or Traffic violations. Multi-player mode will be played on two different devices, View shared and Wi-If Operational. There will be a time limit for the multi-player mode wherein each player must acquire scores by loading and unloading passengers. Committing any violations or accidents will deduct from there points.The maximum capacity of the passenger is 16 and the maximum violation is 3. The traffic rules and regulations included in our game can be seen in the appendix section. Minimum System Requirements: Processor 1 GHz Single Core Memory IAMB RAM Display size 3. 0 inches Resolution 280 Device Type Smart phone Operating System Jelly Bean Android Touchstones Capacitive, Multi-touch Conceptual Framework Review of Related Literature All the related information and games in an android platform will be discussed in this chapter.The information that the group will gather from these different games, will help us analyze each development of these games and apply it to our project. Three perspectives on strategy game design – Sorer Johnson, Brad Mir and Keith Burn are three different experts shared their knowledge about the significance in the design of strategy games, from transparency to decision-making and creating player investment and attachment. For Sorer Johnson, players of a strategy games should choose precisely and throw away their unexpected and random events, and various outc omes and breadth winning conditions.Even though there are a lot of outcomes players have, what important the most is what's on the player's mind, that they truly understand the rules and can able to think them clearly and that they agonize all their inputs and outcomes. Keith Burn was best known for phone rocklike 100 Rogues. For him, the main producer of value in strategy games is interesting decisions. His goal is to provide value quickly to players. He said that if players gave their time make sure that they won't regret spending it playing your game or they should be completely rewarded.Brad Mir wants to create a high degree of character attachment with the help of mechanics in Massive Chalice, because he was influenced by strategy games that include elements of character progression. He wanted to reduce problems to its simple essentials with 100 Rogues, but he doesn't know how to start doing it. What he did is that he started with a rocklike genre and then added tactics to the genre's kit design. He said that you can't Just add interesting decisions to a system; interesting decisions are a property of a really strong-built system.Players can be attached to the players that they're playing in strategy games and make personal stories with them. Losing their characters is a meaningful risk for them. [5] Related games Shopping Street This is a strategy game in which you will build your own mall. Every store has a capacity of customers who can shop. You can upgrade your store so many customers can shop at the same time. A customer who wants to shop in that store should wait. Relation of this game to our game is that there are also numbers of people who can enter a store. 6] Crazy Traffic Jam – This strategy simulation game comes with 3 levels of difficulty; you need to handle the traffic without committing any collisions. [7] Racing Motto This strategy game is a fast paced racing game. You never dare drive so fast in the real world. Control your Motto w ith incredible fast speed during traffic rush time! [8] Our game has the same view with this game which is the bird's eye view. We adopted the road of this game to our project.In order to win the highest score in this game, you have to achieve the longest distance without committing any accidents. In our game, you have to achieve the longest distance so you can gain points without violating any traffic rules and regulation. Temple Run This strategy game is fast paced racing games wherein you need to drive as fast as possible without committing accidents. [9] In this game you have to survive all the challenges that have been waiting for you in order to have a high score.The longer he distance that you run, the more points you gain. If the player fails to survive all the challenges, the demonic monkeys will eat him. It has the same view when the player swipe to the left or right. In our game, if the player taps the left or right button, the street or the background will change Just li ke how background of the temple run changes. Racing Cars ID A strategy racing game that will test your driving skills in difficult levels. In this game, players need to collect coins to upgrade their cars.The player should also avoid obstacles and other cars. When the player hits his car with other and wasn't able to void the obstacles, his health will be deducted. Just like in our game, if the player committed a violation, he will gain 1 x. When the player got 3 x, the game is over. In this game, the player needs to keep his car undamaged in a given time to win the game. Bench mark Description Jeep Racing Shopping Streets Sprites Jeepers, Cars, Passengers, Traffic Rules and Regulations Customers, Shops, Motor, Cars Cars Characters, Rope, Coins.Monkey Controls Tap, Swipe Tap -rap, Tilt Swipe Tap , tilt Scoring Achieve the farthest distance, load and unload the passengers on the proper loading ND unloading area Attract customers by building malls Get the farthest distance Number of C ars Successfully crossed the intersection Drive as fast as possible and get the farthest distance Acceleration Tapping the accelerator button. Holding the screen. Capacity Passengers Customers Game Mode Single Player, 2 Player Single Player Methodology This chapter tackles about how the application works.It contains game story, game play, game rationality and game assembly. Game story discusses the story from start to end of the game including the plot of the story. It contains different figures hat represent the flow of the application, visualized corrections of the game and its architecture. Gamely tackles about how the game will be played. Basically, gamely holds the actions that can be done by the player in the game to reach the objective of the game. Game rationality deals about the logic of the game which is how the game flows from the point where the application is started.Game assembly tackles about the requirements of the application and how the game responds to the user in puts. Gamely and Mechanics In single player mode, the player must acquire as many score as possible by adding and unloading passengers on the right bay without committing any violations and accidents will cause deduction on points and game over. In multi-player mode, the 2 players will play on different devices. The players will acquire points by loading and unloading passengers on a given time limit. The higher score will win the game.Pointing System Points Speed of the Jeep 1 pit per kip Loading passenger 100 points Unloading passenger Deduction Violations Unload passenger on the wrong bay. Accident/collision Game over. Software Methodology Planning phase It is the start of program development. In this phase, the group compiled and analyzed the research in related games and used the gathered information to be applied in the testing phase. The group checked for forums related to our game and listed things that we should avoid applying to our application.Analysis phase The group res earched about related game reviews. The game reviews will help the group determine significant features that can be included in the game and that will make the game better than any other. Design phase The group will focus our graphics and interface to what our target users want. The group will follow the game flow that the group has created. In the game, the group will give some trivia related to it and used Philippine based characters and plots. The group will also use Photos for the images and backgrounds.The group will code all the designs generated from the proponents of the game flow which must be followed sequentially. Implementation After our game has undergone series of tests and code refinements, we will now deploy the software into the Android smartened and tablet. We are going to upload the game on Google Play Store for primary resource. Users may download the game through the website and port it in their own gadget. Verifications will be performed o the testers to make s ure that the said features are working.Testing phase It is the part the group will initiate the beta testing where the group will play the game and test all the possible commands and inputs at the game. Any detected bugs or errors will be immediately fixed or use an error handling. Evaluation phase The group will start to initiate the alpha testing. It is where the group will release the created game to a select group of people and the players of the game will be given an evaluation form in a format of user acceptance test questionnaires. This will determine if the game will need some changes.

Thursday, January 9, 2020

My Life At The Navy - 967 Words

My life for the last couple of decades was full of order and routine I had come to expect. I joined the Navy in 1998 and since then I had seen the world and done many things I thought were challenging, triumphing over every single obstacle thrown my way. I had seen the towers fall, stopped those that would support terrorism in their tracks, hunted pirates, and conducted covert operations in Iraq with our nations heroes, the U.S. Navy SEALS. By 2012 I was on my way to be selected as Chief Petty Officer in the Navy, 14 years down, and six to go until I could retire with full benefits. I met my future wife Christina and my life was on track, or so I thought. At the time, my self-concept was of a man who knew how to multitask, lead, and†¦show more content†¦A truck had attempted to pass two other vehicles using the shoulder along side the fast lane. We were in the slow lane three lanes away. To make a long story short, the truck careened across the freeway, hit my left rear bump er, we went into a spin while the truck hit the guard rail on our right side, flipped over, and our cars locked together like a metal on metal dog fight. We finally slid across the road after doing what seemed like three or four spins and slammed into the highway divide. The driver of the pickup died as a result of not wearing a seat belt and we found out later he had a blood alcohol level of 0.20, we now were victims of a drunk driver. This began both my trial and my call to adventure. I found my mentor where I had least expected it, in my wife. I suffered from a TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury) and back injury as a result of the accident. I found words of encouragement and advice from her. She had an accident before we met and had to go through many changes in her own life that I didn’t understand at the time. She was also my significant other. 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Wednesday, January 1, 2020

Using Quotations in Essays - a Guide

If you want to make an impact on your reader, you can draw on the potential of quotations. The  effective use of quotations  augments the power of your arguments and makes your essays more interesting. But there is a need for caution! Are you convinced that the quotation you have chosen is helping your essay and not hurting it? Here is a checklist to ensure that you are doing the right thing: What Is This Quotation Doing in This Essay? Let us begin at the beginning. You have a chosen a quotation for your essay. But, why that specific quotation? A good quotation should do one or more of the following: make an opening impact on the readerbuild credibility for your essayadd humormake the essay more interestingclose the essay with a point to ponder upon. If the quotation does not meet a few of these objectives, then it is of little value. Merely stuffing a quotation into your essay can do more harm than good. Your Essay Is Your Mouthpiece Should the quotation speak for the essay or should the essay speak for the quotation? Quotations should add impact to the essay and not steal the show. If your quotation has more punch than your essay, then something is seriously wrong. Your essay should be able to stand on its own legs; the quotation should merely make this stand stronger. How Many Quotations Should You Use in Your Essay? Using too many quotations is like having several people shouting hoarse on your behalf. This will drown your voice. Refrain from overcrowding your essay with words of wisdom from famous people. You own the essay, so make sure that you are heard Dont Make it Look Like You Plagiarized Are there any expected standards for using quotations in an essay? Yes, there are. The most important one is that you should not give the impression of being the author of the quotation. That would amount to plagiarism. Here are a set of rules to clearly distinguish your writing from the quotation: Sometimes, you describe the quotation in your own words before using it. In this case, you should use a colon (:) to indicate the beginning of the quotation. Then begin the quotation with a quotation mark (). After you have completed the quotation, close it with a quotation mark (). Here is an example:Sir Winston Churchill made a witty remark on the attitude of a pessimist: A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.Sometimes the sentence in which the quotation is embedded does not describe the quotation, but merely introduces it. In this case, do away with the colon. Simply use the quotation marks. Here is an example:Sir Winston Churchill once said A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.As far as possible, you should mention the author and the source of the quotation. For instance:In Shakespeare’s play As You Like It, Touchstone says to Audrey in the Forest of Arden The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool. (Act V, Scene I).Ensure that the source of your quotation is authentic. Also, verify the author of your quotation. You can do so by looking up the quotation on authoritative Web sites, such as this one. But for formal writing, do not rely on just one Web site. Blend Quotations In An essay can seem quite jarring if the quotation does not blend in. The quotation should naturally fit into your essay. No one is interested in reading quotation-stuffed essays. Here are some good tips on blending in your quotations: You can begin your essay with a quotation that sets off the basic idea of the essay. This can have a lasting impact on your reader. In the introductory paragraph of your essay, you can comment on the quotation if you like. In any case, do ensure that the relevance of the quotation is communicated well.Your choice of phrases and adjectives can significantly boost the impact of the quotation in your essay. Do not go with monotonous phrases like:George Washington once said...If your essay merits the use of powerful speech, consider using emphatic expressions like:George Washington rocked the nation by saying ... Using Long Quotations It is usually better to have short and crisp quotations in your essay. However, if you are convinced that a particular long quotation is more effective, make sure that you follow the necessary rules. When is it Appropriate to use Long Quotations in Your Essay?:  It is your judgment call. Let me explain. Long quotations must be used sparingly as they tend to weigh down the reader. However, there are times when your essay has more impact with a longer quotation. If you have decided to use a long quotation, consider paraphrasing, as it usually works better. But, there is a flip side to paraphrasing too. Instead of the paraphrase, if you use a direct quotation, you will avoid misrepresentation. As you can see, the decision of using a long quotation is not trivial. Once again, it is your judgment call. Punctuating Long Quotes:  Long quotations should be set off as block quotations. Formatting block quotations should be as per the guidelines that you might have been provided. If there are no specific guidelines, you can follow the usual standard - if a quotation is more than three lines long, you block it. Blocking implies indenting it about half an inch on the left. Often, setting up a long quotation is warranted. Writing a brief introduction displays your understanding of the subject. In other cases, you might need to provide a complete analysis of the quotation. In this case, it is best to state the quotation and follow it with the analysis, rather than the other way around Using Cute Quotes Some students choose a cute quotation first, and then try to plug it into their essay. As a consequence, such quotations drag the reader away from the essay. Quoting poetry:  Quoting a verse from a poem can add a lot of charm to your essay. I have come across writing that acquires a romantic edge merely by including a poetic quotation. If you are quoting from poetry, keep in mind that: A small extract of a poem, say about two lines long, requires the use of slash marks (/) to indicate line breaks. Here is an example: Charles Lamb has aptly described a child as A childs a plaything for an hour;/ Its pretty tricks we try / For that or for a longer space; / Then tire, and lay it by. (1-4) If you use a single line extract of a poem, punctuate it like any other short quotation without the slashes. Quotation marks are required at the beginning and at the end of the extract. However, if your quotation is more than three lines of poetry, I would suggest that you treat it like you would have treated a long quotation from prose. In this case, you should use the block quote format. Does Your Reader Understand the Quotation? Do you use quotations in your essays? Surely you follow the expected standards. But, that may not be enough. Having followed all the standards and punctuation, you must ask the critical question: Do readers understand the quotation and its relevance to my essay? If the reader is re-reading a quotation, just to understand it, then you are in trouble. So when you choose a quotation for your essay, ask yourself the following questions: Is this too convoluted for my reader?Does this match the tastes of my audience?Is the grammar and vocabulary in this quotation understandable?