Parable
A parable is a succinct, didactic story, in prose or verse that illustrates one or more instructive lessons or principles. It differs from a fable in that fables employ animals, inanimate objects, or forces of nature as characters, whereas parables have human characters. A parable is a type of analogy; some scholars of the canonical gospels and the New Testament apply the term "parable" only to the parables of Jesus, though, not a common restriction of the term. Parables such as "The Prodigal Son" are central to Jesus's teaching method in the canonical narratives and the apocrypha; the word parable comes from the Greek παραβολή, meaning "comparison, analogy." It was the name given by Greek rhetoricians to an illustration in the form of a brief fictional narrative. Parables are used to explore ethical concepts in spiritual texts; the Bible contains numerous parables in the Gospels section of the New Testament. These are believed by some scholars to have been inspired by a form of Hebrew comparison.
Examples of Jesus' parables include the Prodigal Son. Mashalim from the Old Testament include the parable of the ewe-lamb and the parable of the woman of Tekoah. Parables appear in Islam. In Sufi tradition, parables are used for imparting values. Recent authors such as Idries Shah and Anthony de Mello have helped popularize these stories beyond Sufi circles. Modern parables exist. A mid-19th-century example, the Parable of the broken window, criticises a part of economic thinking. A parable is a short tale, it sketches a setting, describes an action, shows the results. It may sometimes be distinguished from similar narrative types, such as the allegory and the apologue. A parable involves a character who faces a moral dilemma or one who makes a bad decision and suffers the unintended consequences. Although the meaning of a parable is not explicitly stated, it is not intended to be hidden or secret but to be quite straightforward and obvious; the defining characteristic of the parable is the presence of a subtext suggesting how a person should behave or what he should believe.
Aside from providing guidance and suggestions for proper conduct in one's life, parables use metaphorical language which allows people to more discuss difficult or complex ideas. Parables express an abstract argument by means of using a concrete narrative, understood; the allegory is a more general narrative type. Like the parable, the allegory makes a unambiguous point. An allegory may have multiple noncontradictory interpretations and may have implications that are ambiguous or hard to interpret; as H. W. Fowler put it, the object of both parable and allegory "is to enlighten the hearer by submitting to him a case in which he has no direct concern, upon which therefore a disinterested judgment may be elicited from him..." The parable is more condensed than the allegory: it rests upon a single principle and a single moral, it is intended that the reader or listener shall conclude that the moral applies well to his own concerns. Medieval interpreters of the Bible treated Jesus' parables as allegories, with symbolic correspondences found for every element in his parables.
But modern scholars, beginning with Adolf Jülicher, regard their interpretations as incorrect. Jülicher held that Jesus' parables are intended to make a single important point, most recent scholarship agrees. Gnostics suggested that Jesus kept some of his teachings secret within the circle of his disciples and that he deliberately obscured their meaning by using parables. For example, in Mark 4:11–12: And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables. A parable is like a metaphor in that it uses concrete, perceptible phenomena to illustrate abstract ideas, it may be said that a parable is a metaphor, extended to form a brief, coherent narrative. A parable resembles a simile, i.e. a metaphorical construction in which something is said to be "like" something else. However, unlike the meaning of a simile, a parable's meaning is implicit. Akhfash's goat – a Persian parable The parables of Ignacy Krasicki: Abuzei and Tair The Blind Man and the Lame The Drunkard The Farmer Son and Father The parables of Jesus The Rooster Prince – a Hasidic parable Amplification Exemplification Jewish Encyclopedia: Parable Catholic Encyclopedia: Parable Spiritual Parables Secular Parables
Sports betting
Sports betting is the activity of predicting sports results and placing a wager on the outcome. The frequency of sports bet upon varies by culture, with the vast majority of bets being placed on association football, American football, baseball, track cycling, auto racing, mixed martial arts, boxing at both the amateur and professional levels. Sports betting can extend to non-athletic events, such as reality show contests and political elections, non-human contests such as horse racing, greyhound racing, illegal, underground dog fighting. Sports bettors place their wagers either through a bookmaker/sportsbook, or illegally through run enterprises; the term "book" is a reference to the books used by wagebrokers to track wagers and debts. Many legal sportsbooks are found online, operated over the Internet from jurisdictions separate from the clients they serve to get around various gambling laws in select markets, such as Las Vegas, Nevada, or on gambling cruises through self-serve kiosks, they take meaning the bettor must pay the sportsbook before placing the bet.
Illegal bookies, due to the nature of their business, can operate anywhere but only require money from losing bettors and don't require the wagered money up front, creating the possibility of debt to the bookie from the bettor. This creates a number of other criminal elements, thus furthering their illegality. Sports betting has resulted in a number of scandals in sport, affecting the integrity of sports events through various acts including point shaving, spot-fixing, bad calls from officials at key moments, overall match fixing. Examples include the 1919 World Series, the alleged illegal gambling of former MLB player Pete Rose, former NBA referee Tim Donaghy. Moneyline bets do not have a spread or handicap, require the chosen team to win the game outright; the favoured team pays lower odds than does the underdog, thus, it acts as an enticement to take the underdog for a better payout. Sometimes a bettor may couple this type of bet on the favored team to increase the payout of a parlay. Spread betting are wagers.
The spread, or line, is a number assigned by the bookmakers which handicaps one team and favors another when two teams play each other and one is perceived as being more to win. The favorite "takes" points from the final score and the underdog "gives" points; this number can be in increments of half-a-point though few sports have.5 point scoring For example, before game 5 of the 2012 NBA Finals, the Miami Heat were expected to beat the Oklahoma City Thunder. The line read: Miami -3, Oklahoma City +3. To determine who wins against the spread, the line is either added or subtracted from a team's final score. In the above example, if the bettor chose Miami, he would subtract 3 points from Miami's final score and compare that to Oklahoma City's final score. If taking Oklahoma City, he will add 3 points to Oklahoma City's final score. For him to win his bet, Miami would have to win the game by 4 points or more, and if a bettor took Oklahoma City, they would have to lose by less than 3 points. If the final adjusted score is a tie, the bet is considered a push.
This is the most common type of bet in American sports betting. Total bets are wagers made based on the total score between both teams. Example, if an MLB game has a total of 10.5, an over bettor will want the combined total to be greater, the opposite for a bettor taking the under. If the combined total is the same as the proposed total, the bet is a push. Proposition bets are wagers made on a specific outcome of a match not related to the final score of a statistical nature. Examples include predicting the number of goals a star player scores in an association football match, betting whether a player will run for a certain number of yards in an American football game, or wagering that a baseball player on one team will accumulate more hits than another player on the opposing team. Parlays. A parlay involves multiple bets that rewards successful bettors with a greater payout only if all bets in the parlay win. A parlay can be as many as the bookmaker will allow; the possible payout of the parlay is determined by the combined likelihood of all bets placed.
A parlay of riskier bets will pay greater than a parlay of more bets. Teasers. A teaser is a parlay that gives the bettor an advantage at a lower, but still positive, payout if successful; the bettor selects the sport, number of games, number of points given. If the bettor takes two NBA games at +6.5 it will adjust the individual bets at that rate. So a bet on a 3-point underdog at +3 will become a bet at +9.5 points, for favorites, it will change a 3-point favorite at -3 to +3.5 points. Although the rules to win his bet are the same as a parlay, he is paid less than a regular parlay due to the increased odds of winning. If bets. An if bet consists of at least two straight bets joined together by an if clause which determines the wager process. If the player’s first selection complies with the condition the second selection will have action. Run line, puck line, or goal line bets; these are wagers offered as alternatives to moneyline wagers in baseball, hockey, or soccer, respectively. These bets feature a fixed point spread that adjusts payouts based on the handicap
Harvard Business Review
Harvard Business Review is a general management magazine published by Harvard Business Publishing, a wholly owned subsidiary of Harvard University. HBR is headquartered in Brighton, Massachusetts. HBR's articles cover a wide range of topics that are relevant to various industries, management functions, geographic locations; these focus on areas including leadership, organizational change, strategy, marketing and managing people. Harvard Business Review has published articles by Clayton M. Christensen, Peter F. Drucker, Michael E. Porter, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, John Hagel III, Thomas H. Davenport, Gary Hamel, C. K. Prahalad, Vijay Govindarajan, Robert S. Kaplan, Rita Gunther McGrath and others. Management concepts and business terms such as balanced scorecard, core competence, information technology, strategic intent, globalization, marketing myopia, glass ceiling were all first given prominence in HBR. Harvard Business Review's worldwide English-language circulation is 250,000. HBR licenses its content for publication in thirteen languages besides English: Arabic, French, Hebrew, Italian, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish, Taiwanese.
For the first time in its 93-year history, Harvard Business Review has developed a product targeted at early career professionals which focuses on the needs of a regional market: India. HBR Ascend is the first platform from Harvard Business Review to be developed outside the US, with a local editorial presence. Harvard Business Review began in 1922 as a magazine for Harvard Business School. Founded under the auspices of Dean Wallace Donham, HBR was meant to be more than just a typical school publication. "The paper is intended to be the highest type of business journal that we can make it, for use by the student and the business man. It is not a school paper," Donham wrote. HBR's focus was on macroeconomic trends, as well as on important developments within specific industries. Following World War II, HBR emphasized the cutting-edge management techniques that were developed in large corporations, like General Motors, during that time period. Over the next three decades, the magazine continued to refine its focus on general management issues that affect business leaders, billing itself as the "magazine for decision makers."
Prominent articles published during this period include "Marketing Myopia" by Theodore Levitt and "Barriers and Gateways to Communication" by Carl R. Rogers and Fritz J. Roethlisberger. In the 1980s, Theodore Levitt became the editor of Harvard Business Review and changed the magazine to make it more accessible to general audiences. Articles were shortened and the scope of the magazine was expanded to include a wider range of topics. In 1994, Harvard Business School formed Harvard Business Publishing as an independent entity. Between 2006 and 2008, HBP went through several reorganizations but settled into the three market-facing groups that exist today: Higher Education, which distributes cases and book chapters for business education materials. In 2009, HBR brought on Adi Ignatius, the former deputy managing editor of Time magazine, to be its editor-in-chief. Ignatius oversees all editorial operations for Harvard Business Review Group. At the time that Ignatius was hired, the U. S. was going through an economic recession.
"The world was desperate for new approaches. Business-as-usual was not a credible response," Ignatius has recalled; as a result, Ignatius realigned HBR's focus and goals to make sure that it "delivers information in the zeitgeist that our readers are living in." HBR continues to emphasize research-based, academic pieces that would help readers improve their companies and further their careers, but it broadened its audience and improved reach and impact by including more contemporary topics. As part of the redesigned magazine, Ignatius led the charge to integrate the print and digital divisions more and gave each edition of HBR a distinct theme and personality, as opposed to being a collection of academically superlative, yet unrelated articles. Since 1959, the magazine's annual McKinsey Award has recognized the two most significant Harvard Business Review articles published each year, as determined by a group of independent judges. Past winners have included Peter F. Drucker, honored seven times.
K. Prahalad. Official website
Goliath
Goliath is described in the biblical Book of Samuel as a Philistine giant defeated by the young David in single combat. The story signified Saul's unfitness as Saul himself should have fought for Israel; the phrase "David and Goliath" has taken on a more popular meaning, denoting an underdog situation, a contest where a smaller, weaker opponent faces a much bigger, stronger adversary. Saul and the Israelites are facing the Philistines in the Valley of Elah. Twice a day for 40 days and evening, the champion of the Philistines, comes out between the lines and challenges the Israelites to send out a champion of their own to decide the outcome in single combat, but Saul is afraid. David, bringing food for his elder brothers, hears that Goliath has defied the armies of God and of the reward from Saul to the one that defeats him, accepts the challenge. Saul reluctantly agrees and offers his armor, which David declines, taking only his staff and five stones from a brook. David and Goliath confront each other, Goliath with his armor and javelin, David with his staff and sling.
"The Philistine cursed David by his gods", but David replies: "This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand, I will strike you down. David hurls a stone from his sling and hits Goliath in the center of his forehead, Goliath falls on his face to the ground, David cuts off his head; the Philistines flee and are pursued by the Israelites "as far as Gath and the gates of Ekron". David puts the armor of Goliath in his own tent and takes the head to Jerusalem, Saul sends Abner to bring the boy to him; the king asks whose son he is, David answers, "I am the son of your servant Jesse the Bethlehemite." The Books of Samuel, together with the books of Joshua and Kings, make up a unified history of Israel which biblical scholars call the Deuteronomistic history. The first edition of the history was written at the court of Judah's King Josiah and a revised second edition during the exile, with further revisions in the post-exilic period. Traces of this can be seen in the contradictions and illogicalities of the Goliath story - to take a few examples, David turns from Saul's adult shield-bearer into a child herding sheep for his father, Saul finds it necessary to send for him when as the king's shield-bearer he should be beside his royal master, has to ask who David is, which sits strangely with David's status at his court.
The Goliath story is made up of base-narrative with numerous additions made after the exile: Original storyThe Israelites and Philistines face each other. AdditionsDavid is sent by his father to bring food to his brothers, hears the challenge, expresses his desire to accept. Goliath's stature as described in various ancient manuscripts varies: the oldest manuscripts, the Dead Sea Scrolls text of Samuel, the 1st-century historian Josephus, the 4th-century Septuagint manuscripts, all give his height as "four cubits and a span", whereas the Masoretic Text gives this as "six cubits and a span". Large numbers of scholars believe that the "taller" reading is based on an exaggeration, that the "shorter" reading is original, although some disagree; the underlying purpose of the story of Goliath is to show. Saul was chosen to lead the Israelites against their enemies, but when faced with Goliath he refuses to do so. Saul's exact height is not given, but he was a head taller than anyone else in all Israel, which implies he was over 6 feet tall and supposed to be the obvious challenger for Goliath, David is the one who defeated him.
Saul's armour and weaponry are no worse than Goliath's. "David declares that when a lion or bear came and attacked his father's sheep, he battled against it and killed it, has been cowering in fear instead of rising up and attacking the threat to his sheep." 2 Samuel 21:19 tells how Goliath the Gittite was killed by "Elhanan the son of Jaare-oregim, the Bethlehemite." According to Baruch Halperin, "Most storytellers displaced the deed from the otherwise obscure Elhanan onto the more famous character, David." The fourth-century BC 1 Chronicles explains the second Goliath by saying that Elhanan "slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath", constructing the name Lahmi from the last portion of the word "Bethlehemite", the King James Bible adopted this into 2 Samuel 21:18–19, although the Hebrew text at this point makes no mention of the word "brother". The armor described in 1 Samuel 17 appears typical of Greek armor of the sixth century BCE rather than of Philistines armor of the tenth century. Narrative formulae such as the settlement of battle by single combat between champions has been thought characteristic of the Homeric epics, rather than of the ancient Near East.
The designation of Goliath as a איש הביניים, "man of the in-between" appears to be a borrowing from Greek "man of the metaikh
The Tramp
The Tramp known as The Little Tramp, was British actor Charlie Chaplin's most memorable on-screen character and an icon in world cinema during the era of silent film. The Tramp is the title of a silent film starring Chaplin, which Chaplin wrote and directed in 1915; the Tramp, as portrayed by Chaplin, is a childlike, bumbling but good-hearted character, most famously portrayed as a vagrant who endeavors to behave with the manners and dignity of a gentleman despite his actual social status. However, while he is ready to take what paying work is available, he uses his cunning to get what he needs to survive and escape the authority figures who will not tolerate his antics. Chaplin's films did not always portray the Tramp as a vagrant, however; the character was referred to by any names on-screen, although he was sometimes identified as "Charlie" and as in the original silent version of The Gold Rush, "The little funny tramp". The character of the Tramp was created by accident while Chaplin was working at Mack Sennett's Keystone Studios, when dressing up for the short film Mabel's Strange Predicament starring Mabel Normand and Chaplin.
In a 1933 interview, Chaplin explained how he came up with the look of the Tramp: A hotel set was built for Mabel Normand's picture Mabel's Strange Predicament and I was hurriedly told to put on a funny make-up. This time I went to the wardrobe and got a pair of baggy pants, a tight coat, a small derby hat and a large pair of shoes. I wanted the clothes to be a mass of contradictions, knowing pictorially the figure would be vividly outlined on the screen. To add a comic touch, I wore a small mustache. My appearance got an enthusiastic response including Mr. Sennett; the clothes seemed to imbue me with the spirit of the character. He became a man with a soul—a point of view. I defined to Mr. Sennett the type of person, he wears an air of romantic hunger, forever seeking romance. That was the first film featuring the Tramp but a different film, shot but with the same character, happened to be released two days earlier; the Tramp debuted to the public in the Keystone comedy Kid Auto Races at Venice.
Chaplin, with his Little Tramp character became the most popular star in Keystone director Mack Sennett's company of players. Chaplin continued to play the Tramp through dozens of short films and feature-length productions.. The Tramp was identified with the silent era, was considered an international character; when the sound era began in the late 1920s, Chaplin refused to make a talkie featuring the character due to how the character was supposed to be American, Chaplin himself had a strong and obvious British accent. The 1931 production City Lights featured no dialogue. Chaplin retired the character in the film Modern Times, which appropriately ended with the Tramp walking down an endless highway toward the horizon; the film was only a partial talkie and is called the last silent film. The Tramp remains silent until near the end of the film when, for the first time, his voice is heard, albeit only as part of a French/Italian-derived gibberish song; this allowed the Tramp to be given a voice but not tarnish his association with the silent era.
In The Great Dictator, Chaplin's first film after Modern Times, Chaplin plays the dual role of a Hitler-esque dictator, a Jewish barber. Although Chaplin emphatically stated that the barber was not the Tramp, he retains the Tramp's moustache and general appearance. Despite a few silent scenes, including one where the barber is wearing the Tramp's coat and bowler hat and carrying his cane, the barber speaks throughout the film, including the passionate plea for peace, interpreted as Chaplin speaking as himself. In 1959, having been editing The Chaplin Revue, Chaplin commented to a reporter "I was wrong to kill him. There was room for the Little Man in the atomic age."A vaudeville performer named Lew Bloom created a similar tramp character which inspired Chaplin. According to Bloom, he was "the first stage tramp in the business". In an interview with the Daily Herald in 1957 Chaplin recalled being inspired by the tramp characters Weary Willie and Tired Tim from Illustrated Chips; the physical attributes of the Tramp include a pair of baggy pants, a tight coat, a small bowler hat, a large pair of shoes, a springy and flexible cane and the famous small mustache.
The Tramp walks uncomfortably because of the ill-fitting clothing. The Tramp may have seen better days, but he maintains the attitude and demeanor of a high-class individual. Two films made in 1915, The Tramp and The Bank, created the characteristics of Chaplin's screen persona. While in the end the Tramp manages to shake off his disappointment and resume his carefree ways, the pathos lies in the Tramp's having a hope for a more permanent transformation through love, his failure to achieve this; the Tramp was the victim of circumstance and coincidence, but sometimes the results worked in his favor. In Modern Times, he picks up a red flag that falls off a truck and starts to
Miracle on Ice
The "Miracle on Ice" was a medal-round game during the men's ice hockey tournament at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York, played between the hosting United States and the four-time defending gold medalists, the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union had won the gold medal in five of the six previous Winter Olympic Games, were the favorites to win once more in Lake Placid; the team consisted of professional players with significant experience in international play. By contrast, the United States' team—led by head coach Herb Brooks—consisted of amateur players, was the youngest team in the tournament and in U. S. national team history. In the group stage, both the Soviet and U. S. teams were unbeaten. S. achieved several notable results, including a 2–2 draw against Sweden, a 7–3 upset victory over second-place favorite Czechoslovakia. For the first game in the medal round, the United States played the Soviets. Finishing the first period tied at 2–2, the Soviets leading 3–2 following the second, the U.
S. team scored two more goals to take their first lead during the third and final period, winning the game 4–3. Following the game, the U. S. went on to clinch the gold medal by beating Finland in the final. The Soviet Union took the silver medal by beating Sweden; the victory became one of the most iconic moments of the Games and in U. S. sports. Well-known was the television call of the final seconds of the game by Al Michaels for ABC, in which he declared: "Do you believe in miracles?! YES!" In 1999, Sports Illustrated named the "Miracle on Ice" the top sports moment of the 20th century. As part of its centennial celebration in 2008, the International Ice Hockey Federation named the "Miracle on Ice" as the best international ice hockey story of the past 100 years; the Soviet Union entered the Lake Placid games as the heavy favorite, having won the previous four ice hockey gold medals dating back to the 1964 games. In the four Olympics following their 1960 bronze-medal finish at Squaw Valley, Soviet teams had gone 27–1–1 and outscored their opponents 175–44.
In head-to-head match-ups against the United States, the cumulative score over that period was 28–7. The Soviets were led by legendary players in world ice hockey, such as Boris Mikhailov, Vladislav Tretiak, the speedy and skilled Valeri Kharlamov, talented, dynamic players such as defenseman Viacheslav Fetisov and forwards Vladimir Krutov and Sergei Makarov. From that team, Kharlamov and Fetisov would be enshrined in the Hockey Hall of Fame. Many of the Soviet players had gained attention in the Summit Series eight years before and, in contrast to the American players, were de facto professionals with long histories of international play, employed by industrial firms or military organizations for the sole purpose of playing hockey on their organization's team. Western nations protested the Soviet Union's use of full-time athletes, as they were forced to use amateur players due to the International Olympic Committee's amateur-only policy; the situation led to Canadian withdrawal from the 1972 and 1976 Olympics, but the IOC did not change the rules until the late 1980s.
U. S. Head coach Herb Brooks held tryouts in Colorado Springs in the summer of 1979. Of the 20 players who made the final Olympic roster, Buzz Schneider was the only one returning from the 1976 Olympic team. Nine players had played under Brooks at the University of Minnesota, while four more were from Boston University; as Boston University and Minnesota were perennial rivals in college hockey, hostility between some of the players carried over onto the Olympic team for the first few months. However, part of Brooks' selection process was a 300-question psychological test that would give him insight on how every player would react under stress. Brooks had to select from 68 players; the average age of the U. S. team was 21 years old, making it the youngest team in U. S. history to play in the Olympics, but Brooks had selected and knew the limits of every player. As forward John Harrington said, "He knew where to quit. He'd push you right to the limit where you were ready to say,'I've had it, I'm throwing it in'—and he'd back off."
Brooks continued the organization by campaigning for the players' selection of Eruzione as the captain, Craig had been the goalie for him in the 1979 World Championship tournament. Assistant coach Craig Patrick had played with Brooks on the 1967 U. S. national team. The Soviet and American teams were natural rivals due to the decades-old Cold War. In addition, President Jimmy Carter was at the time considering a U. S. boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics, to be held in Moscow, in protest of the December 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. On February 9, the same day the American and Soviet teams met in an exhibition game in New York City, U. S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance denounced the impending Moscow games at an IOC meeting. President Carter decided in favor of the boycott. In exhibitions that year, Soviet club teams went 5–3–1 against National Hockey League teams, a year earlier, the Soviet national team had routed the NHL All-Stars 6–0 to win the Challenge Cup. In 1979–80 all the top North American players were Canadians, although the number of U.
S.-born professional players had been on the rise throughout the 1970s. The 1980 U. S. Olympic
Culture of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom's culture is influenced by its history as a developed state, a liberal democracy and a great power. To a lesser extent the culture of Greece has somewhat influenced British culture via Humanism. British literature, cinema, theatre, media, philosophy and education are important aspects of British culture; the United Kingdom is prominent in science and technology, producing world-leading scientists and inventions. Sport is an important part of British culture; the UK has been described as a "cultural superpower", London has been described as a world cultural capital. A global opinion poll for the BBC saw the UK ranked the third most positively viewed nation in the world in 2013 and 2014; the Industrial Revolution, which started in the UK, had a profound effect on the family socio-economic and cultural conditions of the world. As a result of the British Empire, significant British influence can be observed in the language, law and institutions of a geographically wide assortment of countries, including Australia, the Republic of Ireland, New Zealand, the United States and other English speaking nations.
These states are sometimes collectively known as the Anglosphere, are among Britain's closest allies. In turn the empire influenced British culture British cuisine; the cultures of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland are diverse and have varying degrees of overlap and distinctiveness. First spoken in early medieval England, the English language is the de facto official language of the UK, is spoken monolingually by an estimated 95% of the British population. Individual countries within the UK have frameworks for the promotion of their indigenous languages. In Wales, all pupils at state schools must either be taught through the medium of Welsh or study it as an additional language until age 16, the Welsh Language Act 1993 and the Government of Wales Act 1998 provide that the Welsh and English languages should be treated in the public sector, so far as is reasonable and practicable. Irish and Ulster Scots enjoy limited use alongside English in Northern Ireland in publicly commissioned translations.
The Gaelic Language Act, passed by the Scottish Parliament in 2005, recognised Gaelic as an official language of Scotland, commanding equal respect with English, required the creation of a national plan for Gaelic to provide strategic direction for the development of the Gaelic language. A 2010 poll among Scots saw a majority view Scots as a dialect of English and not a separate language; the Cornish language is a revived language that became extinct as a first language in Cornwall in the late 18th century. Under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, the UK Government has committed to the promotion of certain linguistic traditions; the United Kingdom has ratified the charter for: Welsh, Scottish Gaelic and Scots and Irish and Ulster Scots. British Sign Language is a recognised language. Owing to its long history and regional accents vary amongst the four countries of the United Kingdom, as well as within the countries themselves; some nearby cities have different dialects and accents, such as Scousers from Liverpool and Mancunians from Manchester, which are separated by just 35 miles.
Notable Scouse speakers include John Lennon and Paul McCartney of The Beatles, while Mancunians include Liam and Noel Gallagher from Oasis. The Cockney accent is traditionally spoken by working-class Londoners. Michael Caine is a notable exponent, as is Eliza Doolittle in Pygmalion, whose dialect includes words that are common among working-class Londoners, such as ain't: "I ain't done nothing wrong", said Doolittle. Received Pronunciation is the accent of standard English in the UK, with speakers including the British Royal Family. Brummie is the dialect of natives of Birmingham in the West Midlands of England: notable Brummies include rock musicians Ozzy Osbourne, Jeff Lynne, Rob Halford. Geordie is the dialect of people from Tyneside in northeast England: musicians Brian Johnson, Mark Knopfler and Sting are Geordies. Ant & Dec are notable television presenters with Geordie accents. Notable exponents of Scottish accents include Sean Connery, comedian Billy Connolly, The Proclaimers; the West Country accent from southwest England is identified in film as "pirate speech" – cartoon-like "Ooh arr, me'earties!
Sploice the mainbrace!" Talk is similar, while famous pirates hailed from this region, including Blackbeard. Well-known exponents include actor/producer Stephen Merchant, musician Tricky, journalist/writer Julie Burchill; the Northern Irish accent includes golfer Rory McIlroy and actor Liam Neeson the actor Daniel Day-Lewis adopts a strong Northern Irish accent in In the Name of the Father. The actor Russell Brand has a strong Essex accent, actor Sean Bean is known for his distinctive Yorkshire accent, the comedian Eric Morecambe possessed a Lancashire accent
