I'm writing an essay about social class in To Kill a Mockingbird and I was wondering if anyone could give me a shout out. I'm desperate! :o

Jem points out in Chapter 23 of To Kill a
Mockingbird that there are "four kinds of folks in the world." Perhaps he is a bit too
immature to recognize his own limitations in international matters, but he hits the nail on the
head as far as the local social classes go. According to Jem, there
are

• "... the ordinary kind like us and the
  neighbors..."


• "... there's the kind like the Cunninghams out in
  the woods..."


• "... the kind like the Ewells down at the
  dump..."


• "... and the
  Negroes."

This is a fair assessment of the people that
Jem has seen in Maycomb. The Finches and most of their neighbors are regular folks--white,
middle-class and peace-loving. The Cunninghams and Ewells are separated among the lower class
whites: The Cunninghams are poor but basically honest; the Ewells are welfare cases and
untrustworthy, "the disgrace of Maycomb." (Jem apparently overlooks the Cunninghams' willingness
to lynch Tom Robinson in cold blood.) As for the black citizens of Maycomb, they are grouped
together on the bottom of the Maycomb social totem pole.

There are
others that don't quite fit in Jem's class structure, particularly Dolphus Raymond (and possibly
Boo Radley and Miss Caroline). But Jem's "four kinds of people" are a fairly accurate breakdown
of the Maycomb social system. Jem has learned that the classes don't mix: Alexandra won't allow
Walter Cunningham Jr. to visit the Finch household because he is "trash." The Ewells aren't
welcome anywhere, and apparently even the Cunninghams have nothing to do with them. The Finch
children cause a bit of a stir at Calpurnia's church, and Scout never does get to visit Calpurnia
at her own home. Atticus' visit to Tom Robinson's widow--a white man paying a social call to an
African-American woman--is a truly rare occurrence in Maycomb. Such was the way of the world in
1930s Alabama.

In Frank O'Connor's short story "Guests of the Nation," who is the real outsider and who is the real enemy?

The real “outsider” in “Guests of the Nation” is almost
certainly Jeremiah Donovan, the Irish officer who appears in the first paragraph of the story and
who then reappears (usually near the beginnings of new sections throughout the tale). Although
Donovan is an Irishman and should therefore presumably have a close relationship with his fellow
Irish soldiers, in fact he seems remote and distant from everyone else almost from the beginning,
and he becomes increasingly more distant – even belligerent – as the story develops. He seems
most attractive in the opening paragraph; thereafter, he becomes less and less attractive, both
to readers and to some of the other characters, including the narrator (Bonaparte) and Hawkins,
one of the two English captives. Significantly, Belcher, the English soldier who is perhaps the
most appealing character in the entire story, remains thoughtful in his relations with Donovan
until the very end of the tale, just as he has remained thoughtful and considerate in his
dealings with all the other characters. If there were anyone in the story with whom the awkward,
self-conscious Donovan might have struck up a friendship, it might have been Belcher. Instead,
Donovan remains an outsider to the very end and becomes more and more isolated as the tale
proceeds.

Donovan is associated with an increasing level of literal
and figurative darkness throughout the story. Each time he enters the tale, the tone and
atmosphere of the work become increasingly grim. Donovan seems to resent the close friendships
that have sprung up between the two Irish captors and their two English captives. He senses that
he is not respected by his Irish comrades, and the fact that they bond with men who should
nominally be their enemies makes his status as an outsider all the more apparent, to him and to
us. By the end of the tale, Donovan simply disappears. He is no longer relevant to the epiphanies
shared by Bonaparte and Noble. At this point, he becomes an “outsider” in the additional sense
that he is now outside the story itself and thus outside the consciousness of its readers.
Interestingly, “Frank O’Connor” was simply the pen name of the writer Michael O’Donovan. O’Connor
thus gives his own “real name” to one of the least attractive characters he ever created. It is
as if O’Connor wanted to imply that no one can ultimately or entirely separate himself or herself
from the kinds of flaws Donovan so clearly reveals.

If there is a
real “enemy” at all in this story, that “enemy” may be the kind of unthinking hatred between
nations that leads people to mistreat and even kill persons of other nationalities – persons who
in other circumstances could easily have been friends. Part of the point of O’Connor’s story
seems to be that we are too quick to treat each other as enemies and too unwilling or unable to
change our assessments when new facts arise. Yet O’Connor seems less interested in making
thematic points than in exploring a genuinely tragic situation. In that situation, friends must
kill friends because the latter have been designated as enemies, not because
they are foes in any genuine sense of the word. Ironically, in a story about war that is set in
wartime, real enemies seem difficult to identify.

What makes Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead a satire?

The purpose of satire is to point out human flaws in a
humorous way in order to instruct and possibly change humanity.  In this case, the
subject of the satire is man's willingness to just do what he is told without
questioning it or without making good choices for himself.  The play has an overarching
theme of existentialism, and that philiosophy of life states that man must choose to act
and take actions that are for the betterment of self and/or society.  If a person fails
to choose and fails to act, then he is considered existentially dead.  Just breathing
and going along through life with active action is not truly being alive, it is mere
existence. 

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are considered
existentially dead and Stoppard uses humor to make his point.  These men are confused,
don't really know why they were called, they only came because they were called in the
first place, and even when they seem to be able to make a choice for themselves, they
don't-- they let their fate happen to them rather than making a new ending for
themselves.  In this play, they read the re-write of the letter for England and learn
that they will be put death in England, but they don't do anything to stop it.  Stoppard
is illustrating through this negative example how to live -- live better than these two
characters do.  Along the way to this message, Stoppard has many jokes at their expense
and that is part of the satire as well.  One of the most important "jokes" is that the
Player seems to know everything about them (because he lives on at the end of
Shakespeare's Hamlet) and he taunts them with that throughout the play -- unbeknownst to
them even until the last pages.  The play uses silly humor/jokes, bawdy humor with the
players, and deep philosophical statements all in an effort for the audience to see how
to better examine their own lives and how they live them.

What makes One-Act dramas like Trifles effective?

One-Act plays have become more popular after they showed that
they can produce the same effect of quasi instant gratification in the same level that a short
story does.

One of the factors for its effectiveness is that it
gives playwrights a chance produce a substantial piece of work in a shorter amount of time. It
also regulates the number of characters, making it much simpler to split the action, climax, and
falling action among fewer characters hence giving them more power
individually.

Because the one-act play is unapologetic in its
shorter length of action, it can be more daring and adventurous in finding ways to get to the
conclusion of the storyline. It can be surprising and more engaging than a three-act
play.

Nevertheless as the play "Trifles" can show, the action is
unequivocally an attention-getter and the topic so rich that it leaves you in consistent suspense
until the end.

What do you know about non-niterest based investment modes of Finance?

I guess this question is with reference to the modes of
investment that are complaint with the Islamic Shariah as according to the Shariah the
investment of money in interest bearing assets is not
allowed.

The options of investment that are non-interest
bearing and compliant with the Shariah include investment in the equity of companies
involved in activities considered Halal. Here the gains made are due to capital
appreciation and the dividends paid by the
companies.

Another option is buying assets like real
estate, machinery, etc and leasing them to others for their
use.

Trading in commodities which do not violate the laws
of the Shariah like wine, pork, etc. is also a permitted
investment.

Each of the above mentioned options also have
some rules that they have to adhere to for them to be Shariah compliant. More details
are provided in the source given below.

A person in a rowboat 2 miles from the nearest point P on a straight shoreline wishes to reach a house 6 miles down the shoreline from P.If the...

The nearest distance of the person  to the spot P on the
shore = 2miles.

Let starting point of the person to row the
boat be S. Then SP = 2.

Let the house be at the spot H on
the bank of the river.

Then SP = 2, SH = 6
miles.

Therefore PSH form a right angled triangle with
right angle at S.

Therefore PS^2+SH^2 = PH^2 by Pyhagoras
theorem.

2^2+6^2 = PH^2.

Or
PH^2 = 2^2+6^2 = 4+36 = 40

Therefore PH = sqrt(40) = 6.3246
miles.

Therefore the time required to row SH = 6 miles at
the rate of 3mph = 6/3 = 2 hours.

The time required to walk
the distance of PH = 6.3246 miles at the rate of 5 miles per hour = 6.3246/5 = 1.2649
hours = 1 hour 15.9 minutes nealy.

So the least time to
reach is the option of walking.

Is "Araby" by James Joyce comical or serious?

Whilst I do think there are elements of this story that
are humorous and perhaps comical, such as the obvious Romantic notions of the male
narrator about Mangan's sister and his imagination that obviously runs riot, depicting
himself as the knight in shining armour gaining a token for the favour of his beloved,
the overall message and theme of this short story can only be described as serious. Note
how the narrator at the end of this tale experiences an "epiphany" when he recognises
how silly he has been and how he has been fooled by his romantic
notions:

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Gazing up in to the darkness I saw myself as a
creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and
anger.

The story ends with
the lights in the bazaar being turned off, symbolically representing perhaps the end of
the narrator's youth and romantic notions, as he emerges with a far more realistic idea
of life and also of himself. Serious themes indeed.