The treaty of Versailles was a bad idea. It benefited countries like Britain, France and America as they where the top powers to come out of the war. It blamed all of the damages caused to their countries squarely on the Germans simply because Germany was the best target. The German where forced to surrender all their foreign lands. They where forbidden from entering the Rhineland. They where forbidden from uniting with Austria. They where forced to pay reparations to the winning side after the war, leaving the German people and the Wiemar republic in poverty! If it wasn't for all these terms suppressing Germany, Hitler would never pushed the boundaries of the treaty, the Nazi's where unlikely to ever rise to such power as they where elected as a last hope when Germany lost faith in democracy and therefore Britain would not have had to declare war on Germany for taking over Poland and Slovakia, entering the Rhine and uniting with Austria. It is often said that WW1 was just a build up to world war two, as if it wasn't for the treaty of versailles none of this was ever going to or even had a possibility f happening.
Concerns about the effects of media on consumers and the existence and extent of media bias go back to the 1920s. Reporter and commentator Walter Lippmann noted that citizens have limited personal experience with government and the world and posited that the media, through their stories, place ideas in citizens’ minds. These ideas become part of the citizens’ frame of reference and affect their decisions. Lippmann’s statements led to the hypodermic theory, which argues that information is “shot” into the receiver’s mind and readily accepted.[1]
Yet studies in the 1930s and 1940s found that information was transmitted in two steps, with one person reading the news and then sharing the information with friends. People listened to their friends, but not to those with whom they disagreed. The newspaper’s effect was thus diminished through conversation. This discovery led to the minimal effects theory, which argues the media have little effect on citizens and voters.[2]
By the 1970s, a new idea, the cultivation theory, hypothesized that media develop a person’s view of the world by presenting a perceived reality.[3] What we see on a regular basis is our reality. Media can then set norms for readers and viewers by choosing what is covered or discussed.
In the end, the consensus among observers is that media have some effect, even if the effect is subtle. This raises the question of how the media, even general newscasts, can affect citizens. One of the ways is through framing: the creation of a narrative, or context, for a news story. The news often uses frames to place a story in a context so the reader understands its importance or relevance. Yet, at the same time, framing affects the way the reader or viewer processes the story.
Episodic framing occurs when a story focuses on isolated details or specifics rather than looking broadly at a whole issue. Thematic framing takes a broad look at an issue and skips numbers or details. It looks at how the issue has changed over a long period of time and what has led to it. For example, a large, urban city is dealing with the problem of an increasing homeless population, and the city has suggested ways to improve the situation. If journalists focus on the immediate statistics, report the current percentage of homeless people, interview a few, and look at the city’s current investment in a homeless shelter, the coverage is episodic. If they look at homelessness as a problem increasing everywhere, examine the reasons people become homeless, and discuss the trends in cities’ attempts to solve the problem, the coverage is thematic. Episodic frames may create more sympathy, while a thematic frame may leave the reader or viewer emotionally disconnected and less sympathetic.
Shams ad-Din Abu Abd Allah Muhammad ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Luwati at-Tanyi, better known as Ibn Battuta was an important Muslim traveler who was born in the mid 14th century in Morocco; although little is known about him, it is said that he would have traveled longer distances than Marco Polo, Ibn Yuzayy, a Historian to whom Battuta would have told his travels, wrote the Rhila or their chronicles.
In one of these chronicles, he reached Mogadishu and several impressions were recorded. First of all, some customs,such as the one of approaching travelers´ vessels before they arrive to the harbor and offer different services, such as food and hospitality. He found people from Mogadishu generous and welcoming, and described the city as very big, noticing that there was an active trade of sheeps and camels, as there was a big amount of those animals being slaughtered there.
Later in the chornicles, as he was invited to stay in Mogadishu at the Sultan´s home -Bakr ibn Shaikh Umar-, a description of the customs regarding the Sultan´s activities is recorded, particularly in his role as head and leader of the community.
