Jews of Spain relationship with Islamic and Arabic Culture Assignment - 1

Jews of Spain relationship with Islamic and Arabic Culture - Assignment Example Ladino was a romantic language that borrowed much from Judeo-Catalan, Hebrew, and Old Castilian. However, Jews in Spain currently uses Spanish as their language. The adoption of the Arabic culture by the Spanish Jewish started in the twelfth century when Almohades seized the southern parts of the Spain. He gave three choices to the Jews in Spain: death, flee or adopt the Arabic culture. Some of the Arabic cultural practices that Spanish Jews adopted include using of the last name. Jews were renowned of using their first name, their fathers’ name, or even their tribal name but with adoption of the Arabic culture, they were compelled to use the last name. The Spanish Jews adopted washing of legs and hands before entering the synagogue just as the Muslims do; they also adopted Arabic tunes for their sacred songs (Attig 832). In addition, the Arabic rule made the Spanish Jews to shift from their native languages such as Hebrews and Aramaic to Arabic language. The loss of the Jewish language led to extinction of the central literary works that was a characteristic of the Jewish culture. Examples of the Jewish literary works are poetry, Torah, Mishnah, liturgy, and Midrash (Corrà © 172). Moreover, the wide spread of the Arabic language resulted into Bible translation into Arabic. Consequently, Jews shifted from their traditional habit of being religious to secular. Furthermore, the Spanish Jews adopted the court system of settling disputes. Additionally, Jews of Spain accepted the Arabic traditions and customs including clothing in their daily routine (Corrà © 172). Jewish of Spain never lost hope of their culture, however, they took advantage of the Islamic rule to revive their culture by collaborating with them. The Spanish Jews struck an agreement with the Islamic rulers so that they could exercise their religion and culture. This agreement came at a cost because they had to a pay a special tax called jizya. Therefore, they enjoyed

Benefits Project Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Benefits Project - Research Paper Example In addition to this the other facilities and discounts like Lifeworks, flexible working hours, education assistance, service appreciation awards, career growth and training programs for employees with growth and leadership potential have also been considered. This in my opinion would make Sodexo’s plans comparable to Google, Microsoft or any other Fortune 500 company. Basic Issue, Purpose and Relationships But as they say, the strength and efficacy of a plan lies in its weakest link, and in this case, the link was a service provider, namely Aetna. It has been shown that Aetna has been a preferred company for Sodexo’s Group Life Insurance Plan. Therefore I also assume that this company is involved in the administration and provision of services under its Short and Long Term Disability Plans. Interestingly this fact was uncovered by delving into the Exit Interviews of quite a number of employees who had been bitter and critical in their appraisal of the coverage and degre e of care administered by the insurance company even under the Business Travel Accident Plan. Further investigation into the matter by a combination of HR and Medical Staff determined that no less that 15 such instances had occurred in the last one and a half years. Since staff was enrolled in the insurance plans automatically and the coverage was renewed every year, Aetna considered that they simply could not lose. As far as the relationships between fraud in the medical coverage and employee dissatisfaction are concerned, a little analysis will put forth that since the Short and Long Term Disability Plans as well as the Benefits Travel Accident Plan were related, one often leading to another, the connivance and inefficiency of Aetna staff was often the culprit leading to improper and insufficient attention to non-managerial staff. In many cases, such staff had to resort to other or personal means to meet these deficiencies in care. Since the complaints were few and far between, Ae tna had managed to get away with it unscathed so far. The amazing thing is that these very staff took proper care of Sodexo’s managerial and higher level staff quite well in similar instances of accident and disability. Clearly they knew who was wielding the power here. The purpose of this paper is not only to highlight this deficiency but also its causes so that the erring staff is removed or the coverage is given to another insurance company. Such a state of affairs can hardly be tolerated. It is also desired to review the efficacy and management of all the different types of medical coverage so that similar or other deficiencies can be highlighted and corrected. Thus we will accomplish a thorough review of all types of medical coverage given by Sodexo, and by doing so positively impact employee satisfaction. It is also interesting that one or two lower level employees had highlighted these in their assessments of the available benefits at the company, and even made a remar k in their employee satisfaction surveys, but these were unfortunately overlooked by HR as being too unlikely to be true. It was assumed that the employees were over-reacting to an already bad or painful situation. For one thing, this state of affairs may indicate that HR has become too complacent and sure of itself and therefore it is suggested that future employee surveys and benefits assessments be independently