British Women Writers in different periods of time

The English Renaissance

    The English Renaissance began in the later part of the fifteenth century and lasted until the 1660s. Among the most famous women writers of this period is Aphra Behn, who is seen as the first professional woman writer in English. She wrote a number of plays that dealt with topics such as racism and slavery. A good example is Oroonoko published in 1688. Aphra Behn's works include also the plays The Amourous Prince, The Town Fop, The Dutch Lover and her only tragedy, Abdelazer.

The neoclassical period

    Among the well-known women in Bristish literature during the neoclassical period, from 1660 to the end of the eighteenth century, is Anne Finch. She wrote poetry and tried to express all that she saw and experienced. Two other women are recognized for their contribution to neoclassical British literature: Mary Astell and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Mary Astell was a philosopher and a feminist writer. She is best known now for her theories on the education of women.

The Romantic period

    Jane Austen is one of the most famous women writers that worked during the Romantic period (1798-1832). Her works include several novels, most of which focus on marriage as a way for young women to secure social standing and economic security. Her most famous novels are Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility and Emma. Another famous woman writer from the English Romanticism is Mary Shelley. She is the author of Frankenstein, History of Six Weeks Tour and The Last Man.

The Victorian period

    The Victorian period, between the 1830s and 1900, was the time when the Bronte sisters, George Eliot and Elizabeth Gaskell lived and wrote. Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte and Anne Bronte produced many British literary classics. Charlotte's novels include Jane Eyre, Shirley, Villette and The Professor. Mary Anne Evans adopted the male pen name George as she wanted to set herself apart from the feminine genre of cookbooks and domestic moral tales. Her most famous novel is The Mill on the Floss published in 1860.

    Scientists say we are all born with a knack for mathematics. Every time we scan the cafeteria for a table that will fit all of our friends, we're exercising the ancient estimation center in our brain.

    Stanislas Dehaene was the first researcher to show that this part of the brain exists. In 1989, he met Mr. N who had suffered a serious brain injury. Mr. N couldn't recognize the number 5, or add 2 and 2. But he still knew that there are “about 50 minutes” in an hour. Dehaene drew an important conclusion from his case: there must be two separate mathematical areas in our brains. One area is responsible for the math we learn in school, and the other judges approximate amounts.

    So what does the brain's estimation center do for us? Harvard University researcher Elizabeth Spelke has spent a lot of time posing math problems to preschoolers. When he asks 5-year-olds to solve a problem like 21+30, they can't do it. But he has also asked them questions such as, “Sarah has 21 candles and gets 30 more. John has 34 candles. Who has more candles?” It turns out preschoolers are great at solving questions like that. Before they've learned how to do math with numerals and symbols, their brains' approximation centers are already hard at work.

    After we learn symbolic math, do we still have any use for our inborn math sense? Justin Halberda at Johns Hopkins University gave us an answer in his study. He challenged a group of 14-year-olds with an approximation test: The kids stared at a computer screen and saw groups of yellow and blue dots flash by, too quickly to count. Then they had to say whether there had been more blue dots or yellow dots. The researchers found that most were able to answer correctly when there were 25 yellow dots and 10 blue ones. When the groups were closer in size, 11 yellow dots and 10 blue ones, fewer kids answered correctly.

    The big surprise in this study came when the researcher compared the kids' approximation test scores to their scores on standardized math tests. He found that kids who did better on the flashing dot test had better standardized test scores, and vice versa (反之亦然). It seems that, far from being irrelevant, your math sense might predict your ability at formal math.

    Sharing E Umbrella, a new umbrella sharing company based in Shenzhen, China, recently announced that it had lost most of the 300, 000 umbrellas since it was set up.

    China's sharing economy has been growing rapidly, with companies offering anything from bicycles and basketballs to phone batteries for people to rent. Customers make a small deposit（押金）and get to use the thing for a daily cost, with a fine put in place for every day if they fail to return the product in time. It's a simple business model, and market data shows that people see sharing as a cheap and convenient way to cut down waste.

    Zhao Shuping founded the Sharing E Umbrella, an umbrella sharing service, in April. By the end of June, he had already started in 11 major Chinese cities, including Shanghai, Nanjing and Guangzhou. While picking up the umbrellas was relatively simple, as they were made available（可得到的）at bus and subway stations, the return system turned out to be a different matter. "Umbrellas are different from bicycles, "Mr. Zhao told Chinese news site ThePaper.cn. "Bikes can be parked anywhere, but with an umbrella you need something to hang it on. "

    So instead of bothering to return the umbrellas back to a station, a lot of people just took them home, and Sharing E Umbrella has reportedly lost track of most of the 300,000 umbrellas. Considering that borrowing umbrellas requires a 19 yuan deposit, with a fee of 0.50 yuan per half an hour usage, Zhao says that he suffers a loss of 60 yuan per lost umbrella, so the company is now in the red, but he is not ready to stop it just yet. Zhao announces that Sharing E Umbrella still plans to roll out（推出）30 million nationwide by the end of the year.

    I always feel sorry for world leaders busy dealing with fights between nations. When my three children were young, most days it was hard to keep my house from becoming a battlefield.

    It got worse as they grew older. Three years ago, Zack, then 16, couldn't make it through a day without making his sisters, Alex 11 and Taryn 9, angry.

    My husband and I tried to be understanding the boy at such an age. We reasoned, punished, and left heartfelt notes on his bed about how he was hurting our family. His answer was "I say it because it's true."

    I even tried telling the girls to fight back. Bad idea. Now I had three children at war. Whatever I said to them, they paid no attention. When there was no way out, I told everything to my sister, Mary, in an email. She replied, "Don't email me. Email him."

    Our son was online every day, mailing and talking with his friends. Maybe he would actually hear me this way. I didn't say anything different, but email just took the tension away. There'd be no shouting or door banging. Zack wouldn't feel under attack.

    Zack didn't reply for days. When he finally did, his entire message was four small words. I smiled when I read them: "You're right. I'm sorry."

    The children still fought, of course, but Zack changed. Best of all, I now have a better way to talk with not one but three of them. I like it that they don't tune me out as much as they used to. They like not having to listen to me shouting to them. Or as Alex says, "You're so much nicer online."

    All I know is that the house is quiet. But we're talking.

    Most parents fear getting letters home from their children's school. They are usually informing them that their child is in big trouble. But ahead of the SATs exams next week, one school decided to send a letter of a different type.

    Bosses at Buckton Vale Primary School in Stalybridge sent letter to all pupils in the sixth grade to tell them how special and unique they are. The letter highlights all the natural skills and abilities the pupils have and everything that makes them "smart'' individuals.

    They are told how their laughter can brighten the darkest day and that the examiners do not know the pupils are kind, trustworthy and thoughtful.

    The letter, signed by the headmaster and two other teachers, has been put on the school's Facebook page and shared more than 9. 000 times with more than 7,000 likes.

    The letter reads, "Next week you will sit your SATs tests for maths, reading, spelling, grammar and punctuation. We know how hard you have worked, but there is something very important you must know. The SATs test does not assess all that makes each of you special and unique. The people who create these tests and score them do not know each of you in the way that we do and certainly not in the way your families do. "

    The letter goes on to say that the tests are not the most important thing in life, adding, "The scores you will get from this test will tell you something, but they will not tell you everything. There are many ways of being smart. You are smart!"

    The letter has been welcomed by many parents on Facebook. Lynn McPherson wrote, "That's great instilling (逐步灌输) hope, faith and belief. " And Mary Tilling said, "Every child school receive one of these. Brilliant. "

    Steven Stein likes to follow garbage trucks. His strange habit makes sense when you consider that he's an environmental scientist who studies how to reduce litter, including things that fall off garbage trucks as they drive down the road. What is even more interesting is that one of Stein's jobs is defending an industry behind the plastic shopping bags.

    Americans use more than 100 billion thin film plastic bags every year. So many end up in tree branches or along highways that a growing number of cities do not allow them at checkouts(收银台). The bags are prohibited in some 90 cities in California, including Los Angeles. Eyeing these headwinds, plastic-bag makers are hiring scientists like Stein to make the case that their products are not as bad for the planet as most people assume.

    Among the bag makers' argument: many cities with bans still allow shoppers to purchase paper bags, which are easily recycled but require more energy to produce and transport. And while plastic bags may be ugly to look at, they represent a small percentage of all garbage on the ground today

    The industry has also taken aim at the product that has appeared as its replacement: reusable shopping bags. The stronger a reusable bag is, the longer its life and the more plastic-bag use it cancels out. However, longer-lasting reusable bags often require more energy to make. One study found that a cotton bag must be used at least 131 times to be better for the planet than plastic.

    Environmentalists don't dispute(质疑) these points. They hope paper bags will be banned someday too and want shoppers to use the same reusable bags for years.