Why would an authoritarian parenting style be ineffective in our culture and in this day in age with our emphasis on independence and individualism?

An authoritarian parenting style presupposes the agreement of the children that the parent is right in all things. Children born today in the US are bombarded from an early age with messages from media that parents are merely caretakers, there to supply their needs. Unless the parent interacts with his/her child in such a way that demonstrates both the respect for the job of the child, that is. growing and becoming, and the expectation that the parent deserves respect for his/her job, supporting the process of becoming a strong and independent individual, the children in their families tend to ignore the parent as authority figure. Rather than an authoritarian style many parents who respect that job of the child to grow and become approach the role using an authoritative style which sends the message that yes, somebody is in charge, the buck stops here, and I have your back, even while I expect you to respect my knowledge and leadership. This allows the child to feel safe and explore autonomy, knowing that there is a safety net of loving concern.

There are several reasons why parenting experts argue that an excessively authoritarian parenting style can be ineffective. Obviously, some authority is necessary in that one would not wish to let kids learn by experience that electrical outlets and hot stoves are dangerous, and so it makes sense to have strict rules about matters where children might cause immediate danger to themselves or others. Where immediate safety issues are not at stake, though, there are several negative aspects to authoritarian parenting.
Perhaps the worst aspect of authoritarian parenting is that it does not prepare children to think for themselves, and thus is not a good preparation for adulthood. On a social and political level, people used to unthinking obedience to authority easily fall prey to demagogues and dictatorial leaders who thrive because of a habit of unquestioning obedience. The Milgram experiments show the horrific consequences of people trained to blind obedience. 
The next problem with authoritarian parenting is that it is correlated with low self esteem in children and lack of emotional and social skills. Children with authoritarian  parents, according to certain studies are prone to "depression, delinquency, and alcohol problems". 
In today's entrepreneurial environment, much of career success depends on ability to innovate and work independently rather than just being a cog in a corporate structure. This means that children brought up in an authoritarian environment would be at a career disadvantage.
Note that for help additional unrelated topics, you need to post additional questions.
 
https://nature.berkeley.edu/ucce50/ag-labor/7article/article35.htm

What was the overall outcome of the Grange Alliance and the Farmer's Alliance?

The Grange and the Farmer's Alliance were late-19th century grass-roots political movements derived from the interests of the rural poor. They began as cooperative social networks of farmers who sought to protect themselves from the incursions of big business. The changing nature of industry in late-19th century America put small farms increasingly at risk. They were being overwhelmed by larger agricultural companies and the predatory practices of the Gilded Age economy and felt increasingly marginalized by politicians in league with corporate interests like the railroads.
One of the outcomes of these movements was the growth of populism. Populism found expression at the Federal level in the People's Party or Populist Party, founded in 1892. The Populists joined the Democrats through the populist Presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan in the election of 1896. Their platform included the "Free Silver" movement and monetary reform, ideas the populists felt would make the economy more just. Many of the principles first advocated by the Grange and Farmer's Alliance found expression in the Progressive movement and the antitrust legislation of the early 20th century. But as time went on, industrial progress and the changing nature of agriculture continued to threaten the small family farm.

A sphere of radius 20 cm and mass 45 g is placed atop a ramp of height 0.75 m and inclination angle 30 deg. If the ramp were frictionless the sphere would slide down the ramp in a time t . With friction, the sphere rolls without slipping down the ramp and reaches the bottom at time t' . What is (t')/t ?

First use conservation of energy to find v at the bottom of the ramp when there is no friction.
E_i=E_f
mgh=1/2mv^2
v=sqrt(2gh)
Now plug into a kinematic equations to find t after the sphere has rolled down the ramp a distance we will call Delta x .
know v^2=2a Delta x
and
v=t*a
Then v*v=2a Delta x
v=(2a Delta x)/v
t*a=(2a Delta x)/v
t=(2Delta x)/v
t=(2 Delta x)/sqrt(2gh)
Now repeat the process with friction to find t' .
E_i=E_f
mgh=1/2m(v')^2+1/2I(omega)^2
I=2/5mR^2 for a solid sphere.
mgh=1/2m(v')^2+1/2(2/5mR^2)((v')/R)^2
gh=1/2(v')^2+1/5(v')^2
gh=(1/2+1/5)(v')^2
sqrt((10gh)/7)=v'
t'=(2Delta x)/(v')=2 Delta x*sqrt(7/(10gh))
Finally, we have
(t')/t=(2 Delta x sqrt(7/(10gh)))/((2 Delta x)/sqrt(2gh))
(t')/t=sqrt(7/(10gh))*sqrt(2gh)
(t')/t=sqrt(7/5)
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/isph.html

What were the causes of the US Civil War?

The American Civil War is often discussed as if it was a crusade on the part of the North to free the slaves in the South. While it is true that there was significant opposition from Southern states to the election of President Lincoln, who ran on an anti-slavery platform, it is not really true that the North opposed the South out of a great desire, on the part of the common people, for the abolition of slavery.
First, it is important to note that the Unionist soldiers who fought were, for the most part, not driven by a desire to eradicate slavery. The war was not fought, initially, as an attempt to defeat slavery in the South. However, in the South, the idea of having their slaves taken away was certainly a major cause of secession from the Union. Because the South had an economy built on plantations—particularly cotton—Southern whites could not see any way that an end to slavery would not completely bankrupt them. Moreover, as the United States expanded, Northern and Southern states clashed over the issue of slavery in new territories, with the question becoming increasingly heated by the 1850s. As such, Lincoln's election was the final straw that caused the secessions.
The Southern states also strongly believed in the rights of individual states to determine their own rules. Not only did they feel that the federal government should be forbidden to enforce emancipation upon them, they also believed that they were fully entitled to leave the Union if it was no longer working in their interests.
The issue of differing interests between the states had already been causing these issues about secession to brew. Because the economies of the North and South were based upon different systems—the North was driven largely by industrialized labor—there was a sense of cultural divide, while issues of external trade could cause contention, as they potentially benefited one group more than the other. The largely Republican North tended to take opposing political stances to the Democratic South, so the two groups were already primed to split up on the basis of conflicting interests before the Lincoln election divided them entirely.
The South had a powerful regional identity, while the North's identity was more tied to being part of the United States. This was another bone of contention between the two groups, and one of the reasons they did not understand each other.
When Lincoln was elected, the Southern states, in fear of being an underrepresented minority whose ideas about slavery would be swiftly overturned, declared their secession, and the war began.

how does the poem switch from person to person or between different times or places?

One obvious and concrete way that the poem switches slightly between topics and times is by starting a new stanza. Stanza 1 is being narrated by an unknown narrator. We don't know the narrator's gender, but we do know that they have an Aunt Jennifer that has some tigers that prance across a screen. The rest of the stanza stays fairly focused on the tigers. We get a brief bit about men beneath a tree, but then the next line returns to the tigers and their pacing.
Stanza 2 then shifts to Aunt Jennifer herself. We are told that Aunt Jennifer is struggling with her needlework, and that is likely because of her age. We also find out that Aunt Jennifer is/was married, and the marriage wasn't likely a very healthy marriage. Her wedding band sits "heavily" on her hand and is like a "massive weight." That doesn't exactly hint at a happy marriage.
The final stanza doesn't shift away from Aunt Jennifer or her marriage, but it does shift forward in time. The speaker is looking ahead toward when Aunt Jennifer is dead. The first two lines of this stanza are a rather morbid sequence, but then the final two lines of the poem return to being quite hopeful. Aunt Jennifer might be dead, but the tigers that she made will continue to go on prancing. They will be "proud and unafraid." This is an important piece of the poem because it contrasts with Aunt Jennifer and her horrible marriage. Her marriage and life might have been terrible, but her spirit will live on forever in those optimistic and happy tigers.

How would you compare and contrast the poems "America" by Claude Mckay and "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus?

Let’s start with a quick overview of the two poets in question.
Emma Lazarus (1849–1887) was born into a wealthy Jewish family in New York City. As a young poet, she became aware of anti-Semitic prejudice through reading (rather than through personal experience), and in the 1880s she became one of the most prominent writers decrying the persecution of Russian Jews. She also wrote about the plight of poor Jews in the US and other countries, and became one of the earliest Zionists. In 1883, Lazarus wrote “The New Colossus” to help raise funds to build a pedestal for the Statue of Liberty.
Claude McKay (1889-1948) was a prolific writer of poetry, novels, and short stories, all exploring issues related to racism in his native Jamaica, the US, and elsewhere. He was concerned with its political and social aspects, but also with the internal emotional and intellectual processes by which a human being can defend his or her human dignity in the face of discrimination. One of the earliest influences on McKay’s thinking was the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer believed life was inevitably painful. He argued the best human beings can do is develop their spiritual and emotional lives by creating art and preserving their sense of justice and morality.
We can see Lazarus and McKay had several characteristics in common. Both belonged to groups that suffered widespread discrimination. While both were deeply concerned with racism and prejudice, they also both had the advantage of childhoods free of persecution and violence, allowing them a chance to use their intelligence and become highly educated.
Both “America" and "The New Colossus" are sonnets exploring the experience of refugees and minorities in the United States. Each is built around a duality—that is, a pair of contrasting ideas that generate tension. In "The New Colossus,” this duality is expressed through the structure of the verse itself. This is an Italian sonnet: fourteen lines divided into an octave (the first 8 lines) followed by a sestet (the final 6 lines). The rhyme scheme looks like this:
ABBCACCB (the octave)DEDEDE (the sestet.)
Like most Italian sonnets, “America” examines two ideas or perspectives: the first in the octave, and the second in the sestet. (This is the duality mentioned above.) Lazarus begins by describing the “new Colossus,” Lady Liberty, who is to replace the warlike Colossus of antiquity. Instead of a conquering masculine force, she will be a nurturing feminine one: the “Mother of Exiles”. The octave is hopeful and idealistic, employing gentle imagery like “sea-washed, sunset gates” and the lady’s “world-wide welcome,” “her mild eyes” commanding the harbor.
At the end of the eighth line comes the turning-point (sometimes called the volta, Italian for “turn”) into the new perspective of the sestet. Here, Lazarus has Lady Liberty herself describe the plight of poor immigrants to the US:

                              . . . your tired, your poor,Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

In the final two lines, Lazarus confirms her conviction that these refugees will be welcomed and cared for in their new country:

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

McKay’s “America,” by contrast, is a Shakespearean sonnet. (As a child, McKay loved Shakespeare and the English Romantic poets, and his earliest writings were attempts to emulate them.) Here, too, we see a duality: the tension between love for his adopted country and rage against it. Unlike “The New Colossus,” “America” expresses those conflicting emotions not through poetic structure, but through the language itself. (If he were writing a traditional Shakespearean sonnet, one idea would dominate the first twelve lines, and the second one would appear in the final two lines.) McKay shifts perspective over and over, sometimes within a single line (e.g., “Giving me strength erect against her hate . . .”)
We see this in the first quatrain:

Although she feeds me bread of bitterness,And sinks into my throat her tiger’s tooth,Stealing my breath of life, I will confessI love this cultured hell that tests my youth.

Although America feeds him bitterness, pierces his throat like a predator, and tries to kill him, McKay says he loves the “cultured hell” that brings out his own greatest strengths as he fights to defend himself against it.
Because “America” is written in the first person, we feel McKay’s struggle with US culture is more intimate and personal than Lazarus’s in “The New Colossus.” McKay is not talking about immigrants in the abstract, but about his own experience as a black newcomer.
McKay’s feelings about the US remain conflicted to the end of the poem; unlike Lazarus, he gives us no clear conclusion in his final couplet. These last two ambiguous lines remind us again of his love for Shakespeare, whose own sonnets frequently mention Time and decay:

Beneath the touch of Time’s unerring hand,Like priceless treasures sinking in the sand.
https://daily.jstor.org/emma-lazarus-golem/

What was significant about the creation of the Dominion of New England?

The Dominion of New England was a short-lived administrative union between the New England colonies, as well as New York and New Jersey, established in 1686. Notably, it was an attempt by King James II and British Parliament to streamline the administration of the colonies and strengthen English rule in the region.
Before the establishment of the Dominion, the various colonies were administered under the conditions set out in their original charters. They were given a large degree of autonomy in both civil and religious matters. This suited most colonists just fine, as many had come to North America in order to exercise these freedoms.
There was an immediate backlash to the establishment of the Dominion of New England. Colonial leaders in Massachusetts and Connecticut, in particular, refused to cooperate with the regime and openly flouted many of its provisions. They were upset with the establishment of the Church of England as the dominant religious institution of the state and with the taxes imposed by Parliament that they had not consented to.
Even though the Dominion of New England was dissolved in 1689, it is significant in that it can be seen as a precursor to the events that led to the American Revolution a century later.
http://becominglexington.com/massbay_contexts/charter_info_idx/charter_info_e/index.html

Perhaps the most significant and unpopular change that occurred with the creation of the Dominion of New England was that it established the Church of England as the state religion of the colonies within the Dominion. Given that the early English settlers had fled to the New World in search of a place to safely practise their Puritan religion, this caused widespread uproar.
Even those colonists who were not Puritans, however, were generally unhappy with the type of federal control exercised by the Dominion. As a centralized administrative body, it took away certain rights from individual colonies and insisted upon viewing all the colonies concerned as members of the same administrative bloc, with no regard for their differences. As such—and particularly because the sheer size of the Dominion made it ungovernable—the proposed administration was swiftly overthrown.