VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
The church music of Grammatio Metallo, 1602-1613
Keywords: Grammatio Metallo
Italy
sixteenth century
church music
16th century

Grammatio Metallo (1540-1614/15) was maestro di cappella at the Venetian parish church of San Marcuola between 1602 and 1610. His vast output of sacred choral music includes eleven Masses, nineteen Magnificats and over a hundred motets, mainly written in a retrospective loosely polyphonic style. A selection of works also shows his excursions into concertante and cori spezzati mediums. Despite the frequency with which his works were published his contemporary fame as a composer who specialized in the writing of canons and musical puzzles has dwindled over the last three centuries.
This study includes firstly, an examination of the composer's activities prior to his Venetian appointment, referring in particular to the pedagogical intent expressed in his Ricercari a due voci and secondly, extraction of relevant seventeenth century archival data connected with San Marcuola and comparison of its rites with Metallo's output, in order to determine the motivation behind publication. A discussion follows concerning the liturgical function of the ecclesiastical texts chosen by Metallo,drawing where possible upon original seventeenth century liturgical sources for information. Finally, the musical content of Metallo's work is dealt with, covering the areas of compositional technique, thematic sources, the incidence of canon and puzzle, the use of organ bass and the extent of vocal ranges. Before a conclusion is reached, a short description of missing works and fragments leads to the supposition that there may still be several, as yet, unidentified publications by Metallo which have not come to light. It is concluded that the overall picture now presented of Metallo assists in defining more precisely the activities and commitments of a Venetian parish composer, hitherto much neglected in the shadow cast by the great churches and confraternities of the region. A selected edition of thirteen works forms the second portion of the study.
Pathways of target search for bZIP proteins
Keywords: Protein-DNA interactions
Transcription Factors
Intrinsically Disordered Proteins
Solution-state NMR
Fluorescence Polarisation/Anisotropy
Kinetics

The General Control Non-depressible protein 4 (GCN4) is a transcription factor found in Saccharomyces cerevisiae and is involved in the regulation of amino acid biosynthesis in response to stress response. GCN4 is member of the bZIP transcription factors superfamily and is an intrinsically disordered protein that recognises and binds to specific DNA sites through its Basic Region (BR), located in the basic leucine zipper domain (bZIP). GCN4 is found as a monomer in solution and is highly disordered but becomes fully helical upon dimerization on its target site. To this day, GCN4’s target recognition and search pathway, via a monomer or a dimer, has not been established. Previous work has suggested that GCN4 prefers a monomer pathway, however, recent experimental results for one of its mammalian homologs, the CREB bZIP, pointed towards a dimer pathway. In this work, fluorescence-based equilibrium and kinetics methods were employed to investigate the DNA-binding kinetics of three different GCN4 constructs; the monomer BR-only peptide, the wild-type bZIP and the forced-dimerized bZIP, in complex with two of its target sites AP-1 and CRE, and a non-target DNA (nsDNA). Interestingly, the monomer bound relatively weakly to the DNA sites (Κd range ~30-150 μΜ) and possesses only a 5-fold specificity for the target. In contrast, full-length bZIP constructs bind tightly to target and non-target sites and are more specific (~2 nM and ~110 nM, respectively). The dissociation rate constants between the bZIP and the forced-dimer were similar (10 s-1 for CRE and 2 s-1 for AP-1) meaning that the protein appears to leave target sites as a dimer. Association rate constants were the same within error for the two versions, and high, indicating rate enhancement by electrostatic interactions. Further work is required to unambiguously identify the preferred binding pathway. In a further investigation the dynamics of the wildtype GCN4 bZIP in its free or DNA-bound state (with CRE or a non-target DNA) were explored through NMR spectroscopy. In all cases, the Secondary Structure Propensity (SSP) analysis of GCN4 backbone chemical shifts in combination with heteronuclear NOE results demonstrated a rigid coiled-coil leucine zipper. The basic region showed similar helicity with the leucine zipper when bound to the CRE site and was less structured and more dynamic in the apo- and the nsDNA-bound states. Therefore, although the full-length bZIP constructs have relatively high affinity for nsDNA (Kd in the nM range), GCN4 bZIP in complex with nsDNA showed a similar dynamic behaviour to its apo-state and significantly less α-helix content than in the creDNA-bound state. In the intrinsically disordered protein field this would be described as a fuzzy complex.
Figural sculpture in Roman Britain and its continental relationships
Keywords: Roman sculpture
Roman Britain
Gaul
cultural transmission
Roman Germany

Roman sculpture was in many ways remarkably homogenous across the empire, but there was also significant local adaptation. The similarities between sculpture in the Roman provinces of Britannia, Germania Inferior and Germania Superior have been observed, but no comprehensive survey of the similarities and differences, and the reasons for those, has yet been conducted. Indeed, scholarship has inadvertently become rather parochial, but recent studies suggest there is much to be gained by looking across provincial boundaries. This thesis aims to do that analysis and consider different geographies of art.
Three case studies (rider relief tombstones, Mother Goddess dedications, and imperial portraits) elucidate the variation in use and appearance of certain types of sculpture in military, religious and socio-political contexts. Explanation of the observations noted in the case studies are advanced and explained, and modalities of movements of form and technique assessed.
The conclusions show that sculpture in Britain and Germany looks similar but not the same because local circumstances both required and allowed consistency and variance to different degrees over time. Specific interactions or movements of people, access to raw materials, technical tradition of makers, and demand from consumers all affected the appearance of sculpture to different extents. The interplay of transmission of standard or universal form and local adaptation is the main theme of this work.
Modelling and analysis of paste flow in high performance Soderberg electrodes
Keywords: Extensional flow
Mathematical modelling
Boundary layer theory
FEniCS
Lubrication theory
Asymptotic analysis
Industrial mathematics
Soderberg electrode

The Søderberg electrode is a continuously consumed electrode invented about 100 years ago by the company now known as Elkem ASA. It remains the most commonly used electrode system, which provides the energy necessary for the production of ferroalloys and calcium carbide. The electrode paste is the raw material that makes the electrodes: a mixture of pitch tar binder and calcined anthracite. It can be added in the form of solid cylinders at the inlet of the steel casing that encloses the electrode column. As the temperature increases inside the electrode column, the paste softens and spreads until it reaches the electrode casing, and then is baked as the temperature reaches 450 ◦ C. In normal operation, hot paste from lower down the casing may be recirculated up to the top, forming a viscous pool of paste which in urn contributes to the softening of new incoming cylinders.
In this thesis we derive mathematical models focusing on the top part of the electrode where the paste softening process occurs. An incorrect softening profile of the paste may lead to a baked electrode with non-uniform material properties, leading to costly and dangerous breakages. For the models presented in this work, we have incorporated an exponential dependence of viscosity on temperature to account for how sensitive the paste is to temperature variations. Temperature variations result from the heating supplied by hot air outside the casing, as well as electrical induction effects caused by the proximity of the copper tubes that supply the electrical current to the casing.
In Chapter 2, we begin by formulating a two-dimensional flow and temperature model in steady state, which is then asymptotically reduced to a one-dimensional extensional flow model. We obtain numerical solutions to understand which physical effects control the position where the paste touches the casing for the first time, x = λ. In Chapter 3, we investigate this model further by looking at time dependent solutions. We use boundary layer theory and the theory of multiple scales to understand how the addition of cylinders affects the time evolution of λ(t). In Chapter 4, we construct and solve a finite element model to gain some intuition on the role of the recirculating paste near the top of the electrode, and we discuss how we can make some conclusions on cylinder addition from this model. In Chapter 5, we use the structure of the solutions found in Chapter 4 to motivate a hybrid extensional flow model with lubrication flow near the walls where the temperature is higher and the viscosity is lower. We find asymptotic solutions for both the flow profile and the temperature distribution in the various boundary layers found in the problem, which we then interpret in the context of the industrial problem. We conclude this thesis with a summary and a discussion in Chapter 6.
The yellow peril discourse in anglophone and sinophone literatures and cultures, 1895 to the present: mutations, reactions, and reinventions
Keywords: comparative literature
sinophone
racism
positive orientalism
Asian racialization
Chinese South African
yellow peril

Focusing on appropriations of the racist Yellow Peril discourse in a range of Anglophone and Sinophone contexts from 1895 to the present, this thesis advocates a transnational and situated approach to the study of narratives of racialization. It seeks to challenge the discursive ossification of “Yellow Peril” in the existing English-language scholarship dominated by Asian American Studies. The shifting presences and absences of the “Yellow Peril” in a diverse range of cultural materials, including novels, memoirs, poems, song lyrics, and music videos, are examined with comparative perspectives. The three main sections of this thesis (Section I to III) investigate three different geo-cultural contexts. Section I looks at how the “Yellow Peril” trope found both its prototypical and archetypal fictional characters in fin de siècle England and how it turned into culturalist undercurrents in Ezra Pound’s development of literary modernism in the early 20th century. Section II examines Chinese South African life writing about being “yellow” under apartheid, and analyzes the poetic images of China and Chineseness constructed by the “colored” South African anti-apartheid activist Dennis Brutus to counter the dominant “Yellow Peril”/“Red Peril” discourses in the country during the global Cold War. Section III examines the emergence and re-popularization of racializing discourses related to the color yellow in post-Mao China, or the Sinophone world inclusively conceived. Through detailed analyses of dissident writer Wang Lixiong’s novel Yellow Peril (1988), the anti-locust discourse in Hong Kong, and the racial nationalism exhibited in selected patriotic songs produced by Hong Kong and Taiwanese celebrities, it proposes the concept of “Sinophone trouble” to understand the diverse and often paradoxical ways in which different Sinophone actors have appropriated or reacted to the Yellow Peril discourse. With these interconnected case studies, this thesis emphasizes the comparative nature of racialization and multiplies the ways in which the “Yellow Peril” can be imagined and engaged with.
Pre-literary classical influences on two early Germanic heroic legends
Keywords: Germanic legend
classical mythology
classical reception
oral tradition
cultural exchange
migration period
medieval literature
old Norse literature
heroic poetry
comparative mythology

This thesis argues for the influence of Graeco-Roman mythological ideas on two Germanic legendary traditions in the context of interactions between the Germanic-speaking peoples and the Roman Empire in Late Antiquity. Documentary and archaeological evidence testifies to diverse contacts between the Roman world and the Germanic-speaking peoples, intensifying from the third century CE. There are numerous indications of Roman cultural influence on the Germanic-speaking peoples during this period. Material evidence illustrates the conscious emulation of Romanitas amongst Germanic elites, and in particular evidence of the adaptation of Roman ritual and religious influences corroborates the case for the diffusion of mythological material. Legends concerning the revenge of the master smith Wayland and the destruction of the Burgundian kingdom by the Huns developed amongst Germanic-speaking groups during this period, and are preserved in variant forms in medieval texts from Scandinavia, Germany and England. A synthesis of these three branches of literary sources with iconographic material and the evidence of Latin historiography shows several features in both legends that were incorporated into the earliest strata of their pre-literary development. The elements in question are closely paralleled in the classical myths of Daedalus and Medea, and the wide circulation of these myths in the Roman world in Late Antiquity provides a plausible impetus for their accretion into nascent Germanic legendary traditions. The correspondences between the classical and Old Norse texts are additionally studied from an analogical perspective, considering the ways in which they can highlight underlying similarities and differences in the gender dynamics of the cultures that gave rise to the different literary corpora.
The grammaticalization of do-support in the northern Italian Camuno dialect
Keywords: verb raising parameter
do-support
presupposition
grammaticalization
special question
specificity
northern Italian dialect
'do'-support
wh-insitu
wh insitu
embedded question
grammaticalisation

The Camuno dialect is almost unique among the Romance languages in employing a support verb, fa ‘do’, in an interrogative construction strongly reminiscent of English do-support. In the community in which it was originally described (Monno, Upper Val Camonica: Benincà & Poletto, 1998/2004) it is essentially obligatory. However, FS is also found further south in the Middle Val Camonica where it co-occurs with the normal Lombard interrogative that inverts verb and subject clitic (SCI).
This research tested fa-support (FS) use in Middle Valley dialects according to the type of support verb, with an elicitation experiment. The probability of FS use varied according to supported verb semantics. It was highest with activity verbs lexicalizing the manner in their root, lower with verbs lexicalizing result, and lowest with stative verbs. The manner > result > stative pattern also represents the pathway of generalization of FS, and different communities can be arranged along it according to their degree of grammaticalization of the construction.
When FS is optional and co-occurs with SCI in a dialect, the FS question has the pragmatic properties of an indirect question: it refers to an event slightly anterior to the utterance time about which the speaker has already some presupposed notion and is seeking the opinion of the addressee. The embedded proposition can only contain specific references and any wh-item must refer to an entity (person, place, manner) that already exists in the mind of the speaker. Furthermore, the grammatical subject must be referential and not impersonal. It therefore seems to have a biclausal structure with fa ‘do’ as a main and lexical verb in a separate clause. In contrast the direct, SCI question is an ‘open’ question, without strong preconceptions of the answer, and where the wh-item is non-specific.
Memory and mourning: posthumous portraiture in Britain from the mid-eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries
Keywords: death
posthumous portraiture
commemoration
portraiture
death mask
miniatures
nineteenth century
British art
eighteenth century
memory
remembrance
mourning

This thesis focuses on posthumous portraiture produced in the years between 1760 and 1834 in Britain. It examines the strategies used by artists and their patrons to portray the dead during a period known as the ‘Age of Sensibility’ in which the expression of emotion gained heightened prominence.
Beginning at the time of George III’s ascension to the throne, soon before the foundation of the Royal Academy, and ending in the year when Henry Fox Talbot created the first reasonably lightfast photographs, this period saw major developments in the art world including the rise of portraiture as the most popular genre of art. This period also witnessed the emergence of a culture of sensibility that promoted the outward expression of virtuous feeling. It is within this context that artists and their patrons sought new ways of commemorating the dead through portraiture that would allow the bereaved to express their grief, maintain the presence of a lost loved one, and seek comfort in an image of the departed.
This thesis considers a range of different portrait types in order to highlight the various ways in which posthumous portraits were commissioned, designed, displayed and used, and how they responded to the specific needs of the living. Rather than looking at these portraits in isolation, I show how it is essential to consider them within the broader artistic, religious and socio-cultural context, in order to adequately assess their place within mourning practices.
The range of portrait types under discussion in this thesis requires differing modes of analysis and, where appropriate, different but interconnected methodologies. Whilst this thesis is historically grounded, I draw upon anthropological and theoretical approaches in my interpretation of works of arts, in order to thoroughly examine the use, function and value of posthumous portraiture during this period.
Playing to lose in the international arena: the curious case of the Bologna process
Keywords: rational choice
political ethnography
European policy
Higher education
Europe
Bologna process

This thesis discusses two cases of countries voluntarily going against their material interests at the international stage. By focusing on Albania and Lithuania, it strives to uncover the motivations for participating in the Bologna process, even when lacking the means to compete, and benefit from this policy agenda.
The Bologna Process is part of a broader paradigm shift that has transformed the way education is understood, measured and governed. It coordinates joint efforts across Europe to promote mobility, by demanding that governments remove national barriers to the free movement of students. However, although removing state protectionism in the education sector increases competition, leading to winners and losers, the losing countries have chosen to remain loyal to this cooperation, and refrain from voicing their discontent.
This behaviour does not comply with rational choice theories, which assume actors to be utility maximisers. Similarly, European integration theories do not provide compelling answers to this research puzzle. Thus, I approach it from a constructivist perspective, explaining actors’ preferences from the standpoint of the ‘logic of appropriate behaviour’. Furthermore, this study is process-oriented, seeking to shed light on how global agendas travel to and within national contexts. Close attention is paid to how soft governing tools are employed to manufacture consent, as well as to the path-reproducing mechanisms, which increase the costs of switching to more efficient alternatives.
Methodologically, this thesis uses Political Ethnography, which grants privileged access to the losers’ worldview, allowing us to unpack how they understand and interpret their role and identity. Congruently, through a myriad of sources and a combination of research methods, such as observation, in-depth interviews and documentary analysis, I explain what motivates some nations to seek membership in the ‘international society’, whatever the costs.
Connecting the dots: ecology, movement & conservation of lions across the Kalahari-Kavango landscape
Keywords: Kalahari
home range
Panthera leo
connectivity
AKDE
African lion

Movement is a fundamental process that impacts an animal’s fate, population dynamics and the structure of communities and ecosystems. In this thesis I consider open challenges and opportunities in how to model animal movement in the context of wild lion populations. I apply sophisticated modern statistical approaches from across the rapidly developing movement ecology field to long-term movement datasets from wild lions in Southern Africa to generate insights into connectivity between populations, local ranging behaviour and how lions respond to their thermal environment. Specifically, I evaluate how data inputs and approaches for modelling space use and connectivity perform in capturing lion movement (i) during dispersal across a landscape, (ii) at the home range scale and smaller, and (iii) how fine-scale animal movement can be linked to the environment and key climatic variables. As a whole, this body of work extends our understanding of the movement process in lions with particular application to spatial ecology for conservation research.