VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
The creation of a congregationalist identity, Robert Vaughan (1795-1868)

This thesis is a study of the career of Robert Vaughan, a Congregationalist clergyman, author, and teacher in nineteenth-century Britain. The Congregationalists and other non-Anglican British Protestants were known as Nonconformists, and during Vaughan's lifetime they became a powerful political and social force. Most studies of nineteenth-century Nonconformity focus on the role of Nonconformists in radical movements that aimed at securing social and political equality with Anglicans. The main concerns of Robert Vaughan, however, revolved around the status of Nonconformists in society and their intellectual life. This thesis therefore uses Vaughan's life as a basis for examining a number of important questions that have been relatively neglected with the scholarly concentration on radical and political issues: moderate Nonconformist thought, the tensions produced within Nonconformity by changing social circumstances, and the richness and complexity of Nonconformist intellectual life. Vaughan enjoyed a long career as a historian (he was the first Professor of History at the London University), President of a seminary called the Lancashire Independent College, and founder and editor of a Nonconformist periodical, the 'British Quarterly Review'. This thesis explores several facets of this career: Vaughan's training as a clergyman; his time at the London University and at Lancashire Independent College, including his involvement in the controversial Davidson Case over academic freedom; two of his main ventures in the world of publishing, as author of a well-known work of comparative history, 'The Age of Great Cities', and with the 'British Quarterly Review'; and a number of episodes in which he acted as a leader of Nonconformity, commemorating the bicentenary of the expulsion of Nonconformist clergymen from the Church of England in 1662, assessing the American Civil War, and cementing the alliance between Nonconformity and Gladstonian Liberalism. The theme of the thesis is Vaughan's role in reflecting and shaping the Nonconformists' view of themselves, and in particular his campaigns to convince Nonconformists of their centrality in the narrative of British history, and to bridge a widely-perceived gap between middle class respectability and intellectualism, and a strong Nonconformist identity.
"We are struggling" Gender, poverty and the dynamics of survival within low-income households in Botswana

The examination of the characteristics of poverty and life chances, focusing on the gender of the head of the household, has been the subject of increasing academic research in recent years in developing countries. The study of domestic units primarily headed/supported by women in Botswana is of particular interest, given their exceptionally high incidence. Census and household surveys reveal that almost half of all households in Botswana are headed by women, and that a significant proportion of them fall in the lowest income categories. This study examines the causes and manifestations of poverty among female-headed households in Botswana. At the macro-level, the analysis of secondary sources assessed the manifestations of gender inequality and poverty within the context of economic and cultural change. The empirical study was situated at the micro-level, investigating the implications of household organisation and individual gender relations of economic production and social reproduction on the life chances of women and their dependants. The study was conducted within a pool of low-income female and male headed/supported households in a rural village and the Capital City, comparing similarities and differences in their composition, sources of income and survival strategies employed by women and men within them. The discussions with women and men pointed to the complexity of domestic organisation and the significance of gender hierarchies that are often obscured by focusing on discrete notions of 'household' and'headship', and economic measures, of poverty. The findings show that while poverty among households that are primarily supported by women may be due to high age dependency ratios and the paucity of income earners, it is also due to the contradictory implications of the social construction of gender, and relations of extra-marital parenting in contemporary Botswana.
Disease modification approaches to the treatment of osteoarthritis

Hylans are cross-linked high molecular weight hyaluronans, which have recently been advocated for intraarticular treatment of osteoarthritis. Our first study demonstrated that intraarticular hylan therapy at a time point of early to moderate osteoarthritis improve histopathological outcome in dogs. These findings suggest a potential disease-modifying effect of hylan in osteoarthritic cartilage. Neurotrophins play an important role in nerve regeneration and repair. Subtle nerve injury has been cited as a potential etiology for the development of osteoarthritis. Our second study determined that intraarticular neurotrophins improve histopathological outcome of osteoarthritis. Finally, we attempted to better assess chondrocyte adherence, as a prelude to gene therapy. Transplanted chondrocytes maintained their spherical phenotype. Chondrocytes adhered significantly better to cartilage surfaces after the superficial layer was removed suggesting an anti-adhesive effect of the intact cartilage surface. Both TGF-ß and IGF-1 improved chondrocyte adherence, while RGD peptide decreased chondrocyte adherence to articular surfaces suggesting that integrin receptors play an important role in cell-matrix adherence.
Automatic part localization for fixtureless assembly of automotive sheet metal parts

This thesis presents a solution to the problem of part localization in fixtureless assembly. Fixtureless assembly is a new technology in which complex and expensive dedicated fixtures are replaced by robots. However, the elimination of the fixtures implies that the robots must now be able to achieve the same locational accuracy of parts as precision fixtures provide. The implementation of an Automatic Part Localization System (APLS) allows the robots to determine the accurate position and orientation of the parts that are placed in arbitrary locations. In this thesis, the problem of part localization is studied in the context of an application to automotive sheet metal part assembly, specifically car body fenders. The development of the APLS is summarized. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
Poesia y musicalizacion, seleccion y recepcion del texto poetico en forma musicalizada, el caso Uruguayo, 1960-1985

This study examines how the interpretation and reception of a poem (pre-existent as an independent literary text) is affected by its rendering in popular music. A case study allows us to explore how the meaning of a poem changes when it is set to music; the type of effect this has on the reception of the text; the way poetry is re-contextualized in a song as a reaffirmation of values, reactivating the folklore and tradition of a culture; and what benefits there are in exposing poems through music as a way of accessing vaster networks of communication. The Uruguayan case is notable given the intensified number and heterogeneity of musicalizations registered after 1960. The socio-cultural circumstances in which this occurs manifest strong links to the social context. Two distinct stages, in the chronology of the phenomenon reveals this connection. In the first period (1960-1973) poetry adopts a more popular style, responding to a renovation in cultural forms of expression and a new focus on political autonomy mid identity. In the second period (1973-1985) the situation generated by the military dictatorship intensifies the relation of poetry to music as a means of indirect protest. This results not only in an increased use of poetic texts, of various historical periods in the new popular music, but also an increased willingness of some poets such as Washington Benavides and Mario Benedetti, to voluntarily compose texts for music. Other poets included in the poetic work set to music in this period are D. Agustini, V. Cunha, J. Herrera y Reissig, J. de Ibarbourou, C. Maia, O. Rodríquez del Castillo, and I. Vilariño. The musicians included in the study are C. Benavides, W. Carrasco and C. Fernández, E. Darnauchans, E. Labranois and M. Carrero, Los Olimareños, H. Numa Moraes, D. Viglietti, A. Zitarrosa. To address the fundamental issues, this study takes a two-put approach. In the first phase, we establish the theoretical base regarding the correspondences between poetry and music. We then proceed to contextualize and document these considerations by applying those issues to the Uruguayan case. The second phase is based on interpreting the texts themselves, using a hermeneutic approach.
Traffic calming within Metropolitan Toronto

This report evaluates and summarizes the use of various Traffic Calming Measures, within the Metropolitan Toronto (Metro) area. The evaluation is based upon the social acceptance of these measures, their adverse impacts on energy consumption and the environment, their ability to achieve intended objectives, their economic feasibility, and their adverse impacts on the safety of non-motorized street users. Issues were addressed by means of a literature review, a public attitude survey/questionnaire, a survey of the local municipal transportation professionals, as well as an analysis of traffic calming measures in relation to fuel consumption, user safety, and economics. Based on the findings of this study, a systematic planning and evaluation procedure was developed to help in the assessment and selection of different calming measures. The procedure accounts for characteristics such as road hierarchy, area characteristics, environmental concerns, cost and ease of maintenance, and user safety. All of these are important for the implementation and success of any traffic calming plan. Other factors such as public expectations can be considered further at the final decision making stage. In addition, this report makes recommendations to improve conditions for non-motorized users in our environment. This study has been carried out to satisfy the project requirements for the Masters in Engineering (Civil) program.
Desire for development, the education of white women as development workers

For middle-class white Canadians, international development work comprises a normalized choice that increasingly attracts women. This research asks how Canadian women development workers negotiate and understand our positions in relations of power in developing countries. Asserted here is that development, as practised by the (self-proclaimed) more advanced 'North' in the spaces of the 'South', comprises an instrument of global imperial relations. Although African and other Southern theorists challenge dominant models of development, the enterprise remains intact, the legitimacy of white subjects' interventions globally being continuously affirmed through the educative effects of Northern discourse and Canadian national narratives. Through examining open-ended interviews with eighteen women, including myself, who have previously worked in sub-Saharan Africa on long-term contracts, the study elucidates white women's investments in both seeing and masking our micro-level participation in historicized, global power relations. Relying on a conception of subjectivities as constructed through narratives and always in process, this research accepts that the project of white, bourgeois identity formation that was undertaken in earnest during the era of empire persists today. Colonial continuities tracked in participants' narratives include the presence of racialized Othering, the ambivalent positioning of white women as ever-liminal bourgeois subjects, and the individualist imperative to conceive of the self as moral. The development experience (for Canadians) is revealed to be pervaded with desire for the Other, while the careful preservation of participants' moral narratives serves to compromise moves to resist both enactments of domination and the terms of the prevailing paradigm of white subjectivity. Participants' complex positionings in relations of power, collaborating with racialized affirmations of self, produce white women's claims to unprecedented fullnesses of bourgeois subjectivity. The regenerative capacity of Canadian women's desire for development can be understood, then, as fundamentally about the making of self. Conversely, risk of profoundly interrogating our positions in dominance is revealed as a threat to narratives of the moral self, and thus to our very constructions of unitary subjectivity: a conclusion relevant for anti-racist education with white subjects, particularly women, and in other work where deconstructing whiteness is central.
Assessing the organizational learning capacity of schools

The intent of this study was to develop a model of organizational learning that could be used to assess the organizational learning capacity of schools. Seven research questions guided the study: What is the nature of individual professional learning in schools? What is the nature of team learning in schools? What is the nature of whole organization learning in schools? How can schools increase their capacity for organizational learning? Can changes in schools' organizational learning capacities be described as a series of stages? If yes, what are the features of these stages? What conditions stimulate and restrict movement through stages of organizational learning, if such stages can be identified? This research was conducted in two distinct phases. Phase one consisted of an extensive review of the organizational learning literature and the development of a preliminary framework to describe growth in organizational learning capacity of schools. In phase two the framework was revised and refined. Organizational learning capacity was conceptualized as a four-stage process occurring across five units of organizational learning (individual learning, team learning, whole school learning, learning processes and learning levers) that were identified in the model building phase. Using this model it is possible to assess learning capacity along a number of dimensions and determine the stage of development for a particular school. An analysis of the interview data suggests that individual learning occurs along a continuum that ranges from very little interest in individual professional learning in schools that are at Stage 1 to a very sophisticated level of learning in schools that are at Stage 4. Team learning is a sophisticated skill and schools in the early stages of developing their organizational learning capacity are unlikely to be very productive at it. Sophisticated team learning occurred in schools that were in the third and fourth stage of development but for schools in the first two stages there was little evidence of team learning. The level, breadth, rate and strength of the learning process are measures that help to determine the capacity of an organization to learn continuously and to make intelligent decisions. Results from the data indicate that as schools progress through the stages of growth new learning becomes pervasive and widely accepted throughout the school, whereas in the early stages, learning is superficial in nature. A total of six organizational conditions (learning levers) that can leverage the learning capacity of a school were also identified. Prominent among these conditions were building a shared vision of learning and having visionary leaders (principals) with transformational leadership styles, adopting a systems perspective, maintaining a flexible organizational structure, creating a collaborative culture and providing resources for learning. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
Cracking due to alkali-silica reaction and its effect on durability properties of concrete

Around the world, many structures built during the last few decades have suffered from damage due to alkali-silica reaction (ASR). Some of these structures were considered structurally inadequate and have been replaced or repaired. Most of the others are structurally safe but the concrete might have failed as a protective barrier to the reinforcement. ASR causes microcracks in concrete which may lead to inserviceability of structures by providing easy access for other deterioration processes to take place. This thesis work investigates the effect of ASR-induced microcracks on the durability of concrete. Specifically, mass transfer properties and freeze-thaw resistance of damaged, non-air-entrained concrete were assessed. Due to the hydrophilic natural of the alkali-silica gel, it was found that the role it plays in concrete durability is significant. Microcracks caused by ASR increased the rate of diffusion of chloride and gas permeability through concrete. However, it reduced water permeability. The gel exists in the pores and microcracks may mitigate the detrimental effect of cracks on mass transfer. Nevertheless, the net effect is unfavourable to the durability of concrete. The expansion due to ASR had an adverse effect on the freeze-thaw resistance of concrete. The relative dynamic modulus of samples with expansion levels of 0.092%, 0.122% and 0.205% dropped below 60% in less than 50 cycles. Other samples with lower level of expansion lasted about 150 cycles before 60% of relative dynamic modulus was reached. Further research using samples with higher expansion in mass transfer tests and air-entrained concrete in freeze-thaw test is recommended by the author.
External and real, but not supernatural, the terror of the soul in Brockden Brown and Poe

William Hazlitt noted in 1829 that the works of Charles Brockden Brown "were a banquet of horrors," arguing that the lack of European Gothic settings in the New World produced a different vein in the history of the tale of terror, as "the genius of America is essentially mechanical and modern." Brown was obliged to suit his Gothic narratives to his New World environment by explaining apparently supernatural elements as being fundamentally natural in origin. In this, Brown was heir to the Gothic tradition of William Godwin and Ann Radcliffe in advocating psychological and rational explanations, rather than to that of M. G. Lewis which espoused patently supernatural excesses. Edgar Allan Poe wrote fiction which was much more internalized than Godwin's or even Brown's, exploring terrors that were "not of Germany, but of the soul," placing the emphasis on psychological observation rather than grounding his tales in Brown's realistic locales. This dissertation will explore how Brown and Poe deviated from the European schools, with their rejection of Gothic trappings in favour of presenting the capacity for violence inherent in the human mind. The Gothic tradition is analyzed in Chapter 1, which details how Brown and Poe present an American translation of European terrors without resorting to the actual supernatural. Brown's novels are treated in Chapter 2, which examines his explanations of the apparently supernatural through such devices as ventriloquism and spontaneous combustion, along with religious mania. Poe's short stories are analyzed in Chapter 3, which depicts how he further internalizes Brown's exploration of unbalanced mental states with depictions of insanity, revenge, and mournful obsession. Brown's and Poe's works are compared in Chapter 4, which examines how both authors explore the phobias of premature burial and the loss of physical control, through somnambulism or mesmerism, as well as the terrors implicit in outbreaks of plague. Both Brown's subjective but rational realism and Poe's more romantic subjectivism emanate from the Gothic tradition.
Initial characterization of a novel human retinal gene encoding a putative Pleckstrin Homology Domain protein

The human 198L gene is abundantly expressed in retina and encodes a protein containing a putative Pleckstrin Homology Domain. Other proteins containing this domain participate in signalling or cytoskeletal function. Here I describe expression studies of the human and mouse 198L gene. The human '198L' transcript was localized to the photoreceptor layer of the adult human retina as shown by 'in situ' hybridization. In addition, the human transcript was previously shown to be expressed in the human brain and kidney by northern blot. Northern blot analysis shows that the mouse '198l' transcript is abundantly expressed in mouse retina and throughout the mouse CNS, and less abundantly expressed in liver, lung and kidney. These studies suggest that the 198L gene could play an important role in the biology of the photoreceptor cell. Because of its abundant expression in photoreceptors, the human '198L' gene may be a possible candidate gene for retinitis pigmentosa.
The effects of spatial and temporal proximity of means-end information in ecological display design for an industrial simulation

Large displays are prone to losses of integration between different views. To support problem-solving, people must be able to reason functionally along means-ends relations from plant purposes to plant equipment. This research, therefore, was directed at improving integration in ecological displays for large plants by trying to smooth means-ends transitions by manipulating the spatial and temporal proximity of those relations. Three different ecological displays were developed for a simulation of plant. The three displays demonstrated different spatial and temporal designs of means-ends relations: a high spatial low temporal connection, a low spatial high temporal connection and a high spatial high temporal connection. Subjects performed information search tasks and fault detection and diagnosis tasks. It was found that the spatial and temporal proximity of means-end related information improves the traversal of means-end connections on information search tasks. In addition, it was found that close spatial and temporal proximity improved the use of those connections and resulted in faster and more accurate fault diagnosis performance. It can be inferred from this research that greater spatial and temporal proximity of means-ends information may enhance the integration of the display and thereby improve problem-solving performance. This research is a unique look at integration issues with a large plant simulation and helps to expand the application of the ecological approach to large systems.