VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
The humanization of teams in organizations, fact or fantasy : exploring women's experiences

This study examines the application of teams in business organizations, with a focus on women's experience of teams. While layers of conventional, hierarchical management continue to exist in the organizations studied, alternative, team-based approaches had been implemented. The study has implications for the role of the practitioner in the implementation of teams in organizations. The changing demographics of the work force, with a growing number of women, demands attention to the creation of team environments in which female members feel supported and acknowledged. The research examines the individual experiences of 11 Caucasian women, all of them in either middle or senior management, who work in teams. The gender composition of the team experiences ranges from all-female to single female. Literature is examined in three primary fields: current trends in organizational development with a focus on learning organizations; theory on women's development, research on women's issues in employment and a feminist critique of organization development literature; and literature on team theory and research. The issues were studied from a qualitative perspective with an underlying rationale based on the theoretical perspective of phenomenology. The participants formed a homogeneous sample of the same gender from six research sites. Interviewees were volunteers selected from private organizations. Data were gathered through confidential semi-structured, face-to-face in-depth interviews. The findings of the team experiences are clustered around four general themes: sense of support; exercising power; people's relationship to work; and organizational culture practices. Findings are discussed in the context of the relationships and gaps between the women's perceptions of the organizations' concept of teams--'organizations' promise of teams'--and their experiences of teams--'teams in practice'. During the course of the research, the inquiry expanded into an exploration of the participants' confrontation with the promise(s) of the team experience. The team structure provided the vehicle through which to explore women's expectations and their role in organizations. The study concludes with directions for further research and educational recommendations. Suggestions for practitioners implementing teams are offered: incorporating woman-centred values, and recognizing that individuals have pre-existing mental models and assumptions about teams that may influence their team experiences.
Higher level approaches to knowledge and commercial computer simulations

An analytic matrix was created which adapted and merged Bereiter and Scardamalia's (1996) levels of approach to knowledge with concepts from Bloom's taxonomy (Krumme, 1998) and Egan's (1997) concept of understandings. This instrument was used to examine the discourse between students as they worked on a problem-based learning task using a commercial computer simulation for evidence of the presence of the eight levels of approach to knowledge postulated by Bereiter and Scardamalia in 1996. There was a particular focus on the higher levels of approach to knowledge, levels 4 ("knowledge viewed from different perspectives"), 5 ("knowledge as personal artifacts"), and 6 ("knowledge as improvable personal artifacts"). In a study of 17 students from grades six to eight in three suburban schools, evidence was found that level 3 ("knowledge as representable") was necessary to group functioning and that level 4 was used consistently by these students. Evidence of levels 5 and 6 was also present, but less prominent than level 4.
La narrativa de Claribel Alegria, historia e innovacion literaria

The literature of Central America is rich and varied. As in many parts of Latin America, its production in this region has been greatly influenced by the historical development of social upheavals brought about as the result of political oppression and injustice. The 1930's was a period of dictatorships in many of the region's countries and they lasted well into the 1970's. Revolutionary activities came to be directed not only against this phenomenon which took the lives of thousands of innocent people, but also against imperialism, and in support of basic human rights for the people. Many writers were forced to leave their homelands and others took voluntary exile They were faced with two major dilemmas: firstly, it was urgently necessary to break the silence and document the reality prevailing in their nations, and, secondly, they had to search for new narrative techniques in order to artistically interpret and represent that reality in their texts. Claribel Alegría, the subject of my dissertation, is one of the founders of the new narrative fiction which emerged during the cultural revolution of the 1960's. My dissertation focuses on the novels and 'testimonios' of Claribel Alegría, who was the first Central American woman writer to introduce new ways of writing literature and to put it at the service of the marginal, voiceless communities in the region and elsewhere. Chapter one sets the contexts in which a literature is born in the region and more specifically in El Salvador. The remaining chapters center around the study of all of her five novels and two of her four 'testimorios' to show various aspects of her creativity and the importance they have in the context of universal literature. My study of the narrative themes and techniques of these works important new perspectives on Central American history, culture, politics and issues of race and gender My study also demonstrates that Alegría is a master of narrative fiction since she achieves her goals by challenging the existing literary canons and leads the way for other writers to re-write the histories of their people using literary tools that are at once innovative and aesthetically of a high standard.
Hellenism and orientalism in the work of E.M. Forster and Constantine Cavafy, a parallel reading

Forster and Cavafy were both working out of the tradition of western Hellenism. Hellenism served Forster primarily as a vehicle, for literary expression. He was sensitive to the West's appropriation of Greece, as his early interest in the figure of Gemistos Plethon shows. Cavafy's fixation on late Hellenism and Byzantium differed in that it was more concerned with Hellenism's ecumenical dimension. Forster had little sympathy for Byzantium's theocratic imperium and was consequently indifferent to Cavafy's theory of a Greek cultural continuum. Despite this major difference, poet and novelist were both inspired by the cult of Hellenism with its fetish for exiled gods and beautiful young men. The Orient proved to be more of a challenge for Forster than for Cavafy, whose complex Orientalism is at once subaltern (Ottoman), imperialist (Hellenizing), decadent (Parnassian) and occasionally political (anti-colonial). Forster's experience in the East and curiosity about Levantine and Indian culture reflect his determination to transcend his western world view. Novelist and poet became friends in Egypt during the war; yet their relationship was qualified by political considerations, particularly Forster's pro-Turkish writings and connection with Arnold Toynbee. Cavafy had a more sophistic approach to Hellenism and celebrated its supreme cultural status unapologetically. He was most attuned to the paradox of Hellenism's need for the barbaric as a cultural foil, and depicted the tension between these historic polarities with much irony. The Orient was central to his vision of Hellenism; he exploited the East in his own way, indirectly celebrating it by showing how dynamic its commingling with Hellenism could be. Forster eventually grew weary of Hellenism and recognized its creative limitations. He attempted to replace Greece with the radically different culture of India. A Passage to India reflects his Orientalist desire to comprehend the religious aspects of India, which he conveys largely by means of architectural motifs. In the end, Forster returned to his Hellenic habits. With Maurice and the Priapic short fiction, he belatedly reengages the discourse of Hellenism which he never fully abandoned and which continued to influence him.
Between ecstasy and terror, manifestations of marginality in the experiences of Ontario school board teachers of adults

The genesis of this study is the statement that adult education is marginal. The purpose of the research was to examine this claim and gain greater understanding of the status of adult education practitioners. Teachers employed by Ontario school boards to work with adults were chosen to participate in the study. A qualitative research paradigm was chosen which adopted a five-stage approach to the investigation. First, background information about school board adult education was gathered, in order to demonstrate the context for the study. Next, the literature was reviewed and three theoretical constructs of marginality were identified, along with research questions. Those questions formed an interview protocol for the third stage of inquiry, which was the interviewing of school board teachers of adults. Fourthly, the data from the interviews were analyzed using the constructs of marginality as a framework. Finally, conclusions were drawn from the findings. One conclusion of the study is that there are manifestations of marginality in the experiences of school board teachers of adults. Other conclusions are that those teachers of adults are in the margins of the teaching profession, and also in the margins of school board organizations. Furthermore, it is concluded that the belief that school boards exist to educate youth results in the perception that adult educators are marginal, and causes them to experience the effects of that status.
Factors influencing the cardiovascular response to +G¦z, implications on the design of life support systems for acceleration protection

Tactical aircraft pilots can be exposed to high levels of headward acceleration. Resultant gravitoinertial forces (+Gz) impair vision and, if prolonged, may cause loss of consciousness (G-LOC). Current G-LOC countermeasures include a +Gz actuated regulator (G-valve) pressurizing a lower body garment (G-suit). Protection may also be augmented with positive pressure breathing during +Gz (PBG). Before an optimal strategy can be proposed, a comprehensive investigation is required into how the various countermeasures and their timing affect the cardiovascular response and alter +Gz tolerance. Six subjects were exposed to acceleration profiles ranging from +2.5 to +5.0 Gz in a human centrifuge. Subjects wore one of three lower body garments pressurized according to one of three different schedules. Pressurization was coincident with +Gz or was delayed in 1.5 second intervals (maximum lag of 4.5 seconds). When PBG was used, pressure was applied according to one of two schedules. Tolerance to +Gz, based on changes in beat-by-beat heart level systolic blood pressure (SBP) indicated no significant improvements from pressure schedules for the G-suits or PBG. Significant increases in SBP occurred after a 3 to 4 second delay, and were delayed further with any lag in G-suit pressurization. The largest sustained improvements in SBP were recorded with the G-suit providing the greatest coverage to the lower body. An inferential analysis procedure estimated whole body blood flow (Q est) and resistive (Rest) changes. Flow dropped simultaneously with G-suit inflation, but increased above baseline values after 2 to 3 seconds, primarily from an increased heart rate. Resistance rose rapidly with lower body pressurization, but immediately fell to values approaching pre-acceleratory levels. The data suggested that lower body pressurization resulted in an increased afterload concomitant with the forced emptying of the underlying venous vasculature. Heterometric autoregulation and a Bainbridge reflex compensated for the increased afterload and augmented venous return, respectively. Rest decreased as blood settled into venous vessels not compressed by the lower body garment and Qest remained elevated from a "rightward shift" in vascular functioning. With the countermeasures G-LOC employed, the blood pressure control system seems to function more as a poor regulator than a servomechanistic system.
The struggle for a future, capitalism and beyond

Drawing upon the richness of twentieth century theorizing, I want to ideologically rearm the proletariat. However, the history of the revolutionary working class is both continuous and discontinuous, and the present discontinuity concerns the 'other' to the mostly male industrial wage-earner who has been the traditional revolutionary subject, the neo-proletariat in Gorz's terms or the other working class in Negri's The situation is far from clear, as alternative revolutionary subjects range from the mostly female global homeworkers to members of informal economies with community currencies, and other elements of the new social movements. Nevertheless, common to them all is some alternative set of values--alternative to the capitalist market place--that I subsume under the ideational rubric of Care. Heidegger's explication of Care is the most theoretically sophisticated effort of the present to define this term. I appropriate this from him for purposes of defining what could be the basic ideational suprastructure of an emerging revolutionary subject--both continuous and discontinuous with the traditional one. I then show the common ground between Heidegger and Marx. Building from that I then consider the arguments of Fredric Jameson, in particular his conception of the totality. Jameson argues, in his ironic and playful way, for the reconception of Marxist praxis based on the evolution and involution of post-modernism, the third age of capitalism. I then consider the traditional socialist concern with planning, separating planning from the drawing up of blueprints. In reference to the work of General Idea, a group of Toronto artists, I then address the question of a war of position. and an early fighter of such a war. Revolutionaries themselves undergoing revolution is that war's chief point.
An exploration of computer-simulated evolution and small group discussion on pre-service science teachers' perceptions of evolutionary concepts

The primary goal of this study was to explore how the use of a computer simulation of basic evolutionary processes, in combination with small-group discussions, affected Intermediate/Senior pre-service science teachers' perspectives of basic evolutionary concepts. Qualitative and quantitative methods were used in a case study approach with 19 pre-service Intermediate/Senior science teachers at an Ontario university. Several sub-goals were explored. The first sub-goal was to assess Intermediate/Senior pre-service science teachers' current conceptions of evolution. The results indicated that approximately two-thirds of the participants had a poor understanding of basic evolutionary concepts, with only 2 of the 19 participants demonstrating a strong comprehension. These results were found to be very similar to comparable samples of subjects from other research. The second sub-goal was to explore the relationships among Intermediate/Senior pre-service science teachers' understanding of contemporary evolutionary concepts, their perspectives of the nature of science, and their intentions to teach evolutionary concepts in the classroom. Participants' knowledge of evolutionary concepts was found to be associated strongly with their intentions to teach evolution by natural selection ('r' = .42). However, knowledge of evolutionary concepts was not found to be associated with any particular science epistemology perspective. The third sub-goal was to analyze and to interpret the small-group discussions as members interacted with the simulation. The simulation was found to be highly engaging and a very effective method of encouraging participants to speculate, question, discuss and learn about important evolutionary concepts. Analyses of the discussions revealed that the simulation evoked a wide array of correct conceptions as well as misconceptions. The fourth sub-goal was to assess the extent to which creating a lesson plan on the topic of natural selection could affect Intermediate/Senior pre-service science teachers' conceptions of evolutionary theory. All of participants' lesson plans contained various types of misconceptions related to natural selection and overestimated what could be accomplished in a 70 minute period. The results are discussed with respect to the importance of prior knowledge, the influence of cognitive biases in learning evolutionary concepts and the role of computer simulations in obviating biases inherent in traditional curriculum materials used for teaching evolution.
Feminist encounters with symbol, myth, and ritual, Mary Daly, Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, and Rosemary Radford Ruether

The feminist encounter with, and figuring of, the discursive categories of myth, symbol, and ritual have been ongoing processes in the discipline of Religious Studies. In the work of three significant feminist theologians, Mary Daly, Elisabeth Schûssler Fiorenza, and Rosemary Radford Ruether, the categories of myth, symbol, and ritual are central. These categories are not, however, autonomous. Rather, they frequently interconnect with the categories of language, history, and political action. Drawing on a variety of theories that allow them to deconstruct the androcentrism and misogynism found in religious practices, specifically located in the West, they reread, reconceive, and reconstruct those religious traditions they locate themselves with. The study laid out in this text is one that focuses on Daly's, Schûssler Fiorenza's, and Radford Ruether's understanding and use of the categories of symbol, myth, and ritual respectively. To further the analysis of their feminist projects of reclamation, I have examined their development of symbol, myth, and ritual as they intersect with theories of language, hermeneutics and history, and ideology critique and identity politics. In order to engage their feminist positions, I have further intersected their feminist theoretical positions with feminist theories developed in regard to poetry, epistemology, and difference. The study, then, broadly consists of an axiomatic engagement with their work: symbol, myth and ritual interconnected with language, history, and political action which are then further interconnected with feminist poetics, feminist epistemology, and difference. Throughout this study I will continually contest their untheorized use of the categories of symbol, myth and ritual. These categories, or sub-genres in the field of religious studies, have not been theorized by the feminists within this analysis and I will point out the difficulties this lack of theorization introduces into their work. My intention is not to call for a rejection of the work Daly, Schûssler Fiorenza, and Radford Ruether have done, but rather to interact critically with their work in order to demonstrate the limitations therein, and hopefully generate further avenues of inquiry. It is my hope to extend not only feminist discourses within the field of Religious Studies, but also non-feminist discourses that seek to employ the categories of symbol, myth, and ritual.
Isolation and characterization of genes specifically expressed at discrete stages of B cell development

B cell differentiation involves the coordinate activation and suppression of various genes. Identification of those B lineage- and/or developmental stage-specific genes has greatly increased our understanding of this process. However, the genetic program controlling B lymphopoiesis largely remains unresolved. In this thesis, I describe the isolation and characterization of the genes differentially expressed during the transition from pro-B to pre-B cell stages. I used mRNA differential display to isolate genes uniquely present in either IIB4 or 70Z/3 cells which represent the two stages of interest. In total, nine genes have been identified: three are IIB4-specific and six are 70Z/3-specific. DNA sequence analysis reveals that all but one of these genes are previously undescribed. Studies of expression pattern demonstrate stage-specificity for all of them. Based on these criteria, three genes were selected for further characterization. 7A3 is specifically expressed by B lineage cells in late developmental stages, including pre-B cells, immature B cells and plasma cells. It encodes a sialic acid-specific 9-O-acetylesterase, which catalyzes the removal of 9-O-acetyl ester groups from sialic acids present on many glycoconjugates. This enzyme may influence B cell differentiation by regulating the interaction of CD22 with its ligands. 7T9 has an expression pattern similar to that of 7A3 in B lineage cells. It encodes the mouse homologue of human pleckstrin, a major substrate of protein kinase C. This protein may be involved in B cell receptor-mediated signal transduction as suggested by its increased phosphorylation following sIgM aggregation. In addition, it may play a role in further differentiation of pre-B cells since transfection of 70Z/3 cells with an antisense construct induces NF-[kappa]B activity and Ig[kappa] light chain expression. 7G9 is primarily expressed by B cell progenitors. It encodes a precursor protein for a novel tachykinin peptide. The putative peptide resembles substance P both structurally and functionally, raising the possibility that this lymphocyte-specific tachykinin may be the physiological mediator for some immune regulation functions previously ascribed to substance P. Its function in B cell differentiation is not clear. Presumably, it may act as an autocrine growth factor. In summary, I have isolated nine genes differentially expressed at discrete stages of B cell development. Characterization of a selected set of these genes have revealed some novel mechanisms regulating B lymphopoiesis.