bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Optimization design of biomechanical parameters based on advanced mathematical modelling
Authors: Wen Yuan
Published: November 2024

In recent years the use of biomechanics in athletic training and performance has received a lot of attention, especially in university sports programs. Biomechanics is the study of the mechanical principles that control how biological things move or are constructed. It is critical for understanding the intricate relationships between physical performance, body mechanics, and injury prevention. The objective of this study is to establish how biomechanical variables can be designed and optimized in universities using mathematical modeling. In this study, a novel Emperor Penguin Search-driven Dynamic Feedforward Neural Network (EPSO-DFNN) is proposed to optimize the biomechanical parameters of athletes. Various biomechanical data are utilized from athletes participating in different sports. Biomechanical parameters include muscle activation patterns, joint angles, forces, and movement. The data was preprocessed using Z-score normalization from the obtained data. The Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) using features is extracted from preprocessed data. The proposed method is to identify the optimal configurations for athlete’s movements tailored to their sports and individual biomechanical profiles. The proposed method is the performance of various evaluation metrics such as F1-score (92.76%), precision (91.42%), accuracy (90.02%), and recall (89.69%). The result demonstrated that the proposed method effectively improved the performance in athletic capabilities compared to other traditional algorithms. This study demonstrates how mathematical modeling may be used to optimize biomechanical characteristics, providing insightful information that can be used to improve athletic performance and encourage safer behaviors in athletic settings.
Editorial
Authors: Fenech Christine
Published: November 2024

The Institute for Education is dedicated to supporting educators, parents, and students in Malta through its research initiatives and projects. It has established the Malta Journal of Education as a platform for its course participants and staff as well as other researchers in the field of education to disseminate their recent findings, thereby enhancing the knowledge base in the field of education and informing policy and practice.
This issue entitled Education Research 2024 is the eight issue of the Malta Journal of Education and the fourth in the series Education Research exploring various aspects of education in Malta. It includes articles that examine the influence of language in physics education, the benefits of play-based learning, demographic changes in Maltese society, and strategies for managing educational change.
Un tezaur monetar geto-dacic de tip Inotești-Răcoasa descoperite în zona de sud-vest a Dobrogei
Authors:   Muzeul de Istorie Naționlă și Arheologie Constanța, Talmațchi Gabriel Mircea
Published: November 2024

In unclear conditions, which exclude an archaeological excavation, a small hoard composed of six Geto-Dacian silver coins of the Inotești-Răcoasa type was discovered near the town of Hațeg, at the point "Valea Baciului - Dealul lui Văleanu". They are specific to the period corresponding to the end of the 2nd century and the first two to three decades of the 1st century BC. The modest hoard arrives in the local milieu from the north of the Danube, most likely ready-made. It is similar to two others discovered in Dobrogea that contain the same type of coins, more precisely, the hoards from Cochirleni and Somova.
Analysis of Legal Protection for Consumers in Trading Through Electronic Systems Based on Minister of Trade Regulation Number 31 of 2023
Authors: I Made Rai Buda Tantra Yoga Suarsawan  , I Nyoman Prabu Buana Rumiartha  , Ni Putu Adhya Pradnyaswari
Published: November 2024

Trading Through Electronic Systems (PMSE) is a type of trading that is different from conventional trading because it uses an electronic systems. With the rapid advancement of technology, PMSE continues to grow with the emergence of various types of electronic trading. The purpose of this research is to analyze the types of trading through electronic systems and the legal protection provided to consumers engaging in PMSE based on Minister of Trade Regulation Number 31 of 2023. The method used in this research is normative legal research. Normative research involves a literature review with a statutory approach. The results of this study identify various types of PMSE according to Minister of Trade Regulation Number 31 of 2023, as well as several forms of legal protection for consumers participating in PMSE. However, the legal protection offered under this regulation still refers to the Consumer Protection Act. This aspect requires updating, considering the diverse types and forms of PMSE that have emerged.
The Role of Local Wisdom in the Governance of Nunkurus Village
Authors: Filmon Mikson Polin
Published: November 2024

This research, entitled "The Role of Local Wisdom in the Governance of Nunkurus Village," addresses the issue of how local wisdom influences the governance of Nunkurus Village. The objective of this study is to ascertain the role of local wisdom in the governance of the village. The research employs an empirical legal study approach, utilizing both primary and secondary data sources. Data collection techniques include document studies and interviews, with data analysis conducted through descriptive qualitative methods. The findings reveal that local wisdom plays a dual role: for the community, it functions as an unwritten rule or law, while for the village government, it acts as a social norm regulating community behavior concerning livestock, and as a sociological/anthropological legal source in the formation of village regulations.
A Predictive Framework for Real-Time Health Monitoring via Wearable Biosensors
Authors: İbişağaoğlu Duru
Published: November 2024

Wearable biosensors, coupled with predictive analytics, are transforming real-time health monitoring by providing continuous, personalized insights into physiological metrics. This framework leverages wearable technology and advanced machine learning algorithms to process biometric data, enabling early detection of health anomalies and proactive intervention. Through the integration of biosensors monitoring parameters such as heart rate, blood pressure, glucose levels, and respiratory rate, the predictive framework can identify patterns indicative of potential health risks. Machine learning algorithms analyze real-time data streams, facilitating precise predictions and personalized feedback to users and healthcare providers. This approach not only enhances patient engagement and preventive care but also supports the management of chronic conditions by allowing continuous tracking outside clinical settings. Despite its potential, challenges such as data privacy, battery life limitations, and the accuracy of sensor data must be addressed. This research explores the design, functionality, and implications of a predictive health monitoring framework, examining the role of wearable biosensors in enabling proactive healthcare solutions.
Neuro-Responsive AI: Pioneering Brain-Computer Interfaces for Enhanced Human-Computer Interaction
Authors: İbişağaoğlu Duru
Published: November 2024

The convergence of artificial intelligence (AI) and neuroscience has propelled the development of brain-computer interfaces (BCIs), creating new paradigms for human-computer interaction (HCI). Neuro-responsive AI leverages real-time neural signals to enable seamless communication between the brain and external devices, revolutionizing fields such as assistive technology, healthcare, and user experience design. By decoding neural activity, AI-powered BCIs can enhance cognitive capabilities, restore lost functions, and open new possibilities for immersive virtual and augmented reality environments. This research explores the underlying mechanisms, technological advancements, and ethical considerations associated with neuro-responsive AI. It delves into the integration of machine learning algorithms for decoding neural signals, adaptive feedback systems for personalized interactions, and hardware innovations in electrode design for non-invasive applications. Despite its transformative potential, challenges such as data privacy, signal noise reduction, and equitable access must be addressed to ensure responsible deployment. This study aims to bridge the gap between neuroscience and technology, providing insights into the future of neuro-responsive AI in reshaping HCI.
Review of Attfield, Robin, Applied Ethics: An Introduction (Polity: Cambridge, UK, 2022, and Hoboken, NJ, 2023).
Authors: Humphreys Rebekah
Published: November 2024

This review provides a chapter-by-chapter outline and critical commentary of Robin Attfield’s Applied Ethics: An Introduction, published by Polity. Attfield’s voice as a highly experienced teacher, as well as an expert in applied ethics, comes through crystal clear in this important and insightful book, guiding students and teachers through the myriad of ethical arguments in central topics in applied ethics, whilst encouraging the depth of thought that students need to become ethicists in their own right. The result of all this is a book that will undoubtedly serve as a vital resource for anyone interested in studying ethics in practice. Indeed, the style of writing that Attfield is well-known for is epitomised in this book, making it a ‘go to’ text or the first port of call for teachers and students of ethics alike.
Innovation in self-regulatory organisations in the Brazilian capital markets : The BSM Market Supervision case
Authors: Demarco André Eduardo
Published: November 2024

The capital market plays an important part in Brazil’s economic development. It meets a large part of companies’ financing requirements and protects against market fluctuations. BSM is the main self-regulator of the Brazilian capital market. It performs self-regulation, supervision and inspection for organised markets managed by B3 — Brasil, Bolsa, Balcao — one of the world’s largest financial market infrastructure companies, providing trading services in an exchange and over-the-counter (OTC) environment. Pursuant to these goals, BSM monitors operations, orders and trades executed in this trading environments, supervises market participants and, if necessary, applies penalties against those who violate regulations. In this paper, the author shares how, in his current role, he verified the need for strategic mapping of BSM’s self-regulatory agenda. The paper aims to map opportunities for creating and updating legal standards that govern the capital market, to establish incentives for economic agents to reduce cost of compliance and make their regulation more efficient and effective. Several key drivers for BSM developments are: autonomy and empowerment, collaborative culture, agility and adaptability, and technology and digital transformation. BSM is adopting innovations in several areas, including trading technology with advanced analytical tools for monitoring electronic trading platforms, risk management systems and advanced analytical tools, as well as market surveillance monitoring: artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML) and other technologies to detect abusive trading activities. Furthermore, it is promoting education and research: workshops, executive education courses and partnerships with universities and market schools and other initiatives to strengthen market understanding and improve trading analysis practices. All these tools bring to self-regulatory organisations (SROs) significant benefits, including greater transparency and efficiency.
Sustainable Development and Human Rights: Christianity as Mediator
Authors: Alisaca Ryan Vincent
Published: November 2024

This paper aims to show that there is a tension if not a total contradiction, between the notion of sustainable development and the idea of human rights and that Christianity, especially as practiced by Filipinos, can be a starting point for a reflection of a reconciliation of the tension. The paper is divided into four parts. First, a short inquiry into the origin of sustainable development will be made, and it will be shown that sustainable development is closely related to environmentalism. That is to say, caring for the environment is a crucial point of discussion when talking about sustainable development. In the second part, a discussion on human rights will be conducted, especially on human rights, understood as subjective rights usually spoken of using proprietary language. That is to say, human rights are conceived as property. In the third part, it will be shown that sustainable development, understood in tandem with environmentalism, is in tension with the notion of human rights, especially when conceived as subjective rights. The contradiction is usually most apparent in the legal and juridical sphere, and three cases will be given in this regard. In the last part, it is asserted that it is possible to attempt to give some semblance of reconciliation between the two notions above in tension by showing how the specific brand of Christianity practiced by Filipinos, especially as guided by Christian Philosophy, can help least in the theoretical level. It should be noted that what is asserted is not a full-blown solution to the tension. Indeed, Filipino Christianity can only be a starting point of reflection for the reconciliation.
COMPARAÇÃO DOS MODOS VENTILATÓRIOS UTILIZADOS EM UMA UNIDADE DE TERAPIA INTENSIVA NEONATAL
Authors: Junqueira Gabriel Henrique , Vilani Henrique , Carvalho Rafaela Bernardes de , Alves Alessandro Ferreira , Pereira Bianca Reis , Figueiredo Rafaella Rocha
Published: November 2024

Este estudo investigou a utilização de diferentes modos ventilatórios em neonatos internados em uma Unidade de Terapia Intensiva (UTIN) e sua relação com o tempo de internação e desfechos clínicos. Nas últimas três décadas, a neonatologia avançou significativamente, especialmente em relação aos métodos ventilatórios, que são essenciais para a sobrevida e qualidade de vida de neonatos com dificuldades respiratórias. A pesquisa foi de caráter quantitativa, qualitativa, transversal e retrospectiva, analisando 80 prontuários de neonatos internados entre 2020 e 2024 em uma UTIN no sul de Minas Gerais. Os dados foram coletados por meio de prontuário eletrônico hospitalar e analisados com o aplicativo SPSS, considerando variáveis como gênero, tipo de parto, diagnóstico, peso, tempo de internação e uso de ventilação. Os resultados mostraram que a ventilação não invasiva (CPAP e VNI) estava associada a um tempo de internação mais curto e melhores desfechos clínicos em comparação à ventilação mecânica invasiva. Neonatos com ventilação não invasiva após a utilização de Ventilação Mecânica invasiva precisaram de menos ventilação prolongada e apresentaram menos complicações, como pneumonia associada à ventilação e disfunções motoras. A ventilação mecânica invasiva, embora necessária em casos críticos, foi associada a um tempo de internação maior e complicações mais graves. Além disso, o uso de oxigenoterapia não invasiva, como HOOD e cateter nasal, correlacionou-se com melhores resultados clínicos. Concluímos através deste estudo que, para otimizar desfechos e reduzir o tempo de internação, a ventilação não invasiva é altamente recomendada, especialmente para neonatos prematuros e de alto risco. A escolha do método ventilatório deve ser adaptada à necessidade individual do paciente, visando uma recuperação mais rápida e com menores complicações.
OS RISCOS DA AUTOMEDICAÇÃO NO BRASIL E O PAPEL DO PROFISSIONAL FARMACÊUTICO NO ENFRENTAMENTO AO PROBLEMA
Authors: Mota Antonia Thaís Souza , Santos Cintya de Queiroz , Andrade Lorena Silva Matos
Published: November 2024

A automedicação é uma prática comum no Brasil e no mundo, e seu crescimento tem causado preocupações devido aos riscos envolvidos. Este estudo visa analisar os principais riscos associados à automedicação e destacar o papel do profissional farmacêutico na prevenção dessa prática. A pesquisa foi realizada por meio de uma revisão de literatura integrativa, utilizando fontes secundárias de dados para mapear os principais problemas e possíveis soluções. Entre os principais resultados, identificou-se que a automedicação pode levar a graves consequências, como intoxicações, dependência química e o aumento da resistência bacteriana. O farmacêutico, ao atuar na orientação e conscientização dos pacientes, desempenha um papel crucial na promoção do uso racional de medicamentos. A assistência e atenção farmacêutica, campanhas educativas e a regulamentação do comércio de medicamentos também foram apontadas como estratégias essenciais no combate à automedicação.
A INFLUÊNCIA DA MÚSICA NO DESEMPENHO DURANTE ATIVIDADES FÍSICAS
Authors: Solimões Andrei Luiz De Oliveira , Dantas Luiz Henrique Carvalho , Branco Porthos da Costa Castello
Published: November 2024

This study aims to describe evidence of how music preference can mediate exercise responses and performance benefits, identifying which factors may be particularly beneficial for optimizing performance. In addition, the practical implications for practitioners will be highlighted with considerations for strategies to elicit maximum performance through musical preference. The research methodology of this study was based on a literature review study, without the participation of the population or samples. Thus, the articles were extracted for the first time by the authors. The full texts of the relevant articles were then independently evaluated by the authors and advisor. The understandings of each study related to the proposed theme were extracted from all the experiments included. When the data on music and its relationship with physical activity were not explicitly provided, the other significant contents were analyzed to verify which data extraction would be feasible from the works to incorporate this review study. Through the current evidence, it is therefore concluded that an important aspect to increase performance with music is personal choice. In many gyms, locker rooms, and competition environments, music is played over a loudspeaker. The current data available therefore suggests that if music played over the speakers is not preferred by the individual who strives, the performance may suffer from depredations. Thus, coaches and athletes must consider individual musical preferences when trying to optimize performance and training.
O PAPEL DO FARMACÊUTICO NA UNIDADE DE TERAPIA INTENSIVA PEDIÁTRICA: REVISÃO SISTEMÁTICA
Authors: Duque Euclides da Costa , Souza Ingrid Fernanda Ribeiro de , Martins Nedson da Silva , Lira Thiago Azevedo , Carvalho Amanda Bezerra , Costa Reginaldo da Silva
Published: November 2024

INTRODUCTION: The clinical pharmacist in the pediatric ICU plays a crucial role in preventing medication-related problems (MRPs) through interventions aimed at optimizing pharmacotherapy and ensuring patient safety. Their role contributes to reducing adverse events and improving therapeutic outcomes in critically ill children.  OBJECTIVE: To analyze the role of the pharmacist in the pediatric intensive care unit. METHODOLOGY: A systematic literature review was conducted following the PRISMA method. The article search was carried out in August in the databases Biblioteca Virtual em Saúde (BVS), Scientific Electronic Library Online (SCIELO), National Library of Medicine (PUBMED), and Literatura Latino-Americana e do Caribe em Ciências da Saúde (LILACS), allowing for the simultaneous search of articles in the main national and international databases.  RESULTS: Twelve full-paper articles were obtained after applying the inclusion and exclusion criteria. These articles were divided according to the specific objectives addressed. Overall, they highlighted the importance of incorporating pharmacists into the pediatric intensive care unit to perform interventions, reduce errors, and prevent drug interactions.  CONCLUSION: The pharmacist in the pediatric ICU plays a crucial role in improving pharmacotherapy, reducing prescription errors and drug interactions. Their interventions, combined with clinical decision support systems, have shown positive results, with a high acceptance rate and direct impact on patient safety.
DIABETES MELLITUS TIPO 2 COMO FATOR DE RISCO PARA O AGRAVO DA COVID-19 NA POPULAÇÃO BRASILEIRA: UMA REVISÃO SISTEMÁTICA
Authors: Matos André Elias Duque de , Ferreira Daniel Junio Rodrigues , Sales Fábio Machado De , Lima Radcliffe de Souza , Bezerra Amanda Carvalho , Pontes Leandro Fernandes
Published: November 2024

INTRODUCTION: The novel coronavirus, named SARS-CoV-2, is the etiological agent of COVID-19, a highly contagious infectious disease that primarily affects the lower respiratory tract. Type 2 diabetes mellitus may be a factor worsening this condition. OBJECTIVE: To identify the prevalence of diabetes mellitus as a risk factor for COVID-19 in Brazil from 2019 to 2023, assess the severity of cases in different states, analyze the sociodemographic factors affecting prognosis, and clarify the role of pharmacists in monitoring and managing the therapy of these patients. METHODOLOGY: This is a systematic review study using the PRISMA method, divided into four stages. The first stage involved searching for scientific works to answer the question about the frequency of worsening COVID-19 cases associated with type 2 diabetes mellitus in Brazil. The databases consulted were Scielo, PubMed, and the Virtual Health Library (BVS), using keywords such as “Diabetes mellitus,” “COVID-19,” “Brazil,” “Worsening,” and “Death.” RESULTS: Seveteen articles that met the inclusion criteria were selected. The studies indicate that diabetes mellitus is a significant risk factor for the severity and mortality of COVID-19 in Brazil, with mortality rates between 40% and 55% among diabetic patients. Additionally, the disease is associated with other comorbidities, such as hypertension and obesity, contributing to the need for ICU admissions and longer hospital stays. CONCLUSION: Type 2 diabetes mellitus is a significant risk factor for complications and mortality in COVID-19 patients, resulting in higher ICU admission rates and deaths, highlighting the need for rigorous glycemic control. The pharmacist's role is essential in monitoring glycemic levels and educating patients about treatment, contributing to reducing complications and improving clinical outcomes.
A IMPORTÂNCIA DA PERÍCIA CRIMINAL NOS CRIMES CONTRA A VIDA
Authors: Figueiredo Francielle da Conceição Drumond , Rocha Camila Lima
Published: November 2024

Resumo : Este trabalho trata da realização da perícia criminal em casos de mortes violentas, com foco especial em um dos recursos mais empregados pelos profissionais da área: a fotografia criminal. O interesse pelo tema surge, essencialmente, da necessidade de avaliar a constitucionalidade desse tipo de registro, comparando sua aplicação em relação ao direito de imagem dos envolvidos. Fotografar um crime, mesmo com finalidade investigativa, envolve a captura de imagens dos sujeitos e, em casos de mortes violentas, a exposição do corpo da vítima. Para isso, utilizou-se de casos concretos para delimitar outros instrumentos periciais e ressaltar a importância do trabalho técnico para a elucidação dos fatos. Foi adotado o método de abordagem indutivo, com base em dados obtidos por pesquisa quali-quantitativa, além do método de procedimento monográfico e histórico, e técnicas de pesquisa documental e bibliográfica para análise dos resultados. Ao final, concluiu-se que a fotografia criminal é indispensável, pois sua natureza estática garante a fidedignidade das provas – ou seja, que o material examinado na fase preliminar corresponde aos fatos apresentados em juízo.
A NATAÇÃO COMO PRÁTICA AUXILIAR NO DESENVOLVIMENTO MOTOR E AFETIVO-SOCIAL EM CRIANÇAS COM TRANSTORNO DO ESPECTRO AUTISTA – TEA
Authors: Soares Jailson Ribeiro , Carvalho Leyla Regis e Meneses Sousa
Published: November 2024

Introdução: O transtorno do espectro autista (TEA) é caracterizado por diversas mudanças neurológicas que são visíveis durante a primeira infância, entretanto, essas variações afetam o desenvolvimento motor, social e cognitivo. Objetivo: Analisar os benefícios da natação no desenvolvimento motor e afetivo-social em crianças com transtorno do espectro autista – TEA. Métodos: Trata-se de uma revisão bibliográfica do tipo integrativa, realizadas nas bases de dados: Google Acadêmico e Scientific Eletronic Library Online - (SciELO), utilizando de forma isolada e/ou conjugada os seguintes descritores: Autismo e natação; Transtorno do Espectro Autista e natação; Autismo e desenvolvimento afetivo-social; Transtorno do Espectro do autismo e Desenvolvimento afetivo-social; Autismo e desenvolvimento motor; Transtorno do Espectro Autista e Desenvolvimento motor; natação e desenvolvimento afetivo social; natação e desenvolvimento motor. Resultados: Os dados apontaram que manter um estilo de vida ativo é essencial para o desenvolvimento motor e afetivo-social para crianças com TEA. Considerações: Nesta perspectiva, crianças que mantêm um estilo de vida com atividades diárias e práticas de natação tiveram melhorias significativas em todas as dimensões de desenvolvimento aqui propostas. Sugere-se estudos que abordem essa temática, com alternativas de práticas auxiliares neste processo como: danças, esportes, ginástica, jogos e lutas, outra sugestão seria estudar esse transtorno em diferentes faixas etárias, posto que, pesquisas voltadas para indivíduos tanto na adolescência quanto na idade adulta mostraram-se escassas na literatura pré-existente.
Ansiedad en los docentes: ¿Cuándo es Normal y cuándo es Patológica?
Authors: Yance Silva Delfi del Carmen
Published: November 2024

El fenómeno de la pandemia del COVID-19 provocó aumento de la ansiedad y la depresión en los docentes durante el confinamiento, quienes, ante el riesgo de contagio, al tener que replantear nuevos modelos educativos de enseñanza de modo virtual, para los cuales no estaban preparados, generó en ellos fuertes tensiones y manifestaciones diversas de ansiedad que terminaron afectando los estados de bienestar de la salud y su praxis pedagógica. Luego de aquella crítica experiencia vivida, este grupo de educadores, en la actualidad, no tienen claridad sobre la sintomatología de la ansiedad para identificarla como un trastorno. El objetivo general de esta investigación consistió en explicar cuándo la ansiedad deja de ser normal y se transforma en patológica. La metodología de enfoque cuantitativo de tipo explicativo, donde se aplicó la técnica de encuesta a una muestra de 210 maestros de básica primaria y secundaria en el municipio de Fundación, departamento del Magdalena, en Colombia. Los resultados evidencian, la presencia sintomática de la ansiedad con mayores manifestaciones de intensidad en las mujeres, percibiéndose malestares generales y psicológicos; se destacan trastornos de tipo somático, como: irritabilidad, enfado, mal humor, y muy marcado los trastornos de sueño; además, cansancio, pérdida de apetito. Se concluye que, la ansiedad deja de ser normal en los docentes, cuando esta asume un rol principal frente a situaciones que no debería producirla, y se transforma en patológica cuando no deja desarrollar las actividades diarias.
The Role of Information and Communication Technology in Increasing Awareness and Practice of Healthy Nutrition in the Community
Authors: Rufidah Maulina  , Yoanita Hijriyati  , Agnes Ratna Saputri  , Putri Erlyn  , Ni Nyoman Murti
Published: November 2024

Nutritional problems remain a serious challenge in global public health, including in Indonesia. Malnutrition and unbalanced nutritional consumption often contribute to various health problems, such as stunting in children, obesity, and non-communicable diseases such as diabetes and hypertension.The Internet, social media, health apps, and other digital tools provide opportunities to inform the public about the importance of proper nutrition and offer practical strategies for adopting healthy eating patterns.This study aims to explore the role of ICT in improving community nutrition awareness and practices, and to analyze how the use of technology can support nutrition interventions more effectively.This study uses a quantitative approach. The qualitative approach was used to gain a deeper understanding of the experiences, perceptions, and barriers experienced by the community and health workers in using ICT for nutrition education.The sample of this study included 10 respondents for the quantitative part, which were divided into 5 treatment groups and 5 control groups. The study was conducted at the Batang Kuranji Health Center which was implemented in June 2024. The results in both groups before the provision of educational media tended to be lower in the control group (infographics) and the treatment group (web), with a comparison of poor attitude results of 60%-40%. Community attitudes towards the use of IT in improving nutrition practices showed varied responses.
Critical Academy under Attack
Authors: Titley Gavan , Udupa Sahana , Fassin Éric , Mulinari Diana
Published: November 2024

Scholars working within different critical theory traditions are not unfamiliar with the experience of encountering dismissive representations of their work, including from parts of the academy that disavow the politics of academic research and knowledge production. However, the political project of delegitimizing critical research and scholarship seems to be intensifying. Signifiers like “critical theory”, “critical race theory” and “gender theory” have become objects of antagonism and moral panic for a diverse cast of political, cultural and media actors, including self-styled academic dissidents with audiences well beyond the academy. In tandem, critical scholarship faces an increasingly inhospitable ecology within the neoliberal university, even while the latter simultaneously brands itself in the language of social justice. Chaired and introduced by Gavan Titley, the panel contributions from Sahana Udupa, Éric Fassin, and Diana Mulinari reflect on the challenges faced by critical scholars and critical scholarship in a time of emboldened reactionary politics. It asks how these challenges might be intellectually and politically confronted, and countered, in light of the special issue’s reflections on the current condition of critique.
Where’s the Critique? On the Dearth of Critical Theory in German Communication Research
Authors: Tröger Mandy , Van den Ecker Marlen
Published: November 2024

While the influence of critical theory – connected to the Frankfurt School – has been profound, its legacy is almost non-existent in the field of communication research in Germany. In order to address this counterintuitive state of affairs, we first sketch the historical context that led to the dearth of critical in the German field. We then give a brief overview of the current institutionalization of the field and connect it to the founding of the Network for Critical Communications Research (abbreviated: KriKoWi) that aims to (re-) introduce critical theories (that is the critical theory of the Frankfurt School but also other critical approaches). Last but not least, we sketch our understanding of critique which ought to help scholars using different methodological and theoretical approaches to work together. We hope that similar initiatives in other parts of the world might find our endeavours inspiring and join them.
Proposing a Postcritical AI Literacy
Authors: Stamboliev Eugenia
Published: November 2024

So-called artificial intelligence (AI) is infiltrating our public and communication structures. The Dutch childcare benefit scandal, revealed in 2019, demonstrates how disadvantageous the opacity of AI can be for already vulnerable groups. In its aftermath, many scholars urged for the need for more explainable AI so that decision-makers can intervene in discriminatory systems. Fostering the explainability of AI (XAI) is a good start to address the issue, but not enough to empower vulnerable groups to fully deal with its repercussions. As a canon in data and computer sciences, XAI aims to illustrate and explain complex AI via simpler models making it more accessible and ethical. The issue being that, in doing so, XAI depoliticises transparency into a remedy for algorithmic opacity, treating transparency as artificially stripped of its ideological meanings. Transparency is presented as an antidote to ideology, though I will show how this is an ideological move with consequences. For instance, it makes us focus too much on algorithmic opacity, rather than explaining the wider power of AI. Second, it hinders us from having debates on who holds the power around AI’s explanations, application or critique. The problem is that those affected by or discriminated against by AI, as in the Dutch case, have little tools to deal with the opacity of AI as a system, while those who focus on data opacity are shaping the literacy discussion. To address these concerns, I suggest moving beyond the focus on algorithmic transparency and towards a post-critical AI literacy to strengthen debates on access, empowerment, and resistance, while not dismissing XAI as a field, nor algorithmic transparency as an intention. What I challenge here is the hegemony of treating transparency as a depoliticised and algorithmic issue and viewing the explainability of AI as the sufficient path to citizen empowerment.
Cruel, Convenient, and Intimate Publics
Authors: Azhar Ali , Boler Megan
Published: November 2024

Lauren Berlant’s contributions chart innovative conceptual frameworks to help us understand how affect and emotion, desires and hopes traverse the public and private realms. However, rather surprisingly, Berlant’s work does not engage directly with explorations of digital culture and its effects, nor has it been used extensively in the analysis of digital culture. We begin by updating Berlant’s descriptions of how we think about the contemporary culture of ‘crises’ (2011), drawing on recent documentations to illustrate the interconnected phenomena of “epidemics of loneliness” and isolation in the face of uncertainties of the historical present. To address those gaps, we then explore how cruel optimism and intimate publics have been taken up in studies of digital and social media. We will conclude by addressing how these concepts, as well as Berlant’s most recent work on the inconvenience of others, can best be engaged to help navigate and theorize digital culture. Finally, we take up their 2022 work to explore the crises of polarization as a manifestation of loneliness, through the lens of inconvenience. In conclusion, we will suggest how Berlant’s concepts provide valuable insight for further studies of digital culture.
Cover Stories and the Counterfactual
Authors: Blackman Lisa
Published: November 2024

This essay pays tribute to Lauren Berlant, to their work, to their writing and to their commitment to “stranger and distance-based intimacies”[1]. It explores the cover story as a writing device, a form of writing that Berlant plays with, that mines and exploits the counterfactual as critical and creative method. The impetus for this essay is an interview that Lauren and I were discussing that was to explore some of the commonalities and differences between their work and an article by Valerie Walkerdine (1981) called “Video Replay”. We were going to explore issues of autobiography and the non-personal, memory-work, the relationship between practices of censorious silencing and cover stories, and class differences, with an explicit focus on writing styles and method. We never quite got to the interview as our conversation digressed. These digressions have shaped the issues that I explore in this essay, which takes a more speculative approach to imagining how the interview might or perhaps did take a different form.
Missed Feelings
Authors: Kohpeiß Henrike
Published: November 2024

‘Missed Feelings’ addresses the complex repercussions of traumatic experience Lauren Berlant lays out in their article “Structures of Unfeeling” (2015). The article helps to trace the unexpected mediations of injury into affect and discusses the role of victimhood from sexual assault in patriarchal societies. With regard to a case of systemic sexual abuse in Germany, I argue that unfeeling is an essential element of sexual violence. Berlant’s theoretical account of life-sustaining attachments and affect as mediation makes the dialectic of harm and lack of feeling understandable. Unfeeling in the form of social indifference enables gendered violence to occur and to continue uninterrupted, while at the same time, unfeeling is a tool used by survivors in order to be able to live with their experience of assault while often it remains legally and socially unacknowledged. This dynamic of unfeeling explains sexual violence’s subjectifying power: the expectation of not being seen as a credible victim forces survivors to search for other affective mediations of their reality. Therefore, self-protection in a patriarchal world might look risky, idiosyncratic and often unexpected.
‘There is No Direct Evidence of Anything’
Authors: Seigworth Gregory J. , Coleman Rebecca
Published: November 2024

In this essay, we track back and forth between Lauren Berlant’s and Raymond Williams’ work to assemble a purposefully compact genealogy of mediation that also pays attention to how mediation intersects with and often redraws many taken-for-granted understandings of affect, ideology, aesthetics and materialism. We explore how, for Berlant and Williams, mediation requires a suspension or dislodging of direct cause and effect relations in favour of an intuitive (and conjectural) analytics of the ongoing overdeterminations that circulate through and about any particular affective/historical conjuncture. Reckoning with mediation has a profound impact too on our practices of writing and theorising – as critical-creative impulses, drawn from the intertwining rhythms of experience/experiment, emerge from the changing yet precise situations of the ordinary day-to-day. We argue that such a conceptualisation of mediation offers a productive means for attuning to and transforming the capacities of intellectual work, media/digital culture, and everyday life from within the midst of a continua of transformation.
Too Soon / Too Late
Authors: Ross Daniel
Published: November 2024

A slightly modified transcript of the Bernard Stiegler Memorial Lecture given on August 5, 2023, at the invitation of Yuk Hui and the Research Network for Philosophy and Technology, Hong Kong. From a reflection on Engels reflecting on the too-soonness and too-lateness of the French Commune government, via a film by Huillet and Straub to which these words of Engels gave birth, the author begins to reflect on Stiegler’s memorial text for Jacques Derrida. In an effort to reflect on Stiegler’s own position of advance and delay, three philosophical viewpoints on the significance of ChatGPT are offered, as a way into grappling with Stiegler’s most private, idiolectal concept: the idiotext. The recursions of AI are thereby distinguished from the recurrences of idiotextual “protension”, which invokes the question of desire. The latter leads to a little-known text by Stiegler on his time in prison, and on the meaning of prison as a locality of sublimation: a place in which time is in a way freed up, but also a place of sexual deprivation – how to think this conjunction?
Seeing Photographically and the Memory of Photography
Authors: Frosh Paul
Published: November 2024

“Seeing photographically” is an act of cultural memory. In an era of AI-generated images, screenshots, “disappearing” or “view once” photographs, and myriad other practices that challenge the definitional boundaries of photography, the phrase invokes past understandings of the medium’s sensory affordances, transferring them into a continually changing present. Focusing on a case study of the digital “rescue” of found film chemical photography, the article excavates cultural memory processes that relocate photographic seeing to digital arenas. The memory of “seeing photographically” does more, it claims, than preserve photography as a “zombie category” that disguises the reality of computational imagery. Rather, it helps construct and maintain a media ideology of what photography was and is, and of its continuing cultural, and especially existential, significance. Mobilizing worldviews, social values, and moral obligations associated with photography in the past, “seeing photographically” reanimates them in contemporary contexts of media ubiquity, intensified visibility, and existential anxiety, with profound ramifications.
Photography’s Other Sensitivities
Authors: Henning Michelle
Published: November 2024

This article sets out to challenge the idea of photography as a medium that deals purely in the visible. Taking the example of the mid-twentieth-century British photography industry, this article considers photographic sensitivity as part of a sensory economy in which human, technological and environmental sensing are mutually entangled. I emphasise these interlinked sensing systems, and what I see as the “passive agency” of photographic materials, showing how photographic emulsions are capable of registering much more than visible light or even radiation. Chemical photographic materials had distinct cultural biases built into them, yet often registered entities other than those they were designed to picture. Great effort went into restricting photographic sensitivities, as well as into cultivating them. By the 1930s, the photographic materials factories had air purification and climate control systems, sensitometry laboratories and specialist tropical materials. Their sensitised materials and chemicals transformed ecosystems and participated in a “technological sensory training”, shaping what people could perceive.
A Filter Theory of Photography
Authors: Blom Ina , Fuller Matthew
Published: November 2024

Filters – both technically and in a wider sense of the term – provide a new way of theorizing photography. Most obviously, filters sieve things, persons and data out of flows; more specifically, they are key to the non-optical formations at work in image production based on neural networks in machine learning. In this essay, we argue that theorizing photography from the perspective of filtering reconfigures photography as the entire field of material elements and processes involved in the production of an image and presents the photographic image itself as a distribution across a field of perception that includes various forms of technical sensing and formation. Ultimately, attending to filtering as the technical realities as well as aesthetic propositions in recent art projects allows us to understand photographic conditions as a wider and more general set of environments in which image-events occur with many kinds of causality and manifestation.
Seeing and Sensing
Authors: Toister Yanai
Published: November 2024

In this article traditional paradigms of photographic seeing undergo scrutiny through the perspective of non-human sensory processes, notably echolocation, fostering a diverse, interspecies interpretation of vision. This inquiry unsettles the anthropocentric norms prevailing in photographic scholarship and technological innovation. Redefining “seeing” as a layered, multisensory activity extending past human limitations propels a revision of photography’s foundational assumptions, undermining the conventional dependency on light and human vision for defining the essence of photography. Incorporating non-human perspectives, like the echolocative engagements of bats and dolphins, introduces “active sensing” – an interactive engagement between emitter and receiver, shifting away from the static, observer-centric photography paradigm. This conceptual transition advocates for an engaged, participatory framework in image creation, challenging established passive viewing models. The article particularly emphasizes the implications of these insights for autonomous transportation, like vehicle to vehicle (V2V) communication systems, which arguably mirror biological active sensing methods. This confluence of biological senses and technological advancements not only enhances our understanding of autonomous systems but also invites a dialogue with speculative narratives from science fiction, where the fusion of organic and engineered forms of sensing often prefigures the future trajectories of technological evolution and societal adaptation.
Photography at a Standstill
Authors: Cox Geoff
Published: November 2024

What has replaced the still photograph are dynamic and distributed image-assemblages that unsettle received notions of space-time — no longer limited to traditional representation and not necessarily even visual. When it comes to computer vision for example, the descriptor photography seems largely redundant (despite deep learning computer vision systems being trained on large datasets of photographic images), and so too the tired metaphor of the eye that once supported its theories and practices. What is at stake here, as ever, is a kind of ‘seeing’ (if we continue to call it that) that makes clear what is visible, sensible and knowable, and crucially also what is not. We might call this seeing algorithmically, or seeing like a dataset, or perhaps even seeing like an infrastructure, comprised of fake images that render fake history. The logic of this invokes the complex notion of ‘image is dialectics at a standstill’, encapsulating a constellation of possible outcomes. To what extent is the radical potential that Benjamin once foresaw in montage applicable to image-based AI given that it seems less an instrument to imagine a qualitatively different future but simply more of the same. What can be seen is not so much representational nor photographic but latent traces of material relations and infrastructures that render historical experience in compromised form.
Transitional Justice in Colombia: A Systematic Literature Review
Authors: Maria Stephania Aponte-Garcia  , Sonia Sánchez-Arteaga
Published: November 2024

Transitional justice in Colombia has evolved, reflecting the political, social, and academic changes in the country. This study is a systematic review of the literature through articles indexed in Web of Science, applying the PRISMA protocol. Out of 3819 articles published in the last five years (2019-2024), 109 articles were selected following strict exclusion criteria. The methodology includes a quantitative analysis complemented with the visual analysis tool Posit PBC™ for bibliometric analysis in Biblioshyni. The study addresses the research question on the evolution of the main research interests in the field of Transitional Justice in Colombia. The results show that initially, analyses on transitional justice focused on documenting the atrocities of the armed conflict, with a focus on truth and reparation, grounding legal mechanisms such as the Justice and Peace Law of 2005; with the 2016 Peace Agreement, research expanded into more complex issues, including the interaction between transitional justice and development, and the importance of civil society and victim engagement. The inclusion of the gender perspective, particularly after the 2016 Peace Agreement, led to studies on how women and LGBTI+ communities were differentially affected by the conflict. In addition, recent research has focused on the comparison between the peace processes with the AUC and the FARC-EP, analyzing the differences in their transitional justice frameworks and the challenges of implementing these agreements in a context of persistent violence.