bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
A History of Television News Parody in America
Authors: Hersey Curt
Published: July 2024

In this book, Curt Hersey explores the history of U.S. media, demonstrating how news parody has entertained television audiences by satirizing political and social issues and offering a lighthearted take on broadcast news. Despite shifts away from broadcast and cable delivery, comedians like Samantha Bee, Michael Che, and John Oliver continue this tradition of delivering topical humor within a newscast format. In this history of the television news parody genre, Hersey critically engages with the norms and presentational styles of television journalism at the time of their production. News parody has increasingly become part of the larger journalistic field, with viewers often turning to this parodic programming as a supplement and corrective to mainstream news sources. Beginning in the 1960s with the NBC program That Was the Week That Was, the history of news parody is analyzed decade by decade by focusing on presidential and political coverage, as well as the genre’s critiques of television network and cable journalism. Case studies include Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update;” HBO’s Not Necessarily the News; Comedy Central’s original Daily Show, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and The Colbert Report; and HBO’s Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. Scholars of media history, political communication, and popular culture will find this book particularly useful.
Kant's Struggle for Autonomy
Authors: Zreik Raef
Published: July 2024

In Kant’s Struggle for Autonomy: On the Structure of Practical Reason, Raef Zreik presents an original synoptic view of Kant’s practical philosophy, uncovering the relatively hidden architectonics of Kant’s system and critically engaging with its broad implications. He begins by investigating the implicit strategy that guides Kant in making the distinctions that establish the autonomous spheres: happiness, morality, justice, public order-legitimacy. The organizing principle of autonomy sets these spheres apart, assuming there is self-sufficiency for each sphere. Zreik then develops a critique of this strategy, showing its limits, its costs, and its inherent instability. He questions self-sufficiency and argues that autonomy is a matter of ongoing struggle between the forces of separation and unification. Zreik proceeds to suggest that we “read Kant backward,” reading early Kant in light of late Kant. This reading reveals Kant's strategy of both taking things apart and putting them together, focusing on the joints, transitions, and metastructures of the system. The image emanating from this account of Kant’s legal and moral philosophy is of an intimate yet tragic conflict within Kant’s thought—one that leaves us to our own judgment as to where to draw the boundaries between spheres, opening the door for politicizing Kant's practical philosophy.
Schopenhauer and the Nature of Philosophy
Authors: Head Jonathan
Published: July 2024

What is philosophy? What can philosophy offer us? What brings us to think philosophically? Arthur Schopenhauer’s writings offer fascinating answers to these questions that have largely been overlooked until now. In Schopenhauer and the Nature of Philosophy, Jonathan Head explores the surprisingly rich and compelling metaphilosophy that underlies Schopenhauer’s work and argues that it offers a vital key to unlocking many of the mysteries that surround his ideas. Schopenhauer understands philosophy as grounded in a deep wonder about life and the world that is universal to the human experience, as well as meeting a fundamental need for both explanation and consolation. This account of the nature of philosophy leads to further important discussions concerning the relationship between philosophy and religion, the value of mysticism, and the possibility of social progress. Through examining Schopenhauer’s account of how and why philosophy is done, this book sheds crucial new light on a thinker whose ideas continue to both provoke and inspire.
Mediations between Nature and Culture
Authors: Kerr Aaron K.
Published: July 2024

This book explores the placement of human beings, a “betweenness” that elicits the fact that human communication is the mediation between one’s intellectual, moral, and political experience. Aaron K. Kerr explores the relationship between nature and culture, exposing the obscurities caused by technology and economic dogmatism. A renewal of the mediatory role of human communication is juxtaposed to the immediacy of digital consumption. The author reveals that to redress ecological distress, there must be an equal awareness, sense of place, and regional responsibility for built environments which value nature. By situating philosophy and communication within the scientific consensus of the anthropocene, the author clearly indicates the necessary mediations between fact and value, science and religion, local and global, nature and culture. Scholars of philosophy, rhetoric, environmental ethics, and global bioethics will find this book of particular interest.
Communes and the Venezuelan State
Authors: Bean Anderson
Published: July 2024

Since 2006, Venezuela has witnessed an explosion of different forms of popular power and participatory democracy. Over 47,000 grassroots neighborhood-based communal councils and 3,000 communes have been constructed. In Communes and the Venezuelan State: The Struggle for Participatory Democracy in a Time of Crisis, Anderson Bean offers a critical analysis of these experiments in popular and workers' power and their potential for societal transformation within and beyond Venezuela. Drawing on extensive ethnographic research, Bean demonstrates how workers and peasants, through networks of popular power, exercise agency over their own development while facing challenges from the capitalist state. Most importantly, this book connects with the far-reaching implications that the communal movement in Venezuela has for building a society responsive more to the needs of ordinary people than to the desires of the elites.
The Sandžak of Novi Pazar
Authors: Zdravkovski Aleksander
Published: July 2024

The current ethno-religious mosaic in the western Balkans cannot be methodologically analyzed and understood without the in-depth study of the peculiar millet system, which was the very bedrock of the Ottoman society and statehood. This monograph provides the readers with a comprehensive analysis on the establishment and main pillars of this social structure. Furthermore, one will find information on the main dynamics of adoption of Islam in the border area between Serbia and Montenegro which is presently called Sandžak and on the geopolitical wrangling that hastened the decay of the millets and introduced the nations in this volatile part of the Balkans. The impact of conflict and the resulting migrations on the ethno-religious landscape is also given considerable space in this volume. Lastly, the analysis describes the discrepancy between the policies adopted and enforced by the Sublime Porte and the lack on impact of those on the remote provinces and regions where the power of the Sultans was limited, or even in some cases only nominal. The author relies heavily on primary sources, such as contemporary travelogues, reports, and field studies. The chronological analysis is divided into three periods which correspond with the internal and external power and strength of the Ottoman Empire: period of stability, period of challenges, and a period of irreversible decay.
The Battle for Birth Control
Authors: Furgerson Jessica L.
Published: July 2024

The Battle for Birth Control delves into the complex rhetorical history of the American birth control movement in its formative years. In just four decades, advocates, under the strategic guidance of Margaret Sanger, transitioned the fight for contraception from fringe radical movement to a respectable mainstream cause endorsed by powerful professionals and politicians alike. Eschewing their early ideological commitments to obtain widespread acceptance, birth controllers adopted a strategy of political accommodation characterized by deferential rhetoric and careful posturing. This strategy secured significant victories for the movement but at what cost? Informed by a deep commitment to reproductive justice, The Battle for Birth Control traces the duplicity of the movement’s early rhetoric and argues that their accommodationist strategy yielded increased contraceptive access solely because of their willingness to endorse the neoliberal regime of reproductive control largely responsible for the current threats to reproductive autonomy in the 21st century.
Afro-Brazilians in Telenovelas
Authors: Nogueira Joyce Samantha
Published: July 2024

In Afro-Brazilians in Telenovelas: Social, Political, and Economic Realities, Samantha Nogueira Joyce examines representations of Blackness on Brazilian TV, interrogating the role of mass media in developing racial equality and social change. Nogueira Joyce challenges assumptions that place the inclusion of Afro-Brazilians in mass media as a step towards racial progress while contextualizing media representation with the social, political, and economic realities of the Brazilian society at large, thus linking media representations to progressive gains and conservative backlashes in the Brazilian public sphere. This book joins conversations with other works on multiculturalism, Blackness, and whiteness within media studies, critical race and ethnic studies, and Latin American studies. This multilayered approach combines textual analysis with studies of political and economic systems and digital media activism to carefully unravel Brazilian racial dynamics.
The Incorporeal Corpse
Authors: Dorwart Jason B.
Published: July 2024

In this book, Jason B. Dorwart contends that the material presence of visible disability disrupts the framing devices that provide safe distancing for theatre’s fictive nature. Conceptions of disability that place the disabled body into a permanently liminal space between life and death are directly at odds with theatrical performances, which are geared toward moving through liminality into a new point of stasis. Dorwart reveals how this contradiction leads to performance practices that work to marginalize and eliminate the presence of disabled bodies of both character and actor, as disabled characters have historically been written with different character arcs than nondisabled characters and with the assumption that they would be played by nondisabled actors. As more disabled actors gain exposure in film and theatre, the difference in how disabled characters are written is also increasingly affected by whether the role is intended for a disabled or nondisabled actor. These performances are enacting new means to performatively and figuratively reincorporate or eliminate the liminal disabled body. The Incorporeal Corpse demonstrates how recent plays and films try to rectify this tension between the permanence of disability and the transitory nature of performance. Scholars of theatre, disability studies, and performance studies will find this book of particular interest.
Oral Traditions in Contemporary China
Authors: Zhang Juwen
Published: July 2024

In Oral Traditions in Contemporary China: Healing a Nation, Juwen Zhang provides a systematic survey of such oral traditions as folk and fairy tales, proverbs, ballads, and folksongs that are vibrantly practiced today. Zhang establishes a theoretical framework for understanding how Chinese culture has continued for thousands of years with vitality and validity, core and arbitrary identity markers, and folkloric identity. This framework, which describes a cultural self-healing mechanism, is equally applicable to the exploration of other traditions and cultures in the world. Through topics from Chinese Cinderella to the Grimms of China, from proverbs like “older ginger is spicier” to the life-views held by the Chinese, and from mountain songs and ballads to the musical instruments like the clay-vessel-flute, the author weaves these oral traditions across time and space into a mesmerizing intellectual journey. Focusing on contemporary practice, this book serves as a bridge between Chinese and international folklore scholarship and other related disciplines as well. Those interested in Chinese culture in general and Chinese folklore, literature, and oral tradition in particular will certainly delight in perusing this book.
The Construction of Marginalities and Narrative Imaginary in Mohamed Zafzaf's Texts
Authors: Simour Lhoussain
Published: July 2024

This book works on the interface between literature, culture, and discourse. It is entirely devoted to the reading of some of Zafzāf’s novels that came out in the early 1970s and in the late 1980s, and attempts to chart the trajectory of the aesthetic imaginary of an exceptional writing experience that marked out the literary and cultural landscape in Morocco and in the Arab world for long. Zafzāf and his writings are associated with aspects of the country's social contradictions, cultural transition, and political transformations, expressed through various aesthetic patterns that translate the crisis of the intellectual within a society weighed down by poverty, political instability, social conflict, and cultural disintegration. Given the relative scarcity of resources that are written in English about the Moroccan novel of Arabic expression, this work is an attempt to theorize and approach in an interdisciplinary manner a set of narratives that have not been previously explored in western academia. Using postcolonial discourse as approach and a metaphor of reading, it draws attention to the often-neglected texts in Moroccan literature of Arabic expression and explores their aesthetic, discursive, and cultural implications that rethink and disturb canonical formations of literary texts in Morocco. This book will be adopted in the now burgeoning fields of the Humanities, and will provide useful resources for courses about Moroccan Literature and culture.
Devotional Fanscapes
Authors: Kakar Shalini
Published: July 2024

Devotional Fanscapes: Bollywood Star Deities, Devotee-Fans, and Cultural Politics in India and Beyond examines how fans worship film stars as deities. Focusing on temples dedicated to Bollywood (Hindi cinema) stars and the artifacts produced by Hindi and Tamil cinema fans, Shalini Kakar illustrates how the fan constructs their identity as a devotee and that of the star as a deity. Extending her research from India to the US, Kakar highlights the transnational dimensions of this phenomenon to demonstrate the degree to which devotional fan practices (fan-bhakti) and fan artifacts can help us rethink art, religion, and politics. With its interdisciplinary approach, this book addresses how fan-bhakti is performed in the global landscape, in the process augmenting new religious models and identities based on the idea of the “cinematic sacred.”

For more information, check out www.sacredfandom.com.
Racial Realism and the History of Black People in America
Authors: Martin Lori Latrice
Published: July 2024

In Racial Realism and the History of Black People in America, Lori Latrice Martin demonstrates how racial realism is a key concept for understanding why and how black people continue to live between a cycle of optimism and disappointment in the United States. Central to her argument is Derrick Bell’s work on racial realism, who argued that the subordination of black people in America is permanent. Racial Realism includes historical topics, such as Reconstruction, race in the 20th century, and recent events like #BlackLivesMatter, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the killing of George Floyd. As the author lays out, at various times in American history, black people felt a sense of hopefulness and optimism that America would finally extend treasured American values to them only to find themselves marginalized. History shows that black people have had their expectations raised so many times only to find themselves deeply disappointed.
African Immigrants in the United States
Authors: Corra Mamadi
Published: July 2024

African Immigrants in the United States: The Gendering Significance of Race? examines recent trends and implications of the growth of African immigration to the United States. Mamadi Corra highlights several resulting sociodemographic processes underway, including the changing composition of the foreign-born and US Black populations. Corra also explores sociodemographic profiles of these “new African Americans” or “new Americans,” highlighting the increasing diversity, yet also the racialized portrait of this group. Corra discusses key patterns including the shifting racial and gender composition of immigrants, with a growing proportion of “Black” and female African immigrants and a decreasing proportion of “White” and male immigrants. The book also compares socioeconomic profiles of African immigrants with other immigrant groups and Native American subgroups. Taken together, Corra discovers that the salience of race that is mediated by gender.
Imagination in Inquiry
Authors: Iannone A. Pablo
Published: July 2024

Imagination in Inquiry: A Philosophical Model and Its Applications investigates the nature, kinds, component elements, functions, scope, and uses of the imagination involved in inquiry. It further discusses how these kinds and functions vary and interact depending on the context of inquiries carried out in philosophy and its branches—from the philosophy of science and the philosophy of technology to ethics, sociopolitical philosophy, and aesthetics—and institutions like science, technology, art, and education. Using a homeostatic model, A. Pablo Iannone advances a conception of the imagination as a disposition to search for answers to various types of problems, abstract or concrete, theoretical or practical faced in inquiry. The book treats this as a working characterization, though it develops progressively clearer, more precise, and less ambiguous meanings. All along, the primary concern of the author—as well as of contributors Alejandra Iannone and Rocci Luppicini—is with the moral, aesthetic, logical, communicative, scientific, technological, artistic, literary, and philosophical uses and roles of the imagination. The book’s primary focus is not just on such things as the capacity to generate mental images, but especially on the ability to discover and create, anticipate and envision, entertain and manage.
Hungary in State of Exception
Authors: Antal Attila
Published: July 2024

Hungary in State of Exception seeks to analyze the transboundary exchange of political and economic ideas through the global neoliberal hegemonic struggle. Neoliberalism, as a economic and political ideology, defined the history of Hungary not just in the 21st century, but in the troubled 20th century. Eastern Europe played a crucial role in neoliberalism’s rise to control globalized capitalism, and Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have constantly an incubator of and experimental laboratory for new types of neoliberal capitalism. Antal arguesthat neoliberalism, like populism, is historically embedded in Hungarian political history, its the political form is economic and governmental exceptionalism. This book reveals the common history of Western- and Eastern-style neoliberalism from the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the contemporary COVID-19 crisis. Without emphasis on the century of neoliberalization of CEE, the contemporary rise of regional authoritarianism cannot be understood. Antal also details the relationship between Orbán’s rise and contemporary neoliberal politics in CEE.
African Philosophical Adventures
Authors: Murungi John
Published: July 2024

African Philosophical Adventures presents African philosophy as a convergence wherein what is African, what is philosophy, and what is an adventure enter an inter-relational and reciprocal process, each giving birth to the others. Philosophy, whether African or non-African, is an open-ended process. There is no finality in what it says about itself or about the subject matter that it investigates. John Murungi uses this sense of philosophy to guide the chapters in this book. The word “adventure” bears this sense of philosophy, and the same time informs what is to be understood as African philosophy. The singularity of African philosophy, as well as its link to other branches of philosophy, is subject to adventure. Readers of this book who are themselves adventurers in the world of philosophy will benefit greatly. For those who are not already so, it will be an invitation to undertake such an adventure.
From American Empire to América Cósmica Through Philosophy
Authors: MacMullan Terrance
Published: July 2024

From American Empire to América Cósmica through Philosophy: Prospero's Reflection envisions a greater ideal American philosophy that integrates philosophies from across the Americas and is set to work resolving the problems that vex the peoples of the Americas. This work contributes to the rapidly growing dialogue on Inter-American philosophy with research that adds to the list of philosophical affinities across the Americas. However, Terrance MacMullan also delves deeply into the points of philosophical contention and misrecognition between Anglo-American and Ibero-American philosophies by reversing the colonial gaze of the last centuries. Following in the tradition of cultural theorists like Enrique Rodó and Roberto Fernández Retamar, who draw on Shakespeare’s The Tempest as a source of literary metaphors to understand colonialism and imperialism in the Americas, MacMullan argues that the United States will never achieve democratic community unless it first contends with the harsh critiques of its culture and philosophies reflected within the works of Latin American philosophers who prophesied and survived the imperialism of the North American Prospero but whose works are still largely unknown and unseen within U.S. universities.
Peirce Mattering
Authors: Sophia Dorothea
Published: July 2024

“Mattering” is the process and product of reality. It is one from nothing. Using Charles Sanders Peirce’s systematic method of inquiry, Dorothea Sophia explores the meaning, the value, and the consequences of “mattering”: to be able to say, beyond reasonable doubt, “it matters,” and that being on an evolving, developing telos, “it is mattering.”

Peirce Mattering: Value, Realism, and the Pragmatic Maxim develops a three-part hypothesis of “mattering”: value functions as a condition of intelligibility—purpose, as the ground of “mattering” is dependent on value; power—the capacity to cause—is the enabler of force functioning as actual “mattering”; and “mattering” is evolutionary realization of universal telos.

This book argues that championing one’s rights, with disregard for consequences—even for probabilities—and disowning responsibility has come to mean that choice, the hallmark of human freedom, is increasingly circumscribed, as are our chances of saving our world from ecocide.
Supranational Horrors
Authors: Trindade Oliveira Rui M.
Published: July 2024

Supranational Horrors: Italian and Spanish Horror Cinema since 1968 moves beyond national cinema discourse in considering the horror production of two Southern European countries, Italy and Spain. Rui M. Trindade Oliveira examines cultural elements that films from these nations share, arguing that a fuller understanding of European horror is possible when we acknowledge the output of Italy and Spain as being interconnected, as possessing a supranational, common identity: “Italian-Spanishness.”
Stigma and Social Support on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
Authors: Carper Laura Blount
Published: July 2024

Stigma and Social Support on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program delves into the daily complex lives of individuals on the program and the hardships the program has on participants. The author provides examples of experiencing stigmatization while on SNAP and possible methods to help improve, or lessen, the stigma with the use of positive social support. The chapters include the author’s personal experiences on SNAP, factors influencing enrollment, overall views of the program, stigma, disclosure concerns of enrollment, social support, and implications from the findings. Chapters addressing statistical findings and theory application are also included. Stigma and Social Support on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program provides an in-depth view on the themes of stigma while enrolled in SNAP such as embarrassment, feelings of failure, fear of being perceived as lazy, and feelings of judgment. This book serves as a useful tool for researchers of stigma and welfare programs, as well as for policy makers to improve aspects of the program that are causing some of the most vulnerable populations such as typically unrepresented and exploited groups (e.g., immigrants, migrant/temporary workers, and racial/ethnic minorities) to feel more stigmatized than other groups.
The Religion-Supported State
Authors: Rives Nathan S.
Published: July 2024

Between 1776 and 1850, the people, politicians, and clergy of New England transformed the relationship between church and state. They did not simply replace their religious establishments with voluntary churches and organizations. Instead, as they collided over disestablishment, Sunday laws, and antislavery, they built the foundation of what the author describes as a religion-supported state. Religious tolerance and pluralism coexisted in the religion-supported state with religious anxiety and controversy. Questions of religious liberty were shaped by public debates among evangelicals, Unitarians, Universalists, deists, and others about the moral implications of religious truth and error. The author traces the shifting, situational political alliances they constructed to protect the moral core of their competing truths. New England's religion-supported state still resonates in the United States in the twenty-first century.
Bonhoeffer and Climate Change
Authors: Rayson Dianne
Published: July 2024

Where is the voice of theology in the public discourse around anthropogenic climate change? How do we understand the human relationship to Earth and the ecology of which we are a part? How can we account for the human attempt to dominate nature and the devastation we have caused to our own home?

Dianne Rayson addresses these questions. She uses the creation theology of Dietrich Bonhoeffer to examine what it means to be human in the post-Holocene age. Employing a range of Bonhoeffer’s texts, Rayson posits that Bonhoeffer’s Christological theology and this-worldly ethical orientation provide the tools for an Earthly Christianity. She responds to Bonhoeffer’s question, “who actually is Jesus Christ, for us, today?” and proposes a Bonhoefferian ecoethic.
The Evangelical Doctrine of the Church
Authors: Doyle Robert
Published: July 2024

This book is a disciplined introduction to ecclesiology. With respect to the community which “the Lord purchased with his own blood (Acts 20:28), parts one and two focus on a critical-exegetical presentation of the New Testament’s descriptions and themes, locating their treatment within two millennia of reflection, and appreciating the impact of those contexts on our understanding. From over ninety New Testament images, chapters four to ten identify and argue for three foundational concepts: ekklēsia (assembly); sōma Christou (the body of Christ); and koinōnia hagiōn (the communion of the saints). Continuing the conversation with Scripture and its history of interpretation, Robert Doyle then applies the determinative biblical themes to present practice, centering it on the churches of the Evangelical and Reformed traditions. Part four illuminates ecclesiology from other foundational Christian doctrines: the triune God of holy love; Christology, our ascended human high priest and king; and the doctrine of revelation, the church as “the pillar and bulwark of the truth.” The final part focuses on three possible points of transformation in ecclesial life and witness, both internally and outward to the world.
The Lord, the Giver of Life
Authors: Smith Aaron T.
Published: July 2024

In The Lord, the Giver of Life: Spirit in Relation to Creation , Aaron T. Smith argues that the Spirit in which God exists is not a mode of being but a pattern of relation, which enfolds the world in each moment and gives it a life coordinated with God's. “God” and “world” find mutual determination in the eschatological achievement of covenantal existence, in the triumph of love.

Smith offers a new take on the biblical story of creation by bringing intricate interpretation of Genesis into productive dialogue with prominent voices of the Christian tradition as well as contributions from modern science and philosophy. The creation is not primarily a collection of discrete things, but the divinely-willed event of communion, which takes temporal shape within histories of generation, or the history of each generation. The human creature exists authentically in the time-framing of promise and fulfillment, coming to perceive the giving of life as good and right in the manner of the biblical covenant, and coming to desire it again - gladly consenting to life's interdependent generation.
Will Humanity Survive Religion?
Authors: Clark W. Royce
Published: July 2024

When the “human sciences” in the West followed the physical sciences in the 18th and 19th centuries with new measurements, methods, and language, the “metaphysics of infinity” lost its credibility. The response of Western religions was to retrench in a stronger authoritarianism, especially by the last half of the 19th century. While the new human sciences were being extended even to study the history and philosophy of religions, those religions themselves placed more emphasis on their understanding of the Absolute or Unquestionable. That split became a burden both to those who were religious and to those who were not.

Here, W. Royce Clark argues that humanity’s survival may depend on the development of a universal or inclusive ethic in which religions move beyond their Absolutes. Clark poses the sharp challenge: Are religious communities ready to abandon the foundations that until now they have insisted were the only adequate foundation for ethics?
Paul, Politics, and New Creation
Authors: Haddad Najeeb T.
Published: July 2024

Paul, Politics, and New Creation: Reconsidering Paul and Empire nuances Paul’s relationship with the Roman Empire. Using rhetorical, sociohistorical, and theological methods, Najeeb T. Haddad reevaluates claims of Paul’s anti-imperialism by situating him in his proper Hellenistic Jewish and Greco-Roman contexts.
Priest of the Church or Priest of a Church?
Authors: Cox Noel
Published: July 2024

The development of new forms of ministry, lay and ordained, has included worker-priests, now found in the Anglican Communion in a related form variously called Self-Supporting Ministry (SSM) or Non-Stipendiary Ministry (NSM). This book focuses on one of the most recent developments, the creation of Ordained Local Ministry. After chapters that consider preliminary questions of the nature of ministry, such as authority in the church and Holy Orders, Noel Cox argues that the crucial distinction between these and other forms of ministry is that the Ordained Local Minister (OLM) is overtly ordained specifically for a given locality (variously defined); they are a deacon or priest for a specific church, parish, benefice, or deanery, rather than of the universal church. Their introduction inevitably raises difficult ecclesiological questions, which Cox examines.
Luther after Derrida
Authors: Strizzi Marisa
Published: July 2024

This book creatively engages Martin Luther’s theology and Jacques Derrida’s deconstruction in a systematic theological enterprise. Guided by the general question of how to think about theology in postmodern times within a given tradition, Marisa Strizzi meticulously follows deconstruction at work, focusing on distinctive theological elaborations. She argues that Luther’s theology has a significant deconstructive drive and, through the thorough reading of texts, illustrates the ways in which such theology is interactive with the thought of Derrida. Intersections, echoes, and mirrors allow a happy exchange in which the vital theological topics of Luther meet key deconstructive motifs. Thus, the cross, the Deus absconditus, scriptura, fides, gratia and Christo encounter khōra, écriture, the gift, faith, the messianic and autoimmune sovereignty. Strizzi solidly sustains that the deconstructive reading of theological traditions proves to be a critical constructive way of honoring them.
Quantum Dots: Their Unique Properties and Contemporary Applications
Authors: M. Ebeid El-Zeiny , A. Okba Ehab
Published: July 2024

This chapter describes the exciton concept and exciton Bohr radius. It describes new and diverse QDs applications in the fields of photonics, quantum dot lasers, photon upconversion (PUC) and downconversion (PDC) and their applications, biosensors, environmental sensing, ratiometric fluorescence and colorimetric dual-mode sensors, food quality sensing, cancer biomarkers detection, non-photonic medical imaging including magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), radiolabeled quantum dots, positron emission tomography (PET), drug delivery, blood-brain barrier (BBB) crossing, electrochemical sensing, photocatalysis including CO2 reduction, H2 production, and environmental remediation. The chapter ends with a Conclusion and prospects section expecting crucial QDs industrial applications such as displays, solar cells, wastewater treatment, quantum computers, and biomedical applications. Heavy metal-free QDs formulations are a demand to minimize traditional QDs toxicity. There is progress in using non-toxic and eco-friendly starting materials, including carbon-based, biomolecules-based, silicon-based, and ternary I-III-VI QDs alternatives.
Acute Hepatitis B Infection: U.S. Policy and Guidelines
Authors: Henin Sally , Gruenglas Jeffrey , Anaya Miranda , Simard Marie-Chantale
Published: July 2024

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection can lead to chronic complications and increased mortality, supporting the use of post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) as an important initiative in public health. Despite positive trends in reducing HBV exposure with effective screening and vaccination, adoption and implementation of US Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) guidelines reveals gaps in protection for vulnerable populations (e.g., sexual assaulted, IV drug use, incarcerated persons, low socioeconomic status) who remain at risk for infection and viral transmission. This chapter reviews current acute HBV exposure guidelines in the United States (US) and presents opportunities for policy reform to improve equitable access and outcomes across vulnerable populations.
Genotype and Phenotype Diversity in Malus Domestica Borkh Species – Perusha Variety
Authors: Stefanova Boryana , Minkov Petko , Malchev Svetoslav
Published: July 2024

The study was conducted in the period 2020–2022, in the conditions of the Central Balkan Mountain region (600 to 1200 m above sea level), around the town of Troyan and its adjacent villages and hamlets. Some old local apple forms of Perusha variety were discovered and marked, which are threatened with extinction. The genetic diversity of the local specimens of Perusha variety type was evaluated, and the pomological and reproductive properties of some forms were characterized, to select potential cultivars for further cultivation or selection. It was found that all forms have a green fruit skin color, and the fruit flesh in most cases is juicy, slightly sour, with aroma. All the studied forms of the group have different valuable economic qualities and different directions of use; therefore, it can be confidently stated that there is a perspective for their introduction into practice, in creating new orchards for sustainable fruit production.
Determination of Spatial Heterogeneity Index for Naturally Fractured Reservoirs
Authors: Hamam Hassan , Maucec Marko
Published: July 2024

Modeling variations in reservoir properties as a function of space is an important task in evaluating reservoir heterogeneity. While it provides considerable value to capture the relative change in properties in the entire reservoir, it is an overwhelming task to perform in 3D. Various scientific approaches exist that facilitate measuring static reservoir heterogeneity along the wellbore. However, they are very limited and confined to small static datasets that are very often not representative. This chapter introduces a new approach to quantify a metric of 3D static reservoir heterogeneity. It describes the methodology to calculate a spatial heterogeneity index that encapsulates complex features to benchmark formations, zones, reservoirs, and fields. The introduced workflow expands on Lorenz’s scientific approach as the basis for this methodology to develop the heterogeneity index. The systematic approach excels in rendering a universal systematic 3D spatial heterogeneity index where typically data are not available, representative of overall prolificacy for a particular region of interest, zone, or the entire reservoir. The chapter also envisions possible applications, where the spatial heterogeneity index is utilized as a 3D conditioning attribute in dynamic model calibration and optimization.
Perspective Chapter: Future Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Medical Subspecialties – Dermatology and Neurology
Authors: Abidi Nadia , Abidi Zehara , Hanrahan Brian , Parampreet Kaur Mini , Kerego Yemesrach , Ng Pellegrino Anna , Thulasi Venkatraman
Published: July 2024

Without a doubt, academic medicine and research fields have been greatly impacted by the recent introduction of artificial intelligence (AI) machines and software programs. For subspecialties, such as dermatology and neurology, AI systems have been integrated to assist in the management of workflow in the office and clinical settings. This chapter highlights a review of the most up-to-date AI tools for clinical applications in dermatology, and its impact on telemedicine and medical education. Our authors also comment on challenges with AI in dermatology, particularly with consumer trust. Within the field of neurology, the authors examined the impact of AI technologies in imaging interpretation, electroencephalography (EEG) interpretation, in the neuro-intensive care unit (ICU) setting, for stroke events, epilepsy, and neurodegenerative conditions. We conclude our chapter with a brief overview of job security and the implications for medical professionals to work more with AI in the future.
ThyPRO-IR: Translation and Linguistic Validation of the Persian Version of Thyroid-Specific Quality of Life (QoL) Patient-Reported Outcome (PRO) Questionnaire for Benign Thyroid Disorders
Authors: Maghsoomi Zohreh , Khamseh Mohammad Ebrahim , Malek Mojtaba , Dehnad Afsaneh , Mohamadzadeh Shirin , Watt Torquil , Malboosbaf Ramin
Published: July 2024

Background: Considering the high prevalence of benign thyroid disorders, the availability of an instrument measuring health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in this population is very important. Objectives: The current study aims to translate and validate the Persian version of the ThyPRO-39. Methods: In accordance with standard methodology, a double forward, reconciliation, and backward translation of the questionnaire was conducted. A field consultant identified discrepancies between the original questionnaire and the back translation. Discrepancies were addressed, revised, and retested before submitting it for developer review. Finally, five cognitive interviews were conducted among patients with benign thyroid problems to ensure alignment between their understanding of the Persian items and their original English counterparts. Results: Translation and linguistic validations of the Persian version of the ThyPRO-39 Questionnaire were developed according to the established rules. Two translators did the forward translation with no significant disagreement. Considering backward translation, the field consultant changed eight items, and the developer provided seven additional comments. After interviewing five patients, nine revisions were performed by the field consultant. Finally, an external consultant reviewed all changes and approved the questionnaire. Conclusions: We translated and linguistically validated the Persian version of the ThyPRO-39. Now, the ThyPRO-IR is ready for assessment of thyroid-specific QoL in Iranian patients with benign thyroid disorders.
Psychometric Properties of the Persian Version of the Trait and State Cognitive Fusion Questionnaire in Various Mental Disorders
Authors: Soltani Esmail , Karimi Reza , Mowla Arash , Gillanders David T , Keihani Fereshteh , Zarifi Fariba
Published: July 2024

Background: The Cognitive Fusion Questionnaire (CFQ) has two versions (trait and state) that assess taking thoughts literally and thinking as likely to dominate behavior. Objectives: The current study modified original version of CFQ, which was translated previously in Iran and have used CFQ and modified version as known as the State Cognitive Fusion Questionnaire (SCFQ) for psychometrically evaluated these measures. Methods: A sample of individuals with mental disorders (N = 196) completed the CFQ, SCFQ, and other measures of interest. Results: One-factor models emerged for each measure, and each demonstrated good internal consistency. The CFQ versions were associated with psychopathology, experiential avoidance, and life satisfaction measures. Conclusions: These findings provide initial support for using these measures in research and clinical contexts to further our understanding of cognitive fusion in the Iranian mental disorder population.
Detecting Industrial Potato Chips Defects with Machine Learning Methods Using Deep Features
Authors: Taspinar Gulsen , Koklu Murat
Published: July 2024

Detection of production defects in industrial foods is vital to protect consumer health. Early detection of these errors can minimize the economic losses of manufacturers by reducing the costs of recalls and production stoppages. Additionally, continuous monitoring and improvement of product quality can increase brand reliability and customer satisfaction. Image processing can detect product defects, minimize human error and increase efficiency by performing uninterrupted inspection on the production line. Based on these reasons, this study aimed to detect potato chip errors with image processing. PepsiCo Lab Potato Chips Quality Control image dataset was used in the study. There are two classes in the dataset: defective and not defective. There are 967 images in total. SqueezeNet Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) architecture was used to extract the features of the images. With this architecture, 1000 features obtained for each image were classified with Artificial Neural Network (ANN), K Nearest Neighbor (KNN), Random Forest (RF) machine learning methods. As a result of the classifications, 0.986 classification accuracy was obtained from the ANN model, 0.927 from the KNN model, and 0.962 from the RF model. F1 Score, precision, recall and specificity metrics were used to compare the models in detail. According to the data obtained from the experimental results, it is predicted that the proposed feature extraction and classification models can detect industrial production errors occurring in potato chips.
Features of representation of the phenomenon “joy” in the Russian and English languages (based on texts of modern fiction)
Authors: Буркина Е.В.
Published: July 2024

настоящая статья посвящена исследованию когнитивного сценария «радость» на материале текстов современной русской и английской художественной литературы с учетом гендерных и культурных особенностей. В рамках данного исследования были рассмотрены произведения Я. Вишневского, Н. Абгарян и Б. Себастьяна, что позволило провести анализ вербализации радости в различных лингвокультурных контекстах. Целью работы является определение структуры когнитивного сценария «радость» и выявление специфических языковых средств, используемых для его выражения мужчинами и женщинами. Основные результаты исследования показали, что когнитивный сценарий «радость» включает в себя три основных компонента: возникновение причины, внутреннее переживание эмоции и внешнее проявление эмоции. В русском языке радость чаще всего выражается через невербальные средства, такие как улыбка и слезы, тогда как в английском преобладают вербальные выражения и эмфатические конструкции. Исследование также выявило гендерные различия в вербализации радости: женщины чаще используют невербальные средства, тогда как мужчины склонны к вербальным выражениям и внутренним переживаниям. Практическая значимость исследования заключается в возможности использовать его результаты в вузовских курсах лексикологии, спецкурсах по когнитивной лингвистике, лингвокультурологии.

this article is devoted to the study of the cognitive scenario “joy” based on the texts of modern Russian and English fiction, taking into account gender and cultural characteristics. Within the framework of this study, the works of Ya. Vishnevsky, N. Abgaryan and B. Sebastian were examined, which made it possible to analyze the verbalization of joy in various linguistic and cultural contexts. The purpose of the work is to determine the structure of the cognitive scenario “joy” and to identify the specific linguistic means used to express it by men and women. The main results of the study showed that the cognitive script “joy” includes three main components: the occurrence of the cause, the internal experience of the emotion and the external manifestation of the emotion. In Russian, joy is most often expressed through non-verbal means, such as smiling and tears, while in English, verbal expressions and emphatic constructions predominate. The study also revealed gender differences in the verbalization of joy: women are more likely to use nonverbal means, while men are more likely to use verbal expressions and internal experiences. The practical significance of the study lies in the possibility of using its results in university courses in lexicology, special courses in cognitive linguistics, and cultural linguistics.