bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Reminiscing With Mothers and Others: Autobiographical Memory in Young Two-Year-Olds
Authors: Hudson Judith A.
Published: August 2015

Abstract
This study investigated effects of maternal elicitation style, repeated recall sessions, and retention interval on 2-year-olds' autobiographical memory. Ten mothers and their children from 24 to 30 months of age verbally recalled the same four events once a week for 4 weeks. Two weeks later, an experimenter interviewed children about the same events as well as about four new events. Half of the events had taken place in the recent past (up to 6 months); the other half were from the remote past (6 to 10 months). Children recalled specific information about events occurring up to 10 months in the past, although they recalled more information about recent events than about remote events. Chil-dren were very much dependent on an adult partner to cue their recall. If specific cues were not provided, children rarely volunteered information. Chil-dren's conversations with their mothers affected their recall with the experi-menter: Children responded to more information requests, produced more offers of information, and recalled more specific information about events they had previously discussed with mothers than when recalling new events with the experimenter. However, children recalled more information with their mothers than with the experimenter, and prior discussions with mothers did not increase the amount of information children recalled with the experimenter. Two mater-nal elicitation styles were identified that were related to differences in children's responsiveness and amount of recall: Children of high elaboration mothers were more responsive and recalled more information than children of low elaboration mothers. (Psychology)
The Rhetoric of Consciousness in Henry James
Authors: Teahan Sheila
Published: August 2015

Abstract
Although traditionally viewed from a phenomenological perspective, Henry James's compositional device of the center of consciousness can be understood rhetorically as a representational strategy that illustrates the problematics of figurative language and causality. The Jamesian reflector does not simply "re-flect" but crucially intervenes in the causal logic of the texts it claims to focalize. The reflector's relation to the material he or she mediates is one of catachresis, or of "translation," of figurative transfer without a nonfigurative ground. But the rhetorical consequences of this catachrestic mediation cannot be reconciled with James's claims for the center of consciousness as the formal and meta-physical ground of his fictions. James's center of consciousness texts typically reach a representational impasse that thematizes this incompatibility and sacri-fices the central consciousness himself or herself in an allegory of this rhetorical situation. (Literary criticism, rhetorical approach)
"Streght to My Matere": Rereading Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde
Authors: Downes Jeremy M.
Published: August 2015

Abstract Chaucer'sTroilus and Criseydesuggests in closing that it was written "moost for wommen that bitraised be." The Freudian love of the gaze is helpful in reading for this difference, because the gaze, and the voyeurist and exhibitionist poles of scopophilic desire, have pervasive impact on Chaucer's epic. Oedipal codes are reinforced as the dominant, visual codes of written epic, framed around ambivalence toward women and language: The deception implicit in writing is likewise "built in" to women. Patriarchal society needs to control such tokens of exchange, but paradoxically, as tokens dominate exchange, their value and agentic power increases. Texts proliferate and disagree, allowing play for the agent. Often read beyond the conclusion, Criseyde (as agent) reads and writes herself as well. Thus when the poem's ending exaggerates both closure and open-endedness, leaving the audience in turmoil, it creates an open text "moost for wommen that bitraised be."(Literary criticism, psychological ap-proach; gender studies)
(Sub)textual Configurations: Sexual Ambivalences in Sylvia Plath'sThe Bell Jar
Authors: Hoogland Renée C.
Published: August 2015

Abstract Sylvia Plath'sThe Bell Jar(1963/1980) has become one of the classic 20th-century stories of female adolescence. Feminist critics have analyzed this tale of madness and self-destruction primarily in terms of gender conflicts. From a specifically lesbian feminist perspective, this article presents a "stressed read-ing"1 ofThe Bell Jar, arguing that it is not in the first place the operations of gender ideology, but rather the contradictions of female (hetero)sexuality that play a determining part. The resulting conflicts are shown to operate on the novel's narrative as well as discursive levels. The discussion centers on the two most striking features in which sexual ambivalences surface in the text: the relationship between the narrator and her protagonist and the figure of theDoppelgänger. Behind the mask of the female adolescent, it is argued, the configuration of a truly transgressive,2 lesbian sex/textuality can be discerned.(Literary criticism; gay and lesbian studies)
"The Farcical History of Richard Greenow": Aldous Huxley and the Anxieties of Male Authorship
Authors: Sheets Robin Ann
Published: August 2015

Abstract
Aldous Huxley's first piece of published fiction, "The Farcical History of Richard Greenow" (1920), reveals anxieties about authorship and sexual iden-tity that were typical of modernist male writers. This article situates this nou-vella in two contexts. The first concerns Huxley's relationship with his aunt, novelist and social activist Mary Augusta Arnold Ward; the second centers on medical theories of homosexuality presented by Havelock Ellis in Sexual Inversion (1897). The protagonist calls himself a spiritual hermaphrodite because his body is inhabited by two personalities: a male intellectual and an increasingly aggressive female novelist and war propagandist named Pearl Bellairs. As a caricature of Mrs. Humphrey Ward, Pearl reveals Huxley's antagonism toward powerful and popular women novelists. But she also provides a way for protag-onist and author to defend themselves against same-sex eroticism. Ideology does not determine desire. Rather, in the story, as in Sexual Inversion, fears aroused by certain desires seek expression in specific cultural forms. (Literary criticism, psychological approach; gender studies)
Figuring Culture and Literacy in Willa Cather's "Paul's Case"
Authors: Carey Eldred Janet
Published: August 2015

Abstract Literacy, both as a theme and as a narrative structuring device, marks much literature and takes on specific shapes and forms, depending on its relationship to its generic and historical contexts. Set in Pittsburgh, Willa Cather's "Paul's Case: A Study in Temperament" (1905/1983) features the steel world of indus-trialists and laborers, the world of monied capitalists (Carnegie, Mellon, West-inghouse, and Heinz) and of workers aspiring to middle-class safety or, in their daydreams, to the wealth of an employer like Carnegie, who began as one of them and who advanced, as he claims in his autobiographical accounts, in part through literacy. By studying Cather's short story, we can learn how literacy shapes construction of character in fiction and biography as well as construc-tion of persona in autobiographical material. That is, we can learn the integral role that figurations of literacy play in literary narratives.(Literary criticism, dialogic approach and biographical criticism; composition and literacy studies)Dreams are neither ideologically neutral nor politically innocent. (Giroux, 1990)
Analyzing Narratives in Psychotherapy: A Formal Framework and Empirical Analyses
Authors: Russell Robert L. , van den Broek Paul W. , Adams Scott , Rosenberger Karen , Essig Todd
Published: August 2015

Abstract Narration in psychotherapy has become a key area of theoretical and empiri-cal concern. Rationales for this new concern are provided in the context of introducing a three-dimensional model of narrative structure. Numerous measures corresponding to each dimension are operationally defined and used in an illustrative study of 16 pairs of temporally contiguous child-thera-pist stories sampled from Gardner's (1971)Therapeutic Communication with Children. As predicted, the therapist's narratives were more structurally con-nected, more often concerned with protagonists' internal psychological pro-cesses, and more elaborate/complex than the children's narratives. The therapist's narrative measures, however, did not seem adapted to the chil-dren's varying narrative competence, indicated by the absence of significant covariation with the children's narrative measures or with their age. These and additional analyses illustrate how to assess narrative processes in psycho-therapy and suggest future research on and training in the use of narratives in psychotherapy.(Psychology)
The Narrative Role of the Holocaust and the State of Israel in the Coverage of Salient Terrorist Events in the Israeli Press
Authors: Nossek Hillel
Published: August 2015

Abstract The mass media convey dominant values and attitudes through stories and myths that they circulate within a specific culture. As a narrative form, news coverage places events into social reality by retelling them within the framework of known stories or myths. Events acquire meanings and reactions by the ways in which these stories are told. In Israeli society, the Holocaust is a historical event that plays a prominent role in shaping national and cultural identity. An analysis of Israeli press coverage of terrorist attacks on Israel reveals that the Israeli press uses these events to convey the basic myth of the Holocaust and the revival of the Jewish state. Using Barthes' theories of narrative analysis, a composite story is constructed to illustrate the workings of this process. In this story the Jews, formerly helpless victims of Nazi aggression, are saved by Israeli soldiers as proof of the revival of the Jewish people in the state of Israel. The findings of the study suggest that the myth of the Holocaust may be used as a framework by the Israeli press in more serious emergency situations, such as war. At the same time, the study suggests that the analysis of news as narrative provides a means of understanding how terrorist events are reported by the press in other countries and in other media as well.(Mass Communication)
The Nature of Therapeutic Discourse: Accounts of the Self
Authors: Gerhardt Julie , Stinson Charles
Published: August 2015

Abstract
Due to the problems involved in trying to determine the validity of life history accounts in the psychoanalytically based encounter, the concept of narrative has proven very useful for promoting the view that the client's tellings represent different versions of the truth rather than a truth that exists prior to and independent of the storied constructions, as Freud's archeological model would have it. However, although the irreducibly narrative character of client talk is not contested, the claim developed herein is that client talk is structured around the practice of account-giving—more specifically, giving accounts of the self. Our mode of investigating this claim was to examine a client's use of a pair of linguistic markers (the discourse markers I MEAN and SO), which have been characterized as forms that function expressively to convey the speaker's attitudes and evaluative stance toward the content of the discourse. Based on this characterization, it was hypothesized that, in the therapeutic context, such forms would be used by the client as a way of carrying out the proposed agenda of providing self-accounts. (Discourse Analysis/Psychotherapy Research)
History—Consuming Pasts
Authors: Tanaka Stefan
Published: August 2015

Abstract I use the idea of consumption to discuss questions of agency and purpose in history. History, as a consumer of pasts, is itself an agent in the interpretive strategies employed in the construction of a historical narrative. History also consumes people as it attempts to impose its homogenizing narrative. In these senses, there is purpose: to give order and meaning to—thus prioritizing—certain pasts over others and to define commonality—especially of the nation or nation-state—and thus marginality. This view brings out the historicity of history: that there is always contestation in representations of the past, and that there is considerable variability in how individuals make such history meaningful to themselves. The latter brings out another notion of consumption—that individuals consume history. Which parts of history people imbibe, however, depend on connections with their experience, their own pasts and histories. In terms of pedagogy, we must be aware that objectivistic history often meets resistance, invites parody, or fosters disbelief. If one goal of teaching history is to foster belief in the nation-state, then a monological narrative might not be the best way to accomplish that goal.(History; Education; Nation)
Multivoicedness in Historical Representation: American College Students' Accounts of the Origins of the United States
Authors: Wertsch James V. , O'Connor Kevin
Published: August 2015

Abstract
Individuals' representations of history involve a process in which narratives provided by the sociocultural setting are appropriated and used in specific settings to produce concrete texts. This process involves various forms of multivoicedness. The distinction is made between heteroglossia and means conflict as forms of multivoicedness, and these two forms are used to analyze a set of written texts produced by college students about the origins of the United States. This analysis indicates that these students relied very heavily on a single basic narrative as a "mediational means," but they invoked it in a range of different ways, thereby generating different forms of multivoicedness. The nature of this multivoicedness is explored in terms of notions of resistance and consumption. (Education; Psychology; Historical Narrative; Multivoicedness)
Official and Unofficial Histories: The Case of Estonia
Authors: Tulviste Peeter , Wertsch James V.
Published: August 2015

Abstract
We argue that in order to understand how and why history is taught and learned, it is necessary to distinguish between "official" and "unofficial" history. Using this distinction, we examine differing historical representations of events in 1940 that resulted in Estonia's becoming part of the Soviet Union. Results from interviews with six ethnic Estonians are reported in an attempt to examine the differences between their understanding of the official and unofficial histories of the 1940 events. A basic distinction emerged between the official Soviet history, with its relatively coherent narrative line, and the unofficial history, which seems to consist of a set of unorganized anecdotal stories. We suggest that the unofficial historical representation can be understood as a set of counterclaims to the basic claims included in official history and that the unofficial history is generated through a kind of "hidden dialogicality" with the official one. (Psychology; Education)
"Thunder Is When the Angels Are Upstairs Bowling": Narratives and Explanations at the Dinner Table
Authors: Beals Diane E. , Snow Catherine E.
Published: August 2015

Abstract The domain of narrative is often assumed to be the first extended discourse genre accessible to young children, and a natural mode for representing and remembering information. Ultimately, however, children must move beyond narrative to include other genres within their competency, such as explanation. Furthermore, narrative and explanation share a number of features that might lead one to expect more or less parallel development. We studied the occurrence of narrative and explanatory sequences of talk during mealtimes in 31 lowincome families with preschool-aged children. Narrative and explanatory sequences constituted approximately equal percentages of the total talk, but explanatory sequences were much briefer and more frequent than narrative sequences. Equivalent measures of narrative and explanatory talk showed moderate correlations, suggesting that families that engaged in one type of discourse also engaged in the other; this suggestion was confirmed by the finding that a large proportion of explanatory utterance were also parts of narratives. As 3- and 4-year-olds, children participated more competently in narrative than in explanatory discourse, though they requested many explanations at all ages.(Discourse Genres; Explanation; Development)
Models of Narrative Analysis: A Typology
Authors: Mishler Elliot G.
Published: August 2015

Abstract The recent increase in the number of narrative studies in the human sciences is marked by great diversity in methods and theoretical perspectives. Researchers offer different answers to many questions, from what constitutes a narrative and how different genres may be specified to the aims and functions of storytell-ing. To clarify differences among approaches, a typology of models is proposed that focuses on which of three alternative problems are defined as the central task for narrative research: reference and the relation between temporal order-ings of events and their narrative representation; textual coherence and struc-ture, and how these are achieved through narrative strategies; and psychological, cultural, and social contexts and functions of narratives. Within each of these general categories, subclasses are distinguished in terms of the specific ways in which the central problem is addressed. Exemplars of each model are presented and related studies are cited. This comparative analysis demonstrates the depth, strength, and diversity of current research on narra-tive. It is suggested that further development of the field would benefit from more inclusive research strategies that combine what have been separate lines of inquiry.(Narrative Analyses; Types and Functions; Social Sciences; Educa-tion; Psychology
Metaphors of Ethnic Identity: Projective Life History Narratives of Trinidadians of Indian Descent
Authors: Angrosino Michael V.
Published: August 2015

Abstract

Indentured laborers from India were brought to the West Indies beginning in the 1840s. They form upwards of 40% of the population of several West Indian territories, including Trinidad (part of the nation of Trinidad and Tobago). Despite considerable assimilation to West Indian norms, these peo-ple of Indian descent feel strongly about retaining a separate and distinctive cultural identity. There is no overall consensus, however, as to what these people and their distinctive culture should be called. I argue that the quest for an appropriate label of ethnic identity is not a matter of arcane academic interest, but is at the heart of these people's construction of a secure place in a pluralistic society.

The technique of projective life-history narrative is explored as a means to uncover the dynamic of the discourse of ethnic self-identification in modern Trinidad. Four widely used labels of ethnic identity are seen as master meta-phors to which individual life accounts are assimilated. Analysis of the formal properties of those accounts facilitates an understanding of how people of Indian descent think of themselves and present themselves in social interaction with members of other groups.
(Anthropology)
Narrative Organization and Contextual Constraints: The Case of Modern Greek Storytelling
Authors: Georgakopoulou Alexandra
Published: August 2015

Abstract Use of connective forms in oral narratives is increasingly investigated as a device for signaling higher level discoursal relations, thus serving the stories' global organization. I set out to explore connective forms as both local and global links using Modern Greek storytelling as its data. My aims are to uncover the stories' template of organizational relations and to demonstrate their context sensitivity. This is achieved by looking into linkage forms in storytelling for adults as well as in storytelling addressed to children. The results of the analysis bring to the fore an audience-shaped strategy of conti-nuity and explicit signposting in the case of stories for children, as opposed to a strategy of salient segmentational shifts that mainly relies on devices other than discourse markers in stories for adults. I show that these strategies are revealing of an interaction between the stories' textual choices and their im-mediate context of occurrence. In addition, they index and are shaped by the stories' wider sociocultural context of occurrence.(Discourse Analysis; Sociolinguistics)
Emotional Life, Rhetoric, and Roles
Authors: Sarbin Theodore R.
Published: August 2015

Abstract
From a narrative perspective, I suggest restructuring our understanding of the phenomena of emotions by broadening the conception of emotions to emotional life. I make the claim that emotional life is storied; further, that metaphors drawn from the discipline of rhetoric are indispensable to an understanding of emotional life. I make use of the distinction between dramaturgical rhetoric and dramatistic rhetoric to identify the rhetorical acts in which the actor is the author of a concurrent script (dramaturgical) from those for which the author-ship is located in cultural narratives (dramatistic). In conceptualizing emotional life as arising from patterned efforts to resolve moral issues, I turn to role theory to fashion a construction-moral identity roles-as parallel to, but not the same as, social-identity roles. (Social Psychology)
Putting Emotion in Context: Its Place Within Individual and Social Narratives
Authors: Singer Jefferson A.
Published: August 2015

Abstract
The articles presented in this special issue have located emotional responses within more complex narratives dictated by both individual histories and the larger sociocultural context. A major thesis running through these articles is that the study of emotion as a physiological response in the laboratory loses sight of the meanings expressed by emotions in interpersonal and social trans-actions. A deeper understanding of anger, love, and even boredom can be reached by looking at how these aspects of emotional life are expressed in narrative scenarios that involve the adopting of roles, the sharing of expecta-tions, and the stipulation of particular actions. Finally, contextual perspectives challenge researchers to scrutinize and bring to light the narrative expectations their own studies create for the participants involved. (Personality Psychology)
Fifty Years of Grief: Accounts and Reported Psychological Reactions of Normandy Invasion Veterans
Authors: Harvey John H. , Stein Shelly K. , Scott Paul K.
Published: August 2015

Abstract
From Normandy combat veterans, we obtained narrative evidence on the experiences of loss and grief associated with their involvement in the invasion in France, June 6, 1944. Twelve veterans were interviewed in person in Nor-mandy at the time of the 1994 reunion, and 31 were subsequently interviewed by telephone. We present veterans' reports of battle experiences on D-Day and how they believe those experiences were manifest in psychological reactions over the last 50 years. Our analysis of these reports is framed by a theoretical conception that emphasizes the value of developing and communicating story-like constructions, which we refer to as accounts, as a constructive way of psychologically coping with severe stressors and loss over time. Most of the veterans reported lifelong grieving associated with their losses at Normandy. This grief recurred for most on anniversary dates and when thinking of war and death in general. For some, it was manifest in compelling, regular thoughts about the loss of their friends and their firsthand experiences of loss during the D-Day fighting. Many veterans also reported years of depression associated with their war experience. Some indicated that they kept their stories and feelings mostly private over the half century, and only now, around the time of the commemoration, did they open up. Veterans who indicated that they coped best with their trauma over time emphasized the healing power of working on and telling their stories to close others. (Grief Work, Social and Clinical Psy-chology)
"These are the fathers we never knew, the uncles we never met, the friends who never returned, the heroes we can never repay."-President Bill Clinton speak-ing at the American cemetery near Omaha Beach, Normandy, France, June 6, 1994.
"I don't think there's a day that goes by that I don't think and grieve about it. When you think about it, you think it was just yesterday. It's so clear in my mind. I'll never forget."-Normandy combat veteran, age 74, reflecting on his experience during the D-Day invasion.
Conceptions of Self in Mother-Child Birth Stories
Authors: Reese Elaine
Published: August 2015

Abstract
Family stories of children's early experiences may be important contributors to children's growing sense of self. In this study, 35 New Zealand Pakeha (European-descent) mothers told their preschoolers the story of the child's birth. Conversations were coded for mothers' emphasis on interpersonal aspects of the birth or for an exclusive focus on the child. Overall, mothers with daughters and younger preschoolers adopted a more interpersonal focus than did mothers with sons and older preschoolers. Mothers' focus was not solely a function of the topics that children brought up during the conversations. Thus, mothers seem to view the birth narrative as a way of introducing their daughters and younger children into their space in the wider family community. (Development, Gender Socialization, Self-Concept)
Looking for Frogs in the Narrative Stream: Global and Local Relations in Maternal Narratives
Authors: McIntire Marina L. , Reilly Judy
Published: August 2015

Abstract In this study, we compared storytelling of a pictured narrative,Frog, Where Are You?, by 6 Deaf and 6 hearing mothers in American Sign Language (ASL) and in English, respectively. How do these mothers construct their stories, that is, how do they mark episodes? And how do English-speakers' strategies differ from ASL-users' strategies? We found that stories in ASL contained more explicit markers to signal both local and global relations of the narrative. Because of modality and grammatical differences between English and ASL, Deaf mothers seemed to have more strategies available to use. Although the overall pattern of use throughout the story was similar, Deaf mothers appeared to be more "dramatic" in their storytelling than were hearing mothers. Both groups of parents used a variety of markers to call their children's attention to the theme of the story.(Psychology)
Narrative Performance Predicts Psychopathology: A Preliminary Demonstration
Authors: Hambleton George , Russell Robert L. , Wandrei Mary L.
Published: August 2015

Abstract The goals of this study were: (a) to test whether objective narrative variables can be reliably applied to commonly used clinical assessment tasks, (b) to assess the relative stability and differences in mean levels of narrative performance in participants' stories across assessment tasks, and (c) to assess the degree to which levels of psychopathology can be predicted by objective narrative measures. Stories were elicited from 31 substance abuse patients using 4 different narrative tasks. The 124 stories were coded using 5 measures that assess levels of structural connectedness, subjectivity, and complexity. Results, based on the reliably coded narrative measures, indicated that (a) participants displayed stable individual differences, whereas mean performance levels varied systematically across the story-elicitation tasks; and (b) a substantial amount of variance in depressive, anxious, and cognitive mediation symptoms could be predicted using these measures. Results are discussed in terms of the need to further develop objective measures of narrative performance and narrative assessment tasks.(Psychology)
Teaching Storytelling: A Microgenetic Analysis of Developing Narrative Competency
Authors: McKeough Anne , Sanderson Alex
Published: August 2015

Abstract The development of competency in narrative composition is acknowledged to be a complex process of central importance in the educational enterprise. Recent work suggests that growth in story knowledge is largely dependent on finding a fit among three elements: culturally influenced story schemas, children's developmental constraints, and instruction programs. The aim of this study was to examine an instruction program carried out with five 4-year-olds and designed to facilitate growth along an identified developmental pathway through socially situated cognitive scaffolding. The framework emphasized the coordination of prior knowledge with understandings gained in the instruction context. We chose a microgenetic method of analysis in order to look beyond outcomes and examine the actual process of instruction, exposing general trends in the data and providing insight into which instructional conditions lead to which specific changes in individuals' performance. The microgenetic method not only revealed the program's successes and shortcomings but also uncovered unanticipated strategies of participants, offering insight into issues related to the ways in which narrative knowledge builds. Our findings support the notion that learning does not occur in a straightforward, linear fashion but rather follows an irregular course, dropping off when, for example, task demands exceed processing capacity and surging forward when conceptually appropriate scaffolding is provided.(Psychology, Education)
Introduction: Edward Said, Russian Orientalism and Soviet Iranology
Authors: Cronin Stephanie
Published: August 2015

In 1978 the publication of Edward Said's Orientalism changed forever the terms of the debate about the nature of western scholarship on the non-western world. Profoundly unsettling, Said's work had a transformational impact on many academic disciplines in western Europe, the Americas and across Asia. Although drawing on older ideas and research, including critiques of western scholarship formulated in the Soviet Union, Said's book, along with Said's own public persona, came to represent and symbolize a broader rejection of existing power-political relationships between the imperial metropoles and the colonial world. In Orientalism, Said was principally concerned with deconstructing a discourse, seeking to analyze the specific character of a particular ideological mission, the elaboration of Anglo-French Orientalism, through which European intellectuals made an essential contribution to the extension of western hegemonic power over the East. Taking case studies drawn from Iran and the wider Persophone region, the question is posed whether a similar intellectual construction may be discerned within nineteenth century Russian, or post-1917 Soviet, discourses on the Orient. Were tsarist Russian scholars and administrators concerned with the Persophone world Orientalists in the Saidian sense? What was the significance of the rupture of 1917 in Russian discourses on the Orient? Did Soviet Iranology continue or break with traditional imperial Orientology? What was the relationship between knowledge of the East and power over it for imperial Russia and in the Soviet Union? Most controversially, did imperial Russian or Soviet Iranology display the same predisposition as Anglo-French discourses to essentialize Orient and Occident, to impose profound ontological oppositions between them and to conclude with the inherent superiority of the latter?
Soviet Civilization through a Persian Lens: Iranian Intellectuals, Cultural Diplomacy and Socialist Modernity 1941–55
Authors: Pickett James
Published: August 2015

During the Second World War and its immediate aftermath the Soviet All-Union Society for Cultural Ties Abroad (VOKS) engaged in an aggressive campaign of cultural outreach in Iran to promote socialist modernity amongst Iranian leftists. Iran represented VOKS’ first serious expansion outside Europe and one which the Soviet Union was uniquely poised to exploit. VOKS tapped into the Soviet Union's orientalist scholarly establishment inherited from the Russian Empire to advance the argument that not only were Iran and the Soviet Union geographically contiguous, they were both inheritors of the same Persianate cultural legacy—ironically a legacy that the Soviet Union had actively displaced in favor of Turkic national SSRs. Meanwhile, Iranian leftists were not passive receivers of Soviet propaganda. They exploited VOKS resources to found the Iranian Society for Cultural Relations with the USSR and establish regional branches throughout the country. In particular, Iranian intellectuals fixated on Soviet Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan as evidence of the abundant possibilities for a specifically Persianate articulation of socialist modernity. This article uses both Russian archival sources and Persian-language periodicals and interview transcripts to explore this unique confluence of Soviet and Iranian ambitions.
Measuring human locomotor control using EMG and EEG: Current knowledge, limitations and future considerations
Authors: Enders Hendrik , Nigg Benno M.
Published: August 2015

Electrical signals encoding different forms of information can be observed at multiple levels of the human nervous system. Typically, these signals have been recorded in a rather isolated fashion with little overlap between the static recordings of electroencephalography (EEG) commonly used in neuroscience and the typical surface electromyography (EMG) recordings used in biomechanics. However, within the last decade, there has been an emerging need to link the electrical activation patterns of brain areas during movement to the behavior of the musculoskeletal system. This review discusses some of the most recent studies using the EEG and/or EMG to study the neural control of movement and human locomotion as well as studies quantifying the connectivity between brain and muscles. The focus is on rhythmic locomotor‐type activities; however, results are discussed within the framework of initial work that has been done in upper and lower limbs during static and dynamic contractions. Limitations and current challenges as well as the possibility and functional interpretation of studying the connectivity between the cortex and skeletal muscles using a measure of coherence are discussed. The manuscript is geared toward scientists interested in the application of EEG in the field of locomotion, sports and exercise.
Low Adherence of HIV Providers to Practice Guidelines for Hepatocellular Carcinoma Screening in HIV/Hepatitis B Coinfection
Authors: Hearn Bevin , Chasan Rachel , Bichoupan Kian , Suprun Maria , Bagiella Emilia , Dieterich Douglas T. , Perumalswami Ponni , Branch Andrea D. , Huprikar Shirish
Published: August 2015

Background.  In the era of combination therapy for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), liver disease, and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) are major causes of death for patients coinfected with HIV and hepatitis B virus (HBV). This study compared HIV provider and hepatologist awareness of and adherence to the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD) practice guidelines for chronic HBV management. The primary endpoint of HIV provider adherence to HCC screening recommendations was compared to that of hepatologists at a large metropolitan academic medical center.

Methods.  Medical record database searches by ICD-9 codes were used to identify HIV/HBV coinfected (n = 144) and HBV monoinfected (n = 225) patients who were seen at least twice over a 2-year period in outpatient clinics. Adherence to AASLD guidelines was assessed by chart review. Provider awareness was evaluated through a voluntary anonymous survey with knowledge-based questions.

Results.  Over a 2-year period, only 36.0% of HIV/HBV coinfected patients seen in HIV practices completed HCC screening compared to 81.8% of HBV monoinfected patients in hepatology practices (P < .00001). Similarly, HIV providers less frequently monitored HBV viral load (P < .0001), HBeAg/anti-HBe (P < .00001), HBsAg/anti-HBs (P < .00001) than hepatologists but screened more often for hepatitis A immunity (P = .028). Self-reported adherence and knowledge scores were similar among 19 HIV providers and 16 hepatologists.

Conclusions.  HIV providers ordered significantly fewer HCC screening and HBV monitoring tests than hepatologists within a single academic medical center. In the setting of increased reliance on quality indicators for care, both patients and providers will benefit from greater adherence to established guidelines.
Inability of Polymerase Chain Reaction, Pyrosequencing, and Culture of Infected and Uninfected Site Skin Biopsy Specimens to Identify the Cause of Cellulitis
Authors: Crisp Jonathan G. , Takhar Sukhjit S. , Moran Gregory J. , Krishnadasan Anusha , Dowd Scot E. , Finegold Sydney M. , Summanen Paula H. , Talan David A. ,   for the EMERGEncy ID Net Study Group, Abrahamian Fredrick M. , Gross Eric , Lester Laeben , Chiang William K. , Dunbar Lala M. , LoVecchio Frank , Salhi Bisan , Jui Jon , Garg Manish , Rothman Richard , Steele Mark T. , Shroff Sunil , Takhar Sukhjit S. , Crisp Jonathan G.
Published: August 2015

Background.  The cause of cellulitis is unclear. Streptococcus pyogenes, and to a lesser extent, Staphylococcus aureus, are presumed pathogens.

Methods.  We conducted a study of adults with acute cellulitis without drainage presenting to a US emergency department research network. Skin biopsy specimens were taken from the infected site and a comparable uninfected site on the opposite side of the body. Microbiology was evaluated using quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR), pyrosequencing, and standard culture techniques. To determine the cause, the prevalence and quantity of bacterial species at the infected and uninfected sites were compared.

Results.  Among 50 subjects with biopsy specimens from infected and uninfected sites, culture rarely identified a bacterium. Among 49 subjects with paired specimens from infected and uninfected sites tested with PCR, methicillin-susceptible S. aureus was identified in 20 (41%) and 17 (34%), respectively. Pyrosequencing identified abundant atypical bacteria in addition to streptococci and staphylococci. Among 49 subjects with paired specimens tested by pyrosequencing, S. aureus was identified from 11 (22%) and 15 (31%) and streptococci from 15 (31%) and 20 (41%) of the specimens, respectively. Methicillin-resistant S. aureus was not found by culture or PCR, and S. pyogenes was not identified by any technique.

Conclusions.  The bacterial cause of cellulitis cannot be determined by comparing the prevalence and quantity of pathogens from infected and uninfected skin biopsy specimens using current molecular techniques. Methicillin-susceptible S. aureus was detected but not methicillin-resistant S. aureus or S. pyogenes from cellulitis tissue specimens. For now, optimal treatment will need to be guided by clinical trials. Noninfectious causes should also be explored.
Using Immunohistochemistry to Assess the Accuracy of Histomorphologic Diagnosis of Aspergillosis and Mucormycosis
Authors: Jung Jiwon , Park Young Soo , Sung Heungsup , Song Joon Seon , Lee Sang-Oh , Choi Sang-Ho , Kim Yang Soo , Woo Jun Hee , Kim Sung-Han
Published: August 2015

Background.  Data on the accuracy of conventional histomorphologic diagnosis are limited, especially in mucormycosis. We therefore investigated the accuracy of histomorphologic diagnosis of mucormycosis and aspergillosis, using immunohistochemistry (IHC) tests for mucormycosis and aspergillosis.

Methods.  Patients enrolled met the modified criteria for proven and probable mucormycosis (during a 22-year period) or invasive aspergillosis (during a 6-year period) and had formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissues available. We first tested the diagnostic performance of IHC for mucormycosis and aspergillosis in proven cases. Then we determined the accuracy of histomorphologic diagnosis of probable cases, using the IHC tests.

Results.  In 7 proven cases of mucormycosis, the sensitivity and specificity of mucormycosis IHC were 100% (95% confidence interval, 65%–100%) and 100% (68%–100%), respectively. In 8 proven cases of aspergillosis, and the sensitivity and specificity of aspergillosis IHC staining were 87% (53%–98%) and 100% (65%–100%), respectively. Of 23 probable mucormycosis cases, 20 (87%) were positive with mucormycosis IHC, 2 (9%) were positive with aspergillosis IHC (including 1 positive for both), and 2 were negative with both. Of 16 probable aspergillosis cases, 10 (63%) were positive with aspergillosis IHC, 4 (25%) were positive with mucormycosis IHC, and 2 (13%) were negative with both tests.

Conclusions.  Aspergillosis and mucormycosis seem not to be correctly diagnosed morphologically, because some of the probable cases showed either test with both antibodies or failure to stain with the homologous antibody. In the absence of fungal culture results, the IHC tests seem helpful in differentiating between aspergillosis and mucormycosis.
Austerity in 2009–13
Authors: Alesina Alberto , Barbiero Omar , Favero Carlo , Giavazzi Francesco , Paradisi Matteo
Published: August 2015

The conventional wisdom is (i) that fiscal austerity was the main culprit for the recessions experienced by many countries, especially in Europe, since 2010 and (ii) that this round of fiscal consolidation was much more costly than past ones. The contribution of this paper is a clarification of the first point and, if not a clear rejection, at least it raises doubts on the second. In order to obtain these results we construct a new detailed “narrative” dataset which documents the size and composition of the fiscal plans implemented by several countries over 2009–13. Out of sample simulations, that project output growth conditional only upon the fiscal plans implemented since 2009, do reasonably well in predicting the total output fluctuations of the countries in our sample over the years 2010–13 and are also capable of explaining some of the cross-country heterogeneity in this variable. Fiscal adjustments based on cuts in spending appear to have been much less costly, in terms of output losses, than those based on tax increases. Our results, however, are mute on the question whether the countries we study did the right thing implementing fiscal austerity at the time they did, that is 2009–13.
Pliny the Elder
Authors: Doody Aude
Published: August 2015

Gaius Plinius Secundus or Pliny the Elder (b. 23/4–d. 79 ce) is famous for two things: his monumental Natural History (Historia naturalis), which describes the world in thirty-seven volumes, and his death in the eruption of Vesuvius, which was carefully described by his nephew, Pliny the Younger, in one of two letters about his uncle that have survived to us (Plin. Ep. 6.16). In the second of these letters, Pliny the Elder is described as a man who read insatiably and the author of a large number of lost works, including histories of the German Wars and of the later Julio-Claudian period, as well as a treatise on how to throw a javelin from a horse (Plin. Ep. 3.5). Born in Novum Comum in the Transpadane regions, Pliny the Elder served in Germany alongside the future emperor Titus, practiced law at Rome under Nero, and went on to a prominent career as an equestrian administrator under the Flavians, holding a series of important procuratorships, including that of Hispania Tarraconensis, and serving as commander of the fleet at Misenum. The Natural History is dedicated to Titus, and Pliny’s closeness to both Vespasian and Titus seems reflected in his political views in the work, most obviously in his animosity toward Nero and his court. The Natural History is a key document in the history of science and scholarship in Europe. In this encyclopedic text, Pliny gathers together and arranges data from his reading and from his experience to present an account of nature that has Roman concerns at its heart. Pliny is not particularly concerned with philosophical schools, though he is usually seen as influenced by Stoicism. Nature is knowable through a succession of itemized facts that he puts at the disposal of his readers, to encourage them to marvel at the wonderful and unexpected inventiveness of the natural world. The burden of his text can be seen as a moral or a political one: Pliny promotes a return to old Roman values and a renewed spirit of intellectual inquiry in the rhetorical passages of the text, and the work as a whole is dependent on, and produced in the service of, Roman imperial interests. The work is organized in thirty-seven volumes. The first contains the preface and—unusually—a list of the contents and sources for each of the ensuing volumes. The following thirty-six deal with the heavens (Book 2); geography (Books 3–6); humans and other living creatures (Books 7–11); plants (Books 12–19); medicines from plants (Books 20–27); medicines from living creatures (Books 28–32); and an account of metals, minerals, and gemstones and the art that has been produced from them (Books 33–37).
Buddhism in Central Asia
Authors: King Matthew
Published: August 2015

Historically significant civilizations dotted the heart of Eurasia already by the first centuries of the Common Era. Then, Indic Buddhist traditions began to arrive along merchant routes and find local patronage. Central Asia, like Buddhism, is hardly a fixed or consensual category: it takes quite different shape depending on the subfield and the historical period. Scholars of Buddhism (as opposed to scholars of Islam, for example) generally use “Central Asia” in reference to networks of oasis towns, such as Khotan and Turfan, that made up the ancient Silk Road between eastern Iran and Dunhuang during the first millennia ce. Transported by merchants and monks, and according to the ebb and flow of conquest and regional political fragmentation, Buddhism flowed from the Indian subcontinent into and through these city-states. Out of complex multilingual and multicultural encounters leading to Islamic hegemony in the 7th century ce, Indian, Greek, Persian, Turkic, and Chinese civilizations were twined here in new and significant ways. The Buddhisms that formed in the contact zones of Central Asia found material expression in diverse artistic and architectural styles, and they were intoned and expounded upon in some twenty-four languages and written on page and stele in at least seventeen scripts. The Central Asian melting pot provided the foundations for later, more enduring Buddhist traditions in China and Tibet, and proceeding from there to Korea, Japan, Mongolia, and Siberia. Recent scholarship is charting the extent to which Buddhist traditions in Central Asia developed in transformative dialogue with Islam and gave shape to medieval European scholasticism. Despite its formative place in Eurasian history, however, scholarship on Central Asian Buddhism remains remote for nonspecialist Buddhologists and general readers. Much of this scarcity is due to the paucity of primary sources: the archaeological and material record remains fragmentary; the agents of transmission, translation, and innovation are too often nameless or otherwise untraceable; and primary languages have been long dead. Few general overviews are available of the rich scholarship on Central Asian Buddhism to help fill this gap. To compound matters, vast bodies of contemporary secondary scholarship in Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Tibetan, and Mongolian remain inaccessible to nonspecialists in Europe and North America. While a comprehensive guide to that enormous, global scholarly literature would be a worthwhile contribution, it is well beyond the purview of this article (and of the Oxford Bibliographies in Buddhism series more generally). What follows is a necessarily partial bibliography aimed at providing accessible scholarship for nonspecialists, undergraduate educators, and general readers. As such, its linguistic bias is with European-language scholarship. Even so, the sources described below will quickly lead interested readers to key, non-European-language specialist studies, relevant scholarly journals, and databases of primary sources according to interest and linguistic ability.