bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Catholic Canon Law
Authors: Hahn Judith
Published: November 2023

Catholic canon law is the body of laws and legal principles sovereignly established by Catholic authorities to govern the Catholic Church. Current law has developed into two strands: Western, pertaining to the Roman Catholic Church, and Eastern, pertaining to the Catholic Eastern Churches. After centuries of abiding by the 1582 Corpus Iuris Canonici as the main source of law, the universal law of the church was codified by papal legislation in the twentieth century. The key source of law of Roman Catholicism became the Codex Iuris Canonici, established in 1917 and fundamentally reformed after the Second Vatican Council (the current code is from 1983). In 1990, the pope provided the Catholic Eastern Churches with the Codex Canonum Ecclesiarum Orientalium. Both codes endow the global Catholic Church with a legal frame for regulating the constitution of the church, its preaching, teaching, liturgies, sacraments, and the administration of ecclesiastical goods, sanctions, and procedures. The supreme legislator regulates the legal affairs of the global Catholic Church through further individual laws; local legislators address local Catholic churches’ legal affairs through numerous other laws. Following the Second Vatican Council’s development in ecclesiology, canonical legal theory has curbed much of the quasi-state ambitions of the old law, emphasizing the theological foundation of canon law and its purpose to serve the church as a community of Catholic faithful. This theoretical transformation creates new questions, such as whether it is possible to speak of current canon law as law.
Christianity and Human Rights Law
Authors: Hill Mark
Published: November 2023

This chapter examines the foundations of modern human rights law as it is understood and applied under international treaties and other instruments largely composed since the World War II. It reflects on some of the Judeo-Christian thinking that may have informed and animated the drafters of those documents and on the political and diplomatic realities that have shaped their content and enforcement. It examines overtly Christian understandings of human rights law and the role of Christians as advocates of human rights law both for its own sake and in the pursuit of the ecumenical endeavor. Consideration is also given to Christians as the beneficiaries of human rights law and to the conflicts, real or apparent, between the Christian faith and certain of the more secular elements of human rights law in the twenty-first century.
Christianity and the Law of Church-State Relations
Authors: Robbers Gerhard
Published: November 2023

Christian approaches to the relation between church and state, manifold and diverse as they appear, are based on the fundamental distinction between the sacred and the secular. The idea of separation between church and state, which has found a multitude of different interpretations and expressions in the vicissitudes of history, closely relates to this religious teaching. Christian Orthodox views uphold the idea of symphonia, the distinction between, but close proximity of, church and state, often expressed in intense loyalty of the church to the secular rulers in the nation-state. The Roman Catholic Church has for long fought with secular rulers for supremacy one over the other, while the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s came to define a cooperative relationship between the two institutions. In the course of history, churches have experienced a broad spectrum of relations to the secular sphere ranging from identification of the two powers to strict and antagonistic separation. Protestant doctrines entail and mirror probably the most diverse views and practices. In some places Protestantism has taken to naming the secular rulers as supreme bishops of various national churches, thereby establishing state churches, but under different historical circumstances Protestantism has also taught the strictest separation between church and state.
Christianity, Law, and the Ecological Crisis
Authors: Montini Massimiliano , Green M. Christian
Published: November 2023

Humanity is experiencing a global ecological crisis. This chapter examines theological and political approaches to the environment across the Christian tradition. It acknowledges the human roots of the ecological crisis and argues that its main origin can be found in the dominant technocratic paradigm that has shaped human development in the past two centuries. Humanity will be able to tackle the ecological crisis only by developing a different relationship with nature, based on an individual and collective ecological conversion. This should rely on the paradigm of ecological integrity, which recognizes the existence of a close connection between the well-being of humanity and the health and integrity of ecosystems. It is a paradigm that is also giving rise to new ecological understandings of the law.
Christianity and Legal Ethics
Authors: Cochran Robert F.
Published: November 2023

A Christian perspective of legal ethics is grounded in basic Christian themes—Creation, Fall, wisdom, justice, and peace. God created humans in his image, with three significant implications for lawyers: clients and other people who might be affected by legal representation are entitled to dignity; business lawyers and clients exercise dominion—sometimes well, sometimes poorly—as God’s trustees in this world; and lawyers bring the capacity for practical wisdom to legal representation. The work of litigators is grounded in the Fall. They are in the conflict business. Some may choose cases and clients that enable them consistently to fight for justice. More generally, lawyers indirectly contribute to justice by playing a role in the adversary system. Their arguments on each side of a case help judges and juries reach wise, just decisions. Lawyers are also peacemakers: they draft agreements with an eye toward avoiding conflict, they counsel clients to comply with law, and they settle the vast majority of cases before trial. Litigation itself is an alternative to more violent means of resolving disputes. When lawyers and clients disagree over the morality of choices in legal representation, the lawyer may address the disagreement by some combination of the following: refusing to accept or withdrawing from the representation, engaging in moral discourse with the client, or proceeding with the representation and allowing the legal system to resolve the conflict.
Christianity and Human Dignity
Authors: Slotte Pamela
Published: November 2023

This chapter explores the topic of Christianity and human dignity. The chapter opens by acknowledging the complexity of the issue at stake. Being an open-textured concept, human dignity appears in many different contexts and is attributed different, sometimes complementary, but also in part contrasting meanings. The chapter goes on to explore different uses of talk about human dignity and ascertains what contribution it is thought that human dignity can bring and what kinds of meaning it roughly encompasses, including within Christian narratives, where it is a central notion. Human dignity is studied as linked to status and relationality, to intrinsic value and becoming, and to dignified manner and vocation. The chapter also considers various critiques directed toward talk of human dignity and that point out the limits to that talk and misuse arising in the name of human dignity. The chapter ends by discussing human dignity more specifically in a legal human rights context. It explores what the talk of human dignity is thought to be able to achieve in that context.
Christianity and Sovereignty
Authors: Aroney Nicholas
Published: November 2023

This chapter surveys the meaning of sovereignty in both Christian theology and modern jurisprudence and, on the basis of that inquiry, considers what might be right and what might be wrong about the idea. The chapter explains how early Christian theology insisted upon the integral simplicity of the divine nature, such that attributes like God’s power were never abstracted from the other attributes of the divine nature, such as God’s goodness, justice, and mercy. Under the influence of this theology, the human exercise of sovereignty was understood to be limited and ministerial. However, when theologians began to distinguish an aspect of divine sovereignty that they regarded as absolute, the way was opened to an attribution of a similarly absolute power to human institutions, unlimited by law and justice. The absolutely free creative power of God was thus attributed to human lawmakers.
A Tale of Two Social Credit Systems
Authors: Liu Chuncheng
Published: November 2023

Machine learning technologies have permeated diverse sectors, catalyzing transformative shifts in the understanding, management, and navigation of complex sociotechnical systems. However, how are machine learning technologies adopted in different scenarios, and what are the necessary sociotechnical conditions? This chapter undertakes a comparative analysis of machine learning technologies adoption in two Chinese social credit systems. The central argument of this chapter revolves around two primary components: diverse data input and well-defined outcomes. Both elements are fundamental to the effective deployment of machine learning models and influence their accuracy, relevance, and utility. The success or failure of machine learning adoption is not solely a technical or social matter. Instead, as the chapter underscores, there is an intricate balance between technical prowess and social compatibility, both of which are indispensable for successful technology adoption.
Network Neuroscience Methods for Investigating Brain Plasticity
Authors: Finc Karolina
Published: November 2023

This chapter explores the application of network neuroscience in studying brain plasticity—the brain’s ability to change in response to new experiences. Advances in non invasive neuroimaging techniques have allowed researchers to map the connectivity of the human brain, providing insights into how different brain regions communicate. Network neuroscience, an interdisciplinary field that combines network science and neuroscience, offers a promising approach to understanding the structural and functional brain network changes underlying plasticity. The chapter begins by discussing the fundamentals of network neuroscience methods and the potential challenges in brain plasticity research. It covers various topics, including structural and functional connectivity, dynamic functional connectivity, brain parcellations, resting-state and task-based functional connectivity, and network measures. Later it reviews some recent studies that have utilized the network neuroscience approach to investigate brain plasticity in areas like skill acquisition and changes across the life span. Finally, the chapter presents potential challenges and limitations of using network neuroscience to study brain plasticity, along with suggestions for future research directions and open questions in this exciting field.
Media and Transitional Justice
Authors: Savelsberg Joachim J.
Published: November 2023

Using a field theory approach, this chapter explores journalism’s work for, against, and as transitional justice (TJ). Seeking to spread delegitimizing representations of atrocities and repression, TJ institutions depend on media communication. Journalism’s objectivity rule aids TJ institutions, but the juridification of journalistic products may lead to a literal and uncritical transmission of TJ narratives, buying into the institutional logic and other constraints of TJ justice mechanisms. Other features of the media field work against TJ. They include market orientation and the resulting striving for attention-grabbing stories; constraining features of journalistic genres, limiting depth and contributing to a flattening of accounts; tensions between journalistic and judicial habitus; cognitive and spatial disconnects between journalists and TJ institutions; and national filters that impede the transmission of global TJ scripts to national and local levels. When authoritarian regimes follow periods of mass violence, regimes are likely to instrumentalize (politicize) media reporting. Finally, the media may work as TJ when they engage in public shaming of those deemed guilty and reawaken collective memories of past abuses. They may even (re-)ignite interventions by formal TJ institutions. Finally, in all three scenarios of the media for, against, and as TJ, informal social contexts, communities, and opinion leaders filter media messages before they settle in the minds of recipients: a three-step flow of communication.
Settler Colonial States and Transitional Justice
Authors: Cunneen Chris
Published: November 2023

This chapter explores tensions in the relationship between transitional justice and Indigenous demands for recognition (often expressed in terms of sovereignty and reparations for colonial systemic human rights abuses) in the settler colonial states of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States. These states are usually absent from considerations of transitional justice. The author challenges this assumption. In recent years transitional justice mechanisms within settler colonial states, including reparations, apologies, inquiries, and truth commissions, have been adopted. However, these responses have been limited and do not address some of the core demands of Indigenous peoples including recognition of self-determination and sovereignty. The ongoing nature of settler colonialism complicates transitional justice processes: rectifying the past demands changing the structural conditions of the present relationship between Indigenous peoples and settler colonial states.
Transitional Justice Temporalities
Authors: Miller Zinaida
Published: November 2023

This chapter argues that notions of time and temporality are central to the study and practice of transitional justice. The first part of the chapter, “The Times of Transitional Justice,” explores the vying origin points and histories of the field of transitional justice. It contends that both the methodological focus and starting point of an historical study influences how flexible and inclusive the transitional justice field appears to be in contemporary context. The second section, “Time in Transitional Justice,” analyzes the ways in which transitional justice institutions and scholars shape perceptions of the past and ideas about mourning, grief, and reconstruction. It argues that transitional justice practices often promote a vision of justice for harms committed in a relatively recent past that has been—or soon will be—successfully overcome. In doing so, they may make it more difficult to account not only for continuing harm and inequality but for complex, contested pasts. The final section traces the continuities between colonial temporalities enforced through violence and the temporality embedded in contemporary transitional justice by tracing two sets of challenges to mainstream accounts of time in transitional justice: counter-histories (which define the material and ideological stakes of different historical choices) and counter-practices (which contrast assumed singular or linear modes of mourning and memory with Indigenous, postcolonial, and pluralist conceptions). By assessing time from multiple perspectives, the chapter calls for closer attention to the ways in which justice institutions may unwittingly reinforce rather than transform past and present forms of temporal domination.
Conversion
Authors: McGever Sean
Published: November 2023

The Christian fundamentalist understanding of conversion concerns the matter of the experience of receiving salvation. Christian fundamentalists inherited their understanding of conversion from the evangelical tradition. Fundamentalists identified that modernists attacked the supernatural nature not only of the Bible, of the virgin birth, and of the miracles of Jesus, they also recognized that modernists sought to deny the supernatural nature of evangelical conversion. This chapter argues that fundamentalists hold that the experience of Christian conversion, as well as regeneration, which is the divine correlate to the human experience of conversion, is supernatural. Christian fundamentalists also generally held to dispensational millennialism; they believe that the call for conversion should be urgent, but this came with a twinge of pessimism regarding its success. The final argument this chapter makes is that Christian fundamentalists can be accused of contradicting their primary belief that conversion is supernatural whenever they make themselves arbitrators of who is and who is not a Christian. This chapter shows that the supernatural nature of conversion is a critical aspect of Christian fundamentalists past and present.
A Fundamentalist Forerunner?
Authors: Breimaier Thomas
Published: November 2023

The roots of fundamentalism are many and varied, but the Victorian British Baptist C. H. Spurgeon’s conflict with the Baptist Union from 1887 anticipated some of the issues that would animate fundamentalists in the early twentieth century. This chapter examines the so-called Downgrade Controversy, a theological spat in which Spurgeon accused the Baptist Union of tolerating theological liberalism within its ranks, and which resulted in his eventual withdrawal from the denomination. It does so by examining the theological underpinnings of Spurgeon’s disagreements with the Baptist Union in four areas: the place of evangelicalism, the inspiration of the Bible, penal substitutionary atonement, and the final Judgement and eternal punishment. It argues that while Spurgeon was not himself a fundamentalist, his stand against theological liberalism meant that he became a rallying figure for American fundamentalists in the decades after his death.
Sex and Sexuality
Authors: Krivulskaya Suzanna
Published: November 2023

This chapter surveys Christian fundamentalists’ century-long crusade to defend what they view as ‘traditional’ sexual values. From its earliest iterations, fundamentalism has striven for sexual purity through premarital chastity and life-long fidelity in heterosexual matrimony. Yet this ideal has been challenged by broader cultural shifts and undermined by the conduct of the very ministers who have been sexual purity’s most ardent advocates. Time and again, as fundamentalists combated the sexual liberalism of their culture, the people at the top of their leadership betrayed signs of weakness and corruption in the realm of private sexual practices. This chapter traces the constant interplay between stated ideals of sexual purity and lived realities of sexual transgression in the hundred-year history of the fundamentalist movement.
Israel and the Middle East
Authors: Hummel Daniel G.
Published: November 2023

American fundamentalists have thought, preached, and written about the Middle East more than any other region of the globe. This chapter suggests three primary reasons why. First, the Middle East includes the Holy Land, representing the locus of God’s interactions with humanity as recorded in the Bible, as well as the site of the culmination of history and fulfilment of biblical prophecies. Second, the region has represented a priority mission field for fundamentalists, a region they see as dominated by Islam and in need of the Christian message. Third, the United States’ increasing global reach over the twentieth century meant that fundamentalists directed their attention to the region as Americans as well as Christians, conceptualizing the Middle East in civilizational conflict with the Christian West.
Defining and Interpreting Christian Fundamentalism
Authors: Atherstone Andrew , Ceri Jones David
Published: November 2023

Much ink has been spilled trying to define fundamentalism and distinguish it from the wider evangelical movement. While this introductory chapter surveys these attempts at categorization in some detail, it does not seek to offer a new or composite definition of the movement. Rather it reflects on some of the reasons for the resurgence of scholarly interest in fundamentalism, especially since the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington DC in 2001, and describes how historians and others have understood the fundamentalist mentality. It then looks at the porous relationship between evangelicalism and fundamentalism, and the ways in which fundamentalism is used as a polemic category (by means of a case study of reactions to the hugely popular Alpha course, launched in 1993), before charting some of the main historiographical approaches to the subject from the 1930s to the present day.
The Scopes Trial
Authors: Clark Constance Areson
Published: November 2023

The issues inspired by the Scopes evolution trial of 1925 were about more than just the content of science or competing theologies or religious practices. Although it did not set any legal precedents, the trial and the debate surrounding it raised questions about the role of expertise and authority in a democracy, and about democracy itself. It highlighted the role of the media in shaping interpretations of complex events. Media coverage of the trial contributed to stereotypes that have had lasting legacies. It suggested the complexity of defining science, and the growing authority of science. Stereotypes of fundamentalists following the trial, and later in Only Yesterday and Inherit the Wind may have had lasting legacies. The mythology of the Scopes trial mattered more than did the trial itself.
Complexity Science and Networks in Archaeology
Authors: Romanowska Iza
Published: November 2023

The study of complex systems has been a fertile ground across many scientific disciplines. Archaeology has been late in wider adoption of complexity science, both in terms of the philosophy of science shift, and in terms of the technical move toward more computational-based research. However, its potential to address questions on complex dynamic interactions, long-term adaptive processes, and socionatural mechanisms makes it a relevant tool for studying past societies. Network science is, together with simulation, a key tool for studying complexity. They are commonly used to describe and model the web of interactions between components of complex systems, and several archaeological applications demonstrate their potential. Network science techniques provide a formal framework that makes it easier to reconstruct the lives and behavior of past peoples based on their aggregated actions preserved in the archaeological record. It also makes it easier to understand and generalize the processes behind these trends, thus unlocking the comparative potential of archaeology and history for contemporary problems and giving computational archaeologists a significant role to play.
Historical and Archaeological Network Data
Authors: Lemercier Claire
Published: November 2023

This chapter addresses the shared peculiarities of historical and archaeological network data. It lists the main types of sources that have been fruitfully used to produce historical data on interactions and relationships. It presents the main questions that we should keep in mind during the construction of network data, understood as a process of translation of a source into relational terms. The first four parts present four types of historical network data and their archaeological equivalents: data based on legal and quasi-legal records, networks of words from texts, two-mode networks from membership lists, and data built from past narratives on past ties. The fifth part addresses research projects that use several types of source, and the last part lists general practical advice applicable to any type of historical and archaeological data.
Linked Data Networks
Authors: Vitale Valeria , Simon Rainer
Published: November 2023

This chapter provides an introduction to Linked Open Data (LOD), a method for publishing structured data on the web. It explains what the goals, motivation, and foundational technologies of LOD are, presents its uses in the humanities, and discusses how LOD relates to network analysis. In particular, this chapter adopts a more user-centered perspective of LOD: what are the challenges, opportunities, and potentials of LOD for network analytical tasks in humanities scholarship? How can tools help tackle LOD’s notorious lack of usability, and lower the barrier to entry for a wider audience? The chapter concludes with an exemplary workflow, from scholarly source to qualitative analysis, using open source tools.
The Antiquities Trade and Digital Networks
Authors: Graham Shawn , Huffer Damien
Published: November 2023

The internet facilitates the trade in antiquities, both licit and illicit, but not necessarily in the ways we might first expect. The recommendation algorithms of the major platforms push buyers and sellers together, eliminating the need for brokers. The so-called “darknet” is therefore not necessary for the vast majority of people involved in the trade. Network analytic approaches are a valuable tool in studying this trade. In this chapter we consider how network perspectives on social media and e-commerce provide a foundation upon which the illicit antiquities trade can flourish and illustrate this approach with case studies drawn from our own research, and adjacent approaches. Such research also requires careful ethical planning, and we point to an available framework to consider these dilemmas.
Maritime Networks
Authors: Leidwanger Justin
Published: November 2023

The ease of movement by sea, particularly over longer distances and with bulky loads, situates maritime networks centrally within the study of large-scale interaction in many past societies. Because these connections were deeply bound not only to environmental and technological factors but also to social, economic, and political processes, maritime network approaches represent simultaneously spatial and social phenomena. This chapter selectively surveys maritime network studies to identify the challenges and opportunities they present, from their dynamic environments to the archaeological datasets—moving objects, ports, ships—on which they are often based. A closer examination of Mediterranean seaborne interaction under the Roman Empire helps to reveal the potential of network thinking and analysis as well as productive areas for future development. Maritime network approaches can facilitate new historical inquiry into interaction with and across the seas and oceans that have been fundamental to the movements of people, goods, and ideas.
Constitutionalism
Authors: Wiener Antje
Published: November 2023

This chapter addresses constitutionalism as a concept used to explain and understand principles and terms of governance and especially constitutionalization beyond modern nation-states accounting for distinct intellectual traditions. It is argued that constitutionalism beyond the State including post-national and global constitutionalism gained traction against the background of the EU’s dynamics of constitution-building in the West and its massive enlargement towards the East. And against this background, distinct intellectual traditions contributed to establish innovative and novel interdisciplinary perspectives on the much more elusive concept of global constitutionalism. Following the introduction, the chapter then highlights the contested quality of constitutionalism as an approach with distinct intellectual traditions and political purposes. It goes on to recall scholarly moves towards common conceptual frames for research on constitutionalism beyond the State including global constitutionalism. The chapter then offers an outlook on the field of global constitutionalism as an agora for interdisciplinary and international debate about constitutional change.
Indonesian Strategic Resettlement and Development Policies in East Timor
Authors: Gerlach Christian
Published: November 2023

The chapter explores relationships between ‘development’ and violence, using the example of the Indonesian occupation of East Timor, 1975–1999. As a means of anti-guerrilla warfare, Indonesian forces forcibly resettled large parts of East Timor’s population to camps and villages, in combination with a policy of food denial, until the early 1980s. Many tens of thousands died as a result of this violent social engineering. At that time, such policies of starvation or of neglect in famine were no longer in use in other parts of Indonesia. But Indonesian authorities also applied to East Timor development policies pursued and structures used elsewhere in the country, bringing in tens of thousands of transmigrants from other islands, giving priority to food crops rather than cash crops, channelling considerable resources to this annexed region and improving living conditions in what remained a poor province. Many East Timorese came to work for the Indonesian state in one way or another. Relationships between ‘development’ and violence were thus close and complex. The chapter discusses how far these contradictory practices can be understood as colonial.
‘More an Inspiration than a Deterrent’? Capital Punishment and British Colonial Counter-Insurgency, c.1916–1973
Authors: Hynd Stacey
Published: November 2023

Capital punishment operated in the British Empire as the apogee of colonial law and punishment, but during counter-insurgency its role within the wider framework of colonial violence was more contested. This chapter provides the first comparative analysis of the role of the death penalty in British late-colonial counter-insurgency, focusing on the targeting and timing of the use of executions. It demonstrates how rather than just a legal sentence, capital punishment was an expressly political penalty whose use was shaped by shifting socio-political climates, military contexts, and legal frameworks. Both capital sentencing and executions themselves had multiple functions—gathering intelligence, deterrence, individual punishment, revenge—because the death penalty had multiple audiences: insurgents, colonized society, settlers and security forces, imperial authority, and public/international opinion. The chapter shows that whilst capital punishment was purported to be a targeted, legalistic assertion of the rule of law, it was in fact an emotional, irrational punishment and a sign of the weakness of colonial states rather than their strength. The shifting usage of capital punishment reveals the significance of the internationalization of anticolonial insurgencies, the growth of human rights discourses, and the vulnerability of British colonial rule to public and international opinion.
Gender, Mobilization, and Insurgency in South Africa
Authors: Bridger Emily
Published: November 2023

This chapter explores the mobilization and participation of young men and women in the 1980s township uprisings in South Africa—a period of unprecedented protest and political violence that preceded the country’s transition to democracy in 1994. Much of the existing research on the young ‘comrades’ who became the shock-troops of the country’s liberation struggle during these years focuses on boys and young men, taking males as the default agents of protest and political violence. This is something common to many studies of insurgency, which often take male experience as the norm in theorizing why people join rebel groups or participate in conflict. Drawing on oral history interviews with former young activists from South Africa, this chapter asks what motivated girls and young women in the country’s townships to make the unconventional decision to become a ‘comrade’. It argues that while both young men and women shared many grievances that drew them towards the liberation movement, and shared similar emotional benefits from their participation, both these push and pull factors were shaped by and experienced through young people’s gender. While young women did not generally join the struggle in the hopes of advancing gender equality, they nevertheless found that engaging in activism and violence provided them a means of challenging the gendered inequality and victimization they experienced as girls.
Sources, Methods, and the Violence of Insurgency in Northern Ireland
Authors: Caroline Kowalski Rachel
Published: November 2023

The study of violence perpetrated by non-state groups is a burgeoning field of research. Across the disciplines scholars debate the character and impact of political violence. This chapter will introduce the various research methods employed to examine the disparate actions of violent individuals or groups during contemporary and past insurgencies, civil wars, or terrorist campaigns. It will explore the debate that persists among researchers concerning methodological best practice, using the violence perpetrated by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) between 1969 and 1998 as a case study. Studies of every scale, scope, and methodological approach—qualitative and quantitative—have distinct strengths and merits; but they also have limitations. Studies that rely on a single research method or limited pool of evidence may, therefore, produce findings that are misleading without further qualification. This chapter argues that a mixed-method approach can potentially minimize the impact of the shortcomings of either qualitative or quantitative research. But the accuracy of claims based on academic research will always be subject to the quality of the sample of evidence selected and critical analysis that is employed to interrogate it. Accordingly, it is researchers’ awareness of and transparency regarding the specific limitations of their work that is of paramount importance.
Strategic Resettlement
Authors: Feichtinger Moritz
Published: November 2023

If Mao Zedong is right that a revolutionary needs to move among the civilian population like a fish in the water, removing the water will deprive the fish of its element. This simple and compelling logic was one of the reasons why forced resettlement of large parts of the rural population became integral to colonial counter-insurgency in the second half of the twentieth century. In some ways, this was nothing new: colonial troops had resorted to displacement and devastation of rural settlements to crush local resistance during colonial conquests since the eighteenth century. Paralleling repression, colonial powers attempted to civilize and modernize colonized societies. This combination of repression and reformist zeal gave birth to demarcated reservations for a displaced indigenous population, colonial model villages laid out along European blueprints and mission-led education and health programmes. The counter-revolutionary resettlement programmes of the second half of the twentieth century, however, eclipsed these predecessors, both in terms of the scale and scope of their transformative interventions and in terms of their lasting effects. During the years of decolonization and the Cold War, the politics of forced removal not only sought to curb anti-colonial uprisings, but to challenge them with veritable counter-revolutions. Late colonial relocation schemes were often embedded in ambitious plans to transform the economic system and social fabric of colonized societies. They were driven not only by the urgency of political unrest, but also by a technocratic belief in progress and social engineering prevalent in Western thinking during the 1950s and 1960s. In consequence, late colonial resettlement programs irreversibly altered settlement patterns, modes of production, social relations, and the cultures of affected societies.
Hanoi’s National Liberation Strategy, 1954–1975
Authors: Asselin Pierre
Published: November 2023

This chapter considers the strategies and tactics used by Vietnamese communist leaders to defeat the United States and its allies in the Vietnam War. It demonstrates that the guerrilla that has come to define the war in the West was in fact only one aspect of a highly sophisticated campaign to ‘liberate’ the Southern half of the country and bring about national reunification under communist aegis. To prevail in the contest with the Americans and the rival regime in Saigon, Hanoi waged a multifaceted war that rallied not only fighters but also partisans at home and abroad to support them materially and morally. In the final analysis, the United States lost the Vietnam War owing less to its own shortcomings than to the experience, resourcefulness, and ingenuity of its adversaries.
Fibril structures of TFG protein mutants validate the identification of TFG as a disease-related amyloid protein by the IMPAcT method
Authors: Rosenberg Gregory M , Abskharon Romany , Boyer David R , Ge Peng , Sawaya Michael R , Eisenberg David S
Published: November 2023

We previously presented a bioinformatic method for identifying diseases that arise from a mutation in a protein's low-complexity domain that drives the protein into pathogenic amyloid fibrils. One protein so identified was the tropomyosin-receptor kinase–fused gene protein (TRK-fused gene protein or TFG). Mutations in TFG are associated with degenerative neurological conditions. Here, we present experimental evidence that confirms our prediction that these conditions are amyloid-related. We find that the low-complexity domain of TFG containing the disease-related mutations G269V or P285L forms amyloid fibrils, and we determine their structures using cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM). These structures are unmistakably amyloid in nature and confirm the propensity of the mutant TFG low-complexity domain to form amyloid fibrils. Also, despite resulting from a pathogenic mutation, the fibril structures bear some similarities to other amyloid structures that are thought to be nonpathogenic and even functional, but there are other factors that support these structures' relevance to disease, including an increased propensity to form amyloid compared with the wild-type sequence, structure-stabilizing influence from the mutant residues themselves, and double-protofilament amyloid cores. Our findings elucidate two potentially disease-relevant structures of a previously unknown amyloid and also show how the structural features of pathogenic amyloid fibrils may not conform to the features commonly associated with pathogenicity.
Associations of gut microbiome richness and diversity with objective and subjective sleep measures in a population sample
Authors: Holzhausen Elizabeth A , Peppard Paul E , Sethi Ajay K , Safdar Nasia , Malecki Kristen C , Schultz Amy A , Deblois Courtney L , Hagen Erika W
Published: November 2023

Study Objectives

Alterations in gut microbiota composition have been associated with several conditions, and there is emerging evidence that sleep quantity and quality are associated with the composition of the gut microbiome. Therefore, this study aimed to assess the associations between several measures of sleep and the gut microbiome in a large, population-based sample.

Methods

Data were collected from participants in the Survey of the Health of Wisconsin from 2016 to 2017 (N = 720). Alpha diversity was estimated using Chao1 richness, Shannon’s diversity, and Inverse Simpson’s diversity. Beta diversity was estimated using Bray-Curtis dissimilarity. Models for each of the alpha-diversity outcomes were calculated using linear mixed effects models. Permutational multivariate analysis of variance tests were performed to test whether gut microbiome composition differed by sleep measures. Negative binomial models were used to assess whether sleep measures were associated with individual taxa relative abundance.

Results

Participants were a mean (SD) age of 55 (16) years and 58% were female. The sample was 83% non-Hispanic white, 10.6% non-Hispanic black, and 3.5% Hispanic. Greater actigraphy-measured night-to-night sleep duration variability, wake-after-sleep onset, lower sleep efficiency, and worse self-reported sleep quality were associated with lower microbiome richness and diversity. Sleep variables were associated with beta-diversity, including actigraphy-measured night-to-night sleep duration variability, sleep latency and efficiency, and self-reported sleep quality, sleep apnea, and napping. Relative abundance of several taxa was associated with night-to-night sleep duration variability, average sleep latency and sleep efficiency, and sleep quality.

Conclusions

This study suggests that sleep may be associated with the composition of the gut microbiome. These results contribute to the body of evidence that modifiable health habits can influence the human gut microbiome.
Hybrid effectiveness-implementation study of two novel spectrally engineered lighting interventions for shiftworkers on a high-security watchfloor
Authors: Bessman Sara C , Harrison Elizabeth M , Easterling Alexandra P , Snider Michelle N , Preilipper Sebastian M M , Glickman Gena L
Published: November 2023

Shiftwork leads to myriad negative health and safety outcomes. Lighting countermeasures can benefit shiftworkers via physiological effects of light (e.g. alerting, circadian adjustment), and short-wavelength light is the most potent for eliciting those responses; however, limited work indicates it may not be required for alerting. We developed similar-appearing light boxes (correlated color temperature: 3000–3375 K; photopic illuminance: 260–296 lux), enriched (SW+, melanopic EDI: 294 lux) or attenuated (SW-, melanopic EDI: 103 lux) in short-wavelength energy, and implemented them on a high-security watchfloor. Efficacy and feasibility of these two novel lighting interventions were assessed in personnel working 12-hour night shifts (n = 47) in this within-participants, crossover study. For each intervention condition, light boxes were arranged across the front of the watchfloor and illuminated the entire shift; blue-blocking glasses were worn post-shift and before sleep; and sleep masks were used while sleeping. Comparisons between baseline and intervention conditions included alertness, sleep, mood, quality of life (QOL), and implementation measures. On-shift alertness (Karolinska Sleepiness Scale) increased in SW- compared to baseline, while changes in SW+ were more limited. Under SW+, both mood and sleep improved. Psychomotor vigilance task performance did not vary by condition; however, perceived performance and QOL were higher, and reported caffeine consumption and sleep onset latency were lower, under SW-. For both interventions, satisfaction and comfort were high, and fewer symptoms and negative feelings were reported. The addition of spectrally engineered lights to this unique work environment improved sleep, alertness, and mood without compromising visual comfort and satisfaction. This paper is part of the Sleep and Circadian Rhythms: Management of Fatigue in Occupational Settings Collection.
From Subversion to Hard-Wiring Equity
Authors: Slemon Allie , Bungay Vicky , Varcoe Colleen , Blanchet Garneau Amélie
Published: November 2023

Nursing has articulated a shared commitment to equity in response to inequities in health and health care; however, understandings of how nurses enact equity are needed to uphold this professional mandate. This Foucauldian discourse analysis examined how nurses' equity-promoting practices are shaped by dominant discourses within the emergency department and illustrated that within this institutional context that constrained equity, nurses engaged in equity-promoting practices through subversion of discursive power. This study illustrates the need for embedding equity discourses within health care systems and ensuring meaningful supports for nurses in enacting equity-promoting practices within the emergency department setting.
circ_0006528 promotes nonsmall cell lung cancer progression by sponging miR-892a and regulating NRAS expression
Authors: Guo Weixi , Liu Hongming , Zhong Ming , Qi Qinghua , Li Yibin
Published: November 2023

Micro-RNAs play essential roles in developing and progressing nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and drug resistance. Nevertheless, the functions and mechanisms are partly explored. Therefore, the present study analyzes the effect of circ_0006528 and the mechanism of regulation of NSCLC cell progression by sponging miR-892a to regulate neuroblastoma rat sarcoma viral oncogene (NRAS) expression. Initially, circ_0006528 is identified using divergent primers-based PCR and RNase R exonuclease treatments. After administration of the designed circ_0006528-specific siRNA, the RT-qPCR analysis is used to determine the interference efficiency of siRNA. At the same time, cell growth, invasion, and migration are assessed by 3-[4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl]-2,5 diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT), Transwell, and scratch assays in the NSCLC cell lines (secretory pathway Ca2+-ATPase isoform 1 [SPCA-1] and A549) in vitro, respectively. Further, miR-892a inhibitor is added to the cells for functional recovery assay. Finally, the xenograft mouse model is constructed to explore the effect of circ_0006528 on tumor growth in vivo. The RT-qPCR analysis in 66 pairs of NSCLC cancer and noncancerous tissues revealed that circ_0006528 is highly expressed in NSCLC patient tissues. The RNase R experiments revealed that HSA_circ_0006528 is unaffected by RNase R exonuclease. MTT assay showed that knockdown of hsa_circ_0006528 by siRNA significantly decreased cell proliferation and viability in A549 and SPCA-1 cells. The luciferase reporter assay showed direct binding of hsa_circ_0006528 to miR-892a, and miR-892a targets binding NRAS. In addition, the miR-892a inhibitor terminated the hsa_circ_0006528 siRNA, triggering inhibition of proliferation, invasion, and migration of NSCLC cells. In summary, the study revealed that the knockout of hsa_circ_0006528 downregulation of NRAS expression by sponging miR-892a inhibited NSCLC cell growth and invasion.
Hydroa Vacciniforme Lymphoproliferative Disorder in a Young Spanish Woman: An Infrequent Case With Fatal Outcome
Authors: Garcia-Garcia Mar , Morales Moya Ana Luisa , Val Ignacio Sancho , Prieto-Torres Lucía
Published: November 2023

Hydroa vacciniforme (HV) lymphoproliferative disorder is a rare NK/T-cell lymphoma mainly affecting children and with a clinical resemblance to HV, which is mostly reported in Latin American and some Asian countries. Overall, the mature T cell and NK-cell neoplasms are now grouped into 9 families based on diverse concepts: cell of origin/differentiation state, clinical scenario, disease localization, and cytomorphology. HV lymphoproliferative disorder is listed within the group of Ebstein Barr Virus-positive T-cell and NK-cell lymphoid proliferations and lymphomas of childhood according to the fifth edition of the World Health Organization Classification of mature lymphoid neoplasms. We report the extraordinary case of a 22-year-old white woman, native of Spain, first presented in 2016 when she started suffering from recurrent facial edema. Four years later, the disease progressed with lymph node spreading and a fatal outcome. Here, we describe the clinical and histological presentation of the lymphoma throughout its evolution. Cases like this can be difficult to classify posing a real challenge to clinicians and pathologists. So, it is vital to be aware of the rare presentation of this disease to be able to identify the clinical and histological picture to make a correct diagnosis and establish an early treatment.