bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Impact of Tropical Cyclones on the Heat Budget of the South Pacific Ocean
Authors: Jullien S. , Menkes C. E. , Marchesiello P. , Jourdain N. C. , Lengaigne M. , Koch-Larrouy A. , Lefèvre J. , Vincent E. M. , Faure V.
Published: June 2012

The present study investigates the integrated ocean response to tropical cyclones (TCs) in the South Pacific convergence zone through a complete ocean heat budget. The TC impact analysis is based on the comparison between two long-term (1979–2003) oceanic simulations forced by a mesoscale atmospheric model solution in which extreme winds associated with cyclones are either maintained or filtered. The simulations provide a statistically robust experiment that fills a gap in the current modeling literature between coarse-resolution and short-term studies. The authors’ results show a significant thermal response of the ocean to at least 500-m depth, driven by competing mixing and upwelling mechanisms. As suggested in previous studies, vertical mixing largely explains surface cooling induced by TCs. However, TC-induced upwelling of deeper waters plays an unexpected role as it partly balances the warming of subsurface waters induced by vertical mixing. Below 100 m, vertical advection results in cooling that persists long after the storm passes and has a signature in the ocean climatology. The heat lost through TC-induced vertical advection is exported outside the cyclogenesis area with strong interannual variability. In addition, 60% of the heat input below the surface during the cyclone season is released back to the oceanic mixed layer through winter entrainment and then to the atmosphere. Therefore, seasonal modulation reduces the mean surface heat flux due to TCs to about 3 × 10−3 PW in this region exposed to 10%–15% of the world’s cyclones. The resulting climatological anomaly is a warming of about 0.1°C in the subsurface layer and cooling below the thermocline (less than 0.1°C).
Quantification of Cloud Microphysical Parameterization Uncertainty Using Radar Reflectivity
Authors: van Lier-Walqui Marcus , Vukicevic Tomislava , Posselt Derek J.
Published: June 2012

Uncertainty in cloud microphysical parameterization—a leading order contribution to numerical weather prediction error—is estimated using a Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm. An inversion is performed on 10 microphysical parameters using radar reflectivity observations with vertically covarying error as the likelihood constraint. An idealized 1D atmospheric column model with prescribed forcing is used to simulate the microphysical behavior of a midlatitude squall line. Novel diagnostics are employed for the probabilistic investigation of individual microphysical process behavior vis-à-vis parameter uncertainty. Uncertainty in the microphysical parameterization is presented via posterior probability density functions (PDFs) of parameters, observations, and microphysical processes. The results of this study show that radar reflectivity observations, as expected, provide a much stronger constraint on microphysical parameters than column-integral observations, in most cases reducing both the variance and bias in the maximum likelihood estimate of parameter values. This highlights the enhanced potential of radar reflectivity observations to provide information about microphysical processes within convective storm systems despite the presence of strongly nonlinear relationships within the microphysics model. The probabilistic analysis of parameterization uncertainty in terms of both parameter and process activity PDFs suggest the prospect of a stochastic representation of microphysical parameterization uncertainty—specifically the results indicate that error may be more easily represented and estimated by microphysical process uncertainty rather than microphysical parameter uncertainty. In addition, these new methods of analysis allow for a detailed investigation of the full nonlinear and multivariate relationships between microphysical parameters, microphysical processes, and radar observations.
Impact of Geographic-Dependent Parameter Optimization on Climate Estimation and Prediction: Simulation with an Intermediate Coupled Model
Authors: Wu Xinrong , Zhang Shaoqing , Liu Zhengyu , Rosati Anthony , Delworth Thomas L. , Liu Yun
Published: June 2012

Because of the geographic dependence of model sensitivities and observing systems, allowing optimized parameter values to vary geographically may significantly enhance the signal in parameter estimation. Using an intermediate atmosphere–ocean–land coupled model, the impact of geographic dependence of model sensitivities on parameter optimization is explored within a twin-experiment framework. The coupled model consists of a 1-layer global barotropic atmosphere model, a 1.5-layer baroclinic ocean including a slab mixed layer with simulated upwelling by a streamfunction equation, and a simple land model. The assimilation model is biased by erroneously setting the values of all model parameters. The four most sensitive parameters identified by sensitivity studies are used to perform traditional single-value parameter estimation and new geographic-dependent parameter optimization. Results show that the new parameter optimization significantly improves the quality of state estimates compared to the traditional scheme, with reductions of root-mean-square errors as 41%, 23%, 62%, and 59% for the atmospheric streamfunction, the oceanic streamfunction, sea surface temperature, and land surface temperature, respectively. Consistently, the new parameter optimization greatly improves the model predictability as a result of the improvement of initial conditions and the enhancement of observational signals in optimized parameters. These results suggest that the proposed geographic-dependent parameter optimization scheme may provide a new perspective when a coupled general circulation model is used for climate estimation and prediction.
The Impact of Low Clouds on Surface Shortwave Radiation in the ECMWF Model
Authors: Ahlgrimm Maike , Forbes Richard
Published: June 2012

The long-term measurement records from the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement site on the Southern Great Plains show evidence of a bias in the ECMWF model’s surface irradiance. Based on previous studies, which have suggested that summertime shallow clouds may contribute to the bias, an evaluation of 146 days with observed nonprecipitating fair-weather cumulus clouds is performed. In-cloud liquid water path and effective radius are both overestimated in the model with liquid water path dominating to produce clouds that are too reflective. These are compensated by occasional cloud-free days in the model such that the fair-weather cumulus regime overall does not contribute significantly to the multiyear daytime mean surface irradiance bias of 23 W m−2. To further explore the origin of the bias, observed and modeled cloud fraction profiles over 6 years are classified and sorted based on the surface irradiance bias associated with each sample pair. Overcast low cloud conditions during the spring and fall seasons are identified as a major contributor. For samples with low cloud present in both observations and model, opposing surface irradiance biases are found for overcast and broken cloud cover conditions. A reduction of cloud liquid to a third for broken low clouds and an increase by a factor of 1.5 in overcast situations improves agreement with the observed liquid water path distribution. This approach of combining the model shortwave bias with a cloud classification helps to identify compensating errors in the model, providing guidance for a targeted improvement of cloud parameterizations.
Down and Out in Atlantic City
Authors: Avery Jacob
Published: June 2012

This article draws on ethnographic fieldwork and interviews to provide a sociological life history of a man the author calls George. George lived on Atlantic City’s streets between 1995 and 2009. Instead of accessing available social services, George stayed outside year-round, even during the cold winter months. He obtained small amounts of money by begging for spare change and slept in alleyways, casino bus terminals, underneath the Boardwalk, and behind garbage dumpsters until his death. George’s story reveals how someone who likely would have been committed during the era depicted in Goffman’s Asylums (1961) had viable alternatives to confinement within an institution. This article has two aims. First, it adds empirical depth to literature on working-age, unhoused men disconnected from formal labor markets and social service systems. A second, more analytical aim is to extend our thinking about Goffman’s concept of moral career.
Reflections of Self from Missing Things
Authors: Berry Brandon
Published: June 2012

When people fail to locate a personal belonging, it often evokes disturbing reflections of self that they will seek to overcome. While ethnomethodology once manufactured breaches in the taken-for-granted order to reveal the implicit rules of social life, this article explores how people try to recover from such breaches occurring naturally in their material environment. Drawing on a database of about five hundred cases of naturally occurring losses collected through several ethnographic techniques, this article demonstrates how people get back to life as usual through four unique paths. Through each, individuals resolve or avoid the disturbances caused when their taken-for-granted sense of what objects are immediately available to them breaks down.
Suspending Narrative Engagements
Authors: DeLand Michael F.
Published: June 2012

This article explores the way social actors organize their engagements in real time. The term “narrative” points to the subjectively understood practical projects that people structure with beginnings, middles, and ends. All projects may be interrupted, and if social actors are to continue the narrative engagement they must treat the stoppage as a mere suspension. The work of suspending a game of informal pick-up basketball is examined in three phases: interrupting the game, treating the game as suspended, and resuming play. In each phase, players collectively resist the possibility of abandonment as an alternative to game resumption. While narrative structuring is a powerful locus of meaning across diverse social contexts, informal basketball games offer a particularly good setting for the study of narrative organization in social life.
Bonds of Brotherhood
Authors: Jackson Brandon A.
Published: June 2012

This article draws on two years of observation to analyze the ways in which a group of black men promoted, ritualized, enforced, and enacted brotherhood on a predominantly white campus. These men utilized the concept of brotherhood to unite those who shared a marginalized status. The notion of brotherhood enabled the men to express their emotions, violating some of the dominant cultural tenets of manhood. Although black men face many obstacles in white-dominated middle-class social worlds, these men did not passively accept those troubles; they came together and collectively created a brotherhood to help them survive and succeed.
“Influx”
Authors: McCall Betty L.
Published: June 2012

As a direct result of the 1995 welfare reform legislation, some metropolitan areas relocated women on their welfare rolls through a process called “Greyhound therapy.” Many of these women ended up in rural areas that were not only unprepared to meet their specific needs but also not receptive to their presence. This article tells the story of these women, who were moved almost two hundred miles from a large Pennsylvania city to a small town in a rural region.
“Litterers”
Authors: Murphy Alexandra K.
Published: June 2012

How do people get constructed as “litterers” through objects of litter on the ground? Middle- and working-class white and black homeowners of the suburb under ethnographic study believe that litter is a significant problem in their community. Despite rarely seeing anyone actually litter, they develop folk theories that blame this problem on black, poor renters moving into the suburb. This article documents the structural features that sustain litter accumulation across different spaces. It then examines how longtime residents interpret these patterns and use their own behavior toward litter (picking it up) to claim a moral status for themselves as community insiders while constructing those they perceive as outsiders as disreputable litterers. The author considers the relationship between physical and social disorder as they construe it and the consequences of this process for theories of ecological contamination and the reinforcement of racial and class distinctions.
Social Issues in Management Division Dissertation Award Competition for 2011
Authors: Parboteeah K. Praveen
Published: June 2012

This dissertation forum continues the tradition started last year by Business & Society to recognize and recognize the achievements of the finalists of the Academy of Management’s Social Issues in Management (SIM) Division dissertation award. The dissertation forum includes an introductory essay by the chair of the committee. The essay details the procedure behind choosing a winner as well as reflection on the process. The special dissertation forum also includes the three dissertation abstracts by the finalists. The forum includes a description of each of the finalists as well as a critical evaluation of the works. Similar to last year, each finalist was also asked to provide some insights into “for producing exemplary dissertation research.” These insights are also documented at the end of each abstract.
From Heroes to Organizers
Authors: Ishimaru Ann
Published: June 2012

Purpose: Educational leadership is key to addressing the persistent inequities in low-income urban schools, but most principals struggle to work with parents and communities around those schools to create socially just learning environments. This article describes the conditions and experiences that enabled principals to share leadership with teachers and low-income Latino parents to improve student learning. Methods: This study used interviews, observations, and documents to examine the perceptions and experiences of the principals of three small autonomous schools initiated by a community organizing group in California. Data analysis was conducted in iterative phases using shared leadership, social capital, and role theories as lenses to identify themes, triangulate across data sources, and examine alternative hypotheses. Findings: Findings illuminate how a design team process initiated principals into a model of shared leadership with teachers and empowered parents that focused on deep relationships and capacity building. Principals enacted this model of the “principal as organizer” in the newly-opened schools, but they struggled to navigate conflicting leadership role expectations from district administration. Implications: Organizing approaches to education reform can cultivate shared leadership in principals and the capacity to partner with empowered, low-income Latino parents. District expectations and principals’ broader social networks may be critical in navigating and sustaining such leadership. Further research on districts that collaborate with community organizing groups may provide promising insights into the development of a new generation of educational leaders.
Sonication effect on the mechanical properties of MWCNTs reinforced natural rubber
Authors: Tarawneh Mou'ad A , Ahmad Sahrim Hj , EhNoum SeYong , Lau Kin-tak
Published: June 2012

This study investigated the sonication effect on the mechanical properties of thermoplastic natural rubber (TPNR) nanocomposites reinforced by multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs). The TPNR nanocomposites were prepared using the melt blending method from polypropylene, natural rubber and liquid natural rubber as a compatibilizer, respectively, with 1% of MWCNTs. The results showed that a good dispersion on nanotubes was achieved by sonication. An optimal sonication time of 1 h was found to produce nanocomposites with maximum tensile and impact strength. The Young’s modulus, tensile strength, elongation at break and impact strength increased by almost 11%, 21%, 43% and 50%, respectively as compared with a pristine TPNR sample. The effect of sonication was also confirmed by dynamic mechanical analysis, it showed that the storage modulus E′, loss modulus E″ and glass transition temperature ( Tg) also increased for all MWCNTs reinforced samples. Scanning electron micrographs confirm the effect of good dispersion of MWCNTs and their interfacial bonding in TPNR after sonication.
Dynamic mechanical analysis and topological studies of phenoxy reinforced with modified red mud waste nanofiller based composites
Authors: Bhat AH , Khalil HPS Abdul , Varshney S , Banthia AK
Published: June 2012

Roughness on pristine and aged or polymer composite surfaces is of enormous practical importance for polymer applications. This study is about the comparison of the response of a red mud based composite material to an oscillatory deformation (here in tension–torsion mode) as a function of temperature. This study deals with the use of varying quantity of modified red mud as a nanofiller in a poly(hydroxy ether) of bisphenol A (Phe) based matrix. Poly(hydroxy ether of bisphenol A) (Phe) based polymer nanocomposites reinforced with a layered red mud with acidic and organic modifications were prepared by conventional solvent casting technique. The best dispersion occurred in the polymer nanocomposites where the interactions between the functional groups of the polymer matrix and those of the organic substitution of the red mud appeared to be the highest. The oscillatory response was characterized by dynamic mechanical analysis. The roughness and interfacial adhesion in the as synthesized composite materials was analyzed by atomic force microscopy. The dispersion and particle size of the filler materials in composite materials was studied by transmission electron microscopy.
Carbon nanotube–metal oxide composite electrodes for secondary lithium-based batteries
Authors: Marschilok Amy C , Schaffer Corey P , Takeuchi Kenneth J , Takeuchi Esther S
Published: June 2012

Preparation and electrochemical evaluation of battery cathodes made from carbon nanotube substrates and lithium trivanadate (LiV3O8) are reported in this study. Our carbon nanotube substrate–LiV3O8 (CNT-SI) cathodes displayed good rate capability (>140 mAh/g on 1 C discharge) and improved capacity retention (>280 mAh/g after 30 cycles at C/20) when utilized in lithium-based batteries. The use of the CNT-SI composite where the electrodes are comprised of a carbon nanotube substrate and active material with no addition of binder, additional carbon additives, and without a foil backing provides the opportunity for a 25% increase in the percentage of active mass and a 36% reduction in the total electrode mass. These benefits demonstrate that considering electrode configuration as well as active material is a key strategic approach to enhance battery energy density.
Prediction of failure envelopes and stress–strain curves of fiber composite laminates under triaxial loads
Authors: Ye Jianqiao , Zhang Daxu
Published: June 2012

This article presents a methodology for predicting the stress–strain response and failure behavior of fiber composite laminates. First, a stress transfer method is proposed by using the concept of the state space equation. The generalized plane strain deformation is assumed in the model. The state space equation was derived by using Fourier series expansions in the width direction and the layer refinement technique through the thickness. Secondly, Christensen’s stress-based failure criteria are adopted to predict failure of individual plies. Finally, the applications of the methodology are shown by predicting the failure envelopes and stress–strain curves of the test cases provided by the organizers of the Second World-Wide Failure Exercise (WWFE-II).
‘In the Goofy parking lot’: growth churches as a novel religious form for late capitalism
Authors: Maddox Marion
Published: June 2012

Literature on megachurches (Protestant churches with attendance over 2000) concentrates on numbers at the expense of an associated, but more instructive, characteristic: an overriding commitment to growth. Churches of any size can adopt a growth-oriented theology, style and organisational structure. In such churches, the growth imperative is likely to apply not only to congregational membership but also to church buildings and collection receipts; to the television ministry and other forms of outreach; to the pastor’s book and CD sales; and to individual members’ businesses, incomes, houses and possessions. In each dimension of religious life, at both individual and corporate level, the gospel of growth demarcates a novel Christian form, attuned to the ethos of late capitalism.
Perverting Progress? The Challenges of Implementing both Fiscal and Social Responsibility in São Paulo (1995–2010)
Authors: Carolini Gabriella Y.
Published: June 2012

The turn of the 21st century saw two important pieces of legislation introduced in Brazil: the Law of Fiscal Responsibility or LFR (2000) and the City Statute (2001). While each law has been celebrated, this article argues that a perversion of their intentions is emerging in practice. The scale and scope of municipal budget composition and allocations in the period studied (1995–2010) give reason to question how these landmark laws are being locally interpreted. Evidence details a disproportionate rise in current expenditures in all state capitals in Brazil since the introduction of the LFR. Further, among state capitals with the largest number of ‘sub-normal agglomerations’, a few key cities show a peculiarly stagnant proportion of expenditures directed towards housing and urbanisation. A case study of São Paulo is presented to explore explanations for these trends and understand what they mean for the direction and control over upgrading investments in that city.
The Social Network
Authors: Oliver Vanessa , Cheff Rebecca
Published: June 2012

This article looks at the means through which homeless young women are able to improve their flow of social capital by attaining a sense of belonging and forming positive attachments to supportive people and places. In so doing, they also develop relationships with health and social services and improve their overall physical and mental health through stable and supportive interactions. In working with homeless youth, however, the very concept of social capital must be adapted to appropriately respond both to their unique social needs and to the less traditional means by which they are able to attain it. Here, the authors explore the ways in which homeless young women are forming attachments and thereby accruing social capital outside of the nuclear family unit: through extended family, service providers, peers, and online social networks.
Whatever Is Willed Will Be
Authors: Helzer Erik G. , Gilovich Thomas
Published: June 2012

Why do people neglect or underweight their past failures when thinking about their prospects of future success? One reason may be that people think of the past and future as guided by different causal forces. In seven studies, the authors demonstrate that people hold asymmetric beliefs about the impact of an individual’s will on past versus future events. People consider the will to be a more potent determinant of future events than events that happened in the past. This asymmetry holds between- and within-subjects, and generalizes beyond undergraduate populations. The authors contend that this asymmetry contributes to the tendency for people to remain confident about their future performance in domains in which they have largely failed in the past. This research thus contributes to a growing body of literature exploring how thoughts about events in the past differ from thoughts about the same events set in the future.
A new method to compose long unknown Chinese keywords
Authors: Liu Yu-Chin , Lin Chun-Wei
Published: June 2012

There is now a huge amount of electronic documents stored on the internet. In order to retrieve information from this data, each document is commonly represented as a set of keywords, and then all documents are analysed based on the set of discriminative words. In information retrieval the recognition of words in articles is an essential step; however, unlike English, Chinese words are not distinguished by spaces. Therefore, many approaches have been devised to parse Chinese words. The dictionary-based approach is commonly used in most current systems for text segmentation. However, general purpose dictionaries are not always able to provide proper references to accurately parse the domain-specific words, especially with unknown words. This paper aims to propose a new method for classifying longer keywords from Chinese documents by incorporating previously unknown keywords into a keyword list without the effort of building domain-specific dictionaries. Our method first utilizes the parsed words from existing parsers and filters the keywords utilizing term frequency–inverse document frequency (TF-IDF) values; further, based on the parsed words and keywords, a T tree is used to store the candidates for composing unknown words. The candidates are evaluated by an unknown word (UW) coefficient threshold, i.e. newly composed words are deemed as newly discovered unknown words if their UW coefficient is higher than a pre-defined threshold. Finally, the parsed words and newly composed words are re-filtered to form long keywords. The results of several experiments comparing the results with Google and Yahoo show that, regardless of recall rates, precision rates and F-measures, our proposed method significantly outperforms other methods.
The politics of nativism
Authors: Casanova José
Published: June 2012

The politics of nativism directed at Catholic immigrants in 19th-century America offer a fruitful comparative perspective through which to analyze the discourse and the politics of Islam in contemporary Europe. Anti-Catholic nativism constituted a peculiar North American version of the larger and more generalized phenomenon of anti-immigrant populist xenophobic politics which one finds in many countries and in different historical contexts. What is usually designated as Islamo-phobia in contemporary Europe, however, manifests striking resemblances with the original phenomenon of American nativism that emerged in the middle of the 19th century in the United States. In both cases one finds the fusion of anti-immigrant xenophobic attitudes, perennial inter-religious prejudices, and an ideological construct setting a particular religious-civilizational complex in essential opposition to Western modernity. Although an anti-Muslim discourse emerged also in the United States after 11 September, it had primarily a geo-political dimension connected with the ‘war on terror’ and with American global imperial policies. But it lacked the domestic anti-immigrant populist as well as the modern secularist anti-Muslim dimensions. This explains why xenophobic anti-Muslim nativism has been much weaker in the United States than in Europe.
The resistance of those who desire not to be ruled
Authors: Howard Dick
Published: June 2012

There are many recent historical analogies to the events that began in Tunisia and have spread across the Arab world and beyond. I consider them, and then propose a ‘Machiavellian’ reading, going back to the Florentine’s observation that humankind is made up of those who want to rule and those who desire not to be ruled. I then suggest, by means of an allusion to my recent book, The Primacy of the Political: A History of Political Thought from the Greeks to the French and American Revolutions, that the distinction between politics and anti-politics is crucial for the analysis of the next stages of these revolutions. Finally, with reference to Hannah Arendt’s considerations of civil disobedience, I suggest a means of interpreting the possibilities that are on the horizon.
Rethinking the ‘Kurdish question’ in Turkey
Authors: Keyman E. Fuat
Published: June 2012

It is not possible to make Turkish modernity multicultural, Turkish democracy consolidated, Turkish economy sustainable, Turkish society a society of living together, and Turkish foreign policy proactive, multidimensional, and effective, without resolving the Kurdish question. In this article I will suggest that the democratic solution to the Kurdish question lies in (a) a critical analysis of state-centric Turkish modernity and its recent crisis, as the Kurdish identity has always been constructed as the Other of Turkish national identity; and (b) an attempt aiming at a democratic reconstruction of the political in Turkey, which sees a multicultural and differentiated understanding of constitutional citizenship as a constitutive norm of ‘living together in diversity’. By doing so, it would be possible to seek a feasible and effective solution to the Kurdish question not in ‘ethnic terms’ but by exploring possible ways of ‘articulating identity-claims to citizenship rights with an emphasis on the practice of democracy’.
Introduction
Authors: Ferrara Alessandro
Published: June 2012

After focusing on the understanding and the prospect of post-secular society (2008), probing the fruitfulness of expanding multiculturalism into multicultural jurisdictions (2009) and investigating a possible realignment of major liberal notions (2010), in 2011 the so-called ‘trap of resentment’ has been at the center of the İstanbul Seminars. The three sections of this special issue – which collects together the contributions discussed in İstanbul between 19 to 24 May 2011 – are devoted to various facets of the task of inverting the trend and setting a virtuous circle of understanding and trust across cultural and religious divides: (a) identifying the sources and consequences of xenophobic and anti-Moslem resentment as well as the possible remedies (Abdullahi A. An-Nacim, Claus Offe, Rajeev Bhargava, Stefano Allievi, Volker Kaul, Ayan Kaya); (b) rethinking and redesigning the received models for the peaceful coexistence of diversity (Charles Taylor, Anthony Appiah, Alessandro Ferrara, Beate Roessler, David Rasmussen, Fuat Keyman); and (c) tracing and assessing the emerging patterns of the political transformation of Islam (Akeel Bilgrami, José Casanova, Fred Dallmayr, Zaid Eyadat, Dick Howard, Nouzha Guessous).
Reactive identities and Islamophobia
Authors: Allievi Stefano
Published: June 2012

The presence of increasing percentages of immigrants in the European social landscape is not only a quantitative fact, with consequences on several social and cultural dynamics and indicators. It produces an important qualitative change. From being a pathology, plurality is becoming physiology. Religion is a key factor in this process. There is a synchronic pluralization going on: the level of pluralization of the religious and cultural offer is increasing, making society a kaleidoscope of cultures, whose pieces are in constant movement. Islam – and in particular Islam in Europe – is often considered the most problematic and ‘problematized’ expression of this process. It is what we could call exceptionalism: the tendency to see Islam and Muslims as an exceptional rather than standard case. Even the mediatic perception of Islam in conflictual terms can be considered a form of exceptionalism and conflict a specific way of understanding Islam. Islamophobia is part of this phenomenon. Exceptionalism explains why Islam has become a discursive substitute of the main transformation, which is the much higher degree of cultural and religious pluralization of European societies.
Islam and the West
Authors: Bilgrami Akeel
Published: June 2012

This short essay analyzes the deception and self-deception in talk of ‘the clash of civilizations’ and proceeds to diagnose what is wrong in the standard understanding of Islam in the Western media today by looking to the abiding history of colonial relations with Islam down to this day and also looking to the relation between ideals of democracy and the formation of religious identities. The essay closes with some remarks about the nature of identity and the importance to one's own agency of the distinction between the first and the third person point of view in Muslim self-understanding.
Functional and Symptom Impacts of Pediatric Head and Neck Lymphatic Malformations
Authors: Balakrishnan Karthik , Edwards Todd C. , Perkins Jonathan A.
Published: June 2012

Objective

Lymphatic malformations cause significant symptoms and functional deficits. Patients seek care for functional and symptomatic effects of their disease, but current disease burden and treatment outcome measures focus primarily on anatomy and histopathology. The authors describe disease impacts reported by patients and parents as a step toward more comprehensive disease burden assessments.

Study Design

Cross‐sectional.

Setting

Children’s hospital vascular anomaly clinic.

Subjects and Methods

Participants were recruited through a pediatric vascular anomaly clinic. A panel of senior pediatric otolaryngologists and an outcomes scientist developed interview questions based on clinical and research experience and available literature. The outcomes scientist conducted parent and adolescent interviews. The panel reviewed responses to define relevant items within functional domains. Participants rated impact on daily life for each domain.

Results

Thirty‐one participants represented all 5 de Serres stages (mean [SD] age, 9 [6] years; n = 11 adolescents and 20 parents). Adolescents reported frequent sickness as the domain with greatest impact. Sleep was more affected in adolescents with higher stage lesions. Parents of younger children reported greatest impact on breastfeeding. For adolescents, lesion stage predicted perceived social stigma (controlling for age), whereas increasing age was associated with greater impact from swelling (controlling for stage). For parents, stage predicted breastfeeding impact (controlling for stage).

Conclusion

This is the first detailed assessment of patient‐ and parent‐reported functional and symptomatic impacts of head and neck lymphatic malformations. Both adolescent patients and parents of younger children reported significant symptom and functional effects of this disease.
Instant messaging social networks
Authors: Mesch Gustavo S. , Talmud Ilan , Quan-Haase Anabel
Published: June 2012

Most research on social media tends to focus on individual or group-level characteristics, neglecting to consider the influence of relational and cultural variables. To fill this void, we collected social network data in Israel ( N = 492) and Canada ( N = 293) to investigate the effect of individual, relational, and cultural variables on the frequency of communication via instant messaging (IM) and the multiplexity of communication topics. We found that geographic distance continues to matter in interpersonal contact in spite of heavy reliance on digital tools for connectivity. Similar patterns of association were discerned in both countries for propinquity, the use of IM, and closeness. We discuss the findings in terms of theories of networked individualism.
Antidepressant-like effect of creatine in mice involves dopaminergic activation
Authors: Cunha Mauricio P , Machado Daniele G , Capra Juliano C , Jacinto Jardel , Bettio Luis EB , Rodrigues Ana Lúcia S
Published: June 2012

Creatine has been shown to play a significant role in health and disease. However, studies concerning its effect on mood are scarce. This study investigated the effect of creatine (p.o.) in the tail suspension test, a predictive test of antidepressant activity. Creatine reduced the immobility time in the tail suspension test (0.1–1000 mg/kg, male and female mice), without affecting locomotor activity. Furthermore, the involvement of the dopaminergic system in creatine-induced antidepressant-like effect in male mice in the tail suspension test was investigated. The anti-immobility effect of creatine (1 mg/kg) was prevented by the pre-treatment of mice with haloperidol (0.2 mg/kg, intraperitoneal (i.p.) route, non-selective dopamine receptor antagonist), ( R)-(+)-7-chloro-8-hydroxy-3-methyl-1-phenyl-2,3,4,5-tetrahydro-1H-3-benzazepine hydrochloride (SCH23390; 0.05 mg/kg, subcutaneous (s.c.) route, dopamine D1 receptor antagonist) and sulpiride (50 mg/kg, i.p., dopamine D2 receptor antagonist). Creatine (0.01 mg/kg, sub-effective dose) in combination with sub-effective doses of (1-phenyl-7,8-dihydroxy-2,3,4,5-tetrahydro-1H-3-benzazepine) hydrochloride (SKF38393; 0.1 mg/kg, s.c., dopamine D1 receptor agonist), apomorphine (0.5 µg/kg, i.p., preferential dopamine D2 receptor agonist) or bupropion (1 mg/kg, p.o., dopamine reuptake inhibitor with subtle activity on noradrenergic reuptake) reduced the immobility time in the tail suspension test as compared with either drug alone. These results indicate that the antidepressant-like effect of creatine is likely mediated by an activation of dopamine D1 and D2 receptors.
Expression of Ki67, BCL-2, and COX-2 in Canine Cutaneous Mast Cell Tumors
Authors: Vascellari M. , Giantin M. , Capello K. , Carminato A. , Morello E. M. , Vercelli A. , Granato A. , Buracco P. , Dacasto M. , Mutinelli F.
Published: June 2012

The expression of Ki67, BCL-2, and COX-2 was investigated in 53 canine cutaneous mast cell tumors (MCTs) by immunohistochemistry and quantitative real time polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) to evaluate their prognostic significance and the association with the histologic grading and the mitotic index (MI). MCTs were graded according to the Patnaik grading system and the novel 2-tier grading system proposed by Kiupel. The numbers of mitotic figures/10 high-power fields (MI) were counted. Both grading systems were significantly associated with prognosis. The Patnaik grading was of limited prognostic value for grade 2 MCTs, with 23% being associated with mortality. The concordance among pathologists was strongly improved by the application of the 2-tier grading system, and 71% of high-grade MCTs were associated with a high mortality rate. MI and Ki67 protein expression were significantly associated with grading and survival. No significant association between BCL-2 protein expression and either grading system or health status was observed. BCL-2 mRNA expression was significantly higher in grade 2 than in grade 1 MCTs, while no statistically significant differences were detected between low- and high-grade MCTs. The increased BCL-2 mRNA level was significantly associated with increased mortality rate. The COX-2 protein expression was detected in 78% of the MCTs investigated. However, neither association with the tumor grade nor with the health status was observed. COX-2 mRNA was significantly up-regulated in MCTs compared to surgical margins and control skin tissue, but it was neither associated with tumor grade nor with survival.
Laws and tendencies in Marxist political economy
Authors: Fleetwood Steve
Published: June 2012

Whilst terms like ‘law of the tendency’, ‘tendency law’ and ‘tendential law’ appear in Marxist political economy, they are unclear. This paper identifies the main conceptions of laws and tendencies and disambiguates them. Part 1 differentiates between law as (i) event regularity; (ii) event regularity/tendency; and (iii) tendency. Part 2 focuses on (ii) identifying five interpretations: tendency as a trend, cyclical variation, stochastically specified law, counterfactual event and a deliberately imprecise concept. Part 3 introduces tendency as the (transfactual) way of acting of a thing with properties. Part 4 explains why this conception of tendency is impossible to mathematise.
Adjusting ‘our notions of the nature of the State’: A political reading of Ireland’s child protection crisis
Authors: Garrett Paul Michael
Published: June 2012

The Republic of Ireland was the first country in the eurozone to adopt a neoliberal infused ‘austerity budget’, and the ill-judged state bailing out of a number of reckless banks and associated financial institutions is costing billions of euros. In late 2010, as the crisis deepened, the International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank provided a ‘bailout’ package that resulted in further punitive public spending cuts and the eradication of national sovereignty. This paper maintains that the present crisis is more than a mere economic crisis, but can be viewed as a series of interlinked ‘conjunctures’. Tracing the connection between the historical and the contemporary, the first part of the discussion will explore six thematic components relating to the structuring of the Irish state. These are identified as: a ‘class rule state’; an ‘authoritarian state’; a ‘confining state’; a ‘censoring state’; a ‘discriminatory state’; and a ‘state within the state’. These six dimensions provide a contextual underpinning for the second part of the paper, which focuses on the crisis in child welfare and child protection services and dwells on the shambolic performance of the Health Service Executive (HSE), deficits in the ‘care’ system and the HSE failure to furnish reliable data on the deaths of children in contact with social workers.
‘Personalised conditionality’: Observations on active proletarianisation in late modern Britain
Authors: Grover Chris
Published: June 2012

This paper examines the development of the idea ‘personalised conditionality’ in social security policy in Britain through the report, Realising Potential, commissioned by the last of the 1997-2010 Labour governments and the documents and policies of the coalition government formed after the 2010 general election. Using the idea of active proletarianisation from Offe (1984), the paper argues that ‘personalised conditionality’ is part of a long and ignoble policy tradition that has criminalised workless people and held them responsible for their lack of work as a means of discouraging worklessness and forms of subsistence outside of paid work. The tensions in such a policy are discussed and it is concluded that the consequence of ‘personalised conditionality’ may be to detach increasing numbers of people from labour markets, rather than active proletarianisation.
A General Motors works council’s response to the capitalist global financial crisis: A case study from Germany
Authors: Klikauer Thomas
Published: June 2012

The 2008-2009 global financial crisis (GFC) has negatively impacted on banks, financial institutions and companies such as General Motors (GM), bringing the latter’s European subsidiary close to insolvency and highlighting some of the US car manufacturer’s long-term problems, which were solved through a partial takeover by the US government. In Germany, GM’s strongest presence in Europe, the company had a close encounter with bankruptcy in the spring of 2009, narrowly averted when the sale of GM’s Opel subsidiary (GMO) was actively sought. This paper is about the conflict between one company’s management and one works council, in one location. The empirical field research focuses exclusively on the position of GMO’s works council, reporting its views and perspectives on GMO’s management and the GFC. On this basis, two arguments are presented: first, that the relevance of GMO’s works council was reflective of a version of capitalism that has been associated with the model of a ‘coordinated market economy’ (CME) rather than an Anglo-Saxon model of a ‘liberal market economy’ (LME); and second, that despite the eventual cancellation of the sale of GMO by GM-USA (2010), the case highlights how key labour actors coordinated their activities in order to prevent GMO’s bankruptcy.
‘Plan B’: A new Alternative Economic Strategy?
Authors: Radice Hugo
Published: June 2012

Plan B: A Good Economy for a Good Society was published by the centre-left pressure group Compass in October 2011 as an alternative to the UK coalition government’s austerity policies. In addition to short-term policies for restoring jobs and growth, Plan B offers longer-term policy proposals on finance, taxation, industrial renewal, welfare, work and environmental sustainability. The programme is reviewed in the light of Labour’s 1970s Alternative Economic Strategy, and it is argued that it needs to look more at international initiatives, incorporate the trade unions, and address the decline in popular engagement in party politics.
The Relationship Between Import Penetration and Operation of the U.S. Textile and Apparel Industries From 2002 to 2008
Authors: Lu Sheng , Dickerson Kitty
Published: June 2012

The U.S. textile and apparel (T&A) industries have respectively adopted various restructuring strategies in recent years which fundamentally changed the way the two industries operate and the shifting relationship of each sector with imports. This study empirically tests the relationship between import penetration and the operation of the U.S. T&A industries based on data at 4-digit North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code level from 2002-2008. Results from the panel data model show that overall the U.S. textile industry formed a weak cooperative relationship with import penetration level in the U.S. market and a neutral relationship was suggested for the U.S. apparel industry with imports. These findings contribute to understanding the global nature of today's U.S. T&A industries and suggest useful perspectives for the U.S. textile trade policies.
Success against All Odds?
Authors: Kureková Lucia
Published: June 2012

This article investigates the development over time of the automotive and textile industries post-1989 in four Central European countries in order to identify the key reasons behind sectoral growth or decline. The analysis demonstrates a divergent pattern of sectoral development, one that is in contrast to the perceived initial endowments of the countries and the structural positions of the sectors at the outset of the transition. Comparing the two sectors and individual success stories within them against a broader background of sectoral success and failure allows us to understand and isolate factors that lie behind the high status of the automotive sector by not only regional but also international standards. The article identifies three crucial factors that can be attributed to these outcomes: presence of foreign capital in the sector, active government support, and cooperative strategies among the firms in the sector and among the firms and other institutions in the countries.
Breastfeeding Knowledge, Attitudes, Prior Exposure, and Intent among Undergraduate Students
Authors: Kavanagh Katherine F. , Lou Zixin , Nicklas Jennifer C. , Habibi Mona F. , Murphy Lee T.
Published: June 2012

Background:

Understanding breastfeeding knowledge, attitudes, and exposures among nonpregnant youth who are likely to be future parents may provide significant pathways to successfully increasing breastfeeding as the normal, accepted way of feeding infants. However, based on a recent review of the literature, only 3 studies have assessed these factors in nonpregnant, young adults in the United States in the past 10 years.

Objective:

The objective of this study was to gather more recent data regarding breastfeeding knowledge, attitudes, and prior exposure among undergraduate university students.

Methods:

This was a cross-sectional survey, conducted in November 2010. A convenience sample, consisting of undergraduates in attendance in 2 sections of an introductory nutrition class at a large research university, was used for this project (N = 248).

Results:

Breastfeeding knowledge was relatively good. However, overall breastfeeding attitudes were more neutral, which appeared to be explained by the belief that breastfeeding is painful, restrictive, and inconvenient, both in general and specifically for the working mother. Though support for breastfeeding in public was low, men were significantly less likely than women to believe it to be embarrassing or unacceptable. In addition, breastfeeding attitudes were more positive among older students and those who were breastfed as infants. Those who were breastfed as infants were also significantly more likely to intend to breastfeed future children.

Conclusions:

Though this sample indicates good breastfeeding knowledge, attitudes were more neutral, and support for breastfeeding in public appears low. This finding is contradictory and warrants further exploration.