bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Alzheimer‐like changes in protein kinase B and glycogen synthase kinase‐3 in rat frontal cortex and hippocampus after damage to the insulin signalling pathway
Authors: Salkovic‐Petrisic Melita , Tribl Florian , Schmidt Manuela , Hoyer Siegfried , Riederer Peter
Published: January 2006

The insulin‐resistant brain state is related to late‐onset sporadic Alzheimer's disease, and alterations in the insulin receptor (IR) and its downstream phosphatidylinositol‐3 kinase signalling pathway have been found in human brain. These findings have not been confirmed in an experimental model related to sporadic Alzheimer's disease, for example rats showing a neuronal IR deficit subsequent to intracerebroventricular (i.c.v.) treatment with streptozotocin (STZ). In this study, western blot analysis performed 1 month after i.c.v. injection of STZ showed an increase of 63% in the level of phosphorylated glycogen synthase kinase‐3α/β (pGSK‐3α/β) protein in the rat hippocampus, whereas the levels of the unphosphorylated form (GSK‐3α/β) and protein kinase B (Akt/PKB) remained unchanged. Three months after STZ treatment, pGSK‐3α/β and Akt/PKB levels tended to decrease (by 8 and 9% respectively). The changes were region specific, as a different pattern was found in frontal cortex. Structural alterations were also found, characterized by β‐amyloid peptide‐like aggregates in brain capillaries of rats treated with STZ. Similar neurochemical changes and cognitive deficits were recorded in rats treated with i.c.v. 5‐thio‐d‐glucose, a blocker of glucose transporter (GLUT)2, a transporter that is probably involved in brain glucose sensing. The IR signalling cascade alteration and its consequences in rats treated with STZ are similar to those found in humans with sporadic Alzheimer's disease, and our results suggest a role for GLUT2 in Alzheimer's pathophysiology.
Different apoptotic mechanisms are activated in male and female brains after neonatal hypoxia–ischaemia
Authors: Zhu Changlian , Xu Falin , Wang Xiaoyang , Shibata Masahiro , Uchiyama Yasuo , Blomgren Klas , Hagberg Henrik
Published: January 2006

Sex‐related brain injury was evaluated after unilateral hypoxia–ischaemia (HI) in C57/BL6 mice on postnatal day (P) 5, 9, 21 or 60, corresponding developmentally to premature, term, juvenile and adult human brains. There was no sex difference in brain injury when the insult was severe, as evaluated by pathological scoring or tissue loss, but when the insult was moderate, adult (P60) females displayed less injury. In the immature (P9) male brains, neurones displayed a more pronounced translocation of apoptosis‐inducing factor (AIF) (loss of AIF from the mitochondrial fraction and increase in nuclear AIF) after HI, whereas the female brain neurones displayed a stronger activation of caspase 3 (more pronounced loss of pro‐caspase 3, increase in cleaved caspase 3 and increase in caspase 3 enzymatic activity). Two other mechanisms of injury, peroxynitrite‐induced formation of nitrotyrosine and autophagy, were no different between males and females at P9. These data show that the CNS is more resistant to HI in adult females compared with males, whereas no sex differences were found in the extent of injury in neonatal mice. However, critical sex‐dependent differences were demonstrated in vivo with regard to cellular, apoptosis‐related mechanisms.
Increases in α4* but not α3*/α6* nicotinic receptor sites and function in the primate striatum following chronic oral nicotine treatment
Authors: McCallum Sarah E. , Parameswaran Neeraja , Bordia Tanuja , Fan Hong , Tyndale Rachel F. , Langston J. William , McIntosh J. Michael , Quik Maryka
Published: January 2006

Knowledge of the effects of chronic nicotine is critical considering its widespread use in tobacco products and smoking cessation therapies. Although nicotine is well known to up‐regulate α4* nAChR sites and function in the cortex, its actions in the striatum are uncertain because of the presence of multiple subtypes with potentially opposing effects. We therefore investigated the effect of long‐term nicotine treatment on nAChR sites and function in the primate striatum, which offers the advantage of similar proportions of α3*/α6* and α4* nAChRs. Nicotine was given in drinking water, which resembles smoking in its intermittent but chronic delivery. Plasma nicotine and cotinine levels were similar to smokers. Chronic nicotine treatment (> 6 months) enhanced α4* nAChR‐evoked [3H]dopamine release in striatal subregions, with an overall pattern of increase throughout the striatum when normalized to uptake. This increase correlated with elevated striatal α4* nAChRs. Under the same conditions, striatal α3*/α6* nAChR sites and function were decreased or unchanged. These divergent actions of chronic nicotine treatment on α4* versus α6* nAChRs, as well as effects on dopamine uptake, allow for a complex control of striatal activity to maintain dopaminergic function. Such knowledge is important for understanding nicotine dependence and the consequences of nicotine administration for the treatment of neurological disorders.
Oceans of World History: Delineating Aquacentric Notions in the Global Past1
Authors: Buschmann Rainer F.
Published: January 2006

This article presents various ocean‐ and sea‐centered approaches to world history. Utilizing European transoceanic empires as a point of departure, the paper scrutinizes the emergence of “aquacentric” notions among selected global societies. The diasporas of African, Greek, and Polynesian peoples offer important pointers to unravel the global past. These pointers provide novel perspectives on the histories of the Atlantic, Indian, and the Pacific oceans. The article concludes with teaching and theoretical suggestions that derive from such aquacentric systems.
Women and the Reformations: Reflections on Recent Research
Authors: Wiesner‐Hanks Merry
Published: January 2006

Scholarship on women and the Protestant and Catholic Reformations over the last quarter‐century has stressed diversity, difference, and complexity. It has developed new theoretical and methodological directions, and also presented new ways to look at more “old‐fashioned topics,” such as the lives of great women and the ideas of great men. Many studies have explored women's actions in support of or in opposition to the Protestant and Catholic Reformations and women's spirituality more broadly; among these, research on convents and female religious has been especially innovative. Studies of the ideas of the reformers and the effects of the Reformations on women, the family, and notions of gender have focused particularly on the process of social discipline, noting continuities with medieval patterns as well as new emphases. The focus on the “long Reformation” and increased attention to the expansion of Christianity beyond Europe, represent burgeoning areas of current research.
Between Religious Marketplace and Spiritual Wasteland: Religion in the British Atlantic World1
Authors: Pestana Carla Gardina
Published: January 2006

The predominant metaphors in use for describing religion in the British Atlantic world are marketplace and wasteland – the first presenting religion as a product to be sold and consumed, the second asserting that religion was not successfully planted in colonies (at least not outside of New England). Both of these constructs for understanding religion's nature and role rely heavily on the perspective of clergymen. Although they left us much that was written on religious belief and practice for the period to 1800, clergy have a particular perspective and the sources they penned skew the presentation of religion toward competition and absence. These two ways of looking at faith are in fact two sides of the same clerical coin, and ought to be accepted only with caution, if at all. This article argues that we must read these denunciations with a critical eye and look beyond them to appreciate the vibrancy of lay religious faith and practice even in those very places that the clergy vociferously criticized.
The Law of the Land or the Law of the Land?: History, Law and Narrative in a Settler Society
Authors: Attwood Bain
Published: January 2006

This article considers the influence of a controversial historical work on the law, politics and society of a settler nation. It argues that the impact of Henry Reynolds's 1987 The Law of the Land on legal consideration of indigenous rights to land in Australia can be attributed to the fact that it is best described as juridical history. As such, it told a lego‐historical story that provided the High Court of Australia with a new way of interpreting its own traditional narrative, which had long denied Aboriginal people their rights to land, thus enabling it to make a new determination of those rights as well as resolve a crisis of legitimacy for the law and the nation. This article also contends that this history‐making came to be accepted by many settler Australians because it provided the nation with a newly redemptive, liberal myth narrative. It assesses the cost of a story of this kind, asking whether such simple histories can have an enduring effect, especially where their authors are reluctant to signpost the historical or literary form of their texts. Finally, it suggests that histories truer to the complexities of the past might produce better political and social outcomes.
Liberalism and Its Discontents: Lessons From the Brazilian Past
Authors: Graham Richard
Published: January 2006

Brazilian elites during the early nineteenth century pushed for the creation of a free‐market economy, but this made the bulk of the population feel unprotected by the state on which they had come to rely for a minimum of succor. The ensuing violent reaction put a halt to the implementation of such policies. There are lessons here for the present.
Geography, Will it Absolve Cuba?
Authors: Martínez‐Fernández Luis
Published: January 2006

This article seeks two primary goals. First, to provide fundamental information about Cuba's geography: physical aspects, location, climate, natural resources, etc. Second, to discuss and analyze the various ways in which Cuba's particular geographic traits, such as insularity, elongated shape, tropical location, and proximity to the United States, have helped shape the course of its history and the culture of its inhabitants. The essay approaches the subject steering clear from both accepting geographic determinism and ignoring the influence of geography, by focusing on the interaction between the forces of physical geography and human responses to them.
The Ideology of Early Modern Colonisation
Authors: Fitzmaurice Andrew
Published: January 2006

This article argues that colonial ideologies were the concern of more than a privileged élite in early modern Europe. The article shows that early modern English colonisation was torn between the humanistic pursuit of glory, or greatness, and humanist and scholastic scepticism of empire. The article also addresses the relation between state formation and European expansion, and concludes that these processes were inherently linked rather than merely parallel. Historians have focused on the Machiavellian character of the early modern European ideology of greatness, or grandezza. They have accordingly concluded that where grandezza informed the pursuit of empire, it was driven by the Machiavellian concern with virtue rather than profit. According to such accounts, early modern ideologies of empire were uncomfortable with commerce. It is argued here that these accounts have overlooked the emergence of an alternative account of grandezza in early modern Europe, which presented commerce as the means to greatness.
Making the Americas: U.S. Business People and Latin Americans from the Age of Revolutions to the Era of Globalization
Authors: O'Brien Thomas
Published: January 2006

U.S. business people have played a central role in shaping the relationship between the United States and Latin America. Their ambitious transportation, mining, and plantation projects had dramatic economic and political effects on the nations of the Circum‐Caribbean during the nineteenth century. In the course of the past one hundred years, American corporations have extended their activity throughout South America, affecting not only economic development, but attempting to alter the work habits and consciousness of millions of Latin Americans, and providing an important catalyst for both mass political movements in the region and U.S. interventions.
Recent Writing on Early Modern British Urban History (c. 1540‐1720)
Authors: Tittler Robert
Published: January 2006

This subject must be approached in the context established by the seminal work of Peter Clark and Paul Slack in the mid‐1970s. In highlighting themes of crisis and order, emphasizing the period c. 1500‐1640, deriving inspiration from the social sciences of the 1960s, and implicitly privileging provincial towns over the London metropolis, Clark and Slack set the agenda for a generation of research. Since then the emphasis has shifted gradually towards the post‐Civil War era, to London as well as provincial towns, to questions raised by the ‘cultural turn’ of historical enquiry generally, and to the British rather than the insularly English scene. Technological advances of the computer age have also greatly facilitated access to primary source material, opening up new opportunities for research and teaching.
The Hittites ‐ Discoveries and Ongoing Research
Authors: Bryce Trevor R.
Published: January 2006

This article focuses on discoveries and advances in Hittite scholarship and archaeology over the past few decades, as the result of ongoing excavations in the Hittite capital and in regional centres of the kingdom. Of particular significance is the information provided by recent text finds, including that contained in clay tablets, seal impressions and monumental inscriptions on stone.
The Other Atlantic World
Authors: Ward Jason
Published: January 2006

Despite the common imagination of the early modern Atlantic World as centered in the British‐dominated North Atlantic, a broader perspective reveals that there is in fact another Atlantic World which is both larger and older than the English version, and whose general history responds to global but not necessarily European currents of history.1 Locating that "other" Atlantic World requires that we rethink its spatial and temporal dimensions.
State Formation and the Historiography of Early Modern England
Authors: Braddick Michael
Published: January 2006

The history of the state was once at the core of academic history and university curricula. In English history, the revolution of 1649 was said to be of epochal significance and influential analyses of its causes sought to tie together disparate fields of study in a single explanation. Over the last thirty years, however, such accounts have been heavily criticised and, partly as a consequence, the historiography of Stuart England became much more fragmented. Recent histories of ‘state formation’ however, promise to overcome some of the effects of that fragmentation. They explore the organisation, institutionalisation, representation and expression of political power rather than the more or less conscious efforts of particular individuals or groups to transform the state. This emphasis on the broader social and cultural processes which shaped the state reconnects important elements of recent social, economic, cultural, intellectual and political histories. Moreover, it may help to forge connections between medieval, early modern and later modern histories, and the integration of English experience into wider comparative histories.
Globalizing Chinese History
Authors: Van De Ven Hans
Published: January 2006

Globalization is important as an opportunity to bring back the foreign as a significant factor in modern Chinese history and overcome some of the problems associated with exclusively China‐centered histories. This article focuses on the Chinese Maritime Customs to illustrate this point and to bring out the rich complexity of interactions between China and foreign countries. The century between 1850 and 1950 emerges not as one dominated by stagnation and decline but as one of great historical change and significance.
Expansion and Colonization in Early Modern Chinese History
Authors: Waley‐Cohen Joanna
Published: January 2006

This article surveys Chinese expansion and colonization in the early modern period (c.1400–1900), when China extended its frontiers by both conquest and settlement, including the use of convict labor, and sponsored, coerced or accepted migration into sparsely populated peripheral areas already subject to Beijing's central control.
Ancient Greek Democracy and Its Study1
Authors: Robinson Eric
Published: January 2006

Democracy – ordemokratiaas the Greeks called it – first took shape in a few sixth‐century BC city‐states, arising from attitudes and conditions widespread in the Greek world. In the ensuing two centuries it became more common and continued to develop, especially in the city of Athens, where it attained its definitive and most influential form. (Other systems of rule, such as oligarchy and tyranny, remained common in Greek city‐states, however). Democracy meant that thedemos(the people) governed the state directly, controlling affairs through such institutions as jury courts and mass assembly meetings, in which all citizens were eligible to take part, as well as through numerous elected or allotted posts, each held for a brief term only. The political ideals of freedom and equality animateddemokratia, though they did not extend to women and slaves. Historians and other intellectuals, after many centuries of hostility to the idea of democracy, have more recently embraced it and its study. A survey of publications by classicists of the last twenty years or so reveals a lively diversity of views and trends.
New Views on Citizenship and National Identity in Early Modern France
Authors: Wells Charlotte C.
Published: January 2006

This article explores new ideas about the development of standards of citizenship and national identity in early modern France. Rather than appearing full‐blown at the time of the French Revolution, French citizenship has a prehistory going back at least as far as the fifteenth century.
Women's Bodies, Women's Minds: One Way of Rethinking Japanese Women's History
Authors: Walthall Anne
Published: January 2006

We live in a world permeated with violence, yet until recently the field of Japanese studies has not focused on the connection between violence, gender, and modernity. The goal of this article is to suggest ways in which violence and gender figure in conspicuous consumption and the construction of the modern state.
From sub‐Roman Britain to Anglo‐Saxon England: Debating the Insular Dark Ages
Authors: Higham Nick
Published: January 2006

The sub‐Roman/Anglo‐Saxon interface has been hotly debated over the last twenty years, with scholars approaching the subject from several different disciplines and arguing variously for mass migration from Germany and/or elite dominance by a barbarian elite of a British majority. This paper critiques several of the arguments that have recently been offered and suggests that we should prioritise the conquest of eastern England by Anglo‐Saxons at an early date, which left political power in barbarian hands. Both migration and acculturation should be considered integral to the constitution of Anglo‐Saxon England, its people and its culture.
British Castle Studies in the Late 20th and 21st Centuries
Authors: Speight Sarah
Published: January 2006

Few areas of medieval research have been so polarised in the late 20th century as castle studies. With two schools of thought pulling in opposite directions, one towards the castle as fortress, one towards the castle as residence, efforts have been channelled into justifying these camps rather than exploring common ground. Yet many of the approaches on offer are compatible both with each other and with a more inclusive examination of medieval society that examines castles as venues and stages for human behaviour rather than as mere architectural forms. The key to moving forward and opening up new vistas is multi‐ and inter‐disciplinarity; using a wider range of models and sources to examine function and use, and using our historiographical skills to reduce mechanism and determinism in favour of a holistic approach to medieval ‘real’ life.
A Brief History of Cinema from Bombay to ‘Bollywood’
Authors: Bhaumik Kaushik
Published: January 2006

The Bombay film industry began in 1896 with the exhibition of imported films and soon diversified into production of feature‐length films. Adventure romance films dominated the silent period. With the onset of the talkies, romantic melodrama mixed with social realism dominated by music became the principal film genre of Bombay cinema. This cinema is thought to have reflected the social reformist agenda of the Nehruvian state. The 1970s saw the advent of the multi‐generic entertainment extravaganza replete with dramatic dialogue and spectacular song and dance sequences (popularly referred to as masala films). The masala film continues to dominate Bombay film production and has, since the 1990s, assumed global popularity.
‘On with the Show’: American Popular Entertainment as Cultural and Social History
Authors: Springhall John
Published: January 2006

This piece argues that American historians of commercial amusements before television have, in recent years, published important work that places their chosen entertainment forms within a reliable cultural and historical framework. Showman and promoter P. T. Barnum's American Museum in New York is identified as central to the history of American show business from minstrelsy to vaudeville.
Famines in (South) Asia
Authors: Hall‐Matthews David
Published: January 2006

Most historical studies of South Asian famines have appropriately taken a political economy approach, allowing them to critique colonial governance and free trade policy. It would be useful to see more work on social and enviromental aspects of famine. There is a danger, however, typified by Mike Davis’ recent book, that analysis of the role of climate in causing famine can depoliticise the problem. Further studies are still needed of the politics of famine, under communist as well as capitalist systems.
Asking New Questions about the Partition of the Indian Subcontinent
Authors: Khan Yasmin
Published: January 2006

Fierce historical controversy has raged over the causes of the partition of India, ever since Pakistan was created in 1947. This article briefly analyses these debates, but here the major focus is upon the consequences of partition and the new wave of historiography which has emerged in recent years, especially since the fiftieth anniversary of partition in 1997. These new histories have centred upon the experience of ordinary people, and have emphasised the trauma caused by widespread violence and mass migration. This article questions why these histories of violence have struggled to find their place in a more comprehensive and integrated narrative of the events of 1947, and why a gulf still separates the ‘popular’ and the ‘political’ in partition histories.
Pakistan: A Contemporary Searchlight
Authors: Malik Iftikhar
Published: January 2006

This piece highlights some of the main areas of scholarly research and media reportage on Pakistan, which is not only one of the largest Muslim states but also operates as an important bridgehead between South and South‐western Asia. Some of the recent and notable multi‐disciplinary studies, by both foreign and Pakistani publishing houses, are also appended in the list.
Historians and the South African Truth Commission
Authors: Saunders Christopher
Published: January 2006

The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission has attracted a large literature, and is now widely hailed as a model of how to proceed with transitional justice in a post‐conflict situation. This article is not concerned with the working of the Commission, or what it contributed to reconciliation in South Africa, but considers why historians were not more involved in its work, and what their attitudes have been to the findings of the TRC. The importance of the vast archive that the TRC collected is emphasized, but it seems unlikely that access will be granted to this archive in the near future.
How Stiff were their Upper Lips? Research on Late‐Victorian and Edwardian Masculinity
Authors: Heathorn Stephen
Published: January 2006

There is an abundance of scholarship on middle‐class and elite masculinity during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and the notion of a male ‘flight from domesticity’. But there is little solid research on the working classes, and there is a need to connect contemporary prescriptions about masculinity with the actual practices of men of all classes for this era.
Controversies in Sri Lankan History
Authors: Strathern Alan
Published: January 2006

This Viewpoint gives a brief introduction to the ongoing controversies of Sri Lankan historiography, which the current ethnic conflict has served to intensify and politicize. Scholars of many different disciplines, indeed all manner of commentators, have been arguing about how much continuity can be seen in the nature of the state, ethnic identity and religious identity as these have developed over the last 2000 years of history.
Understanding Marriage Dowry
Authors: Majumdar Rochona
Published: January 2006

The dowry problem has not been known to produce suicides elsewhere in the world. Women without dowries or adequate dowries often ended up in convents or religious homes in England or Italy. Suicides and murders of young women on account of their family's inability to gather the requisite amount of dowry is unique to South Asia. What then, one wonders, is the practice of dowry all about? Is it something that represents unremitting oppression to all women or are there aspects to the practice that can in fact be empowering to those who receive dowry? How do we begin to comprehend women's complicity in the giving and taking of dowry and what is the relationship between such actions and law? This review article is an attempt to answer some of these questions by surveying the existing literature on dowry.
Privacy in Modern China
Authors: McDougall Bonnie S.
Published: January 2006

Despite a common belief that ‘the Chinese’ have no concept of privacy, there is a well‐established tradition of private property and privacy values in traditional and modern China. In the twentieth century, rhetoric on the public good generally prevailed over individualism and subjectivity, but privacy practices, especially within the family, persisted despite the state's intrusions into private life. Both privacy and private property were re‐evaluated in the post‐Mao era, giving rise to a new appreciation of privacy functions and values.
An Historiographical Overview of Environmental History in South Africa
Authors: Nell Dawn
Published: January 2006

This article identifies key themes in environmental history in South Africa and points to how research in environmental history has contributed to our understanding of the South African past, ranging from the pre‐colonial period to the late‐twentieth century and the anti‐apartheid struggle. The article notes how research on the environmental practices of indigenous African societies in the pre‐colonial era has furthered understandings of these societies more broadly; how the environment is seen by many historians to have been integral to the processes of conquest and resistance to colonial rule; and how societal tensions in an increasingly racialized South Africa found expression in conflict over environmental resources and interventions.
New Directions in the History of Free Black Activism in the Antebellum North
Authors: Rael Patrick
Published: January 2006

Scholarship on the activism of free African Americans in the northern states before the Civil War developed in the wake of the Civil Rights revolution, and has recently exploded. The new scholarship challenges facets of the older interpretation, which was built on community studies and the history of black nationalism.
Confessionalization: Reformation, Religion, Absolutism, and Modernity
Authors: Boettcher Susan R.
Published: January 2006

This article describes the theoretical aspects of forty years of research on confessionalization, the dominant idea for interpreting the later German Reformation (1555–1649). It describes programmatic statements, important debates, and research that supports and challenges the paradigm in the area of political and social history. It suggests cultural and intellectual history as strong possibilities for further research on the late Reformation.
Catholic Martyrdom in Early Modern Ireland
Authors: Tait Clodagh
Published: January 2006

Approximately 250 men and women who died in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Ireland have been claimed as martyrs for Catholicism. As well as demonstrating one aspect of Irish Catholic experience, martyrdom offers insights into the difficulties in governing Ireland in the early modern period.
The Czech Revolution of 1848: The Pivot of the Habsburg Revolutions
Authors: Dimond Mark
Published: January 2006

The Czechs contributed to the failure of the 1848 Habsburg Revolutions. Firstly, an uncontrollable Prague Revolution led to Habsburg military intervention, giving the military confidence to intervene elsewhere within the empire. Then political stalemate between Slav and German delegates at Kroměříž enabled the Emperor to re‐establish an absolutist monarchy.
The Long Peace in Pennsylvania
Authors: Merritt Jane T.
Published: January 2006

Our understanding of the Long Peace in Pennsylvania has shifted from a focus on Quakers as the purveyors of peaceful relations in the mid‐Atlantic region before the Seven Years’ War to a deeper examination of Indian‐white relations, which helped make and unravel peaceful coexistence from the late seventeenth century to the 1750s.
Shifting Priorities: Australia's Defence Ties to Britain in the Aftermath of Empire
Authors: Benvenuti Andrea
Published: January 2006

For the best part of two centuries, the defence of the Australian continent was almost entirely dependent on the global supremacy of the British navy. The decline of British sea power, particularly in the years after the Second World War, was therefore highly unwelcome in Australia, and brought recurring difficulties in the Anglo‐Australian relationship. Most scholarship to date has focused on the two symbolic moments of British capitulation in Australia's region – the fall of Singapore in 1942, and the decision of the Wilson government some twenty‐five years later to withdraw all British forces from east of Suez. A familiar picture has emerged of overstretched British governments reluctantly cutting their losses in the Far East, while Australian governments applied every means at their disposal to persuade the British to stay. But this picture fails to take into account the impact of the decline of British power on Australian strategic thinking. An examination of British–Australian defence relations in the immediate aftermath of Wilson's ‘East of Suez’ policy shows that the Australian government not only recognized the necessity of Britain's withdrawal, but also regarded the Conservative Party's threat to reverse Wilson's decision as potentially inimical to Australia's interest in the region. For the first time in modern Australian history, Australians questioned the traditional precepts of imperial protection as a possible liability rather than the keystone of their survival.
On History, Historians and Silence
Authors: Jenkins Keith
Published: January 2006

In this short article I argue that, for Lyotard, the ethically responsible historian need not ‘fill in’ the ‘Silences of History’ by empirical noise; there are times when silence speaks volumes. The Holocaust/Auschwitz are examples of this; for Lyotard these are ‘test cases’ for the shortfall of the empirical, the shortfall of the epistemological, indicating the poverty of all forms of historical representation. And Lyotard is happy about this condition – is happy that historians always get things wrong – for it allows him to connect up his idea of the differend to justice and freedom and to the notion of an ethically responsible historian who is not at all like the historian ‘as we have come to know him/her’. And so this article calls us to refigure history/historians in new ways.
Juan Manuel de Rosas: Authoritarian Caudillo and Primitive Populist
Authors: Shumway Jeffrey M.
Published: January 2006

Juan Manuel de Rosas governed Argentina between 1829 and 1852, with a brief interlude in the early 1830s. His rule and his legacy have provoked deep divisions in Argentine society, and much of the history written of him has come in the extremes of diatribes and vindication. The exact nature of the Rosas era and how he governed, therefore, continues to be discussed as historians try to get beyond impassioned polemics. This article provides a brief background on the historiography on Rosas, his rise to power, and, using examples from Afro‐Argentines, gauchos, and Indians, demonstrates how Rosas used a combination of authoritarianism and populism to maintain power and stability during his rule.
The Debate on the Fourth Crusade
Authors: Harris Jonathan
Published: January 2006

This article examines attempts over the past 200 years to account for the diversion of the Fourth Crusade to Constantinople and its sack of the city in 1204. While nineteenth‐century scholars dreamed up far‐fetched conspiracy theories, their successors often put the whole thing down to a series of unforeseen accidents. The debate now seems to have reached a stage where historians set the episode in a much wider context and consider a multitude of factors, though the element of chance will probably always have to feature.
Spices in the Middle Ages
Authors: Freedman Paul
Published: January 2006

Spices were highly prized in the Middle Ages for their culinary, medicinal and liturgical calue. They also had the attraction of exotic and mysterious origins. Their historical significance lies in their role as consumer items, their symbolic association with luxury but also with the sacred, and the stimulus the demand for spices gave to European voyages of exploration and colonization at the end of the Middle Ages.
The Many Faces of El Supremo: Historians, History, and Dr. Francia
Authors: Cooney Jerry W.
Published: January 2006

Dr. José Gaspar de Francia, the first great dictator of Paraguay (1814–1840), has been an object of interest since the early 1800s. In an effort to preserve the independence of his nation, he isolated Paraguay politically from the outside world. Internally, he crushed the power of the Spanish merchant class, brought the old colonial elite to obedience, and subordinated the Church to his will. The state directed both the internal economy and the limited external trade. The dictator allowed no political liberty, but during his long regime Dr. Francia created a nation out of a people.

 Until the mid‐twentieth century historians relied on the few available contemporary accounts of Dr. Francia's Paraguay. Polemics too often replaced objective analysis of his dictatorship. At various times, he was portrayed as a bloodthirsty tyrant, the denier of liberal progress, the defender of national sovereignty, the personification of Rousseau's “Popular Will,” and the progenitor of dictatorships that have cursed Paraguayan history. Even after archival research brought El Supremo (as he became known) into greater focus, controversy surrounded historical interpretations of Francia and his Paraguay. In the latter part of the twentieth century, it was proposed that he was a “leveler” of the colonial class society, a popular revolutionary, and a defender of traditional Paraguayan values. This article analyzes the various historical interpretations of Dr. Francia over the past two centuries and their origins in the political environment of the times. It concludes with suggestions for future research upon El Supremo and his Paraguay.
The New Venice: Historians and Historiography in the 21st Century Lagoon
Authors: Horodowich Liz
Published: January 2006

Although the Renaissance is typically most closely associated with the city of Florence, recent scholarship on the history of Venice provocatively calls this connection into question. While humanism and classicism have traditionally characterized the Renaissance in Florence, historians now argue that the vibrancy of early modern culture also resulted from inc reased cross‐cultural interaction, the development of capitalism and markets, and the process of statebuilding. When one views the Renaissance in this light, Venice takes on a new importance in the early modern world as the epicenter from which the energies of the early modern world emanated. Recent Venetian scholarship also hotly debates a variety of other topics, such as gender and women's history and religious culture, all suggesting that the Venetian archives offer a particularly rich and abundant site at which to study the early modern world.
Seventeenth‐Century Print Culture
Authors: Raymond Joad
Published: January 2006

Early modern cultural historians hang on to Habermas’ phrase ‘the public sphere’ against their better knowledge. This essay looks at the historiographical background to its reception and use, and proposes an alternative approach.
Teaching Women's History: I Offered Social History, They Took Away Heroes
Authors: Swedberg Sarah
Published: January 2006

When the field of women's history emerged, it almost entirely focused on the stories of elite, exceptional women rather than the story of ordinary people. Women's historians who are also social historians have attempted to move women's history toward history from below, focusing on the masses rather than one or two women worthies. When bringing women's history into the classroom as social history, students sometimes reject the lessons of social history and, instead, take away heroes. This article examines and attempts to explain this phenomenon.
Latin American Resistance Movements in the Time of the Posts1
Authors: Kuecker Glen David
Published: January 2006

This article examines the flood of resistance movements in today's Latin America. It places them in the context of the great economic changes that have swept the world since the end of the Cold War, what is often called “globalization.” Analysis focuses on the “newness” of our contemporary period, especially the importance of the transnational political and economic order. This essay illustrates how social scientists attempt to understand this moment of change, and emphasizes the limitations to their theory. Special emphasis is on the utility of New Social Movement theory as a tool for understanding today's resistance movements as well as the potential paths for radical change.
Complete donor chimaerism of Langerhans cells in lymph node early after allogeneic bone marrow transplantation
Authors: Ikeda Kazuhiko , Shichishima Tsutomu , Teshima Takanori , Ogawa Kazuei , Nakamura‐Shichishima Akiko , Tajima Hiroko , Noji Hideyoshi , Hashimoto Yuko , Takeyama Kunihiko , Ishibashi Toshiyuki , Ohto Hitoshi , Abe Masafumi , Maruyama Yukio
Published: January 2006

Abstract:  Host‐derived Langerhans cells (LCs) are crucial antigen‐presenting cells that cause graft‐vs.‐host disease after allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). However, chimaerism of LCs after allogeneic HSCT is largely unknown in humans. We here report a case that developed dermatopathic lymphadenitis accompanied by an accumulation of donor‐derived LCs in the second month after allogeneic HSCT with reduced‐intensity conditioning. This is the first case to show that donor LCs have the ability to migrate into draining lymph nodes and replace host LCs early after HSCT in humans.
Does the band cell survive the 21st century?
Authors: van der Meer Wim , van Gelder Warry , de Keijzer Ries , Willems Hans
Published: January 2006

Abstract: Objectives: The differentiation of white blood cells is a worldwide‐accepted method to obtain medical information. The conventional microscopic differential, however, is a laborious and expensive test with a low statistical value. Especially for band cell identification there is a wide range of variance. In this report we describe the intervariability of band cell enumeration.Methods: From a septic patient, an EDTA anti‐coagulated blood sample was obtained and a smear was made and stained (May‐Grünwald Giemsa). A PowerPoint presentation was made twice of 100 random cells and sent to 157 different hospital laboratories in the Netherlands for a leukocyte differential. In the first survey neutrophils were differentiated in segmented and band neutrophils whereas in the second survey no discrimination was made between segmented and band neutrophils.Results: The first survey was responded by 68% of the laboratories (756 individuals) and the second survey by 73% of the laboratories (637 individuals). The laboratory mean values of the segmented neutrophils were 42.9% (SD: 7.8, range 22–64%) and 69.9% (SD: 1.4, range 62–72%) for the first and second survey respectively. For the individual technicians the values of the segmented neutrophils were 43.9% (SD: 11.2, range 15–72%) and 70.0% (SD: 2.0, range 59–77%) for the first and second survey respectively.Conclusions: Because of the enormous variation of band cell counting we recommend to cease quantitative reporting of band cells, especially since the results only have a clinical relevance in a limited number of pathological circumstances.
Long‐term complete remission in IgD‐myeloma
Authors: Bemelmans R. H. H. , van Toorn D. W. , van Leeuwen L. , Schaar C. G.
Published: January 2006

Abstract:  Long‐term complete remission in IgD multiple myeloma (MM) is rare. This case report describes a patient with a stage IIIB IgD‐MM, who was treated with conventional melphalan and prednisone chemotherapy. The monoclonal protein disappeared after four cycles and therapy was discontinued after 14 cycles. Re‐evaluation after a follow up of more than 8 years demonstrates a continuing complete remission suggesting a cure. This is remarkable, considering that several adverse prognostic factors were present. In addition a concise review on IgD‐MM is given.
Kaposi's sarcoma triggered by endogenous HHV‐8 reactivation after non‐myeloablative allogeneic haematopoietic transplantation
Authors: Bruno Benedetto , Sorasio Roberto , Barozzi Patrizia , Vieira Jeff , Omedè Paola , Giaretta Fulvia , Rotta Marcello , Giaccone Luisa , Massaia Massimo , Luppi Mario , Boccadoro Mario
Published: January 2006

Abstract:  Human herpesvirus 8 (HHV‐8) is causally associated with Kaposi's sarcoma (KS). KS is most frequently observed in HIV patients and in solid organ transplant recipients. The role of HHV‐8 in allogeneic haematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) remains to be determined. Here we describe a case in which KS concomitantly occurred with CMV reactivation after a non‐myeloablative allogeneic HCT and presented with skin lesions, but not visceral involvement. Skin biopsy confirmed the diagnosis and ruled out graft versus host disease or disease recurrence. Molecular findings indicated viral reactivation of the recipient's primary infection. Tumour lesions completely receded when immunosuppression was tapered. Prevalence studies in donors and recipients are needed to determine the clinical impact of HHV‐8 in HCT.
Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) in the elderly: clinical course in 178 patients
Authors: Bizzoni L. , Mazzucconi M. G. , Gentile M. , Santoro C. , Bernasconi S. , Chiarotti F. , Foà R. , Mandelli F.
Published: January 2006

Abstract:  Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) is often diagnosed in the elderly (age ≥65 yr), where it generally presents as a chronic disease. The objective of the present study was to describe the natural history of ITP in the elderly and to evaluate the risk of bleeding and the possible occurrence of other pathologies. We retrospectively evaluated 178 ITP patients (82 men, 96 women; mean age: 72 yr) diagnosed between 1981 and 1998. Therapy was started at diagnosis or during follow‐up, depending on the platelet count and/or bleeding events. Sixty‐six out of one hundred and seventy‐eight patients (37%) initiated therapy at diagnosis; whereas in 11 of the 112 untreated patients (9.8%) therapy was necessary during the follow‐up. Low‐dose of prednisone was the first‐line treatment in all patients (mean daily dose of 0.43 mg/kg). Forty‐nine (63.6%) of the seventy‐seven treated patients showed a response, 14 of these (28.6%) suffered a relapse. Another pathology occurred in 19 of the 178 patients (10.7%). We conclude that low‐dose prednisone is an appropriate initial treatment for elderly persons. We also stress that an adequate follow‐up is advisable, given that isolated thrombocytopenia could in some cases be the first sign of another underlying pathology.
Mutational and methylation analysis of the cyclin‐dependent kinase 4 inhibitor (p16INK4A) gene in chronic lymphocytic leukemia
Authors: Tsirigotis Panagiotis , Pappa Vassiliki , Labropoulos Stefanos , Papageorgiou Sotirios , Kontsioti Frinda , Dervenoulas John , Papageorgiou Efstathios , Panani Anna , Mantzios George , Economopoulos Theofanis , Raptis Sotirios
Published: January 2006

Abstract:  Objectives: Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) comprises a heterogenous group of at least two types of disease entities characterized by distinctive clinical, immunophenotypical and genetic features. The molecular mechanisms underlying the pathogenesis and the histological transformation of CLL are not well known. The INK4A/p16, a cyclin dependent kinase inhibitor has been considered as a tumor suppressor gene. Inactivation of this gene by homozygous deletions, mutations and hypermethylation occurs in a variety of human neoplasms. The aim of the present study was to determine the frequency of p16 gene deletions and mutations as well as the methylation status of the same gene in CLL patients. Methods: We examined 34 samples from CLL patients by Southern Blotting, Single‐Strand Conformation Polymorphism (SSCP), DNA sequencing and Methylation‐Specific PCR. Results: Southern Blot analysis revealed non‐rearranged bands in 33/34 cases. Homozygous deletions were not observed in any case. In 1/34 case a rearranged band was detected with EcoRI enzyme. The PCR‐SSCP analysis of exons 1 and 3 revealed normal pattern of migration in all cases examined. The analysis of exon 2 revealed abnormal migration pattern in 2/34 cases (5.8%). Sequencing of these cases revealed the presence of the ALA148THR polymorphism. Methylation analysis of p16 gene promoter revealed hypermethylation of CpG islands in 6/34 cases (17.6%). Conclusion: These results indicate that genetic alterations of p16 gene are rare events in patients with CLL. The clarification of the role of p16 gene promoter methylation in the pathogenesis and evolution of CLL needs further investigation.