bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Corporate Boards and Performance
Authors: Brown Jill
Published: February 2018

In a new era of corporate governance defined by increasing shareholder empowerment, scrutiny from external stakeholders, and governance failures, there has been a movement toward redefining corporate governance models and the roles of boards. As a result, researchers and practitioners are left wondering what it means to be an effective board, and how a board can operate in the best interests of a firm’s stakeholders in this current environment. Exploring the expanded roles and demands of directors grounded in shareholder and director primacy debates, as well as reviewing theories and contingencies that link corporate boards to task, group, firm, and enterprise-level outcomes, a research agenda is identified that might better identify the parameters of board effectiveness.
Performance Studies in Critical Communication Studies
Authors: Hamera Judith
Published: February 2018

Performance studies presumes that political economy, cultural continuity, self-fashioning, and interpersonal exchange are embodied, aesthetic, affective, creative, contested, and rhetorical processes whose work can be understood through analyses of their presentational and representational particulars. Scholars in the field investigate storytelling, ritual, dance, music, and theater: live and mediated, professional and amateur. But they also deploy “performance” as a heuristic tool for examining practices of everyday life, history, the economy and the law, material culture, and other cultural forms not typically considered performance with the goal of excavating their aesthetic, theatrical, spectacular, audience-directed qualities, then explaining how these qualities do cultural and political work. Thus, in performance studies, performance is both an object and a method of study: a mode of communication and a strategy for framing and examining cultural artifacts and processes. Performance practice is a primary commitment in performance studies; it is a site to be investigated, a mode of scholarly inquiry, and a tool of scholarly representation. Within the field of communication, it is most closely aligned with rhetoric and critical cultural studies. But its many interdisciplinary incarnations include those that privilege modes of communication other than the linguistic, including dance studies and ethnomusicology.

The field of performance studies is highly interdisciplinary, with its roots in the practices of elocution, the oral interpretation of literature, and theater, as well as anthropology and folklore studies. The fundamentally contested nature of performance as a concept requires researchers to clarify the parameters and presumptions about performance in their analyses, including who or what performs, and in what sense. The field’s investment in the body as a site of knowledge and cultural production is evidenced in its primary methodologies, including performance ethnography, performance historiography, and oral history. This investment in the body also emerges in the field’s use of performed and written autoethnography and in experiments with performative writing.
The Indian Ocean Dipole
Authors: Hameed Saji N.
Published: February 2018

Discovered at the very end of the 20th century, the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) is a mode of natural climate variability that arises out of coupled ocean–atmosphere interaction in the Indian Ocean. It is associated with some of the largest changes of ocean–atmosphere state over the equatorial Indian Ocean on interannual time scales. IOD variability is prominent during the boreal summer and fall seasons, with its maximum intensity developing at the end of the boreal-fall season. Between the peaks of its negative and positive phases, IOD manifests a markedly zonal see-saw in anomalous sea surface temperature (SST) and rainfall—leading, in its positive phase, to a pronounced cooling of the eastern equatorial Indian Ocean, and a moderate warming of the western and central equatorial Indian Ocean; this is accompanied by deficit rainfall over the eastern Indian Ocean and surplus rainfall over the western Indian Ocean. Changes in midtropospheric heating accompanying the rainfall anomalies drive wind anomalies that anomalously lift the thermocline in the equatorial eastern Indian Ocean and anomalously deepen them in the central Indian Ocean. The thermocline anomalies further modulate coastal and open-ocean upwelling, thereby influencing biological productivity and fish catches across the Indian Ocean. The hydrometeorological anomalies that accompany IOD exacerbate forest fires in Indonesia and Australia and bring floods and infectious diseases to equatorial East Africa. The coupled ocean–atmosphere instability that is responsible for generating and sustaining IOD develops on a mean state that is strongly modulated by the seasonal cycle of the Austral-Asian monsoon; this setting gives the IOD its unique character and dynamics, including a strong phase-lock to the seasonal cycle. While IOD operates independently of the El Niño and Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the proximity between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, and the existence of oceanic and atmospheric pathways, facilitate mutual interactions between these tropical climate modes.
Civil Service Systems
Authors: Smalskys Vainius , Urbanovič Jolanta
Published: February 2018

Civil service consists of civil servants and their activity when implementing the assigned functions and decisions made by politicians. In other words, it is a system of civil servants who perform the assigned functions of public administration. The corpus of civil servants consists of people who work in central and local public administration institutions. The concept and scope of civil service in a particular country depends on the legal framework that defines the areas of public and private sectors and their relationship. In many countries, civil service consists of an upper level, a mid-level, and civil servants who work for coordinating, independent, and auxiliary institutions. However, the scope of civil service in different countries varies. When analyzing/comparing civil service systems of different countries, researchers often categorize them as Western European, continental European, Anglo-American, Anglo-Saxon, Eastern European, Scandinavian, Mediterranean, Asian, or African.

All European Union member states can be classified into two groups: the career system—dominant in continental Europe, with the prevalence of traditional-hierarchical public administration, rational bureaucracy, and formalized operational rules—and the position system—dominant in Anglo-Saxon countries, with the prevalence of managerial principles, pragmatic administration, and charismatic leadership. Neither of the two models exists in pure form. If features of the career model dominate in the civil service of a country, it is identified as a country with the career CS model; if elements of the position model dominate the country is identified as a country with the position civil service model. An intermediate version of this model, characteristic of a number of countries, is the mixed/hybrid model.

Many civil service researchers claim that in the case of two competing systems of civil service—closed (the career model) and open (the position model)—reforms of the open civil service system win. It has been argued that the organizing principles of the open, result-oriented civil service system (the position model), which is under the influence of “new public management,” will permanently “drive out” the closed, vertically integrated and formal procedure-oriented career model. Scholars argue that civil servants of the future will have to be at ease with more complexity and flexibility. They will have to be comfortable with change, often rapid change. At the same time, they will make more autonomous decisions and be more responsible, accountable, performance-oriented, and subject to new competency and skill requirements.
LGBTQI Rights and Sub-Saharan Africa
Authors: Thoreson Ryan
Published: February 2018

In recent decades, the efflorescence of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) movements has created powerful inroads for sexual rights in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa. While conditions for LGBTI people vary considerably between and within countries, activists across the region are reshaping political, legal, and social understandings of gender and sexuality through their advocacy, both by seizing opportunities and navigating periods of backlash and repression. Over the years, activists have established domestic movements and have expanded their reach to articulate demands in regional and international forums. Their work has challenged the universality of models developed in other parts of the globe and has generated new tactics to respond to religious, familial, and state-sponsored prejudice. At the same time, questions of representativeness, accountability, and strategy have been raised by constituencies and longtime activists alike, inviting critical assessments of movement politics in the region.
Regional Integration Theory
Authors: Schimmelfennig Frank
Published: February 2018

Regional integration theory seeks to explain the establishment and development of regional international organizations. Key questions are why and under which conditions states decide to transfer political authority to regional organizations; how regional organizations expand their tasks, competencies, and members; and what impact they have on states and societies in their regions. Whereas regional integration theory started with a broad comparative regional and organizational scope in the 1950s and 1960s, it has since focused on European integration and the European Union.

The main (families of) theories explaining the development of European integration—rather than decision making and policy making in the EU—are intergovernmentalism, neofunctionalism, and postfunctionalism. The key debates in regional integration theory have taken place between variants of intergovernmentalist and neofunctionalist integration theory. Intergovernmentalism assumes national governments to be the key actors in regional integration. Governments use regional integration to maximize their national security and economic interests in the context of regional interdependence. Integration outcomes result from intergovernmental bargaining and reflect the regional preference and power constellations. Governments delegate authority to regional organizations to secure their bargaining outcomes but remain in control of regional organizations and the integration process. By contrast, neofunctionalism disputes that governments are able to control the integration process. Transnational corporations and interest groups as well as supranational actors are empowered by the integration process and shape it in their own interest. In addition, integration creates a variety of “spillovers” and path-dependencies that push integration beyond the intergovernmental bargain. More recently, postfunctionalism has enriched and challenged the theoretical debate on regional integration. In contrast to neofunctionalism, postfunctionalism assumes a backlash mechanism of integration. As regional integration progresses and undermines national sovereignty and community, it creates economic and cultural losers who are mobilized by integration-skeptic parties. Identity-based and populist mass politicization constrains regional integration and may even cause disintegration.

Regional integration theories have closely followed and adapted themselves to the development of European integration. They cover the establishment and progress of supranational policies and institutions but also the recent crisis of the EU. An exemplary review of their explanations of major development in European integration shows that they are more complementary than competing.
Plasticity in the Regenerating Nervous System of the Lamprey, a “Simple” Vertebrate
Authors: Rodemer William , Hu Jianli , Selzer Michael E.
Published: February 2018

Human spinal cord injury (SCI) results in long-lasting disabilities due to the failure of damaged neurons to regenerate. The barriers to axon regeneration in mammalian central nervous system (CNS) are so great, and the anatomy so complex that incremental changes in regeneration brought about by pharmacological or molecular manipulations can be difficult to demonstrate. By contrast, lampreys recover functionally after a complete spinal cord transection (TX), based on regeneration of severed axons, even though lampreys share the basic organization of the mammalian CNS, including many of the same molecular barriers to regeneration. And because the regeneration is incomplete, it can be studied by manipulations designed to either inhibit or enhance it. In the face of reduced descending input, recovery of swimming and other locomotor functions must be accompanied by compensatory remodeling throughout the CNS, as would be required for functional recovery in mammals. For such studies, lampreys have significant advantages. They have several large, identified reticulospinal (RS) neurons, whose regenerative abilities have been individually quantified. Other large neurons and axons are visible in the spinal cord and can be impaled with microelectrodes under direct microscopic vision. The central pattern generator for locomotion is exceptionally well-defined, and is subject to significant neuromodulation. Finally, the lamprey genome has been sequenced, so that molecular homologs of human genes can be identified and cloned. Because of these advantages, the lamprey spinal cord has been a fertile source of information about the biology of axon regeneration in the vertebrate CNS, and has the potential to serve as a test bed for the investigation of novel therapeutic approaches to SCI and other CNS injuries.
Sexual Behavior in Males From a Neuroendocrine Perspective
Authors: Balthazart Jacques , Ball Gregory F.
Published: February 2018

It is well established that testosterone from testicular origin plays a critical role in the activation of male sexual behavior in most, if not all, vertebrate species. These effects take place to a large extent in the preoptic area although other brain sites are obviously also implicated. In its target areas, testosterone is actively metabolized either into estrogenic and androgenic steroids that have specific behavioral effects or into inactive metabolites. These transformations either amplify the behavioral activity of testosterone or, alternatively, metabolism to an inactive compound dissipates any biological effect. Androgens and estrogens then bind to nuclear receptors that modulate the transcription of specific genes. This process is controlled by a variety of co-activators and co-repressors that, respectively, enhance or inhibit these transcriptional processes. In addition, recent work has shown that the production of estrogens by brain aromatase can be modulated within minutes by changes in neural activity and that these rapid changes in neuroestrogen production impact sexual behavior, in particular sexual motivation within the same time frame. Estrogens thus affect specific aspects of male sexual behavior in two different time frames via two types of mechanisms that are completely different. Multiple questions remain open concerning the cellular brain mechanisms that mediate testosterone action on male sexual behavior.
Gender, Girls, and Schooling
Authors: Gonick Marnina
Published: February 2018

The schooling of girls has, across different times and places, often been a matter of heated public debate. From the 1800s to the present, contentious issues such as the purpose of girls’ education, curriculum content, and the meanings given to girls’ bodies within educational sites have led to varying discussions, opinions, and policies. At the center of these debates are the questions of how gender is understood; how it is used in a given place and time in the division of labor, the economy, and the family; and how it is assumed that young girls and women should be instructed for eventually taking up the positions deemed appropriate for their time and place. It is impossible, however, to simply talk about girls’ schooling as if this refers to a singular group of people. Differences in class, race, ethnicity, region, citizenship, sexuality, and other characteristics shape both the contours of the debate and the experience of schooling. Thus, any discussion of the issue of gender, girls, and schooling needs to take an intersectional approach—one that takes into consideration the ways in which identity categories work together within and across differences to produce experience, identity, and meaning.

Currently, the question of girls’ education finds its strongest articulation in relation to the Global South. International organizations and major corporations alike have used their platforms to advance the cause of educating girls in the interests of national and global development. This has proved to have consequences that do not always take into account the complexity of girls’ lives in their local contexts. Issues of gendered inequalities in the Global North are sometimes mistakenly assumed to have been resolved, things of the past. However, girls in schools continue to face issues such as sexual harassment, cyberbullying, and discrimination. As a result, their issues are often misunderstood or marginalized within school communities.
Precolonial Metallurgy and Mining across Africa
Authors: Chirikure Shadreck
Published: February 2018

Since their inception, precolonial mining and metallurgy gradually became essential social, technological, and even politico-economic pillars of African communities of varying time periods. However, the onset of metallurgy and mining and the associated technology and sociocultural beliefs varied from region to region in a way that defies generalization. Owing to their cultural and geographical location, Egypt, the Sudan, North Africa, and the Horn of Africa share some very broad similarities in their metallurgical histories. This in some cases sharply differs from that of many regions such as West, central, East and southern Africa. Interestingly, these regions too are characterized by technological similarity and diversity. When considered together, the multiple trajectories taken by metallurgy and mining in Africa’s different regions are essential for achieving a comparative understanding of the continent’s rich technological history. Achieving this, however, requires an interdisciplinary approach from documentation through data analysis to eventual interpretation. This contribution combines insights from various disciplines to present an overview of precolonial metallurgy and mining in Africa’s many regions.
The Anlu Rebellion
Authors: Mougoué Jacqueline-Bethel Tchouta
Published: February 2018

From 1958 to 1961, Kom women in western Cameroon cast aside their regular domestic and agricultural duties to engage in a revolt against British administrative interference in agriculture—normally their domain—and the alleged plan by the ruling political party, the Kamerun National Congress (KNC), to sell Kom land to Nigerian Igbos. In keeping with the practices of anlu, a centuries-old women’s organization generally deployed against people who violated the Kom moral code, women interfered with burial rituals; hurled insults at men in public; demanded the closing of schools, courts, and markets; set up roadblocks; destroyed and burned property; and defied both traditional and British authorities in the Bamenda Grassfields of western Cameroon. Their tactics included stripping naked in front of men. While local men considered the sight of the vagina in public to be a bad portent and thus understood the seriousness of the revolt, flabbergasted British officials had no idea what was to come. By seizing control of resources and demonstrating in public, Kom women disturbed local political power, and protested against British rule in the Southern Cameroons. They were a crucial force in the victory of the Kamerun National Democratic Party (KNDP) in 1961, which brought a restoration of political order at the time of independence.
Western Christendom, c. 1000–1400
Authors: Thibodeau Timothy M.
Published: February 2018

The liturgy of Western Christendom (c. 1000–1400) was the product of sweeping ecclesio-political and religious reforms that had a broad and lasting impact on the content and performance of the rites of the Latin Church in the later Middle Ages. Beginning with the reforms of monasticism at Cluny and culminating in the reformed papacy in the age of the Investiture Controversy, a sharp division between the clerical order and the laity was imposed on Christian society. This fostered a heightened sense of divine mystery in the liturgical rites (principally, the Mass) that could only be administered by properly ordained clergy, under the authority of the pope. The triumph of the clerical rule of Christendom coincided with more concrete expressions of the real presence of Christ in the eucharistic elements in both formal theology and liturgical practice. The Mass liturgy became the summit and quintessence of liturgical piety in this era, eclipsing other forms of liturgical service and becoming the focal point of sacramental theology. With the construction of monumental new churches in the Gothic style, from the 12th through 14th centuries, liturgical performance (including costly vessels and vestments) achieved levels of ostentation that caused some conflict between ascetically minded reformers (the Cistercians) and the proponents of lavish liturgical spaces (the Cluniacs). A thriving tradition of liturgical exposition or formal commentary on the divine offices worked in tandem with these dramatic architectural and artistic developments in the liturgical spaces of Europe. Despite the new scholastic methods of the universities, allegorical exegesis of the liturgy, following a tradition that began in the 8th century with Amalarius of Metz, continued to predominate in the lengthy treatises of expositors who worked in the peak period of scholastic theology, down to and including William Durandus of Mende (c. 1296). The performative aspects of the liturgy also witnessed major advances with the introduction of polyphonic chant, liturgical drama, and para-liturgical processions (such as the Feast of Corpus Christi).
Buddhism and Shinto
Authors: Rambelli Fabio
Published: February 2018

Buddhism in Japan has long coexisted with native cults and beliefs, commonly known as Shinto. According to received understanding, Shinto (literally, in modern Japanese interpretation, “the way of the [Japanese] gods”) is the autochthonous religious tradition of Japan, whose origins date back to the beginning of the Japanese civilization. Its main features are an animistic belief in the sanctity of nature, shamanic practices, ancestor cults, respect for authority and communal value, and a strong capacity to integrate and homogenize foreign elements. This received understanding sees the history of Japanese Buddhism as a gradual process of “Japanization,” that is, of integration within Shinto beliefs and attitudes. This understanding, however, still broadly circulating in Japan and abroad in textbooks and popular media, has been questioned radically by scholarship in the past few decades.

In fact, until approximately 150 years ago, Shinto (and local cults in general) was deeply connected to Japanese Buddhism: Buddhist authors were the first to write doctrines and tales about the Japanese local gods or Kami, and most shrines dedicated to the Kami used to belong to Buddhist temples or were in fact Buddhist temples themselves dedicated to the kami. Kami were normally understood as avatars (Japanese, gongen) of buddhas, bodhisattvas, and other Buddhist divinities; some very popular kami even today, include Hachiman, who was evoked or discovered (if not created) by Buddhist monks, and Daikokuten and Benzaiten, two Buddhist deities from India (their Sanskrit names are, respectively, Mahākāla, the male counterpart of the goddess Kālī, and Sarasvatī, a water goddess). This situation of symbiosis, in which the Buddhist component was always at the top of the religious institutions’ hierarchy, also generated a number of conflicts that erupted in 1868, when the government decided to “separate” Shinto from Buddhism (shinbutsu bunri), an operation that resulted in the destruction of thousands of Buddhist temples and countless texts, images, and other artifacts, and, ultimately, in the creation of two separate religions. Any historical study of Shinto must therefore attempt to reconstruct this premodern situation of symbiosis and conflict.
Political Prefects: The Regional Political Bosses of Mexico
Authors: Falcón Vega Romana Gloria
Published: February 2018

During the formation of the Mexican nation, jefaturas políticas, or prefectures, as they will be called generically in this article, were basic institutions (1812–1917) for centralizing and organizing power and assuring governance. This was a vital task given the civil and international wars the country would endure. These powerful institutions were the mediators between the upper and lower political echelons and social classes. In the prefectures were vested an impressive range of diverse responsibilities—agrarian, fiscal, preserving order, military conscriptions, educational, medical and sanitary services, promoting the economy, elaborating statistics, mapmaking—which made modernization and administrative functionality very difficult. At the turn of the 20th century, this was an obstacle to the modernization and efficacy of the regime.

Even though prefectures had responsibilities for all of Mexico, they also had an important degree of flexibility to attend to local needs. Therefore, laws and practices were adapted to the peculiarities of the different states, for example, regulating labor or conciliating rivalries that sprang from the application of liberal agrarian policies.

Prefects governed specific political districts in which the states were divided and were generally appointed and removed freely by the governors as their personal representatives to enforce laws and policies and to control any opposition. They were remembered in popular imaginary, literary, and revolutionary historiography as brutal and corrupt functionaries loyal only to the upper classes and their clientelist networks. Contemporary studies have proved that these modalities—brutality and corruption—have a place in the prefect’s box of tools, but new research has widened the historiographic perspective and showed how differently these functionaries could act. In fact, they used most of their energy trying to negotiate with the whole range of social classes and political factions. But their repressive character led to its elimination: they fought the revolution of 1910, and when they lost they were suppressed in 1917.
History of the Torre Latinoamericana
Authors: Beckhart Sarah
Published: February 2018

Historians have extensively explored the topic of architecture in Mexico City in the 20th century. From the relationships between politics, public patrons, new construction technologies, and new idioms of modernism, the impressive story of architecture in this megalopolis continues to astound and captivate people’s imaginations. Architecture was a channel that politicians used to address housing, education, and health care needs in a rapidly growing city. Yet scholars have not been especially concerned with private construction projects and their influence on the process of shaping and being shaped by the visual representation of Mexico City. Private building projects reveal an alternative reality of the city—one not envisioned by politicians and public institutions. Private construction projects in the historic city center are particularly interesting due to their location. These buildings are built on ancient clay lakebeds and volcanic soil on which the Aztecs first built the city. Not only are these buildings located in the heart of the city, the buildings in the rest of the historic district are also sinking. Any building in a historic district that has withstood the test of time should be an object of interest to scholars. The Torre Latinoamericana is perhaps the only building in the historic district and the entire city that ceases to sink, and instead floats! Located on the corner of Madero and San Juan de Letrán, the building sits at the heart of history, culture, and ancient Aztec clay lakebeds. The Torre Latinoamericana was built between 1948 and 1956 and is one of the most important visual symbols of resilience and modernity in Mexico City today.
Hispanic Constitutionalism and the Independence Process in the Kingdom of Guatemala, 1808–1823
Authors: Avendaño Rojas Xiomara
Published: February 2018

Unlike the French and North American revolutions, which fought against a monarchical power, the Hispanic political revolution began by evoking the memory of the beloved Ferdinand VII of Spain. The French invasion of Spain in 1808 had unimaginable repercussions; the government was reestablished in the name of the King, and the territories of the Americas that were convened in the Cortes participated in the development of a charter in 1812 that created a constitutional monarchy. In the Kingdom of Guatemala, the application of constitutionalism gave rise to tensions between elected officials and former royal appointees. By way of indirect elections, the isthmus took its first steps in the construction of a representative system, and worked its way up to local, provincial, and legislative power.

The Declaration of Independence, which took place on September 15, 1821, along with the Plan of Iguala inadvertently brought about a type of “examination” in which the provinces, empowered by their sovereignty and autonomy, broke away from the metropolis but produced a dilemma: Mexico or Guatemala. Independent from the choice, they assumed full ownership of the government that originated from the 1812 Constitution of Cádiz. Few people called for a congress, and the traditional referent in the political community, the cabildos, chose the Imperio del Septentrión (the Northern Empire). After the fall of the monarch Agustín de Iturbide, in March 1823, a constituency was organized to decide on their future government as the Provincinas Unidas del Centro de América (United Provinces of Central America). The new republican project was issued in a second Declaration of Independence or absolute independence, signed on July 1, 1823.
Cognitively Oriented Theories of Meaning
Authors: Gärdenfors Peter
Published: February 2018

There are two main theoretical traditions in semantics. One is based on realism, where meanings are described as relations between language and the world, often in terms of truth conditions. The other is cognitivistic, where meanings are identified with mental structures. This article presents some of the main ideas and theories within the cognitivist approach.

A central tenet of cognitively oriented theories of meaning is that there are close connections between the meaning structures and other cognitive processes. In particular, parallels between semantics and visual processes have been studied. As a complement, the theory of embodied cognition focuses on the relation between actions and components of meaning.

One of the main methods of representing cognitive meaning structures is to use images schemas and idealized cognitive models. Such schemas focus on spatial relations between various semantic elements. Images schemas are often constructed using Gestalt psychological notions, including those of trajector and landmark, corresponding to figure and ground. In this tradition, metaphors and metonymies are considered to be central meaning transforming processes.

A related approach is force dynamics. Here, the semantic schemas are construed from forces and their relations rather than from spatial relations. Recent extensions involve cognitive representations of actions and events, which then form the basis for a semantics of verbs.

A third approach is the theory of conceptual spaces. In this theory, meanings are represented as regions of semantic domains such as space, time, color, weight, size, and shape. For example, strong evidence exists that color words in a large variety of languages correspond to such regions. This approach has been extended to a general account of the semantics of some of the main word classes, including adjectives, verbs, and prepositions. The theory of conceptual spaces shows similarities to the older frame semantics and feature analysis, but it puts more emphasis on geometric structures.

A general criticism against cognitive theories of semantics is that they only consider the meaning structures of individuals, but neglect the social aspects of semantics, that is, that meanings are shared within a community. Recent theoretical proposals counter this by suggesting that semantics should be seen as a meeting of minds, that is, communicative processes that lead to the alignment of meanings between individuals. On this approach, semantics is seen as a product of communication, constrained by the cognitive mechanisms of the individuals.
Tupian Languages
Authors: Dietrich Wolf
Published: February 2018

“Tupian” is a common term applied by linguists to a linguistic stock of seven families spread across great parts of South America. Tupian languages share a large number of structural and morphological similarities which make genetic relationship very probable. Four families (Arikém, Mondé, Tuparí, and Raramarama-Poruborá) are still limited to the Madeira-Guaporé region in Brazil, considered by some scholars to be the Tupí homeland. Other families and branches would have migrated, in ancient times, down the Amazon (Mundurukú, Mawé) and up the Xingú River (Juruna, Awetí). Only the Tupí-Guarani branch, which makes up about 40 living languages, mainly spread to the south.

Two Tupí-Guaraní languages played an important part in the Portuguese and Spanish colonisation of South America, Tupinambá on the Brazilian coast and Guaraní in colonial Paraguay. In the early 21st century, Guaraní is spoken by more than six million non-Indian people in Paraguay and in adjacent parts of Argentina and Brazil.

Tupí-Guaraní (TG) is an artificial term used by linguists to denominate the family composed by eight subgroups of languages, one of them being the Guaraní subgroup and the other one the extinct Tupinambá and its varieties.

Important phonological characteristics of Tupian languages are nasality and the occurrence of a high central vowel /ɨ/, a glottal stop /ʔ/, and final consonants, especially plosives in coda position. Nasality seems to be a common characteristic of all branches of the family. Most of them show phenomena such as nasal harmony, also called nasal assimilation or regressive nasalization by some scholars.

Tupian languages have a rich morphology expressed mainly by suffixes and prefixes, though particles are also important to express grammatical categories. Verbal morphology is characterized by generally rich devices of valence-changing formations. Relational inflection is one of the most striking phenomena of TG nominal phrases. It allows marking the determination of a noun by a preceding adjunct, its syntactical transformation into a nominal predicate, or the absence of any relation. Relational inflection partly occurs also in other branches and families than Tupí-Guaraní. Verbal person marking is realized by prefixing in most languages; some languages of the Tuparí and Juruna family, however, use only free pronouns.

Tupian syntax is based on the predication of both verbs and nouns. Subordinate clauses, such as relative clauses, are produced by nominalization, while adverbial clauses are formed by specific particles or postpositions on the predicate. Traditional word order is SOV.
Natural Hazards Governance in Nigeria
Authors: Onu Steve I.
Published: February 2018

Nigeria, like many other countries in sub–Saharan Africa, is exposed to natural hazards and disaster events, the most prominent being soil and coastal erosion, flooding, desertification, drought, air pollution as a result of gas flaring, heat waves, deforestation, and soil degradation due to oil spillage. These events have caused serious disasters across the country. In the southeast region, flooding and gully erosion have led to the displacement of communities. In the Niger Delta region, oil exploration has destroyed the mangrove forests as well as the natural habitat for fishes and other aquatic species and flora. In northern Nigeria, desert encroachment, deforestation, and drought have adversely affected agricultural production, thereby threatening national food security.

The federal government, through its agencies, has produced and adopted policies and enacted laws and regulations geared toward containing the disastrous effects of natural hazards on the environment. The federal government collaborates with international organizations, such as the World Bank, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), Center for Infectious Disease Research (CIDR), United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), United Nations High Commission for Refugees UNHCR, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), to address disaster-related problems induced by natural hazards.

However, government efforts have not yielded the desired results due to interagency conflicts, corruption, low political will, and lack of manpower capacity for disaster management.

There is a need for a good governance system for natural hazards prevention and reduction in the country. This will require inter-agency synergy, increased funding of agencies, capacity building, and public awareness/participation.
Combating hospital-acquired C. diff
Authors: Johnson Shelley
Published: February 2018

A successful collaboration between clinical nurse leaders and clinical nurse specialists
What Regulatory Requirements and Existing Structures Must Change If Competency-Based, Time-Variable Training Is Introduced Into the Continuum of Medical Education in the United States?
Authors: Kogan Jennifer R. , Whelan Alison J. , Gruppen Larry D. , Lingard Lorelei A. , Teunissen Pim W. , ten Cate Olle
Published: February 2018

As competency-based medical education is adopted across the training continuum, discussions regarding time-variable medical education have gained momentum, raising important issues that challenge the current regulatory environment and infrastructure of both undergraduate and graduate medical education in the United States. Implementing time-variable medical training will require recognizing, revising, and potentially reworking the multiple existing structures and regulations both internal and external to medical education that are not currently aligned with this type of system. In this article, the authors explore the impact of university financial structures, hospital infrastructures, national accrediting body standards and regulations, licensure and certification requirements, government funding, and clinical workforce models in the United States that are all intimately tied to discussions about flexible training times in undergraduate and graduate medical education. They also explore the implications of time-variable training to learners’ transitions between medical school and residency, residency and fellowship, and ultimately graduate training and independent practice. Recommendations to realign existing structures to support and enhance competency-based, time-variable training across the continuum and suggestions for additional experimentation/demonstration projects to explore new training models are provided.
The University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee Flexible Option for Bachelor of Science in Nursing Degree Completion
Authors: Litwack Kim , Brower Aaron M.
Published: February 2018

The 2010 “Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health” report from the Institute of Medicine recommended that 80% of registered nurses (RNs) obtain a bachelor of science in nursing (BSN) degree by 2020. Hospitals with BSN nurses have reduced morbidity and mortality. In 2014, the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee and the University of Wisconsin–Extension launched the University of Wisconsin Flexible Option BSN (UW Flex BSN) as an additional model for BSN degree completion, adding to the in-person and online delivery models already being offered.

In this article, the authors examine the decision to launch the UW Flex BSN program as a competency-based, time-variable approach to RN-to-BSN degree completion. They discuss the factors contributing to its success (including proactive, wraparound support for students through the use of academic success coaches and regular and substantive interaction with faculty), design and program elements and decisions, and continuing challenges that have yet to be resolved.

UW Flex BSN is one version of direct-assessment, competency-based education, and it represents the first of its kind in a public institution for postlicensure BSN degree completion. The program meets all Higher Learning Commission standards and requirements and is grounded in the American Association of Colleges of Nursing Baccalaureate Essentials and program quality standards. The UW Flex BSN for degree completion is a successful example of a competency-based, time-variable education model that has been applied in a practice discipline.
Flexibility in Postgraduate Medical Training in the Netherlands
Authors: Hoff Reinier G. , Frenkel Joost , Imhof Saskia M. , ten Cate Olle
Published: February 2018

Postgraduate medical training in the Netherlands has become increasingly individualized. In this article, the authors describe current practices for three residency programs at the University Medical Center Utrecht: anesthesiology, pediatrics, and ophthalmology. These programs are diverse yet share characteristics allowing for individualized residency training. New residents enter each program throughout the year, avoiding a large simultaneous influx of inexperienced doctors. The usual duration of each is five years. However, the actual duration of rotations or of the program as a whole can be reduced because of residents’ previous medical experience or demonstration of early mastery of relevant competencies. If necessary, the duration of training can also increase.

Although working hours are already restricted by the European Working Time Directive, most residents choose to train on a part-time basis. The length of their program then is extended proportionally. The extension period added for those residents training part-time can be used to develop specific competencies, complete an elective rotation or research, or explore a focus area. If the resident meets all training objectives before the extension period is completed, the program director can choose to shorten the program length. Recently, entrustable professional activities have been introduced to strengthen workplace-based assessment. The effects on program duration have yet to be demonstrated.

Flexible postgraduate training is feasible. Although improving work–life balance for residents is a necessity, attention must be paid to ensuring that they gain the necessary experience and competencies and maintain continuity of care to ensure that high-quality patient care is provided.
A Comprehensive Review of Low-Speed Rear Impact Volunteer Studies and a Comparison to Real-World Outcomes
Authors: Cormier Joseph , Gwin Lisa , Reinhart Lars , Wood Rawson , Bain Charles
Published: February 2018

Study Design.

This study combined all prior research involving human volunteers in low-speed rear-end impacts and performed a comparative analysis of real-world crashes using the National Automotive Sampling System – Crashworthiness Data System.

Objective.

The aim of this study was to assess the rates of neck pain between volunteer and real-world collisions as well as the likelihood of an injury beyond symptoms as a function of impact severity and occupant characteristics in real-world collisions.

Summary of Background Data.

A total of 51 human volunteer studies were identified that produced a dataset of 1984 volunteer impacts along with a separate dataset of 515,601 weighted occupants in real-world rear impacts.

Methods.

Operating-characteristic curves were created to assess the utility of the volunteer dataset in making predictions regarding the overall population. Change in speed or delta-V was used to model the likelihood of reporting symptoms in both real-world and volunteer exposures and more severe injuries using real-world data. Logistic regression models were created for the volunteer data and survey techniques were used to analyze the weighted sampling scheme with the National Automotive Sampling System database.

Results.

Symptom reporting rates were not different between males and females and were nearly identical between laboratory and real-world exposures. The minimal risk of injury predicted by real-world exposure is consistent with the statistical power of the large number of volunteer studies without any injury beyond the reporting of neck pain.

Conclusion.

This study shows that volunteer studies do not under-report symptoms and are sufficient in number to conclude that the risk of injury beyond neck strain under similar conditions is essentially zero. The real-world injury analyses demonstrate that rear impacts do not produce meaningful risks of cervical injury at impacts of similar and greater severity to those of the volunteer research. Future work concerning the mechanism of whiplash-related trauma should focus on impacts of severity greater than those in the current literature.

Level of Evidence: 3
Point-of-Care Ultrasonography in Emergency and Critical Care Medicine
Authors: Chen Leon , Malek Tony
Published: February 2018

To stabilize critically ill patients, emergency and critical care medicine providers often require rapid diagnosis and intervention. The demand for a safe, timely diagnostic device, alongside technological innovation, led to the advent of point-of-care ultrasonography (POCUS). POCUS allows the provider to gain invaluable clinical information with a high level of accuracy, leading to better clinical decision-making and improvements in patient safety. We have outlined the history of POCUS adaptation in emergency and critical care medicine and various clinical applications of POCUS described in literature.
An Assessment of an Outpatient Antimicrobial Therapy Program in a Rural Medical Center
Authors: Burkett Matthew Shawn , Macci Bires Angela , Cline Thomas W. , Knight Anthony
Published: February 2018

Current literature supports outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT). This article presents results from a research study that evaluated an OPAT program that treated community-acquired pneumonia. If patients had the opportunity to receive outpatient intravenous antibiotics for community-acquired pneumonia, would this prevent future hospitalization? Was there a decrease in hospital admissions? An informal cost-benefit analysis comparing OPAT with inpatient hospital admissions for the same disease was also reviewed to provide evidence whether there was a change. What was the overall health care cost savings? The medical charts of 50 patients with confirmed pneumonia who had received OPAT in a 3-month period were reviewed. A retrospective medical record review was performed. All patients were evaluated by the in-house OPAT team. The resulting analysis provided evidence that an estimated savings of approximately $2100 per day would be achieved by decreasing hospital readmissions for patient who had been treated with OPAT. The conclusion of this study provides evidence that the implement of an OPAT program was, and is, essential for patient care and evidence-based best practice adherence.