bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Biwa Masters and Musical Hierophanies in the Heike monogatari and Other Medieval Texts
Authors: Bialock David T. 
Published: February 2014

Abstract
The Heike monogatari has long been at the center of discussions about the function of medieval Japanese performing arts, linked variously to ritual placation, purification, and to Buddhist sermonizing and entertainment. The present essay complicates this view by connecting Heike and biwa playing to several musical phenomena that have received less attention. These include the accusation of bōkoku no oto (sounds of a nation going to ruin), which criticized certain kinds of music from a Confucian ethical perspective, as well as the practice of esoteric biwa initiation (biwa kanjō) along with the related phenomena of the musical hierophany (yōgō) and the elaborate descriptions of music in Heike texts that I call ‘musical ekphrasis.’ The essay is divided into two parts. The first half highlights aspects of vocal, musical, and textual performance in the Heike, including the kinesthetic dimension of dance. The second part examines parallels between medieval guides to esoteric biwa initiation, such as the Biwa kanjō shidai, and descriptions of musical instruments and hierophanies in the Genpei seisuiki and Engyōbon Heike monogatari, two lesser known Heike variants. Moving away from a purely instrumental use of description in the Heike narratives, i.e., what might a certain passage tell us about biwa playing, I argue instead that these elaborate musical ekphrases woven into the Heike texts are themselves synaethesias, or auditory-visual-tactile manifolds, that gesture toward the epiphanic moment of enlightenment through music that is also echoed in the adornment (shōgon) of the esoteric biwa initiation ceremony.
Ninnaji and Otherworlds in the Nō Tsunemasa
Authors: Oyler Elizabeth A. 
Published: February 2014

Abstract
This essay discusses the Nō Tsunemasa in connection with narratives about the life of the warrior Taira Tsunemasa, killed during the Genpei War, and his biwa lute, Seizan. A mugen Nō (“dream Nō,” in which the main character, the shite, is a ghost) in one act, the play exhibits an unusual structure: it is the enactment of a memorial musical service for the dead Tsunemasa, set at Ninnaji, the temple at which he served during his youth, rather than at the locale where he died, the more common setting for such plays. Focusing on Ninnaji as the setting for the play, I discuss how its structure as a performance of a service creates connections with several other scenes of virtuoso biwa performance found in Tsunemasa’s life story. I argue that the play’s use of the meaningful site of Ninnaji—arguably the center of Shingon practice and a temple at which royal princes served as Omuro, or “prince-abbot”—creates complex ways of addressing the character of Tsunemasa historically and within the performance traditions of Heike monogatari recitation and the Nō.
Public Reason, Private Virtue, and Political Philosophy: Religious Approaches to the Progressive Income Tax
Authors: Livingston Michael A. 
Published: February 2014

The use of religious texts in public policy debates has been the cause of significant controversy. Believing Christians, Jews, and others naturally suggest that their faith should play a role in real-world policy discussions. But others suggest that such arguments may be dangerous and, in any event, lack persuasive power to those not part of the same religious tradition. The public reason theory, frequently associated with John Rawls, states that religious arguments are permissible only when supported by evidence that would be accessible to those who do not share the same underlying religious beliefs.
While religious arguments are most commonly associated with abortion, homosexuality, and other social issues, they have also been applied to tax policy. Conservatives have cited the Biblical tithe as evidence in support of a flat, low-rate tax. Liberals have cited Biblical injunctions to practice social justice and protect the poor in favor of progressive, redistributive tax systems. These arguments vary in different religious traditions, but they share a sense that traditional religious texts remain relevan to the contemporary debate.
The tax experience suggests the dangers of religious perspectives are frequently exaggerated. Religious arguments frequently contradict each other and only rarely do they make an appeal to direct, irrefutable divine guidance. A larger problem is that religious guidance is often inexact in nature, and religious people may have a tendency to become overly emotional in presenting them. A degree of modesty making such arguments, rather than a full or partial exclusion, appears the best solution.
Frozen Music: Music and Architecture in Vitruvius’ De Architectura
Authors: Walden Daniel K.S. 
Published: February 2014

AbstractThis paper explores the convergence of musical and architectural theory in Vitruvius’De Architectura.Section 1 describes Vitruvius’ architectural lexicon, borrowed from Aristoxenus (I.2), and explores his description of the laws of harmony, modeled onElementa Harmonica(V.4). Section 2 explores how Vitruvius proposes using music theory in practical architectural design, including construction of columns using architectural orders analogous to Aristoxeniangenera(I.2.6; IV.1); acoustical designs for theatres (V.5); and the development of machines, including siege engines ‘tuned’ like musical instruments (X.12) and water-organs [hydrauli] constructed to execute all the different varieties of tuning (X.8). Section 3 reflects on Vitruvius’ use of analogies with a musical instrument, thesambuca, to explain his understanding of cosmic harmony and architectural form, and his possible sources (VI.1). Finally, Section 4 discusses Vitruvius’ ideas about the importance of a liberal arts education that includes study of music theory. The best architects, Vitruvius explains, can discover in music the secrets to forms they both encounter in nature and create themselves.
The Devil Wears Dockers: Devil Pacts, Trade Zones, and Rural-Urban Ties in the Dominican Republic
Authors: Derby Lauren , Werner Marion 
Published: February 2014

AbstractThis essay examines popular narratives that a spirit demon or bacá lurked in an export garment plant in the Santiago trade zone of the Dominican Republic in the early 2000s. By interpreting thebacástory, and the transformation of the bacá itself from a rural context to an urban factory, we unpack the changing nature and meaning of employment under neoliberal capitalism, and tease apart complex geographies of status, exploitation, technology and debt.
Timescale Invariance in the Pacemaker-Accumulator Family of Timing Models
Authors: Simen Patrick , Rivest Francois , Ludvig Elliot A. , Balci Fuat , Killeen Peter 
Published: February 2014

Pacemaker-accumulator (PA) systems have been the most popular kind of timing model in the half-century since their introduction by Treisman (1963). Many alternative timing models have been designed predicated on different assumptions, though the dominant PA model during this period — Gibbon and Church’s Scalar Expectancy Theory (SET) — invokes most of them. As in Treisman, SET’s implementation assumes a fixed-rate clock-pulse generator and encodes durations by storing average pulse counts; unlike Treisman’s model, SET’s decision process invokes Weber’s law of magnitude-comparison to account for timescale-invariant temporal precision in animal behavior. This is one way to deal with the ‘Poisson timing’ issue, in which relative temporal precision increases for longer durations, contrafactually, in a simplified version of Treisman’s model. First, we review the fact that this problem does not afflict Treisman’s model itself due to a key assumption not shared by SET. Second, we develop a contrasting PA model, an extension of Killeen and Fetterman’s Behavioral Theory of Timing that accumulates Poisson pulses up to a fixed criterion level, with pulse rates adapting to time different intervals. Like Treisman’s model, this time-adaptive, opponent Poisson, drift–diffusion model accounts for timescale invariance without first assuming Weber’s law. It also makes new predictions about response times and learning speed and connects interval timing to the popular drift–diffusion model of perceptual decision making. With at least three different routes to timescale invariance, the PA model family can provide a more compelling account of timed behavior than may be generally appreciated.
Formation and Diversity of Jewish Languages and of Judeo-Arabic in North Africa I. Middle Judeo-Arabic and its Forms of Hybridization
Authors: Chetrit Joseph 
Published: February 2014

AbstractThe article deals with the evolution of Middle Judeo-Arabic in North Africa. The study examines the linguistic processes and the hybridized uses of Judeo-Arabic in a theoretical framework oriented toward the main sociopragmatic features of Jewish languages. These include diglossic functioning, endolectal appropriation of a non-Jewish language, hybridization of grammatical and lexical structures, and discursive and textual diversity. Middle Judeo-Arabic is considered here in three different periods of its formation and use in North Africa. The first period, the classic period, lasted from the tenth to the thirteenth century. It generated religious, philosophical, literary, and epistolary texts that are documented by the archives of the Cairo Genizah and by the seminal works of famous scholars. The second period began after the settlement of the Megorashim in urban centers of North Africa at the end of the fifteenth century and lasted until the nineteenth century. During this period, Jewish poets turned their attention to some remnants of Middle Judeo-Arabic texts, mostly paraliturgical, to heighten the language of their Judeo-Arabic poems. The third period was characterized by a new kind of literary Judeo-Arabic used by journalists and writers in Tunis at the end of the nineteenth century.
中国农民合作社的功能与多样性变迁环境中发展现状探讨
Authors: Leeuwis Cees , Lie Rico 
Published: February 2014

Abstract
The agricultural sector and the rural sector in China have experienced fundamental changes from the 1980s onward, and farmer cooperatives have emerged in response to these changes. Beginning in 1990, a series of different policies have been implemented by the Chinese government to promote farmer cooperatives (FCs). This article aims to explore the functioning of FCs on the basis of the type and scope of the services they provide and their connections with the rural communities. The findings show that activities carried out by FCs help to extend farmers’ engagement in value-chain participation and management. FCs, as organizational innovations, also provide opportunities to bring knowledge providers and farmers together. Some FCs are starting to coordinate activities for farmers, rural communities and local government to make better use of collective resources. Four types of FCs are identified in the research: commodity-based FCs, community-based FCs, specialized technology providers and credit service providers. The emergence of these four types of FCs is embedded in broader institutional developments. The government mainly promotes commodity-based FCs and specialized technology-providing FCs. Companies focus on commodity-based FCs, and research institutes and development organizations are involved in community-based FCs. These findings imply that an integrated and broader view of policies is needed to promote the development of FCs in the long run.
(This article is in English.)

摘要
20世纪80年代以来中国的农村和农业经历了深刻的变革。从20世纪90年代开始，政府出台了一系列的政策推动农民合作社的发展，合作社数量逐步增加。本文意在展示合作社提供服务的类型和范围，以及他们与农村社区之间的联系，并以此为基础探讨合作社的功能发挥。本文研究显示合作社开展的活动有利于农户参与到农产品价值链不同环节以及价值链管理中。合作社作为一项组织创新，也为建立农户与技术提供者之间的联系搭建了桥梁。一些合作社协调农户、农村社区和政府部门之间的关系，实现了集体资源的充分利用。本研究将合作社分为四类：产品型合作社、 社区型合作社、专业技术服务合作社和资金互助合作社。这四类合作社的产生根植于外部制度环境。政府主要倡导产品型合作社和专业技术服务合作社的发展。公司致力于产品型合作社的发展，而研究机构和发展组织更多参与到社区型合作社的发展中。这些研究发现意味着政府需要制定更具包容性的政策，加强政策间的一致性，以从长远角度促进合作社的发展。
Dragomans and “Turkish Literature”: The Making of a Field of Inquiry
Authors: Rothman E. Natalie 
Published: February 2014

Abstract
Theories of cultural and linguistic mediation have tended to posit intermediaries as conduits through which one culture/language either enters another unproblematically, or gets “distorted” due to intermediaries’ incompetence or self-interest. Both these perspectives presuppose stable, well-bounded, and coherent cultures/languages as what intermediaries purportedly mediate. Instead, this paper proposes an understanding of cultural and linguistic mediation as a process that constitutes its objects, that is, as an essential dimension of all acts of cultural and linguistic boundary-making. It focuses on dragomans (diplomatic interpreters) who operated at the interface between the Ottoman government and foreign diplomats to the Porte throughout the early modern period. The paper suggests how dragomans’ practices of knowledge production were profoundly collaborative, involving a range of Ottoman and Venetian interlocutors. Such practices thus belie any facile distinction between “local” and “foreign,” but rather challenge us to consider the emergence of “Oriental” studies as a dialogical project that necessitated ongoing recalibrations of prior knowledge through a multiplicity of perspective, where diplomatic institutions and epistemologies played a key role.
Müste’min Dealing with the Ottoman Justice: Role and Strategy of the Ambassador
Authors: Dumas Juliette 
Published: February 2014

Abstract
Because of their status as foreigners, non-subject of the Empire, müsteʾmin are subject to a system of laws different from the other subjects of the Empire. They also benefit from advantages secured by the granting of imperial orders: the ʿahidnâme also known as the capitulations: these are prescriptions issued by the sultan, directly influenced by political and economic aspects and which may vary from one nation to another. However, it is not a code of law different from others in force in the Empire: except in specific cases prescribed by the capitulations, the müsteʾmin are submitted as other Ottoman subjects to the Ottoman legal system.
Nevertheless, the Ottoman legal system is complex: the actors and the practices vary and depend on the individuals involved and cases. Therefore, the question is who are the interlocutors of the müsteʾmin? The documents examined here show that the type of conflicts impacted on the interlocutors that were involved. Each time the case involves, in one way or another, the privileges of the müsteʾmin from a given nation, the imperial divan had to solve the case—then, it usually refers to the local court. But if private, the case was directly submitted to the kadı. The call for submission of cases to the Imperial divan is interesting because it shows that confidence is put in the Imperial divan rather than in the kadı. Perhaps, it also reveals the limits of the legal knowledge of the privileges and the special rights granted to müsteʾmin. In fact, the population concerned by the Capitulations was minor and the affairs affecting them probably rare, as a result, one should not be surprised by the lack of knowledge of the local actors, of their privileges.
The role of the embassy and of the ambassador must also be emphasized here. In our documents, it appears that the embassy as a whole played a significant role in supporting its citizens through legal advice, assistance and support. The French embassy even seems to have distinguished itself on this item since the legal support offered was presented by the ambassador.
“Civilizing Mission” in the Late Ottoman Discourse: The Case of Gypsies
Authors: Çelik Faika 
Published: February 2014

Abstract
Historians of the Ottoman Empire have up until now written extensively not only on the polyethnic and multireligious nature of the Ottoman Empire, but also on the specific ethnic and religious groups that made up this plurality. Yet, although the Gypsies were a part of this pluralistic society, they have not received sufficient critical attention from Ottomanists whether in Turkey or abroad. While a few important studies have recently been published on the Ottoman Gypsies, this scholarship, though indeed very useful as a guide to the rich materials available on the subject, are weakened by two competing arguments. The first of these arguments is that the Gypsies of the Ottoman Balkans provide a salient example of a group marginalized through stigmatization, segregation and exclusion, whereas the second maintains that Gypsies were benignly tolerated by the Ottoman state. These analyses however fail to take into account that the legal, social and economic status of the Roma people in the Ottoman Empire seems to have been, at different times and in different places, much more complicated than simple marginalization or toleration. The question in fact needs to be problematized through a consideration of regional, local and temporal differences. My previous readings of the kanunnames and the mühimme registers of the second half of the sixteenth century substantiate this view and demonstrate that the marginality of the Gypsies in the Ottoman Balkans in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries was neither absolute and unchanging nor inflexible and complete. The interaction of the Gypsies both with the state and with Ottoman society at large was both hostile and symbiotic. Thus, the purpose of this study is to delve further into this topic and analyze how the Ottoman Imperial state dealt with what I call “community in motion” at various levels in the late nineteenth century. Through close reading of a layiha (memorandum) written by Muallim Sa’di Efendi, a college professor in the city of Siroz (Serres) in communication with other archival sources located in Başbakanlık Osmanlı Arşivi in Istanbul, the paper attempts not only to understand the ways and techniques through which the late Ottoman state produced and governed the Empire’s subjects but also to show how Gypsies interacted with and were received by the local population in Serres, including Muslims and Orthodox Christians. My argument is that during the sixteenth century, the imperial state adopts residential and religious mobility of the Gypsies, albeit with certain restrictions. Yet, by the late nineteenth century, one of the most significant concerns of the late Ottoman state was to “reform” (ıslah) the Gypsies. Constants attempts were being made to deconstruct, normalize and eliminate differences of Gypsies, for instance, appointing imams to the Gypsy neighborhoods to “correct” their faith or opening new schools to “save” them from ignorance and poverty that lived in.
ROXAS – an efficient and accurate tool to detect vessels in diffuse-porous species
Authors: Wegner Lena , von Arx Georg , Sass-Klaassen Ute , Eilmann Britta 
Published: February 2014

Wood-anatomical parameters form a valuable archive to study past limitations on tree growth and act as a link between dendrochronology and ecophysiology. Yet, analysing these parameters is a time-consuming procedure and only few long chronologies exist. To increase measurement efficiency of wood-anatomical parameters, novel tools like the automated image-analysis system ROXAS were developed. So far, ROXAS has only been applied to measure large earlywood vessels in ring-porous species.In this study, we evaluate if ROXAS is also suitable for efficient and accurate detection and measurement of vessels in diffuse-porous European beech. To do so, we compared the outcome of ROXAS with that of the established measurement programme Image-Pro Plus in terms of efficiency and accuracy.The two methods differed substantially in efficiency with automatic measurements using ROXAS being 19 times faster than with Image-Pro Plus. Although the procedures led to similar patterns in annual variation of mean vessel area and vessel density, the absolute values differed. Image-Pro Plus measured systematically lower mean vessel areas and higher vessel densities than ROXAS. This was attributed to the species-specific technical settings in ROXAS, leading to more realistic results than those obtained using the default settings in Image-Pro Plus. A shortcoming of ROXAS was, however, that small vessels (<100 μm²) could not be detected with sufficient accuracy. Yet, based on thin sections of European beech, it is generally difficult to distinguish such small vessels from parenchyma cells. Moreover, these small vessels do not contribute substantially to conductive efficiency. Therefore, we do not foresee any problems for most studies if the lower vessel area threshold to be measured is set to 100 μm². Overall, ROXAS proved to be useful for measuring vessel parameters in diffuse-porous tree species, allowing accurate and efficient analyses of large numbers of samples.
Remote Effects of El Niño and Modoki Events on the Austral Summer Precipitation of Southern Africa
Authors: Ratnam J. V. , Behera S. K. , Masumoto Y. , Yamagata T. 
Published: February 2014

Abstract
Remote effects modulating the austral summer precipitation over southern Africa during El Niño/El Niño Modoki events are investigated by analyzing the observed events during December–February of the years from 1982/83 to 2010/11. Based on the composite analyses, it is found that southern Africa experiences significantly below normal precipitation during El Niño events compared to El Niño Modoki events. During these latter events, precipitation anomalies are not so significant although southern Africa as a whole receives below normal precipitations. The differences in the spatial distribution of precipitation over southern Africa are seen to be related to the sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies of the equatorial Pacific through atmospheric teleconnections.
The low-level (850 hPa) Matsuno–Gill response to anomalously high precipitation over the Pacific during El Niño events results in an anomalous anticyclone extending from the equatorial to the subtropical South Indian Ocean. These anomalous anticyclonic winds weaken the tropical moisture flow into the southern Africa landmass. Rossby wave activity flux analysis of the upper-level (300 hPa) circulation shows an anomalous tropospheric stationary wave from the Pacific propagating toward southern Africa and maintaining an anomalous anticyclone over southern Africa. The anomalous Matsuno–Gill response and the anomalous tropospheric stationary wave response are intense during El Niño events, causing drought over southern Africa. During El Niño Modoki events, these processes are weaker compared to El Niño events.