title: Bound analysis for Whiley programs

authors: Weng, Min-Hsien

subjects: Static Analysis

abstract: The Whiley compiler can generate naive C code, but the code is inefficient because it uses infinite integers and dynamic array sizes. Our project goal is to build up a compiler that can translate Whiley programs into efficient OpenCL code with fixed-size integer types and fixed-size arrays, for parallel execution on GPUs. This paper presents an abstract interpretation-based bound inference approach along with symbolic analysis for Whiley programs. The source Whiley program is first analyzed by using our symbolic analyzer to find the matching pattern and make any necessary program transformation. Then the bound analyzer is used to analyze the transformed program to make use of primitive integer types rather than third-party infinite integer type (e.g. using GMP arbitrary precision library). The bound analysis results provide conservative estimates of the ranges of integer variables and array sizes so that efficient code can be generated and integer overflows avoided. The bound analyzer combines the bound consistency technique along with a widening operator to give fast time of solving program constraints and of converging to the fixed point. Several example programs are used to illustrate the bound analyzer algorithm and the program transformation.

text: Bound analysis for Whiley programs The Whiley compiler can generate naive C code, but the code is inefficient because it uses infinite integers and dynamic array sizes. Our project goal is to build up a compiler that can translate Whiley programs into efficient OpenCL code with fixed-size integer types and fixed-size arrays, for parallel execution on GPUs. This paper presents an abstract interpretation-based bound inference approach along with symbolic analysis for Whiley programs. The source Whiley program is first analyzed by using our symbolic analyzer to find the matching pattern and make any necessary program transformation. Then the bound analyzer is used to analyze the transformed program to make use of primitive integer types rather than third-party infinite integer type (e.g. using GMP arbitrary precision library). The bound analysis results provide conservative estimates of the ranges of integer variables and array sizes so that efficient code can be generated and integer overflows avoided. The bound analyzer combines the bound consistency technique along with a widening operator to give fast time of solving program constraints and of converging to the fixed point. Several example programs are used to illustrate the bound analyzer algorithm and the program transformation.

year: 2015

title: Understanding 'the National Sport for New Zealand Women': A Socio-Spatial Analysis of Netball

authors: Marfell, Amy Elizabeth

subjects: Netball

abstract: Since the early 20th century, netball has been heralded ‘the national sport for New Zealand women’ and it continues to represent one of the few team sport environments not characterized by the interests and participation of men. Created by and for women, netball promotes and preserves a sense of women-onlyness. There is, however, a link between netball and femininity that has gone largely unexplored among contemporary studies of sport.
	This research focuses on the social production of netball space and the ongoing and complex relationship between netball and heteronormative femininity in New Zealand. Drawing upon interviews with 16 recreational players and ethnographic fieldwork conducted over two years, I examine how women experience, negotiate and challenge notions of gender, sexuality, corporeality and subjectivity in spaces of netball. Adopting a poststructural feminist interpretation of Henri Lefebvre’s spatial theory, I demonstrate how the relationship between women’s sporting bodies, space and social relations is mutually constituted.
In this thesis, I explain spaces of netball as reproducing and celebrating particular gendered and sexualized identities and thus, prioritizing a relatively narrow but culturally valued heteronormative feminine athletic ideal. Whilst some women enjoy and are empowered by the social conditions of this sport, the power relations operating on and through netball spaces can also work to subordinate and exclude alternative or ‘other’ femininities and bodies. Yet, as my research reveals, netball also offers opportunities for resistance as some netballers engage in oppositional politics and/or use this space to disrupt normative discourse. This is particularly evident in the ways some players resist the involvement of men, how mothers use netball space to obtain momentary reprieve from the expectations of motherhood, and how pregnant, ‘fat’ and older bodies challenge the discursive construction of the contemporary (feminine) athletic ideal via their participation in this sport. To this end, this research not only demonstrates the social geography of netball in the everyday lives of New Zealand women, but also the potential of theoretical syntheses between Lefebvre and feminism for offering productive new ways to think about the interrelationships between active bodies, identities, space, power and resistance in sport and female physical culture.

text: Understanding 'the National Sport for New Zealand Women': A Socio-Spatial Analysis of Netball Since the early 20th century, netball has been heralded ‘the national sport for New Zealand women’ and it continues to represent one of the few team sport environments not characterized by the interests and participation of men. Created by and for women, netball promotes and preserves a sense of women-onlyness. There is, however, a link between netball and femininity that has gone largely unexplored among contemporary studies of sport.
	This research focuses on the social production of netball space and the ongoing and complex relationship between netball and heteronormative femininity in New Zealand. Drawing upon interviews with 16 recreational players and ethnographic fieldwork conducted over two years, I examine how women experience, negotiate and challenge notions of gender, sexuality, corporeality and subjectivity in spaces of netball. Adopting a poststructural feminist interpretation of Henri Lefebvre’s spatial theory, I demonstrate how the relationship between women’s sporting bodies, space and social relations is mutually constituted.
In this thesis, I explain spaces of netball as reproducing and celebrating particular gendered and sexualized identities and thus, prioritizing a relatively narrow but culturally valued heteronormative feminine athletic ideal. Whilst some women enjoy and are empowered by the social conditions of this sport, the power relations operating on and through netball spaces can also work to subordinate and exclude alternative or ‘other’ femininities and bodies. Yet, as my research reveals, netball also offers opportunities for resistance as some netballers engage in oppositional politics and/or use this space to disrupt normative discourse. This is particularly evident in the ways some players resist the involvement of men, how mothers use netball space to obtain momentary reprieve from the expectations of motherhood, and how pregnant, ‘fat’ and older bodies challenge the discursive construction of the contemporary (feminine) athletic ideal via their participation in this sport. To this end, this research not only demonstrates the social geography of netball in the everyday lives of New Zealand women, but also the potential of theoretical syntheses between Lefebvre and feminism for offering productive new ways to think about the interrelationships between active bodies, identities, space, power and resistance in sport and female physical culture.

year: 2016

title: Dual cultural identity and tangihanga: Conflict, resolution and unexpected outcomes

authors: Edge, Kiri

subjects: bereavement

abstract: New Zealand has a significant number of dual-cultural whānau (families) which incorporate the identities of both Pākehā (New Zealander of European descent) and Māori (indigenous peoples of New Zealand). Little attention has been paid to the bereavement processes that will inevitably impact upon the lives of these whānau/families. As part of the Tangihanga Research Programme based at The University of Waikato, a directed study was conducted with a participant whose family/whānau included two life ways: Māori and Pākehā. An open-ended narrative approach was used to explore the participant’s bereavement after the death of his beloved wife. Two central themes emerged within the narrative, which related to conflict and eventual resolution. Decision-making processes and language played significant roles in the conflict experienced by the participant. Communication and compromise helped to resolve these conflicts. Unexpected outcomes included new understandings and strengthened connections between the participant and his wife’s marae.

text: Dual cultural identity and tangihanga: Conflict, resolution and unexpected outcomes New Zealand has a significant number of dual-cultural whānau (families) which incorporate the identities of both Pākehā (New Zealander of European descent) and Māori (indigenous peoples of New Zealand). Little attention has been paid to the bereavement processes that will inevitably impact upon the lives of these whānau/families. As part of the Tangihanga Research Programme based at The University of Waikato, a directed study was conducted with a participant whose family/whānau included two life ways: Māori and Pākehā. An open-ended narrative approach was used to explore the participant’s bereavement after the death of his beloved wife. Two central themes emerged within the narrative, which related to conflict and eventual resolution. Decision-making processes and language played significant roles in the conflict experienced by the participant. Communication and compromise helped to resolve these conflicts. Unexpected outcomes included new understandings and strengthened connections between the participant and his wife’s marae.

year: 2010