Precarity and resistance: Mediating home across contemporary Europe through the short hybrid film

Addressing an increasingly globalised housing crisis, European filmmakers have turned their attention to the precarity of home, generating a vast mediascape of activist documentaries, essay films, shorts, and some features. Adopting a film and urbanism approach, in this article I take a specific focus on the short film form, framing it as a space for experimentation, and offering a snapshot of a wider transnational corpus of media. I compare two 2019 short films by two emerging women artists: British Ayo Akingbade’s Dear Babylon and Portuguese Leonor Teles Dogs Barking at Birds (Cães Que Ladram Aos Pássaros). These artists’ works establish film as a form of resistance while, at the same time, being rooted in an understanding of socio-economic inequality in housing. Purposedly merging observational, participatory methods with the fictional, these two films share a focus on young people in uncertain living conditions. Grappling with their individual situations the youth at the centre of these stories build forms of resistance to their present housing struggles in the attempt to shape a better future for themselves and their community

Framing transformative change

Key messages: Transformative change is a fundamental, system-wide reorganisation across technological, economic and social factors, including paradigms and goals, and valuing the climate, the environment, equity and wellbeing within decision making (IPBES, 2018; IPCC, 2018). If Ireland is to achieve its goals under the national climate objective, the Paris Agreement and the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, transformations will be necessary in the energy, food and land systems, urban systems (including planning, transport and buildings), livelihoods, lifestyles, development pathway, systems of governance and in participation. A clear long-term vision and plan for the transformation of each system will accelerate short-term action and enhance synergies while minimising and managing trade-offs and realising the benefits of transformative change.The decisions and actions taken this decade will reverberate for generations. Much of the groundwork for action has been lain and most technologies and solutions are already available. However, climate action is not occurring quickly enough: opportunities and benefits are being missed and the possibility of shaping a better future for all is being put at risk by not taking a holistic and systemic approach to change. Action needs to be scaled up and accelerated. An incremental approach will not deliver what is required. If Ireland is to address the scale, speed and depth of the change required to close the gap between ambition and action, an approach that focuses on rapid and systemic transformations is necessary. Equity is an important societal goal and an essential element of achieving transformative change both in terms of mitigation and adaptation to climate change. Including considerations of equity at the core of decision making is key to enabling transformative change that enhances living standards, while halving associated energy demand, reducing vulnerability and proactively preparing individuals, households, communities and systems for climate shocks. Climate change and biodiversity loss share many underlying drivers. These underlying drivers need to be addressed if Ireland is to achieve its national and international commitments. Just as the drivers of these crises are linked so too are the solutions. A long-term integrated strategic plan is necessary to drive action in the immediate and short terms, but also to deliver a strong signal on the direction of travel towards a climate-neutral, climate-resilient, biodiverse and sustainable future. Such a plan can leverage greater benefits and opportunities, now and in the future

Towards a better understanding of energy poverty

Energy poverty can manifest itself in households unable, for reasons of access and/or affordability, to source clean energy for necessities such as heat, light, cooling, cooking, and appliance use, or having to use an excessive portion of their disposable income to provide these essentials. Developing more effective responses to this social challenge necessitates a deeper appreciation of energy poverty and the different ways in which it manifests. While there has been some arguing for the importance of appreciating the lived experience of the energy poor, much of the literature on energy poverty has tended to be quantitative in nature. Work within the EnergyMeasures project identified a gap between the macro- and meso-level analysis of energy poverty and the identification of individual energy poor households. Energy poverty is fundamentally a human condition. The various definitions of energy poverty speak of people being unable to access or afford sufficient energy to meet their basic service needs

Freedom of association under the treaties of the United Nations: A right of intrinsic or instrumental value?

Although included within a number of United Nations instruments, the right to freedom of association is principally enshrined within Article 22 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and has been developed within the jurisdiction of the Human Rights Committee (the Committee). Whilst this right has been the subject of significant commentary by the Special Rapporteur on freedom of peaceful assembly and association (the Special Rapporteur) and of numerous resolutions of the Human Rights Council (the Council), the Committee’s engagement with Article 22 ICCPR has been sparse. Despite calls from the Special Rapporteur, the right to freedom of association is yet to receive a General Comment. Notwithstanding a paucity of jurisprudence, this article seeks to outline the contours of the right to freedom of association as protected by the UN treaties. Part II analyses the scope of the protections afforded, restrictions permitted, and positive obligations imposed by Article 22. Part III explores the interaction and interdependencies between the right to freedom of association and other provisions of the ICCPR. Part IV discusses the rational underpinnings of the right to freedom of association. Although freedom of association appears to lie ‘in the overlapping zone between civil and political rights’, the comparative analysis adopted in this article suggests that the Human Rights Committee and other UN bodies have disproportionately framed Article 22 in terms of its political and systemic significance, and have neglected to develop a philosophical basis for the right deriving from its inherent value to the human person. Whereas comparable rights have been framed as ‘fundamental’, ‘intrinsic’, and ‘indispensable for the full development of the person’, freedom of association remains cast in terms of its instrumental function in buttressing political pluralism, bolstering accountability, and facilitating the myriad of ‘purposes and principles of the United Nations’

Early life exposure of infants to benzylpenicillin and gentamicin is associated with a persistent amplification of the gut resistome

Background Infant gut microbiota is highly malleable, but the long-term longitudinal impact of antibiotic exposure in early life, together with the mode of delivery on infant gut microbiota and resistome, is not extensively studied. Methods Two hundred and eight samples from 45 infants collected from birth until 2 years of age over five time points (week 1, 4, 8, 24, year 2) were analysed. Based on shotgun metagenomics, the gut microbial composition and resistome profile were compared in the early life of infants divided into three groups: vaginal delivery/no-antibiotic in the first 4 days of life, C-section/no-antibiotic in the first 4 days of life, and C-section/antibiotic exposed in first 4 days of life. Gentamycin and benzylpenicillin were the most commonly administered antibiotics during this cohort’s first week of life. Results Newborn gut microbial composition differed in all three groups, with higher diversity and stable composition seen at 2 years of age, compared to week 1. An increase in microbial diversity from week 1 to week 4 only in the C-section/antibiotic-exposed group reflects the effect of antibiotic use in the first 4 days of life, with a gradual increase thereafter. Overall, a relative abundance of Actinobacteria and Bacteroides was significantly higher in vaginal delivery/no-antibiotic while Proteobacteria was higher in C-section/antibiotic-exposed infants. Strains from species belonging to Bifidobacterium and Bacteroidetes were generally persistent colonisers, with Bifidobacterium breve and Bifidobacterium bifidum species being the major persistent colonisers in all three groups. Bacteroides persistence was dominant in the vaginal delivery/no-antibiotic group, with species Bacteroides ovatus and Phocaeicola vulgatus found to be persistent colonisers in the no-antibiotic groups. Most strains carrying antibiotic-resistance genes belonged to phyla Proteobacteria and Firmicutes, with the C-section/antibiotic-exposed group presenting a higher frequency of antibiotic-resistance genes (ARGs). Conclusion These data show that antibiotic exposure has an immediate and persistent effect on the gut microbiome in early life. As such, the two antibiotics used in the study selected for strains (mainly Proteobacteria) which were multiple drug-resistant (MDR), presumably a reflection of their evolutionary lineage of historical exposures—leading to what can be an extensive and diverse resistome

Home as survival: Seeing Queer archival lives

As a teenager in the eighties, French filmmaker Sébastien Lifshitz scoured flea markets for amateur photographs. In 2013, he assembled a book titled The Invisibles comprised of snapshots depicting queer lives. He included a pair of Kodachrome images, which replicate a near-identical domestic scene in the 1960s: two aging women in their bourgeois home sit at a table, embracing as they look at the camera. Taking as a point of departure these personal photographs, this article focuses on two documentaries that queer postwar domesticity: Lifshitz’s The Invisibles (2011) and Magnus Gertten’s Nelly and Nadine (2022). In his film, Lifshitz not only includes postwar snapshots and home movies, but also reinvents the amateur dispositif. He interviews queer aging men and women inside their homes, challenging social exclusion and stigma based on gender nonconformity and aging. In Nelly and Nadine, a sexagenarian named Sylvie retrieves home movies from her attic that uncover a lesbian love story between her grandmother Nelly and a fellow survivor of Ravensbrück named Nadine. Decades later, the centrality of the domestic space and the amateur archive in these two documentaries offers a lesson in seeing the home as survival and unlearning the master narratives of the postwar era

Proprietary estoppel and inheritance: Enough is enough?

In recent years, as illustrated by Thorner v Major (2009) UKHL 18, the law of proprietary estoppel has become more favourable to claimants in the inheritance context. Focusing on two recent English Court of Appeal decisions, Suggitt v Suggitt (2012) EWCA Civ 1140 and Bradbury v Taylor (2012) EWCA Civ 1208, this article questions whether the courts are being too generous – both in terms of the type of representation that can form the basis of a claim and in terms of the extent of the remedy afforded to a successful claimant. The article also reflects on the role of the appellate courts in cases of this nature

Nebulised delivery of RNA formulations to the lungs: From aerosol to cytosol

In the past decade RNA-based therapies such as small interfering RNA (siRNA) and messenger RNA (mRNA) have emerged as new and ground-breaking therapeutic agents for the treatment and prevention of many conditions from viral infection to cancer. Most clinically approved RNA therapies are parenterally administered which impacts patient compliance and adds to healthcare costs. Pulmonary administration via inhalation is a non-invasive means to deliver RNA and offers an attractive alternative to injection. Nebulisation is a particularly appealing method due to the capacity to deliver large RNA doses during tidal breathing. In this review, we discuss the unique physiological barriers presented by the lung to efficient nebulised RNA delivery and approaches adopted to circumvent this problem. Additionally, the different types of nebulisers are evaluated from the perspective of their suitability for RNA delivery. Furthermore, we discuss recent preclinical studies involving nebulisation of RNA and analysis in in vitro and in vivo settings. Several studies have also demonstrated the importance of an effective delivery vector in RNA nebulisation therefore we assess the variety of lipid, polymeric and hybrid-based delivery systems utilised to date. We also consider the outlook for nebulised RNA medicinal products and the hurdles which must be overcome for successful clinical translation. In summary, nebulised RNA delivery has demonstrated promising potential for the treatment of several lung-related conditions such as asthma, COPD and cystic fibrosis, to which the mode of delivery is of crucial importance for clinical success

Are these the 5 best literary video games of all time?

Literary games appeal because they present the player with a radically new type of storytelling