Genetic Glass Ceilings

As the world’s population rises to an expected ten billion in the next few generations, the challenges of feeding humanity and maintaining an ecological balance will dramatically increase. Today we rely on just four crops for 80 percent of all consumed calories: wheat, rice, corn, and soybeans. Indeed, reliance on these four crops may also mean we are one global plant disease outbreak away from major famine. In this revolutionary and controversial book, Jonathan Gressel argues that alternative plant crops lack the genetic diversity necessary for wider domestication and that even the Big Four have reached a “genetic glass ceiling”: no matter how much they are bred, there is simply not enough genetic diversity available to significantly improve their agricultural value. Gressel points the way through the glass ceiling by advocating transgenics—a technique where genes from one species are transferred to another. He maintains that with simple safeguards the technique is a safe solution to the genetic glass ceiling conundrum. Analyzing alternative crops—including palm oil, papaya, buckwheat, tef, and sorghum—Gressel demonstrates how gene manipulation could enhance their potential for widespread domestication and reduce our dependency on the Big Four. He also describes a number of ecological benefits that could be derived with the aid of transgenics. A compelling synthesis of ideas from agronomy, medicine, breeding, physiology, population genetics, molecular biology, and biotechnology, Genetic Glass Ceilings presents transgenics as an inevitable and desperately necessary approach to securing and diversifying the world's food supply

Discourse shifts in the translation of politically sensitive texts with relevance to English/Arabic media texts

Abstract unavailable please refer to PD

Kitchen sink dramas: women, modernity and space in Weimar Germany

This article uses historical evidence about the competing designs of kitchens in 1920s German social housing to argue that historians (and, to an extent, geographers) have overlooked the coercive capacity of space to compel certain forms of social relationship. Such has been the potency of the ‘cultural’ model in history and geography that the ‘material’ world has been cloaked by language and symbol. Bourgeois politicians, planners and reformers in 1920s Germany were not only compelled to think about domestic space for the poor for the first time, but had to actually produce the physical space if they wanted to make their ideologies ‘live’. This article also shows that if we disaggregate the space of the home into its constituent parts (rather than simply contrasting the private and the public realms), different gender ideologies could be designed into domestic space, forcing families to adopt ways of living and patterns of sociability according to the priorities of, variously, ‘Americanizers’, socialists, conservatives and liberals. The kitchen designs of Frankfurt are well known, but in fact those of Munich were probably more widespread, and so this work further serves to decentre the canon of Modernism which dominates much discussion of Weimar building

Culture or Canon? Critical Pedagogy and the Politics of Literacy

A review of Literacy: Reading the Word and the World, by Paulo Freire and Donaldo Macedo

Contested Notions of Irishness: Social integration and the multiple intersections of ethno-racial, religious, and national identities in Dublin, Ireland

This dissertation evaluates the contested notions of identity (e.g. ethno-racial, religious, and national) and the growing tensions between native-born Irish citizens and recently arrived immigrants living in the Republic of Ireland. Examining these political and cultural intersections broadens our geographic understandings by contributing to larger geographic literatures consisting of: the geographies of inclusion and exclusion; collective identity construction; sense of belonging; community – both real and imagined; small-scale human territoriality; (social) integration; religiosity; and, of course, notions of Irishness. Despite the significance of these geographic issues in contemporary society, there exists a considerable lacuna within the discipline of Geography as it relates to the study of the multiple intersections that exist between ethno-racial, religious, and national identities, and what this ultimately means in a society that is rapidly changing due to increased immigration. Consequently, this study addresses this absence within the literature and adds nuance and depth to contemporary understandings of these socio-spatial intersections. These topics will be examined through a case study conducted over the course of three years (2012-2014) at the Victory Christian Fellowship (VCF), a non-denominational and multicultural Christian church, and the surrounding South Dublin community where the church is located. The overarching framework of this dissertation centers on the social integration process of migrants and how the recent influx of large-scale immigration has rapidly transformed Ireland from the homogeneous monoculture it once was perceived to be into a heterogeneous multicultural society. While this research specifically investigates Irish identity, or more precisely, the contemporary conceptualizations and constructions of Irish identity, the issues and themes that are addressed have a broader application and significance when placed in a larger European context. The Republic of Ireland is not alone regarding the various social changes that are associated with a large increase of immigrants within a society. Similar contestations of identity are currently occurring throughout much of Europe and this has unfortunately resulted in an increase of xenophobic rhetoric accompanied by the ethno-racial discrimination and religious bigotry that are typically associated with it

Domestication of open educational resources by academics in an open distance e-learning institution of South Africa

The emergence of open educational resources has gained popularity and acceptance in higher education institutions and beyond the basic education sector. This brought a persisting shift in depending on information communication technologies for tuition and research provision. Information technology artifact was not treated in isolation to user perspective. The study established how academics accept, feel, perceive, and what skills, opportunities, challenges exist to hinder the domestication. The study context had no uniform guidelines or tools and policy in place for the domestication of open educational resources. The study adopted the exploratory approach guided by the interpretivism paradigm. The study employed Domestication theory. This study conducted in an heterogenous single case study, which is the open distance e-learning (University of South Africa). That was done for an in-depth investigation by relying on multi-methods for data triangulation such as semi-structured interviews, focus group interviews, document analysis, and actual artifact analysis. The total of participants were 52. The study found that most academics played a role in the domestication of open educational resources besides the minority who were unable. The experience and prior knowledge were found to be a factor hindering the domestication process. Open distance e-learning found to relevant space for open educational resources. Such institutions play a role in the adoption and development of open educational resources and mostly rely in information technology for tuition and research. Information technology infrastructure found to be an enabler and disabler in the domestication process. This study contribution to the world of knowledge is based on the theory and practice. Eight theoretical propositions were suggested. The study further contributed by extension of domestication theory as recommended two additional phases which are non-appropriation and dis-appropriation. The current proposed Domestication theory has five phases. Lastly, the study recommended the actual guidelines for adoption and development of open educational resources. This guideline can be adopted by higher education institutions by infusing them in policy development or for general guidance in actual adoption and developments

Arab Women in Translation : the Dynamics of Representation and the Construction of Alterity

Cette recherche examine la traduction et la réception en France, en Grande Bretagne et aux États-Unis de la littérature contemporaine d’expression arabe écrite par des femmes, afin de répondre à deux questions principales: comment les écrivaines provenant de pays arabes perdent-elles leur agentivité dans les processus de traduction et de réception? Et comment la traduction et la réception de leurs textes contribuent-elles à la construction d’une altérité arabe? Pour y répondre, l’auteure examine trois romans présentant des traits thématiques et formels très différents, à savoir Fawḍā al-Ḥawāss (1997) par Ahlem Mosteghanemi, Innahā Lundun Yā ‘Azīzī (2001) par Hanan al-Shaykh et Banāt al-Riyāḍ (2005) par Rajaa Alsanea. L’analyse, basée sur le modèle à trois dimensions de Norman Fairclough, vise à découvrir comment les écrivaines expriment leur agentivité à travers l’écriture, et quelles images elles projettent d’elles-mêmes et plus généralement des femmes dans leurs sociétés respectives. L’auteure se penche ensuite sur les traductions anglaise et française de chaque roman. Elle examine les déplacements qui s’opèrent principalement sur le plan de la texture et le plan pragma-sémiotique, et interroge en quoi ces déplacements ébranlent l’autorité des écrivaines. Enfin, une étude de la réception de ces traductions en France, en Grande Bretagne et aux États-Unis vient enrichir l’analyse textuelle. À cette étape, les critiques éditoriales et universitaires ainsi que les choix éditoriaux relatifs au paratexte sont scrutés de façon à mettre en lumière les processus décisionnels, les discours et les tropes sous-tendant la mise en marché et la consommation de ces traductions. L’analyse des originaux révèle tout d’abord qu’à travers leurs textes, les auteures sont des agentes actives de changement social. Elles s’insurgent, chacune à sa manière, contre les discours hégémoniques tant locaux qu’occidentaux, et (ré-)imaginent leurs sociétés et leurs nations. Ce faisant, elles se créent leur propre espace discursif dans la sphère publique. Toutefois, la thèse montre que dans la plupart des traductions, les discours dissidents sont neutralisés, l’agentivité et la subjectivité des écrivaines minées au profit d’un discours dominant orientaliste. Ce même discours semble sous-tendre la réception des romans en traduction. Dans ce discours réifiant, l’expression de la différence culturelle est inextricablement imbriquée dans l’expression de la différence sexuelle: la « femme arabe » est la victime d’une religion islamique et d’une culture arabe essentiellement misogynes et arriérées. L’étude suggère, cependant, que ce sont moins les interventions des traductrices que les décisions des éditeurs, le travail de médiation opéré par les critiques, et l’intérêt (ou le désintérêt) des universitaires qui influencent le plus la manière dont ces romans sont mis en marché et reçus dans les nouveaux contextes. L’auteure conclut par rappeler l’importance d’une éthique de la traduction qui transcende toute approche binaire et se fonde sur une lecture éthique des textes qui fait ressortir le lien entre la poétique et la politique. Enfin, elle propose une lecture basée sur la reconnaissance du caractère situé du texte traduit comme du sujet lisant/traduisant.The present research explores the translation and reception in France, the UK and the US of contemporary Arabic literature by women authors, with a view to answering two main questions that have gone largely unexplored within translation studies: how do women authors from Arab countries lose their agency and subjectivity in the process of translation? And how do the translation of their dissident writings contribute to the construction of an Arab alterity? To answer these questions, the research analyzes three Arabic novels authored by women, and chosen for their very different thematic and formal characteristics, namely Ahlem Mosteghanemi’s Fawḍā al-Ḥawāss (1997), Hanan al-Shaykh’s Innahā Lundun Yā ‘Azīzī (2001), and Rajaa Alsanea’s Banāt al-Riyāḍ (2005). Using Norman Fairclough’s three-dimensional model, the analysis aims to explore the way these authors express their agency through their texts, as well as the images they depict of themselves and of women, in general, in their respective societies/communities. The English and French translations of each novel are then compared to the original with a view to identifying patterns of textural and pragma-semiotic shifts in the translations, and gaining insight into how these shifts undermine the author’s voice and agency. Finally, the analysis moves to the various practices involved in the reception of these translations in the US, the UK and France. Publishers’ decisions, editorial reviews and academic discourse are investigated with a view to identifying patterns in publishers’ decision-making and shedding light on the discourses and tropes undergirding the reception and consumption of these translations in their target contexts. Analysis of the originals reveals that the authors act as agents of change through their texts. They contest, each in her own way, both local and Western dominant discourses, and (re)imagine their societies and nations in the process. In so doing, they carve out their own discursive spaces in the public sphere and open breaches for social change. However, the research shows that in several of the translations, the authors’ agency is undermined and their dissident discourses are backgrounded while an orientalist discourse is foregrounded. This same reifying discourse appears to underpin the reception of the novels in translation, as well. It is a reifying discourse wherein the representation of cultural difference seems to be inextricably imbricated in the representation of sexual difference: the “Arab woman” is (re)written as voiceless and powerless because of an Islamic religion and an Arab culture that are essentially misogynistic and backward. Nevertheless, analysis reveals that publishers’ decisions, reviewers mediation and scholarly interest (or disinterest) impinge upon the way these novels are received and consumed more significantly than do translators through their interventions. Finally, the research underscores the importance of an ethical translation that transcends binary approaches and highlights the link between the aesthetic and the political. It also proposes an ethics of reading based on awareness of the situatedness of both the translated text and the reading/translating subject