Writing Science Through Critical Thinking

Written and extensively class tested with NSF/NIH support, this timely and useful text addresses a crucial need which is acknowledged in most universities and colleges. It is the need for students to learn to write in the context of their field of study; in this case science. Although numerous how to writing books have been published, few, if any, address the central pedagogical issues underlying the process of learning to think and write scientifically. The direct connection between this writing skill and that of critical thinking is developed with engaging style by the author, an English professor. Moriarty\u27s book is an invaluable guide for both undergraduate and graduate science students. In the process of learning the specific requirements of organization demanded by scientific writing, students will develop strategies for thinking through their scientific research, well before they sit down to write. This instructive text will be useful to students who need to satisfy a science writing proficiency requirement in the context of a science course, a course in technical writing, advanced composition, or writing for the profession.https://digitalcommons.hollins.edu/facbooks/1047/thumbnail.jp

My responsibility in the face of mass extinction

Extinction is the “irreversible condition of a species or other group of organisms having no living representatives in the wild, which follows the death of the last surviving individual of that species or group” (Hine and Martin 2015g, para. 1). Mass extinctions are extinctions of the greatest magnitude, occurring “when many diverse groups of organisms become extinct over short periods of time” (Condie 2011, 250). These “are not step-events but rather a step into a prolonged alternative global ecosystem state” (Hull 2015, R941). Five mass extinctions have previously been recorded. A sixth has begun. Humans are the cause of the latest episode. This thesis develops an Indigenous, non-agential conception of responsibility for considering an ethical problem of wide consequence. Founded in mātauranga Māori and recalling the work of Emmanuel Levinas, it applies Kaupapa Māori autoethnography, narrative, and conceptual analyses alongside exegeses and a replication study. Investigations of responsibility across various positions are encountered: those found in place and polity, those made as visitor and the commanded, those gifted as inherited erudition and in the suffering-with. Now facing the last structural violence, what is my responsibility

Play Among Books

How does coding change the way we think about architecture? Miro Roman and his AI Alice_ch3n81 develop a playful scenario in which they propose coding as the new literacy of information. They convey knowledge in the form of a project model that links the fields of architecture and information through two interwoven narrative strands in an “infinite flow” of real books

‘Determined to be Weird’: British Weird Fiction before Weird Tales

Weird fiction is a mode in the Gothic lineage, cognate with horror, particularly associated with the early twentieth-century pulp writing of H. P. Lovecraft and others for Weird Tales magazine. However, the roots of the weird lie earlier and late-Victorian British and Edwardian writers such as Arthur Machen, Count Stenbock, M. P. Shiel, and John Buchan created varyingly influential iterations of the mode. This thesis is predicated on an argument that Lovecraft’s recent rehabilitation into the western canon, together with his ongoing and arguably ever-increasing impact on popular culture, demands an examination of the earlier weird fiction that fed into and resulted in Lovecraft’s work. Although there is a focus on the literary fields of the fin de siècle and early twentieth century, by tracking the mutable reputations and critical regard of these early exponents of weird fiction, this thesis engages with broader contextual questions of cultural value and distinction; of notions of elitism and popularity, tensions between genre and literary fiction, and the high/low cultural divide allegedly precipitated by Modernism

‘Determined to be Weird’: British Weird Fiction before Weird Tales

Weird fiction is a mode in the Gothic lineage, cognate with horror, particularly associated with the early twentieth-century pulp writing of H. P. Lovecraft and others for Weird Tales magazine. However, the roots of the weird lie earlier and late-Victorian British and Edwardian writers such as Arthur Machen, Count Stenbock, M. P. Shiel, and John Buchan created varyingly influential iterations of the mode. This thesis is predicated on an argument that Lovecraft’s recent rehabilitation into the western canon, together with his ongoing and arguably ever-increasing impact on popular culture, demands an examination of the earlier weird fiction that fed into and resulted in Lovecraft’s work. Although there is a focus on the literary fields of the fin de siècle and early twentieth century, by tracking the mutable reputations and critical regard of these early exponents of weird fiction, this thesis engages with broader contextual questions of cultural value and distinction; of notions of elitism and popularity, tensions between genre and literary fiction, and the high/low cultural divide allegedly precipitated by Modernism

Spaces of Appearance: Writings on Contemporary Theatre and Performance

This thesis, a collection of previously published materials, reflects a plural and evolving engagement with theatre and performance over the past fifteen years or so: as researcher, writer, editor, teacher, practitioner, spectator. These have rarely been discreet categories for me, but rather different modalities of exploration and enquiry, interrelated spaces encouraging dynamic connectivities, flows and further questions. Section 1 offers critical accounts of the practices of four contemporary theatre directors: Jerzy Grotowski, Robert Wilson, Peter Brook and Ariane Mnouchkine. Section 2 draws on elements of contemporary philosophy and critical thinking to explore the mutable parameters of performance. lt proposes performative mappings of certain unpredictable, energetic events 'in proximity of performance', to borrow Matthew Goulish's phrase: contact, fire, animals, alterity, place. Section 3 contains examples of documentation of performance practices, including a thick description of a mise en scene of a major international theatre production, reflections on process, training and dramaturgy, a performance text with a framing dramaturgical statement, and personal perspectives on particular collaborations. The external Appendix comprises a recently published collection of edited and translated materials concerning five core collaborative projects realised by Ariane Mnouchkine and the Theatre du Soleil at their base in the Cartoucherie de Vincennes, Paris. The core concerns of this thesis include attempts to think through: • the working regimes, poetics and pedagogies of certain directors, usually in collaborative devising contexts within which the creative agency of performers is privileged; • the processes and micro-politics of collaboration, devising, and dramaturgical composition; the dramaturgical implications of trainings, narrative structures, spaces, mise en scene, and of images as multi-layered, dynamic 'fields'; • the predicament and agency of spectators in diverse performance contexts, and the ways in which spectatorial roles are posited or constructed by dramaturgies; • the imbrication of embodiment, movement and perception in performance, and the plurality of modes of perception; • the critical and political functions of theatre and theatre criticism as cultural/social practice and 'art of memory' (de Certeau), of dramaturgies as critical historiographies, and of theatre cultures (and identities) as plural, dynamic, and contested; • performance as concentrated space for inter-subjectivity and the flaring into appearance of the 'face-to-face' (Levinas); the possibility of ethical, 'response-able' encounter and exchange with another; identity as relational and in-process, alterity as productive event, the inter-personal as political; • the poetics and politics of what seems an unthinkable surplus (and constitutive 'outside') to the cognitive reach of many conventional frames and maps in theatre criticism and historiography; an exploration of acts of writing as performative propositions and provocations ('critical fictions') to think the event of meanings at/of the limits of knowledge and subjectivity. This partial listing of recurrent and evolving concerns within the thesis traces a trajectory in my evolution as a writer and thinker, a gradual displacement from the relatively 'solid ground' of theatre studies and theatre history towards more fluid and tentative articulations of the shifting 'lie of the land' in contemporary performance and philosophy. This trajectory reflects a growing fascination with present process, conditions, practices, perceptions 'in the middle', and ways of writing (about) performance as interactive and ephemeral event

Middle Scots humorous narrative verse

Examining diverse narrative poems in the Middle Scots literary tradition (c. 1450 -1590), the thesis explores the nature of medieval humour (risible tales, satires, parodies, etc.) in relation to genre, literary conventions, comic techniques, intended audience, and function (the moral or didactic purpose, the relationship between entertainment and edification), with special reference to the kind of narrative each poems represents, the many varieties of story or mimetic transcript. I argue for a distinction between stories (basically, character-determined plots) and what I call mimetic transcripts. Briefly, mimetic transcripts may have many or all of the appurtenances of stories (e.g. characters, dialogue, action, sequential episodes) but lack a distinct peripeteia and often anagnorisis. Many satires, dream - visions, burlesques, and song -like or "situational" poems (debates, complaints, laments, etc.) are mimetic transcripts; most fabliaux, comic romances, and fables- -even when incorporating satiric, parodic, or didactic materials --are stories. Narrative kind is closely bound up with a poet's purpose and techniques, and helps to account for poets' qualitative differences. For example, Henryson's major poems are all stories, broadly edifying. Dunbar and Lindsay almost never write stories but rather mimetic transcripts, which, usually peopled with characters who are animated by thematic instead of dramatic considerations, better lend themselves to topical satire. A large number of the extant humorous poems in Middle Scots are satiric mimetic transcripts

Play Among Books

How does coding change the way we think about architecture? Miro Roman and his AI Alice_ch3n81 develop a playful scenario in which they propose coding as the new literacy of information. They convey knowledge in the form of a project model that links the fields of architecture and information through two interwoven narrative strands in an “infinite flow” of real books

‘And who is my neighbor?’: reading animal ethics through the lens of the Good Samaritan

In this thesis I argue that the major philosophical arguments in the field of animal ethics, as it has developed in the twentieth century, are inadequate without a robust theological foundation. While these arguments for greater moral respect for animals have acquired some cultural purchase in relation to systematic abuses of animals in factory farming and some forms of hunting, they lack the resources for articulating the many complexities inherent in human relationships with other animals. These positions, expounded most prominently by Peter Singer and Tom Regan, seek to extend to animals the moral frames of earlier Enlightenment thinkers and are thus bound by the same concerns and constraints; they therefore do not sufficiently problematise the modern distinction between humans and other animals that has advanced the modern mistreatment of animals to a degree of systematic cruelty unknown in human history. I argue that the Christian tradition has richer resources for articulating human moral relationships with other animals – and for problematising the modern framing of the human-animal distinction – than these secular theories possess on their own. This is by no means the first theological foray into the field of animal ethics. Previous theological accounts, however, still work predominantly within the confines set by secular philosophers. For example, Andrew Linzey clearly articulates his concept of “Theos-rights” for animals from within the conceptual framework of deontological categories. I will argue instead that a richer theological account of human relationships with other animals can be made by embracing the foundational love ethic found in Christianity. The Christian category of neighborly love represents a normative moral position in its own right rather than a simple addition to or reinterpretation of earlier consequentialist or deontological accounts. Using the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37), I outline a theologically informed animal ethic in which animals are seen as potential neighbors. My argument proceeds in two stages. The first and largest section identifies and explores three themes key to interpreting the parable with a view toward animal ethics. First, I explore the theme of responsibility and employ the thought of Emil Brunner and Karl Barth in asking to what degree humans, as imago Dei, are responsible for their relationships with animals. Second, I argue for the importance of caring in human moral encounters with animals. Here, I explore the similarities and deficiencies of feminist theory in relation to the Christian concept of neighborly love. Third, I consider the moral relevance of nearness, or proximity, in human relationships with animals. Here, I outline the different responsibilities inherent in human relationships with wild, domestic working, and pet animals. After expounding these three themes, the second stage of my thesis employs them in critiquing two specific theological issues. I first compare the Christian concept of dominion over animals found in Genesis 1:28 with competing claims from Christian stewardship ethics and environmental land ethics. Then, primarily in conversation with Barth, I conclude with a discussion of the theological arguments for and against Christian vegetarianism