Beauty as Pride: A Function of Agency

This is basically a paper about artistic evaluation and how multiple interpretations can give rise to inconsistent and conflicting meanings. Images like Joel-Peter Witkin’s First Casting for Milo (2004) challenge the viewer to look closely, understand the formal properties at work, and then extract a meaning that ultimately asks, Is the model exploited or empowered? Is Karen Duffy, pictured here, vulnerable and “enfreaked” or is she potentially subversive, transgressive, and perhaps self-empowered? I will offer an argument in agreement with artist/author/ performer Ann Millett-Gallant that favors the latter interpretation, but will augment and complicate the issue by also introducing a pointed question or two taken from a recent analysis by Cynthia Freeland on objectification. I judge the works by photographer Joel-Peter Witkin to be representations of disabled persons who are empowered through agency and pride, but I also worry about the risk of multiple, conflicting interpretations on the part of viewers who do not, or cannot, entertain such enlightened readings. Like second wave feminist views about pornography that depicted women in demeaning ways, or feminist critiques of Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party , Witkin’s photos can be judged as potentially offensive. But they are also objects of beauty—both in terms of aesthetic properties (they are magnificent studies in black and white, shadows, the human body, with many classical references) and because of the feeling of beauty and pride felt by the posers, who become performers of their own beauty and pride. I argue that beauty trumps offensiveness. Pride wins. But I’m not sure that everyone will agree

Hapke-based computational method to enable unmixing of hyperspectral data of common salts

© 2018, The Author(s). Environmental scientists are currently assessing the ability of hyper-spectral remote sensing to detect, identify, and analyze natural components, including minerals, rocks, vegetation and soil. This paper discusses the use of a nonlinear reflectance model to distinguish multicomponent particulate mixtures. Analysis of the data presented in this paper shows that, although the identity of the components can often be found from diagnostic wavelengths of absorption bands, the quantitative abundance determination requires knowledge of the complex refractive indices and average particle scattering albedo, phase function and size. The present study developed a method for spectrally unmixing halite and gypsum combinations. Using the known refractive indexes of the components, and with the assistance of Hapke theory and Legendre polynomials, the authors develop a method to find the component particle sizes and mixing coefficients for blends of halite and gypsum. Material factors in the method include phase function parameters, bidirectional reflectance, imaginary index, grain sizes, and iterative polynomial fitting. The obtained Hapke parameters from the best-fit approach were comparable to those reported in the literature. After the optical constants (n, the so-called real index of refraction and k, the coefficient of the imaginary index of refraction) are derived, and the geometric parameters are determined, single-scattering albedo (or ω) can be calculated and spectral unmixing becomes possible

Spectral properties of zero temperature dynamics in a model of a compacting granular column

The compacting of a column of grains has been studied using a one-dimensional Ising model with long range directed interactions in which down and up spins represent orientations of the grain having or not having an associated void. When the column is not shaken (zero 'temperature') the motion becomes highly constrained and under most circumstances we find that the generator of the stochastic dynamics assumes an unusual form: many eigenvalues become degenerate, but the associated multi-dimensional invariant spaces have but a single eigenvector. There is no spectral expansion and a Jordan form must be used. Many properties of the dynamics are established here analytically; some are not. General issues associated with the Jordan form are also taken up.Comment: 34 pages, 4 figures, 3 table

Interactive Nutrition Curriculum for College Students

The demand for nutrition services has increased in the past year at Georgia State University. Group classes would be an efficient way to educate larger groups of students at once rather than providing one on one attention, which requires more employees. This interactive nutrition curriculum is informed by best practices shown in the literature and student interests. Six modules rooted in social cognitive theory have been developed to increase knowledge and improve self-efficacy and behavioral capability for healthy eating patterns among college students at Georgia State. The curriculum promotes reflection and personalized goal setting with the intention of advancing students through the stages of change model. Topics include MyPlate guidelines, how to eat healthy on a budget, meal planning, label reading, healthy dining-out options, and basic cooking skills. The use of this curriculum has great potential to enhance the existing services of the GSU Counseling Center, add value to PantherDining, and meet the needs of students

Traditional food processing practices of oats (Avena sativa) and its contribution to food security in Gozamin District of northwest Ethiopia

Oat is one of the cereal crops in Ethiopia, which is less recognized in terms of its food value and productivity. It is grown and utilized as a staple food only in a specific part of the country. The objective of this study was to assess the food significance of oat and document associated traditional food knowledge of the crop in Gozamin district, Northwest part of Ethiopia. Data were collected using a semi-structured questionnaire, focus group discussion and key informant interviews. Secondary data collected from Gozamin agriculture development offices and research centers were used to support our results. A total of 388 households participated in this cross-sectional study. Data were edited, coded, entered and analyzed using SPSS for windows version 20.0. The results of this study affirmed that 97.2% of the producers cultivated oat every year and high rainfall is the suitable weather condition for its production. As per the results of this study, oat is tolerant to acidic and marginally fertile soils where other plants do not grow and yield well. As compared to other conventional cereal crops, 85% of the participants of the study reported that the cultivation of oat does not require extensive farming and can be produced with minimum inputs. The entire population of respondents (100%) reported that oat grain was used as food. Almost all the respondents (99.2%) utilized oat as their staple crop for their families. Oat ranked first in terms of consumption at household level as compared to other cereal crops (tef, maize, wheat, and barley). In the district, oat is processed into different food types and beverages including injera, kitta/anababiro, gruel, porridge, enket, and local alcoholic drinks, tella. Oat is rarely used to prepare porridge and local alcoholic beverages as compared to other cereal-based staple food types. Porridge and local alcoholic beverages are commonly prepared for special occasions and on holidays. Oat is a less known crop in specific locations but could contribute to enhancing food diversity options to improve food and nutrition security efforts in the country

The FRUIT : food, fertility, fascination

Sensulato, and botanically speaking, fruit is an assemblage of standard components intended for the reproduction of a plant organism. A fruit holds the seed(s) destined to produce a new generation, irrespective of its edible qualities (Bell,1998). Fruit, in the widest and yet most basic context, is nothing but a ripened ovary with seed structures attached to it (Harris & Harris, 2001), and by this virtue both conception and cradle of new life

Genetic control of plasticity of oil yield for combined abiotic stresses using a joint approach of crop modeling and genome-wide association

Understanding the genetic basis of phenotypic plasticity is crucial for predicting and managing climate change effects on wild plants and crops. Here, we combined crop modeling and quantitative genetics to study the genetic control of oil yield plasticity for multiple abiotic stresses in sunflower. First we developed stress indicators to characterize 14 environments for three abiotic stresses (cold, drought and nitrogen) using the SUNFLO crop model and phenotypic variations of three commercial varieties. The computed plant stress indicators better explain yield variation than descriptors at the climatic or crop levels. In those environments, we observed oil yield of 317 sunflower hybrids and regressed it with three selected stress indicators. The slopes of cold stress norm reaction were used as plasticity phenotypes in the following genome-wide association study. Among the 65,534 tested SNP, we identified nine QTL controlling oil yield plasticity to cold stress. Associated SNP are localized in genes previously shown to be involved in cold stress responses: oligopeptide transporters, LTP, cystatin, alternative oxidase, or root development. This novel approach opens new perspectives to identify genomic regions involved in genotype-by-environment interaction of a complex traits to multiple stresses in realistic natural or agronomical conditions.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures, Plant, Cell and Environmen