The politics of gift-giving and the provocation of Lars Von Trier's Dogville

In what follows, I wish to use the circumstances and dynamics of the nocturnal scene of destruction at the Old Mill and the subsequent scene of carnage at the house of Chuck and Vera in Dogville as a springboard for developing some reflections on the ‘politics of gift-giving’, and the relationship between friendship and hostility in the exchange of social goods. The term ‘springboard’ is no doubt too vague, here, because I intend to approach the two scenes, and the film as a whole, as a radical provocation, thus distinguishing my approach from the traditional methodology of ‘application’, in which a work of art is used in order to exemplify a certain theoretical construction. As it happens, ‘provocation vs. illustration’ in itself constitutes one of the key ‘moral’ antagonisms of von Trier’s film and, as I shall argue, it is the dogged determination of Tom Edison Jr. (Paul Bettany), the town’s amateur-philosopher, moral lecturer and self-crowned “miner of the human soul”, to illustrate the human problem and his failure to be provoked which brings unrest to the township of Dogville and which finally makes it go to the dogs

Assigning English change ringing patterns (permutation) in acoustic and EA music.

Change Ringing has been developed in English church towers since the 16th century. The number of towers in England dominates other countries in the British Isles - hence English, rather than British Change Ringing. Strangely, it occurred in few places other than former British colonies. Bells have provided symbolic and cultural messages for civilisations throughout the centuries. They can provide signals and important information (someone’s coming, bring out your dead…). Composers’ have used bells for a corresponding amount of time, whether it is to investigate the spectral content (the very sound of a bell) or the envelope or pattern created through a peal of bells (Sir Peter Maxwell-Davies [1], Sir Harrison Birtwistle and Anthony Gilbert most notably in the 20th and 21st Centuries). Permutations found in English Change Ringing Patterns can be very beautiful as a pure selfcontained logical entity. They are not rung to sound a melody but rather create different mathematical patterns using the permutations on the set of available bells. This paper discusses a variety of applications within musical composition

Fine Grained Component Engineering of Adaptive Overlays: Experiences and Perspectives

Recent years have seen significant research being carried out into peer-to-peer (P2P) systems. This work has focused on the styles and applications of P2P computing, from grid computation to content distribution; however, little investigation has been performed into how these systems are built. Component based engineering is an approach that has seen successful deployment in the field of middleware development; functionality is encapsulated in ‘building blocks’ that can be dynamically plugged together to form complete systems. This allows efficient, flexible and adaptable systems to be built with lower overhead and development complexity. This paper presents an investigation into the potential of using component based engineering in the design and construction of peer-to-peer overlays. It is highlighted that the quality of these properties is dictated by the component architecture used to implement the system. Three reusable decomposition architectures are designed and evaluated using Chord and Pastry case studies. These demonstrate that significant improvements can be made over traditional design approaches resulting in much more reusable, (re)configurable and extensible systems

Auditory training records for the preschool deaf and severely hard of hearing.

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston University 2 disk recordings. In Audio-Visual Library

Plate and faults boundary detection using gravity disturbance and Bouguer gravity anomaly from space geodesy

Nowadays, satellite technology has developed significantly. Geodesy satellites such as Grace and Grace-FO can be used for subsurface mapping. The mapping is in the form of detection of the plate details, faults, and regional geodynamic conditions. This study aims to detect plate and faults from space geodesy using the gravity disturbance and Bouguer gravity anomaly parameter. The study area is in the Sunda Strait. Gravity disturbance is one of the gravity model parameters. Gravity disturbance is the gravitational potential of the topography expressed by the spherical harmonic model and the topographic effect by Barthelmes's calculations. Gravity disturbance can visualize subsurface conditions. Bouguer gravity anomaly is needed to get the condition on subsurface objects. This parameter visualizes subsurface conditions in the form of rocks and non-rocks. These conditions can distinguish oceanic crust and continental crust. Gravity contours are needed to obtain plate and faults predictions. The results obtained are validated patterns and shapes with plate and faults secondary data. The tolerance used in this validation is 80%. The gravity disturbance parameter obtained a value of 83% in verifying the accuracy of assessment in plate and faults detection. The Bouguer gravity disturbance parameter obtained a verification value of accuracy assessment in plate detection but 65% in faults detection. This accuracy assessment uses pattern and texture parameters in detecting the similarity of two or more images. This plate and faults detection results are more detailed and can be used for geophysical, geological, earthquake, and earth dynamics applications

Deaf-blind children and rhythm development: suggestions for a beginning program.

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit

Fish assemblages and indicator species: reef fishes off the southeastern United States

For many fish stocks, resource management cannot be based on stock assessment because data are insufficient-a situation that requires alternative approaches to management. One possible approach is to manage data-limited stocks as part of an assemblage and to determine the status of the entire unit by a data-rich indicator species. The utility of this approach was evaluated in analyses of 15 years of commercial and 34 years of recreational logbook data from reef fisheries off the southeastern United States coast. Multivariate statistical analyses successfully revealed three primary assemblages. Within assemblages, however, there was little evidence of synchrony in population dynamics of member species, and thus, no support for the use of indicator species. Nonetheless, assemblages could prove useful as management units. Their identification offers opportunities for implementing management to address such ecological considerations as bycatch and species interrelations