4,973 research outputs found
Theater and Nation in Contemporary Malaysia: The Work of the Five Arts Centre
How does theater interrogate a nation that preaches racial harmony, on the one hand, yet practices racial inequality, on the other? Focusing on the work of the Five Arts Centre, an artistic company in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, this paper finds that this interrogation takes place on the symbolic plane of words, images, movement, and sound, all of which cohere in performances that offer middle-class audiences alternative scenarios of a pluralistic Malaysia.  Its intent is to destabilize the state’s policies on racial privileging and political suppression, to create a space for free discourse, and to advocate a pluralistic Malaysia. To do so, however, requires a social movement organization to espouse a frame of action that fuses performance and commentary, and to support this work by building and mobilizing resources, among them networks, financial resources, and political leverage. But the Five Arts Centre’s focus, since its founding in 1983, largely remains with the Malaysian middle class. To reach out to economically disadvantaged groups, if deemed necessary, will challenge the collective’s creativity as it continues to construct a more inclusive Malaysia
Efficiency of encounter-controlled reaction between diffusing reactants in a finite lattice: topology and boundary effects
The role of dimensionality (Euclidean versus fractal), spatial extent,
boundary effects and system topology on the efficiency of diffusion-reaction
processes involving two simultaneously-diffusing reactants is analyzed. We
present numerically-exact values for the mean time to reaction, as gauged by
the mean walklength before reactive encounter, obtained via application of the
theory of finite Markov processes, and via Monte Carlo simulation. As a general
rule, we conclude that for sufficiently large systems, the efficiency of
diffusion-reaction processes involving two synchronously diffusing reactants
(two-walker case) relative to processes in which one reactant of a pair is
anchored at some point in the reaction space (one walker plus trap case) is
higher, and is enhanced the lower the dimensionality of the system. This
differential efficiency becomes larger with increasing system size and, for
periodic systems, its asymptotic value may depend on the parity of the lattice.
Imposing confining boundaries on the system enhances the differential
efficiency relative to the periodic case, while decreasing the absolute
efficiencies of both two-walker and one walker plus trap processes. Analytic
arguments are presented to provide a rationale for the results obtained. The
insights afforded by the analysis to the design of heterogeneous catalyst
systems are also discussed.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figures, uses revtex4, accepted for publication in
Physica
Los alfares arandinos
En número dedicado a: La provincia de Burgo
Didactic strategies for comprehension and learning of structural concepts
p. 926-937In previous papers we have established the convenience of formulating educational
strategies at the university level for both disciplines: Civil Engineering and Architecture,
which involves academic topics of mutual interest by means of shared practices. As a
particular matter of this approach, the application of physical experimental models is
considered of special usefulness, in order to understand in better ways the performance of materials and structural systems.
Several strategies of selection and development of such physical models will be discussed in this work, considering as a first step, the establishment of its correspondence with the different levels of structural complexity studied in curriculum plan: statics, strength of materials and structural design, among others.
This task constitutes a part of the work program of the Laboratory of Structural Models,
which is an academic project that develops and applies different didactic prototypes to
structure courses in the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, campus Azcapotzalco, in
Mexico City, project we have already presented in recent forums.
Two different modes of application are implemented in classroom sessions and in
structures workshop: the devices for functional demonstration of typical cases of structural work as well as the experimentation with student's own designs of destructible models where certain typologies are tested up to its failure limit.
The first one allows teachers to explain adequately the theoretical principles and formulas
(that usually are expressed on the blackboard) by means of didactic models identified in
accordance to specific cases of the curriculum on variable level of complexity. This kind of practice allows the students of architecture and civil engineering to realize in better ways the possibilities of use and application of the different structural typologies. Such
experimental models are part of more than fifty devices of the Laboratory's catalog.
In the same sense, the possibility of observation of structural work of their own
architectural designs, allows future professionals to achieve a better conception of the
structural solutions that affect positively their designs. Based on specific predefined guides, the students develop their own architectural-structural projects and subject them to diverse loads, observing their behavior under the influence of variable stresses leading up the experiment to its last resistance.
From both experiences a significant learning is obtained for the student's formation and
training, who will be capable in his future professional work to use better tools of
comprehension of the structural concepts applied to architecture as well as of increasing his conscience of the benefits and convenience of multidisciplinary work.Moreno, C.; Abad, A.; Gerdingh, JG.; Garcia M., C.; Gonzalez C., O. (2010). Didactic strategies for comprehension and learning of structural concepts. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/695
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