RECONSTRUCT THE IDENTITIES ON CULTURAL AND LANGUAGE TRANSITION IN TAIWAN

Since 1980s, the marriage pattern in Taiwan has had a huge change for a large number of female immigrants both from Southeast Asia and Mainland China started to immigrate to Taiwan. It is called “Marriage Migration.” Researches concerning female immigrant spouses’ homeland cultures and familial identities were seldom discussed; however, it is till recent years that the stories of those female immigrants were fully presented/ represented by means of various narratives. For instance, many films, photos, and the contexts exquisitely depict conflicts between female immigrants and their cross-cultural marriages, families, children and even their families of origin. There are three kinds of narratives in immigrants’ writing: oral/confessional narrative, textual narrative, and documentary films. The first is based on female immigrants’ description orally with their own languages and then being translated into Chinese, or they write with simple Chinese. For example, the Taiwanese female artist, Lulu Shur-tzy Hou, played as a medium in depicting seven female immigrant spouses by means of the firstperson monologue in her three episodes Look Toward the Other Side: Song of Asian Foreign Brides in Taiwan (2005-2009). These episodes probed into the question of spouses’ self-identity whilst living in an exotic place. Then, the Textual narrative tends to focus on the mother-daughter relationships and Pepe Wu’s three short stories in Moving Skirts will be discussed. It usually illustrates the mother figures with madness, aphasia, or also absence from home. All mothers are silent without voices. Finally, in the documentary films, Out/Marriage and Let’s not be Afraid display that women not only play as mothers, wives, daughter-in-laws, but as a defenders to protect their rights. This research will explore the following issues in female immigrants from Southeast Asia in Taiwan: (1) cultural and National identities; (2) motherhood and the mother-daughter relationships; (3) narrative writing. It will definitely provide a new perspective in Asian ethic and women’s writing and set up a landmark toward research possibilities of diasporic females studied by the approaches of displacement

Influence of commercial proteases on the proteolysis of enzyme modified cheese : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Technology in Food Technology at Massey University, Palmerston North, New Zealand

The influence of four commercial proteases, Protease A, Protease B, Protease C and a two enzyme blend Protease DE, on proteolysis in an enzyme modified cheese (EMC) base has been investigated. Also, a series of preliminary experiments to determine the basic characteristics of the four enzyme preparations in buffer systems has been undertaken. Generally, the exopeptidase activity of the four enzyme preparations was more stable than the endopeptidase activity of the preparations. The highest enzyme activity for all preparations was given at pH 6.5 and Protease B was found to be sensitive to chelating agents. In addition, Protease B was found to contain at least two exopeptidases. Residual protease activities in EMC using a 55% moisture cheese base were found to be 0.005%, 0.009%, 0.007% and 0.004% (w/v) for Protease A, Protease B, Protease C and Protease DE, respectively, following inactivation by heating at 95°C heating for 30 minutes. Under the same incubation conditions (0.15% enzyme at 40°C for 24 h), Protease DE gave greater proteolysis than the three other enzymes and Protease B was the weakest protease. EMC digestion with a combination of proteases was different from that obtained with individual proteases. The combinations of Protease A/Protease C, Protease DE/Protease C, Protease B/Protease C and Protease DE/Protease A showed that the higher the proportion of the former protease in the combinations, the higher the amounts of total amino acids produced in the EMC. The combinations of Protease A/Protease B and Protease B/Protease DE gave greater amounts of total amino acids with the ratio of each enzyme close to 50:50 than with the individual enzymes. With respect to the molecular mass distribution of peptides in the various EMC digestions, Protease DE produced the greatest amount of peptides of 3 or fewer residues and Protease C gave the greatest amount of more medium sized peptides with 11-20 residues. Compared with Protease C, Protease A was more efficient in giving small peptides, while Protease B gave the lowest levels of medium and small peptides, but a high level of free amino acids. In sensory testing, Protease DE produced EMC with a strong pungent and astringent flavour, Protease C gave bitterness, Protease A gave a sweet flavour at a low concentration but bitter flavours with a high concentration and Protease B produced more savoury flavour without bitterness

Getting healed from a globalised age : a study of the New Age Movement in Taiwan

The aim of this qualitative study of the New Age Movement (NAM) in Taiwan was to test the ideas about 'self-religion', 'reflexive modernisation' and 'globalisation' that underlie many sociological accounts of the New Age phenomena. It also explored the neglected issues of emotions and embodiment in New Age practices. By means of in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 40 participants in New Age activities, participant observation in two New Age courses about healing and documentary analysis, my project produced the following four conclusions. First, the characteristics of New Age spiritualities in Taiwan, such as 'spiritual but not religious' and 'transformational but not salvational', differ from those of the country's main religions and new religious groups. But many people in the NAM seek a new balance between 'tradition and modernity' or 'new age spiritualities and "old age" religions'. Second, changes in emotional states are critical for participants in New Age activities in terms of 'being healed' through a process of self-transformation. Participants experience emotional identification, display and experience, whilst also internalising a set of feeling rules based on the 'emotion ideology' of New Age spiritualities. Third, analysis of interviewees' biographical reconstructions of their experiences shows that the New Age can be regarded as an integral part of late modern society in Taiwan. Not only is the NAM mainly about self-reflexivity but it also influences the life politics of its followers. It can therefore serve as a source of 'alternative' expert knowledge in late-modern society. Fourth, the structure of the NAM in Taiwan can be described as a loose, web-like network. Furthermore, the globalised aspects of the movement cannot be regarded simply as an expression of 'Westernisation' or 'Americanisation', but should be properly understood as a process of 'parallel glocalization'. This thesis is an original combination of conceptual analysis, theoretical ideas and empirical investigation. Its main contributions are, on the one hand, to have integrated the New Age in Taiwan into theorising about late-modernity and globalisation and, on the other, to have placed emotions and healing at the center of the study of New Age activities

Top-quark flavor-changing tqZtqZ couplings and rare ΔF=1\Delta F=1 processes

We model-independently study the impacts of anomalous $tqZ$ couplings ($q=u,c$), which lead to the $t\to q Z$ decays, on low energy flavor physics. It is found that the $tuZ$-coupling effect can significantly affect the rare $K$ and $B$ decays, whereas the $tcZ$-coupling effect is small. Using the ATLAS's branching ratio (BR) upper bound of $BR(t\to uZ) < 1.7\times 10^{-4}$, the influence of the anomalous $tuZ$-coupling on the rare decays can be found as follows: (a) The contribution to the Kaon direct CP violation can be up to $Re(\epsilon'/\epsilon) \lesssim 0.8 \times 10^{-3}$; (b) $BR(K^+\to \pi^+ \nu \bar \nu) \lesssim 12 \times 10^{-11}$ and $BR(K_L \to \pi^0 \nu\bar \nu)\lesssim 7.9 \times 10^{-11}$; (c) the BR for $K_S \to \mu^+ \mu^-$ including the long-distance effect can be enhanced by $11\%$ with respect to the standard model result, and (d) $BR(B_d \to \mu^+ \mu^-) \lesssim 1.97 \times 10^{-10}$. In addition, although $Re(\epsilon'/\epsilon)$ cannot be synchronously enhanced with $BR(K_L\to \pi^0 \nu \bar\nu)$ and $BR(K_S\to \mu^+ \mu^-)$ in the same region of the CP-violating phase, the values of $Re(\epsilon'/\epsilon)$, $BR(K^+ \to \pi^+ \nu \bar\nu)$, and $BR(B_d \to \mu^+ \mu^-)$ can be simultaneously increased.Comment: 19 pages, 3 figures, version to be published in the European Physical Journal