South African film music: representation of racial, cultural and national identities, 1931-1969

The thesis examines the role of music in South African film pertaining to representation of identity of South African peoples and cultures, from the country's earliest sound films until the industry expansion of the 1970s. Chapter 1 contextualizes the study in relation to South African film and music, mainstream (Hollywood) film music theory/analysis/history, and national film music studies outside the Hollywood context. Chapter 2 provides an analysis of nationalist trends in South African silent film and the transition to sound film. The subsequent two chapters analyse the filmic use of rural and urban African music as tools of representation of African identity across a continuum of films, from earlier colonial/Afrikaner nationalist-oriented films to later films with an explicitly anti-apartheid message. The final chapter returns to the themes of Chapter 2, exploring film-musical representation of Afrikaner nationalism. As with Chapters 3 and 4, the source material is eclectic, covering a broad spectrum of techniques to promote a nationalist agenda. The study reaches four principal findings. Firstly, film-musical representation of African identity develops nuance over time, as African subjects succeed in moving from being represented to achieving some self-representation. This representation remains within the ambit of diegetic music, however, and frequently maintains a subject/object relationship regarding white/black representation. Secondly, the use of diegetic African music functions as a form of othering, creating an illusion of representational "authenticity" while in practice ensuring the music remains external to the filmmakers' expressive universe, relegating it to the role of "ethnic" colour rather than engagement with characters' psychologies. Thirdly, film music is implicated in issues of land rights: rural African music questions the legitimacy of "whites only" city spaces, and is metaphorical of population displacement from rural to urban locales. Conversely, nationalist films use pastoral tropes to reimagine rural African spaces through European conceptualizations of "tamed" land, and sentimentalize spaces through song to lay claim to them through emotional ties. Fourthly, it evaluates African music's potential to function as dramatic, narrative, extradiegetic underscore, showing how this was partly achieved by certain films of the period, with possible implications for contemporary mainstream film scoring

Arbitrary Rotated Coordinate Systems for the Inclined Plane as an Introduction to Group Theory in the Introductory Physics Classroom

The elementary problem of a block sliding down an inclined plane is examined in detail with respect to different oriented coordinate systems that are typically not utilized due to the complexity of the problem. After solving for the equation of motion in these different coordinate systems group theory is applied and shown to yield the same results

Perceptions of Levels of Preparedness of Alternatively Licensed Career and Technical Education Teachers in the State of Ohio

Background: Levels of preparedness of alternatively licensed career and technical education teachers were measured using a Likert-type scale across four tasks of a performance-based assessment as part of an induction program in the state of Ohio. Purpose: The purpose of this research study addresses the paucity of research that deals with licensure in the field of career and technical education for alternatively licensed teachers who completed a performance-based assessment. Method: Demographic data and levels of preparedness were analyzed quantitatively and effect sizes were reported. Qualitative data in the form of anecdotal evidence were also analyzed for themes. Discussion: Results of the study indicated levels of preparedness were not significantly different among selected demographic variables. However, further analysis of the data determined that alternatively licensed career and technical teachers perceived themselves to be less prepared on various tasks of the RESA and specified lower perceived levels of preparedness on all four sub-scales. Conclusion: The study established baseline data regarding levels of perceived preparedness to communicate to stakeholders in education which tasks alternatively licensed career and technical education teachers perceived themselves to be most prepared to complete

New approaches to cross-cultural research on education's outcomes amongst the poor: reflections on RECOUP's methodology

The Research Consortium on Educational Outcomes and Poverty (RECOUP), one of the three DFID consortia funded in 2005 to produce policy-relevant research in international education, has as its remit to investigate the outcomes of education for the poor. In this paper, at the mid-point of the research, we reflect on the research design for one of the three themes of RECOUP's work - human and social outcomes - in the light of the assumptions made at the time and subsequent experiences. We identify the three main ways in which we intend to organise our analysis in order to combine the best of both quantitative and qualitative traditions, which we identify as Q-squared (where economics is the lead discipline); mixed methods (where sociology or education is the lead discipline) and nested case studies (where anthropology is the lead discipline). The research, carried out in Ghana, India, Kenya and Pakistan, uses an innovative household survey instrument as well as a series of qualitative studies (including semi-structured interviews, focus groups, life histories) carried out in the same geographical areas and covering in greater depth sub-sets of the topics investigated by the surveys . We review progress towards combining quantitative and qualitative research methods to produce data that will allow us to analyse educational outcomes for the poor in these four countries, to test new research instruments to measure educational outcomes, as well as to generate valid cross-country comparisons

A realistic double many-body expansion potential energy surface for from a multiproperty fit to accurate ab initio energies and vibrational levels

A single-valued double many-body expansion potential energy surface (DMBE I) recently obtained for the ground electronic state of the sulfur dioxide molecule by fitting correlated ab initio energies suitably corrected by scaling the dynamical correlation energy is now refined by fitting simultaneously available spectroscopic levels up to 6886 cm-1 above the minimum. The topographical features of the novel potential energy surface (DMBE II) are examined in detail, and the method is emphasized as a robust route to fit together state-of-the-art theoretical calculations and spectroscopic measurements using a single fully dimensional potential form.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6VNG-44JJ0TT-5/1/c39f816ff06826dc517ad62441e91b5

Estimating Peak Demand for Beach Parking Spaces

The United States Army Corps of Engineers planning guidance stipulates that in order for local beach communities to qualify for Federal cost share funds for Hurricane and Storm Damage Reduction beach renourishment projects, the community must provide public beach access and parking to satisfy peak demand. This study presents a method for estimating peak demand for beach parking spaces in the presence of parking constraints. A Tobit regression model is developed to estimate the number of parking spaces that would be necessary to meet unconstrained demand on a given percentage of peak demand days. For example, the model can be used to estimate the number of parking spaces that would be adequate to meet peak demand on 90% of peak parking days. The Tobit model provides a promising framework for estimating peak parking demand under constrained parking conditions, a situation that characterizes most beach communities.