The Arabic calligraphy. An identifying parameter in space, time and contents

The art of Arabic calligraphy is particularly considered in the Islamic world. However, it should not be forgotten that if writing was an important means of preserving and spreading the Koran, calligraphy has historically found widespread use even in areas not strictly religious, such as in the decoration of everyday objects. Throughout the history of Islam, the work of calligraphers has been researched and appreciated. Calligraphy and abstract representations have become the main means of artistic expression, since there was a belief that figurative art was a form of idolatry. Contemporary artists from the Islamic world, and not only, still use the legacy of calligraphic art to insert inscriptions or abstract figures in their works as if it were an identifying mark, a recognizable art form, a language that defines a belonging. Starting from the research and analysis developed during the master degree thesis , aimed at investigating the connections between the most widespread forms of artistic expression in the Islamic world (geometry, calligraphy and arabesque), we wanted to focus attention on one of these three art forms, probably the most important for Arabs, to highlight its importance linked to the past, its developments in space and time and its future potential

About the Lifespan of Peer to Peer Networks

We analyze the ability of peer to peer networks to deliver a complete file among the peers. Early on we motivate a broad generalization of network behavior organizing it into one of two successive phases. According to this view the network has two main states: first centralized - few sources (roots) hold the complete file, and next distributed - peers hold some parts (chunks) of the file such that the entire network has the whole file, but no individual has it. In the distributed state we study two scenarios, first, when the peers are ``patient'', i.e, do not leave the system until they obtain the complete file; second, peers are ``impatient'' and almost always leave the network before obtaining the complete file.Comment: 15 pages, LaTeX, 1 figure, Proc. 10th Int'nl Conf. Principles Of Distributed Systems (OPODIS), Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Vol. 4305, Springer Verlag, Berlin, 2006, 290--30

Les grandes deviations sans larmes

SIGLEAvailable at INIST (FR), Document Supply Service, under shelf-number : 22522, issue : a.1995 n.5 / INIST-CNRS - Institut de l'Information Scientifique et TechniqueFRFranc

Twenty-five years of Marxist Biblical criticism

In the context of a renewed interest in Marxism outside biblical studies, this article surveys and critiques the background and current status of a similar renewal in biblical studies. It begins with a consideration of the background of current studies in liberation, materialist and political theologies, and moves on to note the division between literary and social scientific uses of Marxist theories. While those who used Marxist literary methods were initially inspired by Terry Eagleton and Fredric Jameson, more recent work has begun to make use of a whole tradition of Marxist literary criticism largely ignored in biblical studies. More consistent work, however, has taken place in the social sciences in both Hebrew Bible and New Testament studies. In Hebrew Bible studies, debates focus on the question of mode of production, especially the domestic or household mode of production, while in New Testament studies, the concerns have been with reconstructing the context of the Jesus movement and, more recently, the Pauline correspondence. I close with a number of questions concerning the division into different areas of what is really a holistic approach to texts and history