Poetics of (Id)entity and supporting performances: (adrift) subjectivities in Hollywood

This essay discusses the ways in which performative and interpretative dialectics function within the representational hierarchization of Hollywood film during the 30´s and the 40´s. In particular, an emphasis is placed upon Flying Down to Rio (Freeland,1933), Mexican Spit re (Goodwins, 1940) and Gilda (Vidor, 1947), in which “stardom” is discussed into their space of hybrid representability. The objective of this analysis is to question the transculturation process that is repressed by the hierarchical connotation of power that is established for Latino spatialities in Hollywood. Este estudio discute las formas de dialéctica interpretativa y performativa establecidas por la jerarquización representacional en el ámbito del cine hollywoodiense de las décadas de los años 30 y 40. Se estudian, en concreto, los filmes Flying Down to Rio (Freeland, 1933), Mexican Spit re (Goodwins, 1940) y Gilda (Vidor, 1947) para cuestionar la transculturación reprimida por la connotación jerárquica de poder establecida para las espacialidades latinas en Hollywood, y se problematiza la funcionalidad de la representación de las identidades femeninas y masculinas -o masculinizantes- como maquinaria de ratificación de la estructura social estratificada del Hollywood de la época

Cultural Studies and Space in Contemporary Narratives

Cultural Studies and Space in Contemporary Narratives recoge los trabajos del grupo de investigación CSSAN-UDC: Society and Alternative Narratives in Cultural Studies. Desde su formación este grupo se ha ocupado de investigar las narrativas de discursos que no son canónicos en las enseñanzas universitarias de Letras o Humanidades, tales como las narrativas del cine, de las series televisivas, de la danza, de la música, de los videojuegos, del performance o de la literatura fantástica y la ciencia ficción. Entre los resultados de este grupo de investigación se encuentra la organización de varias ediciones de la Conference Alternative Narratives and Cultural Studies (2017-2021) y de tres ediciones del Cultural Studies Seminar (2019-2021).[Resumen] El presente volumen responde a la necesidad creada por un grupo de jóvenes investigadores que se plantearon la siguiente pregunta: ¿qué espacios ocupan en la investigación académica los discursos con los que más empatizan las nuevas generaciones de lectores, espectadores o creadores? Resulta evidente que no se puede articular una respuesta única en torno a un planteamiento tan amplio y heterogéneo, pero la discusión alrededor del alcance de sus premisas sí merece una indagación más extensa y detenida. El marco teórico que subyace en el presente estudio se ha desarrollado necesariamente desde el ámbito de los Estudios Culturales, y más concretamente dentro del debate, ya canonizado, entre la cultura alta y la cultura popular

Voces de una infancia silenciada: transitoriedad como espacialidad descentralizadora en tres películas contemporáneas

The interconnection between space production, place configuration, and identity development is interrogated in this essay through the lens of three film directors with transnational backgrounds. These auteurs introduce with Huelepega: La ley de la calle (Elia Schneider), Le temps du loup (Michael Haneke), and Children Underground (Edet Belzberg) the complications accrued by abandoned children and problem young adults whose erratic lives have forced them to dwell in transitional places. This essay looks at the spatial consequences of the confrontation of childhood and reterritorialization, and explores the ramifications of these interactions in terms of spatiality and place resignification.Este artículo pone en diálogo la relación entre producción espacial, configuración del lugar y desarrollo de la identidad, para cuestionarla a través de la óptica de tres directores de cine de procedencia transnacional. En sus películas Huelepega: La ley de la calle (Elia Schneider), Le temps du loup (Michael Haneke) y Children Underground (Edet Belzberg) estos autores presentan las dificultades experimentadas tanto por niños que han sido abandonados como por jóvenes adultos problemáticos, cuyas erráticas vidas los han obligado a vivir en lugares de transición. Este ensayo analiza las consecuencias espaciales que surgen de la confrontación de la infancia y su reterritorialización, y explora las ramificaciones de estas interacciones en términos de espacialidad y resignificación del lugar

Coastal flooding risk assessment at Garachico: Canary Islands

Coastal Hazards are a topic of great interest for managers, given the possible socio-economic consequences associated with them. Specifically, investigating coastal flooding is particularly critical to assess the risk related to extreme ocean events. Also, climate change impacts will potentially increase the risks associated with it. In this sense, a critical parameter to predict the occurrence of flooding in vulnerable areas is the wave runup. In this study, the estimation of wave runup and overtopping were based on several published empirical formulas, derived from field and laboratory experiments, mainly depending on the oceanographic parameters, and the geomorphology of the beach or geometry of the structure. This study aims to 1) investigate the ability of expressions found in the literature to compute wave runup into a rocky and steep bottom at Garachico Island (Spain), by comparing it with past historical events; and 2) assess the risks of coastal flooding based on return periods (response approach) for extreme events using the tilted bathtub approach for evaluating the flooding extension, considering current and future conditions. Moreover, the effect of sea-level rise on different IPCC (Assessment Report 6) scenarios were evaluated. This study will contribute to the development of a methodology to assess coastal flooding, especially for areas characterized by rocky and steep bottoms, which represents a gap in the literature.This thesis had the support from the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master’s Degree (EMJMD) program, within the Master’s in Water and Coastal Management (WACOMA), that aims at developing common understanding and deepening scientific knowledge in the vital, challenging, and continuously evolving field of water and coastal ecosystems

Theory of Raman enhancement by two-dimensional materials: Applications for graphene-enhanced Raman spectroscopy

We propose a third-order time-dependent perturbation theory approach to describe the chemical surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy of molecules interacting with two-dimensional (2D) surfaces such as an ideal 2D metal and graphene, which are both 2D metallic monolayers. A detailed analysis is performed for all the possible scattering processes involving both electrons and holes and considering the different time orderings for the electron-photon and electron-phonon interactions. We show that for ideal 2D metals a surface enhancement of the Raman scattering is possible if the Fermi energy of the surface is near the energy of either the HOMO or the LUMO states of the molecule and that a maximum enhancement is obtained when the Fermi energy matches the energy of either the HOMO or the LUMO energies plus or minus the phonon energy. The graphene-enhanced Raman spectroscopy effect is then explained as a particular case of a 2D surface, on which the density of electronic states is not constant, but increases linearly with the energy measured from the charge neutrality point. In the case of graphene, the Raman enhancement can occur for any value of the Fermi energy between the HOMO and LUMO states of the molecule. The proposed model allows for a formal approach for calculating the Raman intensity of molecules interacting with different 2D materials.National Science Foundation (U.S.) (Grant DMR-1004147)MIT-Brazil Collaboration progra

Effect of non-structural masonry brick infill walls on the robustness of a RC

Western countries are increasingly demanding for robust structures, i.e., structures capable of withstanding local damage caused by unforeseen extreme events without triggering a progressive collapse, thus reducing the magnitude and proportion of the resulting consequences. In this paper, the robustness of framed RC buildings is analysed by comparing the reliability of the damaged structure with that of the original structure and considering (or not) the contribution of the masonry infill walls. To validate the adopted methodology, this is tested on a residential RC building severely damage due to a landslide, herein considered as case-study. A numerical model of the original, as well as, of the damaged structure is defined using force-based finite elements with distributed plasticity. Masonry infill walls are modelled as equivalent internal struts. Monte Carlo simulation and FORM coupled with artificial neural networks and response surface polynomials are used in parallel to perform the reliability analyses of both original and damaged structures. Obtained results show that the masonry infill walls are fundamental to contain damage progression after the failure of a couple of columns. In fact, without these non-structural elements, the structure would lack in robustness, and the probability of failure would be above 99%. On the contrary, by considering the structural contribution of the masonry infill walls, the robustness of the structure would be circa of 30% corresponding to a failureprobability of 6%