A very British carnival: women, sex and transgression in Fiesta magazine

This article addresses the claim that pornography’s theme is ‘male power’ and the recent counter-claim that pornography may embody transgressive potential. It pursues the apparent contradictions in these claims by focussing on a specific pornographic text, the British downmarket softcore magazine, Fiesta, and locating it in relation to other forms of sexual and non-sexual representation. In considering the text’s relation to other ‘mass’ and ‘low’ texts, ‘bawdy’ and ‘carnivalesque’ sensibilities, it becomes possible to establish its particularly British and vulgar representation of sexuality which relies not only on its sexual content, but on a ‘dirty style’ in which notions of sexual propriety are self-consciously transgressed. The analysis of Fiesta plays particular attention to the role of women’s bodies and a mode of ‘dirty talk’ as key elements in its representation of sexuality which illuminate the rather abstract claims made about pornography’s structures of dominance and transgression.</p

”Other” or “one of us”?: the porn user in public and academic discourse

The consumption of sexually explicit media has long been a matter of public and political concern. It has also been a topic of academic interest. In both these arenas a predominantly behaviourist model of effects and regulation has worked to cast the examination of sexually explicit texts and their consumption as a debate about harm. The broader area of investigation remains extraordinarily undeveloped. Sexually explicit media is a focus of interest for academics because of the way it ‘speaks’ sex and sexuality for its culture. In this paper I examine existing and emerging figures of the porn consumer, their relation to ways of thinking and speaking about pornography, and the implications of these for future work on porn consumption. </p

Reading porn: the paradigm shift in pornography research

This paper examines the paradigm shift in pornography theory and research from a focus on 'texts and effects' through to work emerging from the late 1980's onwards. The paper considers the reconceptualisation of pornography as a category, the location of pornography in relation to cultural hierarchy and form, the changing status of pornography in relation to mainstream representations, the significance of developing technologies and the movement towards more situated accounts of pornographic texts and their audiences as a series of attempts to contextualise the question 'what is pornography?'</p

Inside out: men on the Home Front

This paper examines the representation of men as domestic experts in British lifestyle television programmes. It considers contemporary representations of the home, locating these in relation to changes in British primetime programming where a movement towards hybrid TV forms appears to rearticulate the mission to ‘inform, educate and entertain’ and to transform private matters into public spectacle. The paper examines the ways in which contemporary representations of the male domestic expert struggle to negotiate perceived boundaries between the ‘inside’ of private space and the ‘outside’ of the public sphere and between the categories of femininity and masculinity. It argues that in the homes and gardens series, Home Front, the figure of the designer provides a significant contemporary rearticulation of the male dandy, and aestheticism and camp become key strategies for the redefinition of the home and of masculinity as matters of lifestyle.</p

Pornography and objectification: re-reading “the picture that divided Britain”

This paper examines the significance of the terms objectification and pornography in three key approaches to analysing pornographic texts; an anti-pornography feminist approach, an historical approach focused on pornography and regulation, and an approach which details pornography’s aesthetic transgressiveness. It suggests that while all three approaches continue to be productive for the analysis of sexual representations, their usefulness is limited by a tendency towards essentialism. A discussion of the public controversy around an advert for Opium perfume in 2000 is used to argue that an attentiveness to the context of particular images, and to the variety of reactions they provoke, provides a useful way of developing the analysis of sexual representations and their contemporary significance.</p

'tits and ass and porn and fighting': male heterosexuality in magazines for men

This paper examines the presentation of male heterosexuality in British soft core pornographic and men’s lifestyle magazines, looking across these formats at the range of conventions and discourses they share. It maps out the key features of male heterosexuality in these publications, focusing on a sample of British magazines collected in June 2003 across both soft core and lifestyle formats, and on the new men’s weeklies, Nuts and Zoo Weekly, launched in January 2004. The depiction of the male body and its relation to sexual pleasure and the presentation and investigation of heterosexual activity are set in the broader historical context of men’s print media and the current socio-cultural context of sex and gender representation.</p

Home visits: A new screening tool for frailty? A retrospective exploratory study.

BACKGROUND: In the United Kingdom, the new NHS contract for primary care mandates that practices use the Electronic Frailty Index (EFI) to screen for frailty and apply clinical judgment, based on knowledge of the patient, to decide whether they have a diagnosis of frailty. EFI has not yet been validated for this purpose. Many primary care clinicians would agree that although not formally investigated, there seems to be a strong association between being housebound or in institutional care and having a diagnosis of frailty. Although being housebound or in institutional care is not commonly coded in primary care computer record systems (IT), this cohort of patients do require home visits if they become unwell. Home visits are coded and it is simple to run a search on primary care IT to generate a list of older people who have received a home over given period. AIM: This study assessed whether being housebound and requiring home visits could form a new screening tool for frailty. DESIGN AND SETTING: Retrospective cohort study from 1/3/15 to 29/2/16. Primary care, South Devon. METHOD: Medical records of 154 patients over 65 years of age were evaluated. Patients were divided into two groups: a group (n = 82) that had received a home visit and a second group consisting of a randomized sample of patients (n = 72) with similar baseline characteristics who had not. Patient records were analyzed by two clinicians to determine whether a frailty syndrome was present. Researchers were blinded to each other's results. An arbitrator determined the frailty status on disagreement. RESULTS: Home visits have a sensitivity of 87.23% [95% confidence interval (CI): 74.35%-95.17%] and specificity of 61.68% (95% CI: 51.78%-70.92%). For frailty, Cohen's Kappa showed fair interobserver reliability. CONCLUSION: This study suggests that home visits are a good screen for frailty; the data are easy to retrieve from primary care IT and could be used as a valid screening tool to assist with identifying frailty in primary care

Effects of 7.5% carbon dioxide inhalation on anxiety and mood in cigarette smokers

Cigarette smoking is associated with elevated risk of anxiety and mood disorder. Using the 7.5% carbon dioxide (CO(2)) inhalation model of anxiety induction, we examined the effects of smoking status and abstinence from smoking on anxiety responses. Physiological and subjective responses to CO(2) and medical air were compared in smokers and non-smokers (Experiment One) and in overnight abstinent and non-abstinent smokers (Experiment Two). CO(2) induced greater increases in blood pressure in non-smokers compared with smokers (ps < 0.043), and greater increases in anxiety (p = 0.005) and negative affect (p = 0.054) in non-abstinent compared with abstinent smokers. CO(2) increased physiological and subjective indices of anxiety. There were differences across smoking groups indicating that the CO(2) inhalation model is a useful tool for examining the relationship between smoking and anxiety. The findings suggested that both acute smoking and acute abstinence may protect against anxious responding. Further investigation is needed in long-term heavy smokers

Feminist Art Activisms and Artivisms - 2 July 2018, Middlesex University

This event was organised by Katy Deepwell for the Create/Feminisms research cluster in the Visual Arts Department, Faculty of Arts and Creative Industries, Middlesex University

Spatial coherence measurement of a high average power table-top soft X-ray laser

Includes bibliographical references (page 126).An extraordinarily high degree of spatial coherence from a high average power tabletop 46.9 nm laser was observed in two-pinhole interference experiments. Refractive anti-guiding and gain guiding along a capillary discharge-produced plasma column causes a rapid increase of the spatial coherence with amplifier length. Full spatial coherence was approached with a 36 cm long plasma of very high axial uniformity and a length to diameter ratio exceeding 1000: 1