2,217 research outputs found
Sex without law, power without a king: sexuality, gender and identity in the travestite's daily life
Neste trabalho propomos questionar como são construÃdos e validados os discursos acerca de sexualidade, gênero e identidade sexual, a partir da história de vida de três irmãos homossexuais nascidos no interior do nordeste brasileiro. Ainda jovens, migraram para a cidade de Diadema - São Paulo, onde se tornaram, no decorrer de alguns anos, travestis e profissionais do sexo. A percepção da homossexualidade foi relatada como parte da infância, e sentida como uma força natural. Já, as transformações realizadas sobre o corpo decorrentes da travestilidade, a decisão pela prostituição, a orientação sexual (por homem ou por mulher), e a construção de uma identidade sexual (gay ou travesti), apareceram como instâncias dissociadas entre si e relacionadas à busca da valorização pessoal e social diante do estigma atribuÃdo ao gay afeminado, pobre e migrante. A religiosidade afro-brasileira e a gramática yorubá assumiram relevância para a constituição desta possibilidade identitária.In this work we propose to question how the speeches on sexuality, gender and sexual identity are built and validated, emerging from the life story of three homosexual brothers who were born in the inland areas of the Brazilian northeast. When they were still young, they migrated to Diadema, in São Paulo, where in the course of time, they became transvestites and sex professionals. The perception of homosexuality was reported as part of childhood and sensed as a natural force. Now, the modifications made in the body due to "travestilidade", the decision on prostitution, the sex orientation (to men or to women) and the building of a sexual identity (gay or transvestite), came to view as fields dissociated from each other and related to the search of individual and social valorization before the stigma attached to the effeminate, poor and migrant gay. The Afro-Brazilian religiosity and the Yoruba grammar assumed relevance to the constitution of this possibility of identity
The utopian function of film music
In this article I apply Ernst Bloch's utopian philosophy to film music
Nigerian scam e-mails and the charms of capital
So-called '419' or 'advance-fee' e-mail frauds have proved remarkably successful. Global losses to these scams are believed to run to billions of dollars. Although it can be assumed that the promise of personal gain which these e-mails hold out is part of what motivates victims, there is more than greed at issue here. How is it that the seemingly incredible offers given in these unsolicited messages can find an audience willing to treat them as credible? The essay offers a speculative thesis in answer to this question. Firstly, it is argued, these scams are adept at exploiting common presuppositions in British and American culture regarding Africa and the relationships that are assumed to exist between their nations and those in the global south. Secondly, part of the appeal of these e-mails lies in the fact that they appear to reveal the processes by which wealth is created and distributed in the global economy. They thus speak to their readers’ attempts to map or conceptualise the otherwise inscrutable processes of that economy. In the conclusion the essay looks at the contradictions in the official state response to this phenomena
Dynamics of Serial Manipulators using Dual Quaternion Algebra
This paper presents two approaches to obtain the dynamical equations of
serial manipulators using dual quaternion algebra. The first one is based on
the recursive Newton-Euler formulation and uses twists and wrenches instead of
3D vectors, which simplifies the classic procedure by removing the necessity of
exhaustive geometrical analyses since wrenches and twists are propagated
through high-level algebraic operations. Furthermore, the proposed formulation
works for arbitrary types of joints and does not impose any particular
convention for the propagation of twists. The second approach, based on Gauss's
Principle of Least Constraint (GPLC), takes into account elements of the dual
quaternion algebra and provides a linear relationship between twists
derivatives and joint accelerations, which can be particularly useful in robot
control. Differently from other approaches based on the GPLC, which have
representational singularities or require constraints, our method does not have
those drawbacks. We present a thorough methodology to obtain the computational
cost of both algorithms and compared them with their classic counterparts.
Although our current formulations are more computationally expensive, they are
more general than their counterparts in the state of the art. Simulation
results showed that both methods are as accurate as the classic recursive
Newton-Euler algorithm.Comment: Submitted for publication (currently under review
Malignant teratoma in Klippel-Feil syndrome: a case report and review of the literature
Introduction: Klippel-Feil syndrome is characterized by a congenital fusion of cervical vertebrae. Intracranial teratomas are nongerminomatous germ cell tumors and they account for 0.3 to 0.9% of all intracranial tumors. Teratomas with malignant transformation refer to lesions which give rise to malignant cancer of somatic type. The association between tumors of dermoid origin and Klippel-Feil malformation is extremely rare. Only 23 other cases have so far been reported, and only one case of dermoid tumor with areas of dedifferentiation on squamous cell carcinoma has been described. Case presentation: We report the case of a 72-year-old white man with a 2-year history of gait and balance disturbances. A brain magnetic resonance imaging revealed a fourth ventricle neoplastic process with infiltrative features. He was operated through a suboccipital craniectomy with a C1 laminotomy and bilateral vertebral artery transposition. At 6-months follow-up, magnetic resonance imaging showed an early regrowth of the fourth ventricle tumor, with the same radiological features. Conclusions: Patients with Klippel-Feil malformation could develop posterior fossa dermoid tumors. The malignant potential of such tumors must be considered and surgery is recommended. Particular attention must be focused on the histopathological analysis in order to identify possible foci of malignant transformation
Adorno on Hope
I argue that Theodor W. Adorno’s philosophy articulates a radical conception of hope. According to Lear, radical hope is ‘directed toward a future goodness that transcends the current ability to understand what it is’ (2006:103). Given Adorno’s claim that the current world is radically evil, and that we cannot know or even imagine what the good is, it is plausible that his conception of hope must be radical in this sense. I develop this argument through an analysis of (i) Adorno’s engagement with Kant’s conception of hope, (ii) Adorno’s references to hope, and (iii) his critical diagnosis of a metaphysical need for hope. Having demonstrated that Adorno must reject both ordinary and Kantian hope, I examine why Adorno thinks that we still may have reasons for hope. I also show that Adorno’s conception of hope differs from Lear’s in one important respect
Noise influence on electron dynamics in semiconductors driven by a periodic electric field
Studies about the constructive aspects of noise and fluctuations in different
non-linear systems have shown that the addition of external noise to systems
with an intrinsic noise may result in a less noisy response. Recently, the
possibility to reduce the diffusion noise in semiconductor bulk materials by
adding a random fluctuating contribution to the driving static electric field
has been tested. The present work extends the previous theories by considering
the noise-induced effects on the electron transport dynamics in low-doped
n-type GaAs samples driven by a high-frequency periodic electric field
(cyclostationary conditions). By means of Monte Carlo simulations, we calculate
the changes in the spectral density of the electron velocity fluctuations
caused by the addition of an external correlated noise source. The results
reported in this paper confirm that, under specific conditions, the presence of
a fluctuating component added to an oscillating electric field can reduce the
total noise power. Furthermore, we find a nonlinear behaviour of the spectral
density with the noise intensity. Our study reveals that, critically depending
on the external noise correlation time, the dynamical response of electrons
driven by a periodic electric field receives a benefit by the constructive
interplay between the fluctuating field and the intrinsic noise of the system.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures, to appear in J. Stat. Mechanics: Theory and
Experim., 200
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