166 research outputs found
Re-establishing the âoutsidersâ: English press coverage of the 2015 FIFA Womenâs World Cup
In 2015, the England Womenâs national football team finished third at the Womenâs World Cup in Canada. Alongside the establishment of the Womenâs Super League in 2011, the success of the womenâs team posed a striking contrast to the recent failures of the England menâs team and in doing so presented a timely opportunity to examine the negotiation of hegemonic discourses on gender, sport and football. Drawing upon an âestablished-outsiderâ approach, this article examines how, in newspaper coverage of the England womenâs team, gendered constructions revealed processes of alteration, assimilation and resistance. Rather than suggesting that âestablishedâ discourses assume a normative connection between masculinity and football, the findings reveal how gendered âboundariesâ were both challenged and protected in newspaper coverage. Despite their success, the discursive positioning of the womenâs team as âoutsidersâ, served to (re)establish menâs football as superior, culturally salient and âbetterâ than the womenâs team/game. Accordingly, we contend that attempts to build and, in many instances, rediscover the history of womenâs football, can be used to challenge established cultural representations that draw exclusively from the history of the menâs game. In such instances, the 2015 Womenâs World Cup provides a historical moment from which the womenâs game can be relocated in a context of popular culture
The politics of vibrant matter: consistency, containment and the concrete of Mussoliniâs bunker
This article explores the idea of how vibrancy can be produced. Specifically, the attempt is to investigate the multiplicities of vibrancy by considering one of Mussoliniâs bunkers. The author examines the location of the bunker in the EUR (Esposizione Universale Romana) neighbourhood in Rome, the bunkerâs materiality, and the context and social meaning of the bunker through a contemporary art exhibition called âConfrontiâ (Confrontations) that took place in the bunker in 2009. The article argues that while emphasizing matterâs inherent vibrancy may be useful in some cases, there is also merit in further unpacking the ways in which vibrancy is produced. In this example, the concrete bunker expresses vibrancy through the processes involved in the emergent material form, and in the sustained politics and social considerations embedded in valuing tangible urban heritage
Asymmetric response of forest and grassy biomes to climate variability across the African Humid Period : influenced by anthropogenic disturbance?
A comprehensive understanding of the relationship between land cover, climate change and disturbance dynamics is needed to inform scenarios of vegetation change on the African continent. Although significant advances have been made, large uncertainties exist in projections of future biodiversity and ecosystem change for the world's largest tropical landmass. To better illustrate the effects of climateâdisturbanceâecosystem interactions on continentalâscale vegetation change, we apply a novel statistical multivariate envelope approach to subfossil pollen data and climate model outputs (TraCEâ21ka). We target paleoenvironmental records across continental Africa, from the African Humid Period (AHP: ca 14 700â5500 yr BP) â an interval of spatially and temporally variable hydroclimatic conditions â until recent times, to improve our understanding of overarching vegetation trends and to compare changes between forest and grassy biomes (savanna and grassland). Our results suggest that although climate variability was the dominant driver of change, forest and grassy biomes responded asymmetrically: 1) the climatic envelope of grassy biomes expanded, or persisted in increasingly diverse climatic conditions, during the second half of the AHP whilst that of forest did not; 2) forest retreat occurred much more slowly during the mid to late Holocene compared to the early AHP forest expansion; and 3) as forest and grassy biomes diverged during the second half of the AHP, their ecological relationship (envelope overlap) fundamentally changed. Based on these asymmetries and associated changes in human land use, we propose and discuss three hypotheses about the influence of anthropogenic disturbance on continentalâscale vegetation change
Model systems for studying trophoblast differentiation from human pluripotent stem cells
Late Holocene linkages between decadeâcentury scale climate variability and productivity at Lake Tanganyika, Africa
Microlaminated sediment cores from the Kalya slope region of Lake Tanganyika provide a near-annually resolved paleoclimate record between ~~2,840 and 1,420 cal. yr B.P. demonstrating strong linkages between climate variability and lacustrine productivity. Laminae couplets comprise dark, terrigenous-dominated half couplets, interpreted as low density underflows deposited from riverine sources during the rainy season, alternating with light, planktonic diatomaceous ooze, with little terrigenous component, interpreted as windy/dry season deposits. Laminated portions of the studied cores consist of conspicuous dark and light colored bundles of laminae couplets. Light and dark bundles alternate at decadal time scales. Within dark bundles, both light and dark half couplets are significantly thinner than within light bundles, implying slower sediment accumulation rates during both seasons over those intervals. Time series analyses of laminae thickness patterns demonstrate significant periodicities at interannualÂżcentennial time scales. Longer time scale periodicities (multidecadal to centennial scale) of light and dark half couplet thicknesses are coherent and in some cases are similar to solar cycle periods on these time scales. Although laminae thickness cycles do not strongly covary with the actual Âż14C record for this same time period, two large Âż14C anomalies are associated with substantial decreases in both light and dark laminae thickness. In contrast to the multidecadalÂż centennial time scale, significant annual to decadal periodicities, which are broadly consistent with ENSO/PDO forcing and their impact on East African climate, are not coherent between light and dark half couplets. The coherency of lightÂżdark couplets at decadalÂżcentennial time scales, but not at shorter time scales, is consistent with a model of a long-term relationship between precipitation (recorded in wet season dark laminae thickness) and productivity (light laminae thickness), which is not manifest at shorter time scales. We hypothesize that this coupling results from long-term recharging of internal nutrient loading during wet periods (higher erosion of soil P) and reduced loading during drought intervals. The relationship is not expressed on short time scales during which the dominant control on productivity is wind-driven, dry season upwelling, which is uncorrelated with wet-season precipitation. Our record greatly extends the temporal record of this quasi-periodic behavior throughout the late Holocene and provides the first evidence linking decade- to century-scale episodes of enhanced productivity to enhanced precipitation levels and nutrient recharge in a productive tropical lake
Biodegradation of dissolved organic carbon in soil extracts and leachates from a temperate forest stand and its relationship to ultraviolet absorbance
Composition of weathering crusts on sandstones from natural outcrops and architectonic elements in an urban environment
Effect of wall effusivity on termally induced secondary atomisation of single drop impacting onto a tilted surface
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