Crítica de llibres

Índex de l'obra ressenyada: Peter L. BERGER, Adventures of an accidental sociologist. How to explain the world without becoming a bored. New York : Prometheus Books, 2011

Book Reviews

Andrew DAWSON, A new world religion. London : Continuum, 2013

A field test for titratable acidity and the determination of lactic acid by gas chromatography

A simple, convenient kit was developed to measure titratable acidity (TA) of milk in farm bulk tanks. The kit was based on the con-ventional determination of TA with standard base and phenolphthalein. Glass tubes were calibrated to contain a calculated amount of milk and base to show the phenolphthalein endpoint up to a chosen TA level. Samples remaining white would be rejected as TA above the chosen level. A survey using the kit and standard TA titration was carried out in winter and summer on manufacturing and Grade A milks. In 192 samples, TA averaged 0.164% and ranged from 0.11 to 0.31% TA with a standard deviation of 0.021% TA. There was no difference from grades or seasons. The kit test failed on only four samples. Lactic acid content of milk was measured in selected samples by an ether extraction-gas chromatographic method. Good agreement was obtained between the method and added and/or developed acidity determined by titration. Fresh milks with varying TA were shown to contain no lactic acid

Notas de libros

Índex de l'obra resenyada: Anna FEDELE, Looking form Mary Magdalene : alternative pilgrimage and ritual creativity at catholic shrines in France. Nueva York: Oxford University Press. 201

Continual Learning of Hand Gestures for Human-Robot Interaction

In this paper, we present an efficient method to incrementally learn to classify static hand gestures. This method allows users to teach a robot to recognize new symbols in an incremental manner. Contrary to other works which use special sensors or external devices such as color or data gloves, our proposed approach makes use of a single RGB camera to perform static hand gesture recognition from 2D images. Furthermore, our system is able to incrementally learn up to 38 new symbols using only 5 samples for each old class, achieving a final average accuracy of over 90\%. In addition to that, the incremental training time can be reduced to a 10\% of the time required when using all data available

Samozvanets (The Pretender)

he Russian word Samozvanets most directly translates to Imposter in English. However, for this thesis, I have selected the alternative interpretation of Pretender. Imposter implies the taking or assuming of another’s position. Pretender, more personally, carries the meaning of presenting self as something one is not. It is through the lens of the Pretender that I examine the idea of what it means to be a member of a particular ethnicity, and to engage with one’s cultural heritage. I do this through a collection of fictional stories, investigating various lives within the Russian diaspora following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. I use this lens to present some of the various ways in which Russians preserve and redefine their sense of self apart from their home country. The collection focuses its attention on themes of identity and nationalism to present the unique challenges faced by a modern diasporic community. Shadows in the Field sets the reader in a remote area of Russia and follows a young man as he attempts to pursue his dream of becoming a tailor in the immediate aftermath of the Soviet Union’s dissolution, eventually leading him to immigrate to the United States. The Distance Between Us brings the reader to a dilapidated porch outside of a house party in Boston, Massachusetts where a Russian adoptee and a runaway discuss what it means to be free from the past and present. What We Keep brings the reader further into the home, following the experience of a private tutor called to work with a traumatized Russian orphan. Moonflower expands on the idea of “the home” by inter-weaving three time periods across Moscow, Boston, and London, into the journey of a young woman iii seeking to overcome the grief of the sudden death of her mother, while attempting to establish independence from her controlling oligarch father. The Pretender concludes the collection with a Russian immigrant’s meditation on masculinity, power, and nationalism in the wake of the Russo-Ukrainian War