"Rarely we see them for all that they do": Examining the Civic Participation of Immigrant Women in Norway

Often immigrant women are assumed to be politically apathetic due to statistically lower rates of involvement in traditional political participation strategies. These measurements neglect the different strategies immigrant women may utilize to influence positive change, such as of civic participation. This thesis explores the strategies and arenas of civic participation immigrant women in Norway use as well as the accessibility and appeal of civic and alternative forms of participation to immigrant women. This was a qualitative, interpretive phenomenological study utilizing six semi-structured interviews. The participants were immigrant women who were involved in the community. Thematic analysis was used to analyze the data and identify codes and themes. This study found that participants were involved in the community in many ways, including participating in NGOs with social justice aims, the neighborhood, in dugnad, and more. Their insights also revealed more informal strategies of participation, such as personal interactions to challenge stereotypes and racism. Experiences of marginalization influence the type and aim of participation. Participants’ involvement was constrained by factors applying particularly to their intersecting identities, such as unfamiliar and exclusionary social codes and organizational power imbalances. As immigrant women, they also felt they were seen as victims and not recognized for their competences. The way in which participants persisted despite barriers to affect change represents a potential for empowerment in civic engagement. Many participants held transformative aims and saw civic participation as a valuable arena to this purpose. However, the conception of active citizenship reveals the normative values inherent in valorizing high levels of participation. Immigrant women in particular are pressured to perform their belonging through acts of contribution to the community without recognition of the barriers they face. Valuable participation is defined by the dominant society, and dominant spaces that reproduce hierarchies and constrain possibilities for truly transformative change are privileged. This study concludes that while civic participation holds a potential for empowerment, it must be evaluated contextually, and the participation of immigrant women in informal arenas should be further explored and uncovered.Master's ThesisGLODE33

Digital Disruption beyond Uber and Airbnb – tracking the long tail of the sharing economy

The sharing economy can be regarded as a discontinuous innovation that creates increased abundance throughout society. Extant literature on the sharing economy has been predominantly concerned with Uber and Airbnb. As little is known about where the sharing economy is gaining momentum beyond transportation and accommodation, the purpose of this paper is to map in what sectors of the economy it is perceived to gain traction. Drawing on data from social and traditional media in Sweden, we identify a long tail of 17 sectors and 47 subsectors in which a total of 165 unique sharing-economy actors operate, including sectors such as on-demand services, fashion and clothing, and food delivery. Our findings therefore point at the expanding scope of the sharing economy and relatedly, we derive a set of implications for firms

Scanning and Transmission Electron Microscopic Studies on the Oviducts of Pekin Ducks Fed Methyl Mercury Containing Diets

This study was undertaken to examine the effects of varying levels of methyl mercury (MeHg) on the ultrastructure of the surface epithelium of the oviduct of ducks. Accordingly, Pekin ducks were maintained on feed containing varying doses of (0.0; 0.5; 5.0; 15.0 ppm) of MeHg (Group I - control to IV) for 12 weeks and sacrificed. Tissue from the magnum and the shell gland regions of the oviduct was processed for scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). It was found that the primary and secondary folds of these regions of the oviducts of the control and 0.5 ppm treatment group were densely populated with ciliated cells and that the cilia tend to cover the apical surfaces of the non-ciliated secretory cells. This unchanged ultrastructural morphology of the surface epithelium of 0.5 ppm treatment group was verified with TEM. The ciliated and nonciliated cells in surface epithelium appeared to be equal in frequency. The nuclei of ciliated cells were superficial in location compared to nonciliated secretory cells which had nuclei in the basal part of the cytoplasm. In the oviducal tissues from ducks fed 5.0 ppm MeHg isolated areas of ciliary loss, but minimal disruption of the apical plasma membrane were observed by SEM. In a few birds plasma membrane lesions, condensation of nuclear chromatin and very dilated rough endoplasmic reticulum were seen with TEM. In the oviducal tissues from ducks fed 15.0 ppm MeHg it could be seen that ciliary loss was much more extensive than hitherto observed, and disruption of the apex of cells could be seen. TEM showed degeneration of cytoplasmic organelles, more or less severely damaged ciliated cells, loss of ciliary extensions and formation of compound cilia. These observations indicate that methyl mercury at 5.0 and 15.0 ppm dose levels causes toxic injury to oviducal surface epithelium of Pekin duck that may cause reduced reproductive capability

Fabrication of a Porous Fiber Cladding Material Using Microsphere Templating for Improved Response Time with Fiber Optic Sensor Arrays

A highly porous optical-fiber cladding was developed for evanescent-wave fiber sensors, which contains sensor molecules, maintains guiding conditions in the optical fiber, and is suitable for sensing in aqueous environments. To make the cladding material (a poly(ethylene) glycol diacrylate (PEGDA) polymer) highly porous, a microsphere templating strategy was employed. The resulting pore network increases transport of the target analyte to the sensor molecules located in the cladding, which improves the sensor response time. This was demonstrated using fluorescein-based pH sensor molecules, which were covalently attached to the cladding material. Scanning electron microscopy was used to examine the structure of the templated polymer and the large network of interconnected pores. Fluorescence measurements showed a tenfold improvement in the response time for the templated polymer and a reliable pH response over a pH range of five to nine with an estimated accuracy of 0.08 pH units

Algebraic Structures on Grothendieck Groups of a Tower of Algebras

The Grothendieck group of the tower of symmetric group algebras has a self-dual graded Hopf algebra structure. Inspired by this, we introduce by way of axioms, a general notion of a tower of algebras and study two Grothendieck groups on this tower linked by a natural paring. Using representation theory, we show that our axioms give a structure of graded Hopf algebras on each Grothendieck groups and these structures are dual to each other. We give some examples to indicate why these axioms are necessary. We also give auxiliary results that are helpful to verify the axioms. We conclude with some remarks on generalized towers of algebras leading to a structure of generalized bialgebras (in the sense of Loday) on their Grothendieck groups

Digital entrepreneurship and field conditions for institutional change - Investigating the enabling role of cities

Digital entrepreneurship may result in institutional turbulence and new initiatives are frequently blocked by vested interest groups who posit superior financial and relational resources. In this paper, we explore the role of cities in facilitating digital entrepreneurship and overcoming institutional resistance to innovation. Drawing upon two historical case studies of digital entrepreneurship in the city of Stockholm along with an extensive material on the sharing economy in Sweden, our results suggest that cities offer an environment that is critical for digital entrepreneurship. The economic and technological diversity of a city may provide the field conditions required for institutional change to take place and to avoid regulatory capture

Openness versus secrecy in adoptive parenthood

In recent years there has been much debate about providing adult adoptees access to information from their original birth certificates and to other background information once considered to be confidential. The overall purpose of this study was to investigate adoptive parents' attitudes about this debate. More specifically, three purposes of the study were (a) to determine how well a proposed set of independent variables explained the variability in adoptive parents' attitudes toward openness of background information about adoptees (b) to provide descriptive information about adoptive parents and their attitudes about the open birth record issue and (c) to analyze important relationships identified in the research. The 131 adoptive parents who participated in the study were selected from three North Carolina adoption agencies and one Minnesota agency. These parents had adopted infants 2 years of age or less between the years 1960 and 1980. A 15-page questionnaire was sent to each of the participants. Eighty-six percent of the 151 parents who initially agreed to participate in the study returned completed questionnaires to the researcher