Festival Space: gender, liminality and the carnivalesque

Purpose - Contemporary outdoor rock and popular music festivals offer liminal spaces in which event participants can experience characteristics associated with the carnivalesque. Festival goers celebrate with abandonment, excess and enjoy a break from the mundane routine of everyday life. The aim of this conceptual paper is to explore the way gender is negotiated in the festival space. Design/methodology/approach - The rock and popular music tribute festival, known as ‘Glastonbudget’ provides the focus for this conceptual paper. A pilot ethnographic study at the event utilising photographic imagery was used to understand the way in which gender is displayed. Findings - It is suggested that liminal zones offer space to invert social norms and behave with abandonment and freedom away from the constraints of the everyday but neither women nor men actually take up this opportunity. The carnivalesque during Glastonbudget represents a festival space which consolidates normative notions of gender hierarchy via a complicated process of othering. Research limitations/implications - This is a conceptual paper which presents the need to develop social science based studies connecting gender to the social construction of event space. The ideas developed in this article need to be further explored further building upon the research design established here. Originality/value – There is currently a paucity of literature surrounding the concept of gender within these festival spaces especially in relation to liminality within events research

Seasonally consistent small home range and long ranging distance in Presbytis rubicunda in Danum Valley, Borneo

Seasonal fluctuation in food availability is a universal problem for wild animals. One common response to dietary changes is to modify ranging patterns. We studied the ranging pattern of one group (8–12 individuals) of red leaf monkeys (Presbytis rubicunda) in the lowland dipterocarp forest of Danum Valley, Borneo from December 2006 to December 2008. The seasonal availability of fruits varies significantly in this forest because of mast fruiting. We tested the hypothesis that changes in ranging pattern are linked with seasonal changes in diet in this species. We recorded activity, foods eaten, and location every 10 min from around 06:00 until 16:00 h, 5–10 days/mo. The home range size was 21.4 ha over the 25-mo study (95% kernel contour). There were no statistically significant relationships between feeding times on the four major nonexclusive dietary components (all species of seeds, all species of young leaves, young leaves of Spatholobus macropterus, and other species of young leaves) and either the home range (95% kernel contour) or the core area (50% kernel contour). The areas used in the seed-eating and non-seed-eating seasons overlapped to a large extent. The daily path length was 1160 ± 340 m (mean ± SD, range: 550–2140 m). Neither daily path length nor monthly mean travel rate was significantly related to feeding time on any of the four major dietary components. The group’s ranging patterns may be related to the unusual fallback strategy of this population, which depends on the young leaves of an abundant liana (S. macropterus), which are available in small patches. The monkeys need only a small home range because of the high abundanceof these leaves. However, they range a relatively long distance because the patches of S. macropterus are easily depleted; thus the ranging distance does not decrease in nonseed-eating periods

The Events Management student as co-producer: establishing new working relationships

This article introduces the basis for research relating to the management and monitoring of student expectations within a new Events Management degree. It is important to gain an understanding of the Events Management students’ expectations and backgrounds. This research offers a starting point in exploring how teaching and learning practices can accommodate student learning and satisfaction. The root of this research lies with the Student Voice Initiative (Fielding, 2004), in which students are seen as the co-producers rather than higher educational consumers. We have established a wide-reaching discourse with students regarding their expectations and experiences of the new degree programme, in order to promote better communication channels between both groups. This research is prompted by a noted evolution in the student character; ‘they are supposed to become unique, successful individuals, making their own choices and plans to accomplish autonomy’ (Harris, 2004, p.6). As educators we have a responsibility to respond to societal changes in student expectations in order to benefit their student development and experience. The methods used take particular account of the student need for autonomy and individuality through participatory activities, qualitative methods and flexibility. The aim is to reflect on current departmental practice and also to respond to and accommodate the emerging student voice. We present our plans for this co-production of research at the early stages of development

Annual periodicity of fruiting in temperate forests in Yakushima, Japan

Fruiting phenology, assessed by seed fall, in five warm- and cool-temperate forests on Yakushima Island, southern Japan, was studied for two years in one 50 m × 50 m plot and for four years in four 100 m × 50 m plots. The elevation of the plots ranged between 170 and 1200 m a.s.l. Seed fall phenology showed annual periodicity in all five plots. This was clear when assessed by the number of species but became less clear when assessed by the biomass of seed litter. Community-level annual periodicity was based on the prevalence of population-level annual periodicity and interspecific synchronization of the fruiting peak from autumn to winter. Fleshy fruits had peaks of seed fall in a wider range of months than non-fleshy fruits, since it is sometimes beneficial to bear fruit outside the community-level fruiting peaks in order to avoid interspecific competition for animal seed dispersers. No consistent effect of climatic factors on seed fall phenology was detected

Application of Convex Optimization Results of DE FINETTI’s Problem for Proportional Reinsurance (A Case Study of CAARAMA Insurance Company in Algiers)

This research aims to find the optimal retention level for a proportional reinsurance treaty based on the results of the convex optimization developed in De Finetti's model. The latter makes it possible to determine the level of retention that achieves the expected profit by the insurer while minimizing claims volatility. The convex functions appear abundantly in economics and finance. They have remarkable specificities that allow actuaries to minimize financial risks to which some institutions are exposed, especially insurance companies. Therefore, using mathematical tools to manage various risks is paramount. To remedy the optimization problem, we have combined the probability of failure method with the (De Finetti) model for proportional reinsurance, which proposed a retention optimization process that minimizes claim volatility for a fixed expected profit based on the results of the non-linear optimization

戰爭資源と國民消費生活

研

Molecular Identification of Rhizobium Isolates and The Effect of Nanoparticles on Growth and Differentiation

In this study, five isolates of Rhizobium bacteria were isolated from several different agricultural regions of Nineveh Governorate. The five isolates showed their ability to dilute gelatin, as well as a positive result of the growth test on a triglyceride medium and iron showed their ability to produce catalase and urease enzyme, and the results of the molecular diagnosis showed The isolates are identical and in varying proportions to the standard isolates recorded in the GenBank, and the biological activity of silver nanoparticles showed a clear antagonistic effect on the growth of rhizobium bacteria, where the first concentration (250) was the least effect, while the third concentration (750) had the highest effect ratio

Peranan Perserikatan Bangsa- Bangsa dan African Union (Au) dalam Menyelesaikan Konflik Bersenjata Noninternasional di Darfu

Non-International armed conflict that occured in Darfur Sudan is the continued conflict between Northern Sudan and Southern Sudan. It seemed a coincidence that the Darfur crisis broke out soon after the signing of Machakos Protocol, 20 July 2002. The conflict involving the Sudan's government aided militant group called the Janjaweed against the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement / Army (SLM / A) and the Justice Equality Movement (JEM) which is based on the struggle for natural resources between community groups Arab and groups nonArab who's live in Darfur. Janjaweed accused of human rights violations, including torture, kidnapping, rape, looting and other. This became the International spotlight. Therefore, the United Nations (UN) and African Union (AU) decided to intervention in to Darfur conflict by acting as a mediator to reach a peace agreement between Sudan's government, SLM/Aand JEM. The Sudanese government presurred by United Nations and the African Union to support ongoing Peacekeeping Operation. UNAMID managed to bring peace to the Sudan by signing the "Doha Document" on February 23, 2010 in Doha, Qatar. This document contains the ceasefire agreement and agreed to work toward a full peace agreement by the Sudanese government, the Janjaweed, the SLM / A and JEM

In–out decomposition of boundary integral equations

We propose a reformulation of the boundary integral equations for the Helmholtz equation in a domain in terms of incoming and outgoing boundary waves. We obtain transfer operator descriptions which are exact and thus incorporate features such as diffraction and evanescent coupling; these effects are absent in the well-known semiclassical transfer operators in the sense of Bogomolny. It has long been established that transfer operators are equivalent to the boundary integral approach within semiclassical approximation. Exact treatments have been restricted to specific boundary conditions (such as Dirichlet or Neumann). The approach we propose is independent of the boundary conditions, and in fact allows one to decouple entirely the problem of propagating waves across the interior from the problem of reflecting waves at the boundary. As an application, we show how the decomposition may be used to calculate Goos–Haenchen shifts of ray dynamics in billiards with variable boundary conditions and for dielectric cavities