She Came to Slay: The Life and times of Harriet Tubman

For an extraordinary historical figure, Dunbar offers an accessible and multidimensional biography of Harriet Tubman Ross and renders her as a complex “a true boss lady, a superhero, and a warrior” in She Came to Slay (xii).Organized chronologically, Dunbar opens with a discussion of Tubman’s grandmother Modesty who “planted a seed of resilience in her progeny that would blossom even in her absence (6-7).” Acknowledging the scant archival record, Dunbar establishes the familial roots contributing to Tubman’s fortitude and character. Although offering freedom to her daughters and granddaughter in his will, Pattison’s daughter and her husband, however, ignored this provision. Death, however, enabled Rit to find love and marry Ben Ross, enslaved person owned by her owner’s second husband (13). Their enslavers’ financial issues threatened the Ross family. After the sale of her sister, Harriet “prepared her for her future role as rescuer-in-chief of members of her family (16).” She also experienced the brutality of slavery. By the time she reached adolescence, Dunbar contends that her body became a “sinewy machine of muscle and strength;” but one regularly inflicted epileptic seizures, visions, and severe headaches following a head injury (22)..

Review of Gender and the Victorian Periodical

\u27We are dominated by Journalism\u27 \u27a really remarkable power\u27, Oscar Wilde observed, not entirely neutrally, in \u27The Soul of Man under Socialism\u27 published in the Fortnightly Review in 1891. Like many of his contemporaries, Wilde recognized not only the power of the press, but also its modernity. In this wide ranging and important study Hilary Fraser, Stephanie Green and Judith Johnston argue that precisely because of its power the periodical press occupied a central position in the construction of gender in Victorian cultural history. Journalism was gendered masculine by those who accorded it a lofty status within the profession of letters, they suggest. It was just as insistently gendered feminine by those who denigrated writing for the press. Hence Matthew Arnold\u27s description of the so-called \u27New Journalism\u27 in 1887 as \u27full of ability, novelty, variety, sensation, sympathy, generous instincts; its one great fault is that it is featherbrained\u27, - all attributes conventionally associated with women. Ironically the increasing number of women who joined the ranks of journalists as the century progressed served to downgrade the periodical press still further, by emphasizing its femininity. But for emerging writers like Marian Evans, Harriet Martineau, Margaret Oliphant and Eliza Lynn Linton earlier in the century the press provided a platform from which their careers were launched. Just as anonymity permitted men \u27never meant for authors\u27 to enter the writing profession, it gave women with literary ambitions an opportunity to write for publication. Fraser and Johnston quote Daniel Brown\u27s comment that the periodical essay became \u27the Trojan horse that allowed women writers to enter the male preserve of professional writing\u27. And their male counterparts were aware of their arrival. G. H. Lewes\u27s article \u27The Condition of Authors in England, Germany and France\u27 (1847) despite its jocular tone, reveals anxiety about the infiltration of the masculine writing profession by \u27speculators\u27 - \u27women, children, and ill-trained troops\u27. A subsequent article in The Leader, \u27A Gentle Hint to Writing Women\u27 (1850), continued the military metaphor, claiming that \u27women have made an invasion of our legitimate domain\u27 - \u27they are ruining our profession\u27 - \u27My idea of a perfect woman\u27, the article concludes, \u27is of one who can write but won\u27t\u27 , an unexpected comment, as the authors observe, by the man who was to become George Eliot\u27s consort

Sensory over-responsivity and social cognition in ASD: Effects of aversive sensory stimuli and attentional modulation on neural responses to social cues.

Sensory over-responsivity (SOR) is a common condition in autism spectrum disorders (ASD) that is associated with greater social impairment. However, the mechanisms through which sensory stimuli may affect social functioning are not well understood. This study used fMRI to examine brain activity while interpreting communicative intent in 15 high-functioning youth with ASD and 16 age- and IQ-matched typically-developing (TD) controls. Participants completed the task with and without a tactile sensory distracter, and with and without instructions directing their attention to relevant social cues. When completing the task in the presence of the sensory distracter, TD youth showed increased activity in auditory language and frontal regions whereas ASD youth showed decreased activation in these areas. Instructions mitigated this effect such that ASD youth did not decrease activation during tactile stimulation; instead, the ASD group showed increased medial prefrontal activity. SOR severity modulated the effect of the tactile stimulus on social processing. Results demonstrate for the first time a neural mechanism through which sensory stimuli cause disruption of social cognition, and that attentional modulation can restore neural processing of social cues through prefrontal regulation. Findings have implications for novel, integrative interventions that incorporate attentional directives to target both sensory and social symptoms

Educational reconstruction: African American education in the urban South, 1865-1890

The central question that I ask in this dissertation is: how did African Americans and their supporters create, develop, and sustain a system of education during the transition from slavery to freedom in Richmond, Virginia and Mobile, Alabama? For newly freed African Americans, education served as a means for distancing themselves from their slave past, for acquiring full access to the rights of American citizenship, and for economic mobility in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War. Unwilling to accept African Americans' claims of citizenship through education and new postwar realities, many local white elites and restored city governments in the urban South opposed African American education. These socioeconomic conditions forced African Americans to seek strategic alliances with both non-local groups supportive of educational attainment, such as the Freedmen's Bureau, Northern missionaries, as well as a few local, sympathetic whites. African Americans' process of building networks to yield education for the largely under and uneducated masses, I argue, amounted to Educational Reconstruction. These relationships were continually negotiated, accommodated, and resisted by all involved as each had a stake in the success and failure of African American education. As in any relationship, power struggles ensued and internal strife sometimes marred the networks. Even as African Americans witnessed a contested terrain concerning African American education globally, nationally, and locally to limit the growth of black education between 1865 and 1890, African Americans experienced educational triumph through two major developments in African American education--the Freedmen's Schools and state-funded public schools. As partners and circumstances changed, this dissertation argues that urban African Americans never lost sight of these aims in their struggle for educational access and legitimacy for the African American schoolhouse. Through Educational Reconstruction, African Americans successfully moved African American education from being a non-entity to a legitimate institution, established a professional class of African-American public school teachers, and ensured the continuation of this educated middle class for future generations

Modelling weather data by approximate regression quantiles.

In the paper we introduce and explore an approximate regression quantiles method. It is based on a new interpretation of M-functionals as quantiles of probability distributions which are determined by the original distribution and the M-function. A correction factor can be applied and this brings the corrected M-functional, called an approximate quantile functional, very close to the quantiles of the original distribution. In the present paper we extend approximate quantile functionals onto parametric models and call them approximate regression quantiles . We next model probability distributions of some weather components as they vary over time. We use very simple, but non-linear, parametric models. By applying the approximate regression quantiles method we obtain five-curve summaries of the varying over time probability distributions of the considered weather components

A self-management programme to reduce falls and improve safe mobility in people with secondary progressive MS: the BRiMS feasibility RCT

This is the final version, also available from NIHR journals library via the DOI in this record.Abstract Background Balance, mobility impairments and falls are common problems for people with multiple sclerosis (MS). Our ongoing research has led to the development of Balance Right in MS (BRiMS), a 13-week home- and group-based exercise and education programme intended to improve balance and encourage safer mobility. Objective This feasibility trial aimed to obtain the necessary data and operational experience to finalise the planning of a future definitive multicentre randomised controlled trial. Design Randomised controlled feasibility trial. Participants were block randomised 1 : 1. Researcher-blinded assessments were scheduled at baseline and at 15 and 27 weeks post randomisation. As is appropriate in a feasibility trial, statistical analyses were descriptive rather than involving formal/inferential comparisons. The qualitative elements utilised template analysis as the chosen analytical framework. Setting Four sites across the UK. Participants Eligibility criteria included having a diagnosis of secondary progressive MS, an Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS) score of between ≥ 4.0 and ≤ 7.0 points and a self-report of two or more falls in the preceding 6 months. Interventions Intervention – manualised 13-week education and exercise programme (BRiMS) plus usual care. Comparator – usual care alone. Main outcome measures Trial feasibility, proposed outcomes for the definitive trial (including impact of MS, mobility, quality of life and falls), feasibility of the BRiMS programme (via process evaluation) and economic data. Results A total of 56 participants (mean age 59.7 years, standard deviation 9.7 years; 66% female; median EDSS score of 6.0 points, interquartile range 6.0–6.5 points) were recruited in 5 months; 30 were block randomised to the intervention group. The demographic and clinical data were broadly comparable at baseline; however, the intervention group scored worse on the majority of baseline outcome measures. Eleven participants (19.6%) withdrew or were lost to follow-up. Worsening of MS-related symptoms unrelated to the trial was the most common reason (n = 5) for withdrawal. Potential primary and secondary outcomes and economic data had completion rates of > 98% for all those assessed. However, the overall return rate for the patient-reported falls diary was 62%. After adjusting for baseline score, the differences between the groups (intervention compared with usual care) at week 27 for the potential primary outcomes were MS Walking Scale (12-item) version 2 –7.7 [95% confidence interval (CI) –17.2 to 1.8], MS Impact Scale (29-item) version 2 (MSIS-29vs2) physical 0.6 (95% CI –7.8 to 9) and MSIS-29vs2 psychological –0.4 (95% CI –9.9 to 9) (negative score indicates improvement). After the removal of one outlier, a total of 715 falls were self-reported over the 27-week trial period, with substantial variation between individuals (range 0–93 falls). Of these 715 falls, 101 (14%) were reported as injurious. Qualitative feedback indicated that trial processes and participant burden were acceptable, and participants highlighted physical and behavioural changes that they perceived to result from undertaking BRiMS. Engagement varied, influenced by a range of condition- and context-related factors. Suggestions to improve the utility and accessibility of BRiMS were highlighted. Conclusions The results suggest that the trial procedures are feasible and acceptable, and retention, programme engagement and outcome completion rates were sufficient to satisfy the a priori progression criteria. Challenges were experienced in some areas of data collection, such as completion of daily diaries.National Institute for Health Research (NIHR

Increasing doses of fiber do not influence short-term satiety or food intake and are inconsistently linked to gut hormone levels

Background: People who eat more fiber often have a lower body weight than people who eat less fiber. The mechanism for this relationship has been explained, in part, by increased satiety, which may occur as a result of changes in appetite-suppressing gut hormone levels, and decreases in food intake at subsequent meals. Objective: We hypothesized that increasing doses of mixed fiber, consumed in muffins for breakfast, would proportionally influence satiety, gut hormone levels, and subsequent food intake. Design: This was a randomized, double-blind, crossover study. Healthy men (n=10) and women (n=10) with a BMI of 24±2 (mean±SEM) participated in this study. Fasting subjects consumed a muffin with 0, 4, 8, or 12 g of mixed fibers and approximately 500 kcal. Visual analog scales rated hunger and satiety for 3 h; blood was drawn to measure ghrelin, glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), and peptide YY3–36 (PYY3–36) at various intervals; and food intake was measured at an ad libitum lunch. Results: Responses to satiety-related questions did not differ among treatments. However, despite lack of differences in satiety, gut hormone levels differed among treatments. Ghrelin was higher after the 12 g fiber dose than after the 4 and 8 g fiber doses. GLP-1 was higher after the 0 g fiber dose than after the 12 and 4 g fiber doses, and PYY3–36 did not differ among fiber doses. Food intake was also indistinguishable among doses. Conclusion: Satiety, gut hormone response, and food intake did not change in a dose-dependent manner after subjects consumed 0, 4, 8, and 12 g of mixed fiber in muffins for breakfast

Climate change, food, water and population health in China

Anthropogenic climate change appears to be increasing the frequency, duration and intensity of extreme weather events. Such events have already had substantial impacts on socioeconomic development and population health. Climate change’s most profound impacts are likely to be on food, health systems and water. This paper explores how climate change will affect food, human health and water in China. Projections indicate that the overall effects of climate change, land conversion and reduced water availability could reduce Chinese food production substantially – although uncertainty is inevitable in such projections. Climate change will probably have substantial impacts on water resources – e.g. changes in rainfall patterns and increases in the frequencies of droughts and floods in some areas of China. Such impacts would undoubtedly threaten population health and well-being in many communities. In the short-term, population health in China is likely to be adversely affected by increases in air temperatures and pollution. In the medium to long term, however, the indirect impacts of climate change – e.g. changes in the availability of food, shelter and water, decreased mental health and well-being and changes in the distribution and seasonality of infectious diseases – are likely to grow in importance. The potentially catastrophic consequences of climate change can only be avoided if all countries work together towards a substantial reduction in the emission of so-called greenhouse gases and a substantial increase in the global population’s resilience to the risks of climate variability and change

Beyond ‘peer pressure’: rethinking drug use and ‘youth culture’

The study of drug use by young people in the West has been transformed over the last decade by the development of sociological approaches to drug use which take serious account of the cultural context in which young people encounter drugs. One consequence is that the notion of ‘peer pressure’, as the primary articulation of the engagement between youth culture and drug use, has been displaced by that of ‘normalisation’, which envisages ‘recreational’ drug use as one expression of consumer-based youth cultural lifestyles. In stark contrast, academic discussion of drug use in Russia remains primarily concerned with the prevalence and health consequences of (intravenous) drug use while explanations of rising rates of drug use focus on structural factors related to the expansion of drugs supply and, to a lesser extent, post-Soviet social and economic dislocation. In this article, original empirical research in Russia is used to develop an understanding of young people's drug use that synthesises structural and cultural explanations of it. It does this by situating young people's narratives of their drugs choices in the context of local drugs markets and broader socio-economic processes. However, it attempts to go beyond seeing structural location as simply a ‘constraint’ on individual choice by adopting an understanding of ‘youth culture’ as a range of youth cultural practices and formations that simultaneously embody, reproduce and negotiate the structural locations of their subjects