Mothers, Lovers Others: An Evolutionary Analysis of Womanhood in Western Malayo-Polynesian Oral Traditions

This thesis is the first to study female characters from Western Malayo-Polynesian oral tradition. It is also the first to apply an evolutionary literary analysis to these stories. The aim was to analyse the life history cycle of women as portrayed in oral stories from the Western Malayo-Polynesian language group, which includes languages spoken across southern Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, the island states of western Micronesia, and Madagascar. The general principle behind evolutionary literary theory is that any knowledge (including stories) generated by the mind is a biological phenomenon and worthy of scientific study. This tenet is then compounded with an evolutionary understanding of life whereby all animals, including humans, are driven to ensure somatic success through the preservation of life, and reproductive success through the proliferation of genes. It is argued that oral stories contain implicit evolutionary ‘lessons’ that may assist humans in obtaining somatic and reproductive success. The most recurring evolutionary theme in female-led Western Malayo-Polynesian oral stories revolves around reproductive success, with approximately 90% of stories in this thesis focusing either on family life or the search for a partner. In the section ‘Tales of Family Life’, stories portray the complexity of family dynamics, showing how family members must sacrifice their selfish interests for the sake of their kin in order to maximize the propagation of their genes. In ‘Tales of Searching for a Partner’, heroines take part in complex mate attraction and retention strategies, showing that the search for a ‘Happily Ever After’ (or evolutionary fitness) is not always a straightforward journey. Unsurprisingly, themes without direct correlations with evolutionary fitness form only 10% of the entire corpus. ‘Tales Beyond Family and Partners’ attempt to explore stories of evolutionary anomalies through the phenomenon of childfree and heroic women. Evolutionary studies, however, have yet to provide a satisfactory theory on women whose behaviour seems to hold little or no reproductive advantages, and analysis of these types of stories would benefit from further research. As a multidisciplinary study, this thesis is able to impact future research in three different ways. Firstly, it is hoped that it will bring attention to and increase knowledge of the lesser known and under-studied Western Malayo-Polynesian oral traditions. Secondly, the thesis can also serve as a model for the application of evolutionary theory to the folkloric study of oral stories. Finally, it shows the potential of applying evolutionary literary theory to non-Western cultures. It is hoped that future research will be able to expand the findings of this thesis either through larger or more concentrated pools of data, with the aim of emphasizing the universal drives that underlie our common humanity

Reading Carol Ann Duffy’s “Politics” through unnatural ecopoetics

Carol Ann Duffy is one of the most notable poets in contemporary English poetry. In accordance with her poetic dexterity, she was appointed as Great Britain’s Poet Laureate in 2009. This study deals with Duffy’s “Politics,” which was introduced in The Bees (2011), her first collection published after having been named Poet Laureate. In this poem, the poet tackled natural and unnatural imagery resultant from diverse experiences. This study proposes that the material environment surrounding Carol Ann Duffy is intertwined with her nonmaterial environment in “Politics.” This argument runs parallel with the concept of unnatural ecopoetics, which is considered to be a new direction in ecopoetics in examining contemporary poetry. The current study argues that the poet’s ideology after becoming poet laureate and also her experience as a Scottish, feminist, bisexual poet have all together configured a kind of nonmaterial environment intertwined with the material world or nature in the textual space through “Politics”. This assumption is not far from Sarah Nolan’s concept of Unnatural Ecopoetics in her book Unnatural Ecopoetics: Unlikely Spaces of Contemporary Poetry (2017). So, this study is conducted in the light of Nolan’s concept, which denotes the relations between the human, natural, and unnatural environments and the language in the poetic text. Accordingly, more focus will be on the poet’s experiences, memories, ideology, and feelings which inspired her to symbolize nature in another dimension in “Politics” as an unnatural ecopoetics poem

Factors affecting adherence to lipid-lowering drugs: a scoping review

Objectives: Dyslipidaemia is an important risk factor of cardiovascular disease. In developed countries, only 50% of patients who had chronic illness adhere to their long-term therapy. This article aimed to review the factors affecting adherence to lipid-lowering drugs (LLD). Methods: The articles search were selected based on the available keywords in the title and abstract with the publication restricted between January 2010 to September 2020. Articles generated from the databases must fulfil both inclusion and exclusion criteria in the present systematic review. A total of 221 literature reviews obtained from the initial search. After the exclusion of the articles with irrelevant topics, a total of 23 articles were chosen for this current review. Results: The factors were classified based on three main factors which were patient related, medication related and health- care workers related factors. For patient related factors, this review found gender, age, number of family members, education level, post-hospitalization, comorbidities & CVD risk, follow-up status, occupation, socio-economy, insurance, perception, ethnicity and health plan were among factors affecting adherence to LLD. As for medication related factors, timing, polypharmacy, duration of treatment, generic medication, intensity of medication, side effects, initiating dose, packaging, drug dosing and type of drugs were revealed as contributing factors. In the light of healthcare workers related, factors shown were counselling, medication optimisation, type of provider, and location of hospital. Conclusions: Recommendations to improve adherence include educating patients on the disease itself and the importance of the treatment, modification of the dosing, timing and type of lipid-lowering drugs, and effective consultations by healthcare workers. Further studies need to be done in Malaysia as there is inadequate research on this particular topic

Book Review: On the Fringes of Literature and Digital Media Culture: Perspectives from Eastern and Western Europe

No abstract