Critical Friendship for Librarians: Striving Together for Scholarly Advancement

Critical friendship is a form of non-hierarchical developmental relationship in which there is no mentor or protégé. In critical friendship, individuals with similar aims and differing experiences and knowledge aid each other in achieving goals by critically observing each other’s performance and progress. Bonded with trust, critical friends serve as sworn friends who strive and struggle side by side and share joy and pain throughout their journey. Originating from within the field of higher education, the critical friendship methodology has primarily been used by educators to improve their teaching skills, but has been found to be a powerful resource for librarians. While the literature on critical friendship demonstrates its effectiveness when applied to educators\u27 pedagogical strategies, it has not been studied as a means to promote scholarly advancement in higher education nor for its positive impact on professional development for librarians. Especially for those who are tenure-track librarians, having a tool to aid with publication, service, and academic contribution for tenure and promotion is incredibly useful. This chapter reports on the action research project conducted by us, two junior faculty librarians at an urban university, who have converted the critical friendship methodology to a framework accessible to non-teaching, tenure-track faculty librarians. For two years, we have implemented a practice of critical friendship as a way to assist each other to survive, strive, and succeed during our long journey to tenure while fostering each other’s advancement as librarians. The authors have found that a diversity of experience aids in the strength of a critical friendship. The expression of unique cultural understandings, in our case our disparate upbringings in Midwest America and Tokyo, Japan, has aided to strengthening and empowering each critical friend. The chapter will not only discuss the definition, the history, the methodology, the benefits, and challenges of critical friendship, but also will provide a summary, an outline, tools, and advice for librarians seeking a new non-hierarchical model of mentorship

Single-Step Screening of the Potential Dependence of Metal Layer Morphologies along Bipolar Electrodes

The preparation of surface gradients is a hot topic in contemporary research. Among various physical chemistry approaches, bipolar electrochemistry allows the control of such gradients through the interfacial polarization between a conducting substrate and an electrolyte solution. Here, we report the straightforward, single‐step generation of metal composition gradients on cylindrical carbon fibers. The screening of different metal deposit morphologies, which evolve gradually along a bipolar electrode, is demonstrated with monometallic layers as well as a bimetallic composite layer based on copper and nickel

Μεσαίες πόλεις : προοπτικές ανάπτυξης - διαφανείς τάσεις στο ελληνικό αστικό σύστημα

<p>HR3∶ 16 hours hypoxia followed by 3 hours reoxygenation.</p

ETB receptor protects the tubulointerstitium in experimental thrombotic microangiopathy

ETB receptor protects the tubulointerstitium in experimental thrombotic microangiopathy.BackgroundThe characteristic features of thrombotic microangiopathy (TMA) include glomerular and peritubular capillary endothelial cell injury with thrombus formation and subsequent ischemic tubulointerstitial damage. The endothelin ETB receptor has been shown to mediate both endothelial cell proliferation and vasodilation, and we therefore hypothesized that blockade of this receptor might promote more severe injury in this model.MethodsTMA was induced in recently established transgenic rats that lack expression of ETB receptor in the kidney; these animals were compared to control rats with TMA both in the short-term (days 1 and 3) when acute glomerular injury was most manifest, and the long-term (day 17) when glomeruli have recovered but tubulointerstitial injury is still present. Renal damage was assessed by histological analysis and blood urea nitrogen (BUN) measurements.ResultsNo difference in the TMA model was observed between rats with and without ETB receptor on days 1 or 3. At day 17, however, rats without the ETB receptor showed more severe tubulointerstitial injury compared with those with ETB receptor, which was associated with higher BUN levels. The tubulointerstitial damage was associated with a more severe loss of peritubular capillaries.ConclusionsThese findings suggest that the ETB receptor may protect peritubular capillaries under the ischemic insult, and serve a defensive role in the tubulointerstitium induced by renal microvascular injury

ヒサエ・ヤマモトの父親表象 : 「茶色の家」と「ラスヴェガスのチャーリー」

The purpose of this paper is to examine the Issei fathers in Hisaye Yamamoto\u27s two stories, "The Brown House" and "Las Vegas Charlie." In her stories, Yamamoto dramatizes the struggles of Issei fathers and mothers in her earlier stories. The Issei mothers are the victims of their Issei husbands, who repress their wives with traditional Japanese gender codes. Yamamoto describes such Issei males with irony and sometimes with derision, while she shows her compassion for the unfruitful rebellion of the Issei women.However, it should be noted that Yamamoto shows a different view of Issei fathers in "The Brown House" and "Las Vegas Charlie." The two stories are similar in the way they depict the male protagonists. They are compulsive gamblers and become losers. In addition to that, instead of using a sensitive girl as she does in her earlier stories, Yamamoto adopts a narratie voice, which is objective and detached, in the two stories. With the use of such a narrative style, she reveals that the decline of the two fathers is caused not only by their inner weakness but also by the social marginalizationcaused by racial prejudice and discrimination against Japanese immigrants. Particulaly in "Las Vegas Charlie," Yamamoto reveals that the internment during the WWII was an utter blow to the Issei by summarizing the entire span of the Issei history into the 1950s.It is often pointed out that father figures in the stories of Yamamoto are normally presented in a negative light, but reading "The Brown House" and "Las Vegas Charlie" will lead us to recognize that Yamamoto\u27s view of Issei fathers is not always critical and ironical but more complicated and ambivalent

日系アメリカ文学の変容とヒサエ・ヤマモト

Hisaye Yamamotoʼs works have been widely read particularly since the publication of Seventeen Syllables and Other Stories, a collection of her works in 1988. Most of the reviews and studies about her have mainly focused on the significance of gender, Japanese American culture and hybrid identity. However, it should be noted that many recent studies on Yamamoto have shifted to an analysis of an interracial solidarity in her works. One such work is “The Eskimo Connection.” Although it has not been fully examined by scholars, a reading of“ The Eskimo Connection” will surely lead us to recognize that Yamamoto had a sharp insight into the possibilities and limits of interracial and interethnic relationships among US minorities. The aim of this paper is to point out the significance of“ The Eskimo Connection” by comparing it with Cynthia Kadohataʼs Weedflower and to examine Yamamotoʼs influence on such a postmodern writer as Kadohata.“The Eskimo Connection” and Weedflower are similar in that they deal with relationships between Japanese Americans and Native Americans. “The Eskimo Connection” （1983） is a fictional narrative about correspondence between a young incarcerated Native American man, Alden, and an older Japanese American woman, Emiko. Although Emiko is, at first, hesitant to respond to Alden when he asks her to give him some comments on an essay he has written, she finally decides to answer his request, and starts a two-year correspondence with him. Emiko begins to understand his inner sufferings and to sympathize with him because his situation reminds her of her internment experience during World War II.Kadohataʼs Weedflower （2006） is set at Poston internment camp during World War II. Sumiko, a 12-year-old Nisei girl, happens to meet Frank, a Mohave boy, at the camp. At first they both feel anger toward each other, until Sumiko learns from Frank that Native Americans have been denied civil rights like Japanese Americans. Subsequently they begin to feel empathy with each other when they come to know that Japanese Americans and Native Americans share a common history of losing their lives and their places in society because of racism.Although the two stories were published more than twenty years apart, there appear to be deep resonances between Yamamoto and Kadohata. Both show that coalitional relationships across racial lines are sometimes necessary, but at the same time they also suggest that there exist social boundaries and restrictions which are difficult to overcome because Japanese Americans and Native Americans have different histories and different social locations in American society. “The Eskimo Connection” definitely reveals that Yamamoto predicted the limitations of cross-racial collaborations in contemporary multiracial America