British colonial education and the rise of nationalism in Malaya: tracing the route of the Merdeka1 generation in Adibah Amin’s this end of the rainbow

Frantz Fanon in The Wretched of the Earth (1961) asserted the importance of colonial education for the emergence of “native intellectuals” who will be able to represent the masses and participate in the national agenda against colonisation. Likewise Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities (1983) draws attention to a secondary school in West Africa during French colonialism that offered colonial education to the local boys who eventually became nationalist leaders. Both Fanon and Anderson opined that colonial education was vital for the emergence of an elite indigenous group who possessed the key to mobilise the masses, contributing to the rise in nationalism. With the emergence of the Subaltern Studies in South Asia, the significance of the elite group and the ways non-elite members of a nation have been represented in nationalist discourses have been highly debated. This paper examines the relationship between British colonial education and the rise of nationalism in This End of the Rainbow (2006), a Malaysian life-writing in English by Adibah Amin, a female writer of Malay ethnic origin. Also, this paper looks at how as a nationalist writing, the narrative has deployed colonial education to distinguish the elites as decolonising agents from the masses, placing the latter at the margin as the subalterns

Comparative Study of Machine Learning Algorithms to Measure the Students’ Performance

Students’ performance in the continuous assessments needs to be monitored to identify the students who may not perform well in the final examination. The aim of the research is to predict the students at risk those who will not complete the course. In order to predict the students at risk, Machine Learning algorithms can be applied to the students’ data at hand to construct a model from the training data set. With the prediction model, testing data can be applied to identify the students at risk. In this paper, two Machine Learning Algorithms namely C4.5, and Naïve Bayes Algorithm are used to analyze the training data set to build the prediction models and tested on the testing data set. The accuracy level of the two algorithms were also computed and compared to identify the algorithm which yields results at higher accuracy

Which tongue? The imported colonial standard or motherland vernacular? exploring “death” as the birth of postcolonial Malaysia in Muthammal Palanisamy’s funeral chant

This article examines “death” in a funeral chant set in the plantation estates of Malaysia, and written in English and Tamil, as a metaphor for the birth of the nation. It explores how the death of communal linguistic elements, both in orality and symbolic references, lead to the deconstruction of motherland identity markers which are then replaced by the reconstruction of diasporic identities that are observable through the use of standardized English. For this purpose, the Malaysian Indian life-writer, Muthammal Palanisamy’s English version of an oppari (Tamil for funeral chant), which was published in Malaysia (2002) will be read in relation to the Tamil version published in India (2007) through transliterated and translated texts of the chant. In so doing, the paper highlights the inherent gap between the two versions that can be usefully deployed to address whether English is an enabling tool through which ethnic Indians can express their identities in a postcolonial nation like Malaysia or is it perpetually contaminated by colonial history and values. On the other hand, the paper also draws attention to the question of whether the displacement of the vernacular language, i.e., Tamil, witnesses the inevitable cultural death of a diasporic community or does it display a form of inclusivity within the polyglot linguistic environment of the adopted land, Malaysia

“Teasing” and “mocking” as the language of courtship: The egalitarian gendered status of Lundayeh women

This article examines the complementarity that exist between Lundayeh men and women by exploring the community’s oral literature to determine whether “teasing” and “mocking” can be perceived as forms of language courtship, and more importantly, how do such language forms in Lundayeh relationships provide the womenfolk a rather egalitarian gendered status in the community. By contextualizing the Lundayeh as both inlanders and highlanders of Borneo, this article employs two lines of inquiry: (1) the extent to which, as swidden hunter-gatherers, the sexual division of labor among the Lundayeh men and women contribute to the complementarity in gendered status; and, (2) how does the past practice of successful headhunting, that is celebrated through a commemorative ceremony, highlight the role of women as they make fun of the severed head, cry for the head, and eventually nurse the head, has been translocated as “teasing” and “mocking” in the community’s oral literature. The latter is important to locate the cultural significance of headhunting because, if the head was a symbol of male sexuality in the past, after the abolishment of headhunting during the colonial period and following conversion to Christianity, the present-day “teases” and “mocks” in the oral literature stand as a testament that men do not have access to the women until they prove their masculinity. This is to say that, even though headhunting has formally ended since the 1930s, the cultural significance associated with headhunting continues to survive in the oral literature, because, as the evidence suggest, women can utilize opportunities such as courtship or even pre-arranged alliances by manipulating the situation in order to both mock and relish their male partners

Representation of Buayeh in the Quality of Life of the Lundayeh People

Buayeh or crocodile plays a very important role in the life of the Lundayeh society. Their belief in buayeh, which is a ferocious river reptile, has been with them since their existence for hundreds of years. During the headhunting period the animal symbolised an enemy that was defeated. On the other hand the crocodile also symbolises strength, heroism, fame and wealth. For instance, among the Lundayeh people, strength is when a person succeeds in chopping and bringing an enemy’s head after a war or headhunting expedition and is highly regarded as a hero and a grand celebration is held to welcome him. The whole community would participate in building a crocodile image made of earth where they would perform the fekuab, a heroic song which was led by a woman, followed by the warrior’s relatives and followers. The warrior and the hero of the day would then boast and recite a self-proclamation about his fame by cutting the effigy with a sword felefet with all his might. In the case of wealth, only a man who succeeded in farming was able to build a huge Ulung Buayeh or crocodile mound in the heath forest. In this paper therefore I will examine the manifestation of the quality of life for the Lundayeh people as elements of strength, heroism, fame and wealth which are represented in the oral literature through the image of buayeh

Bone health after menopause: effect of surgical menopaus on bone mineral density and osteoporosis

Background: Natural menopause or surgical menopause is associated with endocrinological changes and alteration in bone and mineral metabolism. Hence this study was conducted to assess the bone mineral density changes in women with surgical menopause. Methods: This is a prospective observational study conducted in the department of obstetrics and gynaecology at Sri Ramachandra medical college, which is a tertiary care teaching hospital. 60 women with surgical menopause were included in the study. BMD was assessed by dual energy X-ray absorptiometry at the lumbar spine and hip joint. All the data was entered in Microsoft excel spread sheet and analysed by using SPSS software.Results: Among 60 study subjects, 41 individuals had a normal BMD, 16 had osteopenia, and 3 were diagnosed with osteoporosis. Osteopenia and osteoporosis is significantly higher in patients who had undergone hysterectomy with removal of ovaries. Observations of osteopenia and osteoporosis were significantly higher with increasing number of years post hysterectomy.Conclusions: Prevalence of osteoporosis is high in patients who undergo hysterectomy. Oophorectomy is associated with postoperative bone loss. Targeted management strategies should include routine BMD assessment and hormone therapy improves management of bone health in this population. Further more studies are needed in large populations to test alternative treatments for post oophorectomy osteoporosis

Stereotypes of Chinese culture in American picture books through written and visual languages

Language is a communication system which consists of a set of sounds or written symbols. As a specific form of children's book, picture books combine pictures and words to tell a complete story, pictures in which can be accepted as visual language because meaning can be conveyed from one party to another. Language is also the carrier of culture. Apart from the explicit meaning of the story, there are limitations in cultural connotations implied in the picture-word language system. Chinese culture is a very important part of the multiculturalism in American picture books. Through this study, it has been found that there are some stereotypes in the display of Chinese culture in American picture books. Firstly, the full view of Chinese culture is overshadowed by the excessive attention and localization of cultural symbols such as the Chinese dragon and the Spring Festival. Secondly, the confusion of Asian cultures in visual language and written language weakens the uniqueness of Chinese culture. Thirdly, Information disorder weakens the authenticity of Chinese culture. The reasons of these stereotypes are rooted in the real attitude of the multiculturalism in America. The misinterpretation results in the following complications: (i) Chinese culture is equated with the culture of Chinese Americans; (ii) Chinese culture is regarded as static, which leads to serious homogenization; (iii)The sightseeing attitude towards Chinese culture resulted in the overfocus of cultural symbols

To explore the reasons of the surge in sales of picture books during the COVID-19 Pandemic in China

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the shutting down of schools and offices, and he enforcement of home quarantine and other measures have led to an increase in digital online reading, which has boosted digital publishing. However, several studies have reported that more “screen exposure” time might lead to higher rates of abnormal psychological problems in preschool children's mood, conduct, attention, peer interaction and other aspects. In China, as a response to this perceived risk and reduce screen exposure among preschool children, families, society and the publishing industry have concentrated promoting printed picture books in these ways: parent-child reading of picture books in the family; storytelling, performance and other promotional activities in public and private libraries; and audible platforms promoted by the publishing industry and We-media