Publishing “Poznański Czerwiec 1956”: A History of the Book

The author remembers the initiatives taken in 1981 to celebrate the twenty fifth anniversary of Poznań 1956 protest.The author remembers the initiatives taken in 1981 to celebrate the twenty fifth anniversary of Poznań 1956 protest

Interview of John Kledzik

Huffard interviews Kledzik on his experiences in the mission field in Zambia. The interview was conducted in Searcy, AR

Róža Domašcyna’s Poetical Project between Folklore and Modernity

Poetical project by Sorbian poet Róža Domašcyna fits into the category of „minor literature”, coined by  F.  Guattari  and  G.  Deleuze  in  1975.  Despite  its  inevitably  political,  ecological  and ideological local connotations, it is rooted in the experience of modernity, still unpopular among the contemporary Sorbian writers. Its main topics are: the devastation of Lusatian environment, erotic and cultural hybridity. Domašcyna uses the hybrid nature of Sorbian identity to create an post-modern subject, conscious of the non-transparent nature of language. The result is an original poetry, which suits the current comparative and postcolonial categories of interpretation.Poetical project by Sorbian poet Róža Domašcyna fits into the category of „minor literature”, coined by  F.  Guattari  and  G.  Deleuze  in  1975.  Despite  its  inevitably  political,  ecological  and ideological local connotations, it is rooted in the experience of modernity, still unpopular among the contemporary Sorbian writers. Its main topics are: the devastation of Lusatian environment, erotic and cultural hybridity. Domašcyna uses the hybrid nature of Sorbian identity to create an post-modern subject, conscious of the non-transparent nature of language. The result is an original poetry, which suits the current comparative and postcolonial categories of interpretation

Wymiana spojrzeń. „Zaręczyny w San Domingo” Heinricha von Kleista na tle niemieckich badań postkolonialnych

The article reports on the state of research in the German postcolonial studies, comparing it with a discussion on the implementation of a similar project in the Polish literary discourse, and on the basis of the bibliography argues that German researchers boldly confront the traditional instruments of interpretation with those of postcolonial studies. The proof of this state is also presented on the basis of considerations of German researcher, Monica Ehlers, who gives the interpretation of the story of Heinrich von Kleist Betrothal in Santo Domingo. According to her view, the text anticipates the critical point of modernity, demonstrating crisis of the primacy of sight, which constitutes a discursive figure of European domination.The article reports on the state of research in the German postcolonial studies, comparing it with a discussion on the implementation of a similar project in the Polish literary discourse, and on the basis of the bibliography argues that German researchers boldly confront the traditional instruments of interpretation with those of postcolonial studies. The proof of this state is also presented on the basis of considerations of German researcher, Monica Ehlers, who gives the interpretation of the story of Heinrich von Kleist Betrothal in Santo Domingo. According to her view, the text anticipates the critical point of modernity, demonstrating crisis of the primacy of sight, which constitutes a discursive figure of European domination

Advances in the Combinatorics of the Unipotent Upper Triangular Groups

Describing the conjugacy classes of the unipotent upper triangular groups UTn(Fq) uniformly (for all or many values of n and q) is a nearly impossible task. This thesis investigates the combinatorial structure present in approximate solutions to this problem, including supercharacter theories and normal subgroups. This contributes to a growing study of "unipotent combinatorics,'' giving new or deepened interpretations of combinatorial objects like partial orders, graph colorings, Schr&ouml;der paths, polyominoes, matroids, and other objects in terms of UTn(Fq). The final chapter also gives a number of results about supercharacter theories of arbitrary finite groups; these results have the potential to give further combinatorial results upon application to UTn(Fq).The first half of the thesis takes a Hopf algebraic approach, constructing a novel graded Hopf algebra on the tower of UTn(Fq)-class functions for n &ge; 0, and a sub-Hopf algebra spanned by the supercharacters of a well-known family of supercharacter theories. This sub-Hopf algebra has graded dimension given by the Catalan numbers and is isomorphic to a known Hopf algebra of natural unit interval graphs; previously, it was used to study the chromatic quasisymmetric function, a well-known symmetric function which generalizes the chromatic polynomial of a graph. With this sub-Hopf algebra structure, the map given by induction to GLn(Fq) becomes a Hopf algebra homomorphism into the canonical Hopf algebra of GLn(Fq)-class functions. Using the theory of combinatorial Hopf algebras, I give combinatorial formulas for this homomorphism; these formulas involve the chromatic quasisymmetric function, as well as a second well-known family of symmetric functions called vertical strip LLT polynomials. These results suggest an exciting connection to other areas of algebraic combinatorics which has yet to be explored fully.The remaining combinatorial results of the thesis describe the normal subgroups of UTn(Fq). For q a prime, a bijection between the set of all normal subgroups of UTn(Fq) and certain pairs of Fq*-labeled combinatorial objects is given. This leads to a nice formula for the number of normal subgroups in which the q-Stirling numbers appear. When q is not prime, the same results describe the normal subgroups which correspond to Le algebra ideals in the nilpotent upper triangular Lie algebra utn(Fq). An extension of this result (non-bijectively) enumerates normal subgroups for non-prime q, which conjecturally has many of the nice properties as the enumeration in the case where q is prime.The final results of the thesis concern the construction of supercharacter theories for arbitrary finite groups. These show how certain subgroup lattices can be used to produce supercharacter theories, both directly and by gluing together supercharacter theoretic data from smaller subquotients, corresponding to lattice intervals. The gluing construction is reminiscent of the gluing property in sheaf theory, and significant effort is devoted to cementing this comparison. Finally, a few examples of these constructions are discussed, leading to new perspectives on previously known supercharacter theories.</p

Frankofoński postkolonializm z Europy Wschodniej

Artykuł opiera się na ostatnich badaniach, w których toczy się spór dotyczący analizowania literatury pochodzącej z nazwanej tak przez Davida Chioniego Moore‟a „sfery postsowieckiej” pod kątem teorii postkolonialnej. Dowodzi, że uznanie krajów byłej sowieckiej strefy wpływów za posiadające cechy wspólne z byłymi koloniami francuskimi może przynieść twórcze rezultaty. Możliwe, że zainteresowanie studiów literaturoznawczych relacjami pomiędzy Pierwszym a Trzecim Światem pozostawiło lukę w postaci Drugiego Świata, a przynajmniej – pisarzy frankofońskich. Możemy zacząć ją wypełniać, studiując teksty po francusku napisane przez twórców pochodzących z obszarów byłej dominacji sowieckiej. Niniejszy artykuł bada fikcjonalne i teoretyczne prace Julii Kristevej, Agoty Kristof, Milana Kundery, Andreï Makinego i Briny Svit. Ich spojrzenie wykorzystywane jest do zbadania zakresu, w jakim intelektualiści z małych krajów Europy Środkowej i Wschodniej oceniają swoją pozycję jako „postkolonialną” – politycznie i językowo podobną do sytuacji frankofońskich naukowców i pisarzy z Maghrebu, Afryki Subsaharyjskiej lub Antyli.This article draws from recent research that makes an argument for studying literature from what David Chioni Moore calls „the post-Soviet sphere‟ under the rubric of postcolonial theory. It contends that conceiving of countries formerly under Soviet rule as having some characteristics in common with countries once under French colonial rule can yield productive results. It is quite possible that the concentration in literary studies on relations between the First and Third Worlds has left a void with respect to the Second World, at least with respect to francophone writers. We can begin to fill this void by studying texts in French by writers from places formerly under Soviet domination, and this article examines the fictional and theoretical works of Julia Kristeva, Agota Kristof, Milan Kundera, Andreï Makine and Brina Svit. Their insights are used here to explore the extent to which intellectuals from small Central and Eastern European countries find themselves in a „postcolonial‟ position – politically and linguistically – similar to that of francophone scholars and writers from the Maghreb, sub-Saharan Africa or the Antilles

The effect of school-based creative expression group therapy on the self-concept of female adolescents

Adolescents face a wide array of social, emotional, and academic problems in today’s world during what is often described as a challenging and complicated stage of development (Perryman, Moss, & Cochran, 2015). During adolescence, the peer group becomes more important as teens begin to search for and establish their identities. Therefore, group work can be an advantageous way of reaching the adolescent population. Creative and expressive art techniques allow a safe way for adolescent girls to express themselves and relate to others around them. They learn in a group setting that they are not alone in the world and that others struggle with similar challenges. Together, they are able to learn healthy coping skills and a positive sense of self in a setting and manner that is developmentally appropriate. Additionally, social-emotional health has been strongly correlated with academics in the literature: the better a teen’s social-emotional health is, the better their grades will be. Although the use of creative mediums in working with adolescents has been relatively well-established, many teens are intimidated by the idea of creating art work. The researchers propose a manual of creative expressive interventions designed to allow clients to create art with easy-to-assemble projects, thereby decreasing stress and anxiety related to art, while still allowing a creative process (Spangler, 2015). In this single-case research design, researchers utilized the Piers-Harris Children’s Self-Concept Scale 2 to measure the effects of a creative art expression group on adolescent females at a high school in the Midwest. Participants provided responses before the intervention for 3 weeks to establish a baseline (A), for 8 weeks during treatment (B), and for 3 weeks following the completion of the study (A). Preliminary results of the pilot project are presented along with application-based materials

Identifying climatic risk to soybean cultivation in the transitional type of moderate climate in Central Poland

Meteorological measurements carried out in 1986-2015 were used to evaluate the climatic risk for soybean cultivation in the transitional type of moderate climate in Poland, as well the directions and the significance of changes in the meteorological indices were considered. Their analysis led to determination of the following unfavourable climatic conditions for soybean cultivation: shortening of the active growth period, a delay of the date on which the soil warms up to 8 °C at a depth of 5 cm, occurrences of meteorological and agricultural droughts and of late spring ground frosts. All indices of the climatic risk in soybean cultivation demonstrated high temporal variability. Significant trends of changes for the following indices were observed: an increase in the number of moderate and strong frosts and an earlier start of the period when soil reaches 8 °C at a depth of 5 cm. For 2000-2015, in relation to the previous 15-year period of 1986-2000, it was found that temporal variability increased for the number of moderate and strong late spring frosts and for the date of the last late spring frost. On the other hand, variability was reduced as regards the beginning and the length of the period of active growth of plants, as well as precipitation shortages and surpluses in the period when soybean water needs are intensified

Insights into the Ecology and Evolutionary Success of Crocodilians Revealed through Bite-Force and Tooth-Pressure Experimentation

BackgroundCrocodilians have dominated predatory niches at the water-land interface for over 85 million years. Like their ancestors, living species show substantial variation in their jaw proportions, dental form and body size. These differences are often assumed to reflect anatomical specialization related to feeding and niche occupation, but quantified data are scant. How these factors relate to biomechanical performance during feeding and their relevance to crocodilian evolutionary success are not known.Methodology/Principal FindingsWe measured adult bite forces and tooth pressures in all 23 extant crocodilian species and analyzed the results in ecological and phylogenetic contexts. We demonstrate that these reptiles generate the highest bite forces and tooth pressures known for any living animals. Bite forces strongly correlate with body size, and size changes are a major mechanism of feeding evolution in this group. Jaw shape demonstrates surprisingly little correlation to bite force and pressures. Bite forces can now be predicted in fossil crocodilians using the regression equations generated in this research.Conclusions/SignificanceCritical to crocodilian long-term success was the evolution of a high bite-force generating musculo-skeletal architecture. Once achieved, the relative force capacities of this system went essentially unmodified throughout subsequent diversification. Rampant changes in body size and concurrent changes in bite force served as a mechanism to allow access to differing prey types and sizes. Further access to the diversity of near-shore prey was gained primarily through changes in tooth pressure via the evolution of dental form and distributions of the teeth within the jaws. Rostral proportions changed substantially throughout crocodilian evolution, but not in correspondence with bite forces. The biomechanical and ecological ramifications of such changes need further examination