Doing Democracy Differently

Transnational civil society networks have become increasingly important democratizing actors in global politics. Still, the exploration of democracy in such networks remains conceptually and methodologically challenging. Practice theory provides a framework to study democracy as routinized performances even in contexts of fluid boundaries, temporal relations and a diffuse constituency. The author attempts to understand how new forms of democratic practice emerge in the interaction between political actors and their structural environments

Barbara Morgan's Photographic Interpretation of American Culture, 1935-1980

In 1935, Barbara Morgan, a recent arrival in Depression-era New York, reinvented her career as an artist when she abandoned painting and adopted the medium of photography. In the four-and-a-half decades that followed, Morgan witnessed the remaining years of the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean Conflict, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, and Three Mile Island. This dissertation will trace the photographic oeuvre of Morgan as she responded to these events both directly and indirectly, while simultaneously tracking the important artistic and cultural trends of each decade. The first chapter discusses Morgan's early photomontage work, in which she pushed the boundaries of American photography while exploring diverse metaphors for metropolitan splendor and urban isolation as well as the anxieties of the Great Depression and hope for a better future. Morgan's 1941 book Martha Graham: Sixteen Dances in Photographs anchors the second chapter. The influential dance photographs that comprise this publication highlight Morgan's modernist interpretations of Martha Graham's early dances and allow Morgan to examine beauty, strength, and a complex series of emotions through simple gestures and movement. The third chapter uses the light abstraction Morgan employed as a tailpiece for Sixteen Dances as the starting point to investigate her connections to broader artistic trends in the United States during and after the Second World War. In 1951, Morgan published Summer's Children, a photographic account of life in a summer camp that marked a major departure for the artist. Chapter four examines this book in the context of the Cold War and considers such diverse topics as summer camps, progressive education, fear-mongering, and the rise of the photo-spread. In the last two decades of her career, Morgan returned to the medium of photomontage. The fifth chapter examines this period, in which Morgan protested nuclear proliferation, environmental indifference, a perceived lack of scientific morality, and violent entertainment through her montages

Phosphor Thermometry on Surfaces - A Study of its Methodology and its Practical Applications

Phosphor Thermometry is a term describing an optical measurement technique for remote temperature sensing. Its working principle is based on the temperature-sensitive emission characteristics of certain ceramic substances termed thermographic phosphors. These inorganic materials can either be coated on objects for surface thermometry or be seeded into the gas phase or into liquid flows as solid particles. After optical excitation, often achieved using pulsed laser systems, the phosphor emits an extended and typically red-shifted afterglow referred to as phosphorescence. As the temperature changes, either the temporal or the spectral composition of the phosphorescence emission can be used to determine temperatures through comparison with the results of temperature calibration, carried out earlier. In many applications, temperatures both at various points and in two-dimensional fields have been characterised with a high degree of temporal and spatial resolution by use of thermographic phosphors. The combined sensitivities of different phosphors span a temperature range extending from cryogenic temperatures up to approximately 2000 K. In the present study, the reader is introduced to the physical basis of phosphor luminescence and to utilization of the optical properties involved for temperature measurement. The thesis also examines various means of reducing measurement uncertainty in surface phosphor thermometry. This is done in a series of experimental studies concerned with the characterization and treatment of various error sources during temperature calibration, signal detection and data evaluation. A major factor considered here is that of the coating thickness. It appears to have an intrusive effect on surface temperatures in applications involving both high local and temporal thermal gradients. The effects of instrumentation on signal detection are also investigated. The measurement accuracy was found to depend very much upon the consistency, achieved in the reproduction of the operating conditions from the temperature calibrations carried out to the experiments. This can be attributed to non-linear signal transformations that occur during detection. Even two detectors nominally identical were shown to exhibit large differences in the linearity of the signal response. Unfortunately, the linear workspace of many detectors is confined to very low signal values, the measurement precision being comparably poor due to the low signal-to-noise ratios involved. In order to improve the measurement precision without reducing the accuracy of the results, higher signal levels could be accessed through measures to compensate for detector-specific non-linearities. The signal responses to variations in operating conditions of several different point detectors and imaging devices were characterized, providing a basis for effective means of signal correction. Interest in uncertainty reduction here also led to the investigation of means of signal processing enhancement. Temperature sensitivity was found to be a quantity which is not determined exclusively by the phosphor itself, it is also depending on the operator's choice of conditions for detection and evaluation. For evaluation schemes based on temporal decay transients, the proper choice of a time window for evaluation was found to play an important role. Finally, the versatility of phosphor thermometry as applied to surfaces was demonstrated in several industry-relevant applications, including a car engine, an aircraft turbine and a large-bore two-stroke diesel engine for marine vessels

Doing democracy differently: political practices and transnational civil society

Transnational civil society networks have become increasingly important democratizing actors in global politics. Still, the exploration of democracy in such networks remains conceptually and methodologically challenging. Practice theory provides a framework to study democracy as routinized performances even in contexts of fluid boundaries, temporal relations and a diffuse constituency. The author attempts to understand how new forms of democratic practice emerge in the interaction between political actors and their structural environments

Modulation induced frequency shifts in a CPT-based atomic clock

We investigate systematic errors associated with a common modulation technique used for phase sensitive detection of a coherent population trapping (CPT) resonance. In particular, we show that modification of the CPT resonance lineshape due to the presence of off-resonant fields leads to frequency shifts which may limit the stability of CPT-based atomic clocks. We also demonstrate that an alternative demodulation technique greatly reduces these effects.Comment: 14 pages, 7 figure

Gesundheitsreformen im Konflikt zwischen nachhaltiger Finanzierung, Effizienz und sozialem Ausgleich

Die "Performance" eines Gesundheitswesens, aber auch jede "Gesundheitsreform" kann nur anhand bestimmter Kriterien beurteilt werden. Hierzu zählen mindestens die "Nachhaltigkeit der Finanzierung", die "Effizienz der Leistungserbringung und der Abdeckung des Krankheitsrisikos" sowie ein "zielführender Sozialausgleich". Anhand dieser drei Kriterien wird das System der gesetzlichen Krankenversicherung in Deutschland insbesondere vor dem Hintergrund der aktuellen Reformdiskussion kritisch analysiert. -- The “performance” of a health system, but also any “health reform“ can only be judged by certain criteria. Among these are at least the “sustainability of financing”, the “efficiency of service provision and of coverage of the health risk” as well as “fair financing”. Based on these three criteria, the German statutory health insurance is analysed in particular against the background of the actual reform discussion.

ART PERPETUATING FAME: THE POSTERS OF BUFFALO BILL'S WILD WEST

From 1883 until 1913, Buffalo Bill's Wild West attracted fifty million people in more than one thousand cities in ten countries. William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody's globe-galloping extravaganza would not have attained its status as one of the most widely attended and wildly popular turn-of-the-century spectacles without an extensive and effective promotional system to perpetuate its fame. Using the exhibition's posters as primary objects of inquiry, this dissertation examines the Wild West's most iconic and resonant elements. Each of four case studies is anchored by a key image--a poster that serves as a platform from which to investigate other imagery devoted to the same theme--and incorporates visual and contextual analysis, contemporary public reception, and an exploration of influential iconography originating from both fine art and popular sources as well as their literary counterparts. The first chapter focuses on the man at the center of it all, Buffalo Bill himself, and the meanings of the various roles he played within the Wild West's arena and in its advertising. The second chapter analyzes the complicated and shifting status of Indians near the close of the nineteenth century. The cowboy, who, like the Indian, experienced a change in reputation vividly chronicled by the Wild West and its promotional imagery, is the subject of the third chapter. The Congress of Rough Riders of the World, a reflection of increasing American imperialism, cultural hegemony and exceptionalism during an era when the word "frontier" no longer strictly referred to the American West, is the topic of the final chapter. The posters of Buffalo Bill's Wild West advertised more than a traveling exhibition that captivated millions for three decades. A century after the exhibition met its fate on the auction block, the posters designed to promote it still perpetuate its fame. Simultaneously, images of Buffalo Bill, Indians, cowboys, and multinational Rough Riders continue to illuminate many defining currents of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. When considered in their cultural context, the posters of Buffalo Bill's Wild West both influenced and underscored complex sociopolitical ideologies, perspectives, and values that challenged and shaped America