Taking a break: doctoral summer schools as transformative pedagogies

This chapter focuses on the doctoral summer school as a challenging pedagogy for doctoral education, in which the traditional supervisory relationship and the disciplinary curriculum are deconstructed through intensive group processes. We draw on our experiences as pedagogues on the Roskilde University Graduate School in Lifelong Learning which has hosted an international summer school for the last ten years. We describe the new learning spaces created and explore the democratic group processes and the collaborative action learning in-volved when discipline and stage of study are set to the side in this multi-paradigmatic, multi-national context. Despite the wide range of participants in terms of length of study, focus and methodological approach, the respite from supervisory pedagogies and the careful critiques of multi-national peer ‘opponents’ is often transformative in the doctoral students’ research sub-jectivities and continuing journeys

The unification bonus (malus) in postwall Eastern Germany

This paper presents estimates of the unification bonus for East Germans over the period 1991 to 1998. The unification bonus is defined as the discounted value of the difference between a person?s actual income and his or her counterfactual real income stream forecast for a hypothetical continuation of economic life in a static GDR. The two main issues tackled in this study are the construction of valid deflators for a comparison of real incomes during the transition from a centralized to a market economy and the estimation of plausible counterfactual income streams. Our central result is that 19 percent of East Germans received a present value malus and so can be regarded as unification losers but that the aggregate bonus is ten times the size of the aggregate malus of the sample. --Real income comparison,income distribution and mobility,economies in transition

Symbiotic outcome modified by the diversification from 7 to over 700 nodule specific cysteine rich peptides

Legume-rhizobium symbiosis represents one of the most successfully co-evolved mutualisms. Within nodules, the bacterial cells undergo distinct metabolic and morphological changes and differentiate into nitrogen-fixing bacteroids. Legumes in the inverted repeat lacking clade (IRLC) employ an array of defensin-like small secreted peptides (SSPs), known as nodule-specific cysteine-rich (NCR) peptides, to regulate bacteroid differentiation and activity. While most NCRs exhibit bactericidal effects in vitro, studies confirm that inside nodules they target the bacterial cell cycle and other cellular pathways to control and extend rhizobial differentiation into an irreversible (or terminal) state where the host gains control over bacteroids. While NCRs are well established as positive regulators of effective symbiosis, more recent findings also suggest that NCRs affect partner compatibility. The extent of bacterial differentiation has been linked to species-specific size and complexity of the NCR gene family that varies even among closely related species, suggesting a more recent origin of NCRs followed by rapid expansion in certain species. NCRs have diversified functionally, as well as in their expression patterns and responsiveness, likely driving further functional specialisation. In this review, we evaluate the functions of NCR peptides and their role as a driving force underlying the outcome of rhizobial symbiosis, where the plant is able to determine the outcome of rhizobial interaction in a temporal and spatial manner

A qualitative comparison of how older breast cancer survivors process treatment information regarding endocrine therapy.

BACKGROUND:It remains unclear how information about aromatase inhibitors (AI) impacts women's decision-making about persistence with endocrine therapy. PURPOSE:To describe and compare how women treated for primary early stage breast cancer either persisting or not persisting with an AI received, interpreted, and acted upon AI-related information. DESIGN:Thematic analysis was used to sort and compare the data into the most salient themes. PARTICIPANTS:Women (N = 54; 27 persisting, 27 not persisting with an AI) aged 65-93 years took part in qualitative interviews. RESULTS:Women in both subgroups described information similarly in terms of its value, volume, type, and source. Aspects of AI-related information that either differed between the subgroups or were misunderstood by one or both subgroups included: (1) knowledge of AI or tamoxifen prior to cancer diagnosis, (2) use of online resources, (3) misconceptions about estrogen, hormone replacement therapies and AI-related symptoms, and (4) risk perception and the meaning and use of recurrence statistics such as Oncotype DX. CONCLUSIONS:Persisters and nonpersisters were similar in their desire for more information about potential side effects and symptom management at AI prescription and subsequent appointments. Differences included how information was obtained and interpreted. Interactive discussion questions are shared that can incorporate these findings into clinical settings

Smart City Tours as an Innovative Way to (re)Discover Urban Environments in an Italian Context

This article explores the foundations upon which to build innovation and further professionalise the tour guiding sector in an Italian context. It is based on a cooperation initiative started in March 2020 just at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic which proposes smart city tours as innovative, sustainable, and creative ways to (re)discover urban environments with the expected impact to make tour participants think, influence post-tour behaviour towards sustainability, and to provide a differentiated view of a visited place. The study is designed as a formative evaluation prior to introducing measures that allow further exploitation of the potential for smart city tours by looking at a set of innovation characteristics in tourist guiding, organisational aspects, marketing, and prospective demand. Results demonstrate that the foundations for introducing smart city tours are in place. The city of Bolzano in the Autonomous Province of Bolzano - South Tyrol has extensive thematic diversity but also has experienced licensed tour guides and tour managers, who receive continuous training on innovative topics, didactics, and technologies. In terms of organisation and marketing, the research points to areas with a need for further development, and potential areas of interest for different target groups in smart city tours can be demonstrated

Escrituras más allá de las palabras: vocabulario “islámico” en las primeras traducciones árabes de la Biblia

This article discusses the use of “Islamic” vocabulary in Christian Arabic Bible translations composed around the 9th century. It suggests that there is a link between such use and the translation’s Vorlage dependence, function, and the general translation technique attested in it. The article further proposes that a function of translations containing a notable and seemingly deliberate use of Islamic-sounding vocabulary was to show that the Christian Scriptures were able to absorb the message of Islam, just like early Christian Arabic theologians promulgated the idea that Christian dogmas permeated the Qurʾān. Thus, instead of shielding their Scriptures from a competing religion by dressing them in a more neutral linguistic register, these translators and authors presented a Christianity essentially elevated beyond words and contexts and therefore portrayable in any of them.Este artículo discute el uso de vocabulario “islámico” en traducciones árabes de la Biblia, compuestas en torno al siglo IX. El artículo sugiere la existencia de un vínculo entre dicho uso y la dependencia y función de la traducción Vorlage, y de la traducción técnica general atestiguada en ella. El artículo además propone que una función de las traducciones, que contienen un uso aparentemente notable y deliberado del vocabulario de sonido islámico, fue mostrar que las Escrituras cristianas podían absorber el mensaje del Islam, al igual que los primeros teólogos cristianos árabes promulgaron la idea de que los dogmas cristianos calaron en El Corán. Por lo tanto, en lugar de proteger sus Escrituras de una religión competidora, vistiéndolas en un registro lingüístico más neutral, estos traductores y autores presentaron un cristianismo esencialmente elevado más allá de las palabras y los contextos y por lo tanto representable en cualquiera de ellos