Relating to Relational Aesthetics

This thesis will examine the practice of relational aesthetics as it involves the viewer, as well as the way in which it plays out within and outside of the institutional setting of the museum. I will focus primarily on two unique projects: that of The Machine Project Field Guide at Los Angeles County Museum of Art on November 15, 2008, produced by Machine Project, a social project operated out of a storefront gallery in Echo Park; and David Michalek\u27s Slow Dancing at the Lincoln Center Festival in New York City, July 12-29 2007

Cosmological Constraints from Primordial Black Holes

Primordial black holes may form in the early Universe, for example from the collapse of large amplitude density perturbations predicted in some inflationary models. Light black holes undergo Hawking evaporation, the energy injection from which is constrained both at the epoch of nucleosynthesis and at the present. The failure as yet to unambiguously detect primordial black holes places important constraints. In this article, we are particularly concerned with the dependence of these constraints on the model for the complete cosmological history, from the time of formation to the present. Black holes presently give the strongest constraint on the spectral index $n$ of density perturbations, though this constraint does require $n$ to be constant over a very wide range of scales.Comment: 8 pages LaTeX file, using elsart.sty, with three figures incorporated using epsf. To appear, proceedings of DM98, Los Angeles (ed D Cline, Elsevier

Generic Viewer Interaction Semantics for Dynamic Virtual Video Synthesis

The FRAMES project is developing a system for video database search, content-based retrieval, and virtual video program synthesis. For dynamic synthesis applications, a video program is specified at a high level using a virtual video prescription. The prescription is a document specifying the video structure, including specifications for generating associative chains of video components. Association specifications are sent to an association engine during video synthesis. User selection of a virtual video prescription together with the default behavior of the prescription interpreter and the association engine define a tree structured search of specifications, queries, and video data components. This tree structure supports generic user interaction functions that either modify the traversal path across this tree structure, or modify the actual tree structure dynamically during video synthesis

Information Retrieval and Link Authoring in an SGML-based Editor

This document describes the integration of Grif, an SGML editor developed at Inria and marketed by Grif.Sa, with Sigma, a text retrieval tool developed by CSIRO. The integration provides Grif with flexible search and dynamic hypertext linking functions, and enhances the Sigma system to support search and display of SGML documents using a structured editor. The integration also clarifies the requirements for more generic facilities for document search, linking, and indexing for the respective systems as modular components of an open systems environment

Generalised constraints on the curvature perturbation from primordial black holes

Primordial black holes (PBHs) can form in the early Universe via the collapse of large density perturbations. There are tight constraints on the abundance of PBHs formed due to their gravitational effects and the consequences of their evaporation. These abundance constraints can be used to constrain the primordial power spectrum, and hence models of inflation, on scales far smaller than those probed by cosmological observations. We compile, and where relevant update, the constraints on the abundance of PBHs before calculating the constraints on the curvature perturbation, taking into account the growth of density perturbations prior to horizon entry. We consider two simple parameterizations of the curvature perturbation spectrum on the scale of interest: constant and power-law. The constraints from PBHs on the amplitude of the power spectrum are typically in the range 10^{-2}-10^{-1} with some scale dependence.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figures, version to appear in Phys. Rev. D with minor change to calculation of constraints for spectral index not equal to on

Primordial black hole constraints in cosmologies with early matter domination

Moduli fields, a natural prediction of any supergravity and superstring-inspired supersymmetry theory, may lead to a prolonged period of matter domination in the early Universe. This can be observationally viable provided the moduli decay early enough to avoid harming nucleosynthesis. If primordial black holes form, they would be expected to do so before or during this matter dominated era. We examine the extent to which the standard primordial black hole constraints are weakened in such a cosmology. Permitted mass fractions of black holes at formation are of order $10^{-8}$, rather than the usual $10^{-20}$ or so. If the black holes form from density perturbations with a power-law spectrum, its spectral index is limited to $n \lesssim 1.3$, rather than the $n \lesssim 1.25$ obtained in the standard cosmology.Comment: 7 pages RevTeX file with four figures incorporated (uses RevTeX and epsf). Also available by e-mailing ARL, or by WWW at http://star-www.maps.susx.ac.uk/papers/infcos_papers.htm

Family-led rehabilitation after stroke in India: a randomised controlled trial

Background: Most people with stroke in India have no access to organised rehabilitation services. The effectiveness of training family members to provide stroke rehabilitation is uncertain. Our primary objective was to determine whether family-led stroke rehabilitation, initiated in hospital and continued at home, would be superior to usual care, in a low resource setting. Methods: The Family-led Rehabilitation after Stroke in India (ATTEND) trial was a prospectively randomised open trial with blinded endpoints (PROBE) conducted across 14 hospitals in India. Patients (and their caregivers) were randomised to intervention or usual care by site Coordinators, using a secure web-based system, with minimisation by site and stroke severity. The intervention group received additional structured rehabilitation training, commenced in hospital and continued at home for up to 2 months. The primary outcome was death or dependency, defined by scores 3 to 6 on the modified Rankin scale (range, 0 [no symptoms] to 6 [death]) as assessed by blinded observers at six months. Secondary outcomes included any serious adverse event, hospital length of stay, activities of daily living, health-related quality of life, anxiety and depression, and caregiver strain. All analyses were intention to treat. Registration: Clinical Trials Registry-India (CTRI/2013/04/003557); Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (ACTRN12613000078752); and Universal Trial Number (U1111-1138-6707) Findings: A total of 1,250 patients were randomised (623 intervention and 627 control) between 13 January 2014 and 12 February 2016. At six months, 285 of 607 (47·0%) participants in the intervention group were dead or dependent compared to 287 of 605 (47·4%) in the control group (odds ratio 0·98; 95% confidence Interval 0·78 to 1·23, P = 0·87). No significant differences were observed in any of the secondary or safety outcomes. Interpretation: Family-led rehabilitation did not reduce death or dependency after stroke

Family-led rehabilitation in India (ATTEND)—Findings from the process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial

Background Training family carers to provide evidence-based rehabilitation to stroke patients could address the recognized deficiency of access to stroke rehabilitation in low-resource settings. However, our randomized controlled trial in India (ATTEND) found that this model of care was not superior to usual care alone. Aims This process evaluation aimed to better understand trial outcomes through assessing trial implementation and exploring patients’, carers’, and providers’ perspectives. Methods Our mixed methods study included process, healthcare use data and patient demographics from all sites; observations and semi-structured interviews with participants (22 patients, 22 carers, and 28 health providers) from six sampled sites. Results Intervention fidelity and adherence to the trial protocol was high across the 14 sites; however, early supported discharge (an intervention component) was not implemented. Within both randomized groups, some form of rehabilitation was widely accessed. ATTEND stroke coordinators provided counseling and perceived that sustaining patients’ motivation to continue with rehabilitation in the face of significant emotional and financial stress as a key challenge. The intervention was perceived as an acceptable community-based package with education as an important component in raising the poor awareness of stroke. Many participants viewed family-led rehabilitation as a necessary model of care for poor and rural populations who could not access rehabilitation. Conclusion Difficulty in sustaining patient and carer motivation for rehabilitation without ongoing support, and greater than anticipated access to routine rehabilitation may explain the lack of benefit in the trial. Nonetheless, family-led rehabilitation was seen as a concept worthy of further development

Protocol for process evaluation of a randomised controlled trial of family-led rehabilitation post stroke (ATTEND) in India

Introduction We are undertaking a randomised controlled trial (fAmily led rehabiliTaTion aftEr stroke in INDia, ATTEND) evaluating training a family carer to enable maximal rehabilitation of patients with stroke-related disability; as a potentially affordable, culturally acceptable and effective intervention for use in India. A process evaluation is needed to understand how and why this complex intervention may be effective, and to capture important barriers and facilitators to its implementation. We describe the protocol for our process evaluation to encourage the development of in-process evaluation methodology and transparency in reporting. Methods and analysis The realist and RE-AIM (Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation and Maintenance) frameworks informed the design. Mixed methods include semistructured interviews with health providers, patients and their carers, analysis of quantitative process data describing fidelity and dose of intervention, observations of trial set up and implementation, and the analysis of the cost data from the patients and their families perspective and programme budgets. These qualitative and quantitative data will be analysed iteratively prior to knowing the quantitative outcomes of the trial, and then triangulated with the results from the primary outcome evaluation. Ethics and dissemination The process evaluation has received ethical approval for all sites in India. In low-income and middle-income countries, the available human capital can form an approach to reducing the evidence practice gap, compared with the high cost alternatives available in established market economies. This process evaluation will provide insights into how such a programme can be implemented in practice and brought to scale. Through local stakeholder engagement and dissemination of findings globally we hope to build on patient-centred, cost-effective and sustainable models of stroke rehabilitation. Trial registration number CTRI/2013/04/003557

Diaspora identification and long-distance nationalism among Tamil migrants of diverse state origins in the UK

Accounts of Tamil long-distance nationalism have focused on Sri Lankan Tamil migrants. But the UK is also home to Tamils of non-Sri Lankan state origins. While these migrants may be nominally incorporated into a 'Tamil diaspora', they are seldom present in scholarly accounts. Framed by Werbner's (2002) conception of diasporas as 'aesthetic' and 'moral' communities, this article explores whether engagement with a Tamil diaspora and long-distance nationalism is expressed by Tamil migrants of diverse state origins. While migrants identify with an aesthetic community, 'membership' of the moral community is contested between those who hold direct experience of suffering as central to belonging, and those who imagine the boundaries of belonging more fluidly - based upon primordial understandings of essential ethnicity and a narrative of Tamil 'victimhood' that incorporates experiences of being Tamil in Sri Lanka, India and in other sites, despite obvious differences in these experiences. © 2013 Taylor & Francis