Fake news as a floating signifier: hegemony, antagonism and the politics of falsehood

‘Fake news’ has emerged as a global buzzword. While prominent media outlets, such as The New York Times, CNN, and CBS, have used the term to designate misleading information spread through websites, President Donald Trump has recently used the term as a negative designation of these very ‘mainstream media’. In this article, we argue that the concept of ‘fake news’ has become an important component in contemporary political struggles. We showcase how the term is utilised by different positions within the social space as a means of discrediting, attacking and delegitimising political opponents. Excavating three central moments within the construction of ‘fake news’, we argue that the term has increasingly become a ‘floating signifier’: a signifier lodged in-between different hegemonic projects seeking to provide an image of how society is and ought to be structured. By approaching ‘fake news’ from the viewpoint of discourse theory, the paper reframes the current stakes of the debate and contributes with new insights into the function and consequences of ‘fake news’ as a novel political category

Disguised Propaganda from Digital to Social Media

Disguised propaganda and political deception in digital media have been studied since the early days of the World Wide Web. At the intersection of internet research and propaganda studies, this chapter explores disguised propaganda on websites and social media platforms. Based on a discussion of key concepts and terminology, this chapter outlines how new modes of deception and source obfuscation emerge in digital and social media environments, and how this development complicates existing conceptual and epistemological frameworks in propaganda studies. The chapter concludes by arguing that contemporary challenges of detecting and countering disguised propaganda can only be resolved, if social media companies are held accountable and provide the necessary support for user contestation

Evaluating the Benefits of Aphasia Intervention Delivered in Virtual Reality: Results of a Quasi-Randomised Study

Introduction This study evaluated an intervention for people with aphasia delivered in a novel virtual reality platform called EVA Park. EVA Park contains a number of functional and fantastic locations and allows for interactive communication between multiple users. Twenty people with aphasia had 5 weeks’ intervention, during which they received daily language stimulation sessions in EVA Park from a support worker. The study employed a quasi randomised design, which compared a group that received immediate intervention with a waitlist control group. Outcome measures explored the effects of intervention on communication and language skills, communicative confidence and feelings of social isolation. Compliance with the intervention was also explored through attrition and usage data. Results There was excellent compliance with the intervention, with no participants lost to follow up and most (18/20) receiving at least 88% of the intended treatment dose. Intervention brought about significant gains on a measure of functional communication. Gains were achieved by both groups of participants, once intervention was received, and were well maintained. Changes on the measures of communicative confidence and feelings of social isolation were not achieved. Results are discussed with reference to previous aphasia therapy findings

Gender Differences in Early Reading Strategies: a Comparison of Synthetic Phonics Only with a Mixed Approach to Teaching Reading to 4-5 Year-Old Children

A survey of primary schools in England found that girls outperform boys in English across all phases (Ofsted in Moving English forward. Ofsted, Manchester, 2012). The gender gap remains an on-going issue in England, especially for reading attainment. This paper presents evidence of gender differences in learning to read that emerged during the development of a reading scheme for 4- and 5-year-old children in which 372 children from Reception classes in sixteen schools participated in 12-month trials. There were three arms per trial: Intervention non-PD (non-phonically decodable text with mixed methods teaching); Intervention PD (phonically decodable text with mixed methods teaching); and a ‘business as usual’ control condition SP (synthetic phonics and decodable text). Assignment to Intervention condition was randomised. Standardised measures of word reading and comprehension were used. The research provides statistically significant evidence suggesting that boys learn more easily using a mix of whole-word and synthetic phonics approaches. In addition, the evidence indicates that boys learn to read more easily using the natural-style language of ‘real’ books including vocabulary which goes beyond their assumed decoding ability. At post-test, boys using the nonphonically decodable text with mixed methods (Intervention A) were 8 months ahead in reading comprehension compared to boys using a wholly synthetic phonics approach

Maltreated children use more grammatical negations

Many studies reveal a strong impact of childhood maltreatment on language development, mainly resulting in shorter utterances, less rich vocabulary, or a delay in grammatical complexity. However, different theories suggest the possibility for resilience – a positive adaptation to an otherwise adverse environment – in children who experienced childhood maltreatment. Here, we investigated different measures for language development in spontaneous speech, examining whether childhood maltreatment leads to a language deficit only or whether it can also result in differences in language use due to a possible adaptation to a toxic environment. We compared spontaneous speech during therapeutic peer-play sessions of 32 maltreated and 32 non-maltreated children from the same preschool and equivalent in gender, age (2 to 5 years), home neighborhood, ethnicity, and family income. Maltreatment status was reported by formal child protection reports, and corroborated by independent social service reports. We investigated general language sophistication (i.e., vocabulary, talkativeness, mean length of utterance), as well as grammatical development (i.e., use of plurals, tense, grammatical negations). We found that maltreated and non-maltreated children showed similar sophistication across all linguistic measures, except for the use of grammatical negations. Maltreated children used twice as many grammatical negations as non-maltreated children. The use of this highly complex grammatical structure shows an advanced linguistic skill, which shows that childhood maltreatment does not necessarily lead to a language deficit. The result might indicate the development of a negativity bias in the structure of spontaneous language due to an adaptation to their experiences

Opportunistic or event-driven maintenance at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center

The Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) uses a maintenance management philosophy that is best described as opportunistic or event-driven. Opportunistic maintenance can be defined as a systematic method of collecting, investigating, pre-planning, and publishing a set of proposed maintenance tasks and acting on them when there is an unscheduled failure or repair ``opportunity``. Opportunistic maintenance can be thought of as a modification of the run-to-fail maintenance management philosophy. This maintenance plan was adopted and developed to improve the overall availability of SLAC`s linear accelerator, beam delivery systems, and associated controls, power systems, and utilities. In the late 1980`s, as the technical complexity of the accelerator facility increased, variations on a conventional maintenance plan were used with mixed results. These variations typically included some type of regular periodic interruption to operations. The periodic shutdowns and unscheduled failures were additive and resulted in unsatisfactory availability. Maintenance issues are evaluated in a daily meeting that includes the accelerator managers, maintenance supervisors and managers, safety office personnel, program managers, and accelerator operators. Lists of pending maintenance tasks are made available to the general SLAC population by a World Wide Web site on a local internet. A conventional information system which pre-dates the WWW site is still being used to provide paper copies to groups that are not yet integrated into the WWW system. The local internet provides real time maintenance information, allowing people throughout the facility to track progress on tasks with essentially real-time status updates. With the introduction of opportunistic maintenance, the accelerator`s availability has been measurably better. This paper will discuss processes, rolls and responsibilities of key maintenance groups, and management tools developed to support opportunistic maintenance

A Case of Diprosopus: Perinatal Counseling and Management

Diprosopus is a rare congenital malformation associated with high mortality. Here, we describe a patient with diprosopus, multiple life-threatening anomalies, and genetic mutations. Prenatal diagnosis and counseling made a beneficial impact on the family and medical providers in the care of this case

Hyeropic shift after LASIK induced Diffuse lamellar keratitis

BACKGROUND: Diffuse lamellar keratitis (DLK) is a relatively new syndrome that is increasingly being reported after LASIK. We have observed that a hyperopic shift may be associated with the occurrence of this diffuse lamellar keratitis. CASE PRESENTATION: A 26 year old man developed bilateral diffuse lamellar keratitis (DLK) following myopic LASIK. The residual refractive error was +0.5D OD and +0.25D OS at the end of the first week. The sterile infiltrates resolved over a period of 4–6 weeks on topical steroid therapy. A progressive hyperopic shift was noted in the right eye with an error +4.25Dsph/+0.25Dcyl 20 at the final follow up 6 months post surgery. CONCLUSION: Diffuse lamellar keratitis after LASIK may be associated with a significant hyperopic shift