Spaces of Graphs, Boundary Groupoids and the Coarse Baum-Connes Conjecture

We introduce a new variant of the coarse Baum-Connes conjecture designed to tackle coarsely disconnected metric spaces called the boundary coarse Baum-Connes conjecture. We prove this conjecture for many coarsely disconnected spaces that are known to be counterexamples to the coarse Baum-Connes conjecture. In particular, we give a geometric proof of this conjecture for spaces of graphs that have large girth and bounded vertex degree. We then connect the boundary conjecture to the coarse Baum-Connes conjecture using homological methods, which allows us to exhibit all the current uniformly discrete counterexamples to the coarse Baum-Connes conjecture in an elementary way.Comment: 27 pages, added a new section concerned with counterexamples to the conjectur

'It's a film' : medium specificity as textual gesture in Red road and The unloved

British cinema has long been intertwined with television. The buzzwords of the transition to digital media, 'convergence' and 'multi-platform delivery', have particular histories in the British context which can be grasped only through an understanding of the cultural, historical and institutional peculiarities of the British film and television industries. Central to this understanding must be two comparisons: first, the relative stability of television in the duopoly period (at its core, the licence-funded BBC) in contrast to the repeated boom and bust of the many different financial/industrial combinations which have comprised the film industry; and second, the cultural and historical connotations of 'film' and 'television'. All readers of this journal will be familiar – possibly over-familiar – with the notion that 'British cinema is alive and well and living on television'. At the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century, when 'the end of medium specificity' is much trumpeted, it might be useful to return to the historical imbrication of British film and television, to explore both the possibility that medium specificity may be more nationally specific than much contemporary theorisation suggests, and to consider some of the relationships between film and television manifest at a textual level in two recent films, Red Road (2006) and The Unloved (2009)

Compact κ\kappa-deformation and spectral triples

We construct discrete versions of $\kappa$-Minkowski space related to a certain compactness of the time coordinate. We show that these models fit into the framework of noncommutative geometry in the sense of spectral triples. The dynamical system of the underlying discrete groups (which include some Baumslag--Solitar groups) is heavily used in order to construct \emph{finitely summable} spectral triples. This allows to bypass an obstruction to finite-summability appearing when using the common regular representation. The dimension of these spectral triples is unrelated to the number of coordinates defining the $\kappa$-deformed Minkowski spaces.Comment: 30 page

Isometric group actions on Banach spaces and representations vanishing at infinity

Our main result is that the simple Lie group $G=Sp(n,1)$ acts properly isometrically on $L^p(G)$ if $p>4n+2$. To prove this, we introduce property ({\BP}_0^V), for $V$ be a Banach space: a locally compact group $G$ has property ({\BP}_0^V) if every affine isometric action of $G$ on $V$, such that the linear part is a $C_0$-representation of $G$, either has a fixed point or is metrically proper. We prove that solvable groups, connected Lie groups, and linear algebraic groups over a local field of characteristic zero, have property ({\BP}_0^V). As a consequence for unitary representations, we characterize those groups in the latter classes for which the first cohomology with respect to the left regular representation on $L^2(G)$ is non-zero; and we characterize uniform lattices in those groups for which the first $L^2$-Betti number is non-zero.Comment: 28 page

Target company cross-border effects in acquisitions into the UK

We analyse the abnormal returns to target shareholders in crossborder and domestic acquisitions of UK companies. The crossborder effect during the bid month is small (0.84%), although crossborder targets gain significantly more than domestic targets during the months surrounding the bid. We find no evidence for the level of abnormal returns in crossborder acquisitions to be associated with market access or exchange rate effects, and only limited support for an international diversification effect. However, the crossborder effect appears to be associated with significant payment effects, and there is no significant residual crossborder effect once various bid characteristics are controlled for

Strategic positioning:an integrated decision process for manufacturers

Purpose – This paper describes research that has sought to create a formal and rational process that guides manufacturers through the strategic positioning decision. Design/methodology/approach – The methodology is based on a series of case studies to develop and test the decision process. Findings – A decision process that leads the practitioner through an analytical process to decide which manufacturing activities they should carryout themselves. Practical implications – Strategic positioning is concerned with choosing those production related activities that an organisations should carry out internally, and those that should be external and under the ownership and control of suppliers, partners, distributors and customers. Originality/value – This concept extends traditional decision paradigms, such as those associated with “make versus buy” and “outsourcing”, by looking at the interactions between manufacturing operations and the wider supply chain networks associated with the organisation

Urban myths: popular culture, the city and identity

This article uses Manchester (England) as a case study to examine some relationships between the city and the popular culture that emerges from, or seeks to represent, this city. We focus on post-war popular culture that has been widely disseminated such as film, television and popular music. The article considers whether these examples of popular culture reflect wider urban, social and cultural change and discuss what impact this popular culture has had on changing the landscape and fortunes of the city. In particular, we discuss the case study of Manchester's popular culture in terms of ideas about place-based identities and social class. We consider popular culture in terms of de-industrialising Manchester through to regenerated Manchester. The paper concludes by discussing the possibility that the city centre of Manchester has become gentrified and considers the impact that this is having on popular culture

Socio-Economic Deprivation, Culture and Extremism in Britain

The July 7/7 suicide attacks on the United Kingdom (UK) were highly significant in that they were perpetrated by four 2nd and 3rd generation British citizens from Yorkshire. The event shocked both the Government and public, and forced British policymakers to reassess the nature of both integration and the welfare society at large. The purpose of this thesis is to gain a better understanding into the root causes of home-grown extremism in the UK, and to assess whether or not socio-economic deprivation, and/or culture encourage/s such extremism. Through the utilization of both statistical and cultural analyses, this thesis asserts that the roots of home-grown extremism in the UK are linked both with socio-economic deprivation and with the cultural tenets of segregated British communities. Furthermore, this thesis asserts that such extremism is thus more likely to occur in Britain\u27s most deprived regions, and that both the economic status and political behaviors of segregated British communities are heavily influenced by culture