Apna Britain: negotiating identity through television consumption among British Pakistani Muslim women in Bradford

British Pakistani Muslim women of Bradford inhabit a highly mediatised space where contested discourses of gender, ethnicity, culture and nationality take shape. This ethnographic study looks into the ways British Pakistani women in Bradford use television to negotiate and manage identities and identifications (Hall, 1996) in the context of everyday life. Electronic media, especially television, become central to the manifestation of conflicting discourses of belonging to national and transnational communities. The tensions associated with national and transnational identities are negotiated and renewed in the context of everyday life and as women move between the domestic, the ‘community’ and the national sphere. Through an ethnographic lens and an empirical study that took place in a community centre and four households, the discussion unravels these women’s attempts to exercise agency within the intensively restrictive socio-cultural framework where their lives unfold. Most relevant to this thesis is the use of electronic media, especially television. This thesis explores the role of television in three parallel realms: the home, the ‘community’ and the nation. Participants were found to engage with television narratives in their homes, not as passive viewers but as active audiences creating new meanings. Communal spaces were re-imagined through women’s participation in social events and by employing ‘women-oriented’ religious media. Subsequently the women approached their belonging in the national context by contesting their portrayals in mainstream media and by reinterpreting the cultural norms of their parents through the narratives of television. By underlining the importance of Bradford’s locally specific culture and the ways this culture has been influenced by the systemic alienation of working-class ethnic minority families, I argue that women and their narratives of identity and belonging have been radically curtailed. However, active agency and persistent structural negotiations have led many participants to reinvent ethnicity’, thus creating ‘new [rooted, local and yet supra-national] ethnicities’ (Hall, 1996, emphasis mine). The space around television – in its consumption and media talk – provides a platform for engaging with hegemonic discourses of ethnicity, religion, gender and nationality and for reflecting on the limits of these discourses, as well as on the limits of their identities. A strong shared sense of belonging to a community provides the framework to manage these contradictory realities of the socially situated gendered identities. I argue that the role of television is cyclical, in that the meanings created at home ripple into the nation and back via the ‘community’. Media are central to diasporic life and the crises that explicate migrant life are reflected in their media consumption. Within unsettling narratives of being a migrant, the participants seek belonging among the familiar within the mediatised world that surrounds the diasporic life. In this space, identities and identifications are seemingly new, but are born out of the ashes of the old and familiar

Aqueous-Phase Reactive Uptake of Dicarbonyls as a Source of Organic Aerosol Over Eastern North America

We use a global 3-D atmospheric chemistry model (GEOS-Chem) to simulate surface and aircraft measurements of organic carbon (OC) aerosol over eastern North America during summer 2004 (ICARTT aircraft campaign), with the goal of evaluating the potential importance of a new secondary organic aerosol (SOA) formation pathway via irreversible uptake of dicarbonyl gases (glyoxal and methylglyoxal) by aqueous particles. Both dicarbonyls are predominantly produced in the atmosphere by isoprene, with minor contributions from other biogenic and anthropogenic precursors. Dicarbonyl SOA formation is represented by a reactive uptake coefficient γ = 2.9 × 10−3 and takes place mainly in clouds. Surface measurements of OC aerosol at the IMPROVE network in the eastern U.S. average 2.2 ± 0.7 μg C m−3 for July–August 2004 with little regional structure. The corresponding model concentration is 2.8 ± 0.8 μg C m−3, also with little regional structure due to compensating spatial patterns of biogenic, anthropogenic, and fire contributions. Aircraft measurements of water-soluble organic carbon (WSOC) aerosol average 2.2 ± 1.2 μg C m−3 in the boundary layer (<2 km) and 0.9 ± 0.8 μg C m−3 in the free troposphere (2–6 km), consistent with the model (2.0 ± 1.2 μg C m−3 in the boundary layer and 1.1 ± 1.0 μg C m−3 in the free troposphere). Source attribution for the WSOC aerosol in the model boundary layer is 27% anthropogenic, 18% fire, 28% semi-volatile SOA, and 27% dicarbonyl SOA. In the free troposphere it is 13% anthropogenic, 37% fire, 23% semi-volatile SOA, and 27% dicarbonyl SOA. Inclusion of dicarbonyl SOA doubles the SOA contribution to WSOC aerosol at all altitudes. Observed and simulated correlations of WSOC aerosol with other chemical variables measured aboard the aircraft suggest a major SOA source in the free troposphere compatible with the dicarbonyl mechanism.Earth and Planetary SciencesEngineering and Applied Science

Towards timing and stratigraphy of the Bronze Age burial mound royal tomb (Königsgrab) of Seddin (Brandenburg, northeastern Germany)

This study uses an integrated multi-method geoarcheological and geochronological approach to contribute to the understanding of the timing and stratigraphy of the monumental burial mound royal tomb (Königsgrab) of Seddin. We show that the hitherto established radiocarbon-based terminus post quem time frame for the construction of the burial mound of 910–800 BCE is supported by optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating. The radiocarbon samples were obtained from a substrate directly underneath the burial mound which supposedly represents the late glacial/Holocene soil that was buried below the structure. We use sedimentological (grain-size analyses) and geochemical analyses (element analyses, carbon, pH, and electric conductivity determinations) to reassess and confirm this hypothesis. In addition to the burial age associated with the last anthropogenic reworking during construction of the burial mound, the OSL dating results provide new insights into the primary deposition history of the original substrates used for the structure. In combination with regional information about the middle and late Quaternary development of the environment, our data allow us to provide a synoptic genetic model of the landscape development and the multiphase stratigraphy of the royal tomb of Seddin within the Late Bronze Age cultural group “Seddiner Gruppe” of northern Germany. Based on our initial experiences with OSL dating applied to the sediments of a burial mound – to the best of our knowledge the first attempt in Europe – we propose a minimal invasive approach to obtain datable material from burial mounds and discuss related opportunities and challenges

Detecting tax evasion: a co-evolutionary approach

We present an algorithm that can anticipate tax evasion by modeling the co-evolution of tax schemes with auditing policies. Malicious tax non-compliance, or evasion, accounts for billions of lost revenue each year. Unfortunately when tax administrators change the tax laws or auditing procedures to eliminate known fraudulent schemes another potentially more profitable scheme takes it place. Modeling both the tax schemes and auditing policies within a single framework can therefore provide major advantages. In particular we can explore the likely forms of tax schemes in response to changes in audit policies. This can serve as an early warning system to help focus enforcement efforts. In addition, the audit policies can be fine tuned to help improve tax scheme detection. We demonstrate our approach using the iBOB tax scheme and show it can capture the co-evolution between tax evasion and audit policy. Our experiments shows the expected oscillatory behavior of a biological co-evolving system

The landscape of the Late Bronze Age royal tomb of Seddin (NE Germany): linking geomorphology, archaeology, and historic evidence

The monumental Late Bonze Age royal tomb of Seddin is located in the old morainic landscape of the Prignitz region, northeastern Germany. Together with other richly equipped burials and a row of stone pits in its direct vicinity, it provides evidence for the presence of an elite from the nineth to sixth centuries BCE in this region. Our map emphasizes the well-chosen location of the royal tomb in relation to the spatial arrangement of other archaeological monuments that together form an ensemble of a ritual landscape. We trace legacies of land use from the Bronze Age to the present against the backdrop of Late Quaternary landscape evolution. These include the Bronze Age landscape (re-)organization for ritual and economic purposes, its medieval use for arable farming, its economic use and settlement history in historic times, and modern times melioration of agricultural areas that together form the palimpsest of the present-day landscape

Alice May Douglas Correspondence

Entries include a typed biography, a handwritten letter concerning permission granted by Dunnack to collect Maine poetry for a possible anthology that Douglas never spoke of, and typed and handwritten correspondence about books sent to the Maine Author Collection

Global Budgets of Atmospheric Glyoxal and Methylglyoxal, and Implications for Formation of Secondary Organic Aerosols

We construct global budgets of atmospheric glyoxal and methylglyoxal with the goal of quantifying their potential for global secondary organic aerosol (SOA) formation via irreversible uptake by aqueous aerosols and clouds. We conduct a detailed simulation of glyoxal and methylglyoxal in the GEOS-Chem global 3-D chemical transport model including our best knowledge of source and sink processes. Our resulting best estimates of the global sources of glyoxal and methylglyoxal are 45 Tg a−1 and 140 Tg a−1, respectively. Oxidation of biogenic isoprene contributes globally 47% of glyoxal and 79% of methylglyoxal. The second most important precursors are acetylene (mostly anthropogenic) for glyoxal and acetone (mostly biogenic) for methylglyoxal. Both acetylene and acetone have long lifetimes and provide a source of dicarbonyls in the free troposphere. Atmospheric lifetimes of glyoxal and methylglyoxal in the model are 2.9 h and 1.6 h, respectively, mostly determined by photolysis. Simulated dicarbonyl concentrations in continental surface air at northern midlatitudes are in the range 10–100 ppt, consistent with in situ measurements. On a global scale, the highest concentrations are over biomass burning regions, in agreement with glyoxal column observations from the SCIAMACHY satellite instrument. SCIAMACHY and a few ship cruises also suggest a large marine source of dicarbonyls missing from our model. The global source of SOA from the irreversible uptake of dicarbonyls in GEOS-Chem is 11 Tg C a−1, including 2.6 Tg C a−1 from glyoxal and 8 Tg C a−1 from methylglyoxal; 90% of this source takes place in clouds. The magnitude of the global SOA source from dicarbonyls is comparable to that computed in GEOS-Chem from the standard mechanism involving reversible partitioning of semivolatile products from the oxidation of monoterpenes, sesquiterpenes, isoprene, and aromatics.Earth and Planetary SciencesEngineering and Applied Science

Testing the accuracy of feldspar single grains to date late Holocene cyclone and tsunami deposits

Quartz is the preferred dosimeter for luminescence dating of Holocene sediments as optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) signals reset rapidly upon light exposure, and are stable over time. However, feldspar is required where quartz luminescence properties are inappropriate for dating, as is often the case in geologically young mountain ranges and areas with young volcanism. Here we aim to evaluate the potential of single grain feldspar luminescence dating applied to late Holocene cyclone and tsunami deposits, for which complete signal resetting can a priori not be guaranteed. To address potential problems of feldspar dating of such deposits associated with heterogeneous bleaching, remnant doses and anomalous fading, we use a low-temperature post infrared infrared stimulated luminescence protocol (pIRIR150) on single grains. For most samples, good agreement between fading corrected IR50 and non-fading corrected pIRIR150 ages is observed. Both feldspar ages generally also show good agreement with age control provided by historical data and quartz luminescence ages. pIRIR150 remnant ages in modern analogue samples are shown to be 150, IR50 and quartz ages, indicates that a significant number of grains must have experienced relatively complete signal resetting during or immediately prior to transport, as the three signals are known to bleach at different rates. Since light exposure during the event is expected to be limited, we deduce that a significant portion of the grains in the cyclone and tsunami deposits was already bleached prior to the event of interest. These well-bleached grains were likely eroded at the beach, while other grains with larger remnant ages probably originate from the shallow subtidal, coastal barriers or even further inland sources. Additional signal resetting during storm and tsunami transport is indicated by slightly younger quartz than feldspar ages for grains with incomplete pre-transport resetting that were eroded at the Holocene coastal barrier.</p