Aspects of the Semantics of Emotions and Feelings in Dalabon (South-Western Arnhem Land)

International audienceThis article explores the Dalabon roots kangu ("belly") and yolh ("feelings"), used in Dalabon to form expressions that describe emotions. The semantics of compounds using kangu reveals a widespread metaphor whereby the belly is viewed as a more or less malleable receptacle of external impacts on the person. This metaphor is activated in ritual. On the other hand, the compounds using yolh show that not all emotions originate from external impacts; some stem from the person proper. This semantic division shows that the notion of autonomous self is part of the conceptual landscape of Dalabon speakers.Cet article présente une description sémantique des termes dalabons relatifs aux émotions, en particulier deux racines, kangu (" ventre ") et yolh (" sentiments "). Kangu est employé pour décrire des émotions relatives à l'environnement, notamment l'environnement social. Yolh, au contraire, est employé pour décrire des états intimes qui renvoient aux pulsions individuelles, propres à chacun, sans origine sociale. L'alternance entre ces deux racines indique que, malgré la très grande importance attachées aux interactions sociales et aux valeurs d'échange dans cette société, les pulsions purement individuelles ne sont ni réprimées ni dévalorisées. Au contraire, l'individu dans sa dimension radicalement autonome trouve sa place dans les pratiques et valeurs locales

Body-parts in Dalabon and Barunga Kriol: matches and mismatches

This article describes a number of body-part lexemes in Dalabon, a non-Pama-Nyungan language of the Gunwinyguan family (Australia), and their counterparts in Barunga Kriol, the local creole. The aim of this paper is a comparison between some aspects of the Dalabon body-part lexicon and their counterparts in Barunga Kriol. I discuss particularities of the Dalabon bodypart lexicon and of linguistic descriptions of the body in this language. Throughout the study of Dalabon and Barunga Kriol lexemes denoting the hand (or front paw) and its digits, the foot (or back paw) and its digits, the face, the nose and the nostrils, and finally, the head and the crown of the head, it is found that Barunga Kriol replicates some of the lexical structures of the local Aboriginal languages, but not all of them. In particular, a remarkable specificity of Dalabon, the fact that the head and the face are not labelled as such, and are preferably described as an assemblage of features, is only partially replicated in Barunga Kriol. The paper seeks to identify some of the factors explaining the matches and mismatches between Barunga Kriol and DalabonANU College of Arts & Social Sciences, School of Language Studies; ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, School of Culture, History and Languag

Measurement of Electromagnetic Activity of Yeast Cells at 42 GHz

This paper discusses the possibility of using a device composed of a resonant cavity, preamplifiers, and a spectrum analyzer to detect electromagnetic emission of yeast cells at a frequency of about 42 GHz. Measurement in this frequency range is based on the Frohlich\'s postulate of coherent polar oscillations as a fundamental biophysical property of biological systems and on the experiments of Grundler and Keilmann who disclosed effects of exposure to the electromagnetic field at 42 GHz on the growth rate of yeast cells. This article includes a detailed description of the laboratory equipment and the methods used to evaluate the obtained results

The Body in Linguistic Representations of Emotions in Dalabon (Northern Australia)

In the Dalabon language of Northern Australia (Gunwinyguan family, non-Pama-Nyungan), body-part words are used in expressions denoting emotions. For instance, kangu-yowyow(mu), literally ‘flowing belly’ (kangu ‘belly’+ yowyow(mu) ‘flow’) means ‘feel good, be nice’. This is cross-linguistically unsurprising: most languages in Australia and around the world make use of body-parts to describe emotions. However, these body-parts can play different roles. They are often involved in metaphors. Thes..

Conceptual representations and figurative language in language shift : Metaphors and gestures for emotions in Kriol (Barunga, northern Australia)

This article explores the correlations between linguistic figurative features and their corresponding conceptual representations, by considering their respective continuities and discontinuities in language shift. I compare the figurative encoding of emotions in Kriol, a creole of northern Australia, with those of Dalabon, one of the languages replaced by this creole, with a particular focus on evidence from metaphorical gestures. The conclusions are three-fold. Firstly, the prominent figurative association between the body and the emotions observed in Dalabon is, overall, not matched in Kriol. Secondly, although this association is not prominent in Kriol, it is not entirely absent. It surfaces where speakers are less constrained by linguistic conventions: In non-conventionalized tropes, and gestures in particular. Indeed, some of the verbal emotion metaphors that have disappeared with language shift are preserved as gestural metaphors. Thus, Kriol speakers endorse the conceptual association between emotions and the body, in spite of the lower linguistic incidence of this association. The third conclusion is that therefore, in language shift, conceptual figurative representations and linguistic figurative representations are independent of each other. The former can persist when the latter largely disappear. Conversely, the fact that speakers endorse a certain type of conceptual representation does not entail that they will use corresponding linguistic forms in the new language. The transfer of linguistic figurative representations seems to depend, instead, upon purely linguistic parameters.I am immensely grateful to speakers of Dalabon and Kriol speakers for their support with this project, as well as to Siva Kalyan for his help on a first version of this article. I would also like to thank Sarah Cutfield for sharing her data with me, in particular videos that crucially helped my analysis (Section 5.2). My thanks also go to the ASLAN project (ANR-10-LABX-0081) of Universite de Lyon within the program "Investissements d'Avenir" (ANR-llIDEX- 0007) of the French government operated by the National Research Agency (ANR), for funding this research project, including fieldwork

Barbara Glowczeswski & Rosita Henry, eds, Le Défi indigène. Entre spectacle et politique

Comme son nom l’indique, ce livre est un défi, non seulement un défi indigène mais aussi un défi anthropologique, car l’ouvrage se présente comme un manifeste pour une anthropologie plus proche de l’indigénéité. Cette anthropologie engagée, mise en œuvre tout au long du volume, est décrite et défendue par Barbara Glowczewski dans son introduction, nommée par Rosita Henry dans sa conclusion : il s’agit d’une « anthropologie de la décolonisation ». Elle consiste à porter l’attention non pas uni..

Anti-biofilm formation of a novel stainless steel against Staphylococcus aureus

© 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).Abstract Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) is a bacterium frequently found proliferating on metal surfaces such as stainless steels used in healthcare and food processing facilities. Past research has shown that a novel Cu-bearing 304 type stainless steel (304CuSS) exhibits excellent antibacterial ability (i.e. against S. aureus) in a short time period (24 h.). This work was dedicated to investigate the 304CuSS's inhibition ability towards the S. aureus biofilm formation for an extended period of 7 days after incubation. It was found that the antibacterial rate of the 304CuSS against sessile bacterial cells reached over 99.9% in comparison with the 304SS. The thickness and sizes of the biofilms on the 304SS surfaces increased markedly with period of contact, and thus expected higher risk of bio-contamination, indicated by the changes of surface free energy between biofilm and the steel surfaces. The results demonstrated that the 304CuSS exhibited strong inhibition on the growth and adherence of the biofilms. The surface free energy of the 304CuSS after contact with sessile bacterial cells was much lower than that of the 304SS towards the same culture times. The continuously dissolved Cu2+ ions well demonstrated the dissolution ability of Cu-rich precipitates after exposure to S. aureus solution, from 3.1 ppm (2 days) to 4.5 ppm (7 days). For this to occur, a hypothesis mechanism might be established for 304CuSS in which the Cu2+ ions were released from Cu-rich phases that bond with extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) of the microorganisms. And these inhibited the activities of cell protein/enzymes and effectively prevented planktonic bacterial cells attaching to the 304CuSS metal surface.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Understanding the wear behaviour of non-doped and Si,O-doped diamond-like carbon films

Two diamond-like carbon coatings have been examined, both prior to, and post tribotesting. Physical–chemical characterisation allows the elucidation of both the physical and tribochemical mechanisms underpinning the respective wear behaviours. The wear of the undoped a-C:H DLC coating is far lower than that of the Si,O-doped DLC. Both coatings show formation of protective tribofilms with tribochemically-relevant elements derived from the lubricant additives; however the tribofilms on the two coatings exhibit key differences, with one containing pyrophosphate. The undoped a-C:H DLC coating shows an increase in non-planar sp2 carbon content during wear testing which appears to be at the expense of sp3-hybridised carbon. In comparison, the Si,O-doped DLC undergoes comparatively little change in carbon hybridisation state

Sheets of vertically aligned BaTiO₃ nanotubes reduce cell proliferation but not viability of NIH-3T3 cells

All biomaterials initiate a tissue response when implanted in living tissues. Ultimately this reaction causes fibrous encapsulation and hence isolation of the material, leading to failure of the intended therapeutic effect of the implant. There has been extensive bioengineering research aimed at overcoming or delaying the onset of encapsulation. Nanotechnology has the potential to address this problem by virtue of the ability of some nanomaterials to modulate interactions with cells, thereby inducing specific biological responses to implanted foreign materials. To this effect in the present study, we have characterised the growth of fibroblasts on nano-structured sheets constituted by BaTiO3, a material extensively used in biomedical applications. We found that sheets of vertically aligned BaTiO3 nanotubes inhibit cell cycle progression - without impairing cell viability - of NIH-3T3 fibroblast cells. We postulate that the 3D organization of the material surface acts by increasing the availability of adhesion sites, promoting cell attachment and inhibition of cell proliferation. This finding could be of relevance for biomedical applications designed to prevent or minimize fibrous encasement by uncontrolled proliferation of fibroblastic cells with loss of material-tissue interface underpinning long-term function of implants