1,279 research outputs found
The doing and undoing of global literature : myth, microcosm and atopia in triestine writing
La prĂ©sente Ă©tude conduit les traditions fragmentĂ©es de la culture littĂ©raire de Trieste vers les prĂ©occupations contemporaines de la littĂ©rature mondiale Ă lâĂ©poque actuelle oĂč la mondialisation est largement perçue comme le paradigme historique prĂ©dominant de la modernitĂ©. Ce que jâappelle la « littĂ©rature globalisĂ©e » renvoie Ă la refonte de la Weltliteratur â envisagĂ©e par Goethe et traduite comme « world literature » ou la « littĂ©rature universelle » â par des discours sur la culture mondiale et le post-nationalisme. Cependant, lorsque les Ă©tudes littĂ©raires posent les questions de la « littĂ©rature globalisĂ©e », elles sont confrontĂ©es Ă un problĂšme : le passage de lâidĂ©e universelle inhĂ©rente au paradigme de Goethe entre le Scylla dâun internationalisme relativiste et occidental, et le Charybde dâun mondialisme atopique et dĂ©shumanisĂ©. Les spĂ©cialistes de la littĂ©rature mondiale qui tendent vers la premiĂšre position acquiĂšrent un fondement institutionnel en travaillant avec lâhypothĂšse implicite selon laquelle les nations sont fondĂ©es sur les langues nationales, ce qui souscrit Ă la relation entre la littĂ©rature mondiale et les littĂ©ratures nationales. LâuniversalitĂ© de cette hypothĂšse implicite est rĂ©futĂ©e par lâĂ©criture triestine.
Dans cette Ă©tude, je soutiens que lâĂ©criture triestine du dĂ©but du XXe siĂšcle agit comme un prĂ©curseur de la rĂ©flexion sur la culture littĂ©raire globalisĂ©e du XXIe siĂšcle. Elle dispose de sa propre Ă©conomie de sens, de sorte quâelle nâentre pas dans les nationalismes littĂ©raires, mais elle ne tombe pas non plus dans le mondialisme atopique. Elle nâest pas catĂ©goriquement opposĂ©e Ă la littĂ©rature nationale; mais elle ne permet pas aux traditions nationales de prendre racine. Les Ă©crivains de Triestine exprimaient le dĂ©sir dâun sentiment dâunitĂ© et dâappartenance, ainsi que celui dâune conscience critique qui dissout ce dĂ©sir. Ils rĂ©sistaient Ă lâidĂ©alisation de ces particularismes et nâont jamais rĂ©ussi Ă rĂ©aliser la coalescence de ses Ă©crits dans une tradition littĂ©raire unifiĂ©e. Par consĂ©quent, Trieste a souvent Ă©tĂ© considĂ©rĂ©e comme un non-lieu et sa littĂ©rature comme une anti-littĂ©rature.
En contournant les impĂ©ratifs territoriaux de la tradition nationale italienne â comme il est illustrĂ© par le cas de Italo Svevo â lâĂ©criture triestine a Ă©tĂ© ultĂ©rieurement incluse dans les paramĂštres littĂ©raires et culturels de la Mitteleuropa, oĂč son expression a Ă©tĂ© imaginĂ©e comme un microcosme de la pluralitĂ© supranationale de lâancien Empire des Habsbourg. Toutefois, le macrocosme projetĂ© de Trieste nâest pas une image unifiĂ©e, comme le serait un globe; mais il est plutĂŽt une nĂ©buleuse planĂ©taire â selon lâimage de Svevo â oĂč aucune idĂ©alisation universalisante ne peut se rĂ©aliser. Cette Ă©tude interroge lâimage de la ville comme un microcosme et comme un non-lieu, comme cela se rapporte au macrocosme des atopies de la mondialisation, afin de dĂ©montrer que lâĂ©criture de Trieste est la littĂ©rature globalisĂ©e avant la lettre. La dialectique non rĂ©solue entre faire et dĂ©faire la langue littĂ©raire et lâidentitĂ© Ă travers lâĂ©criture anime la culture littĂ©raire de Trieste, et son dynamisme contribue aux dĂ©bats sur la mondialisation et les questions de la culture en dĂ©coulant. Cette Ă©tude de lâĂ©criture triestine offre des perspectives critiques sur lâĂ©tat des littĂ©ratures canoniques dans un monde oĂč les frontiĂšres disparaissent et les non-lieux se multiplient. Lâimage de la nĂ©buleuse planĂ©taire devient possiblement celle dâun archĂ©type pour le monde globalisĂ© dâaujourdâhui.The present study brings the fragmented traditions of Triestine literary culture to bear on contemporary preoccupations with world literature at a time when globalization is widely perceived as the predominant historical paradigm that informs modernity. What I am calling âglobal literatureâ refers to the refashioning of Weltliteratur â envisioned by Goethe and translated as âworld literatureâ or âlittĂ©rature universelleâ â by discourses on global culture and post-nationalism. However, when literary studies take on questions of global literature they are faced with a problem, navigating the universal idea of Goetheâs paradigm between the Scylla of a relativist, occidental internationalism and the Charybdis of a dehumanized, atopian globalism. Proponents of world literature who lean towards the former position gain an institutional foothold by working with the implicit hypothesis that nations are based in language, which underwrites the relationship between world literature and national literatures. The universality of this implicit hypothesis is what Triestine writing disproves.
In this study, I argue that Triestine writing in the first decades of the twentieth century acts as a precursor to thinking about global literary culture for the twenty-first century. It has its own economy of sense, whereby it doesnât fit into literary nationalisms, but it doesnât fall into atopian globalism either. It is not emphatically opposed to national literature; rather it does not admit national traditions to take root. Triestine writers expressed a desire for a sense of unity and belonging, as well as a critical conscience that undoes that desire. It resists the idealization of its particularities, and never successfully coalesces into a unified literary tradition. Consequently, Trieste has often been thought of as a non-place and its literature as antiliterature.
In bypassing the territorial imperatives of the Italian national tradition â as the case of Italo Svevo illustrates â Triestine writing was later caught up in the literary-cultural parameters of Mitteleuropa, where its literary expression was imagined as a microcosm of the former Habsburg Empireâs supranational plurality. However, the projected macrocosm of Trieste is not a unified image, like a globe; but instead it is a nebula â as Svevo had imagined it â where no universal idealizations could gain a foothold. This study interrogates the image of the city as a microcosm and as a nowhere and how that relates to the macrocosm of the atopias of globalization, in order to demonstrate that Triestine writing is global literature ante litteram. The unresolved dialectics of doing and undoing literary language and identity through the act of writing that animates Triestine literary culture plays out in globalization debates and the questions of culture that arise from it. Triestine writing offers critical perspectives on the status of canonic literatures in a world of disappearing borders and placeless places, where the nebula is a master image for todayâs world
A connection between the Camassa-Holm equations and turbulent flows in channels and pipes
In this paper we discuss recent progress in using the Camassa-Holm equations
to model turbulent flows. The Camassa-Holm equations, given their special
geometric and physical properties, appear particularly well suited for studying
turbulent flows. We identify the steady solution of the Camassa-Holm equation
with the mean flow of the Reynolds equation and compare the results with
empirical data for turbulent flows in channels and pipes. The data suggests
that the constant version of the Camassa-Holm equations, derived under
the assumptions that the fluctuation statistics are isotropic and homogeneous,
holds to order distance from the boundaries. Near a boundary, these
assumptions are no longer valid and the length scale is seen to depend
on the distance to the nearest wall. Thus, a turbulent flow is divided into two
regions: the constant region away from boundaries, and the near wall
region. In the near wall region, Reynolds number scaling conditions imply that
decreases as Reynolds number increases. Away from boundaries, these
scaling conditions imply is independent of Reynolds number. Given the
agreement with empirical and numerical data, our current work indicates that
the Camassa-Holm equations provide a promising theoretical framework from which
to understand some turbulent flows.Comment: tex file, 29 pages, 4 figures, Physics of Fluids (in press
Tissue remodeling: a mating-induced differentiation program for the Drosophila oviduct
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In both vertebrates and invertebrates, the oviduct is an epithelial tube surrounded by visceral muscles that serves as a conduit for gamete transport between the ovary and uterus. While <it>Drosophila </it>is a model system for tubular organ development, few studies have addressed the development of the fly's oviduct. Recent studies in <it>Drosophila </it>have identified mating-responsive genes and proteins whose levels in the oviduct are altered by mating. Since many of these molecules (e.g. Muscle LIM protein 84B, Coracle, Neuroglian) have known roles in the differentiation of muscle and epithelia of other organs, mating may trigger similar differentiation events in the oviduct. This led us to hypothesize that mating mediates the last stages of oviduct differentiation in which organ-specific specializations arise.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Using electron- and confocal-microscopy we identified tissue-wide post-mating changes in the oviduct including differentiation of cellular junctions, remodeling of extracellular matrix, increased myofibril formation, and increased innervation. Analysis of once- and twice-mated females reveals that some mating-responsive proteins respond only to the first mating, while others respond to both matings.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>We uncovered ultrastructural changes in the mated oviduct that are consistent with the roles that mating-responsive proteins play in muscle and epithelial differentiation elsewhere. This suggests that mating triggers the late differentiation of the oviduct. Furthermore, we suggest that mating-responsive proteins that respond only to the first mating are involved in the final maturation of the oviduct while proteins that remain responsive to later matings are also involved in maintenance and ongoing function of the oviduct. Taken together, our results establish the oviduct as an attractive system to address mechanisms that regulate the late stages of differentiation and maintenance of a tubular organ.</p
Toughening and asymmetry in peeling of heterogeneous adhesives
The effective adhesive properties of heterogeneous thin films are
characterized through a combined experimental and theoretical investigation. By
bridging scales, we show how variations of elastic or adhesive properties at
the microscale can significantly affect the effective peeling behavior of the
adhesive at the macroscale. Our study reveals three elementary mechanisms in
heterogeneous systems involving front propagation: (i) patterning the elastic
bending stiffness of the film produces fluctuations of the driving force
resulting in dramatically enhanced resistance to peeling; (ii) optimized
arrangements of pinning sites with large adhesion energy are shown to control
the effective system resistance, allowing the design of highly anisotropic and
asymmetric adhesives; (iii) heterogeneities of both types result in front
motion instabilities producing sudden energy releases that increase the overall
adhesion energy. These findings open potentially new avenues for the design of
thin films with improved adhesion properties, and motivate new investigation of
other phenomena involving front propagation.Comment: Physical Review Letters (2012)
Analysis and simulations for a phaseâfield fracture model at finite strains based on modified invariants
Phaseâfield models have already been proven to predict complex fracture patterns for brittle fracture at small strains. In this paper we discuss a model for phaseâfield fracture at finite deformations in more detail. Among the identification of crack location and projection of crack growth the numerical stability is one of the main challenges in solid mechanics. Here we present a phaseâfield model at finite strains, which takes into account the anisotropy of damage by applying an anisotropic split of the modified invariants of the right CauchyâGreen strain tensor. We introduce a suitable weak notion of solution that also allows for a spatial and temporal discretization of the model. In this framework we study the existence of solutions and we show that the timeâdiscrete solutions converge in a weak sense to a solution of the timeâcontinuous formulation of the model. Numerical examples in two and three space dimensions illustrate the range of validity of the analytical results
Influence of Mo on the Fe:Mo:C nano-catalyst thermodynamics for single-walled carbon nanotube growth
We explore the role of Mo in Fe:Mo nanocatalyst thermodynamics for
low-temperature chemical vapor deposition growth of single walled carbon
nanotubes (SWCNTs). By using the size-pressure approximation and ab initio
modeling, we prove that for both Fe-rich (~80% Fe or more) and Mo-rich (~50% Mo
or more) Fe:Mo clusters, the presence of carbon in the cluster causes
nucleation of Mo2C. This enhances the activity of the particle since it
releases Fe, which is initially bound in a stable Fe:Mo phase, so that it can
catalyze SWCNT growth. Furthermore, the presence of small concentrations of Mo
reduce the lower size limit of low-temperature steady-state growth from ~0.58nm
for pure Fe particles to ~0.52nm. Our ab initio-thermodynamic modeling explains
experimental results and establishes a new direction to search for better
catalysts.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures. submitte
Status of QCD
I have been asked to discuss the status of QCD. It seems to me that there are
three main points to be made about the present status of QCD: QCD is
right, and we can do many beautiful things with it. There are several
important concrete problems that lie just beyond the edge of our current
understanding. There are some foundational issues in QCD, and some
recent developments, that may point toward entirely new directions. These
points will, I believe, emerge quite clearly from the following more detailed
discussion. The discussion will be in three parts. I'll first discuss
elementary processes, then more complicated processes, and then finally
foundational issues.Comment: 28 pages, use Phyzzx, figures available by FAX or mail on request,
IASSNS-HEP-93/6
Multidomain Spectral Method for the Helically Reduced Wave Equation
We consider the 2+1 and 3+1 scalar wave equations reduced via a helical
Killing field, respectively referred to as the 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional
helically reduced wave equation (HRWE). The HRWE serves as the fundamental
model for the mixed-type PDE arising in the periodic standing wave (PSW)
approximation to binary inspiral. We present a method for solving the equation
based on domain decomposition and spectral approximation. Beyond describing
such a numerical method for solving strictly linear HRWE, we also present
results for a nonlinear scalar model of binary inspiral. The PSW approximation
has already been theoretically and numerically studied in the context of the
post-Minkowskian gravitational field, with numerical simulations carried out
via the "eigenspectral method." Despite its name, the eigenspectral technique
does feature a finite-difference component, and is lower-order accurate. We
intend to apply the numerical method described here to the theoretically
well-developed post-Minkowski PSW formalism with the twin goals of spectral
accuracy and the coordinate flexibility afforded by global spectral
interpolation.Comment: 57 pages, 11 figures, uses elsart.cls. Final version includes
revisions based on referee reports and has two extra figure
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