Encountering the Other:everyday Embodied Othering Experiences of Young Muslims in the Netherlands

Whilst the phenomenal growth in ethnic and religious diversity in Western world cities has in recent years been extensively researched and debated within academia and beyond, there is one dimension that is notable for the limited attention it has received to date: the human body. This PhD dissertation sets out to contribute to the emerging study on encountering urban diversity as an inter-corporeal process through Othering. Perhaps the most problematised body in the European context is that of the Muslim, often framed in public discourse and debate as Europe's ultimate Other. Through an urban ethnography in Amsterdam, the study aims to understand how ‘difference’ is lived on the ground by addressing how young Muslims sensorially, corporeally, and affectively experience, feel, and respond to the Othering attached to their bodies within everyday urban spaces of encounter. It will do so by addressing two core questions: how do young Muslims experience Othering?; and how do they respond to Othering? The main contribution of the project lies in its focus on the intersection between religion, race, culture, urbanism, and the body by exploring the ways through which the Muslim Other is (re)constructed and responded to in everyday urban spaces and through mundane urban practices. Focusing on the lived embodied experiences of young Muslims and urban geographies of Othering, the study sheds light on the body-society relationship and provides a better understanding of what it means to be a Muslim in the urban West today

“Saying Nothing Is Saying Something”:Affective Encounters with the Muslim Other in Amsterdam Public Transport

Taking the Muslim other into consideration, this article investigates Muslims’ everyday encounters within the (im)mobile spaces of public transport that entangle bodies with different histories, backgrounds, and imaginaries. Building on affective atmospheres, I propose an embodied understanding of othering practices and traveling with difference in public transport. Employing (auto)ethnography in Amsterdam, I present public transport as a cross-cultural meeting place with spatial negotiation of difference to study everyday travel experiences of young Muslims. Contributing to the field of mobilities studies, this article bridges the gap in the empirical evidence on the role of public transport, race, and religion in the othering of Muslims

On Exact/Approximate Reduction of Dynamical Systems Living on Piecewise linear Partition

Abstract. Order reduction problem for dynamical systems living on piecewise linear partitions is addressed in this paper. This problem is motivated by analysis and control of hybrid systems. The technique presented is based on the transformation of affine dynamical systems inside the cells into a new structure and it can be applied for both exact reduction and also approximate model re-duction. In this method both controllability and observability of the affine system inside the poly-topes are considered for the reduction purpose. The framework is illustrated with a numerical ex-ample.