The literary significance of clothing in the Icelandic family sagas

This thesis examines the occurrences of clothes and the particular ways in which they are used in some of the Icelandic family sagas in order to assess their literary significance. In a genre where few superfluous details are given by the writers, it seems reasonable to suppose that even a seemingly unimportant detail such as a comment regarding a man's cloak is present for a reason. The thesis is divided into three sections. Section One deals with the use of colour in dress, beginning with a general chapter on coloured clothes but continuing with an examination of specific colours such as red, blue, green and white. In the second section two contrasting items, head-dress and footwear, have been grouped together. The third section concentrates on major items of body clothing and is divided into three parts. The first five chapters concern individual and generally unrelated issues, whereas in the following three chapters clothing is associated in one way or another with the supernatural. Finally there is an examination of certain literary strategies used by the writer of Laxdoela saga. At times a motif involving clothes can be seen to have a recognised received meaning, especially if it can be found in another saga or literary form. On the other hand certain incidents have been analysed specifically within the context of the saga in which they occur. During this study various likely influences on the medieval Icelandic saga writer have been taken into consideration - influences which may be derived from pagan and Christian mythology, cultural traditions, heroic sagas and romantic European literature. An awareness of any possible literary significance of clothes within the sagas can aid a clearer understanding of the text and of the motives of the authors

Media industries and engagement: A dialogue across industry and academia

This article focuses on media engagement within the industry. The article takes the form of a dialogue between industry and academic researchers involved in a collaborative project on production and audience research on engagement (funded by the Wallenberg Foundation and in collaboration with Endemol Shine Group). Speakers from the film and television industry, and academic researchers working on media engagement, discuss how engagement is multifaceted, working across political and public spheres, policy and industry sectors, audiences and popular culture

Mongolians in the Genetic Landscape of Central Asia: Exploring the Genetic Relations among Mongolians and Other World Populations

Genetic data on North Central Asian populations are underrepresented in the literature, especially autosomal markers. In the present study we use 812 single nucleotide polymorphisms that are distributed across all the human autosomes and that have been extensively studied at Yale to examine the affinities of two recently collected, samples of populations: rural and cosmopolitan Mongolians from Ulaanbaatar and nomadic, Turkic-speaking Tsaatan from Mongolia near the Siberian border. We compare these two populations to one another and to a global set of populations and discuss their relationships to New World populations. Specifically, we analyze data on 521 autosomal loci (single SNPs and multi-SNP haplotypes) studied on 57 populations representing all the major geographical regions of the world. We conclude that the North Central Asian populations we study are genetically distinct from all other populations in our study and may be close to the ancestral lineage leading to the New World populations

Skin-impedance in Fabry Disease: A prospective, controlled, non-randomized clinical study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>We previously demonstrated improved sweating after enzyme replacement therapy (ERT) in Fabry disease using the thermo-regularity sweat and quantitative sudomotor axon reflex tests. Skin-impedance, a measure skin-moisture (sweating), has been used in the clinical evaluation of burns and pressure ulcers using the portable dynamic dermal impedance monitor (DDIM) system.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We compared skin impedance measurements in hemizygous patients with Fabry disease (22 post 3-years of bi-weekly ERT and 5 ERT naive) and 22 healthy controls. Force compensated skin-moisture values were used for statistical analysis. Outcome measures included 1) moisture reading of the 100^threpetitive reading, 2) rate of change, 3) average of 60–110^threading and 4) overall average of all readings.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>All outcome measures showed a significant difference in skin-moisture between Fabry patients and control subjects (p < 0.0001). There was no difference between Fabry patients on ERT and patients naïve to ERT. Increased skin-impedance values for the four skin-impedance outcome measures were found in a small number of dermatome test-sites two days post-enzyme infusions.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The instrument portability, ease of its use, a relatively short time required for the assessment, and the fact that DDIM system was able to detect the difference in skin-moisture renders the instrument a useful clinical tool.</p

Documentary style as post-truth monstrosity in the mockumentary horror film

This article argues that the mockumentary horror film uses its stylistic hybridity to address the ontological and epistemic challenges posed to factual media in a post-truth and post-modern age through an analysis of the film Apollo 18 (Gonzalo López-Gallego, 2011). By adopting the visual aesthetics associated with factual media, and particularly those associated with post-9/11 surveillance culture, the form challenges the endurance of longstanding cultural structures (news, documentary, factual broadcasting) upon which our conceptualisation of the world is founded. In this respect, the boundary-crossing aesthetics parallel longstanding conceptualisation of the monster in horror. This aesthetic approach is most clearly manifested through the emulation of medium-specific textural artefacts which accrue across the film in a structured manner to create a situation in which the documentary investigation records its own destruction. The mockumentary horror film literalises the broader conceptual failure of the documentary project to work through and make sense of unresolved traumas and stand up to the threats posed by the epistemic horrors of a post-truth cultural turn

The Irish conflict as portrayed in British drama documentaries : An analysis of the television text and audience interpretations.

The research was developed and conducted to analyse the way in which the conflict is represented in two British drama-documentaries, Who Bombed Birmingham? and Shoot to Kill, and to examine audience understandings of the events presented in the programmes. In doing it has raised issues concerning the social production of knowledge, the availability of discourses around the conflict and the processes by which viewers make sense of television presentations. This research has aimed to locate the representations and the audience interpretations in the wider social context. With the focus on discourse and language it has been possible to show how the debates about the conflict take place around a restricted set of repertoires, in particular debates concerning violence. This is pa: tly due to censorship, but also because of the way in which some accounts are seen as being obvious or 'natural'. This was empirically addressed by the 0-methodological study which identified two accounts through which participants made sense of the conflict. This set the wider social and cultural context within which the broader based audience discussions and understandings could be located. The audience group discussions clearly showed viewers to be both 'social' and 'active' although constrained by the text which could be seen as having 'set the agenda', but, some viewers could be seen as giving 'critical' readings. By examining drama-documentaries some key questions were addressed concerning the role they played in constructing social knowledge and creating histories of the events of the conflict. The notion of drama-documentary as a 'problematic' form was addressed with particular attention being paid to the way in which 'fact' and 'fiction' are constructed as separate entities. This further opened up the debate as to whether they could or should be seen as a 'progressive' teievisual form. Whilst they can be seen as providing some space for alternative representations they do so in the wider context within which there are a limited number of representations in circulation from which to draw from

Unsymmetrical tridentate phosphine ligands

A general synthetic route, via phosphonium salts and phosphine oxides has been developed for the preparation of unsymmetrical triphosphine ligands, which necessarily contain one central chiral phosphorus atom. The ttparent" tridentate phosphine is (2- diphenylphosphinoethyl)(3-diphenylphosphinopropyl) phenylphosphine, Ph2P(CH2)3PPh(CH2)2PPh2, "eptp". Other tridentates were prepared by varying the substituents at one phosphorus atom to form the analogous ligands with a general formula of R2P(CH2)3PPh(CH2)2PPh2 where R=p-FC6H4, p-C1C6H4, o-CH30C6H4. The ligands were found to complex readily with nickel(Il) and palladium(ll) to form air-stable complexes containing square planar species such as [NiI(eptp)]+ in solution. Complexes were isolated using C104, PF6- and 1 as counterions, and were characterised by elemental analysis, magnetic and conductance measurements, infrared spectroscopy, and especially by 31 P nmr spectroscopy where the three non-equivalent phosphorus nuclei, all coupled to one another, provided a wealth of useful data. Crystals were grown for a single-crystal X-ray crystallographic study of the Ni12 complex of eptp, which showed one weakly bonded iodo ligand at the apex of a square pyramid. This is the site at which a substrate molecule would be expected to coordinate in any asymmetric homogeneous catalytic application; the other side of the square plane was sterically crowded. The unit cell contained four molecules, two of each enantiomer. The nickel(II)-triphosphine complexes were screened for catalytic activity in the hydrogenation of alkenes. In this investigation they were all found to be inactive for hydrogenation at ambient conditions. However addition of a little NaBH4 produced colourless solutions, presumably nickel(0) complexes, which in air were found to be excellent oxidation catalysts, rapidly oxidising added phosphines to phosphine oxides. The phosphine oxide intermediate in the tridentate phosphine ligand synthesis, Ph2P(0)(CH2)3P(0)Ph(CH2)2PPh2, teptp02, provided an attractive stage at which to investigate resolution of the two enantiomers, since the final trichlorosilane reduction stage of the phosphine oxides to phosphines is known to be stereospecific. 31P nmr studies showed strong chiral recognition between eptp02 and (+)-camphorsulphonic acid in CDCI3. The novel mixed phosphine/phosphine oxide ligand eptp02 was found to coordinate exclusively via phosphorus to palladium(Il) in [PdC12(eptpO2)21 or via the phosphine oxide groups to lanthanum(lII). It would also coordinate simultaneously to both, and so is ideally suited to the preparation of very unusual heterobinuclear complexes containing one oxophilic f-block metal ion (e.g. La 3 ) and one 'soft' d-block metal ion (e.g. Pd2+). Such complexes presumably contain macrocyclic rings involving both types of metal ion. Various other routes to unsymmetrical tridentate ligands were investigated which involved some unusual mixed bidentate ligands. A new route to bisphosphine monoxides, Ph2P(CH2)P(0)Ph2, has been developed in this programme. These monoxides provided a simple route to new tn- and tetra- phosphine oxides such as eptp03 and the "2,3,2"-tetraoxide , Ph2P(0)(CH2)2P(0)Ph(CH2)3P(0)Ph(CH2)2P(0)Ph2. In collaboration with The University of Barcelona, (Campus of Tarragona), the bisphosphine monoxides with -(CH2)2- and -(CH2)4- backbones were converted to ligands containing both a phosphine sulphide and a phosphine oxide group e.g. Ph2P(S)(CH2)2P(0)Ph2. This ligand and the bisphosphine monoxide, were found to coordinate to tin(II) chloride through the phosphine oxide only. Whereas various alkyl and aryl substituents at phosphorus have been extensively investigated in polyphosphine ligands by previous workers, the pyridyl substituent has not been used in this way. This would be an interesting substituent as it is sterically similar to phenyl but electronically quite different. New routes to a pyridyl substituent at phosphorus were investigated, producing the previously unknown pyridyltriphenyiphosphonium salt [PPh3(2-py)]Br and the ligand 6-bromo-2(diphenylphosphino)pyridine. When hydrolysed phosphonium salts containing a pyridyl group were found to lose the pyridyl group in preference to phenyl, so elaboration to di- and tri-phosphines was not possible