Cloaca Palace

In this thesis, I trace the compulsive fear of holes, known as trypophobia, from an uncontrollable obsession to a pleasurable preoccupation. The body’s physical porousness makes us receptive to our surroundings, allowing external matter in and destabilizing the boundaries of self and other. Matter invades us, encoding itself into our DNA and transforming humans into chimeric creatures. Through paintings and multi-media installations, I encourage viewers to reflect on their own bodies as a series of holes, vulnerable receptors to the world. I use the figure of a woman to personify a human hole which has been infected by the outside, giving her the power to infect others. I employ Luce Irigaray’s formation of mimicry to hyperbolize tropes of feminine performance, building a world where being hole is both offensive and defensive camouflage

Understanding issues of exclusivity surrounding shared mobility devices in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

This project aims to understand the factors associated with micromobility and shared mobility devices that contribute to inequitable access in local transportation systems. While there are many factors of inequity, I will focus on the intersection of policy and gender in a number of selected cities. The compendium of selected cities should serve as a guide to policymakers and communities that are seeking to add or regulate shared mobility devices into preexisting transportation networks. Through looking at various pilot programs and policy created by these cities, I will outline a number of recommended measures for Harrisonburg, and small cities more broadly to consider for creating effective policy that understands gendered access as vital to the success of a transportation system

Time-Variant Institutions: Implications for European Unemployment

The upward trend of European unemployment begs many questions, the most basic of which is why unemployment continues to climb after twenty-five years. Adverse shocks, rigid labor market institutions, and their interaction are used to explain this persistence and the differences in individual country experiences. While these models do indeed answer both questions to some extent, they assume that institutions predate the rise in unemployment, often treating them as static. By compiling extant data series and constructing my own, I find that this assumption is weak, and that the evolution of institutions is far from static. I create and estimate a new dynamic panel of 20 OECD countries with three empirical specifications, and uncover several significant results. First, the tax burden on labor appears to have a very strong and positive relationship with unemployment rates, implying that the tax structures of a country are an important indirect mechanism driving joblessness. Second, the unionization level shows a significant amplification effect; that is, high union density exacerbates adverse shocks to employment. Third, restrictions on firm hiring and firing seem to have the opposite effect - more protection reduces the impact of shocks. I also find evidence that both union/employer coordination and benefit duration affect unemployment rates significantly

Textile Praxis: The Case for Malaysian Hand-Woven Songket

This research was prompted by a concern for the vulnerability of traditional pre-industrial handicrafts, namely the songket textiles of Malaysia. The songket textile has been woven for over two centuries in Southeast Asia, and its materiality represents cultural heritage, tradition, and national identity in Malaysia. Market competition from imported, less expensive and mass-produced songket textile replicas has forced local makers to instigate creative change, as a means of longevity and secure a place in the market. Within this research theories of development and social science are used to direct the creative practice of the researcher, forming a textile praxis. The practice of the researcher, as a textile designer and weaver, will introduce alternative technology, namely yarns and weaving techniques, to the production of the textile in order to instigate change. This practice is conducted within the field in Malaysia and in the London studios of the Royal College of Art. The implementation of the practice reflects the local material, technological, and economic environments, hence, providing alternative yarns and weaving techniques which are ‘appropriate’ (Schumacher 1993) to the local hand-woven production infrastructure. It is the socio-cultural context of the textiles materiality which most challenges the researcher in her practice; the duality (Gell 1998) of the object, subject, and social relationship. Manifesting itself as objectivity, dualism presents an agency upon creative practice. The autonomous practice of the researcher is challenged by the autonomy of material representation. The textiles which were produced by the researcher’s practice consist of radical changes in materiality. Through acquiring local knowledge, they represent creativity, where social objectivity has been considered and also abstracted by the researcher. The textiles exist, not as a new genre of materiality, but as exposure and influence to local makers, demonstrating creativity which can be achieved by expanding upon existing technological frameworks. By experiencing the use of alternative yarns during the researcher’s field practice, local makers have chosen to adopt and appropriate the use of the yarns within their practice and subsequent textile market, a use which they have sustained. The use of exposure to influence the local makers practice has already caused changes in the textiles materiality. The future materiality of the textile depends upon the time and space in which its creative practice and society resides

Idealized Design of A Leadership from the Middle Process

This slide presentation describes the origin, approach and deliverables of course Org. Dynm.633, on “Leadership from the Middle” (LftM). Course participants were middle managers taking responsibility without authority for producing results in uncertain organizational environments, under high pressure. This course involved students in analyzing their current organizational challenges and realities and then in designing an idealized leadership approach in class. Between classes students adapted the class idealized design to their own opportunities and challenges. The course had two phases; analyzing the current reality followed by the design of an idealized general LftM process. After using the nominal group technique to define class learning objectives; the current reality analysis involved using system thinking tools to analyze, and project a base case of the opportunities and challenges assuming no change in trends. The idealized design involved using group facilitation techniques such as brainstorming, affinity diagramming, process mapping, nominal group technique, prioritization matrices and others to design and validate the version 1.0 LftM process against top priority requirements. Based on the validation results, the class added and dropped elements of the idealized design to produce a version 2.0 idealized LftM process design. The presentation includes a flowchart of the third and final LftM process design and identifies next steps for further development of LftM

Time-Variant Institutions: Implications for European Unemployment

The upward trend of European unemployment begs many questions, the most basic of which is why unemployment continues to climb after twenty-five years. Adverse shocks, rigid labor market institutions, and their interaction are used to explain this persistence and the differences in individual country experiences. While these models do indeed answer both questions to some extent, they assume that institutions predate the rise in unemployment, often treating them as static. By compiling extant data series and constructing my own, I find that this assumption is weak, and that the evolution of institutions is far from static. I create and estimate a new dynamic panel of 20 OECD countries with three empirical specifications, and uncover several significant results. First, the tax burden on labor appears to have a very strong and positive relationship with unemployment rates, implying that the tax structures of a country are an important indirect mechanism driving joblessness. Second, the unionization level shows a significant amplification effect; that is, high union density exacerbates adverse shocks to employment. Third, restrictions on firm hiring and firing seem to have the opposite effect - more protection reduces the impact of shocks. I also find evidence that both union/employer coordination and benefit duration affect unemployment rates significantly

Enfoques para la Resolución del Problema ELSP

[ES] En este trabajo se pretende realizar una recopilación de los enfoques planteados en la literatura para la resolución del problema de Programación del Lote Económico, esto es, ELSP. Estos métodos son: Solución Independiente, Ciclo Común, Periodo Básico, Periodo Básico Extendido y Variación del Tamaño de Lote. Para cada una de las aproximaciones de solución se plantea a quien son atribuidas, el correspondiente modelo, así como una serie de referencias que lo han empleado.Este trabajo ha sido realizado gracias a la financiación de la Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, a través del proyecto PAID-05-09-4335 "Coordinación de flujos de materiales e información en sistemas distribuidos de producción".Vidal Carreras, PI. (2010). Enfoques para la Resolución del Problema ELSP. Working Papers on Operations Management. 1(2):31-43. doi:10.4995/wpom.v1i2.787SWORD314312Ballou, R. H. (2004). Logística: Administración de la cadena de suministro. Pearson Educación.Ben-Daya, M., & Hariga, M. 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C., & LEFRANÇOIS, P. (1994). Multi-item, single-machine scheduling problem with stochastic demands: a comparison of heuristics. International Journal of Production Research, 32(3), 583-596. doi:10.1080/00207549408956954Giri, B. C., Moon, I., & Yun, W. Y. (2003). Scheduling economic lot sizes in deteriorating production systems. Naval Research Logistics, 50(6), 650-661. doi:10.1002/nav.10082Goyal, S. . (1997). Observation on the economic lot scheduling problem: Theory and practice. International Journal of Production Economics, 50(1), 61. doi:10.1016/s0925-5273(97)00025-xHaessler, R. W. (1979). An Improved Extended Basic Period Procedure for Solving the Economic Lot Scheduling Problem. A I I E Transactions, 11(4), 336-340. doi:10.1080/05695557908974480Haessler, R. W., & Hogue, S. L. (1976). Note—A Note on the Single-Machine Multi-Product Lot Scheduling Problem. Management Science, 22(8), 909-912. doi:10.1287/mnsc.22.8.909Hahm, J., & Yano, C. A. (1995). 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