Joke-making Jews /jokes making Jews: Essays on humor and identity in American Jewish fiction

Beginning from the premise that humor plays a prominent role in the construction of group and individual identities, as a social phenomenon and a simultaneously alienating and assimilating force, these essays explore and examine humor and its construction of American Jewish identity within the context of various works of American Jewish fiction. Though organized as chapters, the essays do not build upon one another progressively, nor do they center on a unified thesis; rather, each is written to stand alone; however, each approaches the general subject of humor and identity in American Jewish fiction, and as a collection it is intended that the whole equal more than the sum of its parts; Following the Introduction, chapter two examines Abraham Cahan\u27s Yekl and the relationship between humor and identity for the Jewish immigrant at the turn of the 20th century. Attention is also paid to the absences of humor, and how these are likewise capable of constructing identity; Chapter three raises questions regarding the ethics of humor, particularly when dealing with the Holocaust. It examines Saul Bellow\u27s The Bellarosa Connection under the guiding question of What is to be gained by reading this novella? ---with specific attention being given to the connective function of the novella\u27s humor; Bernard Malamud\u27s God\u27s Grace is examined in chapter four, which seeks to read the novel as a retelling of an old Jewish joke, in the form of the story of Abraham and Isaac; Malamud\u27s reversal of the story, and his use of absurdist humor, is read as an affirmation of humanism and Jewish identity; Chapter five examines the humor of Philip Roth and Woody Allen, as representatives of second-generation anxieties about Jewish identity in America; Then, chapters six and seven explore two possible responses to these anxieties. Chapter six looks at the works of the Coen brothers and asserts that Jewishness has been deliberately absented from their narratives; chapter seven looks at the works of Allegra Goodman and Nathan Englander and asserts that, in their fiction, a new, anxiety-free Jewish Self is being constructed, with humor playing a prominent role in this postassimilationism

Brachypodium distachyon: a new pathosystem to study Fusarium head blight and other Fusarium diseases of wheat

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p><it>Fusarium </it>species cause Fusarium head blight (FHB) and other important diseases of cereals. The causal agents produce trichothecene mycotoxins such as deoxynivalenol (DON). The dicotyledonous model species <it>Arabidopsis thaliana </it>has been used to study <it>Fusarium</it>-host interactions but it is not ideal for model-to-crop translation. <it>Brachypodium distachyon </it>(Bd) has been proposed as a new monocotyledonous model species for functional genomic studies in grass species. This study aims to assess the interaction between the most prevalent FHB-causing <it>Fusarium </it>species and Bd in order to develop and exploit Bd as a genetic model for FHB and other <it>Fusarium </it>diseases of wheat.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The ability of <it>Fusarium graminearum </it>and <it>Fusarium culmorum </it>to infect a range of Bd tissues was examined in various bioassays which showed that both species can infect all Bd tissues examined, including intact foliar tissues. DON accumulated in infected spike tissues at levels similar to those of infected wheat spikes. Histological studies revealed details of infection, colonisation and host response and indicate that hair cells are important sites of infection. Susceptibility to <it>Fusarium </it>and DON was assessed in two Bd ecotypes and revealed variation in resistance between ecotypes.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Bd exhibits characteristics of susceptibility highly similar to those of wheat, including susceptibility to spread of disease in the spikelets. Bd is the first reported plant species to allow successful infection on intact foliar tissues by FHB-causing <it>Fusarium </it>species. DON appears to function as a virulence factor in Bd as it does in wheat. Bd is proposed as a valuable model for undertaking studies of Fusarium head blight and other <it>Fusarium </it>diseases of wheat.</p

Joke-Making Jews, Jokes Making Jews: Humor and Identity in Abraham Cahan’s Yekl

Le processus de construction identitaire de tout membre d’une minorité culturelle connaît deux phases caractéristiques : effort d’intégration qui définit les rapports du sujet avec les membres extérieurs de son groupe, et effort de non aliénation qui définit ses rapports avec ses pairs. Dans les deux contextes le sujet ouvre volontiers des portes aux ressors du comique car il a souvent recours à l’humour pour gérer des « incidents » dus à des incongruités qui lui échappent. L’assimilation d’un tel individu dans la culture dominante ou son aliénation de sa minorité culturelle est elle-même une incongruité que le sujet intègre ou rejette, selon les cas, comme trait de sa personnalité, par le truchement de l’humour. Autrement-dit, l’humour participe à la construction identitaire du sujet.Le présent article illustre ce cas de figure en s’appuyant sur la longue nouvelle de Abraham Cahan, Yekl (1898) qui se déroule au sein da la communauté juive-Américaine

Joke-Making Jews, Jokes Making Jews: Humor and Identity in Abraham Cahan’s Yekl

Le processus de construction identitaire de tout membre d’une minorité culturelle connaît deux phases caractéristiques : effort d’intégration qui définit les rapports du sujet avec les membres extérieurs de son groupe, et effort de non aliénation qui définit ses rapports avec ses pairs. Dans les deux contextes le sujet ouvre volontiers des portes aux ressors du comique car il a souvent recours à l’humour pour gérer des « incidents » dus à des incongruités qui lui échappent. L’assimilation d’un tel individu dans la culture dominante ou son aliénation de sa minorité culturelle est elle-même une incongruité que le sujet intègre ou rejette, selon les cas, comme trait de sa personnalité, par le truchement de l’humour. Autrement-dit, l’humour participe à la construction identitaire du sujet.Le présent article illustre ce cas de figure en s’appuyant sur la longue nouvelle de Abraham Cahan, Yekl (1898) qui se déroule au sein da la communauté juive-Américaine

Saturation of intersubband transitions in p-doped GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells

Optical saturation experiments have been performed on hh1-hh2 intersubband transitions in two samples of p-doped GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells. The transitions had energies of 183 and 160 meV and the measured population relaxation times were 2±1.5 and 0.3±0.1 ps, respectively. Modeling of the quantum wells with a 6×6 k·p method shows that intersubband scattering by LO phonons can account for these relaxation times. The valence bandstructure is typically more complicated than the conduction bandstructure in a quantum well but these measurements show that LO phonons are the dominant intersubband scattering mechanism in both cases

Analysis of the magnetic coupling in binuclear complexes. I. Physics of the coupling

Accurate estimates of the magnetic coupling in binuclear complexes can be obtained from ab initio configuration interaction ~CI! calculations using the difference dedicated CI technique. The present paper shows that the same technique also provides a way to analyze the various physical contributions to the coupling and performs numerical analysis of their respective roles on four binuclear complexes of Cu (d9) ions. The bare valence-only description ~including direct and kinetic exchange! does not result in meaningful values. The spin-polarization phenomenon cannot be neglected, its sign and amplitude depend on the system. The two leading dynamical correlation effects have an antiferromagnetic character. The first one goes through the dynamical polarization of the environment in the ionic valence bond forms ~i.e., the M1¯M2 structures!. The second one is due to the double excitations involving simultaneously single excitations between the bridging ligand and the magnetic orbitals and single excitations of the environment. This dispersive effect results in an increase of the effective hopping integral between the magnetic orbitals. Moreover, it is demonstrated to be responsible for the previously observed larger metal-ligand delocalization occurring in natural orbitals with respect to the Hartree–Fock one

Threaded Rings that Swim in Excitable Media

Cardiac tissue and the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction provide two notable examples of excitable media that support scroll waves, in which a filament core is the source of spiral waves of excitation. Here we consider a novel topological configuration in which a closed filament loop, known as a scroll ring, is threaded by a pair of counterrotating filaments that are perpendicular to the plane of the ring and end on the boundary of a thin medium. We simulate the dynamics of this threaded ring (thring) in the photosensitive Belousov-Zhabotinsky excitable medium, using the modified Oregonator reaction-diffusion equations. These computations reveal that the threading topology induces an exotic motion in which the thring swims in the plane of the ring. We propose a light templating protocol to create a thring in the photosensitive Belousov-Zhabotinsky medium and provide experimental confirmation that this protocol indeed yields a thrin

Attitudes of publics who are unwilling to donate DNA data for research

With the use of genetic technology, researchers have the potential to inform medical diagnoses and treatment in actionable ways. Accurate variant interpretation is a necessary condition for the utility of genetic technology to unfold. This relies on the ability to access large genomic datasets so that comparisons can be made between variants of interest. This can only be successful if DNA and medical data are donated by large numbers of people to 'research', including clinical, non-profit and for-profit research initiatives, in order to be accessed by scientists and clinicians worldwide. The objective of the 'Your DNA, Your Say' global survey is to explore public attitudes, values and opinions towards willingness to donate and concerns regarding the donation of one's personal data for use by others. Using a representative sample of 8967 English-speaking publics from the UK, the USA, Canada and Australia, we explore the characteristics of people who are unwilling (n = 1426) to donate their DNA and medical information, together with an exploration of their reasons. Understanding this perspective is important for making sense of the interaction between science and society. It also helps to focus engagement initiatives on the issues of concern to some publics.This work was supported by Wellcome grant [206194] paid to AM, LF, KIM, RM via Wellcome Genome Campus Society and Ethics Research Group, Connecting Science. We would like to thank the following people from GA4GH for their encouragement and infrastructure support: Peter Goodhand, Julia Wilson, Bartha Knoppers. This work was also supported by Global Alliance for Genomics and Health, with their funding delivered via Wellcome (GA4GH grant, with thanks to Audrey Duncansen). DV acknowledges the infrastructure funding received from the Victorian State Government through the Operational Infrastructure Support (OIS) Program

Ohio Wesleyan Bacillus Collection Student Research

This semester students in BIOL 328 Bacterial Physiology lab worked in teams on a laboratory project that they devised, developed, and conducted. Each group met weekly with Dr. Tuhela-Reuning and Maddy Russell during the first third of the semester to develop a research project that involved the Bacillus culture collection at OWU. The Bacillus collection contains over 3000 isolates of Bacillus obtained from wild songbirds in Ohio, Arizona, and Washington, and many of these isolates degrade feathers. Student projects involved quantification of bird feather degradation by several Bacillus isolates, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) of biofilms and feather, possible correlation of biofilm production with speed of feather degradation, ability of Bacillus isolates to produce antibiotics effective against Gram positive and negative bacteria, and the ability to transform Bacillus isolates with pigment-producing plasmids. Students experienced the actual research process by troubleshooting problems, coordinating their lab work schedules, analyzing complex results, and working as a team. The final results of the projects will be presented by each team in oral and written formats