Blocking of word-boundary consonant lengthening in Sienese Italian

This paper examines an aspect of Raddoppiamento sintattico (RS), the lengthening of word-initial consonants following certain words e.g. tre [mm]ele ‘three apples’ in Italian. Most phonological accounts claim the phenomenon is predictable and obligatory (e.g. Nespor & Vogel 1986). However, descriptive sources on Italian (e.g. Camilli 1941) have long claimed that RS interacts with and can be blocked by other phenomena operative in natural speech e.g. pausing. In this paper we outline the phonetic details of the RS blocking phenomena and present the results of an auditory and preliminary acoustic analysis of the interaction between RS and these other phenomena based on a corpus of spontaneous speech data

Music, movement and marimba: an investigation of the role of movement and gesture in communicating musical expression to an audience

The experiment reported in this article investigated the assumption that visual movement plays a role in musician-to-audience communication in marimba performance. Body movement is of particular relevance here as the expressive capabilities of the marimba are relatively restricted, and the movements required to play it are visible. Twenty-four musically trained and 24 musically untrained observers rated auditory-only and auditory-visual presentations of 20th-century solo marimba excerpts for perceived expressiveness and interest. Performances were given by a male and a female professional musician in projected (public performance expression) and deadpan (minimized expressive features) performance manners. As hypothesized, higher ratings were recorded in response to projected performances than to deadpan. The hypothesized interaction between modality and performance manner was observed. Musically trained participants recorded higher ratings than musically untrained observers, upholding the final hypothesis. Expressive body movement plays an important role in the communication between marimba performer and audience - a role relevant for both performers and educators. Copyrigh

Patterns of injury and violence in Yaoundé Cameroon: an analysis of hospital data.

BackgroundInjuries are quickly becoming a leading cause of death globally, disproportionately affecting sub-Saharan Africa, where reports on the epidemiology of injuries are extremely limited. Reports on the patterns and frequency of injuries are available from Cameroon are also scarce. This study explores the patterns of trauma seen at the emergency ward of the busiest trauma center in Cameroon's capital city.Materials and methodsAdministrative records from January 1, 2007, through December 31, 2007, were retrospectively reviewed; information on age, gender, mechanism of injury, and outcome was abstracted for all trauma patients presenting to the emergency ward. Univariate analysis was performed to assess patterns of injuries in terms of mechanism, date, age, and gender. Bivariate analysis was used to explore potential relationships between demographic variables and mechanism of injury.ResultsA total of 6,234 injured people were seen at the Central Hospital of Yaoundé's emergency ward during the year 2007. Males comprised 71% of those injured, and the mean age of injured patients was 29 years (SD = 14.9). Nearly 60% of the injuries were due to road traffic accidents, 46% of which involved a pedestrian. Intentional injuries were the second most common mechanism of injury (22.5%), 55% of which involved unarmed assault. Patients injured in falls were more likely to be admitted to the hospital (p < 0.001), whereas patients suffering intentional injuries and bites were less likely to be hospitalized (p < 0.001). Males were significantly more likely to be admitted than females (p < 0.001)DiscussionPatterns in terms of age, gender, and mechanism of injury are similar to reports from other countries from the same geographic region, but the magnitude of cases reported is high for a single institution in an African city the size of Yaoundé. As the burden of disease is predicted to increase dramatically in sub-Saharan Africa, immediate efforts in prevention and treatment in Cameroon are strongly warranted

Thinking strategically about dance making : an analysis of the structuring stage and the strategies choreographers use for varying dance works

This empirical study investigates how expert choreographers structure their dance pieces and vary their dance designs. Specifically, the methods choreographers apply for selecting, ordering, and refining movement material into a coherent whole were explored. Accordingly, the structuring process of two expert contemporary choreographers was isolated and examined separately from other stages of dance development. We have used observations, interviews and questionnaires to understand the choreographers’ actions and thoughts as they worked on creating three dance pieces. In addition, a model from the field of design (Yilmaz et al 2011) was utilised as the main framework for analysing the quantitative and qualitative data that was extracted. We found that choreographers transform their composition through the application of multiple strategies and particularly, ‘Local’ strategies. Still, each choreographer relies on a particular set of strategies based on the problems they identify in each process and their own personal preferences. Notably, real innovation was enabled through the application of ‘Process Strategies’. These techniques guided the choreographers’ overall approach through the solution space by forcing changes in a particular direction. As a result, new dance forms were discovered

Long-Term Memory for Contemporary Dance is Distributed and Collaborative

Professional dancers appear to be the embodied records of works of choreography that have been created, rehearsed and performed. Their precision in recalling extended sequences of movement developed for these works defies the conventional methods used to investigate memory. A distributed cognition view holds that memory will not only be individualistic but also extended across a dance ensemble. Working closely with the highly skilled dancers of Australian Dance Theatre (ADT), we set out to develop an ecologically valid method that elicited memory recall and lapsing. Dancers were divided into two “teams” with each team asked to choose excerpts for memory recall from the company’s extensive repertoire that would challenge individual dancers in the other team. There were 14 trials; 12 involved the dancers recalling dance excerpts on their own (solo condition) and 2 with a partner (duet condition). In the ADT studio, seven dancers recalled (reproduced) as much of the excerpt as possible in the absence of an accompanying soundscape. Recall was extensive, but contained lapses, and these recall failures form the core of the analysis in this study. Four novel types of successful memory recall were identified: static shapes, isolated movements, partial and full movement sequences; and two strategies for recall: looking for movement by moving and collaborative sketching. Four types of errors were observed: errors of detail, order, omission, and additions. Analysis was conducted through a new method of counting ‘choreographic items’. The most detailed recall (73-96%) was for the two duet excerpts with significantly poorer recall of excerpts from complex group sections of a dance. Movement gist was generally retained. The types of recall and types of errors observed pointed to the use of not only procedural memory and chaining but also contextual cues as aids to movement recall. Collaborative elements of recall were observed that suggest the importance of distributed cognition and collective memory within a contemporary dance ensemble

Time course of creativity in dance

Time-motion studies revolutionized the design and efficiency of repetitive work last century. Would time-idea studies revolutionize the rules of intellectual/creative work this century? Collaborating with seven professional dancers, we set out to discover if there were any significant temporal patterns to be found in a timeline coded to show when dancers come up with ideas and when they modify or reject them. On each of 3 days, the dancers were given a choreographic problem (or task) to help them generate a novel, high quality contemporary dance phrase. They were videoed as they worked on this task for sessions of 15, 30, and 45 min. At the end of each 15 min interval during each session, we had them perform the phrase they were creating. They recorded and then coded the video of themselves dancing during these sessions by using a coding language we developed with them to identify when ideas are introduced, modified, and rejected. We found that most ideas are created early and that though these early ideas are aggressively pruned early on, many still make it into the final product. The two competing accounts of creativity in design research make predictions for the temporal structure of creativity. Our results support neither account, rather showing a more blended version of the two. The iterative design view, arguably the dominant view, is that good ideas are the product of generating many ideas, choosing one fairly early, committing to it, and iteratively improving it. The “fail fast fail often” view is that good ideas are the product of rapidly generating and discarding ideas and holding back from early commitment to any one in particular. The result of holding back commitment, typically, is not that an idea is taken up later and then incrementally improved at the last minute, as much as that later designs are not completely novel, instead incorporating the best parts of the entire sequence of ideas. In our study, we found no evidence that one account or the other was more predictive for the domain of contemporary dance. The behavior of the dancers that we studied revealed elements of both, calling into question how predictive these theories are

Exploring Practitioner Perspectives of Sourcing Risks: Towards the Development of an Integrated Risk and Control Framework

Outsourcing of information and communication technologies (ICT) and related services is an established and growing industry. Recent trends, such as the move toward multi-sourcing have increased the complexity and risk of these outsourcing arrangements. There is a critical research need to identify the risks faced by both the organisations that outsource ICT and the vendors that provide it in this changing landscape. To address growing concerns regarding the best way to deal with risk and control in this environment, our research focuses on establishing a Sourcing Risk and Control Framework to assist organisations identify these risks and develop effective mitigation strategies. In this paper we report on the first stage of our research that sought to document how sourcing risk is represented and considered in practice. To date, limited empirical research has been conducted in an Australian context. Using a series of workshops involving client and vendor representatives, we identified a broad range of risks and developed a cohesive categorisation scheme that incorporates functional and multi-stakeholder perspectives

Spectre within: unburying the dead in Elizabethan literature

This thesis examines spectrality in Elizabethan literature, focusing on the ghost as a figuration of disjuncture within contemporary constructions of the dead. Taking account of the cultural unease and uncertainties about the afterlife generated during the Reformation, I explore how particular conceptualizations of the dead manifest instabilities that move the figure of the ghost into the disturbing role of the spectre. The literature I examine ranges from Elizabethan translations of Seneca and key theological treatises to examples of the English revenge tragedy produced by Shakespeare, Marston, and Chettle. In drawing upon this cross-section of work, I highlight the resonances between varying forms of spectrality in order to explore ways in which the ghost incorporates, but also exceeds, the theatre’s requirement for dramatic excess. It thus becomes clear that the presence of the spectre extends beyond the immediate purposes of particular writers or genres to expose a wider disruption of the relation between, and ontologies of, the living and the dead. The theoretical apparatus for this project is drawn primarily from deconstruction and psychoanalytic theory, with attention to the uncanny as an area in which the two intersect and overlap. These modes of analysis usefully highlight areas of disturbance and slippage within the linguistic and conceptual structures by which the living and dead are defined and understood. In adopting this approach, I aim to expand upon and complicate existing scholarship concerning the figure of the ghost in relation to sixteenth-century theological, philosophical, mythological, and popular discourses and traditions. I do so by demonstrating that the emergence of the uncanny arises through a culturally specific haunting of the form and language of Elizabethan treatments of the dead. The spectre thereby emerges as a figure that is as much the product as the cause of instabilities and erosion within the Elizabethan construction and containment of the dead