Spaces Between: Towards Depolarized Readings of \u3ci\u3eIncidents in the Life of a Slave Girl\u3c/i\u3e

Harriet Jacobs\u27 Incidents in the Life of A Slave Girl is a text which, written in a culture divided between polarities of race and gender, has continued in the 130 years of its reception to traverse a landscape of mutably yet continually divided racisms and sexisms, changeably yet continually cloven raced and gendered identities. The text itself, due to the legally and socially constructed polar ontologies of race and gender in 19th century America, is tom between what can be said and what can\u27t, what is true and what is false, what is black and what is white. The tears manifest themselves on all levels, from the text\u27s ambiguous manipulation of the slave narrative genre and of the conventions of sentimentality, down to paradoxical statements housed in a single sentence. Readings of Incidents have also been tom. From acceptance at face value, that is, that Jacobs was the black fugitive slave she claimed to be, to readings which understood it as a fiction by a white woman, to its recent recovery and revalorization as an authentic slave narrative, the text has been read in radically contradictory ways. This paper will be an examination of how the rendings and renderings in the text, and the rendings and renderings of the text as it has been read, suggest in the midst of their divisions spaces between polarities which have the potential to reveal those polarities\u27 construction. The text\u27s many slippages between categorical understandings, in other words, suggest possible sites not of synthesis, but of ranges of understanding. Antebellum American culture was, as contemporary American culture still is, built on dualistic understandings supported by law and language. Race has long been a cornerstone of this belief system for white Europeans and Americans, with black and white occupying opposite ends of the chain of being. Thus in 1862, Abraham Lincoln told a group of black leaders that You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists between any other two races. Never mind that these two races, divided by the broadest distance Lincoln could imagine, mingled and mingled easily, mostly through the rape of slave women by slave owners, to the point where Jacobs could ask the question, who can measure the amount of Anglo-Saxon blood coursing in the veins of American slaves? As Jacobs elsewhere points out, No matter whether the slave girl be as black as ebony or as fair as her mistress, in either case, there is no shadow of law to protect her from insult, from violence, or even from death. In other words, it is the law which polarizes the understanding of race, not race which dictates the law. The words black and white, when applied to race, thus become not descriptions of actual appearance, but justifying metaphors for a system of legally sanctioned social tyranny. Categorical language, which supports and naturalizes social and legal constructions by eliding spectra of color and identity into polarized definitions of black/white, thus creates an official ontology of the visible and the understandable, which is an ontology of polarity. This ontology must, in order to preserve its absolute bifurcation, assimilate and internalize [other permutations of \u27race\u27] ... to its own rigid polar logic, as Fuss says of sexuality. Words and definitions thus function both to buttress legal interdictions, in this case the antebellum laws surrounding race, and as interdictions themselves, prohibit in their polarity the visibility of spaces between and sanction the constant reconstruction of dichotomized understandings. Thus interdicted, the spaces between polarities are unsayable and invisible

Should “acculturation” be a variable in health research? A critical review of research on US Hispanics

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2003.12.00

Religious Education and Political Activism in Mandate Palestine

This dissertation offers a conceptual analysis of Jewish and Islamic religious education in Palestine during the years of British military, civil and Mandatory control (1917-1948). It examines the policies toward religious education pursued by the Government of Palestine, as well as practices developed by Jewish and Muslim educators for use within Zionist and private Arab schools. Based on a combination of archival sources, school curricula, textbooks, memoirs and newspapers, this dissertation elucidates the tensions that characterized attempts on the part of colonial and "native" reformers to transform the structure, content and purpose of religious education in pursuit of their respective political goals. In order to situate the Department of Education's policies within Palestine's sectarian context, I chart how an understanding of religion as an apolitical source of individual ethics found reflection in a legal structure that tied educational freedom to the religious community. I further argue that the Department of Education promoted a novel version of religious education within both Jewish and Muslim communities as, somewhat paradoxically, a means of preserving the "traditional" order in which religious knowledge was separated from national politics. Therefore while secular studies were encouraged on an instrumental basis, administrators vigorously opposed the development of secularism as an ideological framework associated with moral discord and political upheaval. The second half of this project discusses educational initiatives among Zionist and Palestinian Muslim leaders in order to highlight the points of overlap and rupture with policies pursued by the Mandatory state. Notwithstanding a strong impetus within both groups to vilify customary forms of communal schooling, neither acquiesced to the colonial view of religious education as the source of "universal" values that transcended the realm of mass politics. In contrast, Jewish and Muslim leaders in Palestine offered alternative educational models in which control over religious knowledge was innately linked to the goals of their respective political movements. Rather than viewing religious education as a source of social continuity, modernists placed the reform of religious education at the center of a program that aimed at revolutionary change. Finally, by adapting a theoretical model borrowed from Bruno Latour, this project argues that the apparent differences between the Government of Palestine on one hand, and Jewish and Muslim educators on the other, were more discursive than material. Education functioned as a political tool within the schools maintained by each group; however, the link between pedagogy and politics was one that the Mandatory government refused to recognize. On the contrary, the Department of Education accused Jewish and Muslim leaders of transgressing the boundary meant to separate education as an exercise in character formation from education as a site of social conditioning and political mobilization. Battles over the content and purpose of religious education therefore constituted part of a larger conflict regarding the relationship between mass schooling and political engagement in modern Palestine

Treadmill exercise within lower body negative pressure protects leg lean tissue mass and extensor strength and endurance during bed rest.

Leg muscle mass and strength are decreased during reduced activity and non-weight-bearing conditions such as bed rest (BR) and spaceflight. Supine treadmill exercise within lower body negative pressure (LBNPEX) provides full-body weight loading during BR and may prevent muscle deconditioning. We hypothesized that a 40-min interval exercise protocol performed against LBNPEX 6 days week(-1) would attenuate losses in leg lean mass (LLM), strength, and endurance during 6° head-down tilt BR, with similar benefits for men and women. Fifteen pairs of healthy monozygous twins (8 male and 7 female pairs) completed 30 days of BR with one sibling of each twin pair assigned randomly as the non-exercise control (CON) and the other twin as the exercise subject (EX). Before and after BR, LLM and isokinetic leg strength and endurance were measured. Mean knee and ankle extensor and flexor strength and endurance and LLM decreased from pre- to post-BR in the male CON subjects (P < 0.01), but knee extensor strength and endurance, ankle extensor strength, and LLM were maintained in the male EX subjects. In contrast, no pre- to post-BR changes were significant in the female subjects, either CON or EX, likely due to their lower pre-BR values. Importantly, the LBNPEX countermeasure prevents or attenuates declines in LLM as well as extensor leg strength and endurance. Individuals who are stronger, have higher levels of muscular endurance, and/or have greater LLM are likely to experience greater losses during BR than those who are less fit

Mercury sources and cycling processes in the Cape Fear River estuary, North Carolina

This research presents the first data on mercury (Hg) concentration and speciation in North Carolina for a southeastern US blackwater estuary. Water column data for Hg speciation and ancillary parameters were determined on 11 cruises between July 2004 and September 2006. Average surface water concentrations for total dissolved Hg (TDHg) were 7 pM and ranged from <1 to 37 pM, while the average particulate Hg (Hgpart) concentrations was 11 pM with a range of <1 to 46 pM. Average methylmercury (MeHg) surface water concentrations were 0.42 pM and ranged from <0.1 to 1.7 pM. TDHg concentrations are highest under medium flow conditions, where as Hgpart concentrations are highest under high flow conditions. Sediment analyses throughout the estuary revealed elevated concentrations of Hg at freshwater stations M61, HB and LVC. Hg concentrations are similar throughout the lower estuary when normalized to organic carbon content, however concentrations at LVC are elevated suggesting a local point source from a defunct chlor-alkali plant. Benthic flux experiments conducted at M61 and HB indicate that sediments act as both a source and sink for total Hg in the estuary, having one of the highest TDHg flux out of sediments in comparison to other estuaries. However, sediments were never a source of MeHg in the Cape Fear River estuary (CFRE) unlike many other systems where sediments are a significant input of MeHg to overlying waters. Photolysis experiments indicate that irradiation of CFRE water does not impact the speciation or concentration of water column TDHg. Photolysis of estuary water containing ambient particles and resuspended bottom sediments show no clear increase or decrease of water column Hg concentrations. Irradiation of unfiltered CFRE surface waters produces significant concentrations of dissolved gaseous Hg (DGHg) and demethylates Hg at a rate dependent on initial MeHg concentration. Mass balance calculations indicate that riverine input is the primary source of Hg and MeHg to the estuary. The primary sink for TDHg is benthic flux. Tidal exchange transports approximately 20% of total Hg and 40% of MeHg to the coastal ocean. Comparison with other estuaries indicates that the CFRE is a moderately impacted industrialized estuary

BOSS Ultracool Dwarfs I: Colors and Magnetic Activity of M and L dwarfs

We present the colors and activity of ultracool (M7-L8) dwarfs from the Tenth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). We combine previous samples of SDSS M and L dwarfs with new data obtained from the Baryon Oscillation Sky Survey (BOSS) to produce the BOSS Ultracool Dwarf (BUD) sample of 11820 M7-L8 dwarfs. By combining SDSS data with photometry from the Two Micron All Sky Survey and the Wide-Field Infrared Sky Explorer mission, we present ultracool dwarf colors from $i-z$ to $W2-W3$ as a function of spectral type, and extend the SDSS-2MASS-WISE color locus to include ultracool dwarfs. The $i-z$, $i-J$, and $z-J$ colors provide the best indication of spectral type for M7-L3 dwarfs. We also examine ultracool dwarf chromospheric activity through the presence and strength of H$\alpha$ emission. The fraction of active dwarfs rises through the M spectral sequence until it reaches $\sim$90% at spectral type L0. The fraction of active dwarfs then declines to 50% at spectral type L5; no H$\alpha$ emission is observed in the late-L dwarfs in the BUD sample. The fraction of active L0-L5 dwarfs is much higher than previously observed. The strength of activity declines with spectral type from M7 through L3, after which the data do not show a clear trend. Using one-dimensional chromosphere models, we explore the range of filling factors and chromospheric temperature structures that are consistent with H$\alpha$ observations of M0-L7 dwarfs. M dwarf chromospheres have a similar, smoothly varying range of temperature and surface coverage while L dwarf chromospheres are cooler and have smaller filling factors.Comment: 24 pages and 13 figures, submitted to AJ. A short video describing these results can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwX5WkuJCU

Exercise Thermoregulation Following 13 Days of Bed Rest

This investigation examined two potential mechanisms, altered skin blood flow (SBF) and sweating rate (SR) responses, that may be responsible for an elevated core temperature during exercise after bed rest (BR) and space flight. Seven healthy men (29 +/- 5 yr, 179.6 +/- 7.1 cm, 77.2 +/- 17.0kg; mean +/- SD) underwent 13 days of 6 deg head-down BR. Pre- and post-BR, subjects completed supine submaximal cycle ergometry (20 min at 40% and 20 min at 65% of pre-BR supine VO2pk) in a thermoneutral room (23.4 +/- 0.5 C, 56 +/- 8 %RH) during, heat production (VO2 ; indirect calorimetry), intestinal temperature (T(sub in) ; ingestible pill), SBF (laser Doppler velocimetry), local SR (dew point hygrometry), and total sweat loss (TSL; Delta body weight) were measured. Pre- and post- BR plasma volume (PV) was measured using I-125 dilution. After BR, T(sub in) was elevated at rest (36.99 +/- 0.14 vs. 37.30 +/- 0.06 C; p<_0.05) and at the end of exercise (37.57 +/- 0.13 vs. 37.90 +/- 0.09 C; P less than or equal to 0.05). However, the increase in T(sub in) from rest to the end of exercise was not different after BR (0.59 +/- 0.07 vs. 0.60 +/- 0.07 C). There was no difference in VO2 pre- to post-BR during rest (0.28 +/- 0.04 vs. 0.24 +/- 0.03 1 multiplied by min(exp -1) ) or 40% VO2pk (0.95 +/- 0.08 vs. 0.96 +/- 0.05 1 multiplied by min(exp -1)), but VO2 was significantly less at the end of the 65% VO2pk stage (1.53 +/- 0.09 vs. 1.42 +/- 0.11 1 multiplies by min(exp - 1); p less than or equal to 0.05). The percent change in SBF from rest to end of exercise was less after BR (211 +/- 53 vs. 96 +/- 31%; p less than or equal to 0.05), the threshold for the onset of SBF was greater (37.17 +/- 0.18vs. 37.51 +/- 0.17 C; p less than or equal to 0.05), and the slope of the response tended to be reduced (536 +/- 184 vs. 201 +/- 46 %A PC; p=0.08). TSL was not different after BR (0.42+0.06 vs. 0.44 +/- 0.08 kg), but the T in threshold at the onset of sweating was delayed significantly (37.06 +/- 0.1 1 vs. 37.34 +/- 0.06 C; p less than or equal to 0.05). However, the slope of SR was not changed after BR (3.45 +/- 1.22 vs. 2.58 +/- 0.71 mg multiplied by min(exp -1) multiplied by cm sq). PV was decreased by 11% after BR (3,259 +/- 177 vs. 2,894 +/- 138 ml; p less than or equal to 0.05). These results suggest that exercise SBF and SR responses after BR are altered, and heat production is unchanged or reduced, consistent with observations following space flight. The higher resting T(sub in) with a proportional increase in T(sub in) during exercise and delayed onset of SBF and SR suggest a centrally-mediated elevation in the thermoregulatory set point during microgravity exposure

Housework by Husbands Determinants and Implications

WOMEN continue to carry disproportionate responsibility for household tasks. A study of 650 Detroit women reveals that attitudes, employment status, life cycle, and husband's income all contribute to husband's housework effort. Some evidence is presented that the greater the earnings differential of husband over wife, the less he contributes in help at home.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/67012/2/10.1177_0192513X8100200207.pd