Die leser in Breyten Breytenbach se tronkpoësie

Breyten Breytenbach is the most important prison writer in the Afrikaans literary tradition. This article briefly places his prison writing against the background of national and international prison writing before going on to investigate the way in which the reader is represented in his Afrikaans prison poetry. Research about prison writing points out the importance of communication with the outside world for the prisoner. To the prisoner who is also a creative writer, writing is one of the most important means of establishing contact with the outside world. Amongst the large number of poems in Breytenbach’s body of prison poetry which depict an attempt to communicate with the outside world, there are several in which the addressee is explicitly referred to as the reader. The focus of this investigation thus falls on that which reception aesthetics refer to as a”text-internal reader” or “explicit reader”, directly or indirectly addressed in the text. The investigation shows that the poet-narrator in Breytenbach’s prison poems is very conscious of the reader’s role in the concretization of the poem. Several poems from Breytenbach’s body of prison poetry, collected in the anthology Die ongedanste dans (“The undanced dance”, 2005), are analysed to show different facets of the poetnarrator’s relationship with the reader. Some of these analyses describe the poet-narrator’s circumspect approach to the reader and the explanations and instructions given to the reader. Other analyses focus on the poet-narrator’s attempts to manipulate references to time in order to create the illusion of simultaneity with the  reader. Further analyses show that the prison writer’s emphasis on the anonymity and absence of the reader can be related to philosophical representations of signification while at the same time being grounded in the material circumstances of Breytenbach’s imprisonment. It is also shown that some of the poems depict the reader as being complicit in creating the circumstances in which the prison poet finds himself.

Burden of fetal alcohol syndrome in a rural West Coast area of South Africa

Background. Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) is common in parts of South Africa; rural residence is a frequently cited risk factor. We conducted a FAS school prevalence survey of an isolated rural community in a West Coast village of Western Cape Province, so obtaining the first directly measured rate, focusing specifically on a South African rural area, of FAS and partial FAS (PFAS). Methods. The study area (Aurora village), a community of about 2 500 people in a grain-producing region, has one primary school. All learners were eligible for study inclusion. Initial anthropometry screening was followed by a diagnostic stage entailing examination by a dysmorphologist for features of FAS, neurodevelopmental assessment, and an interview assessing maternal alcohol consumption. Results. Of 160 learners screened, 78 (49%) were screen-positive, of whom 63 (81%) were clinically assessed for FAS. The overall FAS/PFAS rate among the screened learners was 17.5% (95% confidence interval 12.0 - 24.2%), with 16 (10.0%) children having FAS and 12 (7.5%) PFAS. High rates of stunting, underweight and microcephaly were noted in all learners, especially those with FAS or PFAS. Five (18%) mothers of affected children were deceased by the time of assessment. Conclusion. We describe very high rates of FAS/PFAS in an isolated rural part of the Western Cape that is not located in a viticultural region. Our study suggests that the prevalence of FA S may be very high in isolated communities, or in particular hot-spots. It adds to the growing evidence that FAS/PFAS is a significant, and underestimated, health problem in South Africa. Expanded screening and surveillance programmes, and preventive interventions, are urgently needed

Anaemia – a pale ale?

Despite some modest improvements described recently, anaemia remains a significant global public health concern affecting both developed and developing countries. It affects a quarter of the global population, including 293 million (47%) children who are younger than five years of age. A prevalence of 42% and 30% has been described in pregnant and non-pregnant women, respectively. Children and women of reproductive age are at high risk, partly because of physiological vulnerability, followed by the elderly. Africa and Asia are the most heavily affected regions, accounting for 85% of the absolute anaemia burden in highrisk groups. According to the World Health Organization global database on anaemia (1993–2005), this disorder was considered to be a moderate public health problem in South African preschool children, pregnant women and non-pregnant women of reproductive age

Life Cycle of the Oriental Compost Worm Perionyx Excavatus (Oligochaeta)

In order to exploit the concept of using vermiculture as biotechnology for waste control and protein production, the life cycle of the vermicomposting species, Perionyx excavatus, was studied. The development, growth and reproduction of P. excavatus  were investigated. Urine free cattle manure with a moisture content of 76-83% and a temperature of 25°C was used as substrate. Data were gathered over a period of 300 days. It was found that mating is not a prerequisite for cocoon production, which starts at the mean age of 24 days. Maturation was attained at the age of approximately 21 days. Cocoons were produced at a mean rate of 1,1 cocoons per worm per day. The mean incubation period of cocoons produced by batches of worms was 18,7 days with a mean hatching success of 63,4%. The mean incubation period of cocoons produced by single worms was 20,4 days with a mean hatching success of 40,4%. As a rule only one worm hatched per cocoon. The life cycle of this species is presented diagrammatically

Prediction of Adolescent Sexual Reoffending: A Meta-Analysis of the J-SOAP-II, ERASOR, J-SORRAT-II, and Static-99

Several risk assessment tools, including the Juvenile Sex Offender Assessment Protocol-II (Prentky & Righthand, 2003), the Estimate of Risk of Adolescent Sexual Offense Recidivism (Worling & Curwen, 2001), the Juvenile Sexual Offense Recidivism Risk Assessment Tool-II (Epperson, ralston, Fowers, DeWitt, & Gore, 2006), and the Static-99 (Hanson & Thornton, 1999), have been used to assess reoffense risk among adolescents who have committed sexual offenses. Given that research on these tools has yielded somewhat mixed results, we empirically synthesized 33 published and unpublished studies involving 6,196 male adolescents who had committed a sexual offense. We conducted two separate meta-analyses, first with correlations and then with AUCs. Total scores on each of the tools significantly predicted sexual reoffending, with aggregated correlations ranging from .12 - .20 and aggregated area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) scores ranging from .64 - .67. In many cases, however, heterogeneity across studies was moderate to high. There were no significant differences between tools, and although the Static-99 was developed for adults, it achieved similar results as the adolescent tools. To help interpret these findings, results are compared to other meta-analyses of risk tools used in the area of violence risk assessment and in other fields

Life-cycle of the European compost worm Dendrobaena veneta (Oligochaeta)

The life-cycle of Dendrobaena veneta was studied to assess the potential of this species in vermiculture. The development, growth and reproduction were investigated by rearing worms at 25°C on urine-free cattle manure with a moisture content of 80% over a period of 200 days. It was found that cocoons are produced at a mean rate of 0,28 cocoons per worm per day and production can be sustained for at least 200 days. The mean incubation period of the cocoons is 42,1 days with a very low hatching success. The mean number of hatchlings per cocoon that hatched was 1,1. Sexual maturity may be attained within 20 to 35 days but some worms take up to 130 days. Dendrobaena veneta grew well on cattle manure. This species seems to be less suitable than some other epigeic species for vermiculture, at least in terms of its reproductive capacity in the experimental climatic conditions

Peyronie's disease - a perspective on the disease and the long-term results of radiotherapy

From 1966 to 1988, 98 of 108 patients with symptomatic Peyronie's disease received radiotherapy at our institution. In 11 of 61 patients (18%) who attended the clinic regularly for follow-up for longer than a year, new lesions distinct from the original lesions developed. This confirms that there is progression of the disease in a substantial number of cases after treatment. Long-term follow-up over an average of 111,5 months was achieved by means of a questionnaire in 47 of the 98 cases (48%). Forty-one of these patients (87,2%) had sexual intercourse after radiation. Twenty-eight of the 41 (68,3%) still have intercourse. Their average age at present is 59,6 years while the average age of the 13 patients (31,7%) not having intercourse is 70,9 years. The decline in sexual activity is thus age-related. Twenty-one of 25 patients (84%) experienced relief from pain, and angulation of the penis improved in 17 of 44 patients (38,6%) after radiotherapy. Radiotherapy may therefore be of benefit to patients with active Peyronie's disease and should be investigated in a randoIIlised controlled study

Solitary waves and supersonic reaction front in metastable solids

Motivated by an increasing number of remarkable experimental observations on the role of pressure and shear stress in solid reactions, explosions and detonations, we present a simple toy model that embodies nonlinear elasticity and dispersion as well as chemical or phase transformation. This generalization of the Toda Lattice provides an effective model for the description of the organization during an abrupt transformation in a solid. One of the challenges is to capture both the equilibrium degrees of freedom as well as to quantify the possible role of out-of-equilibrium perturbations. In the Toda Lattice, we verify that the particle velocities converge in distribution towards the Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution, thus allowing us to define a bona-fide temperature. In addition, the balance between nonlinearity and wave dispersion may create solitary waves that act as energy traps. In the presence of reactive chemistry, we show that the trapping of the released chemical energy in solitary waves that are excited by an initial perturbation provides a positive feedback that enhances the reaction rate and leads to supersonic explosion front propagation. These modes of rupture observed in our model may provide a first-order description of ultrafast reactions of heterogeneous mixtures under mechanical loading

An assessment of the statistical procedures used in original papers published in the SAMJ during 1992

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