Multiculturalism and American Democracy

Multiculturalism: is it the face of twenty-first century America or merely a passing intellectual fad? With its celebration of ethnic diversity and strong advocacy of tolerance, this contemporary movement provides philosophical justification for many who seek to correct social inequities. But while its proponents see it as a means of promoting self-esteem among marginalized groups, its critics see it as a dangerous form of relativism that culminates, paradoxically, in a new form of intolerance. The fourteen essays in this volume address the pros and cons of multiculturalism and explore its relationship with liberal democracy. A team of stellar contributors—C. Vann Woodward, Linda Chavez, Stanley Fish, and others—offers viewpoints on multiculturalism from the perspectives of political theory, history, philosophy, and fiction. The editors first help explain multiculturalism by contrasting it with the Sixties counterculture. How is it, they ask, that yesterday\u27s radicals, so concerned with economic justice, have given way to the multiculturalist preoccupation with identity politics? The contributors then explore different facets of the multiculturalism issue: they present disparate views of the stakes involved as older notions of pluralism and assimilation give way to multiculturalism; examine it in its relation to the principles of liberal democracy; and assess its place in public education. In a final section, the role of the arts in the multiculturalism debate is addressed by celebrated novelists J. M. Coetzee and Mario Vargas Llosa. Because multiculturalism is a movement without a leader or guiding document, its tenets remain difficult to define. This book not only tells what the controversy is about but also clarifies the concerns it should raise for thoughtful citizens. The points of view expressed here will prove helpful to those who are trying to frame their own opinions about multiculturalism—and they are guaranteed to spark new debate among those who have already chosen sides. Description Arthur Melzer is professor of political science at Michigan State University. He is the author, editor, or coeditor of eleven books, including The Supreme Court and the Idea of Constitutionalism. Jerry Weinberger is University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of political science at Michigan State University. He has written, edited, and coedited several books on political thought, including Benjamin Franklin Unmasked: On the Unity of His Moral, Religious, and Political Thought. M. Richard Zinman is University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of political theory in James Madison College at Michigan State University. With Melzer and Weinberger, he has co-edited several books on democracy and modern politics. This Kansas Open Books title is funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Humanities Open Book Program.https://digitalcommons.pittstate.edu/kansas_open_books/1045/thumbnail.jp

Determining subpopulation methylation profiles from bisulfite sequencing data of heterogeneous samples using DXM

Epigenetic changes, such as aberrant DNA methylation, contribute to cancer clonal expansion and disease progression. However, identifying subpopulation-level changes in a heterogeneous sample remains challenging. Thus, we have developed a computational approach, DXM, to deconvolve the methylation profiles of major allelic subpopulations from the bisulfite sequencing data of a heterogeneous sample. DXM does not require prior knowledge of the number of subpopulations or types of cells to expect. We benchmark DXM\u27s performance and demonstrate improvement over existing methods. We further experimentally validate DXM predicted allelic subpopulation-methylation profiles in four Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphomas (DLBCLs). Lastly, as proof-of-concept, we apply DXM to a cohort of 31 DLBCLs and relate allelic subpopulation methylation profiles to relapse. We thus demonstrate that DXM can robustly find allelic subpopulation methylation profiles that may contribute to disease progression using bisulfite sequencing data of any heterogeneous sample

Searching the Hyper-heuristic Design Space

We extend a previous mathematical formulation of hyper-heuristics to reflect the emerging generalization of the concept. We show that this leads naturally to a recursive definition of hyper-heuristics and to a division of responsibility that is suggestive of a blackboard architecture, in which individual heuristics annotate a shared workspace with information that may also be exploited by other heuristics. Such a framework invites consideration of the kind of relaxations of the domain barrier that can be achieved without loss of generality. We give a concrete example of this architecture with an application to the 3-SAT domain that significantly improves on a related token-ring hyper-heuristic