Foreword to Visual Imagery, Metadata, and Multimodal Literacies Across the Curriculum

As one of those educated to consider the primacy of the word – written and spoken – as the vehicle for creating and transferring knowledge, I am often surprised by the evidence around me that we live in a world inwhich technological devices of variousshapes and sizes have blunted the reliance on the layerings of words to define and engage in favor of various shortcuts to knowledge. Complexity of expression in the textures of language has given way, because of those devices and their applications, to abbreviations, neologisms, emojis, deliberate misspellings, instagrams, tweets, and other avenues of expression that focus both the sender and the recipient on a screen rather than on a page, on immediacy of connection and information (even about emotions, now presented through various forms of round faces) rather than on the subtleties and nuances of words. Of course, those new forms are a language as well, and they are helping to reshape the dimensions of how those of us in traditional academic roles might consider language as object, as visual form, and not necessarily, as I learned it, a system of sounds and signs

Translating Lithuanian poetry

Translators of Lithuanian poetry hear the resonances of the ancient dainos as we work to re-create in the new language the music, images, and metaphorical themes of the old. The dainos--literally translated, "songs"--are the earliest incarnation of the Lithuanian lyric tradition, folk poetry of prehistoric origin that celebrates the drama and cycles of daily life.Not

BDNF Variants Influence Educational Attainment But Not Disease Characteristics in Alzheimers Disease

This study aimed to determine whether brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) variants are related to premorbid educational attainment, progression of cognitive and functional decline, and associated neuropsychiatric symptoms in patients with Alzheimers disease (AD). A sample of n = 341 AD subjects was genotyped for the BDNF polymorphisms val66met, C270T, and G-712A. Subjects received tests of cognition and daily function at baseline and at multiple subsequent time points during their participation in a variety of research protocols. Cognition was measured by the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and Alzheimers Disease Assessment Scale (ADAS-Cog). Functional performance was assessed using the Instrumental Activities of Daily Living questionnaire (IADL) as well as the Alzheimers Disease Cooperative Study-Activities of Daily Living inventory (ADCS-ADL). Subjects were also characterized for the frequency and severity of neuropsychiatric symptoms using the Neuropsychiatric Inventory (NPI). There was a significant effect of val66met genotype on educational attainment (F = 7.42, df = 2, 329, P = .00070), with met homozygotes having significantly fewer years of education than both the val/met and val/val groups. No association was observed between any BDNF polymorphism and measures of cognitive or functional decline. The C270T-T allele was associated with a higher prevalence of neuropsychiatric symptoms (Z = -2.11, N = 241, p = .035) and specifically with the presence of hallucinations (OR = 3.25, 95% CI = [1.22-8.62], p = .018). In summary, the val66met polymorphism appears to be associated with lower premorbid educational attainment in AD patients. The C270T-T allele demonstrated association with total neuropsychiatric symptoms and specifically hallucinations. BDNF genotypes in this sample do not confer a more rapid rate of cognitive or functional decline

Ikaro Prisikelimas

This work, entitled Ikaro Prisikelimas, which means ‘the resurrection of Icarus,’ continues the themes Professor Zdanys began to explore in his book of prose poems entitled The Kingfisher’s Reign. The poems are lyric poems that explore what Zdanys calls “epiphanic moments”—moments of personal insight, realization and revelation. These moments are then presented and considered in the poems through various voices and in various settings, though the mythical figure Icarus—and the story and implications of his fall and, according to Zdanys, of his ultimate resurrection—is a principal and foundational presence

Dotnuvos stoty: eilėraščiai

Poetry in Lithuanian written by Sacred Heart University faculty author Jonas Zdanys

Auros Daina : Lyrika

Poetry in Lithuanian written by Sacred Heart University faculty author Jonas Zdanys

Dūmu̜ stulpai: eilėraščiai

Poetry in Lithuanian by Sacred Heart University faculty author Jonas Zdanys. Some of these poems and some in different versions, are published in English in White (White Birch Press, 2004)

Cormorants

Cormorants consists of 25 modified sonnets that are thematically linked together. Zdanys chose to entitle his work Cormorants because in each of his poems he used the figure of the cormorant, a sea bird, to construct a theopoetical framework through which one tries to find God in poetic articulations of lived, or imagined, experiences. Using various cultural and religious frameworks in his poems, Zdanys asked his readers to consider the idea that reality and the natural world are a legitimate source of divine revelation, mystery and of human expression of connection to God

Tarpdury: Eilėraščiai

Poetry in Lithuanian by Jonas Zdanys