Peoples, Homelands, and Wars? Ethnicity, the Military, and Battle among British Imperial Forces in the War against Japan

Ethnicity is increasingly central to analysis of war. Whether conceived in essentialist or constructivist terms, ethnicity is often accorded explanatory primacy in accounting for the organization and use of violence in wartime settings, in part due to the utility of processes of othering for group mobilization. Both the political and ideological context of hostilities as well as the motivations of combatants in the actual making of wartime violence are frequently conceptualized in ethnic and racialized terms. In a word, wartime violence is domesticated; it is seen as arising from the identities of, and commitments to, homelands

Tarak Barkawi: The Globalisation of the Hollywood War Film

For a long time, people in other countries had to watch American war films. Now they are making their own. Recently, Russia and Germany have produced dueling filmic visions of their great contest in World War II

Combat and Historiography in the Battle of Sangshak

Produced by soldiers and veterans, the materials through which we seek to understand war carry war's antagonisms; they are shaped by fighting, by specific battles, by old debts and lost arguments between commanders, invoiced in the lives of their soldiers. In a way, military historiography is too close to its own subject matter. Clarity demands an exacting reflexivity, of a kind evident in the life and work of Louis Allen, a Japanese-speaking British military intelligence officer who participated in the Burma campaign and wrote its standard account, Burma: The Longest War 1941-45. Between the first and second editions of that book, Allen became embroiled in historiographical disagreement with veterans of the Battle of Sangshak. He helps guide us through some of the ways in which history is a continuation of war by other means

Orientalism in Times of War: Why 'Small Wars' Have Big Consequences

Streaming video requires RealPlayer to view.The University Archives has determined that this item is of continuing value to OSU's history.Tarak Barkawi is senior lecturer in international security at the Centre of International Studies, University of Cambridge. He is lecturing on his current book project "Orientalism in Times of War: Why 'Small Wars' Have Big Consequences."Ohio State University. Mershon Center for International Security StudiesEvent webpage, streaming video, photo

International origins of social and political theory: introduction

This article introduces the main themes that animate this special issue: the necessary entanglement of theory and history, the cortical relationship between theory and practice, and the transboundary (i.e., international) relations that help to constitute systems of both thought and practice. We integrate the contributions to the special issue within these overarching themes and identify their main contributions. We make three core arguments: first, all theory is situated knowledge, derived in and through historical context; second, theory-practice is a single field in which theory arises out of and acts upon historical experience; and third, both social and political theory have international origins, arising from transboundary encounters

The postcolonial moment in security studies

In this article, we critique the Eurocentric character of security studies as it has developed since World War II. The taken-for-granted historical geographies that underpin security studies systematically misrepresent the role of the global South in security relations and lead to a distorted view of Europe and the West in world politics. Understanding security relations, past and present, requires acknowledging the mutual constitution of European and non-European worlds and their joint role in making history. The politics of Eurocentric security studies, those of the powerful, prevent adequate understanding of the nature or legitimacy of the armed resistance of the weak. Through analysis of the explanatory and political problems Eurocentrism generates, this article lays the groundwork for the development of a non-Eurocentric security studies.</jats:p

Performance of dual lips elastomeric seal for spigot-socket push fit joint using finite element method

Spigot-socket push fit joint leakage analysis for piping system is presented in this paper. A new design of dual lips elastomeric seal characteristics has been investigated in order to prevent leakage from happening. The seal was part of the spigot-socket joining system for steel pipeline used for water distribution. Finite element method was used to analyse the joint performance by employing finite element software, LS-DYNA3D and LUSAS. Money-Rivlin strain energy equation was used to identify the seal permissible working pressure that occurred at the top and bottom surface of the elastomeric seal using squeezing analysis. The result shows various working pressure by changing the seal thickness and width. The highest pressure value for top surface is at 28.5 MN/m2 and 23.8 MN/m2 for bottom surface occurred at 3 mm thickness and 0.5l mm width. These pressure values were higher than the water pressure which valued at 3.1 MN/m2. This is attributed to higher pushing force that must exceed 10 kN to overcome the elastomer shear stress and for the ease of joining

Ventilation Parameters and Thermal Comfort of Naturally and Mechanically Ventilated Offices

This paper discusses thermal comfort for a postgraduate study office room in the Mechanical Engineering Department of University Putra Malaysia (UPM), which maybe either naturally ventilated or air-conditioned. Thermal comfort variables were assessed by survey of sensation of the indoor climate. Tracer gas analysis, based on the concentration decay method, was employed to determine air exchange rate, age of air, and air exchange effectiveness (AEE). When the air conditioner was working the study office had conditions within the comfort zone of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) Standard 55; and the occupants reported they were "slightly cool." Objective data analysis showed that the office was thermally comfortable. Under naturally ventilated conditions objective results showed that the office was uncomfortable but a subjective study revealed that students found the conditions to be "slightly warm." The neutral temperature showed a wider thermal comfort range for Malaysian students than that suggested by ASHRAE Standard 55-1992, which indicates that Malaysians are acclimatized to higher environmental temperatures. However, the result is in line with the current version of ASHRAE Standard 55-2004 that includes an adaptive comfort standard that allows warmer indoor temperatures for warmer climate zones. The results of a ventilation study indicated air flow patterns in the occupied zones, which approximated to "perfect mixing" under both ventilation conditions. The measured air exchange rate also indicated that the provision of outside air for ventilation was adequate when the room was mechanically ventilated (air-conditioned). Results of over 50 survey responses to thermal comfort questions in the study room at UPM are given

A review and comparison on some rubber elasticity models

This study reviews several classical continuum mechanics models for incompressible and isotropic materials based onstrain energy potential and then compares ability of neo-Hookean, Yeoh, Mooney-Rivlin and Ogden models in predicting uniaxialdeformation states based on experimental data from dumb-bell test specimen under uniaxial loading