Children with Special Needs in Latvia. Legislative Frame

The analysis of the legislative regulation which determines the rights of children with special needs and regulates their guarantee leads to the conclusion that, on the one hand, defining equal rights to all children to receive education but failing to ensure these rights to children with special needs in a place that is as much as possible close to their dwelling place, their rights to live in the family, to choose education that corresponds to their desire as well as the possibility to socialize with children who have no special needs are violated. Why such statements? They are based on the analysis of the legislative acts of the Republic of Latvia and the education possibilities offered by the municipalities.

INFLUENCE OF THE PROJECT “QUALITATIVE INCLUSIVE EDUCATION FOR SPECIAL NEEDS CHILDREN” ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF INCLUSIVE EDUCATION IN THE PROJECT SCHOOLS

The study „Evaluation of the project influence on the development of inclusive education in project schools” was implemented from 2009 till 2011 in the project “Qualitative inclusive education for special needs children” (Education initiative centre, State Education content centre, Soros Foundation Latvia, more information in: http://www.iic.lv) with the aim to find out whether the project results brought changes in defined inclusive education indicators. The article analyzes how the cooperation of school’s pedagogues in promoting inclusive education in general comprehensive school has improved as a result of the project

Feminist Activism in Hip-Hop Culture in México: Batallones Femeninos and Mare Advertencia Lirika

In a Mexican political context permeated by drug-related violence, organised crime, and violence against women and feminised bodies, young women with different class and ethnic backgrounds are using hip-hop culture to denounce the government and create consciousness in relation to feminicide in the country. This thesis focuses on the work of the female rap collective Batallones Femeninos (Women’s Battalions) which originated in the frontier of Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, and of Mare Advertencia Lirika, from the southern state of Oaxaca. Immersed in heavily male-dominated hip-hop culture, the female rappers in my research emerge as openly feminist artists and position their feminisms with reference to very particular geographical contexts, and class and ethnic backgrounds. In the case of Batallones, their feminism is informed by specific experiences in el barrio (the hood), of Juárez and Mexico City, the influence of autonomous Zapatismo, and their travels through the country. Mare’s feminism is also influenced by her travels, but mostly by her identity as a Zapotec woman and the practices of comunalidad, characteristic among the indigenous groups of her hometown, Oaxaca. Both these artists generate networks, mainly among women, that allow them to travel, produce their music, and organise their concerts and workshops. I define these networks as redes extendidas de sororidad (extended sorority networks) by which women from different backgrounds, regardless of their autonomous or institutional feminist locations, support Batallones and Mare in the fight against feminicide, in consciousness-raising towards women’s autonomy, and in questioning the foundational myth of mestizaje as the Mexican national identity. Travelling was at the core of my fieldwork during the feminist ethnography reflected in this thesis. I accompanied the members of Batallones and Mare on their music tours and while they conducted workshops in different locations in México. During these travels, I immersed myself in Batallones’s and Mare’s historical contexts, either at the desert Juárez frontier or in rebellious Oaxaca. In this way, I had the opportunity to experience first-hand the construction of redes de sororidad, the key role played by their located geographic problematics, and the impact of broader social movements on their work as well as the impact of their feminist hip-hop on their own communities and redes de sororidad. In this thesis, and in the work of my participants, feminist hip-hop becomes a space for dialogue among women from different class, ethnic, racial backgrounds, and a space for articulating the possibilities for an enduring feminist autonomous consciousness

Audiological Investigation of Otitis Media in Children with Atopy

Otitis media (OM) describes an inflammatory process within the middle ear space that is generally associated with accumulation of fluid and which may lead to hearing loss, learning difficulties and delay of language development. The pathogenesis of OM is multifactorial, involving the adaptive and native immune system, Eustachian tube dysfunction, viral and bacterial load, genetic and environmental factors. The involvement of IgE mediated allergic reactions in the pathogenesis of OM has been suggested by clinical observations of a high prevalence of OM among patients with allergies. Evidence from studies involving tympanometric measurements, audiometric measurements and otoscopic examination confirms the role of atopy in the development and persistency of O

Preliminary Evidence of Increased Hippocampal Myelin Content in Veterans with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder.

Recent findings suggest the formation of myelin in the central nervous system by oligodendrocytes is a continuous process that can be modified with experience. For example, a recent study showed that immobilization stress increased oligodendrogensis in the dentate gyrus of adult rat hippocampus. Because changes in myelination represents an adaptive form of brain plasticity that has a greater reach in the adult brain than other forms of plasticity (e.g., neurogenesis), the objective of this "proof of concept" study was to examine whether there are differences in myelination in the hippocampi of humans with and without post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We used the ratio of T1-weighted/T2-weighted magnetic resonance image (MRI) intensity to estimate the degree of hippocampal myelination in 19 male veterans with PTSD and 19 matched trauma-exposed male veterans without PTSD (mean age: 43 ± 12 years). We found that veterans with PTSD had significantly more hippocampal myelin than trauma-exposed controls. There was also found a positive correlation between estimates of hippocampal myelination and PTSD and depressive symptom severity. To our knowledge, this is the first study to examine hippocampal myelination in humans with PTSD. These results provide preliminary evidence for stress-induced hippocampal myelin formation as a potential mechanism underlying the brain abnormalities associated with vulnerability to stress

Ne ta ranka – ne toks vaikas: kairiarankių vaikų ugdymas sovietinėje Latvijoje

Left-handers have always been surrounded by stigma and controversy, and attitudes toward this group have always been rooted in the ideas and traditions of power relations existing in a given society. Thus, the goal of this study is to describe the retraining of left-handers as it was conducted in Soviet education. The impact of political power on an individual’s body-mind interaction is a significant problem in research on the creation of the “New Soviet Man.” The teaching of left-handed children in the Soviet Union is a noteworthy example of the totalitarian regime’s illusionary endeavors to change human nature. The Soviet education envisaged neither a special attitude nor any particular pedagogical strategies for the work with left-handed children. The Soviet science was based on the anthropological understanding of man as a tabula rasa, which made it possible to explain the omnipotence of Soviet pedagogy as well as the unswerving belief that it was possible to educate every child into a true member of the socialist society. The present study provides insight into the disciplining of the left-handed children’s bodies and minds using pedagogical tools that was being conducted in Soviet Latvia. Kairiarankiams nuolat tenka susidurti su stigmomis ir prieštaringais požiūriais į save, be to, nuostatos apie šią žmonių grupę visada būna susijusios su konkrečios visuomenės galios santykiais ir tradicijomis. Todėl šio tyrimo tikslas – aptarti kairiarankių permokymą, kaip tai buvo daroma sovietinėje švietimo sistemoje. Politinės galios įtaka žmogaus kūno ir proto sąveikai yra dažnai nagrinėjama problema tyrimuose apie „naujojo sovietinio žmogaus“ kūrimą. Kairiarankių vaikų mokymas Sovietų Sąjungoje yra puikus iliuzinių totalitarinės valdžios siekių pakeisti žmogaus prigimtį pavyzdys – sovietiniame švietime nebuvo nei atskiros prieigos, nei konkrečių pedagoginių strategijų ugdant kairiarankius vaikus. Sovietinis mokslas buvo grindžiamas antropologiniu žmogaus, kaip tabula rasa, supratimu, leidžiančiu paaiškinti sovietinės pedagogikos visagalybę, ir nepajudinamu įsitikinimu, kad iš kiekvieno vaiko galima išugdyti tikrą socialistinės visuomenės narį. Šis tyrimas supažindina su sovietinėje Latvijoje vykusiu kairiarankių vaikų kūno ir proto disciplinavimu pasitelkiant pedagogines priemone