Reading Graphic Design in Cultural Context

Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 2019.Reading Graphic Design: •Is a much needed examination of graphic design in the expanded field •Forms an introduction to writing critically about graphic design through twelve chapters providing exemplary analyses of the semantic richness of the selected case studies •Goes beyond aesthetic judgments to explore how graphic design and illustration function as fields of industry and commerce in the West •Will inform, challenge and entertain undergraduate students of graphic design internationall

Pfaffians and Shuffling Relations for the Spin Module

We present explicit formulas for a set of generators of the ideal of relations among the pfaffians of the principal minors of the antisymmetric matrices of fixed dimension. These formulas have an interpretation in terms of the standard monomial theory for the spin module of orthogonal groups.Comment: 10 page

Spontaneous blink rate as an index of attention and emotion during film clips viewing

Spontaneous blinking is a non-invasive indicator known to reflect dopaminergic influence over frontal cortex and attention allocation in perceptual tasks. 38 participants watched eighteen short film clips (2 min), designed to elicit specific affective states, and arranged in six different emotional categories, while their eye movements were recorded from the vertical electroculogram. The largest blink rate inhibition, reflecting greater attention allocation to the movie, was observed during the presentation of Erotic clips, excerpts on wilderness depicting beautiful landscapes (Scenery), as well as clips showing crying characters (Compassion). Instead, the minimum blink rate inhibition was found for Fear clips, which induced a defensive response with stimulus rejection. Blink rate across time evidenced how Compassion clips elicited early inhibition while Sadness clips induced a slower, later inhibition. Correlation analyses also revealed a negative correlation (r < -0.40) between total blink rate recorded during Erotic and Compassion clips and self-reported interest. Overall, the main variable explaining blink rate was emotional Valence. Results suggest that blink modulation is related with the motivational relevance and biological significance of the stimuli, tracking their differential recruitment of attentional resources. Furthermore, they provide a solid background for studying the emotion-attention patterns and their deficits also in clinical samples (e.g., neurological and psychiatric patients) using spontaneous blinking as a not-interfering psychophysiological measure

Pl\:ucker relations and spherical varieties: application to model varieties

A general framework for the reduction of the equations defining classes of spherical varieties to (maybe infinite dimensional) grassmannians is proposed. This is applied to model varieties of type A, B and C; in particular a standard monomial theory for these varieties is presented.Comment: 15 pages, accepted for publication in Transformation Group

The ring of sections of a complete symmetric variety

We study the ring of sections A(X) of a complete symmetric variety X, that is of the wonderful completion of G/H where G is an adjoint semi-simple group and H is the fixed subgroup for an involutorial automorphism of G. We find generators for Pic(X), we generalize the PRV conjecture to complete symmetric varieties and construct a standard monomial theory for A(X) that is compatible with G orbit closures in X. This gives a degeneration result and the rational singularityness for A(X).Comment: 15 pages, Late