Dressing down criminals, deviants and other undesirables

Fear of just censure and the sense of shame it produced kept Roman citizens from doing wrong (Cic. Rep. 5.6). Invective functioned socially as a strategy of social sanction. One amongst a number of commonly identified topics of accusation in the Roman tradition of ridicule was unusual appearance, clothing or demeanour. Not surprisingly, John the Baptist emerges from the desert attired distinctly, demoniacs come out of the tombs so fierce that no one would pass by them (Mt 8:28), a man with an unclean spirit lives amongst the tombs and, even though adorned with fetters and chains, cannot be controlled (Mk 5:15–20). Herod pretentiously puts on the royal robes and is eaten by worms and dies (Ac 12:21). A woman uninvited enters a rich man’s dinner party with an alabaster flask of perfume and anoints the feet of Jesus (Lk 7:38). Clearly, in each case, unusual appearance, clothing, and demeanour suggest a lapse from the appropriate, socially acceptable style of deportment and clothing. Oddities in dress and demeanour were equated with oddities in behaviour and provided a powerful rhetorical means of excluding undesirables from society.http://www.hts.org.zaam201

Understanding the Social World of the New Testament

Londonxv, 285 p : Illus; 23 cm

Mockery and secretism in the social world of Mark's Gospel

Londonxiv, 204 p.: bibl., index; 23 c

Sumptuous clothing and ornamentation in the Apocalypse

Using different categories of social psychology on body decoration and dress, this article examines the author’s course of shifting political, moral, religious and eschatological values as reflected in the clothing and ornamentation motifs deployed in the narrative of the Apocalypse. The article focuses on questions such as the eschatological values betrayed by the author’s deployment of clothing and ornamentation themes, the meaning adduced from the passages in the Apocalypse where body surface is taken seriously, ancients’ connection of clothing and body decoration with the person and society, and the social values reflected by dress and ornamentation, such as honour/shame, status, boundaries, and identity personally and collectively.Spine cut of Journal binding and pages scanned on flatbed EPSON Expression 10000 XL; 400dpi; text/lineart - black and white - stored to Tiff Derivation: Abbyy Fine Reader v.9 work with PNG-format (black and white); Photoshop CS3; Adobe Acrobat v.9 Web display format PDFhttp://explore.up.ac.za/record=b100134

The socio-rhetorical force of ‘truth talk’ and lies : the case of 1 John

This article canvassed Greek and Roman sources for discussions concerning truth talk and lies. It has investigated what social historians and/or anthropologists are saying about truth talking and lying and has developed a model that will examine the issue of truth and lying in socio-religious terms as defined by the Graeco-Roman sources. The article tracked down the socio-rhetorical force of truth talk and lies, in terms of how they are strategically deployed to negotiate authority, to exert epistemic control, to define a personal and communal identity and to defend innovation in the midst of competing truth claims. It focused on the New Testament writing (1 John) and demonstrated that the author, in his desire to establish and defend his vision of truth, resorts to a style of truth talk endemic to the literary habits of Graeco-Roman antiquity. In so doing, the author established himself as a credible witness, set himself apart from those propounding falsehoods and, to some extent, distanced himself from the vision of truth propounded in the Gospel of John.http://www.hts.org.z

The socio-rhetorical force of ‘truth talk’ and lies : the case of 1 John

This article canvassed Greek and Roman sources for discussions concerning truth talk and lies. It has investigated what social historians and/or anthropologists are saying about truth talking and lying and has developed a model that will examine the issue of truth and lying in socio-religious terms as defined by the Graeco-Roman sources. The article tracked down the socio-rhetorical force of truth talk and lies, in terms of how they are strategically deployed to negotiate authority, to exert epistemic control, to define a personal and communal identity and to defend innovation in the midst of competing truth claims. It focused on the New Testament writing (1 John) and demonstrated that the author, in his desire to establish and defend his vision of truth, resorts to a style of truth talk endemic to the literary habits of Graeco-Roman antiquity. In so doing, the author established himself as a credible witness, set himself apart from those propounding falsehoods and, to some extent, distanced himself from the vision of truth propounded in the Gospel of John.http://www.hts.org.z

Polarization wave at the onset of collective cell migration

Collective cell migration underlies morphogenesis, tissue regeneration, and cancer progression. How the biomechanical coupling between epithelial cells triggers and coordinates the collective migration is an open question. Here, we develop a one-dimensional model for an epithelial monolayer which predicts that after the onset of migration at an open boundary, cells in the bulk of the epithelium are gradually recruited into outward-directed motility, exhibiting traveling-wave-like behavior. We find an exact formula for the speed of this motility wave proportional to the square root of the cells' contractility, which accounts for cortex tension and adhesion between adjacent cells