Journal articles on the topic 'Ending Middle Ages'

How the treatment of animals in Galicia evolved before the first printed veterinary works appeared today is little known to tell. The reason for this is the lack of relevant historical research in this area. However, this gap will no doubt be widened over time. This work is long and exhausting, since it is based on archival research and also on literature, which refers to a specific period. These will be pieces from different spheres of life, which, after proper segregation, will make it possible to complete this chapter. The above mentioned text of the treatment of horses by Slavs since 1394 is the oldest known mention of an equine doctor, as well as the salary for surgery and payment for medication. Confirming that in medieval Galicia, both the forging and the treatment of horses belonged to the blacksmith's duties. Preparation of medicines for horses was carried out by those who treated them. The blacksmiths, who were treated, began to be called Konoval. The oldest mention is recorded on parchment in 1505, also there is a guild sign of people of this profession. This is also evidenced by the engraving, whose origins date back to the Middle Ages. Blacksmiths are in the first place in the Middle Ages like equestrian doctors, they are already mentioned in the literature from the XI century. The grooms appear near the blacksmiths, but the name of the groom began dating only in the early 13th century. Since then, there are the first written mentions of poultry, falconers and dog-keepers. They were responsible for the care and treatment of the poultries or animals that had been cared for. In addition to agricultural content, there were also guidelines for the treatment and breeding of pets. In very few cases, veterinary writers describe the signs or causes of diseases, mainly by continuing to give the name of the disease and method of treatment. Therefore, treatment is empirical in the full sense of the word. Following the custom at the time of treatment, describe the treatment of each disease, as it is today in surgery, that is, starting from the head and ending at the feet. When the doctor could not make the correct diagnosis, he called the horse sick and recommended to treat it with a mixture consisting of butter, eggs and salt. By the term “attack” the author understood the signs of a very acute and usually fatal illness. Since drugs that deserve attention, we recommend sulfur, copper greens, turpentine, mustard, quicklime, mercury, tar, used as an ointment or liniment for external treatment. In addition to the aforementioned measures, the burning of the ferrous iron of the tumors was applied and then sprinkled with green copper, indicating the treatment of cutaneous form of sap. Medicines can be divided into three groups, namely: Medicinal products of vegetable, animal and mineral origin. The medicines were mixed and prepared mainly by the horse doctor, the medicines consisted mainly of home remedies and were readily available to anyone. In the liquid form were infused into the mouth, nose, enemas, ablution, bathing. Water, wine, vinegar and olive oil are the basis for liquid medicines. Ointments, suppositories, patches, pastes and poultices were used in the condensed form, Ointments are often used in a warm state. The basis for this was fats and wax. In the form of powdered substances that have blown into the eye or wounds. In addition to the above remedies, medicinal products and magical procedures were used for therapeutic purposes: words with superstitious signs related to religious worship were used to achieve treatment. Dressings and surgical instruments. A horn was served to deliver the medication, with certain preparations filled in the horn. Wounds were washed using a copper syringe. A leather bag made of the same material has replaced today's pourer. A hoof knife, a blood dispenser, a razor to remove hair are also mentioned, and also iron for burning ulcers and eczema. The dressing material is hemp yarn, scarves, mostly blue, spartan shale.

Urban public space was a forum for political contests between cities of the Low Countries—particularly Ghent—and the late medieval Burgundian state. Contrary to much of the scholarship on the Low Countries' urban history of the late Middle Ages, civic space was independentof marketact ivities, however important these activities were. In the long fierce contests over rights and privileges waged by the late medieval cities of the southern Low Countries against princely hegemony, possession of civic spaces became the ultimate sign of political legitimacy. But their ultimate possessors often destroyed them, thus ending their power to confer legitimacy on future challengers and/or erasing memory of their defilement at the hands of pretenders.

The apocryphal Apocalypse of St. Paul the Apostlebelongs to the group of early-Christian texts which exerted significant impact on people’s perceptionof the nether world and the Last Judgment. In the Middle Ages, the text was known in the area ofwestern and eastern Christian literary tradition. Numerous translations also include the renditionof the Apocalypse of St. Paul the Apostle into Church Slavonic, made in Bulgaria between the 10thand the 11th century, whose presence and distribution in the area of southern Slavdom and Rutheniais confirmed by copies of manuscripts. The article is devoted to a manuscript of the Apocalypse ofSt. Paul the Apostle hitherto overlooked in studies, whose unique form supplements and makes theSlavic textual tradition of the manuscript more comprehensible. The unique feature of the discussedcopy is supplementation of the text with an ending, present only in the ancient Syrian and Coptictranslations of the apocryphal text.

The present article seeks to analyse the place of Shakespeare’s work within the oeuvre of Gabriel Josipovici, starting with the latter’s first published critical book, The World and the Book, and ending with his most recent, Hamlet: Fold on Fold. In the early work Josipovici sought to establish a direct line between the Middle Ages and Modernism, yet Shakespeare was already a presence whose plays obliged that line to deviate. In his later critical work, such as On Trust, Shakespeare becomes one of the figures who allows Josipovici to exemplify clearly the crucial gap he wishes to explore between saying and doing. This gap is most fully explored in the recent book on Hamlet, where the protagonist is seen as the supreme literary example of what happens when the traditions governing doing have fallen away, leaving the character adrift in a sea of possibilities of utterance and action, none of which has the feel of necessity.

Abstract The reminiscence bump is a well-documented autobiographical memory phenomenon characterized by middle-aged and older adults reporting a disproportionate number of memories from adolescence and early adulthood (Rubin, Wetzler, & Nebes, 1986). It is typically assessed through either cue word or important memory techniques. The Life History Mail Survey (LHMS) in the Health and Retirement Study affords unique data to investigate this phenomenon among a representative US sample of older adults. At the beginning of the LHMS, participants (N=3088, M age=70, range 50-107) completed a calendar noting the important things that happened to them in seven life decades, starting with ages 0-9 and ending by ages 70-79 (or their actual age). For each life period, we coded the number of events respondents reported. We observed significantly more memories reported for the age decade 20-29, compared with other life periods (80% vs 47-66%). Our results are consistent with previous findings in the autobiographical memory literature. Follow-up analyses evaluated existing theoretical accounts of the bump, such as cultural life script theory which suggests that life events occur in a specific order and are characterized by a prototypical life course. For example, we determined whether respondents’ sociodemographic characteristics, such as age cohort, gender, marital and educational histories (information available in LHMS) influenced the size and temporal location of the reminiscence bump. We also analyzed the content of reported important life events to investigate whether types of events included in each decade of life are consistent with the cultural life script account of the phenomenon.

In the article, the author examines one of the most outstanding andproblematic periods in the art history of Tallinn as a Hanseatic city,which originated, on the one hand, in the Hanseatic tradition andthe medieval approach to Gothic transcendental realism, and onthe other, in the approach typical of the new art cities of Flanders,i.e. to see a reflection of the new illusory reality in the pictures. Acloser examination is made of two works of art imported to Tallinnin the late 15th century, i.e. the high altar in the Church of the HolySpirit by Bernt Notke and the altarpiece of Holy Mary, whichwas originally commissioned by the Brotherhood of Blackheadsfor the Dominican Monastery and is now in St Nicholas’ Church.Despite the differences in the iconography and style of the twoworks, their links to tradition and artistic geography, which in thisarticle are conditionally defined as the Hanse canon, are apparentin both of them.The methods and rules for classifying the transition from theMiddle Ages to the Modern Era were not critical nor exclusive.Rather they included a wide range of phenomena on the outskirtsof the major art centres starting from the clients and ending with
 the semantic significance of the picture, and the attributes that wereemployed to the individual experiences of the different masters,who were working together in the large workshops of Lübeck, andsomewhat later, in Bruges and Brussels.When ‘reading’ the Blackheads’ altar, a question arises of threedifferent styles, all of them were united by tradition and the waythat altars were produced in the large workshops for the extensiveart market that stretched from one end of the continent to the other,and even further from Lima to Narva. Under the supervision ofthe leading master and entrepreneur (Hans Memling?) two othermasters were working side by side in Bruges – Michel Sittow, whowas born in Tallinn, and the Master of the Legend of Saint Lucywere responsible for executing the task.In this article, the author has highlighted new points of reference,which on the one hand explain the complex issues of attributionof the Tallinn Blackheads’ altar, and on the other hand, placethe greatest opus in the Baltics in a broader context, where, inaddition to aesthetic ambitions, both the client and the workshopthat completed the order, played an extensive role. In this way,identifying a specific artist from among the others would usuallyremain a matter of discussion. Tallinn was a port and a wealthycommercial city at the foregates of the East where it took decadesfor the spirit of the Renaissance to penetrate and be assimilated.Instead of an unobstructed view we are offered uncertain andoften mixed values based on what we perceive through the veil ofsemantic research.

Purpose. Fragments of clay vessels are the most massive findings from the cultural layer of the town of Tobolsk. The development of classification is the main task of the research of Tobolsk’s crockery with using statistical and comparative analyzes. Results. The classification of ceramic’s crockery at the ending of the 16th –17th centuries has a most importance for studying the archaeological materials of Russian settlements in Siberia. Their volumes have already reached immense sizes, but many questions of chronology and systematization remain unresolved. For solve this problem necessary to determinate the archaeological objects of the Russian population, where standing out the complexes of findings are reliably dated by a narrow period of time. At the end of the 16th –17th centuries objects are Lozvinsky Gorodok, Mangazeya, Berezovo, Albazinsky Ostrog characterized that period. In Tobolsk, during archaeological works, was singled out a cultural layer at the ending of the 16th –17th centuries, where the most massive findings are fragments of ceramic crockery. For create a classification of this collection necessary to learn experience of studying the materials of the other objects in Siberia. The most importance is using the system of statistical registration of ceramics from the epoch of the Russian Middle Ages, developed by V. Yu. Koval. Learning of Tobolsk crockery at the ending of the 16th – 17th centuries allows to distinguish the following forms of ceramic vessels: pots (a separate category of pots with plums), wash basins, bowls, frying pans, inkwells. Possibly to designate separately single findings of small pots, cups. The systematization forms of the upper parts of the pots allows to distinguish four types, each of them is divided in two variants. The main part of the crockery are made with the use of restorative roasting, it is defined as gray-brown. Better quality dark-gray glazed dishes (represented by single samples) can be defined as imported products. Conclusion. Previously, the local pottery production was formed under the influence of handicraft traditions that had emerged in the central part of the country. Tobolsk’s crockery at the ending of the 16th –17th centuries has many similarities with ceramics was found in the territory of the other Russian settlements in Siberia. Differences are also observed in the technology of production, in the character of the processing surface of crockery and others. We can do the conclusion that for each site there is a special ceramic complex, which requires detailed learning and systematization.

Designed to be comprehensive in its scope, this set covers major religious events from remote prehistory (ca. 60,000 BC) to the highly contemporaneous (AD 2014). Taken together, the editors have done an admirable job in choosing topics to cover and in compiling a highly readable, informative, and thought-provoking compilation. The first volume covers the period of prehistory to AD 600 and includes entries for topics as diverse as the first burials that indicate a belief in an afterlife found in Shanidar Cave, Iraq (ca. 60,000 BC), the discovery of the oldest human-made place of worship at Göbekli Tepe in modern Turkey (tenth millennium BC), the ritual use of alcohol (ca. third millennium BC), the founding of Buddhism (sixth to fourth centuries BC), the Roman conquest of Judaea in 63 BC, the conversion of Saul (Saint Paul) in AD 34, the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451, and the papacy of Gregory the Great (reigned AD 590–604). Volume 2 covers from AD 600 to 1450, thus encompassing the Middle Ages in the West, the rise of Islam in the Middle East, the growth of Christian monasticism, the crusades, the development of the first universities in Europe, and the lives of Joan of Arc and Jan Hus. The final volume covers from 1450 to the present, starting with the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks and ending with the rise of the Islamic State (ISIS, ISIL, or Daesh) in 2014.

The paper describes climatic and tectonic effects on fluvial processes of East Anatolia. This study from the Muş Basin contains three alluvial terrace levels (T3-T1) ranging from 30–35 m to 3–5 m above the present Murat River in its middle section. In order to provide a chronology for the evaluation of the significant, effects of climatic changes and tectonic uplift, we used optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating of the river deposits of the youngest (T3) and medium terrace (T2). The ages from these terrace deposits show that the T3 has formed approximately 6.5 ka ago, i.e., during the last part of the Holocene (MIS 1) and T2 has formed nearly 25 ka ago, i.e., during MIS 2 at the ending of the last glacial period. According to these results, it appears that the Murat River established its terrace sequences both in cold and warm periods. The variations in climate oriented fluvial evolution between the East Anatolia fluvial system and the temperate-periglacial fluvial systems in Europe may be the conclusion of different vegetation cover and melting thicker snow coverings in cold periods.

Background: Abnormal uterine bleeding (AUB) is a common reason for women of all ages to consult their gynecologist and is one of the most common debilitating menstrual problems ending up in hysterectomy in developing countries. This study was done with the aim to observe the clinical and demographic profile of the patients and the pattern of AUB.Methods: It is an observational study, conducted in department of obstetrics and gynaecology, DR Rammanohar Lohia institute of medical sciences, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh from August 2018 to July 2019. All patients in the reproductive age group with symptoms of abnormal uterine bleeding were included in the study.Results: Majority (37.50%) of the women were in the age group of 30-40 years. 71.66% were multiparous and maximum women (60%) were in normal BMI. 69.17% were belonging to middle class. Commonest presentation was menorrhagia (48.3%) followed by oligomenorrhoea (18.1%) followed by polymenorrhoea (17.27%).Conclusions: Excessive menstrual blood loss is a common reason for women to seek medical help and leads to large demands in health resources According to our study majority of the women with AUB were in the age group of 30-40 years, were multiparous with normal BMI belonging to middle class. Commonest presentation was menorrhagia. Following study highlights the clinical and epidemiological pattern of abnormal uterine bleeding of reproductive age group, which is crucial factor in management for these patients. In order to predict causal association, further more studies with larger sample size of higher level of evidence should be conduct to draw causal evidence.

It is well known that the Council of Constance (1414–18) was concerned with reform, heresy and – above all – the ending of the Great Schism of the papacy. However, comparatively few realise how many personal and institutional suits were heard at tribunals there. Christopher Crowder has asserted with justifiable exaggeration that more ‘ecclesiastical carpetbaggers’ were in attendance than ‘ecclesiastical statesman’. This article, based on hitherto unused material, is a case study which presents the activities of certain ‘carpetbaggers’ and their agents in some detail. It is offered partly because it further documents Crowder's assertion, partly because it supports his conclusion that judicial procedures at the papal curia in the late Middle Ages operated with great continuity, and partly because it suggests how closely King Henry v could concern himself with the details of ecclesiastical business. It also throws unusual light on medieval English hospitals, especially on alien priory establishments. Furthermore, it exemplifies the inordinate amounts of time, documentation, money and gifts required in order to pursue cases at the papal curia; difficulties stemming from reliance on proctors there; the time lags and other problems related to international correspondence and financial transactions in the early fifteenth century; and connections between ‘carpetbaggers’ and ‘ecclesiastical statesmen’ that sometimes affected curia cases.

Abstract The eruption of Emeishan lava in southwestern China and northern Vietnam is considered to be a contributing factor to the Capitanian mass extinction and subsequent global cooling event, but the duration of volcanism is uncertain. The difficulty in assessing the termination age is, in part, due to the lack of high-precision age data for late-stage volcanic rocks. The Tu Le rhyolite of northern Vietnam is the most voluminous silicic unit of the Emeishan large igneous province (ELIP) and is spatially associated with the Muong Hum and Phan Si Pan hypabyssal plutons. Chemical abrasion–isotope dilution–thermal ionization mass spectrometry U-Pb dating of zircons from the Tu Le rhyolite (257.1 ± 0.6 Ma to 257.9 ± 0.3 Ma) and Muong Hum (257.3 ± 0.2 Ma) and Phan Si Pan (256.3 ± 0.4 Ma) plutons yielded the youngest high-precision ages of the ELIP yet determined. The results demonstrate that Emeishan lavas erupted over a period of ∼6 m.y,. with plutonism ending shortly thereafter. Thus, it is possible that Emeishan volcanism contributed to global cooling into the middle Wuchiapingian. It appears that these rocks represent a distinct period of ELIP magmatism, as they are young and were emplaced oblique to the main north-south–trending Panxi rift.

The article is devoted to the study of the interdisciplinary phenomenon of self-regulation. Within the framework of this topic, various approaches to understanding the process of self-regulation proposed by domestic and foreign researchers are considered. A review of the key concept of the leading Russian expert in the field of psychology of self-regulation of personality V. I. Morosanova and her questionnaire “style of self-regulation of behavior”, used to assess the degree of development of self-regulation processes and measures of formation of strategic structures of individual self-consciousness. Based on socio-philosophical analysis, it is shown that the level of self-regulation changes significantly in different periods of life: from low and rapidly growing in childhood, continuing high and stable in middle age, and ending with a slow decline after 30 years. The characteristic reasons for reducing or increasing the level of self-regulation in people of different ages were revealed. Described wide range of adjustment procedures samoregulyatsii low ability individuals, including methods that do not require special training - situational (switch, self-hypnosis), recitative (active neuromuscular relaxation and ideomotor training), system (introspection, self-analysis) and more complex, requiring a monitoring specialista method of biofeedback, meditation, autogenic training.

Oscillations of periods with low and high temperatures during the Quaternary in the northern hemisphere have influenced the genetic composition of birds of the Palearctic. During the last glaciation, ending about 12,000 years ago, a wide area of the northern Palearctic was under lasting ice and, consequently, breeding sites for most bird species were not available. At the same time, a high diversity of habitats was accessible in the subtropical and tropical zones providing breeding grounds and refugia for birds. As a result of long-term climatic oscillations, the migration systems of birds developed. When populations of birds concentrated in refugia during ice ages, genetic differentiation and gene flow between populations from distinct areas was favored. In the present study, we explored the current genetic status of populations of the migratory European bee-eater. We included samples from the entire Palearctic-African distribution range and analyzed them via mitochondrial and nuclear DNA markers. DNA data indicated high genetic connectivity and panmixia between populations from Europe, Asia and Africa. Negative outcomes of Fu’s Fs and Tajima’s D tests point to recent expansion events of the European bee-eater. Speciation of Merops apiaster started during the Pliocene around three million years ago (Mya), with the establishment of haplotype lineages dated to the Middle Pleistocene period circa 0.7 Mya. M. apiaster, which breed in Southern Africa are not distinguished from their European counterparts, indicating a recent separation event. The diversification process of the European bee-eater was influenced by climatic variation during the late Tertiary and Quaternary. Bee-eaters must have repeatedly retracted to refugia in the Mediterranean and subtropical Africa and Asia during ice ages and expanded northwards during warm periods. These processes favored genetic differentiation and repeated lineage mixings, leading to a genetic panmixia, which we still observe today.

Large historical problems are stimulating to debate but difficult to specify and answer in ways that might carry forward our long-standing discourses in global economic history. The papers which form the basis of our essay deal with a meta question and are focused upon the economic consequences (the costs and benefits) for those European societies most actively involved in territorial expansion, colonization, world trade, capital exports and emigration to other continents over the past five centuries. Our symbolic dates mark (rather than demarcate) the beginning and ending of European imperialism. Colonisation occurred in Antiquity and in the Middle Ages but between 1415 and 1789 European powers, particularly Britain but also Spain, Portugal, Holland, France and Italy, founded hundreds of colonies. Individual articles have concentrated upon periods of significance for particular countries and are, moreover, analysed within the context of an international economy, evolving through four eras (or orders) of mercantilism (1415–1846), liberalism (1846–1914), neo-mercantilism (1914–48), and decolonisation (1948–74). Our Introduction draws heavily upon six national case studies as well as discussions that took place at a conference in Madrid in 1997. We do not intend to cite particular contributions to the inferences and conclusions in this essay. Our views represent an elaboration upon and an interpretation of the articles that follow.

One day, a young romance writer who has lost his place to urban expansion in Buenos Aires overhears this intimate conversation coming from another bedroom in an all-women's residence hall. An “invisible houseguest” in Madame Bazan'spensionadofor middle-class women of all ages, Mauricio Ridel works on finishing a happy ending for his latest serialized novel. During the writing process, however, he finds himself distracted by the sounds and rhythms of the house, his focus carried away to the conversations in the house on fashion, family life and female emancipation. Careful not to indicate his presence in any way (for he has agreed to respect the privacy of the women who live there), Ridel listens in to the conversations between female residents from the comfort of his assigned room. Believing themselves removed from male listeners, the female characters of Juana Manuela Gorriti'sOasis en la vida(1888) openly discuss their concerns and desires in the security of enclosed spaces. The dialogic sequence that begins this essay demonstrates the relief that a group of unnamed women experience when removing their uncomfortable clothing. They complain about the weight and needless complexity of their fashions and even flesh out a conspiracy theory concerning a few of those crazy designers. As the women contemplate the changes that tomorrow's fashions will inevitably bring, their soft, sweet voices appear punctuated by the incongruous thud of tossed garments.

The provenance of Middle Eocene clastic rock from the Gercus Molasse, NE Iraq was determined by detrital zircon (DZ) U-Pb geochronology. The Gercus Molasse in the Iraqi segment of the north-eastern Zagros Thrust Zone provides an ideal example of foreland system evolution with respect to the transition from passive margin to the accretionary complex terrene-flexural foreland basins. The DZ U-Pb age spectra from the Gercus Molasse suggest that the foreland sediments either influx from multiple provenances or are the result of recycling from the accretionary complex terrane. During pre-accretion, however, the radiolarite basin (Qulqula Radiolarite, 221 Ma) located along Arabian passive margin likely acted as an intermediate sediment repository for most or all of the DZ. Representative DZ U-Pb measurements revealed that the Gercus clastic rocks fall into several separable age population ranges of 92-102 (Albian-Cenomanian), 221 (Upper Triassic), 395-511 (Cambrian), 570- 645 (Neoproterozoic), 1111 (Mesoproterozoic), and lesser numbers of Paleoproterozoic (1622-1991 Ma) ages. The source of Proterozoic detrital Zircons is enigmatic; the age peaks at 1.1, 1.5, 1.6, and 1.9 Ga (Proterozoic) does not correspond to any known outcrops of Precambrian rocks in Iraq, and it may be useful to continue to search for such basement. The detrital zircons with age populations at 0.63–0.86 Ga probably originated from the Arabian-Nubian Shield. The age peak at 0.55 Ga correlates with Cadomian Magmatism reported from north Gondwana. The age peaks at ~0.4 Ga is interpreted to represent Gondwana rifting and the opening of Paleotethys. The youngest ages populations at 93 Ma indicate that fraction of DZ were transported directly from the contemporaneously active magmatic arc (Zagros Ophiolite segments). The paleogeography and tectonic evolution of the Neogene Zagros foreland basin were reconstructed and divided into two tectonic stages. The early stage is defined by the Campanian accreted terranes (i.e. orogenic wedge) form loads sufficient to produce flexural basin with a deepest part is situated next to the tip of the loads. This flexural basin is filled by the flysch clastics of the Maastrichtian– Early Eocene (i.e. referred to by the Tanjero-Kolosh flysch sequence). The late stage is marked by a synchronized modification of the clastics fill of the basin and changes in dip directions to compensate for the reduction of the load by both erosion and extension and the basin, therefore, was sealed by a shallowing upwards depositional sequence ending with the terrestrial Gercus Formation.

This work examines the surviving persistence of the National Catholic discourse within current Spanish historiography with special regard to the specific case of the study of the Middle Ages. This approach to the medieval Iberian past may be summarized in two major features: the historical illegitimacy of al-Andalus from its origins, expressed through the notion of the Arab and Islamic “invasion” of Iberia, and the consequent legitimacy and glorification of the Christian conquest (so-called Reconquista), ending with the siege of Granada by the Catholic Kings in 1492. The recent publication of AlAndalus y la cruz, by Rafael Sánchez Saus, represents the last academic byproduct of this tendency and its entire argument still drags its most typical prejudices and stereotypes.Key WordsAl-Andalus, National-Catholicism, Reconquista, Religious tolerance, Dhimma.ResumenEste artículo analiza el fenómeno de la continuidad del discurso nacionalcatólico en la historiografía española actual en relación con el caso específico del estudio de la Edad Media. Esta perspectiva sobre la historia medieval ibérica se caracteriza por dos aspectos principales, la ilegitimidad histórica de al-Andalus desde sus orígenes, expresada a través de la noción de la “invasión” árabe y musulmana, y la consiguiente legitimidad y glorificación de su conquista por los cristianos (re-conquista), culminada con la toma de Granada por los Reyes Católicos en 1492. El libro Al-Andalus y la cruz, de Rafael Sánchez Saus, representa la más reciente manifestación de esta corriente historiográfica en el ámbito académico, y todo su argumento todavía arrastra a sus más típicos prejuicios y estereotipos.Palabras claveAl-Andalus, Nacionalcatolicismo, Reconquista, Tolerancia religiosa, Dimma

Pollen study of two soil sections, located in two different relief positions (the gully bottom at Sadgora 1 and the upper part of a slope at Ridkivtsi I) enables us to show vegetational and climatic changes in the Bukovyna area (the Chernivtsi region) during the last 2000 years (the end of the Early Subatlantic, the Middle and Late Subatlantic). The reconstructions of past vegetation are based on the analyses of pollen surface samples, taken from the soils of different ecotops in the sites’ vicinity. The reconstructed short-period phases of environmental change correspond well with those established in other areas. These are the end of the “Roman warm period” (before the 14C date of 1.74 ka BP), with the humid climate; the relatively dry “Dark Ages cool period” (before the 14C date of 1.19 ka BP); the wet “Medieval warm period”; the cool “Little Ice Age” (with its wetter beginning and drier ending) and the modern warm phase (the last 150 years).Centennial environmental changes − the cooling within the Medieval Warming (XI cent.) and the warming within the “Little Ice Age” (XV cent.) – have been detected. Human impact on the vegetation can be demonstrated – forest clearance (with the presence of particles of microscopic charcoal and pollen of pyrophitic plants), the introduction of thermophilous walnut during warm periods, and the appearance of pasture lands in the place of former fern patches and woods during the “Little Ice Age”, and the last warm phase (with the presence of pollen of pastoral synanthropic plants). In the last 2000 years, broad-leaved woodland, dominated by hornbeam, grew extensively near Sadgora and Ridkivtsi only during the “Medieval Warm Period”.

Current Ediacaran–Cambrian, paleogeographic reconstructions place Avalonia, Carolinia and Ganderia (Greater Avalonia) at high paleolatitudes off northwestern Gondwana (NW Africa and/or Amazonia), and locate NW Gondwana at either high or low paleolatitudes. All of these reconstructions are incompatible with 550 Ma Avalonian paleomagnetic data, which indicate a paleolatitude of 20–30ºS for Greater Avalonia and oriented with the present-day southeast margin on the northwest side. Ediacaran, Cambrian and Early Ordovician fauna in Avalonia are mainly endemic, which suggests that Greater Avalonia was an island microcontinent. Except for the degree of Ediacaran deformation, the Neoproterozoic geological records of mildly deformed Greater Avalonia and the intensely deformed Bolshezemel block in the Timanian orogen into eastern Baltica raise the possibility that they were originally along strike from one another, passing from an island microcontinent to an arc-continent collisional zone, respectively. Such a location and orientation is consistent with: (i) Ediacaran (580–550 Ma) ridge-trench collision leading to transform motion along the backarc basin; (ii) the reversed, ocean-to-continent polarity of the Ediacaran cratonic island arc recorded in Greater Avalonia; (iii) derivation of 1–2 Ga and 760–590 Ma detrital zircon grains in Greater Avalonia from Baltica and the Bolshezemel block (NE Timanides); and (iv) the similarity of 840–1760 Ma TDM model ages from detrital zircon in pre-Uralian–Timanian and Nd model ages from Greater Avalonia. During the Cambrian, Greater Avalonia rotated 150º counterclockwise ending up off northwestern Gondwana by the beginning of the Ordovician, after which it migrated orthogonally across Iapetus to amalgamate with eastern Laurentia by the Late Ordovician–Early Silurian. SOMMAIRELes reconstitutions paléogéographiques courantes de l’Édiacarien-Cambrien placent l’Avalonie ,la Carolinia et la Ganderia (Grande Avalonie) à de hautes paléolatitudes au nord-ouest du Gondwana (N-O de l'Afrique et/ou de l'Amazonie), et placent le N-O du Gondwana à de hautes ou de basses paléolatitudes. Toutes ces reconstitutions sont incompatibles avec des données avaloniennes de 550 Ma, lesquelles indiquent une paléolatitude de 20-30º S pour la Grande Avalonie et orientée à la marge sud-est d’aujourd'hui sur le côté nord-ouest. Les faunes édicacariennes, cambriennes et de l'Ordovicien précoce dans l’Avalonie sont principalement endémiques, ce qui permet de penser que la Grande Avalonie était une île de microcontinent. Sauf pour le degré de déformation édiacarienne, les registres géologiques néoprotérozoïques d’une Grande Avalonie légèrement déformée et ceux du bloc intensément déformé de Bolshezemel dans l'orogène Timanian dans l’est de la Baltica soulèvent la possibilité qu'ils aient été à l'origine de même direction, passant d'une île de microcontinent à une zone de collision d’arc continental, respectivement. Un tel emplacement et une telle orientation sont compatibles avec: (i) un contexte de collision crête-fosse à l’Édiacarien (580-550 Ma) se changeant en un mouvement de transformation le long du bassin d’arrière-arc; (ii) l’inversion de polarité de marine à continentale, de l’arc insulaire cratonique édicarien observé dans la Grande Avalonie; (iii) la présence de grains de zircons détritiques de 1 à 2 Ga et 760-590 Ma de la Grande Avalonie issus de la Baltica et du bloc Bolshezemel (N-E des Timanides); et (iv) la similarité des âges modèles de 840-1760 Ma TDM de zircons détritiques pré-ourallien-timanien, et des âges modèles Nd de la Grande Avalonie. Durant le Cambrien, la Grande Avalonie a pivoté de 150° dans le sens antihoraire pour se retrouver au nord-ouest du Gondwana au début de l'Ordovicien, après quoi elle a migré orthogonalement à travers l’océan Iapetus pour s’amalgamer à la bordure est de la Laurentie à la fin de l’Ordovicien-début du Silurien.

Many factors influence the activation and maturation of the compositional process in children. Although there are numerous studies on children's processes, production and behaviour, little has been done concerning the influence of the didactic strategies used by the teacher, which may actually encourage or suppress such processes. Children are generally asked to create a composition that has a beginning, a middle and end, but we wondered whether it was really necessary to request this structure or if children of a certain age already adopt it spontaneously, so teachers can use such skills as building blocks for further learning. We investigated if children, without any specific music education, possess a certain ability to use specific types of beginnings and/or endings and how they improve. We asked 132 primary school children, aged 7–10, to perform six improvisations, five with a soprano glockenspiel, and one with tambourine. A total of 792 pieces were recorded and analysed using a specific classification system. After referring to studies on musical theory and semiotics to clarify the concept of beginning and ending in a piece of music, we are presenting the results which show that a certain percentage of children aged 7 already possess the mentioned skills, and that there is a gradual spontaneous acquisition of the beginning/ending conventions. Children improve year by year, with greater progress between 8 and 9 years.

The article attempts to present the author's view on the history of the formation and development of a scientific discipline, referred to as the ontology of designing. The presented material summarizes the work carried out by the author over the past ten years. The author as the founder and executive editor of the journal of the same name with as the discipline under consideration uses the articles published in it and the materials of his works presented at various international conferences, in other specialized journals and published monographs. Despite the fact that the analysis of the formation of the discipline is largely based on the author's own personal experience and is viewed through the prism of this experience, nevertheless, the basis of this formed discipline is the numerous works of its predecessors, ranging from the architects of ancient Greece, mathematicians and engineers of the Middle Ages, and ending with modern works in the field of artificial intelligence and information technology. The author shares a brief personal background of the formation of his own understanding of the ontology of designing, paying tribute to his first scientific advisor V.G. Maslov, who fostered in him a systematic approach to optimizing complex systems, paying particular attention to design uncertainty. Work experience on the creation of computer-aided design systems for the engine, and later for the aircraft as a whole in cooperation with industry, teaching the disciplines on the design of technical systems, general design theory, information systems, databases, ontology of designing and production ontology allowed the author to develop a scientific basis for a new discipline, determine its boundaries and a place in the existing scientific space, develop a range of key terms, form the very concept of ontology of designing. The article provides examples of the implementation of the concept of ontology of designing in various subject areas, in particular, when creating a robot designer at the stage of preliminary design of an aircraft, when forming a model of a future university, in the tasks of production planning, development of electronic manuals, design of scientific journals and other organizational and technical systems.

The article deals with the classification of the judiciary in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (hereinafter referred to as the GDL), which included most Ukrainian lands during that period. The purpose of the work is to identify institutes of justice that were active during the Middle Ages in the GDL, to study their structure, to classify and competence each of them. Following the majority of researchers in the history of national law, the author shares the view that the three stages of the evolution of the organization of justice in the specified period. The periodicisation is based on the well-known principle of court ownership, distinguishing state and non-state courts. Characterization of each of the judicial institutions is carried out. It noted that state courts were under the direct jurisdiction of the Grand Duke and his government officials, while non-state courts were not subordinate to government officials, but their decisions were found to be legitimate. Such courts have arranged both the Grand Duke of Lithuania (the master) and the general population, since the former sought to relieve the courts, and the latter sought opportunities to resolve the dispute on the spot, without long journeys and the pecuniary expense of keeping the letter and spirit of the law. The author pays the most attention to land courts created on the basis of customary Ukrainian law. They originated in the fourteenth century. from the tradition of the Russian faithful courts. It is considered by public courts operating throughout Ukraine's ethnic territory, mostly in rural areas. Cities and towns that were not in Magdeburg law were also included in the land area. Representatives of various sections and strata of Ukrainian society participated in his work, starting with the peasantry and ending with the nobles-government. Attention is drawn to the jurisdiction of land courts in criminal proceedings. It has been proven that property crimes - theft, robbery, robbery, arson - were distinguished from criminal cases considered by land courts. Qualified death penalty was practiced, first of all hanging, burning, quartering. Initially, all the inhabitants of the land district (suburbs) came under the jurisdiction of the land courts, but subsequently the nobility was granted the right to sue the commercial court. The findings of the paper stated that despite the variety of judicial institutions, the competence of each court was sufficiently clearly defined.

The two characteristics of the passive voice found in the North Russian dialect and in other Circum-Baltic languages, the accusative case of the patient or theme as an argument of a verb with passive morphology and intransitive verbs passivized raise a number of related questions. The author of the present paper explores the issues under discussion from an areal-historical perspective, concluding that the aforementioned languages have a tendency for the agent to be the same element as the subject and the patient or theme to be the same element as the (direct) object of the sentence. In the North Russian dialect, we can see an example where the above fact holds true irrespective of whether the verb has an active or a passive morphology as the theme of the sentence assumes the accusative case regardless of whether it is an argument of a verb in the active or in the passive voice.The question as to what lexical elements can function as subjects is itself interesting. Moreover, there seems to be a correlation between what level of abstraction the syntactic category of subject has reached in a language and the existence of a pure passive mean- ing. The less abstract the category of subject is, as in case of Circum-Baltic languages, the farther structures with a passive morphology seem to be from a pure passive meaning. In languages such as English, however, where virtually any noun can function as a subject, there seems to be a pure passive meaning and there is only one morphological way of form- ing passive sentences.The nature of linguistic similarities found in genetically less related languages spoken in the same area has been given a number of varied accounts. The most salient of them ap- pears to be B. Drinka’s explanation based on the influence of Western European languages on ones spoken in the East of the area where once the Hanseatic League existed in the middle ages and I. Seržant’s theory concerning the foregrounding of the agent as passive structures with a stative interpretation gradually assumed a dynamic one.In fact, participles in the North Russian dialect ending in -n / -t can express a dynam- ic, that is, eventive interpretation with a perfect meaning and can even co-occur with the -sja / -s’ postfix, the latter phenomenon being absolutely unimaginable in Standard Russian, where the two affixes are in complementary distribution. The author assumes that the topic should be studied from the perspective of sociology and cultural anthropology as well since linguistic similarities and differences often reflect similarities and differences in thinking beyond the realm of linguistics.

The intellectually and politically tempestuous crystallization of the civic ideal in the nineteenth and twentieth century manifested not only in Europe (especially Western), but also in North and Middle America, and in time – all over the globe. An intense search for the “civic ideal” is clearly discernible in societies comprising the former Polish Republic, whose demise towards the end of the eighteenth century and the subsequent phases of its increasingdecompositionnot only failed to annihilate the republican tradition but in fact intensified authentic debate on possible roads toward modern society in the future independent state. A key role in this important dialogue was played by representatives of the landed gentry and the intelligentsia, the latter emerging in the nineteenth century as a new social formation that basically had no exact counterpart in other countries. In time, a few representatives of other classes also joined this dialogue on the shape of the future Polish state. What is the meaning of the phrase “civic society”? Today, it is used almost naturallyby columnists and politicians representing various positions, but it was virtually non-existent during Norwid’s lifetime, although the very ideaof organizing collective life on the basis of “civic” virtues has an almost immemorial provenance. This article attempts to describe Norwid’s civic thought, mainly by analysing his discursive statements, chiefly in journalism. Norwid was decidedly opposed to any doctrinaire elevation of “humanity” (which he called a “holy abstraction”) over “nation” and “Church,” through which individuals can actually partake in “the work of ages.” Another area in which Norwid struggled to develop clear civic categories comprises visions of humanity’s universal happiness and/or its apocalyptic fall, many of which were promulgated at the time. In his polemics with utopias of “fulfilled history” it is possible to discern clear echoes of ideological debates held at the time, especially ones between mystical and political visions used by various “prophets” to describe the ultimate perspectives for the development of current events whose subject is “humanity” – a category replacing “nations,” which would be thus seen as ending their historical “mission.”From this angle, Norwidwould criticise Skład zasad[A collection of principles] by Adam Mickiewicz– a manifesto of revolutionary transformations of civic rights, which are part of the legacy of the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.In a letter to Józef Bohdan Zaleski, dated 24 April 1848, Norwid expressed his outrage at most theses contained in Skład, which he saw as undermining traditional values such as “homeland,” “property,” “lineage,” “nation,” etc.

The Polish version of the article was published in Roczniki Humanistyczne vol. 62, issue 4 (2014).
 In a wealth of votive gifts, the wax ones undoubtedly deserve special attention. They were common as early as in the Middle Ages, and they were used until the 20th century. There was a variety of such votive offerings, starting with candles, through lumps of wax, and ending with full-scale wax figures that started being used as a votive gesture at the break of the 13th and 14th centuries in the north of Europe. In the 15th and 16th centuries this custom became popular among the wealthy German, Austrian and Italian noblemen. Making wax votive figures took a lot of skill so they were made by specially qualified artists (in Italy wax figures called Boti were produced by sculptors called Cerajuoli or Fallimagini). Religious orders collaborated with the artists-artisans, undertaking to supply wax, whereas the artisans prepared wooden frames, natural hair, glass eyes, paints, textiles and brocade. In the following centuries, the production of wax figures developed ever more dynamically, especially in the north of Europe, with less skilled wax modellers, artisans and gingerbread makers often being their producers. The latter ones mainly made smaller wax figures, cast or squeezed from two-part concave models (this type of items in their form and type reminded of figures made of gingerbread).
 Wax votive figures (especially of children aged three to 12) funded in the area of Upper and Lower Franconia (the Bamberg and Würzburg dioceses) from the mid-19th to the mid-20th century are a separate and rather unusual phenomenon. Popularity of this votive offering became stable about 1880, in the years 1900–1910 it reached its climax; and in the 1950s it came to an end. Franconian offerings were always constructed in a similar way: they had wax faces and hands (more rarely feet), and the other members were made of wood, metal and some other padding materials. Dolls were a dominating model for the production of these votes, and that is why, like dolls, they had wigs made of natural hair on their heads, glass eyes and open mouths. A very important role was played by clothing, in which figures were willingly dressed; they were children’s natural, real clothes (girls were often dressed in the First Communion dresses); moreover, the effigies had complete clothing, which means they had genuine underwear, tights, leather shoes. The figures were supplied with rosaries and bouquets held in their hands, and on the heads of girls there were garlands. The figures were put in cabinets and glass cases, sometimes with wallpaper on the back wall, and they had a longer text on the front glass with the name of the child, or possibly of its parents, and the time when the figure was offered.
 Despite the many features making the Franconian offering deposits different from votive figures from other regions, all these items are joined by a timeless and universal idea, in which—to quote H. Belting—“an artificial body has assumed the religious representation of a living body…”

Taking into account the methodology of Ukrainian and interdisciplinary studies, the available research on the theory and practice of identification processes, the article considers the phenomenon of civilizational identity of Ukrainians, its origins, formation, and current state from the standpoint of civilizational, anthropological, and sociocultural approaches. The concept of “civilizational identity” indicates the affiliation of an individual, ethnic group, or state to a particular civilization and is interpreted as a set of symbols, ideas, feelings, and self-awareness of their belonging to the Ukrainian cultural and civilizational community, which is based on national and universal values within the space of European civilizations and interaction with them. 
 The author analyzes theoretical and methodological foundations of civilizational identity presented in the works by A. Bergson, M. Weber, К. Wolf, S. Huntington, E. Gellner, I. Hoffmann, E. Husserl, J. Derrida, K. Eder, E. Erikson, G. Simmel, A. Camus, E. Cassier, A. Kuna, K. Levi-Strauss, G. Rickert, E. Smith, A. Toynbee, S. Freud, C. Jung, K. Jaspers, and others. He considers its Ukrainian features and structure: ethnic, national, cultural, religious, political, civic, European, and other components, shown in connection with the mentality and global nature against the background of historical progress and post-Soviet transformations, beginning from the Middle Ages, Kyivan Rus, the Renaissance, modernism and ending with postmodernism; emphasizes the historical mission of Ukrainian Cossacks as a national carrier of a new identity, tracks civilizational self-determination of the Ukrainian identity at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries, as well as the role of consciousness, social psychology, and the national idea in the civilizational transformation of identity; highlights the causes of the identity crisis and schism in the conditions of totalitarianism, its devastating consequences for the identification process of Ukrainians in general. 
 The main focus is put on the study of the specifics of the civilizational identity formation in the conditions of independence of Ukraine; the role of its components – ethnic, religious, national, civic, and European; the contribution of T. Bevz, T. Voropaieva, M. Kozlovets, I. Kutsyi, L. Nahorna, M. Obushnyi, Yu. Pavlenko, Yu. Polishchuk, M. Popovych, O. Rafalskyi, V. Tkachenko, M. Shulha, M. Yurii, and others to the study of key aspects of the problem; the influence on the civilizational identification processes, European integration, and globalization of the modern world, Revolution of dignity, democratization of the society, interethnic relations, aggressive policy of Russia. The article highlights ways to preserve Ukrainian identity in the alien environment, the role of Ukrainians abroad in shaping civilizational identity. 
 Significant attention is paid to the importance of Ukrainian studies as an academic synthesis of historical, philosophical, ethnological, cultural, and psychological knowledge in the elaboration of scholarly bases for building the civilizational identity and summarizing the relevant accumulated practical experience. A number of proposals have been made to further research the problem, increasing the role of the state and civil society in activating the civilizational identification of Ukrainians and their prospects.

Notarial signs serving to authenticate private and public legal documents emerged in Dalmatia during the 12th century, and by the late Middle Ages they had become a mandatory part of official documents written on parchment for the legal parties. These signs were graphic as a rule: more or less elaborate drawings with decorative motifs, occasionally with integrated typography, yet without any figural elements. Among the very diverse forms of notarial signs preserved in Croatian archives, that of Split’s canon and Zadar’s notary Helias deserves special attention: instead of using a simple graphic symbol, he depicted a young man’s torso, which for several reasons may be presumed to be his self-portrait. More than fifty notarial signs by Helias have been preserved, but it may be presumed that he produced more than a thousand during more than two decades of his career as a notary. These signs are drawing of very small dimensions (3 x 1.5 cm on the average) and most probably not a result of “artistic” ambition, presuming that such terminology applies at all to the visual production of the time. As many other literate men, Helias probably indulged in drawing and incorporated some of this inclination and skill into his work in a peculiar manner. Over the period of two decades, the depicted figure went through several transformations. Starting from a relatively realistic and quite detailed depiction, in the second phase Helias simplified the drawing and enhanced its elements of caricature, ending with a partially stylized and unified version of his sign. Generally speaking, his drawings were closer to the genre of caricature than an official visual representation, which is why he could style them rather freely as compared to the norms that could be observed in the professional circles, especially in the monumental painting of the 14th century. Despite the fact that they seem somehow timeless, their visual features indicate certain knowledge of the formal language of representative painting. Helias’s skilful handling of lines and the ease with which he used a minimum of expressive devices to outline not only the portrait itself, but also the psychological characteristics of the depicted person, are basically a legacy of Gothic visual culture. Self-portrait as a form, albeit absent at least declaratively from medieval monumental painting, was nevertheless present, even if quite rarely and only in isolated cases, in medieval miniature painting (e.g. the self-portraits of St. Dunstan, the notary Vigil, the painter Hildebertus and his assistant Everwinusa, friar Rufillus, the nun Gude, the miniature painter Matthew Paris, or the illuminator Richard de Montbaston and his wife Jeanne). Nevertheless, the paucity of such examples, as well as the spatial and temporal (partly also cultural) distance, makes it difficult to assess the place of Helias’s self-portraits within a broader context. In any case, the group of some fifty portraits from the 14th century, regardless of their dimensions and character, is certainly a peculiar phenomenon in the context of European visual culture. The key point is thereby not the artistic quality of the drawings, but rather the variety of visual communication in 14th-century Dalmatia.

The paper seeks to outline the overall framework for the reception of St. Clement’s tradition in Slavic literacy in northern, Serb-populated areas; the paper also analyzes major Serbian literary monuments, both Glagolitic and Cyrillic, which may be brought into a close relationship with the literacy tradition of St. Clement. They are presented individually, also taking into account an earlier linguistic background from which they stemmed. These older linguistic traits which are Old Slavonic as well as some later characteristics are generally possible to arrange in an ideal chronological sequence. This makes it possible to suggest a relative chronology of the formation of some Serbian literary monuments. There are also some local linguistic traits and other parameters that allow one to date Serbian literary monuments more precisely and, sometimes, even to delimit their territory of origin. This series begins with the Codex Marianus and continues with Miroslav’s Gospel, the Mihanović Fragment, the Gršković Fragment, Bratko’s Menaion, the Jerusalem Palimpsest, and the Belgrade Prophetologion, ending with the Serbian Prophetologion from St. Petersburg and Kiev. One must keep in mind that the Serbian language, which underlies the spoken background of the Serbian redaction of the Church Slavonic language, was, shortly after its formation (up to the end of the 11th century), still dialectically undiversified (regardless of the potentially heterogeneous situation before the 9th century); thus, based on the current body of knowledge, it is not possible to identify dialectical traits that would provide more specific information about individual writings. However, traces of the general logic of the developmental dynamics of the folk language can be identified in the language of the only 11th-century source presented in this paper: the Codex Marianus. This literary monument is temporally and spatially located in the third quarter of the 11th century and the southeastern boundary of Raška (roughly in Poibarje), near the fortress of Zvečan and the early medieval settlement of Čečan. Miroslav’s Gospel is dated to the period between 1161 and 1170 (ca. 1165) and is linguistically associated with the territory of the Bishopric of Raška because its scribes were the bearers of a dialect typical of this region: the manuscript either originates from Raška or it was written by Rascian scribes in some other area. Based on a rather large number of literary monuments, it is possible to get insight into the third stage in the life of this form of literacy in Polimlje, where the hereditary estates of the Nemanjićs and their relatives were located. From the early Middle Ages this area witnessed lively ecclesiastical activities, though they were based on the Roman Rite. One of the cultural centers must have been located around the trefoil church of St. John at Zaton (9th–11th centuries). In this wider area, a more conservative Serbian literary tradition, which can be traced in the Mihanović Fragment, could have persisted slightly longer. The Mihanović Fragment was the purest representative of the Serbian redaction, without secondary shadings typical of the innovative southern Slavic areas in the 11th century (with the mildest divergence from the vernacular variety when pronouncing the literary language), and it was still based on the linguistic background shaped by St. Clement. The linguistic picture of this literary monument indicates that it could have originated from an area where an ancient linguistic redaction dating back to the early 10th century, or perhaps an even older variety of a literary language from the 9th century (associated with the Roman Rite) combined with a later South Slavic layer of undetermined age (10th–11th centuries), persisted.

This paper presents the variation in the two short high vowels /i/ and /u/ occurring in live syllables ending with final nasal consonants (CVN) in two Southwestern Tai (SWT) dialects: Lue and Khün, respectively spoken in the villages of Nong Bua and Nong Muang in Pa Kha Subdistrict, Tha Wang Pha District, in Nan Province. The data were collected from Lue and Khün language resource persons (LRPs) in three age groups, an elderly group (60 years old and above), a middle-aged group (35–50 years old), and a young group (15–25 years old), with five LRPs in each age group. The data analyzed for this paper come from a total of 30 LRPs (5 LRPs × 3 age groups × 2 SWT dialects).

The article provides a linguistic and historical overview of the problem of integration and differentiation of kinship and affinity of languages, including the features of unions. Based on the conducted linguistic analysis, the authors come to the conclusion that if adverbs in languages of different genders and tribes of Turkic origin are the result of integration of Turkic languages, then the division in the middle ages of Turkic languages (modern national languages, such as Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, etc. languages) is the result of the division of Turkic languages into branches, groups and subgroups. In the course of the work, the authors identify integration and differentiation processes, the kinship and affinity of languages and their integration into one language union, which was influenced by extralinguistic factors. Analysis and comparison of homonymous and polysemantic auxiliary morphemes, namely: case endings, plural endings, possessiveness and declension, suffixes of the noun, adjective, pronouns and verbs of the az-Zamakhshari dictionary [1] and the Kazakh language once again proves the historical uniformity of the vocabulary of the XII century and the modern Kazakh language. At the end of the article, the authors conclude that the differences between auxiliary morphemes in the «Dictionary» and the Kazakh language are expressed in phonetic composition, and semantic and grammatical functions of morphemes state the similarity and homogeneity of languages that belong to the Kipchak, Oguz and Karluk groups

Bridge Glacier is a prominent eastward-flowing valley glacier located on the east side of the Pacific Ranges within the southern British Columbia Coast Mountains. The terminus of Bridge Glacier has retreated at rates up to 125 m/year over the last 50 years and currently calves into proglacial Bridge Lake. Field investigations of the recently deglaciated terrain and moraines led to the discovery of detrital boles and glacially sheared stumps. Dendroglaciological analyses of this subfossil wood produced five radiocarbon-controlled floating tree-ring chronologies. The relative age and stratigraphic location of these samples revealed that Bridge Glacier experienced at least four periods of significant advance during the late Holocene: a Tiedemann-aged advance ca. 3000 14C years BP, an unattributed advance ca. 1900 14C years BP, a first millennium advance ca. 1500 14C years BP, and a Little Ice Age advance beginning ca. 700 14C years BP. Lichenometric investigations at eight terminal and lateral moraine complexes identified early Little Ice Age moraine stabilization during the late 13th to early 14th centuries, with subsequent ice-front oscillations ending in the middle 15th, early 16th, middle to late 17th, early 18th, middle to late 19th, and early 20th centuries. These investigations build upon previous research and compliment recent geobotanical evidence emerging from other glaciers in this region that describe multiple late Holocene glacier advances. The discovery of a glacially sheared whitebark pine stump dating to 1500 ± 50 14C years BP provides irrevocable proof for an advance of Bridge Glacier during a time when glaciers throughout Pacific North America were also expanding.

Abstract. Background: Carotid dissection is a rare disease, mainly affecting young and middle-aged patients potentially ending up in stroke. Multimodality imaging plays an essential role, both in terms of prompt and accurate diagnosis and follow-up of this entity. Patients and methods: We herein present a case series of patients with internal carotid artery dissection and compare the various imaging findings of ultrasonography, multidetector computed tomography angiography and magnetic resonance angiography, with a purpose to illustrate the value of multimodality imaging in the diagnosis of carotid dissection. Results: Ultrasound represents the first-line imaging modality for the evaluation of a suspected carotid pathology. Digital subtraction angiography is considered the gold standard method for evaluation of carotid luminal abnormalities and is currently reserved for those patients selected for endovascular surgery. Nevertheless, the widespread availability of modern cross-sectional techniques such as multi-detector computed tomography angiography and magnetic resonance angiography has made angiography marginalised. Computed tomography and magnetic resonance angiography offered accurate delineation of vascular lumen and providing valuable information for the vascular wall composition. Conclusions: Careful interpretation of imaging findings on various imaging modalities can lead to early and accurate diagnosis of carotid dissection.

Works of the last quarter of XX century, persuasively proved that the socio-economic development of the villages of the south-Russ reached a high level, having conditioned their parity relations with towns. Unlike the West European model, in the cities of Eastern Europe, according to experts, they were the centers of the agricultural surrounding, which facilitated their determination as collective feudal castles. Therefore, researchers should not set villages against towns, but consider them in a formational unity. An example of a rural agglomeration where the resources of the capital of the principality were concentrated is a group of settlements between the Dnieper and the lower reaches of the Desna, providing the necessary raw materials and products for the Chernigov dynasty. Undoubtedly, the capital metropolis had an analogue of such a resource zone, but it has been studied much worse.
 Until recently, the rural district of Kiev was represented in Predslavyne and Teremky, not documented in Kremenyshche, an early stage of the excavations of the Sophiyivska Borshchagivka and small works on a few other monuments, which were explored in small volumes, and some of them could represent the outskirts of neighboring fortified centers, not of Kiev. Therefore, excavations since 2007 by the Northern Expedition of the IA NASU of the Hodosivka-Roslavske settlement, and since 2010 — of the Sofiyivska Borshchagivka have provided a large incremental of the sources on this topic. Sufficiently science-intensive materials have also been obtained in the recent studies.
 In course of the works, residential buildings were studied: a part of them had small room as an additional premises next to the main chamber, one of the constructions on the Borshchagivka settlement consisted of two main chambers. The dwellings were heated with clay ovens, located, where it was possible to trace them, in the corner near the entrance. Noted was one case of placing the heating structure in the far corner with its further transferring to the near one. Near the residential buildings household, grain buildings and pits were erected.
 Characteristics of agricultural activities can be understood from the findings of the tips of tools for soil handling and harvesting. The paleoethnobotanical spectrum is represented by six types of cereals and peas. Animal breeding is marked by spits and bones belonging to a horse, a pig, large and small cattle. Bones of cats and dogs were also found. Prey for hunters from S. Borshchagivka and Hodosivka were 4 and 15 species of mammals, as well as 4 and 13 species of birds, 5 more species of ornithofauna from Hodosivka were unlikely to be an object of hunting. Fixed are 14 species of fish, of rodents — 8, 5 of herpetofauna. arrowheads attribute to hunting, —hooks — to fishing, nets — to sinkers, other tools attributing to ice chisels. The tools found indicate the development of spinning, weaving, making clothes and shoes, processing products.
 In the studied settlements, developing were ferrous metallurgy, processing of non-ferrous metals, wood, bones, wood chemical industries, and the population of Hodosivka-Roslavske was also engaged in making beads, inserts and crosses made of amber.
 The ceramic complex includes various types of kitchen, dining and container ware, among which some very fine specimens are found. Some of the products are covered with a layer of watering, in Hodosivka there are quite a few, even more — with its individual stripes, drops and sprays. Fragments of imported vessels, as well as glass cups were fixed, and in S. Borshchagivka — wooden products of the specific purpose. Among the findings are household appliances, universal tools, tools of crafts, decorations and costume elements. The number of fragments of glass bracelets in Hodosivka exceeds the figures of many similar towns. There are imported things: beads of oriental origin, in Hodosivka settlement — fibula of bronze sheet, characteristic for the synchronous population of the Baltic lands, a pin with topping shaped as a little duck, a ring-shaped brooch with inserts of glass, a knife-shaped pendant with a pointed ending, which findings in the south of Russia are sporadic. At both spots fragments of plinth and floor tiles were found, on Borshchagivka — also cubes of smalt. A lot of items of armament and harness of the battle horse have been found. A range of subjects of personal piety of Christians and things of pagan cults is collected. Remarkable are, from Borshchagivka — a steatite cross of a pilgrim to the Holy Land, from Hodosivka — a sewn metal cross with the Crucifixion of Volto Santo — a sign of a pilgrim to a shrine in Tuscany and a copy of the mother-of-pearl cross of a visitor to Palestine from a clam that inhabits the northern rivers of Europe and America. Numerous keys and fragments of locks evidence quite a high wealth of the population.
 In addition to the materials of the Old Rus and Mongolian-Lithuanian times, those related to the preceding epochs were also found.
 The data obtained makes it possible to trace the development of the material and some aspects of the spiritual culture of inhabitants of the Kiev surroundings of the Middle Ages.

AbstractDuring 1980–90, Japan's annual real GDP growth rate was 4.6%, but which declined to 1.2% in the 1990s. While the drop in itself is a problem, at the same time it exacerbated many other problems, namely inequality, budget deficits, and the increasing burden of an aging society.Society is not concerned about income distribution when the economy is growing, but begins to worry about inequality when an economic slump shows no signs of ending. Moreover, prolonged recession magnifies inequality. With the employment situation surrounding young people worsening, there arose an inequality between those finding jobs and those unemployed. And, the prolonged recession led to a huge budget deficit and the accumulation of government debt. Tax revenue shrank, and the government repeatedly increased public investment in the form of economic stimulus measures, but the Japanese economy did not recover in a sustained fashion.Japan's low growth has already continued for 20 years. Incomes of the younger and middle-aged segments of the population have not increased. Additionally, Japan is an aging society. The aged need pensions, and medical treatment and care, costs which must be borne by younger and middle-aged segments of the population, in fact those who have not experienced Japan's prosperous times.This paper discusses issues relating to the Great Recession, inequality, and the budget deficit and burden of an aging population.Japan's Great Recession is basically explained by monetary shocks. Just the bubble and its bursting are not solely responsible for the prolonged slump. There is no empirical evidence for the assertion that certain structural problems lessened the efficiency of the Japanese economy in the 1990s. TFP (total factor productivity) in the 1990s did not decline compared with the early 1980s. Fiscal policy and the diminution of the financial intermediary function can only explain the Great Recession in small part.The absence of any real monetary policy hampered economic growth through the channels of stock prices and improvement in bank balance sheets. Using vector autoregressive models, the exchange rate was not found to be an important channel of monetary policy, but there is some evidence that it significantly affected output.On inequality problems, that among younger generations is important since it will increase inequality in the future. Japan's economy will stagnate for a long time if the young are not employed and cannot garner skills.Another important point is that the way of maintaining social stability and alleviating inequality in Japan is extremely inefficient. To construct useless dams, roads, ports, and airports is extremely costly just to give jobs to the unemployed. It would be much better to give direct assistance to those in need.There is some reason to think that a budget deficit is not so serious a problem as generally believed, and that the important thing is to cut wasteful government expenditure and not raise government revenue. While I admit this argument carries some weight, there is nevertheless good reason to think that it is necessary to reduce the budget deficit.Before the global financial crisis, Japan's budget deficit was controlled, and declining, but subsequently became uncontrollable. Additionally, and more importantly, an aging population demands more social security expenditure, which causes serious budget problems, but Japan does not seem ready to cope with such problems.The selection of these topics is subjective, but I believe that these are reflected in the Japanese concerns now. Japanese academic circles do not necessarily respond to the interests of the society, but I have tried to select papers on these topics to the extent possible.

The article features the linguistic peculiarities of four novels the author uses in her course on Contemporary English Fiction: Hilary Mantel’s A Change of Climate, Jim Crace’s Quarantine, Graham Swift’s Last Orders, and Adam Thorpe’s Ulverton. The novels probe deeply into some of the stranger aspects of human experience. Hilary Mantel writes of people who try to behave as balanced, rational beings, but to whom irrational and terrible things happen that have to be dealt with. The metaphorical language illuminates this philosophical exploration, which would otherwise be dull or unconvincing. The novel might seem strange for English readers, but the language carries the conviction of the true storyteller. J. Crace has a wonderful sense of exact words for an exact rhythm. Graham Swift’s novel is written as though it were the thoughts and memories of seven different characters. The language here is the colloquial vernacular, the language of elderly and middle-aged men and women with little education from south-eastLondon. The most extraordinary book of these four is Adam Thorpe’s Ulverton. It consists of twelve chapters, which are a chronological set separate ‘stories’ that happened between 1650 and 1988. Each chapter uses a different literary genre for the story-telling: for example, a simple first-person narrative, a sermon, a journal, letters to a lover, lecture notes, an internal monologue, and – ending the novel – a television script. Thorpe has therefore set himself a colossal task: to render into lively readable English, the concerns and passions of individuals, often illiterate individuals, while retaining a sense of the language appropriate to a particular era and a particular genre.Literature is an act of communication between writer and reader which does justice to humanity through expressive, imaginative language. Nobody would be so arrogant as to say that reading literature is the only way of ‘being human’ but more than most activities it forces us to think about people other than ourselves.Readers who would like to read more have available many other fine examples of contemporary English literature, provided by the Oxford Russia Fund for those taking part in the project on Contemporary English Literature in Russian Universities.

Aim. The study was designed for the optimization of the approaches to the diagnosis and management of women with background diseases and tumor pathology of the vulva.Materials and methods. The study involved more than a thousand and a half patients from different regions of Russia and CIS countries with precancerous and tumor pathology of the external genitals. A variety of methods were used in the primary diagnosis and monitoring in the treatment and observation, ranging from the banal examination, palpation, laboratory studies and ending with modern morphological studies, CT, MRI and PET diagnostics.Results. The characteristic differences in the background processes of the vulva were revealed, which allowed us to divide them into two groups: the first group – the pathological process occurs against the background of dystrophic changes in the tissues of the external genitals; the second group – the dermis and subcutaneous fat are not changed. Clear morphological criteria of two variants of changes are accompanied by a significantly different clinical picture. Conservative measures had low efficiency in the pathology of the vulva with a neurodystrophic process. Carrying out a photodynamic therapy and laser vaporization is justified only in young and middle-aged women with precancer. It was found that the high efficiency of surgical treatment is combined with a large number of early and late postoperative complications, which in itself causes discomfort, pain, dysuric phenomena, and dyspareunia. It is possible to reduce the frequency of postoperative complications and improve the functional and cosmetic results of the treatment only with the use of reconstructive plastic surgery. We have developed and widely implemented the methods of closing wound defects in everyday practice and evaluated their effectiveness. Conclusion. Over the past 20 years, a lot of work has been done to address the topical issues related to the diagnosis and treatment of background processes, precancer and vulva cancer. However, at present, there is no center where theoretical issues are studied at a serious level, conservative and invasive methods of treatment are developed, and educational and methodical work with doctors is carried out. Without proper attention to these issues, this problem is unlikely to be solved in the near future, both from theoretical and practical points of view.

Abstract Background In 2015, adolescents 13–24 years were disproportionately affected and accounted for 22% of new HIV infections in the United States. In New York State (NYS), the rate of adolescents (13–19 years) living with HIV infection is more than twice the national rate (44.4 vs. 19.4 per 100,000 population). As part of the ending the epidemic (ETE) program, the NYS Department of Health spearheaded access to pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) for high-risk individuals to keep them HIV negative. This study aims to test the hypothesis that adolescents at risk may not be utilizing PrEP and that there are barriers to adopting it. Methods A cross-sectional survey (Qualtrics) was conducted from Aug 2017 to May 2018 using a 13-item multiple choice and Lickert scale validated questionnaire that takes <5 minutes to complete. Descriptive and nonparametric tests (GraphPad Prism v5.04) were used to characterize knowledge and acceptance of PrEP among adolescents in Capital District NY after the initiation of the ETE program in NYS. Results There were 97 respondents and 89 (92%) completed all questions. Most of the respondents identify themselves as female (36%), straight (27%), middle aged adolescents 15–17 years (64%), African American (46%) and currently in high school (69%). Majority have seen a medical provider in the past 12 months (90%), at the doctor’s office (61%), and majority have never been offered HIV test (60%). Majority have not heard of a medicine that can prevent HIV infection (58%), most have not heard of PrEP (57%), and many do not know where to go to learn more about PrEP (56%). Most have not been offered PrEP (86%) and respondents were split in adopting PrEP (yes 49% vs. no 51%). The reasons for not agreeing to start PrEP are shown in Figure 1. Majority are interested in attending educational program on PrEP (57%). Adolescents are likely to adopt PrEP if they heard about it (P = 0.01), if they know where to go to learn about it (P = 0.02), and if someone offered it (P = 0.03). Conclusion Adolescent knowledge of PrEP may be suboptimal and presents barriers to adopting it. However, they are willing to accept PrEP if offered. This study demonstrates potential avenues for intervention and provider-initiated programs should be evaluated in scaling-up PrEP into adolescent health services. Disclosures All authors: No reported disclosures.

A mere two years ago International Sports Studies was celebrating its fortieth anniversary. At that time, at the beginning of 2018, your editor was able to reflect on the journey of our professional association – the International Society for Comparative Physical Education and Sport (ISCPES). It started with a small, cohesive, and optimistic group of physical education scholars from Europe and North America interested in working across boundaries and exploring new international horizons. The group that met in Borovets in 2017 on the eve of the society’s fortieth anniversary, represented a wider range of origins. They were also more circumspect, tempered by their experience in what had become, four decades later, a very much more complex competitive and fragmented professional environment. Such a comparison seems almost to have reflected a common journey, from the hope and optimism of youth to entry into the challenges and responsibilities of mid adulthood. Yet from the perspective of contemporary history, these last four decades seem generally to be viewed as having been a time of unbroken human progress. Certainly, this is a defensible view when we use technological and economic progress as the criterion. The nation of Indonesia provides an excellent example of progress by these measures. The world’s 10th largest economy in terms of purchasing power parity, and a member of the G-20. Furthermore, Indonesia has made enormous gains in poverty reduction, cutting the poverty rate by more than half since 1999, to 9.78% in 2020. Prior to the COVID-19 crisis, Indonesia was able to maintain a consistent economic growth, recently qualifying the country to reach upper middle-income status. The World Bank (www.worldbank.org/en/country/indonesia/overview) Indeed, when we look at the economic growth charts of the world over the last century, without exception they resemble a J curve with growth over the last half century being particularly rapid. But, from time to time, we need to be reminded that human existence is rather like a coin. Looking at the top side provides one picture but then, when we turn the coin over, a totally different view presents itself. From time to time, pictures find their way to our television screens that remind us that real challenges of poverty are still faced by many today. Similarly, though we have talked about seventyfive years of peace, the other side of the coin reveals that around the globe armed conflict has continued remorselessly since the official ending of World War II in September 2nd 1945. A visit to Wikipedia and its list of ongoing conflicts in the world will inform the casual reader, that in the current or past calendar year there have been over 10,000 deaths related to four major wars – in Afghanistan, the Yemen, Syria and Mexico. In addition, eleven wars, eighteen ‘minor conflicts’ and fifteen ‘skirmishes’ have added to death and misery for many around the world. I make these points in case those of us who are fortunate enough to live in relatively stable, safe and prosperous environments, might be tempted to become complacent and forget how much always needs to be done to increase the welfare of our brothers and sisters throughout the world. Humankind’s end of decade report needs to remind us that, if our progress has generally been steady, there remains area where we still need to improve. Further we need to remember that wealth and material prosperity are not the sole criteria for human well-being and happiness. Quality of life needs to be measured by much more than Gross Domestic Product alone. Such thoughts now seem to be suddenly highlighted, as we move into another new decade. For virtually worldwide, it seems to as if the coin has suddenly been flipped. In 2018 we were looking forward with different expectations to those that we now have since the start of 2020. At a time when the world has never been more interconnected, we have been forcibly reminded that with that connectedness comes a level of risk. There is a belief by some, that interconnectedness provides some sort of protection against war and conflict and that trade relationships provide a rationale for peaceful cooperation between the peoples of the world. However, it is that very interconnectedness that today leaves us at greater risk to the ravages of the latest pandemic to strike the world. Countries that have managed the CoVid19 virus most successfully, have been those like New Zealand that have isolated themselves from others and restricted movements and interactions both across and within borders. Consequently, people in many different settings find themselves in lockdown and working from home. This sudden restriction on interactions and movement, has provided a unique opportunity for reflection by many. Stepping back from the frantic pace of twenty first century lifestyle, though it has inevitably caused much concern economically for many, has given others a chance to rediscover simpler pleasures of previous ages. Pleasures such as the unhurried company of family and friends and the chance to replace crowded commuting with leisurely walks around the local neighbourhood. So, it has been that a number of voices have been pointing to this as a unique opportunity to re-set our careers and our lifestyles. With this comes a chance to re-examine core values and in particular question some of the drivers behind the endlessly busy and often frentic approach to life that characterises our modern fast changing world, with its ceaseless demand for us all to ‘keep up’ and ‘get ahead’. It is then in a spirit of reset that I am pleased to introduce International Sports Studies’ first special supplement. We take very seriously our mission of connecting physical education and sport professionals around the world. It has made us very conscious of the dangers of adopting a view on the world that is centred in the familiar and our own back yards. Yet we all tend to slip into a view of life that seems to be driven and reinforced by the big media and the loudest voices in an interconnected world. Individuals chasing the dream of celebrity are easily recognisable from New Delhi to Anchorage or from Nairobi to Sapporo. We seem forced to listen to them and their ideas even when we wish to disassociate from them. In sport too it seems that in all corners of the world, the superstars of football Messi, Ronaldo, Pogba, Bale are known wherever the game is played. News and influence too often seem to flow from the places where these same celebrities of screen and sporting fields are based. It is the streets and recreation areas of Hollywood, Madrid and Turin, all comparatively restricted areas of the globe, which are continuously brought to us all by the ubiquitous screens. Some of the latest figures from the ITU, the Telecommunication Development Sector a specialised United Nations agency, have estimated that at the end of 2019, 53.6 per cent of the global population, or 4.1 billion people, were using the Internet (ITU, 2020). It is a figure that continues to increase steadily as does the stretch of its influence. The motivation behind this supplement focusing on studies in physical education and sport within Indonesia, can be found in the origins of comparative physical education and sport study. We can all learn by comparison with others and their approaches to both similar and unique problems and challenges. It does not however always make sense to limit ourselves to matching our situations with others for the sole purpose of making scholarly comparisons. Often it makes more sense simply to visit colleagues in another setting and examine in some depth their concerns and practices. Such studies are called area studies and they involve illuminating what is occurring in different settings in order to increase our own understanding and awareness. Indonesia provides a special and important starting point for just such a study. Located off the coast of mainland Southeast Asia in the Indian and Pacific oceans, it is an archipelago that lies across the Equator and spans a distance equivalent to one-eighth of the Earth’s circumference. It is the world’s fourth largest country in terms of population (Legge, 2020). It is a nation that appears modest in its demeanour and that of its people yet has much to offer the rest of us, especially in terms of our common professional interest. The purpose of volume 42e is to offer an opportunity for our colleagues in Indonesia to speak to the global community and for the global community to learn a little more about the work of their colleagues in Indonesia. It is the first of what is intended to be a series within the tradition of comparative studies. It has been a great pleasure and privilege to work with a special editorial team from Indonesia in this project. Their details are briefly provided below. I commend to you the work of this representative group of physical education and sports scholars. I invite you to join us in lifting our heads above our own parapets and resetting our own perspectives by reaching out and listening to a wider circle of colleagues from around the world. We may not be able to travel to meet each other at this time but we can still interact and share, as our responsibility as academics and professionals requires us to do. John Saunders Brisbane, November 2020 References ITU (2020) Statistics. Accessed from https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics? Legge, J. D. (2020) Indonesia. Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica. Accessed from https://www.britannica.com/place/Indonesia

The article analyses elements of dance in the Jesuit theatre in Vilnius University. These elements could be found in the performances produced from the end of the 16th century until the last years of Jesuit Order and the establishment of Educational Commission who took over the administration of the educational system in the Republic of Two Nations. With the help of scientific literature and programs of the performances, the productions with dance elements are presented describing their themes. The most important productions in this context are those titled as ballet, which were produced in Vilnius. These four ballets are an exception in the history of the Jesuit theatre in the Republic of Two Nations. These productions are “Ballet of Bacchus, god of drinks, with a happy beginning and sad ending”, “Ballet in the example of Orestes showing the punishment of gods onto the humans because of their lack of respect to the temples and their definite protection to those who search it looking for the help of gods“, “Ballet of the courageous man Hercules” and “Ballet of four human ages: spring as youth, summer as maturity, autumn as elderly and winter as senility”. They could be connected with some unknown teacher who worked in Vilnius in the middle of the 18th century and most probably originated from the French cultural milieu. This statement could be validated by the French prototypes of most of these ballets and the use of the word “ballet” in their titles, which was common in the French culture of this period.

Abstract Background Obstetric fistula occurs in all developing countries but it is confined to the “fistula belt” across the northern half of Sub-Saharan Africa from Mauritania to Eritrea and in the developing countries of the Middle East and Asia. Ending obstetric fistula is critical to achieving Sustainable Development by 2030. So creating awareness on obstetrics fistula among women in the reproductive age group have a crucial role in reducing morbidity, mortality, and social stigma. Objective To assess awareness on obstetric fistula and its associated factors among reproductive-age women attending governmental hospitals in southwest Ethiopia, 2021. Methods An Institutional based cross-sectional study design was conducted among 413 women. The sample size was estimated by using a single population proportion formula. The collected data were coded and entered into EPI-data version 3.1 then exported to SPSS version 24 for descriptive and inferential analysis. Adjusted odds ratio (AOR) along with 95% confidence level was estimated to assess the strength of the association and variables with a p-value < 0.05 were considered to declare the statistical significance in the multivariable analysis in this study. Results In this study, a total of 400 clients have participated in the study. The mean ages of participants were 30.26 (SD ± 8.525) years old. Education of women who cannot read and write are 85% less likely to have good awareness than women who are above the secondary level of education [AOR = 0.162; 95% CI (0.081–0.364)]. While Women who have primary education level are 83% less likely to have good awareness than women who are above the secondary level of education [AOR = 0.170; 95% CI (0.085–0.446)]. In addition, This study shows women who have not heard about obstetric complications are 54% less likely to have awareness of obstetric fistula than those who heard about obstetric complications [AOR = 0.458; 95% CI (0.368–0.643)]. Conclusion This study identifies that the educational level of women, history of pregnancy, distance to the nearby health institution, and awareness of obstetrics complications were the factors associated with awareness of reproductive age women on obstetrics fistula. Hence, increasing awareness on obstetric fistula plays a key role in averting this problem.

The current study explored the link between psychological well-being (PWB; self-acceptance, personal growth, and purpose in life) and affective themes, including redemption (positive endings for negative events), contamination (negative endings for positive events), and positive and negative affect (no change in affect) in the life stories of Caribbean adults ranging in age from 19 to 78 ( N = 105). How often the memory narrative was rehearsed, and whether or not the theme emerged after being cued in content-coded life story low, high, and turning point scenes were also considered. Affective theme alone did not predict PWB; however, when considering age, rehearsal, and cue, redemption and positive affect predicted personal growth. More work should cue meaning-making in specific ways for different age groups in order to understand why there were no associations for middle-aged adults. Efforts should also be made to understand cross-cultural differences in life stories and PWB.

Background and aims: Yemen has made notable progress in dropping child mortality over the past four decades. In spite of this, due to political instability and the foreign aggression on the country in the past ten years, the incidence of diseases and deaths escalated. The mortality rate of children under the age of 5 in Yemen is still high compared to many low and middle countries (LMIC). Alternatively, patterns and causes of child morbidity in Yemen have not been well inspected. The aim of this study was to investigate the trend of morbidity and causes of disease among children ≤16 years old in Sana'a city, Yemen from 1978 to 2018 based on data from a single child health center.
 Subjects and methods: Data was collected from a private children Health Center in Sana'a. Data collection and analysis was performed for 4 months starting from 15/6/2020 and ending on 9/26/2020. The records included clinical and laboratory investigations for children who visited the out-patient clinic of the medical center. The study included 8,861 clinical diagnosed cases, 4,833 males and 4,028 females, between the ages of less than one year and 16 years. The frequency distribution of the different variables and the ratios of cases containing data on these variables were analyzed and their significance (P-value) was calculated using Chi-squared "N-1" test.
 Results: Between 1978 and 2018, respiratory diseases were the most common accounting for 44.3% of the total causes, followed by gastrointestinal diseases (30.3%), and other diseases such as skin diseases, nutritional disorders, and urinary tract infections by 5.2%, 3.9% and 3.9 % respectively. In addition, central nervous system diseases (CNS) (3.1%), hematology (1.7%), and heart disease (1.33%) were rare childhood diseases.
 Conclusions: Respiratory diseases and gastrointestinal diseases remain among the main causes of children's diseases in Sana'a, Yemen. These findings call for better newborn and child recovery and survival interventions that focus on the key factors that lead to childhood disease.
 
 Peer Review History: 
 Received 6 November 2020; Revised 25 Decembe; Accepted 4 January, Available online 15 January 2021
 UJPR follows the most transparent and toughest ‘Advanced OPEN peer review’ system. The identity of the authors and, reviewers will be known to each other. This transparent process will help to eradicate any possible malicious/purposeful interference by any person (publishing staff, reviewer, editor, author, etc) during peer review. As a result of this unique system, all reviewers will get their due recognition and respect, once their names are published in the papers. We expect that, by publishing peer review reports with published papers, will be helpful to many authors for drafting their article according to the specifications. Auhors will remove any error of their article and they will improve their article(s) according to the previous reports displayed with published article(s). The main purpose of it is ‘to improve the quality of a candidate manuscript’. Our reviewers check the ‘strength and weakness of a manuscript honestly’. There will increase in the perfection, and transparency.
 Received file: Comments of reviewer(s): 
 Average Peer review marks at initial stage: 6.5/10
 Average Peer review marks at publication stage: 8.0/10
 Reviewer(s) detail:
 Dr. Ali Awad Allah Ali Moh. Saeed, National University, Sudan, alimhsd@gmail.com
 Dr. Gulam Mohammed Husain, National Research Institute of Unani Medicine for Skin Disorders, Hyderabad, India, gmhusain@gmail.com
 Dr. Sunita Singh, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA, sunita.nccs@gmail.com
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 PREVALENCE AND POTENTIAL RISK FACTORS OF HEPATITIS B VIRUS IN A SAMPLE OF CHILDREN IN TWO SELECTED AREAS IN YEMEN

Context: Self-immolation is defined as ending life by suicide, particularly through burning, which carries considerable morbidity and mortality. Although its prevalence is low in developed countries, in developing countries, it’s an important problem. Evidence Acquisition: We systematically searched studies published in international and local databases on self-immolation in Iran (either in English or Persian) to identify relevant studies from the time of inception of databases to June 2017. Here, we presented the data regarding the prevalence and factors associated with self-immolation among Iranian women. Results: Sixteen studies were included in this review. In Iran, according to the reports of the forensic organization on deaths by suicide, from 2006 to 2010, 16.4% of the committed suicide were via self-immolation. It is more common in females than males, particularly among young, married, and low educated women. Self-immolation is more common in the north and west of Iran. The most prevalent causes of self-immolation are reported as domestic violence and other stressful events such as family conflicts, intimate relationship break-ups, divorce, and financial difficulties. Conclusions: The prevalence of self-immolation is relatively high among young and middle-aged Iranian women. There are socio-cultural factors that might contribute to this issue. Preventive measures should be strengthened, particularly for young and middle-aged women, to address this problem.

The estimated cost of acute injuries in college-level sport in the USA is ∼1.5 billion dollars per year, without taking into account the cost of follow up rehabilitation. In addition to this huge financial burden, without appropriate diagnosis and relevant interventions, sport injuries may be career-ending for some athletes. With a growing number of females participating in contact based and pivoting sports, middle aged individuals returning to sport and natural injuries of ageing all increasing, such costs and negative implications for quality of life will expand. For those injuries, which cannot be predicted and prevented, there is a real need, to optimise repair, recovery and function, post-injury in the sporting and clinical worlds. The 21stcentury has seen a rapid growth in the arena of regenerative medicine for sporting injuries, in a bid to progress recovery and to facilitate return to sport. Such interventions harness knowledge relating to stem cells as a potential for injury repair. While the field is rapidly growing, consideration beyond the stem cells, to the factors they secrete, should be considered in the development of effective, affordable treatments.

Abstract Background Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) are a public health problem, especially for reproductive-age women. The aim of this study was to determine the incidence and trend of STIs during 11 years in Tunisia (2007–17). Methods We conducted a descriptive study including all women with curable STIs (chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis and trichomoniasis) diagnosed with the syndromic approach in all basic health care centers of the Governorate of Monastir (Tunisia) from 2007 to 2017. Syndromes included, Pelvic Pain (PP), Vaginal Discharge (VD) and Genital Ulceration (GU). Results We analyzed 40,388 episodes of curable STIs with a crude incidence rate and age standardized incidence rate of 1393 (95% Confidence Interval (CI); 1348–1438) / 100,000 Person Year (PY) and 1328 (95%CI; 1284–1372) /100,000 PY respectively. The incidence rate showed a positive trend over 11 years for all age groups and syndromes. VD was the most common syndrome with a crude incidence rate of 1170/100,000 PY. For all syndromes, women aged 20 to 39 were the most affected age group (p < 0.001). Conclusion In conclusion, the incidence rate of STIs episodes among women diagnosed with the syndromic approach was high, consistent with the global evidence. Focusing on reviewing STIs surveillance system in low and middle-income countries could allow the achievement of the ending of STIs epidemics by 2030.

The latest reality program about weight loss makeover, Australian Channel Seven’s Bringing Sexy Back maintained the dominant frame of fat as bad, shameful and unsexy. Similar to other programs’ point of view, only slim bodies could claim to be healthy and sexy. Conversely the Fat Acceptance movement presents fat as beautiful, sexy, and healthy. But what did online audiences in 2014 think about Bringing Sexy Back? In this article online-viewer-generated comments are analysed to find out: a) whether audiences challenged and contested the dominant framing; and b) what phrases did they use to do this. The research task is a discourse analysis in which key words and phrases are highlighted and colour coded as categories and patterns begin to emerge. My intention is to represent the expressions of the participants responding to the articles and or online forums about the program. The focus is on the ‘language-in-use’ (Gee 34), in particular their gut reactions to the idea of whether only slim people can be sexy and their experience of viewing the program. Selected television websites, online television forums and blogs will be analysed. Introduction The latest makeover television program drawing on the obesity-epidemic discourse Bringing Sexy Back (BSB) promises the audience that by the end of the program participants will have bought their sexy back. Sexy in the program is equated with one’s younger and slimmer self; the program host Samantha Armytage (from Sunrise the national Australian morning show) tells viewers sexy can be reclaimed if participants (from their late 30s and up to 51 years) drop kilos, commit to a strenuous exercise regime, and re-style their wardrobe. Experts, the usual suspects, are bought in—the medical machinery, the personal trainer, the stylist, and the hairdresser etc.—to assess, admonish, advise and appraise the participants. At the final reveal the audience—made up of family, friends and the local community—show enthusiasm for the aesthetic desirability of the participants slimmer sexier body as evidenced by descriptors such as “wow”, and “oh my God” as well as an outpouring of emotion such as crying and squeals of delight. Previous researchers of fat-shaming television programs have found audience’s reactions divided: some audience members see it as motivating; others see it as humiliating; and others see it as what the contestants deserve (Holland, Blood and Thomas; Rodan, Ellis and Lebeck; Sender and Sullivan)! I want to find out if online and social media audiences of the relatively tame makeover program BSB, which features individual Australians and couples who are overweight and obese, challenge and contest the dominant framing. In my analysis of the phrases online audiences’ have used about BSB, posters mostly found the program inspiring and motivating. From this inauspicious first strike, I will push onto examine the phrases posters have used to respond to the program. The paper begins with a short background about the program. The key elements of the makeover television genre are then discussed. Following this, I provide an analysis of the program’s official BSB Facebook site, and unofficial viewer-generated sites, such as the bubhub, TVTONIGHT, MamaMia, The Hoopla and the hashtag #sexybackau on Twitter. Posters to these sites were regular, infrequent or intermittent viewers. My approach to the analysis of these online forums and social media sites is a discourse analysis that examines “language-in-use”—as well as other elements such as values, symbols, tools and thinking styles—so as to identify and track tacit knowledge—that is, meanings emerging from obesity-epidemic discourse (Gee 34, 40–41). Such a method is apt given its capacity to analyse contributors’ spontaneous statements of their feelings—in particular their gut reactions to the program and the participants. The paper ends with my findings and conclusions. Bringing Sexy Back: Background Information Screened in 2014, season one of BSB format consists of a host Samantha Armytage, fitness trainer Cameron Byrnes and stylist Jules Sebastian and her team of hairdresser, groomers etc. Undoubtedly, part of the program’s construction is to select participants who appeal to a broad range of viewers. Participants’ ages range from 21 years (Courney Gollings) to 51 years (Vicki Gollings). The individuals or couples who make up the series include: Ned (truck driver), Sam and Gary (parents of two boys), Lisa Wilson (single mother and hairdresser), Vicki and Courtney Golling (mother and daughter), Livio Caldarone (pizza/small restaurant owner), and Paula Beckton (mother of four), The first episode was aired on Australia’s Channel Seven on 12 August 2014 and the final episode on 13 January 2015. This particular series consisted of 9 episodes. In this paper I focus on the six episodes that were aired in 2014. Generally each individual episode consisted of: the intervention, presenting medical facts about participant’s weight; the helper figures setting training and diet regimes; the trials leading to transformation; and the happy ending evident in the reveal. Essentially, these segments illustrate that the program series is highly contrived and they also demonstrate the program’s method of challenging participants to lose weight. Makeover Television I now provide a further construct to assist the reader’s understanding of ‘what is going on’ in the BSB program, which fits within the genre of makeover program. As reflected in the literature, makeover television has some or all of the following ingredients: personal fitness trainer as expertstylist and grooming expertsfamily members and contestant’s reflexivity (reflect on their own behaviour)new self-celebrated photo shootscontestant winning challengessymbols, such as the dream outfit, and before and after photographstransformation before the ‘big reveal’ Moreover, makeover programs are about the ordinary person on television. According to Redden, identities on these programs are individual rather than collective in that they serve to show a type of “individuality” as if it exists irrespective of any social or cultural group (156). And what is the role of the expert? Redden points out the expert on makeover programs interprets the “life situation of the given person, who may represent a certain social category of ordinary person” (153). So while makeover programs purport to be about the ordinary person and make claims about the actuality of the ordinary person’s life (Skeggs and Wood 559; Stagi 138), they also depict a hierarchy of social categories. The participants’ class also features in makeover programs like BSB. Class is evident in that participants who are selected to be on the program are often from lower-middle class backgrounds. Most participants have non-professional occupations—truck driver (Ned), hairdresser (Lisa), pizza/small restaurant owner (Livio), body caster, a person who makes body casts (Paula). Similar to The Biggest Loser (2004–2014) on American NBC, and Australia Network Ten, the participants in BSB were also mainly from lower–middle class backgrounds (Rodan; Sender and Sullivan 575) Several researcher’s show that makeover television promises advancement for lower–middle class citizens (Fraser 188–189; Miller 589; Redden 155; Skeggs and Wood 561) based on the proposition that contestants have the power to transform themselves (Bratich 17; Ouellette and Hay 471–472; Lewis 443; Sender and Sullivan 581). Like other makeover programs BSB takes advantage of the aspirations of working and lower-middle class participants. And, not surprisingly, the desired transcendence is something most participants/viewers from lower-middle and working class backgrounds cannot strive to achieve without participating in the program (Miller 589). Transcendence in BSB comes from losing weight, and acquiring new gym equipment, gym clothing, access to a personal trainer, gym membership, holiday at a health retreat, new wardrobe, new haircut, and new gym clothes. These acts to transform oneself are often “presented” as the middle class “standard,” taste and specific ongoing “intimate practices” of the “middle class” (Skeggs and Wood 561; Redden 155). But clearly much of the sprucing up (such as a private gym at home, personal trainers) are expensive and beyond the budget of even an Australian middle-class family. Analysis Posters on the official BSB Channel Seven Facebook forum overall were the most positive about the program—they found the program motivating and inspiring. Several posters on Facebook asked how they might apply to be on the program. After the airing of the reveal, posters on all the online forums and social media analysed consistently used adjectives such as fantastic, awesome, congratulations, stunning, amazing, gorgeous, wow, incredible, look sensational, look hot, look great, champion effort, fabulous, impressive, beautiful, inspirational. Fat-Shaming In BSB fat-shaming works through the use of medical machines and imagery, which measure weight and body fat percentage (BMI) using the DXA scanner and X-ray machine. Even though many physicians object to BMI measurement, it has become an “infallible marker of dangerous risk-saturated obesity” (Morgan 205) in Health Department campaigns, insurance company policies and on makeover television. Participants’ current weight is compared to the weight of their 20 year-old self. The program also induces fat-shaming through visuals of food and drink stashes found in participant’s bedroom cupboards (Ned), remnants of take-away packaging in rubbish bins (Lisa), processed foods in pantry cupboards (Vicki and Courtney), and pizza cartons at work (Livio). Here food amounts are quantified for audiences to gasp with shock and horror reinforcing the stereotype that people are fat because they have insufficient willpower and overeat (Farrell 34), thus perpetuating the view that obese people are undisciplined, sloppy and “less likely to do productive work” (Greenberg et al.). Banners are produced of participants’ photographs in their 20s; the photographs chosen have been taken when participants were slim and looked hot at the beach or night clubbing. These banners are juxtaposed with a banner of participant’s current self—appearing overweight in unflattering short crop top and underwear. Both banners are flashed onto the screen during the program especially in the final reveal presumably as a visual measurement to shame participants for “letting themselves go”. Even though host Samantha provides reasons for participants gaining weight—such as the stress of being a single parent, having a busy life as a mother of four, work commitments etc—the visual banners powerfully signify more than the presenter’s dialogue. Katrina Dowd on Facebook suggests it is the banners that signified the truth about participants’ lifestyles when she comments: Absolutely. Amazing how people whom follow unhealthy eating patterns for years with lack of exercise get congratulated because they’ve lost weight. Should never have let yourself get to that stage. Using your children and work commitments as excuses for why you got that way is a big “fail”. Some social media participants on Twitter and online forum posters saw the participants as “Bogan” ( a white working-class person who lacks fashion sense, is uncouth unsophisticated and invokes disgust), lazy, slobs as represented in the following comments: “Bogan Hunters Makeover” (tvaddict); “STILL A FUCKING FAT BOGAN […] JUST STOP EATING” (Al_Mack); “Stop being a lazy bitch […] Seriously lazy slobs” (Dutchess of Tweet St); “learn to cook lazy cow” (Gidgit VonLaRue). Thus, for Katrina and the posters above, it is the “fat body” that is seen as the “uncivilized body” that lacks the self-control of the thin body (Richardson 80). Inspirational and Motivational I discovered that many online forum and social media participants found the program BSB inspiring and motivating. A similar finding to my study of The Biggest Loser online viewers (Rodan), as well as other researchers who interviewed audiences about The Biggest Loser (Readdy and Ebbeck). For instance, Twitter posters said the BSB inspires “everyday women” (Sharon@Shar0n) and “inspires me that I can do the same” (Sharon@KeepitRealV), “another great show #inspiring” (miss shadow). On Facebook most of the posters talked about how inspired they were by the show and or by the individual participants, for instance: Hi Lisa, I think I see a lot of me in you, I pretty much cried through the whole show. You have inspired me, much admiration for sharing your story with Australia. (Haigh) Many posters on Facebook identified with Lisa as a single mother (Jenkins) and her declaration that she was “an emotional eater” (McTavish). This may account for Lisa Wilson (5,824 likes) receiving the most likes on Facebook. There were those who identified with individual participants, such as Paula, who were attempting to lose weight. On the forum the bubhub, a forum for parents established in 2002, the administrator BH-bubhub started a thread titled “Need some motivation to shift those kilos? Our pal Paula is here to help hubbers!” Paula was the participant on BSB who lost the most weight, and was invited onto the forum to answer forum members’ questions. On this forum, disparaging, negative, demotivating comments were removed from public viewing (see caveat BH-bubhub). Overall, online forum posters on the bubhub expressed positive feelings about BSB as a weight loss program. Participants comments included “Awesome work Paula, I have no doubt you will inspire many and I look forward to hearing all your tips” (Mod-Uniquey) “and … you look fabulous” (BH-KatiesMum), “Wow, you must be so proud of yourself! That is an amazing effort and you look great” (Curby), “What an inspirational story!” (Mod-Nomsie). Facebook posters on the BSB official forum found the show motivating and evidence of others finding the same are: “I feel great after watching #sexybackau” (Freeburn), “an uplifting hour” (Hustwaite), “feeling motivated now to change a lot of things about myself” (McDonald). However, online posters rarely commented that the program inspired or motivated them to take specific actions about their own body size or lifestyle. For some, as other researchers have found about makeover programs, it is a form of televisual escapism (Holland, Blood and Thomas; Readdy and Ebbeck 585)—that is, the pleasure of watching others’ emotions in achieving their goal. For many others, identifying with the participants’ struggle, and seeing them overcome daily challenges and obstacles to losing weight, gave posters insights about themselves and how to change their own lifestyle. But maintaining weight-loss and a lifestyle that supports it—as Facebook posters frequently suggest—is very challenging for most people who are overweight. The transformations and reveals make for fairy-tale endings (the essence of makeover television), but the reality of losing weight is persistence, perseverance and hard work. Criticisms of the Program Posters on Facebook were censored more than some of the other online forums and social media. Facebook criticisms about the program BSB were dealt with swiftly by other posters—that is, posters were pressured to only express positive feelings about the program. For instance, Lynne Nicholas in response to Peter Thomson’s criticism that the program is “exploiting these people for cheap television entertainment” (Facebook, 14 August 2014) posted on Facebook: If you don’t like the show then don’t come on the page and comment. Channel 7 gives these people a chance to change their life and inspire others to do the same. (Facebook, 14 Aug. 2014) And in response to criticisms about the amount of processed food Cam discarded from participants Vicki and Courtney’s cupboard, Emily McCabe commented: If you don’t enjoy the concept of the program, feel free to change the channel and keep your negative comments to yourself. (Facebook, 2 Sep. 2014) Nevertheless, a lot of criticism appeared on the various online and social media outlets ranging from: the commercial aspects (matúš; Hales); the constant use of the word “fat” by the host (Spencer); the sponsorship and advertisements by a take-away food company (Daisy Murray; Patriot); the “irresponsible/unsafe training!” (M_Gardner; Ashton); the insufficient number of “diet tips” (Pedron-Peggs); and “sick of seeing all that food thrown away!!” (Barkla; Dunell; Robbie; Martin; Coupland). As noted above, some of the sites were censored. Criticisms of the program were only aired if the online forum and social media allowed people to vent their feelings and express their opinion. Allowing viewers to express their concerns about mainstream television programs such as BSB counters the argument made by other researchers suggesting that makeover programs do the work of audiences becoming “self-managing” and self-governing citizens (see Stagi; Ouellette and Hay 471-472; Sender and Sullivan 581; Ringrose and Walkerdine); and makeover programs perpetuate the myth that obesity is solely an individual behavioural problem (Yoo). Such critical comments (above) reveal that some viewers do question the show’s premises, and as a consequence they do not accept the dominant framing. Thus the hypothesis that all viewers of makeover programs are pliable and docile cannot be supported in my analysis. Findings and Conclusion Most BSB posters said they found the program inspiring and motivating. It seems many of the online posters identified with the participants’ struggle to lose their weight, and stay motivated to keep it off. So there was little fat-shaming from posters on Facebook and the online forums. The posters on Facebook expressed the most positive comments about the BSB program and the participants; however, the Facebook site was the official BSB social media site. It seems that many of the Facebook and online forum discussants were makeover television fans who had acquired a taste for the makeover genre – that is the transformation and the big reveal at the end, the re-styled self, the symbols as well as the tips, information and ideas about how to lose weight and change their lifestyle. Questions were often asked by posters about the participants’ eating plan, exercise regime, maintenance program etc., as well as how they (the posters) could apply to be on the show. Very few social media or online posters questioned and challenged the makeover genre, the advertising during the program, the quality and number of diet and nutrition tips, and the time as well as financial cost required to maintain the new self. References Al_Mack. “STILL A FUCKING FAT BOGAN.” 26 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Al_Mack. “JUST STOP EATING.” 26 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Ashton, Susan. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 13 Jan. 2015, 17:56. Facebook comment. Barkla, Michelle. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 9 Sep. 2014, 18:39. Facebook comment. BH-bubhub Administrator. “Need Some Motivation to Shift Those Kilos? Our Pal Paula Is Here to Help Hubbers!” The Bubhub 3 March 2015. 15:27. BH-KatiesMum. “Need Some Motivation to Shift Those Kilos? Our Pal Paula Is Here to Help Hubbers!” The Bubhub 3 Mar. 2015 19:26. Bratich, Jack Z. “Programming Reality: Control Societies, New Subjects and the Powers of Transformation.” Ed. Dana Heller. Makeover Television: Realities Remodelled. London: I.B. Tauris, 2007. 6-22. Coupland, Allison. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 2 Sep. 2014, 17:55. Facebook comment. Curby. “Need Some Motivation to Shift Those Kilos? Our Pal Paula Is Here to Help Hubbers!” The Bubhub 3 Mar. 2015, 19.30. Dowd, Katrina. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 19 Aug. 2014, 21:07. Facebook comment. Dunell, Meredith. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 9 Sep. 2014, 17:54pm. Facebook comment. Dutchess of Tweet St (Appy_Dayz). “Seriously lazy slobs feeling sorry for themselves on #SexyBackAu are just bloody annoying.” 19 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Farrell, Amy E. Fat Shame: Stigma and the Fat Body in American Culture. New York: New York University Press, 2011. Fraser, Kathryn. “‘Now I Am Ready to Tell How Bodies Are Changed into Different Bodies…’ Ovid, The Metamorphoses.” Ed. Dana Heller. Makeover Television: Realities Remodelled. London: I.B. Tauris, 2007. 177-92. Freeburn, Tim (TimBurna). “I feel great after watching #sexybackau I would’ve felt better if I didn’t eat all that Lindt chocolate while watching it though.” 19 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Gee, James Paul. An Introduction to Discourse Analysis: Theory and Method. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 2010. Gidgit VonLaRue. “You want to eat crap nightly fine, it’s your body – but not fair to your poor kid. Learn to cook lazy cow.” 19 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Greenberg, B., M. Eastin, L. Hofschire, K. Lachlan, and K.D. Brownell. “Portrayals of Overweight and Obese Individuals on Commercial Television.” American Journal of Public Health 93.8 (2003): 1324–48. Haigh, Renee J. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 26 Aug. 2014, 18:47. Facebook comment. Hales, Wendy. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 26 Aug. 2014, 18:38. Facebook comment. Holland, Kate, R., Warwick Blood, and Samantha Thomas. “Viewing The Biggest Loser: Modes of Reception and Reflexivity among Obese People.” Social Semiotics 25.1 (2015): 16-32. Hustwaite, Megan. “What an uplifting hour @BSBon7 is! @sam_armytage shines and @julessebastian is a talent #sexybackau.” 19 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Jenkins, Yohti. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 26 Aug. 2014, 18:45. Facebook comment. Lewis, Tanya. “Introduction: Revealing the Makeover Show.” Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies 22.4 (2008): 441-46. M_Gardner (MSGardner_1). “This show has just trumped biggestloser for irresponsible/unsafe training! Do not try at home people #SexyBackAu.” 12 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Martin, Tania. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 2 Sep. 2014, 18:41. Facebook comment. matúš (MattLXS). “Sales are going to increase now for the fit bit flex thanks to #sexybackau sorry jaw bone up.” 19 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. McCabe, Emily. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 2 Sep. 2014, 21:01. Facebook comment. McDonald, Christine (Clubby_R8). “Watching #sexyback I’m really feeling motivated now to change a lot of things about myself. Although the smoking thing is a tough call.” 26 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. McTavish, Karen. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 26 Aug. 2014, 18:51. Facebook comment. Miller, Toby. “Afterword: The New World Makeover.” Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies 22.4 (2008): 585-90. miss shadow (Miss_Shadow). “another great show #inspiring.” 26 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Mod-Nomsie. “Need Some Motivation to Shift Those Kilos? Our Pal Paula Is Here to Help Hubbers!” The Bubhub 4 Mar. 2015. 11:47. Mod-Uniquey. “Need Some Motivation to Shift Those Kilos? Our Pal Paula Is Here to Help Hubbers!” The Bubhub 3 Mar. 2015, 17:46. Morgan, Kathryn Pauly. “Foucault, Ugly Ducklings, and Technoswans: Analyzing Fat Hatred, Weight-Loss Surgery, and Compulsory Biomedicalized Aesthetics in America.” Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 4.1 (2011): 188-220. Murray, Daisy. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 2 Sep. 2014, 18:27. Facebook comment. Nicholas, Lynne. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 14 Aug. 2014, 20:08. Facebook comment. Ouellette, Laurie, and James Hay. “Makeover Television, Governmentality and the Good Citizen.” Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies 22.4 (2008): 471-84. Patriot (THEbitchiestgay). “Why is a weight loss show sponsored by a chicken company? Chicken is fattening.” 12 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Pedron-Peggs, Peta. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 16 Sep. 2014, 17:38. Facebook comment. Readdy, Tucker, and Vicki Ebbeck. “Weighing In on NBC’s The Biggest Loser: Governmentality and Self-Concept on the Scale.” Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport 83.4 (2012): 579-86. Redden, Guy. “Makeover Morality and Consumer Culture.” Ed Dana Heller. Makeover Television: Realities Remodelled. London: I.B. Tauris, 2007. 150-64. Richardson, Niall. Transgressive Bodies: Representations in Film and Popular Culture. Farnham, UK: Ashgate Publishing, 2010. Ringrose, Jessica, and Valerie Walkerdine. “The TV Make-Over as Site of Neo-Liberal Reinvention toward Bourgeois Femininity.” Feminist Media Studies 8.3 (2008): 227-46. Robbie, Tina. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 5 Sep. 2014, 16:46. Facebook comment. Rodan, Debbie. “Technologies of the Self: Remaking the Obese ‘Self’ in The Biggest Loser: Couples (Australia).” Proceedings of the Australian and New Zealand Communication Association on Media Democracy and Change Conference. Ed. K. McCallum. Canberra, 2010. Rodan, Debbie, Katie Ellis, and Pia Lebeck. Disability, Obesity and Ageing: Popular Media Identifications. London: Ashgate, 2014. Sender, Katherine, and Margaret Sullivan. “Epidemics of Will, Failures of Self Esteem: Responding to Fat Bodies in The Biggest Loser and What Not to Wear.” Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies 22.4 (2008): 573-84. Sharon (Shar0n). “Watched #SexyBackAu for the first time tonight; a top show to motivate and inspire everyday women to be healthier and set achievable goals.” 26 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Sharon (KeepitRealV). “#SexyBackAu watching another single mum challenge herself and change her life really inspires me that I can do the same!” 26 Aug. 2014, no time. Tweet. Skeggs, Beverley, and Helen Wood. “The Labour of Transformation and Circuits of Value ‘around’ Reality Television.” Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies 22.4 (2008): 559-72. Spencer, Amby. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 17 Aug. 2014, 13:55. Facebook comment. Stagi, Luisa. “Lifestyle Television and Diet: Body Care as a Duty.” Italian Journal of Sociology of Education 6.3 (2014): 130-52. Thomson, Peter. “Bringing Sexy Back.” 14 Aug. 2014, 20:03. Facebook comment. Tvaddict. “Bringing Sexy Back.” TV Tonight 13 Aug. 2014, 18:17. Yoo, Jina. “No Clear Winner: Effects of The Biggest Loser on Stigmatization of Obese Persons. 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This essay combines life writing with meditations on the significance of walking as integral to the ritual practice of pilgrimage, where the individual improves her soul or health through the act of walking to a shrine containing healing relics of a saint. Braiding together insights from medieval literature, contemporary ecocriticism, and memory studies, I reflect on my own pilgrimage practice as it impacts the land itself. Canterbury, England serves as the central shrine for four pilgrimages over decades: 1966, 1994, 1997, and 2003.The act of memory was not invented in the Anthropocene. Rather, the nonhuman world has taught humans how to remember. From ice-core samples retaining the history of Europe’s weather to rocks embedded with fossilized extinct species, nonhuman actors literally petrifying or freezing the past—from geologic sites to frozen water—become exposed through the process of anthropocentric discovery and human interference. The very act of human uncovery and analysis threatens to eliminate the nonhuman actor which has hospitably shared its own experience. How can humans script nonhuman memory?As for the history of memory studies itself, a new phase is arguably beginning, shifting from “the transnational, transcultural, or global to the planetary; from recorded to deep history; from the human to the nonhuman” (Craps et al. 3). Memory studies for the Anthropocene can “focus on the terrestrialized significance of (the historicized) forms of remembrance but also on the positioning of who is remembering and, ultimately, which ‘Anthropocene’ is remembered” (Craps et al. 5). In this era of the “self-conscious Anthropocene” (Craps et al. 6), narrative itself can focus on “the place of nonhuman beings in human stories of origins, identity, and futures point to a possible opening for the methods of memory studies” (Craps et al. 8). The nonhuman on the paths of this essay range from the dirt on the path to the rock used to build the sacred shrine, the ultimate goal. How they intersect with human actors reveals how the “human subject is no longer the one forming the world, but does indeed constitute itself through its relation to and dependence on the object world” (Marcussen 14, qtd. in Rodriguez 378). Incorporating “nonhuman species as objects, if not subjects, of memory [...] memory critics could begin by extending their objects to include the memory of nonhuman species,” linking both humans and nonhumans in “an expanded multispecies frame of remembrance” (Craps et al. 9). My narrative—from diaries recording sacred journey to a novel structured by pilgrimage—propels motion, but also secures in memory events from the past, including memories of those nonhuman beings I interact with.Childhood PilgrimageThe little girl with brown curls sat crying softly, whimpering, by the side of the road in lush grass. The mother with her soft brown bangs and an underflip to her hair told the story of a little girl, sitting by the side of the road in lush grass.The story book girl had forgotten her Black Watch plaid raincoat at the picnic spot where she had lunched with her parents and two older brothers. Ponchos spread out, the family had eaten their fresh yeasty rolls, hard cheese, apples, and macaroons. The tin clink of the canteen hit their teeth as they gulped metallic water, still icy cold from the taps of the ancient inn that morning. The father cut slices of Edam with his Swiss army knife, parsing them out to each child to make his or her own little sandwich. The father then lay back for his daily nap, while the boys played chess. The portable wooden chess set had inlaid squares, each piece no taller than a fingernail paring. The girl read a Junior Puffin book, while the mother silently perused Agatha Christie. The boy who lost at chess had to play his younger sister, a fitting punishment for the less able player. She cheerfully played with either brother. Once the father awakened, they packed up their gear into their rucksacks, and continued the pilgrimage to Canterbury.Only the little Black Watch plaid raincoat was left behind.The real mother told the real girl that the story book family continued to walk, forgetting the raincoat until it began to rain. The men pulled on their ponchos and the mother her raincoat, when the little girl discovered her raincoat missing. The story book men walked two miles back while the story book mother and girl sat under the dripping canopy of leaves provided by a welcoming tree.And there, the real mother continued, the storybook girl cried and whimpered, until a magic taxi cab in which the father and boys sat suddenly appeared out of the mist to drive the little girl and her mother to their hotel.The real girl’s eyes shone. “Did that actually happen?” she asked, perking up in expectation.“Oh, yes,” said the real mother, kissing her on the brow. The girl’s tears dried. Only the plops of rain made her face moist. The little girl, now filled with hope, cuddled with her mother as they huddled together.Without warning, out of the mist, drove up a real magic taxi cab in which the real men sat. For magic taxi cabs really exist, even in the tangible world—especially in England. At the very least, in the England of little Susie’s imagination.Narrative and PilgrimageMy mother’s tale suggests how this story echoes in yet another pilgrimage story, maintaining a long tradition of pilgrimage stories embedded within frame tales as far back as the Middle Ages.The Christian pilgrim’s walk parallels Christ’s own pilgrimage to Emmaus. The blisters we suffer echo faintly the lash Christ endured. The social relations of the pilgrim are “diachronic” (Alworth 98), linking figures (Christ) from the past to the now (us, or, during the Middle Ages, William Langland’s Piers Plowman or Chaucer’s band who set out from Southwark). We embody the frame of the vera icon, the true image, thus “conjur[ing] a site of simultaneity or a plane of immanence where the actors of the past [...] meet those of the future” (Alworth 99). Our quotidian walk frames the true essence or meaning of our ambulatory travail.In 1966, my parents took my two older brothers and me on the Pilgrims’ Way—not the route from London to Canterbury that Chaucer’s pilgrims would have taken starting south of London in Southwark, rather the ancient trek from Winchester to Canterbury, famously chronicled in The Old Road by Hilaire Belloc. The route follows along the south side of the Downs, where the muddy path was dried by what sun there was. My parents first undertook the walk in the early 1950s. Slides from that pilgrimage depict my mother, voluptuous in her cashmere twinset and tweed skirt, as my father crosses a stile. My parents, inspired by Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, decided to walk along the traditional Pilgrims’ Way to Canterbury. Story intersects with material traversal over earth on dirt-laden paths.By the time we children came along, the memories of that earlier pilgrimage resonated with my parents, inspiring them to take us on the same journey. We all carried our own rucksacks and walked five or six miles a day. Concerning our pilgrimage when I was seven, my mother wrote in her diary:As good pilgrims should, we’ve been telling tales along the way. Yesterday Jimmy told the whole (detailed) story of That Darn Cat, a Disney movie. Today I told about Stevenson’s Travels with a Donkey, which first inspired me to think of walking trips and everyone noted the resemblance between Stevenson’s lovable, but balky, donkey and our sweet Sue. (We hadn’t planned to tell tales, but they just happened along the way.)I don’t know how sweet I was; perhaps I was “balky” because the road was so hard. Landscape certainly shaped my experience.As I wrote about the pilgrimage in my diary then, “We went to another Hotel and walked. We went and had lunch at the Boggly [booglie] place. We went to a nother hotel called The Swan with fether Quits [quilts]. We went to the Queens head. We went to the Gest house. We went to aother Hotle called Srping wells and my tooth came out. We saw some taekeys [turkeys].” The repetition suggests how pilgrimage combines various aspects of life, from the emotional to the physical, the quotidian (walking and especially resting—in hotels with quilts) with the extraordinary (newly sprung tooth or the appearance of turkeys). “[W]ayfaring abilities depend on an emotional connection to the environment” (Easterlin 261), whether that environment is modified by humans or even manmade, inhabited by human or nonhuman actors. How can one model an “ecological relationship between humans and nonhumans” in narrative (Rodriguez 368)? Rodriguez proposes a “model of reading as encounter [...] encountering fictional story worlds as potential models” (Rodriguez 368), just as my mother did with the Magic Taxi Cab story.Taxis proliferate in my childhood pilgrimage. My mother writes in 1966 in her diary of journeying along the Pilgrims’ Way to St. Martha’s on the Hill. “Susie was moaning and groaning under her pack and at one desperate uphill moment gasped out, ‘Let’s take a taxi!’ – our highborn lady as we call her. But we finally made it.” “Martha’s”, as I later learned, is a corruption of “Martyrs”, a natural linguistic decay that developed over the medieval period. Just as the vernacular textures pilgrimage poems in the fourteeth century, the common tongue in all its glorious variety seeps into even the quotidian modern pilgrim’s journey.Part of the delight of pilgrimage lies in the characters one meets and the languages they speak. In 1994, the only time my husband and I cheated on a strictly ambulatory sacred journey occurred when we opted to ride a bus for ten miles where walking would have been dangerous. When I ask the bus driver if a stop were ours, he replied, “I'll give you a shout, love.” As though in a P. G. Wodehouse novel, when our stop finally came, he cried out, “Cheerio, love” to me and “Cheerio, mate” to Jim.Language changes. Which is a good thing. If it didn’t, it would be dead, like those martyrs of old. Like Latin itself. Disentangling pilgrimage from language proves impossible. The healthy ecopoetics of languages meshes with the sustainable vibrancy of the land we traverse.“Nettles of remorse…”: Derek Walcott, The Bounty Once my father had to carry me past a particularly tough patch of nettles. As my mother tells it, we “went through orchards and along narrow woodland path with face-high nettles. Susie put a scarf over her face and I wore a poncho though it was sunny and we survived almost unscathed.” Certain moments get preserved by the camera. At age seven in a field outside of Wye, I am captured in my father’s slides surrounded by grain. At age thirty-five, I am captured in film by my husband in the same spot, in the identical pose, though now quite a bit taller than the grain. Three years later, as a mother, I in turn snap him with a backpack containing baby Sarah, grumpily gazing off over the fields.When I was seven, we took off from Detling. My mother writes, “set off along old Pilgrims’ Way. Road is paved now, but much the same as fifteen years ago. Saw sheep, lambs, and enjoyed lovely scenery. Sudden shower sent us all to a lunch spot under trees near Thurnham Court, where we huddled under ponchos and ate happily, watching the weather move across the valley. When the sun came to us, we continued on our way which was lovely, past sheep, etc., but all on hard paved road, alas. Susie was a good little walker, but moaned from time to time.”I seem to whimper and groan a lot on pilgrimage. One thing is clear: the physical aspects of walking for days affected my phenomenological response to our pilgrimage which we’d undertaken both as historical ritual, touristic nature hike, and what Wendell Berry calls a “secular pilgrimage” (402), where the walker seeks “the world of the Creation” (403) in a “return to the wilderness in order to be restored” (416). The materiality of my experience was key to how I perceived this journey as a spiritual, somatic, and emotional event. The link between pilgrimage and memory, between pilgrimage poetics and memorial methods, occupies my thoughts on pilgrimage. As Nancy Easterlin’s work on “cognitive ecocriticism” (“Cognitive” 257) contends, environmental knowledge is intimately tied in with memory (“Cognitive” 260). She writes: “The advantage of extensive environmental knowledge most surely precipitates the evolution of memory, necessary to sustain vast knowledge” (“Cognitive” 260). Even today I can recall snatches of moments from that trip when I was a child, including the telling of tales.Landscape not only changes the writer, but writing transforms the landscape and our interaction with it. As Valerie Allen suggests, “If the subject acts upon the environment, so does the environment upon the subject” (“When Things Break” 82). Indeed, we can understand the “road as a strategic point of interaction between human and environment” (Allen and Evans 26; see also Oram)—even, or especially, when that interaction causes pain and inflames blisters. My relationship with moleskin on my blasted and blistered toes made me intimately conscious of my body with every step taken on the pilgrimage route.As an adult, my boots on the way from Winchester to Canterbury pinched and squeezed, packed dirt acting upon them and, in turn, my feet. After taking the train home and upon arrival in London, we walked through Bloomsbury to our flat on Russell Square, passing by what I saw as a new, less religious, but no less beckoning shrine: The London Foot Hospital at Fitzroy Square.Now, sadly, it is closed. Where do pilgrims go for sole—and soul—care?Slow Walking as WayfindingAll pilgrimages come to an end, just as, in 1966, my mother writes of our our arrival at last in Canterbury:On into Canterbury past nice grassy cricket field, where we sat and ate chocolate bars while we watched white-flannelled cricketers at play. Past town gates to our Queen’s Head Inn, where we have the smallest, slantingest room in the world. Everything is askew and we’re planning to use our extra pillows to brace our feet so we won’t slide out of bed. Children have nice big room with 3 beds and are busy playing store with pounds and shillings [that’s very hard mathematics!]. After dinner, walked over to cathedral, where evensong was just ending. Walked back to hotel and into bed where we are now.Up to early breakfast, dashed to cathedral and looked up, up, up. After our sins were forgiven, we picked up our rucksacks and headed into London by train.This experience in 1966 varies slightly from the one in 1994. Jim and I walk through a long walkway of tall, slim trees arching over us, a green, lush and silent cloister, finally gaining our first view of Canterbury with me in a similar photo to one taken almost thirty years before. We make our way into the city through the West Gate, first passing by St. Dunstan’s Church where Henry II had put on penitential garb and later Sir Thomas More’s head was buried. Canterbury is like Coney Island in the Middle Ages and still is: men with dreadlocks and slinky didjeridoos, fire tossers, mobs of people, tourists. We go to Mercery Lane as all good pilgrims should and under the gate festooned with the green statue of Christ, arriving just in time for evensong.Imagining a medieval woman arriving here and listening to the service, I pray to God my gratefulness for us having arrived safely. I can understand the fifteenth-century pilgrim, Margery Kempe, screaming emotionally—maybe her feet hurt like mine. I’m on the verge of tears during the ceremony: so glad to be here safe, finally got here, my favorite service, my beloved husband. After the service, we pass on through the Quire to the spot where St. Thomas’s relic sanctuary was. People stare at a lit candle commemorating it. Tears well up in my eyes.I suppose some things have changed since the Middle Ages. One Friday in Canterbury with my children in 2003 has some parallels with earlier iterations. Seven-year-old Sarah and I go to evensong at the Cathedral. I tell her she has to be absolutely quiet or the Archbishop will chop off her head.She still has her head.Though the road has been paved, the view has remained virtually unaltered. Some aspects seem eternal—sheep, lambs, and stiles dotting the landscape. The grinding down of the pilgrimage path, reflecting the “slowness of flat ontology” (Yates 207), occurs over vast expanses of time. Similarly, Easterlin reflects on human and more than human vitalism: “Although an understanding of humans as wayfinders suggests a complex and dynamic interest on the part of humans in the environment, the surround itself is complex and dynamic and is frequently in a state of change as the individual or group moves through it” (Easterlin “Cognitive” 261). An image of my mother in the 1970s by a shady tree along the Pilgrims’ Way in England shows that the path is lower by 6 inches than the neighboring verge (Bright 4). We don’t see dirt evolving, because its changes occur so slowly. Only big time allows us to see transformative change.Memorial PilgrimageOddly, the erasure of self through duplication with a precursor occurred for me while reading W.G. Sebald’s pilgrimage novel, The Rings of Saturn. I had experienced my own pilgrimage to many of these same locations he immortalizes. I, too, had gone to Somerleyton Hall with my elderly mother, husband, and two children. My memories, sacred shrines pooling in familial history, are infused with synchronic reflection, medieval to contemporary—my parents’ periodic sojourns in Suffolk for years, leading me to love the very landscape Sebald treks across; sadness at my parents’ decline; hope in my children’s coming to add on to their memory palimpsest a layer devoted to this land, to this history, to this family.Then, the oddest coincidence from my reading pilgrimage. After visiting Dunwich Heath, Sebald comes to his friend, Michael, whose wife Anne relays a story about a local man hired as a pallbearer by the local undertaker in Westleton. This man, whose memory was famously bad, nevertheless reveled in the few lines allotted him in an outdoor performance of King Lear. After her relating this story, Sebald asks for a taxi (Sebald 188-9).This might all seem unremarkable to the average reader. Yet, “human wayfinders are richly aware of and responsive to environment, meaning both physical places and living beings, often at a level below consciousness” (Easterlin “Cognitive” 265). For me, with a connection to this area, I startled with recollection emerging from my subconscience. The pallbearer’s name in Sebald’s story was Mr Squirrel, the very same name of the taxi driver my parents—and we—had driven with many times. The same Mr Squirrel? How many Mr Squirrels can there be in this small part of Suffolk? Surely it must be the same family, related in a genetic encoding of memory. I run to my archives. And there, in my mother’s address book—itself a palimpsest of time with names and addressed scored through; pasted-in cards, names, and numbers; and looseleaf memoranda—there, on the first page under “S”, “Mr. Squirrel” in my mother’s unmistakable scribble. She also had inscribed his phone number and the village Saxmundum, seven miles from Westleton. His name had been crossed out. Had he died? Retired? I don’t know. Yet quick look online tells me Squirrell’s Taxis still exists, as it does in my memory.Making KinAfter accompanying a class on a bucolic section of England’s Pilgrims’ Way, seven miles from Wye to Charing, we ended up at a pub drinking a pint, with which all good pilgrimages should conclude. There, students asked me why I became a medievalist who studies pilgrimage. Only after the publication of my first book on women pilgrims did I realize that the origin of my scholarly, long fascination with pilgrimage, blossoming into my professional career, began when I was seven years old along the way to Canterbury. The seeds of that pilgrimage when I was so young bore fruit and flowers decades later.One story illustrates Michel Serres’s point that we should not aim to appropriate the world, but merely act as temporary tenants (Serres 72-3). On pilgrimage in 1966 as a child, I had a penchant for ant spiders. That was not the only insect who took my heart. My mother shares how “Susie found a beetle up on the hill today and put him in the cheese box. Jimmy put holes in the top for him. She named him Alexander Beetle and really became very fond of him. After supper, we set him free in the garden here, with appropriate ceremony and a few over-dramatic tears of farewell.” He clearly made a great impression on me. I yearn for him today, that beetle in the cheese box. Though I tried to smuggle nature as contraband, I ultimately had to set him free.Passing through cities, landscape, forests, over seas and on roads, wandering by fields and vegetable patches, under a sky lit both by sun and moon, the pilgrim—even when in a group of fellow pilgrims—in her lonesome exercise endeavors to realize Serres’ ideal of the tenant inhabitant of earth. Nevertheless, we, as physical pilgrims, inevitably leave our traces through photos immortalizing the journey, trash left by the wayside, even excretions discretely deposited behind a convenient bush. Or a beetle who can tell the story of his adventure—or terror—at being ensconced for a time in a cheese box.On one notorious day of painful feet, my husband and I arrived in Otford, only to find the pub was still closed. Finally, it became time for dinner. We sat outside, me with feet ensconced in shoes blessedly inert and unmoving, as the server brought out our salads. The salad cream, white and viscous, was presented in an elegantly curved silver dish. Then Jim began to pick at the salad cream with his fork. Patiently, tenderly, he endeavored to assist a little bug who had gotten trapped in the gooey sauce. Every attempt seemed doomed to failure. The tiny creature kept falling back into the gloppy substance. Undaunted, Jim compassionately ministered to our companion. Finally, the little insect flew off, free to continue its own pilgrimage, which had intersected with ours in a tiny moment of affinity. Such moments of “making kin” work, according to Donna Haraway, as “life-saving strateg[ies] for the Anthropocene” (Oppermann 3, qtd. in Haraway 160).How can narrative avoid the anthropocentric centre of writing, which is inevitable given the human generator of such a piece? While words are a human invention, nonhuman entities vitally enact memory. The very Downs we walked along were created in the Cretaceous period at least seventy million years ago. The petrol propelling the magic taxi cab was distilled from organic bodies dating back millions of years. Jurassic limestone from the Bathonian Age almost two hundred million years ago constitutes the Caen stone quarried for building Canterbury Cathedral, while its Purbeck marble from Dorset dates from the Cretaceous period. Walking on pilgrimage propels me through a past millions—billions—of eons into the past, dwarfing my speck of existence. Yet, “if we wish to cross the darkness which separates us from [the past] we must lay down a little plank of words and step delicately over it” (Barfield 23). Elias Amidon asks us to consider how “the ground we dig into and walk upon is sacred. It is sacred because it makes us neighbors to each other, whether we like it or not. Tell this story” (Amidon 42). And, so, I have.We are winding down. Time has passed since that first pilgrimage of mine at seven years old. Yet now, here, I still put on my red plaid wollen jumper and jacket, crisp white button-up shirt, grey knee socks, and stout red walking shoes. Slinging on my rucksack, I take my mother’s hand.I’m ready to take my first step.We continue our pilgrimage, together.ReferencesAllen, Valerie. “When Things Break: Mending Rroads, Being Social.” Roadworks: Medieval Britain, Medieval Roads. Eds. Valerie Allen and Ruth Evans. Manchester: Manchester UP, 2016.———, and Ruth Evans. Introduction. Roadworks: Medieval Britain, Medieval Roads. Eds. Valerie Allen and Ruth Evans. Manchester: Manchester UP, 2016.Alworth, David J. Site Reading: Fiction, Art, Social Form. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2016.Amidon, Elias. “Digging In.” Dirt: A Love Story. Ed. Barbara Richardson. Lebanon, NH: ForeEdge, 2015.Barfield, Owen. History in English Words. Grand Rapids: William B. 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Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2010. 257-274.Haraway, Donna. “Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Plantationocene, Chthulucene: Making Kin.” Environmental Humanities 6 (2015): 159-65.James, Erin, and Eric Morel. “Ecocriticism and Narrative Theory: An Introduction.” English Studies 99.4 (2018): 355-365.Marcussen, Marlene. Reading for Space: An Encounter between Narratology and New Materialism in the Works of Virgina Woolf and Georges Perec. PhD diss. University of Southern Denmark, 2016.Oppermann, Serpil. “Introducing Migrant Ecologies in an (Un)Bordered World.” ISLE 24.2 (2017): 243–256.Oram, Richard. “Trackless, Impenetrable, and Underdeveloped? Roads, Colonization and Environmental Transformation in the Anglo-Scottish Border Zone, c. 1100 to c. 1300.” Roadworks: Medieval Britain, Medieval Roads. Eds. Valerie Allen and Ruth Evans. 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IntroductionIn Nancy Meyers’s 2015 film The Intern a particular kind of masculinity is celebrated through the material accoutrements of Ben Whittaker (Robert De Niro). A retired 70-year-old manager, Ben takes up a position as a “senior” Intern in an online clothing distribution company run by Jules Ostin (Anne Hathaway). Jules’s company, All About Fit, is the embodiment of the Gen Y creative workplace operating in an old Brooklyn warehouse. Ben’s presence in this environment is anachronistic and yet also stylishly retro in an industry where “vintage” is a mode of dress but also offers alternative ethical values (Veenstra and Kuipers). The alternative that Ben offers is figured through his sartorial style, which mobilises a specific kind of retro masculinity made available through his senior white male body. This paper investigates how and why retro masculinity is materialised and embodied as both a set of values and a set of objects in The Intern.Three particular objects are emblematic of this retro masculinity and come to stand in for a body of desirable masculine values: the business suit, the briefcase, and the handkerchief. In the midst of an indie e-commerce garment business, Ben’s old-fashioned wardrobe registers a regular middle class managerial masculinity from the past that is codified as solidly reliable and dependable. Sherry Turkle reminds us that “material culture carries emotions and ideas of startling intensity” (6), and these impact our thinking, our emotional life, and our memories. The suit, briefcase, and handkerchief are material reminders of this reliable masculine past. The values they evoke, as presented in this film, seem to offer sensible solutions to the fast pace of twenty-first century life and its reconfigurations of family and work prompted by feminism and technology.The film’s fetishisation of these objects of retro masculinity could be mistaken for nostalgia, in the way that vintage collections elide their political context, and yet it also registers social anxiety around gender and generation amid twenty-first century social change. Turner reminds us of the importance of film as a social practice through which “our culture makes sense of itself” (3), and which participates in the ongoing negotiation of the meanings of gender. While masculinity is often understood to have been in crisis since the advent of second-wave feminism and women’s mass entry into the labour force, theoretical scrutiny now understands masculinity to be socially constructed and changing, rather than elemental and stable; performative rather than innate; fundamentally political, and multiple through the intersection of class, race, sexuality, and age amongst other factors (Connell; Butler). While Connell coined the term “hegemonic masculinity,” to indicate “masculinity which occupies the hegemonic position in a given pattern of gender relations” (76), it is always intersectional and contestable. Ben’s hegemonic position in The Intern might be understood in relation to what Buchbinder identifies as “inadequate” or “incompetent” masculinities, which offer a “foil for another principal character” (232), but this movement between margin and hegemony is always in process and accords with the needs that structure the story, and its attendant social anxieties. This film’s fetishising of Ben’s sartorial style suggests a yearning for a stable and recognisable masculine identity, but in order to reinstall these meanings the film must ignore the political times from which they emerge.The construction of retro masculinity in this case is mapped onto Ben’s body as a “senior.” As Gilleard notes, ageing bodies are usually marked by a narrative of corporeal decline, and yet for men of hegemonic privilege, non-material values like seniority, integrity, wisdom, and longevity coalesce to embody “the accumulation of cultural or symbolic capital in the form of wisdom, maturity or experience” (1). Like masculinity, then, corporeality is understood to be a set of unstable signifiers produced through particular cultural discourses.The Business SuitThe business suit is Ben Whittaker’s habitual work attire, so when he comes out of retirement to be an intern at the e-commerce company he re-adopts this professional garb. The solid outline of a tailored and dark-coloured suit signals a professional body that is separate, autonomous and impervious to the outside world, according to Longhurst (99). It is a body that is “proper,” ready for business, and suit-ed to the professional corporate world, whose values it also embodies (Edwards 42). In contrast, the costuming code of the Google generation of online marketers in the film is defined as “super cas[ual].” This is a workplace where the boss rides her bicycle through the open-space office and in which the other 219 workers define their individuality through informal dress and decoration. In this environment Ben stands out, as Jules comments on his first day:Jules: Don’t feel like you have to dress up.Ben: I’m comfortable in a suit if it’s okay.Jules: No, it’s fine. [grins] Old school.Ben: At least I’ll stand out.Jules: I don’t think you’ll need a suit to do that.The anachronism of a 70-year-old being an intern is materialised through Ben’s dress code. The business suit comes to represent Ben not only as old school, however, but as a “proper” manager.As the embodiment of a successful working woman, entrepreneur Jules Ostin appears to be the antithesis of the business-suit model of a manager. Consciously not playing by the book, her company is both highly successful, meeting its five-year objectives in only nine months, and highly vulnerable to disasters like bedbugs, delivery crises, and even badly wrapped tissue. Shaped in her image, the company is often directly associated with Jules herself, as Ben continually notes, and this comes to include the mix of success, vulnerability, and disaster. In fact, the success of her company is the reason that she is urged to find a “seasoned” CEO to run the company, indicating the ambiguous, simultaneous guise of success and disaster.This relationship between individual corporeality and the corporate workforce is reinforced when it is revealed that Ben worked as a manager for 40 years in the very same warehouse, reinforcing his qualities of longevity, reliability, and dependability. He oversaw the printing of the physical telephone book, another quaint material artefact of the past akin to Ben, which is shown to have literally shaped the building where the floor dips over in the corner due to the heavy printers. The differences between Ben and Jules as successive generations of managers in this building operate as registers of social change inflected with just a little nostalgia. Indeed, the name of Jules’s company, All About Fit, seems to refer more to the beautifully tailored “fit” of Ben’s business suit than to any of the other clothed bodies in the company.Not only is the business suit fitted to business, but it comes to represent a properly managed body as well. This is particularly evident when contrasted with Jules’s management style. Over the course of the film, as she endures a humiliating series of meetings, sends a disastrous email to the wrong recipient, and juggles her strained marriage and her daughter’s school schedule, Jules is continuously shown to teeter on the brink of losing control. Her bodily needs are exaggerated in the movie: she does not sleep and apparently risks “getting fat” according to her mother’s research; then when she does sleep it is in inappropriate places and she snores loudly; she forgets to eat, she cries, gets drunk and vomits, gets nervous, and gets emotional. All of these outpourings are in situations that Ben remedies, in his solid reliable suited self. As Longhurst reminds us,The suit helps to create an illusion of a hard, or at least a firm and “proper,” body that is autonomous, in control, rational and masculine. It gives the impression that bodily boundaries continually remain intact and reduce potential embarrassment caused by any kind of leakage. (99)Ben is thus suited to manage situations in ways that contrast to Jules, whose bodily emissions and emotional dramas reinforce her as feminine, chaotic, and emotionally vulnerable. As Gatens notes of our epistemological inheritance, “women are most often understood to be less able to control the passions of the body and this failure is often located in the a priori disorder or anarchy of the female body itself” (50). Transitioning these philosophical principles to the 21st-century workplace, however, manifests some angst around gender and generation in this film.Despite the film’s apparent advocacy of successful working women, Jules too comes to prefer Ben’s model of corporeal control and masculinity. Ben is someone who makes Jules “feel calm, more centred or something. I could use that, obviously,” she quips. After he leads the almost undifferentiated younger employees Jason, Davis, and Lewis on a physical email rescue, Jules presents her theory of men amidst shots at a bar to celebrate their heist:Jules: So, we were always told that we could be anything, do anything, and I think guys got, maybe not left behind but not quite as nurtured, you know? I mean, like, we were the generation of You go, Girl. We had Oprah. And I wonder sometimes how guys fit in, you know they still seem to be trying to figure it out. They’re still dressing like little boys, they’re still playing video games …Lewis: Well they’ve gotten great.Davis: I love video games.Ben: Oh boy.Jules: How, in one generation, have men gone from guys like Jack Nicholson and Harrison Ford to … [Lewis, Davis, and Jason look down at themselves]Jules: Take Ben, here. A dying breed. Look and learn boys, because if you ask me, this is what cool is.Jules’s excessive drinking in this scene, which is followed by her vomiting into a rubbish bin, appears to reinforce Ben’s stable sobriety, alongside the culture of excess and rapid change associated with Jules through her gender and generation.Jules’s adoption of Ben as the model of masculinity is timely, given that she consistently encounters “sexism in business.” After every meeting with a potential CEO Jules complains of their patronising approach—calling her company a “chick site,” for example. And yet Ben echoes the sartorial style of the 1960s Mad Men era, which is suffused with sexism. The tension between Ben’s modelling of old-fashioned chivalry and those outdated sexist businessmen who never appear on-screen remains linked, however, through the iconography of the suit. In his book Mediated Nostalgia, Lizardi notes a similar tendency in contemporary media for what he calls “presentist versions of the past […] that represent a simpler time” (6) where viewers are constructed as ”uncritical citizens of our own culture” (1). By heroising Ben as a model of white middle-class managerial masculinity that is nostalgically enduring and endearing, this film betrays a yearning for such a “simpler time,” despite the complexities that hover just off-screen.Indeed, most of the other male characters in the film are found wanting in comparison to the retro masculinity of Ben. Jules’s husband Matt appears to be a perfect modern “stay-at-home-dad” who gives up his career for Jules’s business start-up. Yet he is found to be having an affair with one of the school mums. Lewis’s clothes are also condemned by Ben: “Why doesn’t anyone tuck anything in anymore?” he complains. Jason does not know how to speak to his love-interest Becky, expecting that texting and emailing sad emoticons will suffice, and Davis is unable to find a place to live. Luckily Ben can offer advice and tutelage to these men, going so far as to house Davis and give him one of his “vintage” ties to wear. Jules endorses this, saying she loves men in ties.The BriefcaseIf a feature of Ben’s experienced managerial style is longevity and stability, then these values are also attached to his briefcase. The association between Ben and his briefcase is established when the briefcase is personified during preparations for Ben’s first day: “Back in action,” Ben tells it. According to Atkinson, the briefcase is a “signifier of executive status […] entwined with a ‘macho mystique’ of concealed technology” (192). He ties this to the emergence of Cold War spy films like James Bond and traces it to the development of the laptop computer. This mix of mobility, concealment, glamour, and a touch of playboy adventurousness in a mass-produced material product manifested the values of the corporate world in latter 20th-century work culture and rendered the briefcase an important part of executive masculinity. Ben’s briefcase is initially indicative of his anachronistic position in All About Fit. While Davis opens his canvas messenger bag to reveal a smartphone, charger, USB drive, multi-cable connector, and book, Ben mirrors this by taking out his glasses case, set of pens, calculator, fliptop phone, and travel clock. Later in the film he places a print newspaper and leather bound book back into the case. Despite the association with a pre-digital age, the briefcase quickly becomes a product associated with Ben’s retro style. Lewis, at the next computer console, asks about its brand:Ben: It’s a 1973 Executive Ashburn Attaché. They don’t make it anymore.Lewis: I’m a little in love with it.Ben: It’s a classic Lewis. It’s unbeatable.The attaché case is left over from Ben’s past in executive management as VP for sales and advertising. This was a position he held for twenty years, during his past working life, which was spent with the same company for over 40 years. Ben’s long-serving employment record has the same values as his equally long-serving attaché case: it is dependable, reliable, ages well, and outlasts changes in fashion.The kind of nostalgia invested in Ben and his briefcase is reinforced extradiagetically through the musical soundtracks associated with him. Compared to the undifferentiated upbeat tracks at the workplace, Ben’s scenes feature a slower-paced sound from another era, including Ray Charles, Astrud Gilberto, Billie Holiday, and Benny Goodman. These classics are a point of connection with Jules, who declares that she loves Billie Holiday. Yet Jules is otherwise characterised by upbeat, even frantic, timing. She hates slow talkers, is always on the move, and is renowned for being late for meetings and operating on what is known as “Jules Standard Time.” In contrast, like his music, Ben is always on time: setting two alarm clocks each night, driving shorter and more efficient routes, seeing things at just the right time, and even staying at work until the boss leaves. He is reliable, steady, and orderly. He restores order both to the office junk desk and to the desk of Jules’s personal assistant Becky. These characteristics of order and timeliness are offered as an alternative to the chaos of 21st-century global flows of fashion marketing. Like his longevity, time is measured and managed around Ben. Even his name echoes that veritable keeper of time, Big Ben.The HandkerchiefThe handkerchief is another anachronistic object that Ben routinely carries, concealed inside his suit rather than flamboyantly worn on the outside pocket. A neatly ironed square of white hanky, it forms a notable part of Ben’s closet, as Davis notices and enquires about:Davis: Okay what’s the deal with the handkerchief? I don’t get that at all.Ben: It’s essential. That your generation doesn’t know that is criminal. The reason for carrying a handkerchief is to lend it. Ask Jason about this. Women cry Davis. We carry it for them. One of the last vestiges of the chivalrous gent.Indeed, when Jules’s personal assistant Becky bursts into tears because her skills and overtime go unrecognised, Ben is able to offer the hanky to Jason to give her as a kind of white flag, officially signaling a ceasefire between Becky and Jason. This scene is didactic: Ben is teaching Jason how to talk to a woman with the handkerchief as a material prop to prompt the occasion. He also offers advice to Becky to keep more regular hours, and go out and have fun (with Jason, obviously). Despite Becky declaring she “hates girls who cry at work,” this reaction to the pressures of a contemporary work culture that is irregular, chaotic, and never-ending is clearly marking gender, as the handkerchief also marks a gendered transaction of comfort.The handkerchief functions as a material marker of the “chivalrous gent” partly due to the number of times women are seen to cry in this film. In one of Ben’s first encounters with Jules she is crying in a boardroom, when it is suggested that she find a CEO to manage the company. Ben is clearly embarrassed, as is Jules, indicating the inappropriateness of such bodily emissions at work and reinforcing the emotional currency of women in the workplace. Jules again cries while discussing her marriage crisis with Ben, a scene in which Ben comments it is “the one time when he doesn’t have a hanky.” By the end of the film, when Jules and Matt are reconciling, she suggests: “It would be great if you were to carry a handkerchief.” The remaking of modern men into the retro style of Ben is more fully manifested in Davis who is depicted going to work on the last day in the film in a suit and tie. No doubt a handkerchief lurks hidden within.ConclusionThe yearning that emerges for a masculinity of yesteryear means that the intern in this film, Ben Whittaker, becomes an internal moral compass who reminds us of rapid social changes in gender and work, and of their discomfits. That this should be mapped onto an older, white, heterosexual, male body is unsurprising, given the authority traditionally invested in such bodies. Ben’s retro masculinity, however, is a fantasy from a fictional yesteryear, without the social or political forces that render those times problematic; instead, his material culture is fetishised and stripped of political analysis. Ben even becomes the voice of feminism, correcting Jules for taking the blame for Matt’s affair. Buchbinder argues that the more recent manifestations in film and television of “inadequate or incomplete” masculinity can be understood as “enacting a resistance to or even a refusal of the coercive pressure of the gender system” (235, italics in original), and yet The Intern’s yearning for a slow, orderly, mature, and knowing male hero refuses much space for alternative younger models. Despite this apparently unerring adulation of retro masculinity, however, we are reminded of the sexist social culture that suits, briefcases, and handkerchiefs materialise every time Jules encounters one of the seasoned CEOs jostling to replace her. The yearning for a stable masculinity in this film comes at the cost of politicising the past, and imagining alternative models for the future.ReferencesAtkinson, Paul. “Man in a Briefcase: The Social Construction of the Laptop Computer and the Emergence of a Type Form.” Journal of Design History 18.2 (2005): 191-205. Buchbinder, David. “Enter the Schlemiel: The Emergence of Inadequate of Incompetent Masculinities in Recent Film and Television.” Canadian Review of American Studies 38.2 (2008): 227-245.Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble. New York: Routledge, 1990.Connell, R.W. Masculinities. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2005.Edwards, Tim. Fashion in Focus: Concepts, Practices and Politics. London: Routledge, 2010.Gatens, Moira. Imaginary Bodies: Ethics, Power and Corporeality. New York: Routledge, 1996.Gilleard, Chris, and Paul Higgs. Ageing, Corporeality and Embodiment. London: Anthem, 2014.Lizardi, Ryan. Mediated Nostalgia: Individual Memory and Contemporary Mass Media. 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