Academic literature on the topic 'Obscene gestures'

Straipsnyje analizuojami agresyvų vairavimą aiškinančių veiksnių – vairuotojų agresyvumo, pykčio ir saviveiksmingumo – ypatumai. Buvo keliami šie tyrimo uždaviniai: a) įvertinti Lietuvos vairuotojų agresyvumo, vairavimo pykčio ir saviveiksmingumo rodiklius; b) nustatyti šių rodiklių tarpusavio sąsajas bei ryšius su kitais agresyvų vairavimą aiškinančiais veiksniais (lytimi, amžiumi, vairavimo ypatumais); c) nustatyti eismo įvykio tikimybę geriausiai prognozuojančius rodiklius. Naudojant Buss ir Perry agresijos klausimyną, Vairavimo pykčio skalę, Adelaidės vairavimo saviveiksmingumo skalę bei vairavimo ypatumus atskleidžiančius kintamuosius, buvo ištirti 196 vairuotojai. Gauti rezultatai rodo, kad vairuotojų pykčio ir agresyvumo ryšys yra statistiškai reikšmingai teigiamas, o vairavimo pykčio ir vairuotojų saviveiksmingumo ryšys – statistiškai reikšmingai neigiamas. Nebuvo nustatyta reikšmingų ryšių tarp vairuotojų agresyvumo ir jų vairavimo saviveiksmingumo. Vairuotojų agresyvumo įverčiai geriausiai prognozuoja patekimą į eismo įvykius.Pagrindiniai žodžiai: agresyvus vairavimas, agresyvumas, vairavimo pyktis, vairavimo saviveiksmingumas.Aggressive Driving: the Role of Aggression, Driving Anger, and Self-efficacyČėsnienė I., Kašinska A. SummaryAccording to the World Health Organization (2004), road traffic accidents are one of the ten leading causes of death. Many of these fatalities involve aggressive driving. P. Ellison-Potter et al. (2001) suggest that aggressive driving is any driving behaviour that intentionally endangers others psychologically, physically, or both. Examples of aggressive driving include behaviours such as excessive speeding, tailgating, horn honking, traffic weaving, profanity, obscene gestures, headlight flashing, etc. In order to understand this phenomenon, researchers have examined aggressive driving in terms of several levels of variables such as sociocultural, situational or personal (Valleries et al., 2005). Moreover, self-assessment of driving skills is a central dimension of driving activity. The evaluation of specific skills may be conceptualized by self-efficacy. Self-efficacy refers to individuals’ belief in their ability to accomplish specific goals (Bandura, 1995).The article reports the findings concerning the relationship between aggression, anger and self-efficacy among Lithuanian drivers. The sample consisted of 196 drivers (99 males, 97 females) aged 18 to 74 years. The Buss–Perry Aggression Questionnaire (Buss and Perry, 1992), the Driving Anger Scale (Deffenbacher et al., 1994), and the Adelaide Driving Self-efficacy Scale (George et al., 2007) were used in the study. Participants were administered also a questionnaire measuring a variety of demographical characteristics and driving-related factors.The results showed that more aggressive drivers tend to express the higher levels of driving anger than do less aggressive drivers. A negative relation between driving anger and driving self-efficacy was found. Further, the driving self-efficacy was higher in males than in females. Research findings indicate that there are gender differences in aggression, i.e. male drivers are more aggressive than female drivers. There are significant age differences in driver anger. In addition, high anger and aggression were related to unsafe driving behaviours. Seat-belt wearing tends to be less frequent among male drivers than among females. Aggression was found to be a predictor of crash-related outcomes. Finally, limitations of the study are discussed.Keywords: aggressive driving, aggression, driving anger, driving self-efficacy.

This paper argues that ‘the Anthropocene’ is a deeply depoliticizing notion. This de-politicization unfolds through the creation of a set of narratives, what we refer to as ‘AnthropoScenes’, which broadly share the effect of off-staging certain voices and forms of acting. Our notion of the Anthropo-obScene is our tactic to both attest to and undermine the depoliticizing stories of ‘the Anthropocene’. We first examine how various AnthropoScenes, while internally fractured and heterogeneous, ranging from geo-engineering and earth system science to more-than-human and object-oriented ontologies, place things and beings, human and non-human, within a particular relational straitjacket that does not allow for a remainder or constitutive outside. This risks deepening an immunological biopolitical fantasy that promises adaptive and resilient terraforming, an earth system management of sorts that permits life as we know it to continue for some, while turning into a necropolitics for others. Second, we develop a post-foundational political perspective in relation to our dramatically changing socio-ecological situation. This perspective understands the political in terms of performance and, in an Arendtian manner, re-opens the political as forms of public-acting in common that subtracts from or exceeds what is gestured to hold socio-ecological constellations together. We conclude that what is off-staged and rendered obscene in ‘the AnthropoScenes’ carries precisely the possibility of a return of the political.

In recent discussions there has been a tendency to refer to ‘gesture’ and ‘sign’ as if these are distinct categories, sometimes even as if they are in opposition to one another. Here I trace the historical origins of this distinction. I suggest that it is a product of the application to the analysis of sign languages of a formalist model of language derived from structural linguistics, on the one hand, and, on the other, of a cognitive-psychological view of ‘gesture’ that emerged in the latter half of the twentieth century. I suggest that this division between ‘gesture’ and ‘sign’ tends to exaggerate differences and obscure areas of overlap. It should be replaced by a comparative semiotics of the utterance uses of visible bodily action. This will be better able to articulate the similarities and differences between how kinesics is used, according to whether and how it is employed in relation to other communicative modalities such as speech.

This study examined speaking-rate-induced spectral and temporal variability of F2 formant trajectories for target words produced in a carrier phrase at speaking rates ranging from fast to slow. F2 onset frequency measured at the first glottal pulse following the stop consonant release in target words was used to quantify the extent to which adjacent consonantal and vocalic gestures overlapped; F2 target frequency was operationally defined as the first occurrence of a frequency minimum or maximum following F2 onset frequency. Regression analyses indicated 70% of functions relating F2 onset and vowel duration were statistically significant. The strength of the effect was variable, however, and the direction of significant functions often differed from that predicted by a simple model of overlapping, sliding gestures. Results of a partial correlation analysis examining interrelationships among F2 onset, F2 target frequency, and vowel duration across the speaking rate range indicated that covariation of F2 target with vowel duration may obscure the relationship between F2 onset and vowel duration across rate. The results further suggested that a sliding based model of acoustic variability associated with speaking rate change only partially accounts for the present data, and that such a view accounts for some speakers' data better than others.