Humanities & Social Sciences

The volume, dedicated to the 44th International Conference of the Italian Union for Drawing, investigates the theme of ‘Transitions’, which particularly effectively represents our time and the current condition of the discipline of Drawing. The term, beyond its generic meaning of an intermediate stage in a process in which a condition changes from one state to another, has always been used in various fields, from music to geophysics. In fact, the disciplines of drawing have always been confronted with themes and issues relating to transitions from one condition to another. The history of representation tells us of transformations, even epochal ones, relating to ‘drawing’, with all that such transitions entail: suffice it to think of the evolution of forms of representation, of instrumental apparatuses, of the mutability of supports, of the analogical-digital transition underway, of the new modes of communication on platforms, of the hypertrophic offer of images also on the net that confirms Guy Debord’s intuitions relating to the new spectacularisation of society. Similarly, representation triggers transitions in the prefiguration and communication of design, the anticipation and foreshadowing of future events.The challenges posed by the digital pose open questions whose scope can only be glimpsed, such as the relationship between drawing and the act of modelling, and the construction of new paradigms of visual language and communication. ‘Transitions’, almost implicitly, points to possible futures, the evolution of technique and the search for new modes of expression; at the same time, however, it can suggest silences and reflections in a process of connection between history, theory, criticism and construction.

In diesem Open-Access-Sammelband setzen sich Autor*innen aus unterschiedlichsten Disziplinen mit der Auswirkung einer digitalisierten Öffentlichkeit für die Politische Bildung auseinander. Sie erörtern, wie sich die Formen digitaler politischer Kommunikation auswirken, wie der Politikunterricht mit der veränderten Ausgangslage umgehen könnte und welche Kompetenzen Schüler*innen benötigen, um in der digitalen Öffentlichkeit selbstbestimmt und -ermächtigt politisch teilzuhaben. Die Komplexität und die Interdependenzen digitaler Kommunikation verlangen nach einer multiperspektivischen und transdisziplinären Perspektive, der dieser Band verpflichtet ist.

“Music and its Narrative Potential” is a book about musical stories. It is a collection of thoughts on how music evokes narratives through its own medium-specific strategies. This book is a versatile consideration of narratives expressed through music. There are several threads that flow and recur through its different chapters, namely contemporary music, interdisciplinary approaches, contemporary narratology, or intermediality.

The first study of Somali piracy by a native Somalian, this open access book adds a new, a much-needed perspective on an issue that will recur so long as it remains blind to Somali history and culture, as well as Somalia's sense of its place within the Horn of Africa and the world. Here Muuse Yuusuf synthesizes the copious, Global-North-based studies of Somali piracy available in English, complements them with Italian, Portuguese, Arabic, and Somali sources, and adds new insights gleaned from sources to which he has unique access: interviews with pirates; interviews with Somali politicians and navy personnel; concerns of local fisherman about international trawlers; and even Somali poetry on Somalis’ relationship with the sea. All this reveals how Somali piracy in the Indian Ocean relates to, and is even driven by, the geopolitical and economic rivalries among the world's superpowers that play out there, rivalries that entail illegal commercial fishing as well as greed and poverty created by nearby maritime shipping lines. Such cultural, socio-political, economic, and environmental factors, Yuusuf argues, will continue to drive piracy off the Horn of Africa so long as they remain misunderstood and unaddressed. For its clear structure and explanations of the history, present, and future of Somali piracy, this book is a must-read for upper-level undergraduates, postgraduates, and researchers interested in African studies, international development, and international relations. The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by the Bloomsbury Open Collections Library Collective.

Creationism is based on a fundamental belief in the inerrancy of the bible and negatively affects science education because creationist proponents insist on the inclusion of supernatural explanations for the appearance of species, in particular the origin of humans. This detrimental effect on education is particularly relevant in the United States, where almost 70% of the population rejects the idea of naturalistic evolution and the majority of American students struggle to meet the college-readiness benchmarks in science and math. This dissertation provides a comprehensive look at the issue from historical, judicial and educational perspectives. Twenty-four legal cases in the United States regarding anti-evolutionary strategies were analyzed in detail. Strategic trends were identified ranging from the statewide banning of evolution in public schools to the required teaching of Creation Science. The exact effect of creationist political activity was discerned through the analysis of state science standards and textbook adoption processes, which illustrated the creationists’ ability to lobby for a diminished coverage of evolution in science standards and textbooks. It was found that despite attempts made by scientific and educational agencies to provide guidelines such as the Next Generation Science Standards, the majority of American state science standards continue to be sub-par and one of the major flaws of these standards is the overall attempt to weaken the coverage of evolution throughout the standards. A similar loss of quality occurs in textbooks since publishers engage in self-censorship in order to avoid controversial topics such as evolution in order to prevent their books from being rejected. An examination of the free-choice learning materials revealed that creationist proponents are very active and successful in producing books, films and museums for the sole purpose of promoting creationism. Moreover, a brief look at the creationist movement in Germany provided a powerful comparison to the United States and elucidated the key components necessary for a creationist movement to exist and flourish, namely the presence of fundamentalist willing to fight to get anti-evolutionary materials introduced into science classrooms. This study provides new insights into the creationist phenomenon, present not only in the United States but also increasingly present in European countries such as Germany. Understanding the detrimental link between creationism and science education will help the science community realize that this topic needs to be continually readdressed and that it is imperative that these creationist trends are not dismissed as inconsequential.

Are we a multicultural nation, or a colorblind one? The Problem of the Color[blind] examines this vexed question in American culture by focusing on black performance in theater, film, and television. The practice of colorblind casting---choosing actors without regard to race---assumes a performing body that is somehow race neutral. But where, exactly, is race neutrality located---in the eyes of the spectator, in the body of the performer, in the medium of the performance? In analyzing and theorizing such questions, Brandi Wilkins Catanese explores a range of engaging and provocative subjects, including the infamous debate between playwright August Wilson and drama critic Robert Brustein, the film career of Denzel Washington, Suzan-Lori Parks's play Venus, the phenomenon of postblackness (as represented in the Studio Museum in Harlem's "Freestyle" exhibition), the performer Ice Cube's transformation from icon of gangsta rap to family movie star, and the controversial reality television series Black. White. Concluding that ideologies of transcendence are ahistorical and therefore unenforceable, Catanese advances the concept of racial transgression---a process of acknowledging rather than ignoring the racialized histories of performance---as her chapters move between readings of dramatic texts, films, popular culture, and debates in critical race theory and the culture wars.

This open access volume of the AIDA Europe Research Series on Insurance Law and Regulation brings together contributions from authors with different legal cultures. It aims to identify the legal issues that arise from the intersection of two disciplines: insurance law and corporate/company law. These legal issues are examined mainly from the perspective of European Union (EU) law. However, there are also contributions from other legal systems, enriching the perspective with which to approach these issues.

This is an account of the archaeological excavations of Maiden Castle, in Dorset, England. Included are descriptions of artefacts such as pottery and human remains, together with an account of the methodology used to unearth these.

Why is social media in southeast Italy so predictable when it is used by such a range of different people? This book describes the impact of social media on the population of a town in the southern region of Puglia, Italy. Razvan Nicolescu spent 15 months living among the town’s residents, exploring what it means to be an individual on social media. Why do people from this region conform on platforms that are designed for personal expression?

The book contains detailed introductory chapters regarding the borders of the area in question, its history and church history, communications and economy in the Byzantine period. The body of the book consists of an alphabetical catalogue of all geographical names attested in written sources as well as of all settlements, fortresses, churches, monasteries etc. which are known only from archaeological remains. Band 1: https://e-book.fwf.ac.at/o:1436 Band 2: https://e-book.fwf.ac.at/o:1437 Große Karte: https://e-book.fwf.ac.at/o:1438 Karte Konstantinopel Umgebung: https://e-book.fwf.ac.at/o:1439

Eine »öffentliche Biographie« Arthur Schnitzlers im Spiegel der Zeit - in bislang unerforschten Interviews, Meinungen und Protesten. Arthur Schnitzler gab angeblich keine Interviews, vermied es, Umfragen zu beantworten und äußerte sich nicht öffentlich. Doch über 180 weitgehend vergessene, bislang unerforscht Texte widerlegen diese Behauptung und bieten ein neues Bild seiner öffentlichen Person. Die Interviews, Meinungsäußerungen und Leserbriefe belegen Schnitzlers Bedeutung als Leserbriefschreiber und Interviewpartner für seine Zeitgenossinnen und Zeitgenossen. Martin Anton Müllers Edition stellt eine »öffentliche Biografie« dar, die dokumentiert, was man schon zu Lebzeiten von der Privatperson Schnitzlers wissen konnte. Der ausführliche Kommentar erläutert Fakten und Hintergründe, das Register erleichtert den Zugang und das Nachwort bietet eine vorzügliche Überblicksdarstellung. Insgesamt ergibt sich aus dieser Edition ein überraschendes Bild des berühmten Autors Arthur Schnitzler, der entgegen seiner angeblichen Zurückhaltung, in der Öffentlichkeit ein engagierter und eloquenter Gesprächspartner und Schriftsteller war.

Witness to Marvels traces the development of a unique genre of Sufi-inspired Bengali romances called pir kathas, whose protagonists and plots are wholly fictive. For five centuries these fabulations have parodied indigenous and Hindu textual traditions. Both mimicking and mocking, these parodies adopted a subjunctive tone, exploring a magical world of ‘what-if’. They created an Islam-inflected space within a traditional Bengali cultural environment without trying to legislate what ideally ‘should be’ according to tropes common to Islamic history, theology, and law. The tales’ discursive arena, the imaginaire, delineated the realm of possibility for how these tales might exercise the imagination to integrate Hindu and Islamic cosmologies. Tales insinuated themselves into locally relevant discourses through elaborate intertextual connections, subtly shifting presuppositions about the way the world works and what counts as religious authority. As Allah looked on from heaven, the tales routinely assigned Sufi saints, both pirs and bibis, to the pivotal role of avatar, the periodic descent of divinity, equating them to the Hindu god Narayan. Adopting a semiotic strategy to interpret these tales yields a bold new perspective on the subtle ways Islam assumed its distinctive form in Bengal and suggests how we need to reimagine conversion in this region.

Dirk Jacob Jansen provides an overview of the life and career of the sixteenth-century cosmopolitan courtier, architect and antiquary Jacopo Strada. Readership: All interested in Austrian and Italian Renaissance archtecture, art and antiques trade, court life, and the transmission of ideas to North and Central Europe.

Reflecting upon his experience making his 2010 feature film Mothers, a cinematic triptych interweaving three narratives that are each, in their own way, about the often tenuous lines between truth and fiction, and one of which actually morphs into a documentary about the aftermath in a small Macedonian town where three retired cleaning women were found raped and killed in 2008 and the murderer turned out to be the journalist covering the story for a major Macedonian newspaper, the Oscar-nominated Macedonian-born and New York-based writer-director Milcho Manchevski writes that, “Most of us look at films differently or accept stories in a different way if we believe that they are true. We watch a documentary film in a different way from the way we watch a drama. We read a magazine article in a different way from the way in which we read a short story. Sometimes, we even treat a film that employs actors differently than a regular drama because we were told that it is based on something that really happened. We treat these works based on truth or reporting on the truth in different ways. “Why? “What is it in our relation to reality or in our relation to what we perceive to be reality that makes us value a work of artifice (an art piece) differently depending on our knowledge or conviction of whether that work of artifice is based on events that really took place?”

Das Wachstum des zivilen Luftverkehrs bedeutet eine große Herausforderung für die Luftfahrtbranche. Nur durch effizientere Triebwerke können der spezifische Verbrauch von fossilen Energieträgern und die spezifischen Emissionen reduziert werden und so der Zugang zu Flugreisen für die wachsende Weltbevölkerung sichergestellt werden. Einen maßgeblichen Beitrag zur Steigerung der Effizienz kann die Optimierung der Kühlung von heißen Komponenten des Kerntriebwerks leisten. Gerade im thermisch hoch belasteten Bereich der ersten Turbinenstufen werden große Mengen an Kühlluft verwendet, die sich negativ auf den thermischen Wirkungsgrad auswirken. Neue Kühlverfahren ermöglichen es, den Kühlluftbedarf bei gleichen Standzeiten der Bauteile zu verringern. Vor einem möglichen Einsatz müssen diese neuen Verfahren untersucht und ihre Leistungsfähigkeit bestimmt werden, vor allem die Vorhersage der Materialtemperatur der Schaufeln muss hoch präzise erfolgen. Die vorliegende Arbeit präsentiert neue Verfahren zur Kühlung von Rotorschaufeln. Es wird speziell auf die Drallkühlung eingegangen, die sich in grundlegenden Untersuchungen und in Verbindung mit den sich rapide verbessernden Möglichkeiten der additiven Fertigung als vielversprechendes Verfahren herausgestellt hat. Zur Beurteilung der neuen Konzepte werden Untersuchungen durchgeführt, bei denen die wichtigen strömungsmechanischen Ähnlichkeitskennzahlen der Maschine eingehalten werden. So können die Ergebnisse unmittelbar auf den Einsatz im Triebwerk übertragen werden. Die Untersuchungen bedeuten eine Herausforderung für die als Messtechnik eingesetzte Infrarotthermographie. Neue Kalibrierverfahren werden entwickelt und überprüft. Durch Anwendung dieser Verfahren kann die Oberflächentemperatur der Prüflinge hoch genau bestimmt werden. Anhand der mit den neuen Verfahren bestimmten Verteilung der Oberflächentemperatur und weiteren aerodynamischen Messungen werden abschließend Empfehlungen formuliert, wie ein auf Drallkühlung basierendes Kühlsystem für Turbinenrotorschaufeln leistungsfähiger werden kann und so die geforderte Lebensdauer dieser Bauteile sicherstellen kann.