Cultural threat and anti-immigrant prejudice: The case of Protestants in Northern Ireland

Using data from the 2002 and 2009 Northern Ireland Life and Times (NILT) surveys, we examine attitudes towards immigrant and ethnic minority groups in Northern Ireland. We suggest that Protestant and unionist communities experience a higher level of cultural threat than Catholic and nationalist communities on account of the ‘parity of esteem’ principle that has informed changes in the province since the Belfast Agreement of 1998. Our analyses confirm that, while there is evidence for some level of anti-immigrant sentiment across all groups, Protestants and unionists do indeed report relatively more negative attitudes towards a range of immigrant and ethnic target groups compared to Catholic, nationalist, or respondents who do not identify with either religious or political category. The analyses further suggest that their higher level of perceived cultural threat partially accounts for this difference. We suggest that cultural threat can be interpreted as a response to changes in Northern Ireland that have challenged the dominant status enjoyed by Protestants and unionists in the past.

Ultraviolet exposure of melanoma cells induces fibroblast activation protein-α in fibroblasts: Implications for melanoma invasion.

Fibroblast activation protein-a (FAP-a) promotes tumor growth and cell invasiveness through extracellular matrix degradation. How ultraviolet radiation (UVR), the major risk factor for malignant melanoma, influences the expression of FAP-a is unknown. We examined the effect of UVR on FAP-a expression in melanocytes, keratinocytes and fibroblasts from the skin and in melanoma cells. UVR induces upregulation of FAP-a in fibroblasts, melanocytes and primary melanoma cells (PM) whereas keratinocytes and metastatic melanoma cells remained FAP-a negative. UVA and UVB stimulated FAP-a-driven migration and invasion in fibroblasts, melanocytes and PM. In co-culture systems UVR of melanocytes, PM and cells from regional metastases upregulated FAP-a in fibroblasts but only supernatants from non-irradiated PM were able to induce FAP-a in fibroblasts. Further, UV-radiated melanocytes and PM significantly increased FAP-a expression in fibroblasts through secretory crosstalk via Wnt5a, PDGF-BB and TGF-ß1. Moreover, UV radiated melanocytes and PM increased collagen I invasion and migration of fibroblasts. The FAP-a/DPPIV inhibitor Gly-ProP(OPh)2 significantly decreased this response implicating FAP-a/DPPIV as an important protein complex in cell migration and invasion. These experiments suggest a functional association between UVR and FAP-a expression in fibroblasts, melanocytes and melanoma cells implicating that UVR of malignant melanoma converts fibroblasts into FAP-a expressing and ECM degrading fibroblasts thus facilitating invasion and migration. The secretory crosstalk between melanoma and tumor surrounding fibroblasts is mediated via PDGF-BB, TGF-ß1 and Wnt5a and these factors should be evaluated as targets to reduce FAP-a activity and prevent early melanoma dissemination.

Testing a social ecological model for relations between political violence and child adjustment in Northern Ireland

Relations between political violence and child adjustment are matters of international concern. Past research demonstrates the significance of community, family, and child psychological processes in child adjustment, supporting study of interrelations between multiple social ecological factors and child adjustment in contexts of political violence. Testing a social ecological model, 300 mothers and their children (M = 12.28 years, SD = 1.77) from Catholic and Protestant working class neighborhoods in Belfast, Northern Ireland, completed measures or community discord, family relations, and children's regulatory processes (i.e., emotional security) and outcomes. Historical political violence in neighborhoods based on objective records (i.e., politically motivated deaths) were related to family members' reports of current sectarian antisocial behavior and nonsectarian antisocial behavior. Interparental conflict and parental monitoring and children's emotional security about both the community and family contributed to explanatory pathways for relations between sectarian antisocial behavior in communities and children's adjustment problems. The discussion evaluates support for social ecological models for relations between political violence and child adjustment and its implications for understanding relations in other parts of the world.

The Geography of Conflict and Death in Belfast, Northern Ireland

The conflict known as the oTroubleso in Northern Ireland began during the late 1960s and is defined by political and ethno-sectarian violence between state, pro-state, and anti-state forces. Reasons for the conflict are contested and complicated by social, religious, political, and cultural disputes, with much of the debate concerning the victims of violence hardened by competing propaganda-conditioning perspectives. This article introduces a database holding information on the location of individual fatalities connected with the contemporary Irish conflict. For each victim, it includes a demographic profile, home address, manner of death, and the organization responsible. Employing geographic information system (GIS) techniques, the database is used to measure, map, and analyze the spatial distribution of conflict-related deaths between 1966 and 2007 across Belfast, the capital city of Northern Ireland, with respect to levels of segregation, social and economic deprivation, and interfacing. The GIS analysis includes a kernel density estimator designed to generate smooth intensity surfaces of the conflict-related deaths by both incident and home locations. Neighborhoods with high-intensity surfaces of deaths were those with the highest levels of segregation ( 90 percent Catholic or Protestant) and deprivation, and they were located near physical barriers, the so-called peacelines, between predominantly Catholic and predominantly Protestant communities. Finally, despite the onset of peace and the formation of a power-sharing and devolved administration (the Northern Ireland Assembly), disagreements remain over the responsibility and ocommemorationo of victims, sentiments that still uphold division and atavistic attitudes between spatially divided Catholic and Protestant populations.

Capacity-building, representation and intracommunity conflict

This paper explores the nature of community capacity-building in the context of local development. It challenges some of the simplistic constructions of community as a distinctive stakeholder with a shared set of values and clear identity. Even in apparently homogeneous place-based communities such as in the Catholic Ardoyne area of North Belfast there are important differences in the way in which local people interact with the organised voluntary sector. The paper concludes by highlighting the need to reach deeper into the concerns of local people, rather than the priorities of statutory funders, as a basis for service provision and local planning.

The Battle of the Somme in Ulster memory and identity

One of the enduring illusions about Northern Ireland is that its society can be conceptualized through a binary distinction between protestant and catholic. unionist and nationalist. It is increasingly apparent that these broad domains are themselves fractured and diverse and that otherness is often conceived from within rather than without. Northern Ireland can also be viewed as a laboratory for identity formation as unionists and loyalists strive to reconcile themselves with the fundamental political changes that have followed in the wake of the Peace Process. This paper considers one aspect of the contestation of belonging that increasingly characterizes unionism. It examines the competition for the ownership of the mythology of the Battle of the Somme ( 1916), long a key event in the unionist narrative. In particular, the paper addresses the ways in which paramilitary organizations are using the Somme to legitimate their own activities but also to distance the loyalist working classes from the former hegemonic Britishness of official unionism and the sectarianism of the Orange Order. The analysis concludes that loyalist identity is being conceptualized thorough a narrative of betrayal from within and at an intensely localized scale.

Forward to the Past? Loyalist Paramilitarianism in Northern Ireland since 1994

This article considers in detail loyalist paramilitary activity in Northern Ireland since the paramilitary cease-fires of 1994. The continuing nature of contemporary loyalist violence is documented with reference to sectarian attacks against members of the “Other”/Catholic community and associated symbols of that community, violence directed at other loyalists, and the potential for future violence given constitutional uncertainty regarding Northern Ireland's position within the United Kingdom. The article also challenges assumptions within the broader literature of an inability within loyalist paramilitary groups to move beyond violence in the post-cease-fire period with particular reference to their conflict transformation efforts.

Leadership for inclusion: Conceptualising and enacting inclusion in integrated schools in a troubled society

Inclusion is increasingly understood as an educational reform that responds to the diversity of all learners, challenging the marginalization, exclusion and underachievement which may result from all forms of ‘difference’. Leadership for inclusion is conceptualized here as driving a constant struggle to create shared meanings of inclusion and to build collaborative practice, an effort that needs to be rooted in critical practice lest it risk replicating existing patterns of disadvantage. In response to calls for further research that challenge how school leaders conceptualize inclusion and for research that investigates how leaders enact their understandings of inclusion, this paper aims to increase our understanding of the extent to which leadership vision can map onto a school’s culture and of the organizational conditions in schools that drive responses to diversity. We investigate the enactment of leadership for inclusion in the troubled context of Northern Ireland by looking at two schools that primarily aim to integrate Catholic and Protestant children but which are also sites for a range of other dimensions of student ‘difference’ to come together. Whilst the two schools express differing visions of the integration of Catholics and Protestants, leadership vision of inclusion is enacted by members of the school community with a consensus around this vision brought about by formal and informal aspects of school culture. Multiple and intersecting spheres of difference stimulate a concerted educational response in both schools but integration remains the primary focus. In this divided society, religious diversity poses a significant challenge to inclusion and further support is required from leaders to enable teachers to break through cultural restraints.

Defending Identity and Ethos: an analysis of teacher perceptions of school collaboration in Northern Ireland

The purpose of this article is to examine the process of collaborative working between teachers located in separate faith-based schools in Northern Ireland. Drawing on theories of intergroup relations, and with reference to in-depth interviews with teachers in post-primary schools, the article shows that despite earlier research which identified a reluctance amongst teachers in the different sectors to work together, most Catholic and Protestant teachers are motivated to collaborate to develop a more broadly based curriculum for pupils. However, it has also been shown that teachers tend to studiously avoid discussing their differences in mixed-faith contexts, and it is argued that this may have the potential to constrain collaborative relations. It is concluded that without strategic direction from policy makers to assist teachers in negotiating and exploring their differences it will be difficult to build the trust which is likely to sustain collaborative relations.

Political Violence and Child Adjustment: Longitudinal Tests of Sectarian Antisocial Behavior, Family Conflict, and Insecurity as Explanatory Pathways

Understanding the impact of political violence on child maladjustment is a matter of international concern. Recent research has advanced a social ecological explanation for relations between political violence and child adjustment. However, conclusions are qualified by the lack of longitudinal tests. Toward examining pathways longitudinally, mothers and their adolescents (M = 12.33, SD = 1.78, at Time 1) from 2-parent families in Catholic and Protestant working class neighborhoods in Belfast, Northern Ireland, completed measures assessing multiple levels of a social ecological model. Utilizing autoregressive controls, a 3-wave longitudinal model test (T1, n = 299; T2, n = 248; T3, n = 197) supported a specific pathway linking sectarian community violence, family conflict, childrens insecurity about family relationships, and adjustment problems.

A study of endonuclease III-sensitive sites in irradiated DNA: detection of alpha-particle-induced oxidative damage

An important difference between chemical agents that induce oxidative damage in DNA and ionizing radiation is that radiation-induced damage is clustered locally on the DNA, Both modelling and experimental studies have predicted the importance of clustering of lesions induced by ionizing radiation and its dependence on radiation quality. With increasing linear energy transfer, it is predicted that complex lesions will be formed within 1-20 bp regions of the DNA, As well as strand breaks, these sites may contain multiple damaged bases, We have compared the yields of single strand breaks (ssb) and double strand breaks (dsb) along with those produced by treatment of irradiated DNA with the enzyme endonuclease III, which recognizes a number of oxidized pyrimidines in DNA and converts them to strand breaks. Plasmid DNA was irradiated under two different scavenging conditions to test the involvement of OH radicals with either Co-60 gamma-rays or alpha-particles from a Pu-238 source. Under low scavenging conditions (10 mM Tris) gamma-irradiation induced 7.1x10(-7) ssb Gy/bp, which increased 3.7-fold to 2.6 x 10(-6) ssb Gy/bp with endo III treatment. In contrast the yields of dsb increased by 4.2-fold from 1.5 x 10(-8) to 6.3 x 10(-8) dsb Gy/bp, This equates to an additional 2.5% of the endo III-sensitive sites being converted to dsb on enzyme treatment. For alpha-particles this increased to 9%. Given that endo III sensitive sites may only constitute similar to 40% of the base lesions induced in DNA, this suggests that up to 6% of the ssb measured in X- and 22% in alpha-particle-irradiated DNA could have damaged bases associated with them contributing to lesion complexity.

What now for the contact hypothesis? Towards a new research agenda

This article begins with a review of recent research on the Contact Hypothesis. It will be shown that the literature in this area has become essentially closed and self-referential where the core political and theoretical premises that underpin the Hypothesis have been taken for granted and the debates have therefore become restricted simply to how best to measure the influence of inter-group contact. One of the key reasons for this is the lack of critical engagement with the Contact Hypothesis from those of a more structuralist and/or ‘radical’ perspective. This may be because the individualistic focus of the Hypothesis is seen from such a perspective as largely irrelevant to addressing racial and ethnic divisions and/or because it may be felt that to engage with the concept is to give it undue legitimacy. It will be argued in this article, however, that the wholesale dismissal of the Contact Hypothesis is a little premature. Just as recent research on racial and ethnic divisions has drawn attention to the way in which such divisions exist at a number of layers within the social formation – from the structural, political and ideological through to the sub-cultural, interactional and biographical – so must any initiatives aimed at addressing these divisions be similarly ‘multi-layered’ in their approach. However, it will be argued that for research to help inform specific strategies at the interactional level, there needs to be a significant change in the way that inter-group contact, and the Contact Hypothesis more generally, is studied. The article will ‘model out’ one potentially fruitful way in which such research can develop through the use of an ethnographic case study involving a cross-community scheme arranged for Protestant and Catholic children in Northern Ireland.

‘Proficiscere, anima Christiana’: Gerontius and German mysticism

The popularity in Britain of Elgar's _The Dream of Gerontius_ was triggered by the successful reception of the work in Germany in December 1901 and May 1902. By examining some of the writings on Elgar by German critics in this period, I explain that what may have particularly have appealed to German audiences was the composer's engagement with mysticism, something that as well as being a distinct strand of German theology since medieval times had acquired a new popularity among German artists in a number of fields as part of a reaction to the materialism of Wilhelmine Germany. Through a reading of the work that takes into account both its Catholic theology and ideas of mysticism more generally, I propose that the two Parts of the work should be conceived as taking place simultaneously, rather than successively, and that the work is thus best understood as belonging to the genre of epic rather than drama. ©2013 The Royal Musical Association

An Inconvenient Truth: Barriers to Truth Recovery in the Aftermath of Institutional Child Abuse in Ireland

Contemporary settled democracies, including the United States, England and Wales and Ireland, have witnessed a string of high profile cases of institutional child abuse in both church and state settings. Set against the broader literature on transitional justice, this analysis argues that there are significant barriers to truth recovery within the particular context of historical institutional abuse by the clergy in the Republic of Ireland. In the main, I argue that the frameworks of the inquiries and commissions into historical institutional child abuse are not conducive to truth recovery or the search for justice in dealing with the legacy of an abusive past. It is the church-state relationship which makes the Irish situation noteworthy and unique. The Catholic Church and child care institutions are especially self-protective, secretive and closed by nature and strongly discourage the drawing of attention to any deficiencies in organisational procedures. The nature of the public inquiry process also means that there is often a rather linear focus on accountability and apportioning blame. Collectively, such difficulties inhibit fuller systemic investigation of the veracity of what actually happened and, in turn, meaningful modification of child care policies. The article concludes by offering some thoughts on implications for transitional justice discourses more broadly as well as the residual issues for Ireland and other settled democracies in terms of moving on from the legacy of institutional child abuse.

Hopanoid Production Is Required for Low-pH Tolerance, Antimicrobial Resistance, and Motility in Burkholderia cenocepacia

Hopanoids are pentacyclic triterpenoids that are thought to be bacterial surrogates for eukaryotic sterols, such as cholesterol, acting to stabilize membranes and to regulate their fluidity and permeability. To date, very few studies have evaluated the role of hopanoids in bacterial physiology. The synthesis of hopanoids depends on the enzyme squalene-hopene cyclase (Shc), which converts the linear squalene into the basic hopene structure. Deletion of the 2 genes encoding Shc enzymes in Burkholderia cenocepacia K56-2, BCAM2831 and BCAS0167, resulted in a strain that was unable to produce hopanoids, as demonstrated by gas chromatography and mass spectrometry. Complementation of the Delta shc mutant with only BCAM2831 was sufficient to restore hopanoid production to wild-type levels, while introducing a copy of BCAS0167 alone into the Delta shc mutant produced only very small amounts of the hopanoid peak. The Delta shc mutant grew as well as the wild type in medium buffered to pH 7 and demonstrated no defect in its ability to survive and replicate within macrophages, despite transmission electron microscopy (TEM) revealing defects in the organization of the cell envelope. The Delta shc mutant displayed increased sensitivity to low pH, detergent, and various antibiotics, including polymyxin B and erythromycin. Loss of hopanoid production also resulted in severe defects in both swimming and swarming motility. This suggests that hopanoid production plays an important role in the physiology of B. cenocepacia.