Plasma free fatty acids do not provide the link between obesity and insulin resistance or β-cell dysfunction: results of the Reading, Imperial, Surrey, Cambridge, Kings (RISCK) study

Aims To investigate the relationship between adiposity and plasma free fatty acid levels and the influence of total plasma free fatty acid level on insulin sensitivity and β-cell function. Methods An insulin sensitivity index, acute insulin response to glucose and a disposition index, derived from i.v. glucose tolerance minimal model analysis and total fasting plasma free fatty acid levels were available for 533 participants in the Reading, Imperial, Surrey, Cambridge, Kings study. Bivariate correlations were made between insulin sensitivity index, acute insulin response to glucose and disposition index and both adiposity measures (BMI, waist circumference and body fat mass) and total plasma free fatty acid levels. Multivariate linear regression analysis was performed, controlling for age, sex, ethnicity and adiposity. Results After adjustment, all adiposity measures were inversely associated with insulin sensitivity index (BMI: β = −0.357; waist circumference: β = −0.380; body fat mass: β = −0.375) and disposition index (BMI: β = −0.215; waist circumference: β = −0.248; body fat mass: β = −0.221) and positively associated with acute insulin response to glucose [BMI: β = 0.200; waist circumference: β = 0.195; body fat mass β = 0.209 (P values <0.001)]. Adiposity explained 13, 4 and 5% of the variation in insulin sensitivity index, acute insulin response to glucose and disposition index, respectively. After adjustment, no adiposity measure was associated with free fatty acid level, but total plasma free fatty acid level was inversely associated with insulin sensitivity index (β = −0.133), acute insulin response to glucose (β = −0.148) and disposition index [β = −0.218 (P values <0.01)]. Plasma free fatty acid concentration accounted for 1.5, 2 and 4% of the variation in insulin sensitivity index, acute insulin response to glucose and disposition index, respectively. Conclusions Plasma free fatty acid levels have a modest negative association with insulin sensitivity, β-cell secretion and disposition index but no association with adiposity measures. It is unlikely that plasma free fatty acids are the primary mediators of obesity-related insulin resistance or β-cell dysfunction.

The drowned and the saved: shipwrecks and the 'cursus' of Latin love elegy

Throughout the corpus of Latin love elegy, the imaginary tombs envisaged by the elegists for their own personae and for other inhabitants of their poetic world display a striking tendency to take on the characteristic attributes and personalities of those interred within. The final resting-place of Propertius, for instance, that self-proclaimed acolyte of Callimachean miniaturism and exclusivity, is to be sequestered from the degrading attentions of the passing populace (Prop. 3.16.25–30) and crowned with the poet's laurel (2.13.33–4). What remains of his meagre form will rest in a ‘tiny little urn’ (paruula testa, 2.13.32) beneath a monument declaring the lover's slavery to a single passion (2.13.35–6), and the grave is to be attended, or so he hopes, by the object of that passion herself (3.16.23–4), or occasionally (though he is not so confident of this) by his patron Maecenas (2.1.71–8). Likewise the memorial designed by Ovid for Corinna's pet parrot - an imitatrix ales endowed with the most distinctive foibles of the elegiac tradition - in Amores 2.6, comprising a burial mound pro corpore magnus (2.6.59) topped with a tombstone described as exiguus (‘tiny’, 2.6.60; cf. Prop. 2.1.72, 2.13.33), exhibits an elegiac emphasis worthy of the parrot's human counterparts among Ovid's poetic predecessors.

Cultural policy and cultural politics in Revolutionary Cuba: re-reading the 'Palabras a los intelectuales' (Words to the Intellectuals)

This article re-reads Fidel Castro's speech to Cuban artists and intellectuals at the Biblioteca Nacional José Martí (National Library) in June 1961. Despite extensive discussion of its famous extract, the speech has rarely been examined in depth. This article thus analyses the entire speech, situating it within its co-text and its context and examining its multiple functions, offering as it does an insight into the social and educational implications of cultural revolution in Cuba and the inevitable tensions inherent in these. The article evaluates the negotiations in the text in the light of their relevance to contemporary cultural debates in Cuba.

'Looking at the Others': Oscar Wilde and the Reading Gaol Archive

In looking at Wilde and the prison, scholarship has understandably focussed on the lengthy and complex De Profundis, and how the prison experience confirmed or re-shaped Wilde as a writer and thinker. Wilde himself claimed to have been saved by the ‘others’ that he encountered in prison, and these ‘others’ have received scant attention. Who were they? How does a greater knowledge of them supplement our sense of the nineteenth-century prison and of Wilde? This essay looks closely at the Reading Gaol archive, tracing out the lives of some of those with whom Wilde was incarcerated and providing analyses of the prison population in Reading while Wilde was there. Aside from yielding the only known photographs of any of the young working-class men in whom Wilde took an interest, the essay seeks to build a more nuanced reading of Wilde's experience. Above all, the aim is to open out the meanings of the Wilde myth, and, in particular, to offer a more socially inclusive version.

Christian Gottlob Heyne and the changing fortunes of the commentary in the age of Altertumswissenschaft

This chapter discusses the pedagogic and scholarly priorities that informed Heyne’s commentaries on Tibullus (1755), Virgil (1767-75) and Homer (1802), as well as their initial critical reception. Like those of his teachers, Gesner and Ernesti, Heyne’s works eschew detailed textual scholarship in favour of aesthetic and historicizing appreciation of literary works as wholes. Their formal innovations – most notably the relegation of advanced philological discussions to endnotes and the inclusion of excursuses on significant historical and cultural questions – are an attempt to tailor a traditional format to the demands of an Enlightened age and the cultural-historical interests of the new Altertumswissenschaft. The chapter discusses their contrasting critical receptions in order to raise questions about the viability of Heyne’s endeavours to make a traditional medium fit new concerns.

Reading together: an ethnographic study of a reading group for visually-impaired people

Because reading groups historically have been under-researched (Long, 2003), the literature in this field is limited, presenting this as an interesting area for researchers. A need for further research is also explained by the fact that the traditional model of a reading group has been expanded through recent library policies leading to the development of specific group types such as groups for visually-impaired people (VIPs). To date, there have been no long-term empirical studies of these groups. This thesis, therefore, makes a significant contribution to the literature in this field by providing an in-depth exploration of a VIP reading group. The thesis is an ethnographic study which follows a library-run reading group for visually-impaired people from its formation in September 2007 and concentrates on five of the group members. The methodology for the study is influenced by participatory approaches to research involving disabled people by inviting the participants to participate in the co-creation of knowledge about themselves (French & Swain, 2000, p. 1). It is also influenced by new ethnography’s preference for multi-layered texts by exploring both the individual and collective experiences of the participants. While the participants are defined throughout as readers, visual-impairment plays a role in their experiences. I show that visually-impaired readers and reading groups sit within a complex web of factors which impact on their experiences both as individual readers and as a group. The study also shows that VIP reading groups challenge traditional definitions of reading as a visual activity. The study explores issues of power and concludes that, because ownership of the group lies with the library, this challenges the idea of reading groups empowering their members. Furthermore, offering discrete groups for visually-impaired readers means that the role these groups play in contributing to agendas for social inclusion is problematic. The study concludes by making suggestions as to how these groups might develop to be more inclusive and empowering.

Morphological awareness and reading development in bilingual English-Chinese children in Singapore

Addressing two aspects of morphological awareness – derivational and compound, this study investigates the relationships between morphological awareness and vocabulary and reading comprehension in English-Chinese bilingual primary 3 children in Singapore (N = 76). Comparable tasks in Chinese and English were administered to examine the children’s morphological awareness, vocabulary, and reading comprehension. The results show that morphological awareness is highly related to vocabulary and reading comprehension, with higher correlations between morphological awareness and reading comprehension than between morphological awareness and vocabulary. This indicates that morphological awareness may have direct influence on reading comprehension beyond the mediating effect of vocabulary. Furthermore, the results indicate that children displayed more compound than derivational morphological awareness for Chinese due to the dominance of compound morphology in Chinese. However the children also displayed similar levels of derivational and compound morphological awareness for English despite far more derivatives than compounds in English. The robust cross-linguistic correlations suggest that Chinese compound morphological knowledge plays a facilitating role not only in learning English compounds, but also in learning transparently derived words that do not involve phonological or orthographic shifts.

Love of reading: the evaluation of KidsREAD programme in Singapore

In Singapore about 20% of families are considered to be socio-economically disadvantaged. Children from these families have been identified as having reading difficulties when they enter primary school. Recognizing that children from these families have limited access to reading materials, the National Library Board, in partnership with local community clubs and family service centres, has established the KidsREAD literacy programme where volunteers, mostly university and college students, help children between 4 and 8 years of age overcome some of their reading problems. The KidsREAD clubs aim to “promote the love of reading and cultivate good reading habits among all young Singaporeans, in particular children from low-income families” (National Library Board, 2005). This paper presents an evaluation of the KidsREAD clubs with regard to children’s attitudes towards reading. It explores the differences in children’s reading attitudes at the beginning of the programme and half way through the programme. The study was carried out in three representative clubs. This paper evaluates the attitudes of 65 children towards the clubs and the activities conducted at the clubs. It outlines the children’s beliefs about reading and the extent to which they value reading. It further explores how much KidsREAD clubs have influenced their attitudes towards reading in general and their enjoyment of reading in particular.