"The whole earth as village" : a chronotopic analysis of Marshall McLuhan's "Global Village" and Patrick McGoohan's The Prisoner

Marshall McLuhan's "global village", and his theories on communications and technology, in conjunction with Patrick McGoohan's television series The Prisoner (ATV, 1967-1968) are explored in this thesis. The Prisoner, brainchild of McGoohan, is about the abduction and confinement of a British government agent imprisoned within the impenetrable boundaries of a benign but totalitarian city -state called "The Village". The purpose of his abduction and imprisonment is for the extraction of information regarding his resignation as a government spy. Marshall McLuhan originally popularized the phrase "the global village" in The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making o/the Topographic Man (1962), asserting that, "The new electronic interdependence recreates the world in the image of a global village" (p. 31). This thesis argues that valid parallels exist between McGoohan's conception of "village", as manifested in The Prisoner, and McLuhan's global village. The comprehensive methodological stratagem for this thesis includes Marshall McLuhan's "mosaic" approach, Mikhail Bakhtin's concept ofthe "chronotope", as well as a Foucauldian genealogicallhistorical discourse analysis. In the process of deconstructing McLuhan's texts and The Prisoner as products of the 1960s, an historical "constellation" (to use Walter Benjamin's concept) of the same present has been executed. By employing this synthesized methodology, conjunctions have been made between McLuhan's theories and the series' main themes of bureaucracy as dictatorship, the perversion of science and technology, freedom as illusion, and the individual in opposition to the collective. A thorough investigation of the global village and The Prisoner will determine whether or not Marshall McLuhan and/or Patrick McGoohan visualize the village as an enslaving technological reality.

The influence of emotional body posture on adults' and 8-year-olds' perception facial expressions

The present set of experiments was designed to investigate the development of children's sensitivity of facial expressions observed within emotional contexts. Past research investigating both adults' and children's perception of facial expressions has been limited primarily to the presentation of isolated faces. During daily social interactions, however, facial expressions are encountered within contexts conveying emotions (e.g., background scenes, body postures, gestures). Recently, research has shown that adults' perception of facial expressions is influenced by these contexts. When emotional faces are shown in incongruent contexts (e.g., when an angry face is presented in a context depicting fear) adults' accuracy decreases and their reaction times increase (e.g., Meeren et a1. 2005). To examine the influence of emotional body postures on children's perception of facial expressions, in each of the experiments in the current study adults and 8-year-old children made two-alternative forced choice decisions about facial expressions presented in congruent (e.g., a face displayed sadness on a body displaying sadness) and incongruent (e.g., a face displaying fear on a body displaying sadness) contexts. Consistent with previous studies, a congruency effect (better performance on congruent than incongruent trials) was found for both adults and 8-year-olds when the emotions displayed by the face and body were similar to each other (e.g., fear and sad, Experiment l a ) ; the influence of context was greater for 8-year-olds than adults for these similar expressions. To further investigate why the congruency effect was larger for children than adults in Experiment 1 a, Experiment 1 b was conducted to examine if increased task difficulty would increase the magnitude of adults' congruency effects. Adults were presented with subtle facial and despite successfully increasing task difficulty the magnitude of the. congruency effect did not increase suggesting that the difference between children's and adults' congruency effects in Experiment l a cannot be explained by 8-year-olds finding the task difficult. In contrast, congruency effects were not found when the expressions displayed by the face and body were dissimilar (e.g., sad and happy, see Experiment 2). The results of the current set of studies are examined with respect to the Dimensional theory and the Emotional Seed model and the developmental timeline of children's sensitivity to facial expressions. A secondary aim of the series of studies was to examine one possible mechanism underlying congruency effe cts-holistic processing. To examine the influence of holistic processing, participants completed both aligned trials and misaligned trials in which the faces were detached from the body (designed to disrupt holistic processing). Based on the principles of holistic face processing we predicted that participants would benefit from misalignment of the face and body stimuli on incongruent trials but not on congruent trials. Collectively, our results provide some evidence that both adults and children may process emotional faces and bodies holistically. Consistent with the pattern of results for congruency effects, the magnitude of the effect of misalignment varied with the similarity between emotions. Future research is required to further investigate whether or not facial expressions and emotions conveyed by the body are perceived holistically.

"All The Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues": [Post]Oedipal Fatherhood And Subjectivity In ABC's Lost

ABC's popular television series Lost has been praised as one of the most innovative programs in the history of broadcast television primarily due to its unique storytelling content and structure. In this thesis, I argue that in spite of its unconventional stances in terms of narrative, genre, and character descriptions, Lost still conforms to the conventional understanding of family, fatherhood, and subjectivity by perpetuating the psychoanalytic myth of the Oedipus complex. The series emphasizes the centrality of the father in the lives of the survivors, and constructs character developments according to Freud's essentialist and phallocentric conception of subjectivity. In this way, it continues the classic psychoanalytic tradition that views the father as the essence of one's identity. In order to support this argument, I conduct a discursive reading of the show's two main characters: Jack Shepherd and John Locke. Through such a reading, I explore and unearth the mythic/psychoanalytic importance of the father in the psychology of these fictional constructs.

Haplotype analysis suggest common founders in carriers of the recurrent BRCA2 mutation, 3398delAAAAG, in French Canadian hereditary breast and/ovarian cancer families

Affiliation: Faculté de médicine, Université de Montréal

Faith lost and regained : the evolution of Anne Rice's critique of christianity in The Vampire Chronicles

Ce mémoire réunit trois romans de la série Les Chroniques de vampires de la populaire écrivaine américaine Anne Rice (The Vampire Lestat, Memnoch the Devil et Blood Canticle) afin d'étudier l'évolution de sa critique de la religion à travers l'écriture. Une analyse précise et complète de Lestat de Lioncourt, le personnage principal de la série, est faite afin de mieux comprendre l'impact de la transformation spirituelle du protagoniste sur l'ensemble de l'oeuvre de Rice. Dans The Vampire Lestat, le rejet de toute forme de croyances religieuses de la part de Lestat ainsi que la déconstruction et l'érotisation de rituels religieux traditionnels reflètent l'influence de l'athéisme. Memnoch the Devil représente la transition entre le refus de croire de Lestat et son retour subséquent à la religion catholique. Finalement, Blood Canticle symbolise le retour vers la foi du protagoniste et de l'auteur, en plus de marquer la fin des Chroniques de vampires de Rice. L'analyse s'inspire d'éléments biographiques afin de démontrer l'importance de la religion dans les récits de Rice, sans toutefois considérer ses romans comme des autobiographies.

Thumb-bangers : exploring the cultural bond between video games and heavy metal

« Heavy Metal Generations » is the fourth volume in the series of papers drawn from the 2012 Music, Metal and Politics international conference (http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/publishing/product/heavy-metal-generations/).

High Selectivity Filter Employing Stepped Impedance Resonators, Series Capacitors and Defected Ground Structures for Ultra Wide Band Applications

The paper presents a compact planar Ultra Wide Band ¯lter employing folded stepped impedance resonators with series capacitors and dumb bell shaped defected ground structures. An interdigital quarter wavelength coupled line is used for achieving the band pass characteristics. The transmission zeros are produced by stepped impedance resonators. The ¯lter has steep roll o® rate and good attenuation in its lower and upper stop bands, contributed by the series capacitor and defected ground structures respectively.

Macrobenthos And Its Relation To Ecosystem Dynamics In The Cochin Estuary

Cochin estuary is a shallow brackish water body situated on the south west coast of India. It is a tropical positive estuary extending between 90 40’ and 100 12’ N and 760 10’and 760 30’ E with its northern boundary at Azhikode and southern boundary at Thannermukkom bund.The abundance of benthic fauna in an ecosystem shows the close relationship to its environment and reflects the characteristics of an ecological niche. Seasonal and monthly variations in the distribution of macrobenthos in relation to sediment characteristics were conducted in Cochin estuary from 2009-10 periods. Oxidation-reduction potential showed reducing trends that affected the distribution and diversity of fauna. Seasonal variations in water quality and river discharge pattern affected the faunal composition in the different stations. Sewage mixing was the principal source of organic pollution in the Cochin estuary. The sediment pH was generally on the alkaline side ranging from 4.99 at St.9 and 8.33 at St.1.The Eh ranged from -11mV at St.3 to -625mV at St.2.The temperature varied from 260C to 320C in the estuary. The moisture content ranged from 1.63 to 12.155%, that of organic carbon from 0 09 at St. 6 to 4.29% at St.9 and that of organic matter from 0.16 to 7.39%. Seasonally, the average of Eh was highest during the monsoon (156.22 mV) and in the pre monsoon (140.94 mV). The average pH for the 9 study stations was 7.68 during monsoon period and 7.08 during post monsoon. Based on group wise seasonal analysis, the average mean abundance was maximum for polychaetes (43.47) followed by nematodes (33.62), crustaceans (21.62), molluscs (11.94) and Pisces (0.05) in the estuary. Monsoon season was most favourable for benthic faunal abundance followed by the post monsoon period in the study. The series of human interventions like dredging, discharge of industrial effluents, urbanisation and related aspects had a strong influence on the distribution, abundance of benthic macrofauna in the wetland.

Researching and designing GREAT; the extremely condensed hybrid urban block

The fact that the hybrid building is an extremely condensed urban block which increases the city’s density and contributes to the public realm of the city – horizontally as well vertically - forms one of the key interests of this documentation, research and master studio work. The “ground scraper” is not only public because of the character of its plinth facing surrounding streets, but also in regard to its interior space that is partly accessible to public. As such the European hybrid building potentially extends the city’s public domain horizontally and vertically into the building’s interior and links the public domain inside and outside. Notwithstanding, the hybrid building due to its specific and unconventional character represents a truly urban architecture that was unfortunately often rejected in the name of ‘purity’ of form and function during the twentieth century. Or with other words, its rejection demonstrates the domination of the building’s plan opposed to the section. Today, new frameworks for the city, like the “compact city,” ask for innovative interpretations and designs of building types, worthy to be investigated and proposed. The architectural type of the hybrid building, (re)defines and expresses the relation between architecture and the city in a specific manner. To begin with, the city of Rotterdam forms the first test-case of the Hybrid’s project to document and discuss statements, such as “the hybrid building has a long- standing tradition within this ‘modern city”, “it is a machine for urbanity,” “it enlarges the city,” “it innovates because of its ambitiousness but also because of necessity,” “it combines to activate,” “it asks for extraordinary design intelligence and craftsmanship.” A special way of drawing is developed to document, analyse and compare historical and contemporary representatives of the species. The method includes panoply of scales ranging from the morphological arrangement on the scale of the city, the typologies of stacking diverse programs to the architectural features that establish the mutual relationship between the public space of the city and the interior of the building. Basically the features analysed within the series of drawings are also constitutional for (the success of) every future hybrid building.

Rational modification of the hierarchy of intermolecular interactions in molecular crystal structures by using tunable halogen bonds

A family of 16 isomolecular salts (3-XpyH)(2)[MX'(4)] (3-XpyH=3-halopyridinium; M=Co, Zn; X=(F), Cl, Br, (I); X'=Cl, Br, I) each containing rigid organic cations and tetrahedral halometallate anions has been prepared and characterized by X-ray single crystal and/or powder diffraction. Their crystal structures reflect the competition and cooperation between non-covalent interactions: N-H center dot center dot center dot X'-M hydrogen bonds, C-X center dot center dot center dot X'-M halogen bonds and pi-pi stacking. The latter are essentially unchanged in strength across the series, but both halogen bonds and hydrogen bonds are modified in strength upon changing the halogens involved. Changing the organic halogen (X) from F to I strengthens the C-X center dot center dot center dot X'-M halogen bonds, whereas an analogous change of the inorganic halogen (X') weakens both halogen bonds and N-H center dot center dot center dot X'-M hydrogen bonds. By so tuning the strength of the putative halogen bonds from repulsive to weak to moderately strong attractive interactions, the hierarchy of the interactions has been modified rationally leading to systematic changes in crystal packing. Three classes of crystal structure are obtained. In type A (C-F center dot center dot center dot X'-M) halogen bonds are absent. The structure is directed by N-H center dot center dot center dot X'-M hydrogen bonds and pi-stacking interactions. In type B structures, involving small organic halogens (X) and large inorganic halogens (X'), long (weak) C-X center dot center dot center dot X'-M interactions are observed with type I halogen-halogen interaction geometries (C-X center dot center dot center dot X' approximate to X center dot center dot center dot X'-M approximate to 155 degrees), but hydrogen bonds still dominate. Thus, minor but quite significant perturbations from the type A structure arise. In type C, involving larger organic halogens (X) and smaller inorganic halogens (X'), stronger halogen bonds are formed with a type II halogen-halogen interaction geometry (C-X center dot center dot center dot X' approximate to 180 degrees; X center dot center dot center dot X'-M approximate to 110 degrees) that is electrostatically attractive. The halogen bonds play a major role alongside hydrogen bonds in directing the type C structures, which as a result are quite different from type A and B.

Poly(ethylene glycol)-supported nitroxyls: branched catalysts for the selective oxidation of alcohols

Nitroxyl radicals such as 2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidine-1-oxyl (TEMPO) are highly selective oxidation catalysts for the conversion of primary alcohols into the corresponding aldehydes. In this study, direct tethering of TEMPO units onto linear poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) has afforded macromolecular catalysts that exhibit solubility in both aqueous and organic solvents. Recovery of the dissolved polymer-supported catalyst has been carried out by precipitation with a suitable solvent such as diethyl ether. The high catalyst activities and selectivities associated traditionally with nitroxyl-mediated oxidations of alcohols are retained by the series of "linker-less" linear PEG-TEMPO catalysts in which the TEMPO moiety is coupled directly to the PEG support. Although the selectivity remains unaltered, upon recycling of the linker-less polymer-supported catalysts, extended reaction times are required to maintain high yields of the desired carbonyl compounds. Alternatively, attachment of two nitroxyl radicals onto each functionalized PEG chain terminus via a 5-hydroxyisophthalic acid linker affords branched polymer-supported catalysts. In stark contrast to the linker-less catalysts, these branched nitroxyls exhibit catalytic activities up to five times greater than 4-methoxy-TEMPO alone under similar conditions. In addition, minimal decrease in catalytic activity is observed upon recycling of these branched macromolecular catalysts via solvent-induced precipitation. The high catalytic activities and preservation of activity upon recycling of these branched systems is attributed to enhanced regeneration of the nitroxyl species as a result of intramolecular syn-proportionation.

UV absorption spectra of methyl-substituted hydroxy-cyclohexadienyl radicals in the gas phase

UV absorption spectra of five methyl-substituted hydroxy-cyclohexadienyl radicals, formed by the addition of the hydroxyl radical (OH) to toluene (methyl benzene), o-, m- and p-xylene (1,2-, 1,3- and 1,4-dimethyl benzene, respectively) and mesitylene (1,3,5-trimethylbenzene), have been determined at 298 K, 1 atm pressure (N-2 + O-2), and the corresponding absolute absorption cross-sections measured, using laser flash photolysis and time-resolved UV absorption detection. As observed for other cyclohexadienyl-type radicals, a strong absorption band is present in the 260-340 nm spectral region, with maximum cross-sections in the range (0.9-2.2) x 10(-17) cm(2) molecule(-1). The shape of the band varies significantly from one radical to the next for the series of aromatic precursors investigated. The nature and yields of hydroxylated ring-retaining oxidation products, identified in previous studies of the OH-initiated oxidation of aromatic hydrocarbons, and the results of theoretical density functional theory (DFT) calculations indicate that one or more possible isomers of the various OH-adducts may contribute to the observed spectra. Isomers where the OH-group is ortho- (or both ortho- and ipso-) to a substituent methyl-group are likely to be the most abundant but other isomers may also be formed to a significant extent. Nonetheless, the present study provides absorption spectra of the adduct radicals formed from the gas phase addition of OH to the aromatic hydrocarbons considered, near room temperature and I atm pressure. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Bayesian model averaging and identification of structural breaks in time series

Bayesian Model Averaging (BMA) is used for testing for multiple break points in univariate series using conjugate normal-gamma priors. This approach can test for the number of structural breaks and produce posterior probabilities for a break at each point in time. Results are averaged over specifications including: stationary; stationary around trend and unit root models, each containing different types and number of breaks and different lag lengths. The procedures are used to test for structural breaks on 14 annual macroeconomic series and 11 natural resource price series. The results indicate that there are structural breaks in all of the natural resource series and most of the macroeconomic series. Many of the series had multiple breaks. Our findings regarding the existence of unit roots, having allowed for structural breaks in the data, are largely consistent with previous work.

The Biosynthesis of Artemisinin (Qinghaosu) and the Phytochemistry of Artemisia annua L. (Qinghao)

The Chinese medicinal plant Artemisia annua L. (Qinghao) is the only known source of the sesquiterpene artemisinin (Qinghaosu), which is used in the treatment of malaria. Artemisinin is a highly oxygenated sesquiterpene, containing a unique 1,2,4-trioxane ring structure, which is responsible for the antimalarial activity of this natural product. The phytochemistry of A. annua is dominated by both sesquiterpenoids and flavonoids, as is the case for many other plants in the Asteraceae family. However, A. annua is distinguished from the other members of the family both by the very large number of natural products which have been characterised to date (almost six hundred in total, including around fifty amorphane and cadinane sesquiterpenes), and by the highly oxygenated nature of many of the terpenoidal secondary metabolites. In addition, this species also contains an unusually large number of terpene allylic hydroperoxides and endoperoxides. This observation forms the basis of a proposal that the biogenesis of many of the highly oxygenated terpene metabolites from A. annua - including artemisinin itself may proceed by spontaneous oxidation reactions of terpene precursors, which involve these highly reactive allyllic hydroperoxides as intermediates. Although several studies of the biosynthesis of artemisinin have been reported in the literature from the 1980s and early 1990s, the collective results from these studies were rather confusing because they implied that an unfeasibly large number of different sesquiterpenes could all function as direct precursors to artemisinin (and some of the experiments also appeared to contradict one another). As a result, the complete biosynthetic pathway to artemisinin could not be stated conclusively at the time. Fortunately, studies which have been published in the last decade are now providing a clearer picture of the biosynthetic pathways in A. annua. By synthesising some of the sesquiterpene natural products which have been proposed as biogenetic precursors to artemisinin in such a way that they incorporate a stable isotopic label, and then feeding these precursors to intact A. annua plants, it has now been possible to demonstrate that dihydroartemisinic acid is a late-stage precursor to artemisinin and that the closely related secondary metabolite, artemisinic acid, is not (this approach differs from all the previous studies, which used radio-isotopically labelled precursors that were fed to a plant homogenate or a cell-free preparation). Quite remarkably, feeding experiments with labeled dihydroartemisinic acid and artemisinic acid have resulted in incorporation of label into roughly half of all the amorphane and cadinane sesquiterpenes which were already known from phytochemical studies of A. annua. These findings strongly support the hypothesis that many of the highly oxygenated sesquiterpenoids from this species arise by oxidation reactions involving allylic hydroperoxides, which seem to be such a defining feature of the chemistry of A. annua. In the particular case of artemisinin, these in vivo results are also supported by in vitro studies, demonstrating explicitly that the biosynthesis of artemisinin proceeds via the tertiary allylic hydroperoxide, which is derived from oxidation of dihydroartemisinic acid. There is some evidence that the autoxidation of dihydroartemisinic acid to this tertiary allylic hydroperoxide is a non-enzymatic process within the plant, requiring only the presence of light; and, furthermore, that the series of spontaneous rearrangement reactions which then convert thi allylic hydroperoxide to the 1,2,4-trioxane ring of artemisinin are also non-enzymatic in nature.

‘Anything can happen in the next half-hour’: Gerry Anderson’s transnational science fiction

Gerry Anderson’s 1960s puppet series have hybrid identities in relation to their medial, geographical, and production histories. This chapter ranges over his science fiction series from Supercar (1961) to Joe 90 (1968), arguing that Anderson’s television science fiction in that period crossed many kinds of boundary and border. Anderson’s television series were a compromise between his desire to make films for adults versus an available market for children’s television puppet programs, and aimed to appeal to a cross-generational family audience. They were made on film, using novel effects, for a UK television production culture that still relied largely on live and videotaped production. While commissioned by British ITV companies, the programs had notable success in the USA, achieving national networked screening as well as syndication, and they were designed to be transatlantic products. The transnational hero teams and security organisations featured in the series supported this internationalism, and simultaneously negotiated between the cultural meanings of Britishness and Americanness. By discussing their means of production, the aesthetic and narrative features of the programs, their institutional contexts, and their international distribution, this chapter argues that Anderson’s series suggest ways of rethinking the boundaries of British science fiction television in the 1960s.