Affective and Experiential Influences on English Skills of Heritage Spanish Speakers

Gemstone Team GABS (Grammar Acquisition in Bilingual Students)

Placement of Small Vertical Axis Wind Turbine to Maximize Power Generation Influenced by Architectural and Geographic Interfaces in Urban Areas

Current methods for large-scale wind collection are unviable in urban areas. In order to investigate the feasibility of generating power from winds in these environments, we sought to optimize placements of small vertical-axis wind turbines in areas of artificially-generated winds. We explored both vehicular transportation and architecture as sources of artificial wind, using a combination of anemometer arrays, global positioning system (GPS), and weather report data. We determined that transportation-generated winds were not significant enough for turbine implementation. In addition, safety and administrative concerns restricted the implementation of said wind turbines along roadways for transportation-generated wind collection. Wind measurements from our architecture collection were applied in models that can help predict other similar areas with artificial wind, as well as the optimal placement of a wind turbine in those areas.

An architectural approach to autonomics and self-management of automotive embedded electronic systems

Embedded electronic systems in vehicles are of rapidly increasing commercial importance for the automotive industry. While current vehicular embedded systems are extremely limited and static, a more dynamic configurable system would greatly simplify the integration work and increase quality of vehicular systems. This brings in features like separation of concerns, customised software configuration for individual vehicles, seamless connectivity, and plug-and-play capability. Furthermore, such a system can also contribute to increased dependability and resource optimization due to its inherent ability to adjust itself dynamically to changes in software, hardware resources, and environment condition. This paper describes the architectural approach to achieving the goals of dynamically self-configuring automotive embedded electronic systems by the EU research project DySCAS. The architecture solution outlined in this paper captures the application and operational contexts, expected features, middleware services, functions and behaviours, as well as the basic mechanisms and technologies. The paper also covers the architecture conceptualization by presenting the rationale, concerning the architecture structuring, control principles, and deployment concept. In this paper, we also present the adopted architecture V&V strategy and discuss some open issues in regards to the industrial acceptance.

Heritage

This article examines the concepts, definitions, policies, and practices of heritage in a contemporary context. Within recent years, there have been significant shifts in our understandings and applications of heritage concepts and policies in the modern world. ‘Heritage’ emerged as a buzz word in international policy arenas in the 1980s and early 1990s, and has since weathered the vagaries of turbulent definitional and governance–nomenclature storms, as traditional debates about ‘what it is and what it is not’ reverberate around academia and state agencies alike. Policy and funding structures for heritage are determined by the classifications used to define them in various countries. Typically, reference is made to ‘built heritage’, ‘natural heritage’, and ‘intangible heritage’, loosely reflecting buildings, landscapes, and culture. Aspects of heritage are used by the cultural and tourism industries to add economic value, through heritage tourism sites, museums, and other activities. The cultural tourism product is often anchored around notions of heritage, and in postmodern, post-tourist societies, boundaries between culture, (travel) space, and identities are increasingly blurred. Issues of authenticity become important in the representation of heritage, and questions are asked about the validity of nostalgia versus realism. The role of heritage is examined in the context of identity formulation at individual and nation-state levels, and the political aspects of this are also discussed. Finally, heritage conservation is assessed through an examination of UNESCO’s World Heritage Site listing and protection strategy. In a changing world, new constructs of heritage, identity, authenticity, and representation will continue to emerge as meanings are constantly renegotiated over time and space.

Putting down routes: an examination of local government cultural policy shaping the development of heritage trails

This paper explores the significance of trails within local government cultural strategies by presenting the results of an audit of 1000 trails, content analysis of local cultural strategies and a series of interviews with local government cultural officers. It highlights the growing sophistication of trails as flexible and multi-faceted products promising an array of social, environmental, cultural and economic benefits. However, key issues emerge as challenges for local government cultural officers. These include the need for a realistic assessment of the relative importance of competing rationales, the design of methodologies to enable evidence-based policy making and more effective engagement with commercial organisations.

Fact, fiction and nostalgia: an assessment of heritage interpretation at living museums

This paper aims to explore and discuss the role of nostalgia (a concept that is inherently grounded within a psychological framework) in heritage interpretation from both provider and consumer perspectives. Whilst many cultural practitioners recognise the relationship between sentimentality and authenticity, particularly within a folk-heritage context, few have sought to examine the effect this has on the visitor experience. This paper questions visitors’ ability to objectively assess objects and experiences at heritage sites, and the role of practitioners in presenting often blurred views of social history that may sometimes negate historical fact. Drawing on case study research at two UK living museums, Blists Hill Victorian Town in Shropshire, England, and the Big Pit: National Coal Museum in Wales, notions of reminiscence, authenticity, myth and intangibility are considered within the framework of the interpretive experience. Findings suggest that the visitor experience is inherently subjective, highly individual and that the concept of intangibility is integral to an understanding of the nostalgia-authenticity debate.