Reading Readings: An Approach to the Relationship between Television and Literature at School

The main problem addressed by this research was that of what are the relations between TV viewing at home and studying literature at school, and how an adequate position on this can be reached. As well as the theoretical background, it involved an experimental study with classes of second and sixth grade students, discussing and observing their reactions to and interpretations of a number of animated cartoons. The work is divided into four parts - Is there a Class in this Text?, Stories of Reading, Narratives of Animation and Animation of Narratives, and The (Three) Unrepeatable (Pigs). Beginning, Middle End - which examine the tensions between the "undiscriminating sequence" of the televisual flow and a way of "thinking", "making" and "doing" education that presupposes a fundamental belief in possible re-productions, copies unescaping, following the original, or competing. The work focuses on animated cartoons, seeing them not merely as a part of the flow of television, but as an allegory of reading this flow, of the flow within the flow itself. What they question - "identity", "end", "followability" - is what is most important to teaching. Thus the interest in the metamorphoses of animated films is an interest in the tensions which their "strange law/flow" introduces into the field of teaching - this totally forbidden place of saying everything.

Modeling of temperature and turbidity in a natural lake and a reservoir connected by pumped-storage operations

Pumped-storage (PS) systems are used to store electric energy as potential energy for release during peak demand. We investigate the impacts of a planned 1000 MW PS scheme connecting Lago Bianco with Lago di Poschiavo (Switzerland) on temperature and particle mass concentration in both basins. The upper (turbid) basin is a reservoir receiving large amounts of fine particles from the partially glaciated watershed, while the lower basin is a much clearer natural lake. Stratification, temperature and particle concentrations in the two basins were simulated with and without PS for four different hydrological conditions and 27 years of meteorological forcing using the software CE-QUAL-W2. The simulations showed that the PS operations lead to an increase in temperature in both basins during most of the year. The increase is most pronounced (up to 4°C) in the upper hypolimnion of the natural lake toward the end of summer stratification and is partially due to frictional losses in the penstocks, pumps and turbines. The remainder of the warming is from intense coupling to the atmosphere while water resides in the shallower upper reservoir. These impacts are most pronounced during warm and dry years, when the upper reservoir is strongly heated and the effects are least concealed by floods. The exchange of water between the two basins relocates particles from the upper reservoir to the lower lake, where they accumulate during summer in the upper hypolimnion (10 to 20 mg L−1) but also to some extent decrease light availability in the trophic surface layer.

Educational Television Broadcasting in Germany: Prevailing Practices, Existing Challenges and Adoptable Policies

Television is widely used for educational purposes but has still not achieved its fullest potential neither in developed nor in developing countries. This worldwide under performance invite experts and academics to join hands to search causes and provide suggestions to make television a better and popular learning tool. Guided by this philosophy, the present paper analyzes the educational television broadcasting in Germany from different perspectives. The focus of analysis includes measures and practices adopted by German institutions/broadcasters to promote educational television. Besides dealing with these issues, the paper discusses existing challenges and suggests best adoptable educational television broadcasting polices from Germany to promote educational television in global perspectives.

Television viewing, C-reactive protein, and depressive symptoms in older adults

There is emerging evidence for a link between sedentary behavior and mental health, although the mechanisms remain unknown. We tested if an underlying inflammatory process explains the association between sedentary behavior and depressive symptoms. We conducted a two year follow-up of 4964 (aged 64.5 ± 8.9 years) men and women from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, a cohort of community dwelling older adults. Self-reported TV viewing time was assessed at baseline as a marker of leisure time sedentary behavior. The eight-item Centre of Epidemiological Studies Depression (CES-D) scale was administered to measure depressive symptoms at follow-up. At baseline, TV time was associated with C-reactive protein (CRP), adjusted geometric mean CRP values were 2.94 mg/L (<2 h/d TV); 3.04 mg/L (2–4 h/d TV); 3.29 mg/L (4–6 h/d TV); 3.23 mg/L (>6 h/d TV). We observed both a direct association of TV time on CES-D score at follow-up (B = 0.08, 95% CI, 0.05, 0.10) and indirect effects (B = 0.07, 95% CI, 0.05, 0.08). The indirect effects were largely explained through lack of physical activity, smoking, and alcohol, but not by CRP or body mass index.

Saturday Morning Television Advertisements Aired on English and Spanish Language Networks along the Texas-Mexico Border

Objectives: The aim of this content analysis study is to characterize the TV advertisements aired to an at-risk child population along the Texas-Mexico border. Methods: We characterized the early Saturday morning TV advertisements aired by three broadcast network categories (U.S. English language, U.S. Spanish language, and Mexican Spanish language) in Spring 2010. The number, type (food related vs. non-food related), target audience, and persuasion tactics used were recorded. Advertised foods, based on nutrition content, were categorized as meeting or not meeting current dietary guidelines. Results: Most commercials were non-food related (82.7%, 397 of 480). The majority of the prepared foods (e.g., cereals, snacks, and drinks) advertised did not meet the current U.S. Dietary Guidelines. Additionally, nutrition content information was not available for many of the foods advertised on the Mexican Spanish language broadcast network category. Conclusions: For U.S. children at risk for obesity along the Texas-Mexico border exposure to TV food advertisements may result in the continuation of sedentary behavior as well as an increased consumption of foods of poor nutritional quality. An international regulatory effort to monitor and enforce the reduction of child-oriented food advertising is needed. Editors' Note: This article was submitted in response to the first issue of the Journal of Applied Research on Children: Latino Children.

The New Audiovisual Media Services Directive : Television without Frontiers, Television without Cultural Diversity

After long deliberations, the European Community (EC) has completed the reform of its audiovisual media regulation. The paper examines the main tenets of this reform with particular focus on its implications for the diversity of cultural expressions in the European media landscape. It also takes into account the changed patterns of consumer and business behaviour due to the advances in digital media and their wider spread in society. The paper criticises the somewhat unimaginative approach of the EC to new media and the political (and at times protectionist) considerations behind some of the Directive's provisions.

The Reform of the EC Audiovisual Media Regulation : Television Without Cultural Diversity

In the profoundly changing and dynamic world of contemporary audiovisual media, what has remained surprisingly unaffected is regulation. In the European Union, the new Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMS), proposed by the European Commission on December 13, 2005, should allegedly rectify this situation. Amending the existing Television without Frontiers Directive, it should offer a fresh approach and meet the challenge of appropriately regulating media in a complex environment. It is meant to achieve a balance between the free circulation of TV broadcast and new audiovisual media and the preservation of values of cultural identity and diversity, while respecting the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality inherent to the Community. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether and how the changes envisaged to the EC audiovisual media regime might influence cultural diversity in Europe. It addresses subsequently the question of whether the new AVMS properly safeguards the balance between competition and the public interest in this regard, or whether cultural diversity remains a mere political banner.

Rezension zu: Irini Katsirea, Public Broadcasting and European Law

Public broadcasting has always been a regulatory field somewhat zealously guarded within the nation states' sphere and kept willingly untouched by regional or international rules. Values inherent to the role of public broadcasting, such as cultural and national identity, social cohesion, pluralism and a sustained public sphere, were thought too critical and too historically connected with the particular society to allow any "outside" influence. Different regulatory models have emerged to reflect these specificities within the national boundaries of European countries. Yet, as media evolved technologically and economically, the constraints of state borders were rendered obsolete and the inner tension between culture and commerce of the television medium became more pronounced. This tension was only intensified with the formulation of a European Community (EC) layer of regulation, which had as its primary objective the creation of a single market for audiovisual services (or as the EC Directive beautifully put it, a "Television without Frontiers"), while also including some provisions catering for cultural concerns, such as the infamous quota system for European and independent productions. Against this backdrop, public broadcasting makes a particularly intriguing subject for a study of regulatory dilemmas of national versus supranational, integration versus intergovernmentalism, culture versus commerce, intervention versus liberalisation, and all this in the dynamic setting of contemporary media. The present paper reviews Irini Katsirea's book PUBLIC BROADCASTING AND EUROPEAN LAW and seeks to identify whether all elements of the complex governance puzzle of European public service broadcasting rules are analytically well fitted together.

Sticking to Syntax: The Reflection of Story Grammar in Children's and Adult's Recall of Radio and Television Shows

Two studies were conducted to determine how well story grammar predicted recall of televised stories. In Experiment 1, preschoolers viewed a non-narrated televised story from "Sesame Street." In Experiment 2, preschoolers and adults were administered a narrative via television or radio. In both studies, subjects' retention reflected recall of nodal information, regardless of medium of input.