Ying Chen and the ‘‘Non-Lieu’’

The French-language prose works of Ying Chen re-examine the idea of absolute cultural cores of being and belonging which has traditionally been associated with Chinese overseas literature. Her concept of identity, constantly in the process of becoming, can be understood through the various ways in which her own, and her characters', ‘between-world’ consciousness is expressed, namely through the portrayal of migration, the metaphors of shores and bridges, the themes of attachment and detachment, and the discussion of physical displacement and inner exile. The author's theories on literary language, too, focus on in-between spaces, such as that between the real and the probable.

Bereavement needs assessment in specialist palliative care: A review of the literature

Bereavement needs assessment for specialist palliative care services has been highlighted as important by NICE guidance on palliative care for adults with cancer. Identifying and implementing appropriate bereavement measurement tools has remained a challenge. This paper identifies and reviews bereavement measurement tools to determine their suitability for use within bereavement services and hospice settings. Cochrane, MEDLINE, PsycINFO and CINAHL, electronic databases were searched, yielding 486 papers. From fifty-nine full text papers appraised, 10 measurement tools were analysed in detail. Some tools had been tested on specific populations which limited transferability to specialist palliative care settings; some lacked adequate theoretical links and were not effective in discriminating between normal and complicated grief reactions; and some lacked clear evidence of validity or reliability. Based on these criteria, conclusions are drawn about the suitability of particular tools for UK bereavement services and hospice settings where intervention is delivered by both trained professionals and volunteers.

Desmoplastic Small Round Cell Tumor of Major Salivary Glands: Report of 1 Case and a Review of the Literature

Desmoplastic small round cell tumor is a rare malignant neoplasm mostly occurring in the vicinity of or within the peritoneal cavity, and is uncommon in the head and neck region. Tumor location within a major salivary gland is exceptional. We report a case of a 41-year-old Chinese man with a history of diabetes mellitus and end-stage renal failure on peritoneal dialysis with a desmoplastic small round cell tumor occurring in the left submandibular gland. Fine-needle aspiration cytology showed variably cohesive clusters of small cells with hyperchromatic nuclei and fine granular chromatin. On histology the neoplasm displayed classic features of a desmoplastic small round cell tumor with angulated nests of small round blue cells in a fibromyxoid/desmoplastic stroma. Neoplastic cells were immunoreactive for cytokeratins (AE1/3), desmin (paranuclear dot-like), WT-1 (nuclear), epithelial membrane antigen, and CD56. EWS gene translocation and EWS-WT1 gene fusion were detected by fluorescence in situ hybridization and reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction, respectively. The case presented is the sixth case of and the oldest reported patient with a desmoplastic small round cell tumor occurring in a major salivary gland to date. Desmoplastic small round cell tumor should be considered in the differential diagnosis of a salivary gland neoplasm with a basaloid or small cell pattern on fine-needle aspiration cytology.

Accounting change: Explaining the outcomes, interpreting the process

Purpose: The issue of accounting change, why and how accounting evolves through time and within specific organisational settings, has been addressed by an important body of literature. This paper aims to explain why, in processes of accounting change, organisations confronting similar environmental pressures show different outcomes of change.

Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on archetype theory, the paper analyses the case of two Italian local governments. Comparative case studies were carried out, reconstructing a period of 15 years.

Findings: Although confronted with similar environmental pressures, the two cases show two different patterns of accounting change, where only one case is able to finally reach radical change. Accounting change can be prompted by external stimuli, but, once the change is prompted, the outcomes of the change are explained by the dynamics of intra-organisational conditions.

Originality/value: The study contributes to accounting change literature by adopting an approach (i.e. archetype theory) that overcomes some of the limitations of previous studies in explaining variations in organisational change. Through this, the authors are able to explain different outcomes and paces of accounting change and point out the intra-organisational factors also affecting them in the presence of similar environmental pressures. A specification of the theoretical framework in a particular setting is also provided.

AA and the Redeployment of Temperance Literature

This essay is an examination that, primarily comparativist in its approach, links publication materials from the temperance and Prohibition periods with the Big Book to show how AA's narrative antidotes to the traumas of modernity (sited in alcohol abuse) were as much the product of premodernist and turn-of-the-century hysteria as they were an attempt to write a new chapter in America's relationship with alcohol based on contemporary medical and social research.

Pastoral

This chapter argues that Milton’s Epitaphium Damonis, a neo-Latin pastoral lament on the death of Charles Diodati, is marked by the author's Petrarchan self-fashioning. This is achieved through intertextual engagement with Petrarch's Bucolicum Carmen (especially Ecls. 1 and 10). Milton as the wandering Thyrsis, undertaking a methaphorical and literal journey into the world of Italian humanism, appropriates and adapts the metaphorical departure from and return to a pastoral world now shattered by plague and death. Recourse to the quasi-Augustinian monasticism of Petrarchan neo-Latin pastoral facilitates the poem's crossing of a monastic limen via its subtle interaction with a hagiographic intertext, the Vita Sancti Deodati. Now pastoral saint and scholar become united in death and in subsequent apotheosis.