'I am, by God, fit for high positions' : on the political role of women in al-Andalus

Narrating and explaining the fairly emancipated women in al-Andalus has been fraught with ambiguity for the approximately one century of scholarship on the subject. There has been much stereotyping depending upon the investigator's particular perspective. This paper clarifies the roles of Andalusian women in political relations from the Muslim Conquest in 711 through the fall of Granada in 1492. The interpretations used in historiography pit a traditionalist trend, in which continuity from the pre 1slamic past is stressed, against the anti-continuist trend, in which an Oriental culture of the Muslims added the distinctive features of Iberian character today. In order to evaluate the two historiographic approaches, the contributions of seven prominent women are presented and evaluated for their social contexts during the eight centuries of al-Andalus. Comparisons are then made to prominent women in other political contexts within the Arab world in order to evaluate the strength of the two competing historiographic perspectives.

Active school playgrounds - myth or reality? Results of the "Move It Groove It" project

Background: School playgrounds during break times provide potential opportunities for children to be active during the school day. However, there is limited research on how active children really are during these breaks.

Methods: The CAST (Children's Activity Scanning Tool) instrument was developed, validated, and used to assess the percentages of children engaged in moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA) and vigorous physical activity (VPA—a subset of MVPA) in 18 primary schools (children ages 5–12) in rural Australia. Related environmental factors were also measured.

Results: For a school of median size (200 students), 51.4% of boys and 41.6% of girls were engaged in MVPA while 14.7% of boys and 9.4% of girls were engaged in VPA. Levels of engagement in MVPA and VPA were significantly higher during lunch periods than during recess. MVPA and VPA engagement in smaller schools was significantly higher than in larger schools.

Conclusions: With growing concern about children's physical activity (PA), school playgrounds offer an opportunity to increase children's MVPA engagement especially among girls. Consideration may be given to the lengthening of recess periods in order to increase PA levels. More research is needed to investigate factors affecting PA levels in larger schools.

Investigating health, economic and socio-political factors that need consideration when establishing Victorian Aboriginal land management projects

This article focuses on three Victorian Aboriginal¹ groups (Bangerang, Boonwurrung and Yorta Yorta) to explore elements that provide or discourage development of land management projects. Results from this small qualitative study show that a number of distinct health, socio-political and economic factors need to be considered when developing Aboriginal land management projects. This study indicates that a greater involvement in Aboriginal land management projects -- critical to Aboriginal peoples' health, economic and social structures - will only occur through increased community consultation, respect, training, consistency between all stakeholders involved, resources and the provision of employment opportunities. Further research is required to strengthen this evidence, allowing policy-makers to be progressive when developing land management projects for Aboriginal Victorian people as a health promoting tool.

Political patriotism

As evidenced by the reactions to Martha Nussbaum’s famous essay of 1996, patriotism is a contested notion in moral debate. This paper explores the suggestion made by Stephen Nathanson that patriotism might be understood as “love of one’s country”, and suggests that this phrase is misleading. It suggests that patriotism, like love, is not rational, and it fails to distinguish two kinds of object for that love: one’s cultural community and one’s political community. Accordingly, this phrase can lead to a kind of nationalism which involves chauvinism and militarism and that is, therefore, morally objectionable. The problem arises from ambiguities in the notion of “country” which is said to be the object of such love. Moreover, “love” is not the appropriate term for a relationship whose central psychological function is that of establishing an individual’s identity as a citizen. I suggest that the proper mode of attachment involved in patriotism is identification with one’s political community, and that the proper object of a patriot’s allegiance is the political community thought of without the emotional, nationalistic and moralistic connotations that often accompany the concept of community. The “political patriotism” that arises from such an attitude is sceptical of “the national interest” and does not accept that our moral responsibilities to others stop at national borders. In this way political patriotism is consistent with a cosmopolitan stance towards human rights and global justice.

Giorgio de Chirico and the idea of enigmatic imagery : the innocence of becoming

My paintings emerge from within a context best explained by reference to Nietzsche's perspectivism. That is an intellectual attitude that deprivileges rationalism and accommodates scepticism or unknowing as an acceptable starting point From this standpoint art/language can be seen as being in a state of becoming rather than as representing a state of being. This thesis aims to demonstrate, not only by a philosophical encounter with Giorgio de Chirico's work: ie. his use of myth, his Nietzschean perspectivism and his enigmatic interpretation of figuration, that the most helpful context and understanding of my work can be realied. De Chirico's art, like Nietzsche's philosophy seeks in its processes to explore the possible unity of Dionysian aesthetic force with the Apollonian. Neither Nietzsche nor de Chirico considered within a post-Socratic world that this unity was realizable. Nevertheless they both share in their respective art forms a need to represent the relentless struggle to enact the disjunction of the two aesthetic forces in a secular world. The artist’s enigmatic imagery is characterized by a consideration of appearance and reality and it is for this reason that the work was selected as a model for investigating the nature of enigma. His use of seemingly straightforward, ordinary images suggests a sense of accessibility, yet at the same time they are irreducible to knowing and my own image-making was greatly expanded by investigating these concerns. I am not arguing that de Chirico was influenced by Nietzsche but instead that Nietzsche's philosophical point of view and his use of poetic language to express these views lay in discovering the qualities and substance of the Dionysian spirit As well as working within a Nietzschean world-view set out in The Birth of Tragedy, de Chirico has also drawn on the Italian unification, specifically the Risorgimento and the lineage of these political and mythical figures were endemic to his art and they interface the with his use of the Apollonian-Dionysian disunity first explored by Nietzsche. The focus of the exegesis will be to present the poetic and philosophical use made of the latter in de Chirico’s art It is anticipated that this philosophical encounter with the aesthetic, social and political world of de Chirico will, not only assist in interpreting his life's work anew, but will also provide a context in which my paintings of enigma might be interpreted.

Mermaids and sirens as myth fragments in contemporary literature

This thesis examines three works: Margaret Atwood's The Robber Bride and Alias Grace, and Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus. All three novels feature female characters that contain elements or myth fragments of mermaids and sirens. The thesis asserts that the images of the mermaid and siren have undergone a gradual process of change, from literal mythical figures, to metaphorical images, and then to figures or myth fragments that reference the original mythical figures. The persistence of these female half-human images points to an underlying rationale that is independent of historical and cultural factors. Using feminist psychoanalytic theoretical frameworks, the thesis identifies the existence of the siren/mermaid myth fragments that are used as a means to construct the category of the 'bad' woman. It then identifies the function that these references serve in the narrative and in the broader context of both Victorian and contemporary societies. The thesis postulates the origin of the mermaid and siren myths as stemming from the ambivalent relationship that the male infant forms with the mother as he develops an identity as an individual. Finally, the thesis discusses the manner in which Atwood and Carter build on this foundation to deconstruct the binary oppositions that disadvantage women and to expand the category of female.

More than a mere story : social and political markers in Australian short fiction of the 1980's

This thesis is a literary history which argues that much of the short fiction published in Australia during the 1980s was deeply influenced by the rapid social and political changes during that decade. My argument concentrates on links between the short stones of the period and the socio/political environment into which they were written. The decade was marked by massive changes in technology, the workplace, and in all other areas of social life. In general terms, the ideology of the 'market' predominated over notions of small 'l' liberalism and the last vestiges of state intervention in the economy. The Australian short story benefited from the social 'experiments' of the 1970s in that its concerns became broader - encompassing the onslaught of feminism, the foregrounding of 'multicultural' concerns, and a move away from the bush into the city as a primary site for narratives. The decade was a rich period for the genre. Why was there a tolerance for a new diversity, in literary terms, when the social and political environment was turning to the right? This is a central question of the thesis. I argue that instead of the 'base' determining the 'superstructure' (i.e. culture) the superstructural changes were essential to the deconstruction of the social and political landscape. This thesis contends that a relationship always exists between the 'literary' and 'the social'. I argue, among other things, that many of the short fictions were influenced by 'postmodern' theory to the extent that they became a form of traumatic note-taking, which masked a late romanticism beneath a fear of the sovereign subject. The fear of 'closure' which insinuated itself into many of the texts, besides being a form of academic corrective, was also a flight from emotional candor. I argue that storytelling was, in many cases, the loser.

Still invisible : the myth of the woman-friendly state

Australian women faced the last two decades of the twentieth century, optimistic in their capacity to contribute positively to social change in the restructuring state. Encouraged by the relative euphoria of the late 1970s and early 1980s, women had a fleeting glimpse of the possibilities of woman-friendly legislation and feminist inspired government policy. What eventuated was the dismantling of supportive welfare structures, under the guise of economic rationalist state action, which undermined and eventually halted women’s economic and social advancement. This research project examines the impact of government policy on the welfare of Victorian women, through a feminist analysis of state and federal decision-making, framed in the context of case studies in the areas of employment, education and health. The promotion of ‘gender-neutral’ policy, by generally conservative bureaucracies, effectively exposes the mythical woman-friendly state. The implications do not auger well for Victorian women in the new millenium.

Creating the political will necessary for achieving multilateral disarmament : the need for a peace-industrial complex

This dissertation deals with the failure to end the central arms race and provides some alternative proposals. Chapters 1 and 2 look at the failure of governmental disarmament negotiations and the ineffectiveness of the non-governmental peace movement. Chapter 3 outlines the author's recommended comprehensive strategy for ending the arms race? both the need for the US to make a dramatic unilateral initiative to break the deadlock (Super GRIT) and a detailed disarmament treaty. The main problem, as argued by the author, is more one of political will and so it is necessary to find a way of creating the political will to stimulate the US to make that dramatic unilateral initiative. He calls for the creation of a Peace-Industrial Complex. The intellectual arguments for the potential basis of such a complex are to be found in the research done by the United Nations; this is examined throughout Part II (Chapters 4-7). Unfortunately very little attention has been paid by governments to this work. Part III (Chapters 8 and 9) deals in more detail with the recommended Peace-Industrial Complex. Chapter 8 looks at its possible creation and method of work. Chapter 9 suggests that the proposed complex creates a transcending vision: from ‘uclear winter’to ‘nuclear spring’.

Public space : its mythopoetic foundations and the limits of the law

Drawing on William Dawes' unpublished notebooks on the Indigenous languages spoken around Sydney Cove at the time of white settlement, this article hopes to provoke critical reflection on the limits of the law. Dawes' record of communication with Patyegarang documents a transaction that was both political and erotic, both about the law and in defiance of it. In performances that were gestural as well as verbal, they marked out a middle ground where the laws governing both of them were placed in parentheses and new, provisional, rules of exchange improvised. This article notices the existence of this middle ground, and marks its disappearance in subsequent legal discourse about the status of Indigenous people. Ultimately, it offers a reflection on the laws that govern the meeting place which the middle ground underwrites. That is, before public space became fixed for the legally binding discourse of politics, it was mobile and self-constituting. Is this simply a myth or is it a mythopoetic mechanism for rethinking the grounding of law in Australia? If it is the latter, then the next step will be to establish a middle ground of exchange with Indigenous law-giving systems.

Earthquake fatalities : the interaction of nature and political economy

To say that the level of fatalities resulting from an earthquake is inversely related to a country's per capita level of income is hardly novel. What makes our approach novel is that we relate fatalities to both per capita income and the level of inequality that exists within a country through their joint impact on the likelihood of collective action being taken to mitigate the destructive potential of quakes. We first develop a theoretical model which offers an explanation as to why, in some environments, different segments of society prove incapable of arriving at what all parties perceive to be an agreeable distribution of the burden of the necessary collective action, causing the relatively wealthy simply to self-insure against the disaster while leaving the relatively poor to its mercy. Following this, we test our theoretical model by evaluating 269 large earthquakes occurring worldwide, between 1960 and 2002, taking into account other factors that influence a quake's destructiveness such as its magnitude, depth and proximity to population centers. Using a Negative Binomial estimation strategy with both random and fixed estimators, we find strong evidence of the theoretical model's predictions. That is, while earthquakes themselves are natural phenomena beyond the reach of humankind, our collective inaction with respect to items like the creation and enforcement of building codes, failure to retrofit structures and to enact quake-sensitive zoning clearly plays a part in determining the actual toll that a given quake takes. And, it is through these and other examples of collective inaction that limited per capita income and inequality couple together with a given quake's natural destructive power in determining the actual fatalities resulting from a quake.

The halloween effect and Japanese equity prices : myth or exploitable anomaly

Bouman and Jacobsen (American Economic Review 92(5), 1618–1635, 2002) examine monthly stock returns for major world stock markets and conclude that returns are significantly lower during the May–October periods versus the November–April periods in 36 of 37 markets examined. They argue that, in general, the Halloween strategy outperforms the buy and hold strategy thereby casting doubt on the validity of the efficient market paradigm. More recently, Maberly and Pierce (Econ Journal Watch 1(1), 29–46, 2004) re-examine the evidence for U.S. equity prices and conclude that Bouman and Jacobsen’s results are not robust to alternative model specifications. Extending prior research, this paper examines the robustness of the Halloween strategy to alternative model specifications for Japanese equity prices. The Halloween effect is concentrated in the period prior to the introduction of Nikkei 225 index futures in September 1986. After the internationalization of Japanese financial markets in the mid-1980s, the Halloween effect disappears.