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Vision and monstrous knights in Sir Thomas Malory's Morte darthur
No full textThis thesis aims to explore and expand on the definition of knighthood as set out in Sir Thomas Malory's Morte Darthurthrough theories of vision and monstrosity. The connections established between monstrosity and knighthood are contrasted with an system of reputation and prowess. Despite this established
chivalric structure, renowned knights such as Balin, Gareth, and Lancelot also problematize the concepts of reputation and honour that knighthood is based upon. Deviant behaviour on part of these Arthurian knights offers a nuanced way in which knighthood can be read in the Morte Darthur, as ultimately, a successful knight must balance a kind of monstrosity in order to attain such statu
Freedom from want and fear: revisiting Franklin Delano Roosevelt's second Bill of Rights from a Canadian perspective
No full textWhat does the entrenchment of a specific right into a constitution do that political leadership and willpower cannot? This thesis examines President Franklin D. Roosevelt's proposal to constitutionally entrench social and economic rights with a second Bill of Rights in the U.S. — the bill's influences, history, conceptualization, and broader connection with the patterns of financial deregulation, government rollback, and economic deprivation that prefaced the Great Depression and the promise of a New Deal. While popular politicians and personalities in Canada and the U.S. have revived calls for a "Second Bill of Rights" or a "New Deal," this thesis draws important lessons from analogous Canadian and American experiences with constitutional reform to advance a new plan to entrench socio-economic rights in Canada that overcomes institutional and constitutional challenges to structural economic change. This thesis also discusses what role the judiciary should play in the entrenchment and enforcement of socio-economic rights
The great Canadian Green Crab Hunt: an evaluation of an experiential environmental education program for high school students
No full textExperiential environmental education can be valuable in helping youth to develop environmental appreciation, action competence and environmental stewardship. Kejimkujik National Park Seaside created a program for high school classes that uses citizen science to foster awareness of the importance of conservation and youth environmental stewardship. This case study utilized observations, semi-structured interviews with teachers, students and program staff and a knowledge questionnaire and environmental attitudes survey of students to evaluate the program. Results indicate that the program enhanced cognitive knowledge and motivated students to make a difference but did not facilitate environmental stewardship. Significant program and external barriers were identified, based on the Positive Environmental Action Model, as reasons the program did not foster environmental stewardship. Program improvements including more experiential activities during the post-trip visit and developing opportunities with community organizations are discussed as ways to lessen barriers that prevent the transformation of student motivation into action
Let's be civil: the ambivalences of civility in novels by L.M. Montgomery, Sara Jeannette Duncan, and Nellie McClung
No full textThis thesis demonstrates that early twentieth-century Canadian novels by women authors normalize civility as a set of characteristics exclusive to white subjects. Daniel Coleman's and Sunera Thobani's respective works on the construction of Canada's national identity reveal that compassion, politeness, and caring for others are the characteristics used to limit that identity to white English Canadian subjects. Coleman's literary study, however, underrepresents the significant role of women authors and their women characters in the normalization of whiteness as a necessary component of the civil subject. Expanding on Coleman and Thobani, this thesis examines five novels written by women–L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables (1908) and Rilla of Ingleside (1919), Sara Jeannette Duncan's The Imperialist (1904) and Cousin Cinderella (1908), and Nellie McClung's Painted Fires (1925). These novels represent women characters as crucial to standardising a model of civility that excludes non-white and non-British subjects from Canada. Chapter One lays a theoretical framework to understand the literary project of civility. Chapter Two examines women's role as caretakers in insular communities limited to white subjects in
Montgomery's novels. Further, Chapter Three analyzes the role women play in the trans-national relationship between Canada and Britainin Duncan's novels. Finally, Chapter Four demonstrates that McClung's novel contrasts Montgomery's and Duncan's models of civility by characterizing a white non-British woman as the guardian of Canadian civility. Ultimately, this thesis establishes that popular early twentieth-century women authors problematically normalize a construct of civility in the Canadian national consciousness that grants implicit privileges to white subjects
Determination of antibacterial activity and phytochemical screening of wild and ornamental flowers of Ixora coccinea
No full textIxora coccinea is a small plant, most commonly used in Sri Lankan traditional medicine for the treatment of skin disease, eye disease, leucorrhoea, candida infection and, whooping cough. The flowers of two variety of the plant namely: wild and ornamental were extracted with high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) graded methanol by maceration method and soxhlet apparatus. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis was used to analyze bioactive compounds present in the crude extract of I. coccinea wild and ornamental flowers. The parameters of mass spectral analysis namely: retention time and characteristics of the peak using the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) library were considered for the detection of compounds. The agar disc diffusion method was used for the analysis of the antibacterial activity of methanol extract of I. coccinea. The micro-organisms used for the bioassay included Staphylococcus sp. and Bacillus sp. (Gram-positive), and Escherichia coli and Proteus
sp. (Gram-negative). The major compounds present in the wild crude extract were 4-hydroxypyridine 1-oxide (23.124%), hexanedioic acid, bis (2-ethyl-hexyl) ester (12.022%) and succinic acid, di (3,5-dimethylcyclohexyl) ester (8.940%). The ornamental crude extract had cyclohexasiloxane dodecamethyl (28.015%), octacosane (24.274%), cycloneptasiloxane tetradecamethyl (16.361%) and 1,2-benzenedicarboxylic acid, mono (2-ethylhexy) ester (11.854%) as the major compounds. Both wild and ornamental I. coccinea showed potent antibacterial activity. The ornamental I. coccinea
extract was most effective against E.coli and Bacillus sp. and showed minimum antibacterial activity against Staphylococcus sp. and Proteus sp. whereas, the wild crude extract was effective for all four bacterial species with a maximum antibacterial activity against E. coli. The presence of alkaloids, glycosides, tannins, flavonoids, steroids, and carbohydrates was observed in the flower extract of I. coccinea
Investigating the feasibility of the Canadian assessment of physical literacy for children with disabilities
No full textOnly nine percent of Canadian youth are currently meeting the recommended 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity per day. This number only drops for children with disabilities due to their predisposed difficulties with motor skills and coordination. This study sought out to determine the feasibility of the Canadian Assessment of Physical Literacy (CAPL) for children with disabilities. Eleven participants with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Down Syndrome (DS) and Global Developmental Delay (GDD) underwent the CAPL testing alongside two typically developing participants. The participants completed the Progressive Aerobic Cardiovascular Endurance Run, the Canadian Agility and Movement Skill Assessment and the plank assessment of torso strength in order to determine their physical competence domain score. A qualitative case study approach was utilized to conduct a thematic analysis which highlighted themes within the data. These included adaptations that could be made to the CAPL protocol based on the considerations of Cairney et al.'s (2019) holistic approach to physical literacy in the cognitive, affective and physical domains. More specifically, the results showed that all participants who had their domain score calculated were
placed in the beginning category based on the CAPL standards. It also showed that the participants with disabilities had difficulties concentrating on multi step instructions, the DS group displayed hypotonia on the sit and reach task, the participants had difficulties withthe timing factor of the tasks and that the CAPL testing protocol did not fulfill their three innate psychological needs which in turn impacted their engagement in the tasks. Given these results, it can be suggested that adaptations should be made to the protocol to individualize the testing procedure to allow each child to experience success. In conclusion, this study determined that physical literacy testing is feasible for children with varying disabilities when modifications are in place to meet their unique needs
Affectionate touch and attachment styles, by relationship type and context
No full textAttachment styles (i.e., affectionate relational bonds) are linked with affectionate touch use, such that avoidantly attached adults (i.e., adults who are uncomfortable with relational closeness) use affectionate touch minimally and the link between attachment avoidance and relational, physical, and psychological well-being, is often negative. However, other research suggests that avoidantly attached adults may benefit from affectionate touch if it is received. Since most previous research has failed to assess different components of affectionate touch, the present thesis analyzed whether avoidant attachment predicts desire for, comfort with , and frequency of affectionate touch between romantic partners, and investigated whether attachment avoidance serves as a moderator in the relationships between affectionate touch and well-being. To investigate these associations, 1606 participants were recruited to complete an online survey, wherein they reported on their attachment style and use of affectionate touch with their romantic
partner. Multi-level modelling and regression were used for data analysis, with context (public/private) and relationship type (mixed/same-sex/gender-diverse) serving as further moderators.
As predicted, attachment avoidance was significantly associated with lesser desire, comfort, and frequency of touch, with context and relationship types serving as moderators in some analyses. Furthermore, frequency of affectionate touch was positively associated with relational well-being and was moderated by attachment avoidance, but was not significantly associated with physical or psychological well-being.
Interestingly, relationship type did not interact with attachment avoidance, which suggests that the role of attachment avoidance does not differ between relationships
Abundance of North American large raspberry aphid (Amphorophora agathonica) and concurrent virus load in raspberry fields in the Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia
No full textIn this study, I investigated the abundance of the North American large raspberry aphid Amphorophora agathonica Hottes (Hemiptera: Aphididae) in the Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia. Amphorophora agathonica is an important vector of two plant viruses (Rubus yellow-net virus and Raspberry leaf-mottle virus). The partnership with APM Agricultural Pest Monitoring Consulting Ltd. located in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, provided access to three test fields with four collection sites: commercial raspberry plantings (including a site along the edge of the field), wild raspberry plantings, and wild blackberry plantings. This study collected aphid samples using two collection practices common to Integrated Pest Management (IPM), visual sampling and pan trapping. Our study also evaluated virus presence from wild and conventional raspberry and blackberry leaf samples to diagnose virus presence. In doing so, our study found more virus in wild raspberry and blackberry plantings than conventional raspberry plantings. Suggesting that wild raspberry plants can act as reservoirs for these viruses, ultimately augmenting the abundance of A. agathonica along the edge of the conventional raspberry fields.</p
Total variation denoising of diffusion MRI images using a modified monge-kantorovich norm
No full textEfficient methods for denoising various forms of data are contantly evolving and are crucial in fields like medical imaging where even small amounts of noise can affect a doctor's diagnosis. It has been proposed in a 2016 paper (D. La Torre et al) that using the Monge-Kantorovich metric, along with total variation and regularization, one could create an effective and hopefully efficient method for denoising diffusion MRI images. In this thesis this aforementioned method for denoising will be discussed as well as the advantages of a Monge-Kantorovich style norm versus a Euclidean or other type of norm. Finally the effectiveness of a python-based implementation that was created summer 2019 will be discussed as a measure of the efficiency of the algorithm.</p
Cyberbullying, social media, and Nova Scotia's intimate images and Cyber-protection Act: a discourse analysis
No full textThe purpose of this study is to examine the extent of cyberbullying online, to tease out the larger environment in which cyberbullying occurs, and to add to the parameters of routine activity theory (RAT). Through the lens of RAT, I examine cyberbullying and the larger environment in which it occurs. Whisper, an online social media platform, is used to conduct the analysis.
Forty-five posts, twenty-six threads, including one hundred fifty-two replies provide the data from which a discourse analysis is conducted. The results depict a hostile online environment in which cyberbullying behaviours emerge. The dominant discourse surrounding cyberbullying pertains to its dismissal, rejection and resistance as an important phenomenon. Those discussants who have established authority in the
contentious Whisper environment frequently encourage self-harm, reject, diminish, and minimize the experience and views of others who do not fit within the framework of that environment, thus limiting discursive space on the forum