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The Fear of Being Unknown: First World War Identification Discs in the Canadian War Museum’s Collection
Get PDFAbstract : The Canadian War Museum holds nearly 250 identification discs from Canadian soldiers and nurses of the First World War. Identification discs were objects of bureaucracy, designed to ensure accurate record keeping of the dead and their places of burial. But these discs were more than just an administrative tool, they represented the hopes and fears of soldiers and their loved ones—the hope of being identified in death and the fear of being one of the missing. Military authorities understood the importance of a known grave to soldiers and their families so burial policy evolved over the war to address these concerns. Although the conditions of the Western Front made the consistent application of policy difficult, the identification discs in the museum’s collection represent how military bureaucracy and individual soldiers adapted to life in the trenches.
Sommaire: Le Musée canadien de la guerre possède environ 250 plaques d’identité canadiennes ayant appartenu à des soldats et à des membres du personnel infirmier qui ont servi pendant la Première Guerre mondiale. Les plaques d’identité étaient des objets bureaucratiques qui permettaient d’identifier les militaires qui mouraient et de répertorier les endroits où se trouvaient leurs sépultures, contribuant ainsi à la bonne tenue des dossiers. Mais ces plaques étaient plus qu’un outil administratif, car elles représentaient les espoirs et les craintes des militaires et de leurs proches – l’espoir de l’identification en cas de décès et la crainte de figurer parmi les personnes disparues. Puisque les autorités militaires comprenaient l’importance d’une sépulture connue pour les militaires et leurs familles, la politique d’inhumation a évolué au cours de la guerre pour tenir compte de ces préoccupations. Bien que les conditions sur le front de l’Ouest aient rendu l’application de la politique difficile, les plaques d’identité dans la collection du Musée témoignent de l’adaptation de la bureaucratie militaire et de chaque militaire à la vie dans les tranchées
Review of “Dread Danger: Cowardice and Combat in the American Civil War” by Lesley J. Gordon and “Invisible Wounds: Mental Illness and Civil War Soldiers” by Dillon J. Carroll
Get PDFReview of Dread Danger: Cowardice and Combat in the American Civil War by Lesley J. Gordon and Invisible Wounds: Mental Illness and Civil War Soldiers by Dillon J. Carrol
Review of Graphic War Navy: The Secret Naval Drawings and Illustrations of World War II by Donald Nijboer
Get PDFReview of Graphic War Navy: The Secret Naval Drawings and Illustrations of World War II by Donald Nijboe
Unveiling Trauma and Seeking Justice: Exploring Mass Atrocities Against Tamils through the Lens of Religion, Culture, and Global Justice
Get PDFThis paper examines the mass atrocities committed against the Tamil population in Sri Lanka, analyzing them through the interconnected lenses of religion, culture, and global justice. It explores how Sinhalese-Buddhist nationalism, codified through legal and constitutional mechanisms such as the Sinhala Only Act and state-sponsored cultural erasure, facilitated the systemic marginalization, displacement, and dehumanization of Tamils. The study investigates the legal, political, and cultural underpinnings of these acts ranging from war crimes and ethnic cleansing to potential genocide while assessing the reluctance of both domestic and international actors to enforce meaningful accountability. Drawing on hybrid court models, transitional justice theories, and testimonies from human rights organizations, this paper critiques the failures of postwar reconciliation efforts and emphasizes the need for inclusive justice mechanisms. It further examines the intergenerational trauma endured by Tamil communities and highlights the importance of integrating psychosocial support, local peacebuilding traditions, and cultural restoration in efforts toward long-term reconciliation
Resilience and Canadian SOGIE Refugees: An Application of the Ordinary Magic Model
No full textSOGIE (sexual orientation and gender identity expression) refugees flee their home countries due to stigma and persecution, often undertaking dangerous journeys to seek safety in more inclusive nations like Canada. Although Canada has welcomed many SOGIE refugees, there has been limited research on the resilience they demonstrate throughout their integration process. Guided by Masten’s “ordinary magic” resilience theory, this study examines the immediate challenges faced by SOGIE refugees and the factors that support or hinder their resilience. To analyze interviews with 32 SOGIE refugee participants, I used reflexive thematic analysis (RTA) supported by NVivo 12 software. Four key themes were identified: receiving vital support during critical times, the ability to live authentically in Canada, expressing deep gratitude for Canada’s support, and a strong desire to contribute to Canadian society. All participants reported that their journey would not have been possible without the generous support of loved ones, community organizations, and the Canadian government. These findings support the “ordinary magic” theory of resilience, which emphasizes the importance of everyday social supports over rare internal traits in fostering resilience. In addition, I identified two major barriers to resilience: a reluctance to engage with members of their own diaspora due to past trauma, and an intense fear of unintentionally committing a crime and facing deportation. Regarding the latter, participants noted that Canadian laws are often not well-known or well understood. These insights offer valuable contributions to our understanding of the Canadian SOGIE refugee experience
Diverse Voices and Queer Optimisms: Exploring Queer Potentialities in 21st C. Young Adult Literature
No full textABSTRACT
Diverse Voices and Queer Optimisms is an exploration of the ways in which literature for young readers offers a profoundly fruitful space in which to imagine and model ways of being in relation to ourselves, each other, and the more-than-human world that go beyond the constraint of normative logics. Because we imagine adolescence as a precarious life stage, one in which the young person is at risk of straying from the established paths toward a fulfilling and productive adulthood, I argue that adolescence represents a point of impasse in development. Therefore, stories about young people in the processes of becoming can appeal to readers of any age who, themselves, feel the temporality of impasse as they contemplate what flourishing might mean for them, and whether their attachment to the normative objects of cruel optimism stand in their paths.
On one hand, I am responding to the #WENeedDiverseBooks campaign, offering an alternative approach to the question of representation in YA literature beyond seeking out a diversity of identity markers and toward searching for a radical contemplation of how we can be in relation to ourselves, each other, and the more-than-human world with care and respect. On the other hand, I view my work as a response to Kenneth Kidd’s call for literature for young readers to be considered “as a theoretical site in its own right” (186). Similar to the way that Jack Halberstam turns to the “silly archive” (20) in The Queer Art of Failure as texts that “offer strange and anticapitalist logics of being and acting and knowing” that “harbor covert and overt queer worlds” (20-21), I model a way of reading literature for young people that seeks out and celebrates alternatives to developmentalist thinking and reproductive futurism. I argue, ultimately, that literature for young readers has the potential to inspire those who engage with it to (re)imagine what flourishing might mean beyond the normative models of success wrapped up in neoliberal capitalism, heteronormativity, and white supremacy
Reversible Degradation of Peptidoglycan by Lytic Transglycosylases
No full textAntimicrobial resistance continues to be a burden on the global healthcare system with an estimated cost of billions of dollars and millions of deaths each year. Recently, there has been little to no development on new antibiotics to treat bacterial infection, and any that are developed become resisted to within a few years. Both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria contain a mesh-like layer called peptidoglycan (PG) that surrounds their cells providing strength, cell shape, and protection from their environments. This layer is a polymer of N-acetylmuramic acid (MurNAc) and N-acetylglucosamine (GlcNAc) connected via a b-1,4-glycosidic bond, with each strand being cross-linked to another through a peptide stem attached to MurNAc. Lytic transglycosylases (LTs) are bacterial enzymes that cleave the glycosidic bond producing GlcNAc and a unique 1,6-anhydroMurNAc product, unlike other muramidases such as lysozyme, which produce GlcNAc and MurNAc. LTs are known to cleave PG in order to make space for extracellular components, and to aid in cellular growth, but it is not clear why they specifically generate the unique 1,6-anhydroMurNAc reaction product. The research presented in this thesis explores the hypothesis that LTs also catalyze a reverse reaction, re-ligating PG together in order to maintain its integrity. Neisseria meningitidis LtgA was used as the model enzyme because it is conveniently active on chitooligosaccharides which are commercially available. Two main assays were developed to test the hypothesis. The first utilized a fluorescent dye to label PG, and thereby follow the enzymatic production of reaction products. The second assay used chitopentaose as a soluble substrate in an HPLC-based assay to monitor the production of products with higher degrees of polymerization. Both assays demonstrated the use of 1,6- anhydro amino sugars by LtgA for transglycosylation reactions. This provided a proof-of-concept for this hypothesis and that the assays could serve to further characterize the reaction and potentially be used to develop the LTs as a new antibiotic target
Exploring Mating Patterns: The Interplay of Genes, Environment, and Their Evolutionary Outcomes
Get PDFThere is great variation in the reproductive tactics exhibited both between and within different species, which is reflected in how individuals engage in mate assessment, mate choice and offspring production. It is therefore important to understand general mating patterns of populations, the factors that influence these mating patterns, and the consequences they carry, in order to get a more holistic understanding of mating systems. This doctoral research represents a multi-pronged investigation of the factors shaping mating patterns and their consequences, how environmental factors influence mating patterns, and how both genotypes and the environment interact to influence mate choice decisions and outcomes, in the model species Drosophila melanogaster. This thesis explores (1) mating patterns in D. melanogaster, revealing that they engage in patterns of non-random mating with others that are of similar quality to themselves, which enhances fitness at the individual and the population level; (2) the impact of the structural elements of physical environment on mating patterns, demonstrating how environmental complexity affects female fecundity, courtship behaviors and mating patterns; and (3) the interplay of genes and larval developmental environments in shaping the expression of components of mate choice, highlighting the role of both heritable and environmentally driven variation in female choosiness. Together, my research findings have led to a better understanding of sexual selection\u27s role in population dynamics and its interactions with natural selection, and offer novel insights into how mating systems may evolve across different contexts
How Long Until No Longer This? Notes on Incomplete Research into How Long it Will Take These Mylar Balloons in the Shape of a 5 and a 3 to Decompose Entirely
Get PDFThis poem is from “The Garbage Poems,” a series of poems from a forthcoming book of the same name in which poems are created using the text transcribed from garbage found at local swimming holes. The project is interested in themes of chronic illness, concussion, queerness, climate crisis, garbage, cultural constructions of litter, swimming, embodiment, and joy. Using only words taken from source text found on garbage collected from beaches and lakes near Ameliasburgh, ON, this poem explores the timelines of human-created objects and power structures
