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"DALAM Network Educates about Decolonization of Metadata"
No full textThe impact of colonization is immense, influencing everything from national governance to justice systems to the subject headings in our library catalogues. Decolonization efforts, broadly, are activities that are designed to ameliorate the negative impacts of colonization. DALAM, the University of the Arctic Thematic Network on the Decolonization of Arctic Library and Archives Metadata, is a network that focuses on library subject headings and classification systems, archival descriptions, and other metadata that are incorrect, culturally inappropriate, derogatory or otherwise unacceptable within polar libraries and archives
The Role of Speech-Language Pathologists in Addressing Depression in Adults with Aphasia: A Scoping Review and A Qualitative Study
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People with aphasia (PWA) are at a heightened risk of developing depression, which can, in turn, impede their recovery from aphasia. This complex interplay underscores the critical need for evidence-based services that address both the communication challenges of aphasia and the mental health impacts of depression. Despite this, PWA are often excluded from studies on post-stroke depression due to their communication difficulties. Speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are uniquely positioned to support individuals with dual diagnoses of aphasia and depression, leveraging their specialized training in communication, supported communication strategies, and counselling skills. However, many SLPs lack sufficient knowledge or feel unprepared to address mental health issues in PWA, as this is an emerging area of practice that is only beginning to gain wider attention.
This thesis investigated the role of SLPs in managing depression in PWA through two interconnected studies: a scoping review and a qualitative study. The scoping review synthesized existing evidence on SLP-led practices for addressing depression in PWA, focusing on assessments, interventions, barriers, and facilitators. Databases searched included Medline, Embase, CINAHL, PsycINFO, LLBA, and Scopus, covering studies published up to October 2023. The qualitative study complemented the review by exploring the lived experiences of SLPs through semi-structured interviews, providing insights into how theoretical practices are applied in real-world clinical settings.
Findings from both studies revealed that informal assessment methods, such as clinical observations and reports from patients and caregivers, are commonly used by SLPs to identify depression in PWA. While the scoping review identified validated tools for assessing depression, the qualitative study revealed that these tools were seldom utilized in practice. Instead, informal assessments remained central to SLP-led care, highlighting a gap between the availability of evidence-based tools and their application in clinical settings.
Both studies emphasized the vital role of SLPs in delivering behavioral interventions with low language demands, counseling strategies, and social support initiatives. Although the scoping review identified specialized psychotherapeutic approaches, such as Intensive Language-Action Therapy (ILAT) and Comprehensive Aphasia Programs (ICAPs), the qualitative findings indicated that these evidence-based approaches are rarely implemented in practice.
Barriers to addressing depression in PWA, identified in both the scoping review and the qualitative study, existed at systemic and individual levels. Systemic barriers included inadequate training and education, insufficient staffing, and limited resources. Individual barriers arose from communication difficulties and patients’ reluctance to engage in therapy. Despite these challenges, both studies also highlighted key facilitators, including interdisciplinary collaboration, access to professional development opportunities, and the integration of mental health education into routine SLP practices. These facilitators offer promising avenues to address the identified gaps in care.
Together, these findings contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the disconnect between evidence-based practices and their implementation in clinical settings. They highlight the urgent need for enhanced training programs, improved resource allocation, and interdisciplinary approaches to empower SLPs to meet the psychosocial needs of PWA. This research lays a foundation for future studies aimed at bridging these gaps and improving mental health outcomes for PWA through tailored, accessible, and sustainable services
Flowing Insights: Illuminating Turbulence in Sewer Airflows
Get PDFSewer odours have become a significant urban concern, notably affecting communities in Edmonton such as Steinhauer and Bonnie Doon. Our research addresses these challenges through sewer airflow modeling and experiments. This grayscale image illustrates intricate turbulent airflow patterns, clearly showing vortices and recirculation zones responsible for odour dispersion. This study represents one of the first successful attempts to capture intricate airflow features such as Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities, and it introduces an innovative technique for accurately measuring low air velocities in sewer systems. This visualization not only deepens the understanding of airflow movement and odour transport in sewer systems but also informs more effective ventilation designs to mitigate odours and enhance urban environmental quality
Mortuary variation at the Early Neolithic hunter–gatherer cemetery Shamanka II on Lake Baikal
No full textIn this version of the monograph on the Shamanka II cemetery the focus is on chronology, dietary patterns, and variation in Kitoi mortuary practices. Chapter 1 gives background archeological information relevant to the analytical chapters, reviews the history of fieldwork at Shamanka II, and presents excavation methods. Chapter 2 explores cemetery chronology, its history of use, and dietary patterns based on extensive radiocarbon and stable isotope data. Chapter 3 presents the approach to the examination of variation in mortuary practices. Results of this examination (including the chronology and spatial organization of mortuary features; the position, orientation and integrity of skeletal remains; manifestations of post-disposal mortuary activities as well as the distribution of grave goods) are presented in Chapters 4–6. The faunal remains recovered from the graves are examined in Chapter 7. Chapter 8 is a summary of these studies and assesses how the findings contribute to a more complete knowledge about the history of the Kitoi cultural pattern in Cis-Baikal. The Conclusion provides additional comments about the general archaeological importance of the Shamanka II cemetery and offers a few ideas for future research. The Addendum summarizes all radiocarbon and stable isotope results obtained for Burial 42.02.
The book will be of interest to broad readership — scholars and students — engaged in Holocene hunter-gatherer prehistory of Siberia, northern Eurasia, and even beyond. It provides wealth of data for comparative examination with such “classic” and well-known cemeteries as Olenii Ostrov in Karelia, Zvejnieki in Latvia, Skateholm and Vedbæk in southern Scandinavia, and Téviec and Hoëdic in Britanny. The book can be used as a textbook for university classes on hunter-gather mortuary archaeology including excavation techniques, data collection and approaches to data analysis.
Supplemental file covers Table S.4 Faunal remains analyzed in Chapter 7 (Digital Supplement)
Where Ontologies Meet: 'Land', Governance and Livelihood in Tsimshian Territories/Northern British Columbia
No full textIn the contemporary industrialized landscapes of Tsimshian Territory, now also called northern British Columbia, Western governance is intimately intertwined with environment. This governance manifests in the environment through the delineation of boundaries, jurisdictions and the laws that govern how humans engage in these bounded spaces. Indigenous governance is also intimately intertwined with environment. Kitsumkalum, a community of the Tsimshian Nation, organized a ‘Land Tour’ in 2013 with the intention of showing government officials their connections to lands from which they harvest their resources as part of their livelihood. The outcome of the tour was not what Kitsumkalum had hoped, and they again faced a lack of recognition of their rights to the places that were visited. This trip was indicative that perhaps Kitsumkalum and the government were ‘seeing’ land differently. This disconnect was not something new, and there exists an ongoing requirement for Indigenous people to continually prove their use and occupancy of – their relationship to – ‘land’. This thesis endeavours to gain a better understanding of ontologies, how we understand ourselves to be in relation in and with the world, to unravel the complex relationships with environment in a settler colonial state.
The switch from the external colonialism that began with the Fur Trade in Tsimshian Territory to the internal processes of settler colonialism brought threats to Tsimshian relations to environment and governance. Bureaucratic documents from the archives reveal systemic violences enacted against Indigenous people; for example, knowing that there were systems of governance over lands and resources and purposefully ignoring this pre-existing relationship. During the Royal Commission on Indian Affairs established in 1912, Kitsumkalum leaders voiced their deep concerns over losing their fishing stations and lands – their livelihoods. Over a century later, Kitsumkalum voices these same concerns in different contexts. Since colonization, Kitsumkalum people have had to simultaneously navigate within two systems of governance, while also being required to fit their ontologies of environment into western ontologies of ‘land’.
This research takes a critical anthropological approach supported by ethnographic and archival accounts within a community-based research framework. As a decolonial endeavour, I examine ‘land’ through a theoretical lens of relational ontology towards investigating how land ‘means differently’. To demonstrate this difference of Indigenous and Western ontological engagement in and with environment, I engage with Indigenous ontologies articulated by Indigenous scholars to show how Tsimshian ways of being are enacted through environment using the example of Kitsumkalum. I share an account of a trip to seaweed camp with Kitsumkalum members, part of their livelihood and seasonal round, where relationship in and with environment is enacted and actualized. The ways that seaweed picking engages with environment is contrasted with the boundaries and jurisdictions layered on these same landscapes, striated according to a Western ontology of ‘land’. This research shows that two very different ontologies of human/environment relations are operating at the same time, and, when we consider how those ontologies operate and perpetuate, space is opened for the potential of social change and future possibilities
A decade of change? The effect of ongoing climate warming in plant and lichen communities along permafrost gradients in forests and peatlands of northwestern Canada
No full textWithin Canada, the most rapid climate warming is occurring in the north-west; where forests exist within a landscape matrix of peat deposits and ice-rich permafrost environments that are sensitive to climate warming. In this dissertation I used repeat sampling of a network of 69 plots to explore vegetation-climate relationships and document 10-year changes to understory plant and lichen communities, of forests and peatlands within the Mackenzie Valley region of northwestern Canada. Extending from the Mid Boreal to the High Subarctic, this plot network spanned over 8° of latitude (60°00’ N to 68°19’ N), 6°C in mean annual temperature (-3°C to -9°C) and encompassed Sporadic Discontinuous through to Continuous permafrost conditions, where permafrost underlies 10-50%, and 90-100% of the terrain, respectively. Specifically, I targeted three topographic landscape features: peat plateaux (permafrost-containing bogs), areas of permafrost thaw within the peat plateaux (collapse scars), and upland forests on mineral soils. Firstly, I explored extant vegetation-climate relationships and environmental drivers of community composition. Plant and lichen communities were primarily differentiated according to topographic feature with secondary variation due to latitudinally-driven climatic factors. Tertiary factors varied among topographic features and reflected the different limiting conditions in each environment. Secondly, I examined the effect of 10 years of climate warming on the composition of plant and lichen communities. The largest community changes were detected towards the north, in regions experiencing greater climate warming, and observed changes commonly reflected cascading effects of interacting strata (e.g., increasing shrub cover caused a decline in lichen cover). However, the overall plant and lichen communities did not differ significantly over the 10-year period, reflecting the resilience and ecological inertia of these systems that are regulated by long-lived tree species and thousands of years of peat accumulation. Thirdly, I developed models predicting lichen biomass from cover and height of the lichen layer and used these to quantify the lichen biomass, and 10-year biomass change, across climatic gradients for the three topographic features. Lichen biomass was highest in peat plateau and northern upland forest environments and declined significantly in both of these topographic features over the 10 years. Finally, I investigated the lateral rate of expansion of collapse scar features, as the peat plateau permafrost thaws, and documented the successional sequence of plant communities in this post-collapse environment. Collapse scars expanded significantly [mean ± SE: 22.0 cm ± 4.7 cm year-1; range: -6 to 63 cm year-1] over the 10 years with a clear autogenic successional sequence of post-collapse communities that was driven by increasing height above the water table. The most rapid community transitions occurred in the most recently collapsed areas while the slowest change occurred in the later successional hummock communities. Overall, this research demonstrates the complex nature of vegetation change in response to climatic shifts in northern forest and peatland environments. Local conditions exert the strongest control on the studied plant and lichen communities and established conditions, such as the tree canopy, accumulated peat deposit and presence of permafrost, continue to regulate the understory growth environment, in the absence of disturbance. To a large degree, this overrides external climate forcing and prevents dramatic, short-term, changes to the understory communities. However, disturbances to these controlling factors, such as the thawing of permafrost within peat plateaux, can have a dramatic and long-lasting effect on the plant and lichen communities. This dissertation contributes to our understanding of the ecological processes and ongoing responses of northern forest and peatland ecosystems to climate warming, demonstrating both long-term controls and short-term dynamics that interact to determine community composition