12244 research outputs found
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The mobile woman: getting around during the 1630 plague in Bologna
Get PDFLegal proclamations show that during the 1630 plague outbreak in Bologna, Italy, women were required to remain quarantined in their homes for the duration of the epidemic while men remained mobile. However, primary texts and visual sources demonstrate that despite these legal restrictions, women remained active players in the fight against the plague by circumventing regulations. Significantly, women played a key role in sustaining the Bolognese economy, in particular by travelling to work in the silk industry. Moreover, while male doctors enjoyed special dispensations to avoid visiting the sick directly, female nurses left their homes to care for the daily needs of patients in the lazzaretto, the plague hospital. Artworks and primary texts depict a mobile woman. They show women from the poorest of backgrounds who were compelled to move through the city’s public spaces, remaining active in the street life of the plagued city. For instance, along with unlicensed women healers and nuns, prostitutes commonly volunteered for service in the plague hospitals. This required a brief shift in the social status of these women as they moved from their brothels to the pestilent walls of the lazzaretto. This paper will address the contribution that these resilient women made to maintaining the family economy and the significant positions women held in administering care, which have been overlooked in the scholarship. It will argue that by performing these essential activities, Bolognese women enjoyed an increase in physical but also social mobility, albeit short-lived
Everything is Black and White
No full textAlthough there are distinct currents running through Wood and Harrison’s work (physical and linguistic humour, acceptance and transcendence of boredom or despair, etc.) each work also operates according to its own logic, which is dependent on its colour, materials, and position within a series. The logical consistency of a piece is also frequently reliant on performed physical interactions between the two artists, their dynamic filmed or drawn within the works. As a consequence of this constructed logic, each work develops a sort of existential resilience that, far from being solipsistic, stands up to scrutiny from different perspectives. What I am trying to say, without wanting to spell it out, is that there is a potentially universal validity to these works. They capture experiences shared across diverse individuals and communities: the un- canny feeling of witnessing repetition without apparent cause; the joyful audacity of foiling expectations; the bitter irony of being condemned to separateness in our to- getherness; the absurdity of language employed to designate what sits plainly before us. The way, sometimes, we are just sheep staring at each other for entertainment. These things don’t need explaining, just showing
Thinking as anarchists: selected writings from Volontà
No full textIn the symbolic year of 1984, thousands of anarchists from all over the world gathered in Venice to explore the future of their shared ideal. This collection brings together a series of influential papers from that moment, centred around the Italian anarchist journal Volontà and the international circle connected to it. Initially published from the early 1980s to the late 1990s, most of these papers have never appeared in English before.
Remarkably far-ranging in their points of reference, these interventions are truly interdisciplinary, seeking to reinvigorate the intellectual heart of the anarchist ideal. Together, they form a treasure trove of anti-authoritarian thinking on issues as diverse as authority, the state, utopia, freedom, patriarchy and how we might envisage an anarchist approach to economics. In our era of ecological catastrophe and resurgent fascism, it is more vital than ever that activists and academics see the importance of thinking as anarchists
Religion and worldviews: the further adventures of the first recommendation of the Commission on RE in England
No full textWhat counts as happiness for young people: a qualitative study
Get PDFLimited research exists on young people's own views on their happiness, with research dominated by adult‐led, quantitative well‐being studies. This article discusses a qualitative study on young people's happiness which draws on both Psychology and Childhood and Youth Studies. In all, 42 young people completed writings and a new method of ‘happiness maps’, together with discussion groups and interviews, which were analysed within a constructivist grounded theory approach. Happiness is revealed as wide‐ranging, complex, and individually variable. Family and friends were important, but these relationships were qualified and contingent in how they contributed to happiness. Importantly, discussions of happiness also incorporated unhappiness
Loved ones of remand prisoners: the hidden victims of COVID-19
Get PDFIn September 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) released their ‘criminal courts recovery plan’ . This detailed their intentions to pass temporary legislation to extend the time that defendants could be legally held in custody awaiting trial in England and Wales by two months. The MoJ’s request was couched as a response to the excess of cases created by the restrictions imposed on courts from the pandemic . However, evidence suggests that a bottleneck existed long before COVID hit, and that this pandemic has intensified rather than caused this backlog . A joint letter sent to the Government from national organisations with expertise in justice have said these changes were ‘not good for victims, witnesses, people remanded to prison or prisons’ .
Expanding this argument, we critically consider the possible implications of this extension to the remand period for the loved ones (family, friends and significant others ) of people in prison, who are often marginalised by their absence in prison literature, practices, and policy decisions. The pandemic has resulted in some very difficult public health decisions and it is our intention to focus on some of the consequences of these decisions for the loved ones of remanded prisoners. It is important to remember that it is the act of imprisonment, of any length, ‘that constitutes the punishment’ meaning that legislations that change the prison experience (in this instance, the duration of remand) bring with them significant, additional repercussions to the lives of prisoners and their loved ones. While in this article we often detail how these are punitive consequences, we appreciate that they were not implemented for punitive purposes
Factors motivating destination decisions of Chinese study abroad students
Get PDFPurpose:- The paper examines the effects of individual differences on the key motivational factors affecting Chinese study abroad students.
Design/methodology/approach:- The current study adopts a quantitative survey approach. Students are recruited through the largest online survey provider in China. Using 335 completed questionnaires and factor analysis, the key factors influencing Chinese students are identified. Subsequently, regressions are employed to analyse the impact of age, gender, socio-economic status, previous study or travel abroad experience, degree level and location on factor scores.
Findings:- This research sheds new light on the decision-making process of Chinese study abroad students. It is found that Chinese students are influenced by three key factors, social, cultural and economic environment, non-personal and personal recommendations. The results reveal that male students from the lowest socio-economic group rely on non-personal information to decide destination where they can significantly upgrade their socio-economic status. Personal recommendations are used by young persons aged between 18 and 24 and those without previous overseas travel or study experience.
Originality/value:- Although prior studies explore the motivations of Chinese study abroad students, very few focus on a large sample of students both in China and abroad and identify key factors using the statistical tool factor analysis. No research has been carried out to understand the impact of personal characteristics such as age, gender, prior study or travel abroad experience, degree level and location on significant factor scores. Such analysis is crucial for the financial stability of the international higher education market, particularly during the current COVID-19 crisis
Material soundsystems (2015-2020) [REF2021 collection]
No full textMaterial Soundsystems explores the possibilities of forging symbiotic and dynamic connections between the seemingly opposite properties of sound and matter. This research is bought together in 3 new projects, Ecstatic Material, Mute, and Bloom, where live performative experiments are conducted to test how sound animates materials and materials create sound.
This Collection comprises a multi-component output with contextualising information, evidencing the 3 live performative events: Mute, commissioned by the National Museum of Wales as part of Fragile, an International Survey of Contemporary Ceramics Exhibition in 2015; Ecstatic Material, performed at Karst, Plymouth on 7th February 2019, Caustic Coastal, Manchester, on 11th February 2019, at South London Gallery, on 14th February 2019, and at the Borealis Festival, Bergen, Norway on the 6th & 7th March 2020; and Bloom, which took place at God’s House Tower, Southampton, from November 2019 - January 2020.
Contextualising information includes a 300 word statement, research timeline, research questions, and documentation of methods and processes
Landscape/composite (2016-2020) [REF2021 collection]
No full textThis is the collection for an ongoing practice based research project into visual effects and landscape art.
The Pastoral has been explored in literary and art theory but has not been explored as rigorously in new media studies or moving-image making. Landscape/Composite is a multi-component output that uses visual effects compositing techniques to examine intertextual representations of British idylls and the Pastoral. The output comprises video works, an exhibition and a journal article. Contextual information comprises a 300 word statement, research timeline, research questions, and documentation of an exhibition