1,167 research outputs found
Novel Dialogue 5.1 We Have This-ness, Y’all! Ocean Vuong and Amy E. Elkins (EH)
No full textSeason 5 of Novel Dialogue opens with an impassioned refresher course in literary theory brought to you by Ocean Vuong, poet and author of the bestselling novel On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous (2019). Ocean talks with critic Amy E. Elkins and host Emily Hyde about browsing bookstore shelves and building his personal reading list of “life-giving weirdos.” They discuss genre and gender, antiquing and thrifting, fish sauce and photography, all the while integrating the insights of queer theory and the full range of literary history. What does looking at the world as a junkyard have to do with making art? What does it feel like to run smack dab into a memory? How can we be mindful of the fact that words (like “this”) are tiny objects with infinite possibilities? If autofiction annoys you, listen for how the form reinvents the self against dominant class and gender structures. And if your boots have ever touched down in Hot Springs, Arkansas, stay tuned for our signature question and don’t miss this episode
FIGURE 2 in Nomenclatural comments on the Rusty-spotted Genet (Carnivora, Viverridae) and designation of a neotype
No full textFIGURE 2. Genetta maculata, neotype (left; MNHN 1972-395), Genetta maculata (middle: MNHN 1907-586; Ethiopia) and Genetta pardina (right; MNHN 1977-711; Senegal). Skulls in dorsal view (a), ventral view (b) and lateral view (c). Black arrows indicate the diagnostic characters for G. maculata as quoted in the text.Published as part of Gaubert, Philippe, Tranier, Michel, Veron, Geraldine, Kock, Dieter, Dunham, Amy E., Taylor, Peter J., Stuart, Chris, Stuart, Tilde & Wozencraft, Chris W., 2003, Nomenclatural comments on the Rusty-spotted Genet (Carnivora, Viverridae) and designation of a neotype, pp. 1-14 in Zootaxa 160 (1) on page 8, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.160.1.1, http://zenodo.org/record/501446
Body, time, and the others: African-American anthropology and the rewriting of ethnographic conventions in the ethnographies by Zora Neale Hurston and Katherine Dunham
No full textThis thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.This research looks at the ethnographies Mules and Men (1935) and Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica (1938) by Zora Neale Hurston focusing on representations of Time and the anthropologist’s body. Hurston was an African-American anthropologist, folklorist, and novelist who conducted research particularly between the end of the 1920s and the mid-1930s. At first, her fieldwork and writings dealt with African-American communities in Florida and Hoodoo practice in Louisiana, but she consequently expanded her field of anthropological interests to Jamaica and Haiti, which she visited between 1936 and 1937. The temporal and bodily factors in Hurston’s works are taken into consideration as coordinates of differentiation between the ethnographer and the objects of her research. In her ethnographies, the representation of the anthropologist’s body is analysed as an attempt at reducing temporal distance in ethnographical writings paralleled by the performative experience of fieldwork exemplified by Hurston’s storytelling: body, voice, and the dialogic representation of fieldwork relationships do not guarantee a portrayal of the anthropological subject on more egalitarian terms, but cast light on the influence of the anthropologist both in the practice and writing of ethnography. These elements are analysed in reference to the visualistic tradition of American anthropology as ways of organising difference and ascribing the anthropological ‘Others’ to a temporal frame characterised by bodily and cultural features perceived as ‘primitive’ and, therefore, distant from modernity. Representations and definitions of ‘primitiveness’ and ‘modernity’ not only shaped both twentieth-century American anthropology and the modernist arts (Harlem Renaissance), but also were pivotal for the creation of a modern African-American identity in its relation to African history and other black people involved in the African diaspora. In the same years in which Hurston visited Jamaica and Haiti, another African-American woman anthropologist and dancer, Katherine Dunham, conducted fieldwork in the Caribbean and started to look at it as a source of inspiration for the emerging African-American dance as recorded in her ethnographical and autobiographical account Island Possessed (1969). Therefore, Hurston’s and Dunham’s representations of Haiti are examined as points of intersection for the different discourses which both widened and complicated their understanding of what being ‘African’ and ‘American’ could mean.Isambard Research Scholarship from Brunel University and grant from Allan & Nesta Ferguson Charitable Trust
Reproductive ecology and coexistence among trees in the Guineo-Congolian understory
No full textThe exceptional tree biodiversity found in tropical rainforests is possible because many species coexist at low frequencies. While rarity may be an advantage when it comes to growth and survival, it may be a disadvantage in the context of reproductive success. Most tropical trees are adapted for pollination by animals, and populations at low densities and frequencies may be poorer competitors for pollination services and experience reduced reproductive success. Therefore, species that persist at low frequencies may have traits that help them cope with pollination when rare. Additionally, spatiotemporal variation in flowering patterns may alter the relative abundance relationships among species in ways that influence plant-pollinator interactions. We ask how biotic interactions, abiotic drivers and reproductive traits might interact to influence the reproductive success and persistence of cooccurring species. We answer this using spatially-explicit observational data from a guild of understory trees in Korup National Park, Cameroon, during the 2016 peak flowering season.
In Chapter 1, we find that individual flowering probability is positively related to tree size and decreases with local species abundance, thus decreasing the relative abundance extremes among rare and common species during reproduction. It is not structured by shared ancestry and is unrelated to degree of neighborhood crowding or habitat differences. In Chapter 2, we find that the plant-pollinator interactions in this previously unstudied community are broadly ecologically generalized but that floral scent is a key trait involved in resource partitioning among insect groups, particularly among Diptera and Hymenoptera. In Chapter 3, we focus on the speciose Cola genus, and find that despite both morphologically generalized flowers and high pollination niche overlap, visitation rates are not sensitive to local or plot level flowering frequencies or floral display size and are uncorrelated with pollination success. Higher pollen limitation in abundant species compared to rarer species may be due to reproductive traits that promote outcross pollination. Together, these findings highlight the importance of understanding species reproductive dynamics from a community perspective and show that species trait differences may be key to understanding how pollination contributes to the persistence of rare species, and to biodiversity maintenance more broadly
Drivers and consequences of animal foraging behavior on seed dispersal and plant community composition
No full textDispersal is essential to coexistence and community assembly. Animal dispersal
is particularly important in hyper-diverse tropical communities. However,
dispersal is generally represented simplistically, ignoring its behavioral basis and
the resulting variation among species and individuals. Though the importance of
behavior is increasingly recognized, further work is needed to link the details of
disperser behavior to their repercussions for plant communities. Here we
examine the influence of disperser behavior on spatial patterns of plant-animal
interactions, seed deposition and plant community diversity.
Chapter 1 showed how frugivore consideration of the intrinsic and extrinsic traits
of the available fruiting resources can result in drastic inequalities in plant-animal
interactions. A few highly visited plants in central locations, with rich
neighborhoods and large fruit crops, increased visitation to near neighbors and
contributed to a spatially modular interaction structure. This chapter suggests the
need to examine individual-level interactions in plant-animal mutualisms, as
frugivore foraging behavior may structure interactions in a way that cannot be
predicted from the species-level.
Chapter 2 examined how skewed foraging patterns may structure patterns in
seed dispersal and considered the need to incorporate such foraging decisions
into models of seed movement. We show that incorporating frugivore foraging
decisions, in respect to highly preferred plants, influenced dispersal patterns in
ways that cannot be accurately modeled with traditional dispersal models. This
chapter suggests the need to incorporate individual-level variation in plant frugivore interactions, and the resulting directionality of movement, into future
models of seed dispersal.
Chapter 3 studied how frugivorous disperser foraging behavior may shape the
spatial structure of plant community diversity. We found that biotic dispersal can
be associated with higher or lower diversity near biotically dispersed plants, while
abiotically dispersed plants showed little deviation. Additionally, different
dispersal modes can vary in their influence on spatial diversity patterns, though
the strength of such effects varied across sites relying on different disperser
communities. This chapter indicates how even broadly categorizing disperser
behavior can illuminate the mechanisms generating plant community structure
Changing species interactions and processes in tropical forests in the Anthropocene
No full textHuman activities have caused widespread species declines and habitat degradation, particularly in tropical forests. These changes are not just consequences of global change, but they are also themselves drivers of change. This is because as vertebrate assemblages are altered, ecological and evolutionary processes can be influenced by changes in species interactions. The consequences of this can be profound, but they are not fully understood. Here, we address three critical but understudied aspects of ecological and evolutionary cascades triggered by current global change patterns.
In Chapter 1, we show that defaunation in an Afrotropical system can indirectly increase understory vegetation. We also report a sharp decrease in termite abundances and a 25% lower contribution of invertebrates to decomposition in defaunated compared to faunally-intact forest. Overall, this chapter indicates defaunation may indirectly affect understory vegetation and invertebrate communities with consequences for foodweb dynamics and processes on the forest floor that ultimately influence nutrient cycling.
In Chapter 2, we take a finer-scale approach to look at how defaunation in a neotropical forest affects seed dispersal and the resulting spatial genetic structure of a dominant, animal dispersed palm. Using a genetic approach we find evidence for the first time that even in a generalist tree species (i.e. one able to gain dispersal from a broad suite of frugivores), defaunation can affect seed-dispersal, as indicated by the higher spatial genetic structure we find associated with defaunation. Ultimately, this chapter has implications for how defaunation influences the maintenance and spatial distribution of genetic variation for tropical plant communities.
In Chapter 3, we move from investigating how species interactions and ecological processes are affected by local extinctions to how they are influenced by local habitat disturbance, an equally ubiquitous threat. In studying frugivore visitation to host plants, we find that indicators of past forest disturbance are associated with lower fruit removal rates and altered community composition of frugivore mutualists feeding on fruits of a neotropical palm. This chapter demonstrates that localized differences in forest structure resulting from past disturbance can influence species interactions for decades, potentially influencing seed dispersal services, plant demography and forest regeneration patterns
Creighton University Magazine Summer 2010
No full textDEVELOPING ENTREPRENEURS
It is a safe bet that 10 or 20 years from now the sun will rise on an America filled with millions of inventions that do not currently exist. The questions are: What will those inventions be? Will they make the world a better place? And who will bring them to market? Creighton’s entrepreneurship programs are helping provide some answers. Page 8.
AT SECOND GLANCE: THE KARL MARX YOU NEVER KNEW
What is it in Marx that is, and has remained, so powerful in the more than a century since his death in 1883? To answer this question, we will have to begin thinking about Marx in different ways, writes Creighton’s Amy Wendling, Ph.D., assistant professor of philosophy, a Marx scholar and author of the new book Karl Marx on Technology and Alienation. Page 12.
FACULTY AFTER HOURS
In and out of the classroom, a Creighton University education is about the development of the whole person. Learn about some of the life-affirming pursuits of Creighton faculty members outside of academe — from the whimsical to the more serious. Page 16.
EVENING OF HONORS: ALUMNI AWARDS CEREMONY / EVENING OF HONORS
Five Creighton alumni, who have distinguished themselves in their professional and personal lives, were recognized on April 8 during an Evening of Honors Alumni Awards Ceremony on campus. Page 20.
AYERS ON PACE TO CROSS FINISH LINE AFTER 38 YEARS / FRANK AYERS RETIRES
Frank Ayers, DDS’69, is more than an administrator and faculty member in the School of Dentistry — he is an institution. Ayers is retiring June 30, after 38 years of service to Creighton University. Page 22.32
045 - Amy Elizabeth Boncella
No full textMutations in a number of stress granule-associated proteins have been linked to various neurodegenerative diseases. Several of these mutations are found in aggregation-prone intrinsically disordered domains (IDRs) of these proteins. My studies have focused on two IDR-containing yeast stress granule proteins, Pab1 and Pbp1. I have introduced mutations designed to enhance aggregation of these proteins and observed effects on stress granule dynamics. Results suggest that these mutations affect IDR localization in the context of overexpression, but do not affect stress granule dynamics in an endogenous system. This has led to questions about how the proteostasis machinery affects stress granule dynamics
Correction: Gheyoh Ndzi, E.; Holmes, A. Paternal Leave Entitlement and Workplace Culture: A Key Challenge to Paternal Mental Health. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023, 20, 5454
No full textAmy Holmes was not included as an author in the original publication [...
Editorial: Increasing women’s participation in community based conservation: Key to success?
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