“Pensando Mucho” (“Thinking Too Much”): Embodied Distress Among Grandmothers in Nicaraguan Transnational Families

In this paper, I describe an embodied form of emotional distress expressed by Nicaraguan grandmothers caring for children of migrant mothers, “pensando mucho” (“thinking too much”). I draw on ethnographic fieldwork and semi-structured exploratory interviews about pensando mucho conducted with grandmother heads-of-household to show the cultural significance of this complaint within the context of women’s social roles as caregivers in transnational families. Adopting an interpretive and meaning-centered approach, I analyze the cultural significance of pensando mucho as expressed through women’s narratives about the impacts of mother outmigration on their personal and family lives. I show how women use pensando mucho to express the moral ambivalence of economic remittances and the uncertainty surrounding migration, particularly given cultural values for “unity” and “solidarity” in Nicaraguan family life. I also discuss the relationship between pensando mucho and dolor de cerebro (“brainache”) as a way of documenting the relationship between body/mind, emotional distress, and somatic suffering. The findings presented here suggest that further research on “thinking too much” is needed to assess whether this idiom is used by women of the grandmother generation in other cultural contexts to express embodied distress in relation to broader social transformations.     

Ethnic identity and race: the “double absence” and its legacy across generations among Australians of Southern Italian origin. Operationalizing institutional positionality.

The paper provides a discussion on the concept of “double absence” and its legacy among participants originating from Calabria, Italy. It illustrates the impact of such an embodied affective state in light of race-ethnic relations perceived intergenerationally. While the first generation of participants manifest a condition of feeling “absent”, the second generation present a condition of “liminality”, as a result of a socialization process between “the world” of their immigrant parents and the Australian one. The third generation, due to a perceived positive evaluation about their ethnic background, manifests its ethnicity proudly. A pivotal role is played by the amount of cultural capital accumulated by the participants, dynamics of assimilation and the exogenous pressures the participants perceived from the “common sense” of the dominant society, as Gramsci terms it. Individuals’ ethnic identity appears to be shaped by their institutional positionality, which is their ethnic perception of “being in the world”.     

The Fate of the Method of ‘Paradigms’ in Paleobiology

An earlier article described the mid-twentieth century origins of the method of “paradigms” in paleobiology, as a way of making testable hypotheses about the functional morphology of extinct organisms. The present article describes the use of “paradigms” through the 1970s and, briefly, to the end of the century. After I had proposed the paradigm method to help interpret the ecological history of brachiopods, my students developed it in relation to that and other invertebrate phyla, notably in Euan Clarkson’s analysis of vision in trilobites. David Raup’s computer-aided “theoretical morphology” was then combined with my functional or adaptive emphasis, in Adolf Seilacher’s tripartite “constructional morphology.” Stephen Jay Gould, who had strongly endorsed the method, later switched to criticizing the “adaptationist program” he claimed it embodied. Although the explicit use of paradigms in paleobiology had declined by the end of the century, the method was tacitly subsumed into functional morphology as “biomechanics.”     

DXA: Can It Be Used as a Criterion Reference for Body Fat Measurements in Children?

Objective: Dual‐energy X‐ray absorptiometry (DXA) is often cited as a criterion method for body composition measurements. We have previously shown that a new DXA software version (Hologic Discovery V12.1) will affect whole‐body bone mineral results for subjects weighing <40 kg. We wished to reanalyze pediatric whole‐body scans in order to assess the impact of the new software on pediatric soft‐tissue body composition estimates. Methods and Procedures: We reanalyzed 1,384 pediatric scans (for ages 1.7–17.2 years) using Hologic software V12.1, previously analyzed using V11.2. Regression analysis and ANCOVA were used to compare body fat (total body fat (TBF), percentage fat (%BF)), and non‐bone lean body mass (LBM) for the two versions, adjusting for gender, age and weight. Results: Software V12.1 yielded values that were higher for TBF, lower for LBM, and unchanged for DXA‐derived weight in subjects weighing <40 kg. Body composition values for younger, smaller subjects were most affected, and girls were more affected than boys. Using the new software, 14% of the girls and 10% of the boys were reclassified from the “normal” %BF range to “at risk of obesity,” while 7 and 5%, respectively, were reclassified as obese. Discussion: Hologic's newest DXA software has a significant effect on soft‐tissue results for children weighing <40 kg. The effect is greater for girls than boys. Comparison of TBF estimates with previous studies that use older DXA instruments and software should be done with caution. DXA has not yet achieved sufficient reliability to be considered a “gold standard” for body composition assessment in pediatric studies.     

L’intersubjectif et l’intrasubjectif dans l’expérience de souffrance. Un regard psychanalytique

Psychoanalysis characterises subjectivity as a notion based on the “plurality of psychologically troubled persons”, revealed, for instance, in dreams. The author takes a closer look at a number of Freud’s dream analyses and argues that, in working with the dream, subjects often eject one of their psychologically troubled persons (often the “suffering child”) out of themselves, projecting the person into the Other. As a result, an intersubjective space is created, which is required to receive the divisions originating from the intrasubjective space. Freud’s 1895 Project, however, goes farther: the evacuation of the “disparate part” of the child to the Other grants access to logical and rational judgement, guaranteeing a child’s psychological life a fictional stability (the “Thing” or the “ego”). Freud adds that this process is possible if a Nebenmensch — or “fellow creature” — is present and has the quality of a “helping person” capable of receiving the child’s suffering cry. These two lines of thought, together, help clarify the intersubjective position underlying the analytical work: a tentative encounter between the patient’s distress and the analyst’s presence. Free-floating attention will enable the analyst to receive and hear this distress and ease the patient’s recovery of his or her intrasubjective space.     

Why do primordial germ cells migrate through an embryo and what does it mean for biological evolution?

An explanation of the role of primordial germ cell (PGC) migration during embryogenesis is proposed. According to the hypothesis, various PGCs during their migrations through an early embryo are contacting with anlagen of organs and acquiring nonidentical organ specificities. An individual PGC gets such an organ specificity, which corresponds to specificity of the first anlage with which this PGC has the first contact. As a result, the cellular descendants of PGCs (oocytes or spermatocytes) will express nonidentical organ-specific receptors, hence becoming functionally heterogeneous. Therefore, each clone of germ cells becomes capable of recognizing specifically the molecular signals that correspond only to “its” organ of the body. Such signals are produced by the body’s organ when it functions in an extreme mode. Signals from the “exercising” organ of the body are delivered to the gonad only via the brain retransmitter, which is composed of neurons grouped as virtual organs of a homunculus. Homunculi are so-called somatotopic maps of the skeletomotor and other parts of the body represented in the brain. Signals, as complexes of regulatory RNAs and proteins, are transported from the “exercising” organ of the body to the corresponding virtual organ of the homunculus where they are processed and then forwarded to the gonad. The organ-specific signal will be selectively recognized by certain gametocytes according to their organ specificity, and then it will initiate the directed epimutation in the gametocyte genome. The nonrandomness of the gene order in chromosomes, that is the synteny and genetic map, is controlled by the so-called creatron that consolidates the soma and germline into a united system, providing the possibility of evolutionary responses of an organism to environmental influences.     

Pendular activity of human upper limbs during slow and normal walking

When walking at normal and fast speeds, humans swing their upper limbs in alternation, each upper limb swinging in phase with the contralateral lower limb. However, at slow and very slow speeds, the upper limbs swing forward and back in unison, at twice the stride frequency of the lower limbs. The change from “single swinging” (in alternation) to “double swinging” (in unison) occurs consistently at a certain stride frequency for agiven individual, though different individuals may change at different stride frequencies. To explain this change in the way we use our upper limbs and individual variations in the occurrence of the change, the upper limb is modelled as a compound pendulum. Based on the kinematic properties of pendulums, we hypothesize that the stride frequency at which the change from “single swinging” to “double swinging” occurs will be at or slightly below the natural pendular frequency (NPF) of the upper limbs. Twenty-seven subjects were measured and then filmed while walking at various speeds. The mathematically derived NPF of each subject's upper limbs was compared to the stride frequency at which the subject changed from “single swinging” to “double swinging.” The results of the study conform very closely to the hypothesis, even when the NPF is artificially altered by adding weights to the subjects' hands. These results indicate that the pendulum model of the upper limb will be useful in further investigations of the function of the upper limbs in human walking. © 1994 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

A six decades long follow-up on body size in adolescents from Zagreb,Croatia (1951–2010)

Most studies analysing the influence of socioeconomic deterioration on body size focus on the impact of food shortages and diseases on the growth in early childhood. To evaluate how socioeconomic conditions influence the growth during the adolescence, we tracked the body size of 15–19 year-olds over the last sixty years covering the socialist period (1951–1990), the war (1991–1995) and the transition to capitalistic economy. This study of Zagreb, Croatia, adolescent population provides information on the secular trend in height, weight and Body Mass Index (BMI) and examines their relation with Real Gross Domestic Product. From 1951 to 2010 the girls’ height approximately increased by 6.2 cm and weight by 6.8 kg, while the boys’ height increased by 12.2 cm and weight by 17.3 kg. Prior to 1991 mean BMI in girls was higher than in boys, but from 1991 on, the interrelation between the sexes has been opposite, possibly mirroring the cultural trends that started in mid-1970s and reflecting higher sensitivity of boys to the socioeconomic changes. In conclusion, the secular trend in body size over the investigated period reflects the positive economic trends interrupted by the war. The recent increase in BMI corresponds to the country's economic recovery and indicates the “nutrition transition”.     

Extending Ethnoprimatology: Human–Alloprimate Relationships in Managed Settings

The majority of studies in ethnoprimatology focus on areas of sympatry where humans and nonhuman primates (hereafter, primates) naturally coexist. We argue that much can be gained by extending the field’s scope to incorporate settings where humans manage most aspects of primates’ lives, such as zoos, laboratories, sanctuaries, and rehabilitation centers (hereafter, managed settings). We suggest that the mixed-methods approach of ethnoprimatology, which facilitates examination of both humans’ and primates’ responses to one another, can reveal not only how humans’ ideas about primates shape management strategies, but also how those management strategies affect primates’ lives. Furthermore, we note that a greater focus on managed settings will strengthen links between ethnoprimatology and primate rights/welfare approaches, and will introduce new questions into discussions of ethics in primatology. For example, managed settings raise questions about when it might be justifiable to restrict primates’ freedom for a “greater good,” and the desirability of making primates’ lives more “natural” even if this would decrease their well-being. Finally, we propose that because ethnoprimatology is premised on challenging false dichotomies between categories of field site—specifically, between “natural” and “unnatural” free-ranging populations—it makes sense for ethnoprimatologists to examine settings in which humans exert considerable control over primates’ lives, given that the distinction between “wild” and “captive” is similarly unclear.     

In search of balance: a review of Povinelli’s world without weight

Povinelli and colleagues ask whether chimpanzees can understand the concept of weight, answering with a resounding “no”. They justify their answer by appeal to over thirty previously unpublished experiments. I here evaluate in detail Povinelli’s arguments against his targets, questioning the assumption that such comparative questions will be resolved with an unequivocal “yes” or “no”.     

Developing sociopolitical consciousness of race and social class inequality in adolescents attending progressive and no excuses urban secondary schools

Sociopolitical consciousness refers to an individual’s ability to critically analyze the political, economic, and social forces shaping society and one’s status in it. A growing body of scholarship reports that high levels of sociopolitical consciousness are predictive in marginalized adolescents of a number of key outcomes including resilience and civic engagement. The present study explored the role that urban secondary schools can play in fostering adolescents’ sociopolitical consciousness through a longitudinal, mixed methods investigation of more than 400 adolescents attending “progressive” and “no excuses” charter high schools. Analyses revealed that, on average, students attending progressive high schools demonstrated sizeable shifts in their sociopolitical consciousness of racial inequality, and students attending no excuses high schools demonstrated sizeable shifts in their sociopolitical consciousness of social class inequality. Qualitative interviews with participating students offered insight into the curriculum, programming, and practices that these youth perceived as contributing to these differences in their sociopolitical consciousness.     

公众对植物园功能定位和形象认知的初步调查

作为生物多样性保护的专业机构, 植物园可以通过开展公众教育来发挥作用, 而公众对植物园的功能定位和形象认知将会影响其作用的发挥。作者分别选择1个研究型植物园(中国科学院西双版纳热带植物园, 简称版纳植物园)和1个城市植物园(杭州植物园)为研究对象, 同时以版纳植物园同域分布的西双版纳野象谷森林公园(简称野象谷)为对照, 调查公众对上述3个机构的功能定位和形象认知。研究结果表明: (1)在功能定位方面, 参观两个植物园的游客对植物园是“物种收集和保存的机构”、“开展公众教育, 提高环境意识的机构”和“促进生物多样性保护的专业机构”三个方面有显著的认同度; 对版纳植物园是“科学研究的机构”、“培养训练专业人才的机构”和“提供相关专业资讯和咨询的机构”三个方面也有显著的认同度; (2)同域分布的版纳植物园和野象谷相比, 公众对二者的大多数功能定位认知存在显著差异; (3)在形象认知方面, 公众对3个机构“空气新鲜, 环境宜人”、“具有外面看不到的动植物”、“景色优美, 赏心悦目”以及“是回归自然的地方”认可度显著; 对版纳植物园“是增长科学知识的地方”的认可度最高, 而野象谷的公众对此认可度最低。调查结果可为植物园更好地开展生物多样性保护教育、改善形象以及提高公众服务水平提供有益的借鉴。     

Climate,Acculturation, And Costume A History Of Women’S Clothing Among The Indians Of The Southern Plains

Abstract

This paper accepts Clark Wissler’s dictum, offered as long ago as 1915, in his pioneer study of Plains Indian clothing, that for such perishable objects as costume “real historic data is usually available.” Applying a combination of evidence provided by dated, first-hand, written observations, early drawings and later photographs, as well as selected well documented specimens preserved in museum collections to a study of historic Southern Plains Indian women’s body costume one finds that south of the northern limit of 180 frost-free days the prevailing women’s attire prior to the mid-19th century was a skin skirt and a poncho of the same material. In warm weather the poncho was often omitted sometimes exposing a wearer’s profusely painted or tattooed mammae. By the 1820s some women of affluent families made their garments of trade cloth. By the 1850s a long, trade cloth dress, with kimono sleeves and inset gores was becoming fashionable. This garment, in turn, was superceded among women of status by a three piece skin dress after buckskin became relatively scarce. The two piece skin dress which Wissler proposed as the “plains style” was never typical of the tribes of the Southern Plains. Rather the evidence argues against culture area uniformity in women’s clothing, while suggesting that climate and acculturation resulting from white contact strongly influenced a variety of dress styles among the women of the plains tribes. Indeed the body garments worn by women on the Southern Plains prior to 1850 strikingly resemble those depicted on classic figurines from Vera Cruz, Mexico, while they differed totally from garments worn by women of Northern Plains tribes during early historic times.     

Differences in nutritional status between rural and urban Yucatec Maya children: The importance of early life conditions

Early-life conditions shape childhood growth and are affected by urbanization and the nutritional transition. To investigate how early-life conditions (across the “first” and “second” 1000 days) are associated with rural and urban children's nutritional status, we analyzed anthropometric data from Maya children in Yucatan, Mexico. We collected weight, height and triceps skinfold measures, then computed body mass and fat mass indices (BMI/FMI), in a cross-sectional sample of 6-year-olds (urban n = 72, rural n = 66). Demographic, socioeconomic and early-life variables (birthweight/mode, rural/urban residence, household crowding) were collected by maternal interview. We statistically analyzed rural-urban differences in demographic, socioeconomic, early-life, and anthropometric variables, then created linear mixed models to evaluate associations between early-life variables and child anthropometric outcomes. Two-way interactions were tested between early-life variables and child sex, and between early-life variables and rural-urban residence. Results showed that rural children were shorter-statured, with lower overweight/obesity and cesarean delivery rates, compared to urban children. Household crowding was a negative predictor of anthropometric outcomes; the strongest effect was in boys and in urban children. Birthweight positively predicted anthropometric outcomes, especially weight/BMI. Birth mode was positively (not statistically) associated with any anthropometric outcome. Cesarean delivery was more common in boys than in girls, and predicted increased height in urban boys. In conclusion, urbanization and household crowding were the most powerful predictors of Maya 6-year-old anthropometry. The negative effects of crowding may disproportionately affect Maya boys versus girls and urban versus rural children. Early-life conditions shape Maya children's nutritional status both in the “first” and “second” 1000 days.     

Modifications des comportements liés au SIDA

Since the seropositivity declaration, a certain number of assests appears and express a psychic distress in man. This psychic “shock” doesnt always show itself directly. When it appears it’s often as form of “signifiant “having said that phoneme, word, representing, symbolizing what spring up without some one knowing, a truth of his desire. The first of these assests is the word Revelation This term means not as the surprise as the time lag between a “fashion of life” and its results. As a matter of fact, they must be less surprised than witness of their life always in danger. This word of “revelation” lays us in a sacred country, but also in the dark, the mysterious and experience; saying always “testing something” Other meaning, Aesthetisation Current events media supplies evenly gushing examples of Estheticism. By estheticism, we must understand as much documents where the body is left to the others. Stain and guilt, last stand, “dramatic exist”, taking fligth, so much examples of “desecration” or “redemption”. Other assest, Convocation It’s an experience of the request. Often the person life is marked out a succession of invocations and/or provocations before than the virus intervenes who, in the psychic representations that it conveys, changes the status of requests. It’s in this change of status that people are affected and the doctor can look for an application who arouse changes of behaviours. Revelation, aesthetisation, convocation, these three words part of method where the person works by oscillation between, first time a position of subject, it means a psychic work of hesitations, withdrawal, desire, and also a position of being, it means acting, an act where all sense is vacant. The notions of “risk behaving” and “ordalic behaving” help us to better understand and separate all these behaviours which some people will be infected. To take a risk is the behaviour of “human condition”, like the venial sin defins the human being, only the ordalic behaving shows a desperate endeavour with a meeting of a sort of sovereignty, a next world not defined. The work of this whole on the modifications tie up the AIDS, can give us a reflection about the S.C.D. where the notion of risk is rarely absent.     

The Employment Footprints of Nations

In this study, we present an analysis of the average wages paid for producing direct and indirect imports of nations using employment and income footprints. An employment footprint includes a country's domestic employment and that occurring along the supply chains of, and hence embodied in, its imported goods and services. Our results allow us to group the world's nations into “masters” that enjoy a lifestyle supported by workers in other countries and “servants” that support the lifestyle of master countries. We show that, in 2010, employment footprints of countries differed substantially from their own workforce footprints. Hong Kong, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and Switzerland occupy the top‐ranking positions of master countries, whereas many African and Asian countries are servants. Our findings show that the commodities that are “servant intensive,” such as electronics, agricultural products, and chemicals, tend to have complex supply chains often originating in third‐world countries. The quantification of these master‐servant relationships and the exposing of implicated supply chains could be of benefit to those concerned with their corporate social responsibility and committed to fairer trading or those developing policy around fair globalization.     

How Sex Selection Undermines Reproductive Autonomy

Non-medical sex selection is premised on the notion that the sexes are not interchangeable. Studies of individuals who undergo sex selection for non-medical reasons, or who have a preference for a son or daughter, show that they assume their child will conform to the stereotypical roles and norms associated with their sex. However, the evidence currently available has not succeeded in showing that the gender traits and inclinations sought are caused by a “male brain” or a “female brain”. Therefore, as far as we know, there is no biological reason why parents cannot have the kind of parenting experience they seek with a child of any sex. Yet gender essentialism, a set of unfounded assumptions about the sexes which pervade society and underpin sexism, prevents parents from realising this freedom. In other words, unfounded assumptions about gender constrain not only a child’s autonomy, but also the parent’s. To date, reproductive autonomy in relation to sex selection has predominantly been regarded merely as the freedom to choose the sex of one’s child. This paper points to at least two interpretations of reproductive autonomy and argues that sex selection, by being premised on gender essentialism and/or the social pressure on parents to ensure their children conform to gender norms, undermines reproductive autonomy on both accounts.     

Parental economic insecurity and child health

We explore the effects of parental economic insecurity on their children’s hyperactivity and anxiety. Our central argument is that even after controlling for current family income and employment status, parents may have legitimate feelings of economic insecurity, and these may be detrimental for their children. Data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth indicate that the health of 2- to 5-year-old children is worse when parents report themselves to be “worried about having enough money to support the family.” In particular, boys are more hyperactive and girls are more anxious when parents feel less economically secure. Changes in parenting styles appear to be channels through which parental economic insecurity affects their children.