Time Making and Place Making: A Journey of Immigration from Ethiopia to Israel

ABSTRACT

Anthropological studies of immigration usually focus on the immigrants’ country of origin or their destination. The present ethnographic study is a claim that the immigration experience must be examined as part of a journey and movement. The study was designed to show how the immigration process of Zera Beita Israel (Feres Mura) from Ethiopia to Israel is constructed on a process of journey and dialogue among the various stations. The two main aspects of the journey are place making – constructing a place in the unique context of immigration, and time making – creating being-time and meta-time, both unique to immigration. Each of the places affects the immigration process and is affected by this dynamic, nonlinear process. The combined concepts of place making and immigration time help explain the complexity of immigration.     

Ethnicity,reception and the growth of American immigration

Deportation has always been a feature of the American political, social and economic discourse. A twin effect of immigration, deportation concerns who is granted the right to stay and who is removed from the country. Amid the growing debate on reform, this essay casts light on the changing nature of deportation law during the last century. Paying attention to the reception which immigrants receive and the perceptions of threat and economic competition which natives often perceive, this work evaluates how policy has shifted in response to the changing face of newcomers. As immigration law becomes intertwined with criminal law, so do the stipulations governing entry and exit. Within a politically charged social space, American immigration is a story punctuated with racialized and criminalized images of immigrants. Bridging ethnic and racial currents, this work seeks to understand how these effects continue to shape contemporary immigration policy.     

Defining difference: the role of immigrant generation and race in American and British immigration studies

Abstract

This article reviews the ways in which Britain and the USA classify and analyse the integration of immigrants and their descendants. While both societies recognize racial differences in their official statistics and in the academic analyses of change over time, the USA tends to classify immigrants and their descendants by immigrant generation much more than Britain does. The importance of the concept of generation in American immigration research is highlighted and it is suggested that studies built on the importance of generation can illuminate social processes of integration in Britain. The complexities of defining and measuring immigrant generation are reviewed, including new developments in the measurement of generation that take into account age at migration, and historical period and cohort effects. Racial and ethnic minority groups formed through immigration may have very different characteristics depending on the average distance of their members from immigration – including the possibility of ‘ethnic leakage’, as more assimilated, later-generation individuals no longer identify with the group.     

Migrant deportability: Israel and Ireland as case studies

This article critiques policies of deportation and deportability – a technology emanating from three seemingly conflicting rationalities: states' obligations under international human rights regimes, capitalism's need to facilitate the movement of labour, and the need to reaffirm state sovereignty. After outlining the concept of deportability, we argue that although justified by state actors as an integral part of asylum and immigration policies, deportability epitomizes the paradox of immigration regimes at a point of crisis. We use Israel and Ireland as case studies to illustrate that migrant deportability circumvents human rights and domestic legislation that hinder the power of the state to deport unwanted migrants. Paradoxically, in both, policies that engender the deportability of asylum seekers are a response to their undeportability. Despite their differences, Israel and Ireland are unusual immigration destinations and quintessential diaspora nations, whose histories of dispersal configure Jewishness and Irishness in ethno-racially rigid yet spatially fluid terms, as illustrated by their citizenship regimes.     

Deportation proceedings against Canadian MDs may hold lesson for others heading south

Two Alberta physicians who emigrated to a medically underserviced part of Kentucky have learned a harsh lesson about American immigration law. Drs. David Zetter and Sabina Seitz had been settled in western Kentucky for 2 years when the US government launched deportation proceedings against them. American officials allege that they misrepresented themselves when they entered the US on a temporary visa. They may be allowed to stay following a public outcry against their deportation.     

Driving integration: how is it done

ABSTRACT

The present dilemma of immigrant integration in the West is, that for previous generations of immigrants in Europe and the United States, education and politics were strong engines that drove integration. However, these engines have not worked so well for this current wave of immigration, despite emerging progress. In this review, I examine the chapters on education and politics. Two questions emerge: first, with regard to education, how much can the ineffectiveness of the education system be attributed to the cultural challenges of immigration, compared to the challenges of class, with implications for immigrants and natives as well? and second, with regard to politics, is the problem not just the numbers of minority representatives, but how they are organized, and for what purpose – indeed, if they have a purpose?     

Hierarchical competition models with the Allee effect II: the case of immigration

ABSTRACT

This is part II of an earlier paper that dealt with hierarchical models with the Allee effect but with no immigration. In this paper, we greatly simplify the proofs in part I and provide a proof of the global dynamics of the non-hyperbolic cases that were previously conjectured. Then, we show how immigration to one of the species or to both would, drastically, change the dynamics of the system. It is shown that if the level of immigration to one or to both species is above a specified level, then there will be no extinction region where both species go to extinction.     

The failure of DNA forensic testing: a case study of the 2009 Australian bushfire disaster

Different constructions of the fetus lie at the centre of reproductive, abortion and disability politics. Recent developments mean that, within the same hospital, a fetus may be perceived in contrasting and potentially conflicting ways. It is also argued that the status given to the fetus is directly relevant to the status given to pregnant women. During group discussions facilitated by an ethicist, health-care staff highlighted various perceptions of the fetus which included: person; patient; 'nobody'; commodity. Perhaps not surprisingly in view of the current legal situation, staff tended to claim that it is usually the pregnant woman who decides how her fetus will be constructed, and the practitioner who responds to this. However, various ways in which practitioners might influence women's perceptions of their fetus are highlighted, as are some ways in which the perceptions of staff might be influenced. This paper illustrates how sensitive health-care staff will need to be if they are indeed to respond to, rather than shape, women's constructions of their fetus.     

The long arm of the Arab state

ABSTRACT

Under what conditions do authoritarian states exercise control over populations abroad? The securitization of cross-border mobility has been a common theme in examining immigration policies in the Global North. The securitization of emigration and diasporas in non-democratic contexts remains neglected; this is particularly true with regard to Arab states’ extraterritorial authoritarian practices. This article argues that authoritarian states develop a range of migration policies that are driven by the contradictory pressures of economic and political imperatives or, put differently, an illiberal paradox: if a state does not expect economic gains from cross-border mobility, it is more likely to securitize its emigration policy; otherwise, it is more likely to securitize its diaspora policy. The article illustrates this trade-off via a most-similar comparison of Algeria, Libya, Tunisia, and Morocco. Drawing on Arabic and non-Arabic primary and secondary sources, it sketches a novel area of research on migration and security.     

Storytelling: Armenian Family Albums in the Diaspora

Armenians were scattered across the world after experiencing the collective pain of massacres and deportation from Turkey in 1915. They are an example of a people who have lived through loss and the brutalities of history. In this article, I trace one response to enduring loss: the role of photograph albums in capturing such historical ruptures. For scholars concerned with life stories, family photos and records serve both as goads to recollection and as aids to their certification. “Seeing” other pasts obviates somehow our requirement for complete recollection from our interviewees. Yet our sense of other people's pasts involves more than this. At times photos portray only frozen, static moments cut off from their lived experiences. At other times these albums are a verification of presence in history.

All the sorrows of life can be borne if only we can make them into stories. Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen)     

Red blood cells as an organ? How deep omics characterization of the most abundant cell in the human body highlights other systemic metabolic functions beyond oxygen transport

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Recently, the classification of two ‘novel’ organs, the mesentere and interstitium, was saluted as a scientific breakthrough and disseminated into mainstream media. The novelty of these findings did not pertain to the characterization of some previously unexplored phenomena, rather to the appreciation that well-established tissues may play some hitherto unexplored functions critical to system homeostasis.

Areas covered: Here we provocatively comment on the potential classification of red blood cells – by far the most abundant host cell in the human body (~ 83% of the total cells) – as an organ involved in many functions beyond gas transport. In this perspective article, we describe some of these functions with a special emphasis on the role erythrocytes play with respect to systemic metabolic homeostasis. We thus focus on how these functions modulate the cross talk of red blood cells among each other and with other cell types including immune cells.

Expert commentary: The appreciation of RBCs as an organ impacting systemic metabolic homeostasis and other cell functions while engaging in complex metabolic activity beyond oxygen transport can foster the development of novel therapeutic interventions in pathologic hypoxemia, inflammation, neurodgenerative diseases, aging, and cancer.     

Everyday Encounters in the Shopping Mall: (Un)Making Boundaries in the Divided Cities of Johannesburg and Mostar

ABSTRACT

The many studies that see shopping malls as places of power, control and exclusion have often neglected the potential of malls as places of encounters. Drawing on ethnographic data from the divided cities of Johannesburg in South Africa and Mostar in Bosnia–Herzegovina, we examine the ways in which urban dwellers who enter the mall from a marginalised position – poor black urban dwellers at a regional, middle class and white-dominated mall in Johannesburg and Bosniak city dwellers at a mall located in the Croat part of Mostar – use the mall, what kind of relations they build to others and how they rework boundaries of race, class, religion and ethnicity at the mall. Rather than being spaces that strengthen and reproduce centre–margins relations, urban dwellers appropriate them as places where these relations become reworked.     

National ceremonies: the pursuit of authenticity

Abstract

This article asks what, if any, impact national ceremonies have on the formation of national identities. Why are some ceremonies perceived as national and persistent through time, while others fail to achieve that status? It argues that national ceremonies can only be examined as specific types of situations – performances, rather than rituals – characterized by the relationship between performers and their audiences. Following Jeffery Alexander's cultural pragmatics theory, national ceremonies are seen as successful only when a performance is perceived as authentic. A ceremony's authenticity is, at best, a quality of experience among its audience. Only when the audience is transformed into willing participants through a performance's mise-en-scène can a national ceremony be seen as a ritual-like performance. The paper will conclude that the efficacy of these performances is temporary, and that even when a performance succeeds in creating a community of shared experience, that community dissolves with the end of the performance.     

Making (mixed-)race: census politics and the emergence of multiracial multiculturalism in the United States,Great Britain and Canada

Abstract

During the same time period, the United States, Great Britain and Canada all moved towards ‘counting’ mixed-race on their national censuses. In the United States, this move is largely attributed to the existence of a mixed-race social movement that pushed Congress for the change – but similar developments in Canada and Britain occurred without the presence of a politically active civil society devoted to making the change. Why the convergence? This article argues that demographic trends, increasingly unsettled perceptions about discrete racial categories, and a transnational norm surrounding the primacy of racial self-identification in census-taking culminated in a normative shift towards multiracial multiculturalism. Therein, mixed-race identities are acknowledged as part of – rather than problematic within – diverse societies. These elements enabled mixed-race to be promoted, at times strategically, as a corollary of multiculturalism in these three countries.     

Antimicrobial susceptibility of anaerobic bacteria in Bulgaria

ObjectivesThe antimicrobial susceptibility of anaerobic bacteria isolated from clinical specimens in the referent for Bulgaria anaerobic laboratory was studied in a period of 25 years/1983–2007/.MethodsNCCLS – recommended agar dilution methods were used. β-lactamase activity was determined with nitrocefin discs.ResultsThe 29 antimicrobial agents included in the study were divided according to their in vitro activity against the anaerobic isolates into 4 main groups for guiding empirical treatment: 1st group of metronidazole, chloramphenicol, meropenem, imipenem and combinations of β-lactam antibiotics with sulbactam – with high activity and drugs of choice for treatment; 2nd group – clindamycin, cefoxitin, carbenicillin/and azlocillin, piperacillin/ – with a good activity and low percent of resistant strains; 3rd group – of tetracycline and erythromycin with higher percent of resistant strains including the new macrolides as josamycin, clarithromycin, roxithromycin and azithromycin; 4th group – penicillins/ampicillin, amoxicillin, penicillin/and cephalosporins/cefamandole, cefazolin, cefotaxime and cefoperazone/ – not suitable for treatment of infections including Bacteroides fragilis group strains, with a very high percent of resistant strains, probably due to β-lactamase activity in most of the strains.ConclusionA continued updating and a follow-up in the changes of antibiotic susceptibility are necessary in every country as resistance patterns vary not only between geographical regions but also even among medical centers and hospitals which may be connected with differences in antibiotic usage in man and animals.     

Procurement,commissioning and QA of AI based solutions: An MPE’s perspective on introducing AI in clinical practice

PurposeIn this study, we propose a framework to help the MPE take up a unique and important role at the introduction of AI solutions in clinical practice, and more in particular at procurement, acceptance, commissioning and QA.Material and methodsThe steps for the introduction of Medical Radiological Equipment in a hospital setting were extrapolated to AI tools. Literature review and in-house experience was added to prepare similar, yet dedicated test methods.ResultsProcurement starts from the clinical cases to be solved and is usually a complex process with many stakeholders and possibly many candidate AI solutions. Specific KPIs and metrics need to be defined. Acceptance testing follows, to verify the installation and test for critical exams. Commissioning should test the suitability of the AI tool for the intended use in the local institution. Results may be predicted from peer reviewed papers that treat representative populations. If not available, local data sets can be prepared to assess the KPIs, or ‘virtual clinical trials’ could be used to create large, simulated test data sets. Quality assurance must be performed periodically to verify if KPIs are stable, especially if the software is upscaled or upgraded, and as soon as self-learning AI tools would enter the medical practice.DiscussionMPEs are well placed to bridge between manufacturer and medical team and help from procurement up to reporting to the management board. More work is needed to establish consolidated test protocols.     

Dietary and pharmacological intervention to mitigate the cardiopulmonary effects of air pollution toxicity

BackgroundExposure to air pollution contributes importantly to excess morbidity and mortality. And while regulatory actions under the “Clean Air Act” have saved millions of lives by improving air quality, there are still millions of people in the U.S. who live in areas where particulate air pollution (PM) levels exceed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's National Ambient Air Quality Standards. Therefore, apart from such localities working to attain such standards the protection of the health of public and in particular those at high risk might benefit from interventional strategies that would ameliorate air pollution's adverse health effects. Because inflammation and oxidative stress appear to mediate the health effects of air pollution, one interventional approach to consider is the use of dietary supplementation or medication with anti-inflammatory or antioxidant properties to block the biological responses that initiate the pathophysiological process that culminates in adverse health effects.Scope of reviewThis article reviews the capability of dietary supplementation, such as antioxidant vitamins, polyunsaturated fatty acids, and medications as a strategy to mitigate air pollution-induced subclinical cardiopulmonary effects.Major conclusionsAntioxidant vitamins C and E protect the lungs against short-term ozone and PM exposure. Polyunsaturated fatty acids, such as fish oil and olive oil appear to offer protection against short-term air pollution-induced adverse cardiovascular responses.General significanceTaking dietary supplements or medications with antioxidant or anti-inflammatory properties has the potential to provide at least partial protection against air pollution-induced adverse health effects in those individuals who are known to be most susceptible, namely those with pre-existing respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled Air Pollution, edited by Wenjun Ding, Andrew J. Ghio and Weidong Wu.     

Bisphosphonates and Osteonecrosis of the Jaw: A Retrospective Study

ObjectiveTo assess the prevalence of osteonecrosis of the jaw (ONJ) in patients receiving bisphosphonate therapy and in those who were bisphosphonate naïve.MethodsWe undertook a retrospective review of medical records of patients at the New York Harbor Health Care System from 1999 through 2004. Charts were selected for review if patients had a Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) code suggestive of ONJ or if they had ever received bisphosphonate therapy.ResultsAmong 1,951 medical records reviewed, we identified 2 patients with ONJ who had received bisphos-phonates and 2 patients with ONJ who were bisphospho-nate naïve. Both patients treated with bisphosphonates had multiple myeloma and were receiving monthly infusions. They had initially received pamidronate before treatment was changed to zoledronic acid. In each case, ONJ was precipitated by a routine dental extraction. The prevalence of ONJ in our patient population receiving intravenously administered bisphosphonates was 1 in 71.5. Of the 2 cases of ONJ in bisphosphonate-naïve patients, osteora-dionecrosis was clearly incriminated in 1 patient and potentially the causative factor in the other patient as well. No patients receiving orally administered bisphosphonates had ONJ, nor did this complication occur in any patients receiving parenteral bisphosphonate therapy for disorders such as osteoporosis or Paget’s disease of bone.ConclusionBisphosphonates remain an important option for management of metabolic bone disease and complications of malignant disease. The overall prevalence of ONJ in patients receiving bisphosphonates seems to be very low; however, patients receiving intense parenteral therapy for an underlying malignant condition appear to have a uniquely elevated risk for the development of this complication. A causal relationship between bisphosphonates and ONJ remains to be proved and merits further investigation. (Endocr Pract. 2007;13:232-238)     

Diasporas and secessionist conflicts: the mobilization of the Armenian,Albanian and Chechen diasporas

Abstract

This article examines the impact of diasporas on secessionist conflicts, focusing on the Albanian, Armenian and Chechen diasporas and the conflicts in Kosovo, Karabakh and Chechnya during the 1990s. How do diasporas radicalize these conflicts? I argue that despite differences in diaspora communal characteristics and the types of the secessionist conflicts, a common pattern of mobilization develops. Large-scale diasporic support for secessionism emerges only after independence is proclaimed by the local elites. From that point onwards diasporas become engaged in a conflict spiral, and transnational coalitions are formed between local secessionist and diaspora groups. Depending on the organizational strength of the local strategic centre and the diasporic institutions, these coalitions endure or dissipate. Diasporas exert radicalization influences on the conflict spiral on two specific junctures – when grave violations of human rights occur in the homeland and when local moderate elites start losing credibility that they can achieve the secessionist goal.