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"All the President's Men" is a film analyzed by Christian Keathley and Robert B. Ray in their book. The authors argue that the film focuses on the experience of disorientation and uncertainty rather than the outcome of the investigation. The film, which follows the reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein as they investigate the Watergate scandal, recreates the feeling of being lost in a maze of clues and information. The book provides a close reading of the film's narrative structure, mise-en-scène, and cinematography, and argues for its status as an American classic. The authors also discuss the blend of art movie, classical studio-era, and New Hollywood elements in the film, as well as the deliberate choice to obscure and omit relevant story information. The book offers valuable insights for students of close reading methods and scholars of Hollywood history and style. [Extracted from the article]

"Black Women and the Changing Television Landscape" by Lisa M. Anderson is a book that examines the portrayal of Black women on television throughout history. Anderson, an associate professor of women and gender studies, builds on her previous work to explore the complex and evolving representations of Black women in media. Using a semiotic approach and drawing on the work of Black feminist scholars, Anderson analyzes specific television shows and personalities from the 1950s to the present. The book goes beyond simplistic judgments and aims to understand the historical and cultural contexts in which these representations exist, as well as the agency of Black women in shaping them. It is a valuable resource for scholars in cultural, media, and television studies. [Extracted from the article]

This paper suggests looking at veganism as a set of knowledge that produces and reproduces habitual food practices and changes in semiotic habits and the meanings attached to foods. A semiotic analysis of veganism as a system of knowledge suggests its being a translated text that recognizes scientific and medical knowledge and the non-vegan alimentary system. However, it reconfigures them by communicating a series of signs whose meanings reverse those suggested by omnivores. The identification of signs that constitute the vegan knowledge enables me to look at veganism as complex system, in which syntagmatic and associative relationships are not fully determined (Barthes [1984]. Elements of Semiology. New York: Hill and Wang). Although contesting the essentiality of animal-based foods, vegan meals suggest two overlapping approaches to meals. In one, the plant-based protein serves as the centrepiece of the meal, imitating conventional meals. The other offers an alternative meal structure, in which syntagmatic relations are constructed as a sequence of daily meals, each consisting of an aggregation of simultaneously served dishes out of which diners construct their own repast, thus broadening the scope of associative relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates a taken-for-granted institutional form, shelters for unhoused New Yorkers, through the neo-institutional lens of institutional inertia and critical case study methodology. It focuses on the external shock of COVID-19, NYC's use of unoccupied hotels for social distancing, and the return to shelters when COVID waned. For guidance, we examine other instances of interrupted institutional inertia following shocks. Using Lewin's force field analysis, we explore why changes to some institutional forms amidst COVID persisted while novel approaches to shelter dissipated. We conclude that directly involving unhoused people in the design and implementation of homeless services may improve outcomes. Human service professionals share a body of knowledge and assumptions – a kind of echo chamber that amplifies and confirms beliefs. It is important to look beyond traditional and familiar models of service delivery to find alternative ideas and approaches that may be effective. Returning to Kurt Lewin's concept of force fields provides opportunities to think effectively and holistically about how to modify or change services, policies, and organizations. People served by human services – those with lived experiences – possess unique expertise that can inform organizational decisions and planning in new and helpful ways. As practitioners, we need to find ways to be more inclusive of the perspectives and ideas of those our programs serve through participatory methods of planning, decision making, and evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops a critical perspective on the use of conversational agents (CAs) with children at home. Drawing on interviews with eleven parents of pre-school children living in Norway, we illustrate the ways in which parents resisted the values epitomised by CAs. We problematise CAs' attributes in light of parents' ontological perceptions of what it means to be human and outline how their attitudes correspond to Bourdieu's [1998a. Acts of Resistance. New York: New Press] concept of acts of resistance. For example, parents saw artificial conversation designed for profit as a potential threat to users' autonomy and the instant gratification of CAs as a threat to children's development. Parents' antecedent beliefs map onto the ontological tensions between human and non-human attributes and challenge the neoliberal discourse by demanding freedom and equality for users rather than productivity and economic gain. Parents' comments reflect the belief that artificial conversation with a machine inappropriately and ineffectively mimics a nuanced and intimate human-to-human experience in service of profit motives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2022, a New York civil court concluded that a polyamorous partner should not be automatically excluded from noneviction protection (O'Neill). The decision was hailed as particularly groundbreaking and a 'game changer'. On the other side of the globe, the New Zealand Supreme Court concluded that polyamorous unions could be entitled to the same property-sharing regime as couples. Upon closer examination, the two decisions use function-based modes of recognition to confer similar protections upon the polyamorous union. However, this paper will illustrate some of the limitations inherent in this approach. At present, functional recognition exhibits a continued attachment to the traditional marital family; this aspect, combined with the unique complexity of polyamorous arrangements, renders this route to legal recognition potentially inappropriate. The decisions examined either fail to understand the nature of the arrangement or choose to distort it in order to make polyamory legally intelligible. Both decisions are emblematic of a broader difficulty of functional recognition to provide answers to the legal demands of this type of relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For a long time, I have been interested in belonging: in how we are forced but also need to belong in communities, in how collective identifications form our subjective identities, in how belonging is the subject-matter of our very sense of self. I have also been interested in un-belonging, in what happens to us when we are refused or choose to refuse a collective affiliation, in the dynamic of alienation, betrayal and freedom that ensues. The paper delves into these themes by journeying through the landscape of my own difficult belonging in the land where I was born: Israel-Palestine, sunk these days in a state of catastrophic war; my experience of belonging as it is being negotiated in my own analysis, carried over the phone between Tel Aviv and New York. It is a personal-theoretical postcard from a place of existential crisis but also hope. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: During the past two decades of cannabis legalization, the prevalence of medical cannabis (MC) use has increased and there has also been an upward trend in alcohol consumption. As less restricted cannabis laws generate more adult cannabis users, there is concern that more individuals may be simultaneously using medical cannabis with alcohol. A few studies have examined simultaneous use of medical cannabis with alcohol, but none of those studies also assessed patients' current or previous non-medical cannabis use. This paper explores simultaneous alcohol and medical cannabis use among medical cannabis patients with a specific focus on previous history of cannabis use and current non-medical cannabis use. Methods: A retrospective cohort study of MC patients (N = 319) from four dispensaries located in New York. Bivariate chi-square tests and multivariable logistic regression are used to estimate the extent to which sociodemographic and other factors were associated with simultaneous use. Results: Approximately 29% of the sample engaged in simultaneous use and a large share of these users report previous (44%) or current (66%) use of cannabis for non-medical purposes. MC patients who either previously or currently use cannabis non-medicinally, men, and patients using MC to treat a pain-related condition, were significantly more likely to report simultaneous alcohol/MC use. Conclusions: Findings indicate that there may be differential risks related to alcohol/MC use, which should be considered by cannabis regulatory policies and prevention/treatment programs. If patients are using cannabis and/or alcohol to manage pain, clinicians should screen for both alcohol and cannabis use risk factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Experiential learning in Master of Social Work (MSW) programs can be an instrumental pedagogical method of juxtaposing theoretical knowledge with tangible hands-on approaches, enhancing student experience through incorporating curriculum beyond classroom settings. This paper seeks to employ the use of educational theorist David Kolb's Theory of Experiential Learning as the pedagogical framework to explore the impact of a community partnership with an upstate New York organ donation organization on master level social work students. Furthermore, this paper pursues an increased understanding of experiential learning and factors connecting social work theoretical concepts with the learning process in MSW programming. Student discussions voiced and illuminated a deeper understanding of macrocommunity concepts and demonstrated skills reflecting EPAS. Students' responses to participation in the experiential learning activity were emotional, compelling, and profound. Common areas of understanding gained by students were a clear awareness of the need for social work advocacy, measures to address social justice, and increased education for organ donations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Of concern is a problem of strain gradient porous elastic theory with nonlinear damping terms, whose constitutive equations contain higher-order derivatives of the displacement in the basic postulates. The paper is based on the theory of 'consistency' due to Aouadi et al. [J. Therm. Stress. 43(2)(2020), 191–209] and Ieşan [American Institute of Physics, Conference Proceedings, 1329 (2011), 130–149], and contains four results. We firstly show that the system is global well posed by using maximal monotone operator. The second main result is the existence of global attractors which is proved by the method developed by Chueshov and Lasiecka [Long-time behavior of second order evolution equations with nonlinear damping. Mem. Amer. Math. Soc. vol. 195, no. 912, Providence, 2008; Von Karman evolution equations: well-posedness and long-time dynamics. Springer Monographs in Mathematics, Springer, New York, 2010]. By showing the system is gradient and asymptotically smooth, we establish the existence of global attractors with finite fractal dimension via a stabilizability inequality. Then we study the continuity of global attractors regarding the parameter in a residual dense set. The above results allow the damping terms with polynomial growth. Finally we discuss the exponential decay and global boundedness to the linear case of damping terms of the system. The assumption of equal-speed wave propagations is not needed for all of results obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we extend the optional randomized response technique (ORRT) developed by Chaudhuri and Mukerjee [Optionally randomized response techniques. Bull. Calcutta Statist. Assoc. 1985;34:225–230; Randomized response: theory and techniques. New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc.; 1988] to the situation of estimating the proportion of two sensitive characteristics and their overlap. Lee, Sedory and Singh [Estimating at least seven measures of qualitative variables from a single sample using randomized response technique. Stat Prob Lett. 2013;83(1):399–409; Estimation of odds ratio, attributable risk, relative risk, correlation coefficient and other parameters using randomized response techniques. Behaviormetrika. 2021;48:371–392.] have shown that their crossed model performs better than their simple model from an efficiency point of views. Here we investigated a further improvement in the crossed model along the lines of Chaudhuri and Mukerjee [Optionally randomized response techniques. Bull. Calcutta Statist. Assoc. 1985;34:225–230; Randomized response: theory and techniques. New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc.; 1988]. New unbiased estimators are proposed, their variance expressions are derived and estimators of variances are suggested. Lastly, we carry out a simulation study to investigate the behaviour of the proposed estimators with respect to their competitors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]