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Heidi Kaufman's book, "Strangers in the Archive: Literary Evidence and London's East End," explores the life and work of Maria Polack, an openly Jewish Englishwoman who published the first novel by a Jewish woman in 1830. Kaufman's research reveals that Polack's novel, "Fiction without Romance, or The Locket-Watch," targeted a broad Jewish readership across various communities, including readers in British colonies like Jamaica and Barbados. Kaufman expands Polack's archive by consulting the Legacies of British Slave-Ownership website, comparing subscriber data with other publications, and incorporating private papers from the Lyon family, who had connections to the West Indies. Kaufman's work highlights the interconnectedness of East and West End literary culture and challenges stereotypes of urban degeneration. [Extracted from the article]

The University of East London (UEL) offers a BSc and MSc of Public Health (PH). The programmes are designed to build the workforce capacity by enabling access to higher education (HE) for future PH practitioners and specialists, and facilitating promotion possibilities within current employment. In 2009/10, the MSc and BSc programs had 143 and 70 students respectively, with 209 students undertaking PH combined degrees at the BSc level. This paper presents methods and outcomes of aligning the programs with the United Kingdom Public Health Skills and Career Framework (UK PHSCF). The realigned MSc programme is a 1.5 year (full-time), six module (180 credits) programme with strong emphasis on epidemiology and research. The BSc programme lasts three years (full-time) and consists of 36 modules (360 credits) providing an introductory overview of the core functions of PH. The programmes' modules were mapped against the 9 UK PHSCF PH areas. Additional activities were built into the programs to enhance the learning experience and augment transferable skills. After the realignment, the UK Government published in 2010 the White Paper for PH and, in spite of this, announced budget cuts to HE funding along with increased tuition fees. The programme changes are likely to contribute to PH capacity building but in a time when political reform adversely impacts on the development of the PH workforce. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban intensification is a key planning strategy in the UK, but one that is frequently resisted by local residents objecting to transformations of urban character. This paper is concerned with the factors that underlie such resistance, and with the opportunities for addressing them through the planning process. The paper relates a case-study of the East London district of Dalston where a mixed-use redevelopment project, strongly supported by local authorities, was fiercely resisted by residents who claimed that the existing character of the locality was being violated. Reflecting on the case through theories of place, gentrification, and planning process, we argue that resident resistance was not simply a case of self-interested NIMBYism, but a product of important differences in the ways that character was variously constructed and valued by local authorities and community members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a longstanding literature on the unequal geographical distribution of welfare. In this paper we argue that increasingly geography is becoming the basis for rationing access to some forms of welfare. Focusing on access to secondary schools in East London, England, where the demand for places at the more popular schools generally far exceeds the number of places available, we show how distance from school has now become the primary means of allocating places. Rather than educational resources attempting to compensate for geographical disadvantage, geography (in the form of distance from school) has become the rationale by which those living in advantaged areas continue to have privileged access to educational resources. Whereas previously the role of the state was to compensate for the unfairness of such geographical inequalities, geography (via distance to school) is now used to justify the unequal allocation of scarce school places. The paper demonstrates that not only does the near universal adoption of distance-based allocation policies in East London lead to the reproduction of social advantage and disadvantage, but also it is creating new hierarchies of school popularity and more important unpopularity which are not always clearly related to issues of school attainment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the recent re-emergence of a gay scene in Shoreditch and argues that its reappraisal of British pub culture and appropriated versions of East End localism can be considered as a countercultural response to the marketed cosmopolitanism of Soho's gay village in the early 1990s. The original marketing of Soho as cosmopolitan was built around the rejection of the public house in favour of more 'continental' bars, signalling a move towards Europeanised consumption habits. In contrast, Shoreditch's gay scene evokes local working-class themes and the area's decaying urban aesthetics in attempts to market itself as an 'authentic' alternative to the 'artificial' West End. This paper begins by discussing a number of reoccurring themes in literary and media representations of East London before analysing specifically how some of these themes have been appropriated on Shoreditch's gay scene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper follows the trials and tribulations of a loose alliance of urban conservationists seeking to create and maintain spaces for brownfield wildlife in East London. It focuses, in particular, on the construction of living roofs—an innovative conservation strategy where wildlife habitat is created on top of new and old buildings in the city. The paper identifies three obstacles that have challenged the development of brownfield conservation, which relate to the urban geographies, lively temporalities, and inconspicuous forms of brownfield wildlife and wild-living. These obstacles differ markedly from those of the nonhumans prioritised in mainstream conservation. Brownfield conservationists have developed a novel and fluid model of practice, whose emergence and characteristics can be linked to wider developments in UK nature conservation. This model chimes clearly with new approaches to theorising human-nonhuman interaction that have been developed in nonequilibrium ecology and relational geography. Drawing together these empirical and theoretical innovations, the paper concludes by outlining the parameters of a fluid biogeography of UK wildlife conservation to help understand and guide future conservation practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the effect of social background and ethnicity on educational performance in an area with traditionally poor levels of attainment. It begins by examining the variation in school performance for London and specifically east London. It shows how the disadvantaged nature of the area, as measured by such variables as Mosaic group and ethnic heritage, helps to explain the poor results at GCSE. The paper then changes the focus to schools within a seven-borough area of east London. Using the Pupil Level Annual School Census (PLASC) linked to the geodemographic Mosaic codes based on pupils' home postcode, the authors demonstrate that, although ethnicity accounts for some of the variation in performance, this is considerably less than that accounted for by pupil social background. In addition, they show that it is not simply the social background of the individual pupil that affects school performance at GCSE. The proportion of pupils from a given social background plays some role in boosting or diminishing the overall school performance and will influence the performance of individual pupils whatever their background. It is argued that these social background effects together with the school composition effects have a considerable impact on school performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the personal and public photography taken in the 1960s by Joseph Denfield, a well-known South African ethnographic photographer and amateur historian in East London. We argue that his collection allows for a critical reflection on the narratives of the history and culture of East London during this period. Drawing attention to the economic, infrastructural, political and cultural changes that the city underwent from the 1950s onward, we place Denfield's images alongside such changes noting the ways they offer a silent critique of the ‘dismantling’ of the city's colonial past, and in turn draw on the discursive trope of ‘salvage anthropology’ to ‘redeem’ such a past. His images are melancholic and nostalgic, documenting a city in ruins. They lament the passing of an era and the collapse of a particular kind of city. Some of his photographs were deeply personal and private, but they are also of great public significance because they now provide the cornerstone of a heritage-driven representational history of a city which, we argue, effectively has no modern history. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

‘Home’ is a space which occupies multiple sites, with which come multiple sensory experiences. The geographies of ‘home’ as defined beyond the dwelling and fixed notions of home are what has been called ‘stretched’. This paper investigates ‘home’ for 15 young men of mixed race aged 16 to 19 in East London. Through the use of written electronic diaries, interviews and photo-voice it explores how city spaces became mobile sites of belonging and various ‘public’ urban spaces become ‘homelike’ for young men of mixed race. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Largely catalysed by hosting the XXX Summer Olympic Games, East London is currently experiencing significant urban regeneration at a rate not seen since the period of post-war reconstruction. In doing so, a series of processes that serve to heighten the intensity of cameras in this already saturated video surveillance landscape are occurring. At the same time, these developments, whilst affecting East London, demonstrate a number of key issues, debates and crises germane to the dissemination and operation of video surveillance across the UK as a whole. These include the intensification and cohesion of video surveillance networks; the role of CCTV in urban regeneration schemes; tensions between disparate applications of CCTV and aspirations for a coherent regulatory framework; and, crucially, how CCTV can be justified at a time of severe economic crisis. The paper explores these issues via the identification and analysis of three broad processes operating in East London: the 'additionality' of Olympic-related surveillance measures; the centripetal surveillance-pull of Olympic-related regeneration programmes; and the co-option and integration of extant CCTV facilities. The strong emphasis on surveillant economies of scale and the integration of existing surveillance infrastructures invite reflection on post-Foucauldian theorisations of networked 'societies of control'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper investigates the extent to which social support can have a buffering effect against the potentially adverse consequences of bullying on school achievement and mental health. It uses a representative multiethnic sample of adolescents attending East London secondary schools in three boroughs. Bullied adolescents were less likely to achieve the appropriate academic achievement benchmark for their age group and bullied boys (but not girls) were more likely to exhibit depressive symptoms compared to those not bullied. High levels of social support from family were important in promoting good mental health. There was evidence that high levels of support from friends and moderate (but not high) family support was able to protect bullied adolescents from poor academic achievement. Support from friends and family was not sufficient to protect adolescents against mental health difficulties that they might face as a result of being bullied. More active intervention from schools is recommended. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

While entitlements are often expressed as universal and linked to the rights citizens should have, young people's access to them is shaped by their social positioning, meaning that whether, and in what sense, they are citizens is pertinent. If citizens have access to universal entitlements, does this position certain young people who do not have such access as 'lesser youth' because their entitlements are reduced and citizenship diminished or non-existent? This paper examines whether and how young, separated migrants wanting refuge may be positioned as 'lesser youth'. It draws on a sample of them and multisector professionals examining qualitative data on accessing health care, sexual exploitation and rebuilding lives. The data suggest that the legislative and institutional framework they face militates against their enjoying the 'universal' entitlements of citizens. This reflects their positioning as 'lesser youth' excluded from the full rights citizens are entitled to. Such a positioning is in large part underpinned by contested notions of nationhood, belonging and entitlement central to communitarian citizenship but which exclude them. We argue that a meaningful citizenship for these youth requires a contestation of restrictive communitarian ideas and practices in ways forwarding a more inclusive and socially just multicultural UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper examines the implications for design of inpatient settings of community-based models of care and treatment of mental illness. The study draws on ideas from relational geographies and expands interpretations based on Foucault''s writing. We analyse material from a case study which explored the views of patients, consultants, and other staff from a new Psychiatric Inpatient Unit in a deprived area of East London, UK. We discuss in particular: the tension between providing a caring and supportive institutional environment and ensuring that patients are returned to the community when they are ready; the links between an acute inpatient facility and its local community; the potential significance of the psychiatric hospital as a relatively stable feature in the otherwise insecure and unpredictable geographical experience of people with long-term mental illnesses. We discuss the relevance of these issues for design of new psychiatric inpatient facilities. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The East London railway line extension is one of the most intensive railway reconstruction projects undertaken in the UK. An existing operational railway with Victorian infrastructure has been taken out of service so that it can be extended and upgraded to provide a high-quality metro-style passenger service across London. The project encompasses integrating modern bridges into Victorian railway infrastructure, building new bridges and viaducts in the centre of London and minimising disruption while putting new bridges across the mainlines into two of London's railway termini. The paper describes the bridge structures and how they are being built. Two particular design issues with regard to the maintenance of railway bridges are highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the development of protocols with interpreters employed in an East London psychological trauma clinic. The service treats traumatized refugee people with cognitive methods, according to the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) Guidelines for PTSD. NICE states that language should not be a barrier to treatment, but provides no further guidance to achieve this. These protocols for interpreting CBT are designed to be explicit, consistent and ethical. A telephone poll from a recent UK-wide trauma survey, a focus group with local interpreters, and practitioner reflection were all used to develop and refine the protocols and their rationale, which are described, together with implications for future culturally sensitive practice and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the impact of an oral retelling of Homer's Iliad on pupils' learning in Key Stage 2 classrooms (children aged 9–11) in schools in East London. We argue that the oral nature of the retelling and responses promoted high levels of engagement and inclusion, leading to enhanced understanding by the pupils. The use of a complex and emotionally powerful text also encouraged a changing of the nature of the discourse between teachers and pupils. Finally we argue for the use of texts like the Iliad as an integral part of the literacy curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we investigate whether the distance between school and the pupil’s home is related to social background in a six borough area of East London. Also investigated is the extent to which schools in the area perform in line with expectations on the basis of the social composition of their intake. The research involves analysis of the Pupil Level Annual School Census (PLASC) to which geodemographic codes supplied by Experian have been attached. We demonstrate that the six schools in the area which achieved the highest average points score at GCSE recruit pupils widely from within the area (and to a lesser extent outside), whilst the lowest performing six schools recruit from much more narrowly defined catchment areas. In terms of school performance, we show that whilst we might expect schools to perform better as they become more distant from inner East London and nearer to the M25, this is not necessarily the case. In our conclusions we argue that these data support the claims made on the basis of ethnographic data about the class nature of school selection and parental choice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: While men who have sex with men remain the group at greatest risk of acquiring HIV infection in the UK, the number of new diagnoses among heterosexuals has risen steadily over the last five years. In the UK, three-quarters of heterosexual men and women diagnosed with HIV in 2004 probably acquired their infection in Africa. This changing epidemiological pattern is particularly pronounced in East London because of its ethnically diverse population. Design and methods: The objective of the study was to examine the social, economic and behavioural characteristics of patients with HIV infection currently receiving treatment and care in hospitals in East London. The research focused on ethnicity, gender, sexuality, education, employment, housing, HIV treatment, stigma, discrimination, religion, migration and sexual risk behaviour. People diagnosed with HIV infection attending outpatient treatment clinics at St Bartholomew's, the Royal London, Whipp's Cross, Homerton, Newham and Barking hospitals (all in East London) over a 4-6 month period were invited to participate in the study in 2004-2005. Those who agreed to participate completed a confidential, self-administered pen-and-paper questionnaire. During the study period, 2680 patients with HIV attended the outpatient clinics in the six participating hospitals, of whom 2299 were eligible for the study and 1687 completed a questionnaire. The response rate was 73% of eligible patients and 63% of all patients attending the clinics during the survey period. Discussion: A clinic-based study has allowed us to survey nearly 1700 patients with HIV from diverse backgrounds receiving treatment and care in East London. The data collected in this study will provide valuable information for the planning and delivery of appropriate clinical care, social support and health promotion for people living with HIV not only in East London but in other parts of the capital as well as elsewhere in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]