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This study aims to explore the relationship between large-scale media (referring to individuals or companies with a large number of followers on social media) and marketing, and to utilize the influence of large-scale media to increase product sales and brand exposure. Specifically, the paper first introduces the concept of centrality, including degree centrality, closeness centrality, and betweenness centrality, as well as their applications in social networks. Then, this study regards large-scale media as nodes in the social network and proposes the centrality concept of large-scale media. Next, this study analyzes the influence and propagation effects of large-scale media in the social network, thereby highlighting the importance of large-scale media in marketing activities. Finally, through empirical analysis, the paper verifies the positive impact of the centrality of large-scale media on product sales and brand exposure. The findings of this study suggest that marketing professionals need to pay more attention to the role and value of large-scale media, and strengthen cooperation with large-scale media in marketing strategies. At the same time, this study proposes suggestions for optimizing marketing strategies using centrality methods, such as finding and cooperating with large-scale media with greater influence, and establishing a relationship network with central nodes. These suggestions can help improve product sales and brand exposure, thus bringing better business benefits to enterprises.

This paper provides an insightful exploration of Mass Customization (MC), a rising trend in the modern manufacturing landscape that couples the efficiency of large-scale production with the allure of personalized products. It elucidates MC’s operational, market-related, and customer engagement challenges, offering optimization strategies grounded in digital intelligence technology and Supply Chain Agility (SCA). The paper delves into the role of 3D printing, Flexible Manufacturing Systems, data-driven designs, and Digital Twin Technology, illustrating how these technologies can enhance MC processes. It also underscores the importance of SCA in mediating the complex relationship between these technologies and MC capabilities, thus offering a nuanced understanding of its implementation. The study concludes that the integration of digital intelligence technology, paired with the enhancement of SCA, can effectively navigate the complexities of MC, providing a competitive edge in today’s volatile market landscape. This research is a significant theoretical and practical guide for organizations aspiring to transition toward MC amidst the digital revolution.

Based on the contemporary social network environment, this paper discusses the practical significance of its impact on consumer behavior, and influencers as the main component of social network, this paper mainly take the mega-influencers and small influencers as the research object, through the analysis of the characteristics and application of the small-world network social network model to the micro-influencers, it is concluded that the influence of the mega- influencers on consumer decision-making is very important, but micro-influencers also play a subtle role in consumer behavior, which can be perceived as inseparable. At the same time, the application of small-world network model in economic management is a relatively new research field, which brings new ideas for economic management research and provides an effective technical tool. For example, this paper studies a new model of marketing through small-world network community, and innovates marketing strategy from two aspects of dominance and suggestion according to the different characteristics of mega-influencers and micro-influencers.

Digital technology has changed the original product form, the way of new product production process, business model and organizational form, and even overturned the basic assumptions of many innovation theories. Embedding digital innovation ecosystem makes it possible for small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises to create value from the production side in the industrial era to the demand side in the digital economy era. Through a typical vertical case analysis, this paper reveals the internal mechanism and process of digital innovation ecosystem enpowers the innovation of small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises. The research results show that the embedding of digital innovation ecosystem has a significant positive impact on the innovation performance of small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises, and value co-creation plays an intermediary role between digital innovation ecosystem and the innovation performance of small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises. This paper puts forward the innovation theoretical framework of small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises from the perspective of digital innovation ecosystem.

In this work, a dynamic structured light 3D reconstruction method adapted to random phase shift step size is proposed for the problem of dynamic workpiece 3D reconstruction in industrial manufacturing scenes. The method firstly utilizes a structured light sinusoidal grating pattern to match the relative phase shift of the workpieces moving along the perpendicular direction of the stripes on the conveyor belt. Secondly, in order to solve the problem of non-uniform phase shift step length due to external vibration, electromagnetic radiation and other disturbing factors of the conveyor belt and other mechanical devices, the method proposes a dynamic structured light 3D reconstruction model based on RPSNet, which is based on the CycleGAN network model, and uses the AIR2U-net model proposed in this paper as the generator, and the multilayer convolutional neural network CNN as the discriminator to realize the grating map. discriminator to realize the conversion of raster map to depth map. Finally, for the problem that the network model needs a large amount of data for training and it is difficult to collect data in the actual industrial scene, this paper uses the Thing10k dataset, and the dataset made by Blender simulation software for model training. Finally, a higher quality 3D reconstruction of the workpiece is realized.

This paper focuses on economic issues related to the presence of shopping malls, as economic activities are inevitably influenced by social interactions and interpersonal relationships. Different types of relationships, ranging from weak to strong and positive to negative, form a complex system. The combination of Chinese tradition, cultural background, and the requirements of the current social system has led to the prominence of interpersonal connections. This paper provides a detailed analysis of the significant impact of relationships on transaction subjects. Furthermore, it explores how interpersonal relationships affect the formation and development of enterprises, as well as the allocation and utilization of resources. The paper emphasizes the importance of reducing the negative impact of interpersonal relationships by adopting an approach that prioritizes interpersonal connections. This involves considering new cost and profit expectations and minimizing the reliance on relational functions when constraining economic activities.

A new era of digital technology, characterized by the advent of mobile internet, cloud computing, big data, and artificial intelligence, is reshaping human production and lifestyle, heralding a paradigm shift in the way we engage with the world around us. As a matter of fact, digital transformation is no longer a distant future but an ongoing reality faced by all enterprises alike. Within this evolving landscape, human resources management, being a pivotal component of organizational management, is undergoing profound changes driven by digitalization. This paper combs the literature from all over the world in the field of digital human resource management in the past ten years, and extracts the key discoveries. This paper sums up the four most popular research topics: digital natives, service-oriented human resource management, updated connection mode, and ensuring the status of humanity. On the basis of the review, this paper looks forward to the future by pointing out possible research directions and making relevant recommendations.

In this paper, we analyze the forms of conflictuality and violence in territories subject to agricultural and mining extractivism, the impacts on peasant groups and the way in which resistance based on agroecology is redefined by these processes. We draw attention to gender in interlocked power relations by showing, on the one hand, how it serves the penetration of extractivist projects, by getting (male) peasants to sign up to the projects or by attacking their resistance. On the other hand, we highlight resistance centred on agroecology, the reinvestment of the care work socially assigned to female peasants, opposition and negotiations within families and politicization.

At the beginning of the 1950s, the nationality policy of the People's Republic of China granted the Sui, a Tai-speaking minority (Kam-sui group of the Kadai branch) in southern Guizhou, the status of nationality under the Chinese name "shui" and allocated them an autonomous administrative territory in their name with the rank of district. The study presented here provides an example of the territorial production of the Chinese state captured on a local scale, where questions of ethnic identification and regional autonomy present their own configurations. We begin by examining the classification procedures of the Qing imperial state, which at the end of the seventeenth century drew the first official contours of a Sui territory by dissociating them from the other 'barbarian' (Miao) populations of the region. The role of the classifications produced by Chinese ethnology in the Republican period in the future recognition of the Sui as a nationality is then highlighted, as is the founding role of the Sui scholar Pan Yizhi, of Sui ethnicity, who was briefly entrusted with the vice-presidency of the Sui autonomous district in 1957. The recent re-publication of his work, which was ill-treated during the Cultural Revolution, allows us to retrace the stages in the process of its creation. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the instrumentalisation of this founding period for contemporary local development purposes.

الهدف من هذا البحث هو دراسة الآثار الاقتصادية للسيطرة المصرية على المجموعة "ج" بالنوبة السفلى خلال عصر الدولة الوسطى، مع التعرض للعلاقات المصرية النوبية ، والتعريف بالمجموعة "ج" ، وأسباب التدخل المصرى في النوبة السفلى، بالإضافة إلى إلقاء الضوء على النشاط الاقتصادي للمجموعة "ج" فى النوبة فى ظل السيطرة المصرية، ومنه مزاولة سكان تلك المجموعة لحرفة الرعى والزراعة، والتعرف على سكان المجموعة "ج" في ظل السيطرة المصرية على منتجات المناجم والمحاجر، وعلى منتجات الذهب، ومقتنيات مقابر المجموعة "ج" المتأثرة بالفن المصرى، وكذلك التعرف على طبيعة العلاقات التجارية فى ظل السيطرة العسكرية المصرية، وأخيرًا أسباب سقوط المجموعة "ج".AbstractThe aim of this paper is to study the economic impact of Egyptian control over Group "C" in Lower Nubia during the Middle Kingdom, as well as addressing Egyptian-Nubian relations and introducing Group "C" and the reasons for Egyptian intervention in Lower Nubia. Moreover, it will shed light on the economic activities of Group "C" in Nubia under Egyptian control, including the practice of herding and agriculture by the group’s inhabitants. It will also explore the involvement of Group "C" inhabitants in mining and quarrying products, gold products, and the burial goods of Group "C" influenced by Egyptian art. It will examine trade exchange under Egyptian military control, and finally the reasons for the fall of Group "C".

Starting from the mid-2010s, Japan has seen a rise in media works (such as novels, comics, animation, and TV dramas) discussing the asexual and aromantic identities with an ever-increasing number of people connecting with those labels and, some of them actively associating with the LGBTQ+ community. The pull towards an asexual and aromantic society has also been linked to the lower marriage and birth rate by some experts, wondering whether the identification with such labels could be caused by societal shifts (busier work schedules, less spending power, financial insecurities). In this context, the two works this paper analyses, I Want to Be the Wall (Watashi wa kabe ni naritai, 2019-2023) by Shirono Honami and Is Love the Answer? (Kimi no sekai ni koi wa nai, 2020) by Isaki Uta link the societal pressure to conform to an allosexual and heterosexual way of life with the feeling of disconnect from romantic and platonic relationships with peers.

“Archive” comes from the Ancient Greek ἀρχεῖον, “house of the ruler”: inside, we find what corresponds to the normative framework; outside, everything that dissents and is not conform. This occurs for the heteropatriarchal archive of intimate partner violence, as it is explored by Carmen Maria Machado in In the Dream House (2019), and for the archive of folklore, ruled by each (re-)teller’s framework. What if we regain the oral dimension of the tale tradition in a diffractive perspective? What if the reader entangles with the text, co-creating a new meaning? In this paper, I propose to shed a light on the possibilities of diffracting the folkloric archive, to shift the archival-ruled narratives in the direction of self-representation and empoderamiento for the subjectivities expelled from the archival narratives. Two are the paths proposed: firstly, situated literary retellings, with a focus on Machado’s memoir; and secondly, wild pedagogy and slow scholarship methodologies and practices, enabling the experience of the reader to entangle with and diffract the tales’ narratives.

This paper reports a methodological exploration combining image network analysis and standardized practice analysis on social media data. Through applying the open source software Memespector to access the Clarifai API, the potential of an easy-at-hand image tagging tool as an instrument to manage larger data corpora is explored. Using the example of the German-speaking Twitter hashtag #systemrelevant, we relate image clusters to the results of standardized practice analysis of posts that contain images. The proposed method is intended for research that attempts to carve out the co-constituting of public discourse in social media by different groups of actors. The approach systematically differentiates the contributions of societal groups such as journalism, civil society, or private individuals, and the embedding of their tweets in selected anchoring practices and further modalities of participation. Altogether, the multistep analytical process offers a possible approach to process larger image corpora, while maintaining a sensitivity for the practice-theoretical demand of (re)contextualizing image use.

In visual communication research there are already several methodological approaches for creating image types. These approaches work with creating typologies based on the representational features of visuals / image motifs, reducing the complexity of extensive visual material. However, we argue that in everyday visual communication, the meaning of images depends largely on the practices in which they are embedded and not on the motif. This paper’s aim is to propose a methodological design for an image type analysis that considers both the representational and the artifact-related component of images, following a texto-material understanding of images. We illustrate the procedure step by step through an empirical study that explores visuals in couple relationships in Switzerland. The method enables a qualitative analysis of a large number of visuals that combines a) the creation of image types and b) a dynamic approach to in-depth visual analysis. Image types resulting from this procedure are more heterogeneous in motifs compared to previous traditions of image type analysis but allow for considering both the visual and the material dimensions of visuals, e.g., practices in which images are embedded. The approach builds on existing methods and contributes to the advancements of methods within visual communication research.

This paper explores the phenomenon of iconic image clusters and presents a method for analyzing them. It specifically focuses on compiling individual images into extensive image clusters, such as weblogs, photo series, or image galleries. The analytical interest in this topic is based on the assumption that the compilation and presentation of images are independent means of expression and presentation in visual media. Iconic image clusters can emphasize thematic aspects, highlight contrasts, create styles, or provide visual evidence. In other words, iconic image clusters reflect several communicative possibilities that arise from the technical reproducibility of images. Iconic image clusters belong to the subclass of contemporary hypertext / hyperimage phenomena in media theory and are manifestations of the human ability to generate meaning through relations of similarity and difference in communication theory. This article addresses how iconic image clusters can be analyzed validly. It discusses the communicative structure and functioning of such clusters and proposes a procedure for their analysis. The proposed method is illustrated with examples, including a photographic weblog.

Visual elements play an important role within the multimodal nature of social media (Pearce et al., 2020). A growing body of research has focused on the analysis of still and moving images from different social media platforms from various perspectives of communication and media studies (Hautea, Parks, Takahashi, & Zeng, 2021; Li & Xie, 2020; Veum & Undrum, 2018). Although the aforementioned studies describe visual data collection, their principal focus does not rely on this collection, but on data analysis. Little attention has been paid to the challenges of collecting visual datasets (Highfield & Leaver, 2016). In this paper, I propose a methodological overview of several strategies for collecting large corpora of visual data from image-based social media platforms. Provided with exemplary publications, I review five strategies for collecting visual corpora: hashtag-based, account-based, metadata-based, random sampling, and mixed approach. Lastly, I present a case study with my own mixed approach to the collection of visual data from Instagram. Considering the usage, advantages and limitations of each strategy, the article will contribute to the developing science of social media research. I believe that a literature analysis of visual data collection strategies and a provided case study can help researchers optimize visual data collection from image-based social media.

Exploring medium-to-large datasets of social media imagery can be challenging. This paper describes a digitally-assisted iconology, a hybrid methodology that includes machine learning and data analytics for sorting through medium-sized datasets of images that lack metadata to describe their pictorial content. The method plays to the strengths of current digital technologies. Using machine learning, pictures are first clustered in a preliminary stage based upon basic formal presentational characteristics. Thematic analysis follows this preliminary stage, based upon an expansion of Aby Warburg’s “pre-coined expressive values”, which are frequently found in pictures displaying high levels of user reception. Once clustered via these two separate stages, the researcher can then drill down using familiar forms of visual analysis to explore how similar concepts have been rendered in different ways. The analysis may be augmented by exploring the commentary appended to these pictures, which adds a further level of detail providing insight into end-user interpretations. The approach – including its drawbacks – is demonstrated via a consequential dataset of pictures shared on Twitter in 2015, after a Syrian child was found drowned off the Turkish shore. Derivative imagery based upon the original photographs referenced longstanding iconographic themes.

This paper examines how the keto (ketogenic) diet comes to meet the social and political needs and desires that go unmet in the context of neoliberalism. By tracking the ideology and rhetoric that emerges from personal anecdotes of people reliant on a meat based diet – with a specific focus to online platforms – I situate the diet as engaging with and reproducing a male chauvinistic ideology. I suggest that the person who finds themselves on keto wants to invest in themselves to contrast the anxiety and precarity that they face in a neoliberal society. I call this figure Keto Man.

This special issue entitled “Queering the Tropics” explores how queering as a methodology and gender and sexuality as a critical rubric complicate the study of the tropics and conceptions of tropicality. It also engages with how the tropics as a worldly zone, and the notion of tropicality as simultaneously material and imaginary, reconfigure notions of queer sexuality. In other words, our aim has been to study how the tropical might queer queerness itself. This is to attempt to understand queer as a way to initiate and pursue critical encounters with the tropical world—indeed to begin queering the tropics. This first part of the double special issue draws on queer and trans theories and LGBTQIA2+ studies to map encounters with tropical nature, including tropical materialisms, queer ecologies, and spectral tropicality. Decolonial praxis and Indigenous epistemologies also inform this cartography. The papers collected together in this special issue offer a richness that both critiques and expands queer studies.

This paper argues that the Greek-Bahamian writer, Helen Klonaris, and Trinidadian-born novelist, Shani Mootoo, pay obeisance to those systemically marginalised peoples in the Caribbean whose notions of self continue to be damaged by forms of imperialist attitudes which condemn queer and non-heteronormative desire as monstrous and strange. The authors offer an alternative discourse to etch out critical insights into the complicated lives and subjectivities of Caribbean communities, and in so doing, have recuperated tropical nature as a recourse to therapeutic interventions and as a space that protects the vulnerable from lethal neocolonial forces, which aim to disfigure the mind and body. This work, therefore, presents the task of locating a language in which the tacit understanding of deviant and queer encounters, and pleasures, can be made knowable and available to epistemic inquiry.

In the tropical landscape of Tamil Nadu in southern India, the eighteen-day long festival of Kūttāṇtạvar offers insights into the interplay of transsexuality, death, and regeneration within Tamil Mahābhārata folk cultures. The complexities of queer identity and expression within the context of Tamil Nadu’s cultural landscape, with its entailing myths and rituals, include an understanding of tropicality and the Tamil ecocultural notion of tinai, as conceptual frameworks that shape human-environment interactions and cultural practices. This festival, which is held annually during the months of April-May, has synchronised its rituals with the hot and humid summers. Most of the activities associated with the festival are scheduled primarily during night or dawn hours to avoid the intense midday heat, thus reflecting a practical adaptation to the tropical climate. Within this setting, queer identities find expression through the rituals and myths associated with the Kūttāṇtạvar’s festivals. This paper illuminates the transformative potency of myths and rituals in shaping queer identities and traditions all within the intricate montage of folk cultures in Tamil Nadu.

Terracotta figures were produced in large numbers in Egypt during the Ptolemaic and Roman periods. The introduction of integral moulding, a real technical revolution, made it possible to mass-produce them to meet new needs both in Alexandria and in the hinterland (or chôra). In this paper we will focus on the technical processes used to mass-produce the figurines, particularly remoulding. We will also examine the possible loss of craftsmanship over time and the potential impact this may have had on the consumption of these artefacts.

The study of Hellenistic and Roman gems and seals in the light of the notion of “series” provides a better understanding of how engraved images were conceived in Greco-Roman antiquity. Two recurring types of iconographic series are presented here: series that display a motif whose model is most likely a monetary type, and series of glass pastes, produced from a mould bearing the impression of a die. A comparative study of gems and coins can help to better situate in time the variations observed within a relatively homogeneous series. This paper is also an opportunity to recall the methodological approach that makes it possible to bring together the glass pastes produced by the same mould – these objects are indeed often scattered in various collections.

In ancient Greek religion the Sirens were often associated with the afterlife and burial rituals. Their role in ancient Greek literature and philosophy was also very important. The Sirens’ motif can be interpreted from many viewpoints, has many different meanings and is associated with various deities. This paper presents the Sirens as singers and musicians, individually or in groups. Selected Sirens’ representations, mainly on Attic vase-paintings, are combined with literary sources, focusing on the Archaic and Classical periods (6th-5th c. BCE). We attempt to examine the development of their iconography and significance either in mythological scenes inspired by the epics (Odyssey or Argonautica), or in different scenes, where anonymous Sirens are linked to various concepts (e.g., religious-eschatological). Sirens are depicted on black- and red-figure vases of various shapes and uses. Usually they are singing; sometimes they are holding musical instruments, usually aulos and lyre, rarely crotala. The comparison with similar themes depicted on vase-paintings will show similarities and differences in their iconography and symbolism.

The aim of this paper is the study of Claudia Saturnina and her family. A funeral inscription offers much information about this woman and her mother, her stepfather, her contubernalis and her verna. Furthermore, she was presented in the epitaph as the mamma of one of his freedmen. Who was she? What were her origins? What role did she have in her family? What did the term mamma mean in this context? Such questions will be answered on this article.

This paper focuses on a group of border areas that were subject to joint exploitation by neighbouring communities. Particular attention is paid to the borderlands known as κοιναὶ χῶραι (“common regions”) attested by a handful of inscriptions that preserve some details about their origins and status. The Hellenistic Peloponnese stands out as an area of inquiry of the utmost interest, providing as it does a limited but varied body of evidence.

Recently, the Industry 4.0 paradigm has commenced to swiftly grow in the supply chain management and logistics fields. Despite this development in the logistics and supply chain management domain, the investigations of smart logistics (also known as logistics 4.0) are still in maturity. Especially, some areas such as the drivers and inhibitors of smart logistics are still an adequately unexplored area. On the other hand, smart logistics provides highly practical solutions to overcome the increasing difficulties in logistics operations by enabling worldwide cooperation. For this reason, studies in the field of smart logistics are of critical importance. This study addresses this gap by investigating the driving factors to facilitate and barriers to the adoption of smart logistics in the context of the extant literature. A systematic literature review was conducted to provide a comprehensive result to capture the dynamics and benefits of smart logistics and identify barriers deserving of further academic interest. To summarize the novel investigations in this domain, forty (40) papers were chosen and properly analyzed. As a result of the analysis, it was revealed that there are 6 main barriers preventing the adoption and implementation of smart logistics. These are risk-related barriers, data and technology-related barriers, organizational-related barriers, human resource-related barriers, economic-related barriers, and regulation-related barriers. On the other hand, as a result of the literature review, critical factors (such as investing in smart logistics, developing technological infrastructure, generating organizational culture or mission toward smart logistics, and providing top management support) that will both overcome these obstacles and facilitate the adoption of smart logistics have been determined. The accumulation of knowledge and provided insights in this research will provide advantages for both practitioners and academics interested in this emerging novel technology segment.

General topic in this paper is the role of oil industry in global economy and the result of changing oil prices on economic variables in Azerbaijan. The major aim is to analyze the effects of crude oil price changes on Azerbaijan economy in order to measure how changes in oil prices affect its basic economic variables. At the beginning, a general outlook on oil industry will be given and the main oil exporting economies will be analized. However, main focus will be on the structure of Azerbaijan’s economy and it will examine the example of Azerbaijan as a transition economy where oil and gas production and exports have steadily increased from the mid ‘90s. Many critical oil and gas extraction projects have been implemented; while the oil and gas sector's dominance in the economy poses a number of threats to the balanced development of the country's economy. It will show how the economy of Azerbaijan was affected after the oil crisis, such as other developing countries that mainly depending on oil and petroleum products. For this purpose, VEC Model has been applied, consdering Azerbaijan Statistic Data and analized the effects of oil price fluctuations on its economic variables parallel with the oil industry. The main findings indicate that Azerbaijan's economy is strongly dependent on resource exports, which produce high growth rates when commodity prices are favorable, but end up with lower macroeconomic performance when global oil prices fall. It is clear that the main income of Azerbaijan comes from oil and oil products, so the export of oil will have a high impact on the saving level of the population. At the time of high revenues come from export and the low exchange rate of the foreign currency in Azerbaijan has also led to the low cost of imported goods. As well demonstrated in the research, Azerbaijan economy has been widely exposed to major crude oil price distortions. It can be said that in order to avoid increasing overdependence on oil earnings, diversifying the economy should be a top priority.

This paper analyzes two dystopias belonging to different worlds and eras: one from the 20th century, We, by Russian writer E. Zamjatin and the other from the 21st century, Notre vie dans les forêts, by the French M. Darrieussecq. This literary journey of a century allows us to focus on themes dear to the dystopian genre but especially related to the lives of today’s readers, in the spirit of engaged literature. In particular, readers will be prompted to reflect, with the help of some critical insights, primarily on the disasters of the Anthropocene and on the depersonalization experienced by humans in a world that changes too quickly and in which the boundaries between human and nonhuman seem to have been obliterated. Starting from this last element, the article considers a new model of inclusion of the different, the posthuman, through the studies of Rosi Braidotti and Donna Haraway.

The global entertainment world has recently seen an increase in post-apocalyptic products, clearly reflecting a public demand for catastrophe-related narratives. This ‘catastrophilia’ finds a relevant example in the dystopian works by Komatsu Sakyō, one of Japan's most celebrated science fiction authors, beginning with the first novel Nihon chinbotsu (1973). Having become a transmedia product thanks to film, manga, and anime adaptations, the story portrays a fictional version of “The Big One” able to sink the entire Japanese archipelago in an unknown future. What is the reason behind such success? By adopting an interdisciplinary perspective intertwining psychological, philosophical and media studies, this paper examines the popularity achieved by Japan Sinks and its mediascape to unveil the addiction to the apocalyptic narratives that goes beyond the ecotopic purpose of re-establishing a symbiotic contact between humans and the environment. Instead, it results from a pathological desire for violence and death and an atavistic tendency for morbid curiosity.

In the 20th century, it is common to find some rewritings of classical myths set in post-apocalyptic scenarios. The aim of this paper is to propose an innovative research field that combine the study of dystopian literature and myth criticism. The new myth-critical approach considers three social innovations: informatization, which is essential in dystopian literature as well; migration and postcolonial literature, which is linked to the concept of the otherness science fiction thrives on; and finally, consumerism, which leads to eternal technical reproducibility, also presented in the dystopian works, especially in the concept of cloning. A concrete example are the dystopian adaptations of the myth of Antigone: the movie I Cannibali by Liliana Cavani, the epistolary novel In the Country of Last Things by Paul Auster, and the play Antígona Gelada by the portuguese author Armando Nascimento Rosa.

Reflections on the collective traumas that have shaped Japan’s more recent history (primarily the triple disaster of Fukushima) have ignited a new boom in dystopian productions that have achieved an unprecedented success. These narratives explore themes that deal with the erosion of the ecosystem in which humans live – but also of the human body itself. However, it is not only human beings who play a part in some of these dystopias: the city of Tokyo also plays a key role within them. The purpose of this paper is to explore this peculiar role of Tokyo in three selected case studies: namely, Adou (2021-) by Amano Jaku, Soundtrack (2003) by Furukawa Hideo, and The Emissary (2013) by Tawada Yōko. Destroyed and rebuilt in multiple media productions over the last seventy years and at the center of psychedelic futuristic visions, Tokyo becomes either a swarming center of human life or an abandoned wasteland, an urban skeleton that stands as a reminder of the impending or preceding catastrophe, forcing the reader to think about the actual future of our urban spaces – and whether it will include us humans or not.

The present paper aims at analyzing two works of contemporary Irish fiction, namely, Notes from a Coma (2005) by Mike McCormack and The Fjord of Killary (2012) by Kevin Barry. I argue that both works not only mirror what Dipesh Chakrabarty calls the ‘global’ and the ‘planetary’, but also reflect the non-human space and time scales that Timothy Morton identifies as one of the properties of hyperobjects. Moreover, the two novels are deeply rooted in the history of Ireland, and especially in the semi-peripheral position occupied by the country within the capitalist world system. The intermingling of various narrative layers together with speculative and realistic tropes conveys the epiphenomenality of our lived experience, characterized by the not-yet predictable consequences of planetary climate crisis and the ever-shifting demands of global capitalism.

This paper investigates the representation of bodies in two contemporary Japanese works, namely Murata Sayaka’s Seimeishiki (生命式 , Life Ceremony, 2013) and Ono Miyuki’s Karada o uru koto (身体を売ること “Selling the Body,” 2020). Both novellas are set in the future and share the trope of the ‘uncanny,’ heightened through the transgression of boundaries thanks to the presence of what I refer to as ‘consumed bodies,’ and female protagonists as an ‘unhinged woman,’ the anti-heroine interpreted as a feminist icon recently emblazoned in social networks. In Life Ceremony, the Japanese government has approved anthropophagy as a social practice; in “Selling the Body,” healthy flesh bodies are sold to survive in polluted environments and replaced by robotic ones. Present anxieties concerning the control over bodies and their reproductivity, as well as the fear of objectification are expressed through the practices of cannibalism and cyberization. Consequently, readers are forced to rethink the human nature and ethics in a posthuman dialectic within a hyper-capitalistic society.

The territory of Lima, Peru, is the result of thousands of years of history of prehispanic cultures. A strategic management of ecological and social resources disrupted by colonization and modernity. Nowadays, the South American metropolis struggles with inefficient public policy enforcement to manage its territory, and close to 256 archaeological sites (called by the quechua word huacas) are located in peri-urban areas of the valleys, most of them neglected by local governments, lacking a proper assessment of their significance, and characterization of their context. The landscape of the southeastern side of San Juan de Lurigancho is a testimony of the past relationship between the agricultural economy of the lower Rimac Valley; and hunting-gathering activities and ranching in the surrounding mountains of the present peri-urban interface of Lima. Here, the participation of grassroots organizations, in the conservation of ancient monuments and their landscape, has been crucial for over a decade. The objective of this paper is to trace a biography of the landscape in the south east of San Juan de Lurigancho, and to highlight the role of community involvement in its present conservation. The results show the need to include this type of community action into urban planning and to empower grassroots organizations, to bridge the gap between current policy making and its implementation in the conservation of prehispanic landscapes in urban interstices.

The paper investigates the relationship between liminal, interstitial spaces with displacement and makeshift inhabitation from people on the move across the outskirts of Paris’ municipality. By providing the example of the camps settled along the interstices of the Boulevard Phériphérique, we aim to shed light on the paradoxically relational nature of voids and liminalities, testified by the multifaceted urban fragments that they generate, as well as the resistive strategies employed by marginalised populations to navigate the exclusive mechanisms of neoliberal power and negligence. The case of Delphine Seyrig serves to highlight the tensions that emerge from a space in which dynamics of exclusion and inclusion converge, where resistance and vulnerability, “us and them”, coexist, yet are made visibly distant. By framing the interstitial opacity that characterizes both the materiality of liminal lands and the condition of the migrant, we have called them “spaces of holding”, where people on the move’s inhabitation remains a perpetual negotiation of suspended existence. Based on participant observation in Greater Paris between September 2021 and August 2022, we draw on interstices’ ambivalent nature of in-between, no-longer-there-but-not-there-yet empty spaces that allow the ongoing reproducibility of a variety of forms, functions, and identities. Despite taking a distance from considering such spaces as “solutions” or countermeasures of reception, we look at these fragments as topographical constructs for scrutinizing spatial tensions and conceptual proposals and building a renewed politics of visibility in architecture and urban planning.

Macro-paintings have become a popular tool used by various actors to uplift marginalized communities in cities of the global South by transforming their physical environments. These actors operate under the assumption that improving the material conditions of these communities will lead to their overall transformation. As a result, communities serve as a focal point in this process, upon which macro-paintings are intended to have a significant impact. In this brief paper, we aim to illuminate the phenomenon of macro-painting by considering them within and beyond the context of a single community. In doing so, we shift our focus away from the traditional interpretations of paintings and instead emphasize their capacity to redefine socio-material boundaries on various scales within the city. Drawing on interviews with artists and actors from different Latin American countries, we analyze the boundaries across different scales of macro-paintings—individual houses, neighborhoods/districts, and the city. Our argument centers on the idea that macro-paintings create a unique ecology, influencing meanings, material aspects, and lives throughout the entire city. This perspective holds broader significance for urban studies, highlighting that seemingly invisible, ostensibly uniform urban surfaces are not passive but exert wider spatial effects. Consequently, scholars must acknowledge and investigate these outcomes.

Este trabajo aborda la cuestión del carácter utópico del libro, de la acción y del proyecto político y cultural de Alfonso X. Para tratar de establecer si cabe considerar que las obras del Rey Sabio pueden considerarse utópicas, se analizarán tres aspectos: la propia realización de los códices, como plasmación de un proyecto de reforma; el carácter inconcluso de este proyecto que parece adscribir lo utópico a lo irrealizable; el desplazamiento de la utopía de la obra en sí a su hacedor, el rey. This paper addresses the question of the utopian character of the book, of Alfonso X’s action and of his political and cultural project. To try to establish whether the works of this king can be considered utopian, three aspects will be analysed: the actual creation of the codices, as the embodiment of a reform project; the unfinished nature of this project, which seems to ascribe the utopian to the unrealisable; and the shift of the utopia from the work itself to its maker, the king.

En tres reescrituras de algunos pasajes de la Collatio Alexandri cum Dindimo per litteras facta, contenidas respectivamente en el Libro de los ejemplos por a.b.c., el Cancionero d’Herberay des Essarts y el Libro de las maravillas del mundo de Mandevilla, se presenta un modelo de sociedad que, por la perfección de sus miembros o por su organización ideal, se ha emparentado con la utopía. Este trabajo cuestiona el que la simple descripción de una sociedad ideal baste para considerar un texto como utópico y plantea la importancia de tener en cuenta igualmente sus aspectos formales, así como también los contextos en los que dicho texto se inserta y el horizonte de expectativas de sus destinatarios. Estos parámetros contribuyen a aprehender hasta qué punto un texto, amén de describir una sociedad ideal, la presenta como un espejo invertido de la sociedad receptora, dotando así a la descripción del componente crítico, fundamental en todo texto utópico. In three rewritings of some passages from the Collatio Alexandri cum Dindimo per litteras facta, contained in the Libro de los ejemplos por a.b.c., the Cancionero d’Herberay des Essarts and Mandeville’s Libro de las maravillas del mundo, a model of society is presented which, because of the perfection of its members or its ideal organisation, has been related to utopia. This paper questions whether the mere description of an ideal society is sufficient to consider a text as utopian, and raises the importance of taking into account its formal aspects, as well as the context in which the text is inserted and the horizon of expectations of its recipients. These parameters contribute to understanding the extent to which a text, in addition to describing an ideal society, presents it as an inverted mirror of the readers’ society, thus endowing the description with the critical component that is fundamental to any utopian text.

Consumer credit is of permanent social and economic interest and has therefore benefited from appropriate European and national regulation. In its specialised form, the credit agreement offered to consumers for residential real estate has been regulated by O.G. No 52/2016 and recently amended by Law No 134/2023.The study of the substantial amendments to Law no. 134/2023 is of legal interest, in particular, because of the field addressed, namely mortgage credit.The paper is divided into three parts: "Introduction to the credit agreement", "Consumer credit in national regulations" and "Main legislative amendments to the law on mortgage credit by Law No 134/2023".

This paper aims to bring to attention certain optional reasons for refusing the execution of a European arrest warrant, situations in which the courts can defeat the principle of mutual recognition and trust between the judicial authorities of the European Union states, which represents the “cornerstone” of judicial cooperation in criminal matters. The judicial enforcement authorities cannot refuse to execute a European arrest warrant except for reasons resulting from the Council Framework Decision No. 2002/584/JAI of 13 June 2002, however, in practice, the optional reasons for non-execution often raised problems, the wording of article 4 and article 4a leaving a margin in the judgment of the courts.

Non-governmental organizations play an extremely important role in society, intervening subsidiarily for the welfare of society.This paper describes the results of an exploratory qualitative research, the objective of which is to identify the difficulties and challenges faced by non-governmental organizations, challenges that can generate opportunities for their development. The research was carried out between 2020-2022, on a number of 15 non-governmental organizationsfrom Brasov county. Data collection was carried out through semi-structured interviews. The interviews were carried out with people from the management structures of the non-governmental organizations. The results of the research show that the main difficulties of non-governmental organizations are related to the lack of money, the lack of human resuourses and barriers in promoting the services offered. As opportunities, we can note the development of organisations through reinvention and interdisciplinarity.

This paper examines the balance between professional and personal life among social workers in Bihor County. Factors influencing this balance, as well as modalities to maintain this balance, are explored. The research methodology involves interview-based surveys with 29 social workers from various organizations from the public and private sector. The study reveals a fragile work-personal life balance because of long working hours, overload with tasks and fatigue. The imbalance leads to stress and conflicts. Findings highlight that the support offered by family is an important factor in maintaining this balance among social workers. Also, there is the need for organizational support through flexible schedules and training.

In several litigations at the European level, either before the Court of Justice of the European Union or the European Court of Human Rights, the issue of the LGBT persons’ fundamental rights was raised. Romania was targeted by several recent cases such as “Coman” or “Buhuceanu”. Our paper analyzes the particularities of these cases, their effects in the legal order and the challenges of a legisla tive, administrative and judicial system that is constantly adapting to guarantee fundamental rights in a non-discriminatory manner.

Children’s rights are threatened by conflicts around the world. International humanitarian law provides general protection to children in war, whether they are civilians or combatants and, as it is known, children have the right to protection and freedom from war. The rights of children in conflict are the shared responsibility of IOs, NGO’s and the international community. The paper is focused on highlighting the children’s rights in conflict according to international humanitarian law.

The wine packaging industry is evolving rapidly, driven by technological advancements, sustainability concerns, and consumer preferences. Classic glass bottles, while still predominant, are being supplemented by innovative packaging such as Bag-in-Box, cans, polymer/biopolymer-based bottles, single-serve pouches, and kegs. These alternatives offer some benefits like lower carbon footprints and enhanced convenience, although they also face challenges related to consumer perception and acceptance. Smart packaging enhances wine quality preservation by controlling oxygen levels and monitoring product freshness, thereby extending shelf life and ensuring safety. Recent trends indicate a growing demand for eco-friendly and aesthetically innovative packaging solutions, aligning with consumer preferences and emphasising the industry's dynamic nature and potential for continued growth. This paper offers an overview of different innovative wine packaging.

This paper analyses the state of public transport (PT) stops in Brussels through the lens of inclusiveness for disabled persons. The approach mixes qualitative perspectives (including talks and field trips with numerous NGOs, disabled individuals using PT and public authorities) and a comprehensive quantitative analysis of 2 487 stops across the STIB-MIVB network. The study found that the production of PT stops depends on a wide range of stakeholders. The degree of stops’ inclusiveness has been inherited largely from times when little attention was paid to travellers with specific needs. Despite significant efforts over the past years, a notable share of PT stops is still not inclusive, although shares vary subject to the travel constraints considered. There is no clear geographical pattern of inclusiveness, except at the scale of specific PT modes (underground stations vs surface stops) and several homogeneous bus or tram corridors.

This paper analyses the state of public transport (PT) stops in Brussels through the lens of inclusiveness for disabled persons. The approach mixes qualitative perspectives (including talks and field trips with numerous NGOs, disabled individuals using PT and public authorities) and a comprehensive quantitative analysis of 2 487 stops across the STIB-MIVB network. The study found that the production of PT stops depends on a wide range of stakeholders. The degree of stops’ inclusiveness has been inherited largely from times when little attention was paid to travellers with specific needs. Despite significant efforts over the past years, a notable share of PT stops is still not inclusive, although shares vary subject to the travel constraints considered. There is no clear geographical pattern of inclusiveness, except at the scale of specific PT modes (underground stations vs surface stops) and several homogeneous bus or tram corridors.

This paper analyses the state of public transport (PT) stops in Brussels through the lens of inclusiveness for disabled persons. The approach mixes qualitative perspectives (including talks and field trips with numerous NGOs, disabled individuals using PT and public authorities) and a comprehensive quantitative analysis of 2 487 stops across the STIB-MIVB network. The study found that the production of PT stops depends on a wide range of stakeholders. The degree of stops’ inclusiveness has been inherited largely from times when little attention was paid to travellers with specific needs. Despite significant efforts over the past years, a notable share of PT stops is still not inclusive, although shares vary subject to the travel constraints considered. There is no clear geographical pattern of inclusiveness, except at the scale of specific PT modes (underground stations vs surface stops) and several homogeneous bus or tram corridors.

This paper is the first to provide generalizable estimates on the economic and subjective well-being of 24-hour migrant care workers (“live-ins”) by type of work arrangement. In our empirical analyses, we draw on data from a survey on Polish live-ins working in Berlin selected via respondent-driven sampling (N=222), which allow us to compare live-ins who are contracted by care agencies with live-ins in other types of employment. The analyses show considerable differences in various outcomes between agency live-ins and nonagency live-ins. Compared to agency live-ins, nonagency live-ins are more likely to earn higher wages than agency live-ins but are more likely to report having less time to rest. It is therefore not surprising that we also find variation between agency and nonagency live-ins on different satisfaction outcomes. These findings have major implications for the regulation of migrant live-in care workers’ employment.