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This article considers the interpretation given to the meaning of ‘accident’ in Article 17(1) of the Montreal Convention by Advocate Generals and the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU). It explains that whilst the former have given opinions consistent with the established jurisprudence of other signatory states (in particular the US Supreme Court’s decision in Air France v. Saks), the latter has not followed suit, but rather has alighted on its own erroneous interpretation of ‘accident’ in this context; which is one inimical to the advancement of international uniformity. Passenger Liability, Article 17, Accident, interpretation, uniformity, Saks, CJEU

This discussion note offers a response to Judith Bridges’ focus article “Explaining ‘‑splain’ in digital discourse”. We review some of the article’s core findings on the bound morpheme ‑splain, utilised in words such as whitesplain, covidsplain, and thinsplain, and expand on them by addressing three key concerns: we situate the construction and use of ‑splain formations in a more expansive version of prescriptivism, what we refer to as ‘prescriptivism 2.0’; discuss them within the context of language policing and political correctness; and ask whether forms ending in ‑splain are subject to moral gradience, highlighting directions and opportunities for future research.

Chapter 9 considers what the book tells us about masculinities in the twenty-first century, situating the discussion against a backdrop of Western gender politics, online culture wars, and contemporary gender relations. The chapter then discusses how the findings fit alongside the broader scope of men and masculinities in relation to five areas: how men and boys ‘learn’ to do gender, particularly in terms of digital literacies; the intersection of masculinities and radicalization; the deployment of ‘victimhood’ discourses by men; contemporary (Western) gender politics; and the role of mediated masculinities and their potential for enacting social change. The penultimate section sketches out some of the possible trajectories for language and masculinities studies, before ending with some thoughts about the contribution of the book to masculinities research generally and language and masculinities work specifically.

Chapter 2 introduces the key terms used throughout the book, including sex, gender, men, male, and masculinity. It also describes some of the approaches in the study of men and masculinities, including hegemonic masculinity, positive masculinities, toxic masculinities, and caring masculinities, in addition to sketching out a brief history of language and masculinities studies, showing how this work becomes part of the broader field of language, gender, and sexuality. Finally, the chapter sets out a discussion of men, masculinities, and gender politics, particularly in relation to power and violence.

Chapter 1 introduces the main focus of the book, outlining the background of the book and explaining how a linguistic analysis of male-dominated media contexts can shed light on processes of discrimination, inequality, and affiliation in different online and offline media spaces, including newspapers, forums, social media sites, and television shows. The chapter goes on to situate the book against the broader backdrop of masculinities studies and relates later chapters to existing work in the field, such as hegemonic masculinity, toxic masculinity, caring masculinity, and other relevant frameworks. The chapter then introduces the rationale and motivation for the book, before ending with an overview of the remaining chapters.

Drawing on data collected from four communities on the social networking site Reddit, Chapter 6 sets out a comprehensive treatment of the manosphere and ‘toxic masculinity’, two concepts which have been relatively underexamined in the context of language and masculinities studies. The chapter then analyzes how gender is represented in these communities, focusing on noun referents related to gender (e.g. man, woman, dude, princess). In doing so, the chapter unpacks the discursive frames surrounding men and women in manosphere spaces, providing an insight into the nature of gender politics in the manosphere and how sexist discourses are maintained and promoted by community members.

From television shows to the manosphere and from alt-right communities to fatherhood forums debates about masculinity have come to dominate the media landscape. What does it mean to be a man in contemporary society? How is masculinity constituted in different media spaces? This growing cultural tension around masculinities has been discussed and analyzed both for general audiences and in burgeoning academic scholarship. What has been typically overlooked, however, is the role that language plays in reifying these mediated performances of masculinity. Drawing on data from newspapers, social media sites, television programs, and online forums, this book explores language and masculinities across a range of media contexts, offering a critical evaluation of the intersection between language, masculinities, and identities in contemporary society. Against a cultural backdrop of rising neoliberalism, ethnic nationalism, online radicalization, networked misogyny, and fractious gender relations, this book furthers our understanding of how language is implicated in (re)creating gender ideologies, how language shapes contemporary gender relations, and the different ways men use language to monitor, evaluate, and police gender identities in online and offline spaces.

Using data collected from The Scotsman and The Guardian newspapers, Chapter 4 presents a diachronic analysis of a corpus of news articles to outline how the term ‘hard man’ has been used in print media in the UK. By investigating how ‘tough’ masculinities are constructed at a national level, the chapter considers the role of the press in (de)legitimizing public performances of masculinity, how particular evaluative stances are encoded in newspaper discourse, and the complex web of social meanings associated with the term ‘hard man’. While the focus in this chapter is on British newspapers, the chapter has broader relevance to contexts further afield, particularly in terms of how specific forms of masculinity are constructed in the mass media.

Chapter 8 examines the online construction of fatherhood. As such, this work dovetails with an emergent research agenda which is broadly concerned with the intersection of fatherhood and digital technologies, especially social media spaces. The chapter has three aims. The first is to sketch out some of the background literature on fatherhood and masculinities. The second is to discuss existing work in language and gender studies which focuses on parenting, tracing the main concerns of this research as they relate to motherhood and fatherhood. Building on the caring masculinities approach, the chapter then presents an analysis of data collected from a fatherhood forum. This analysis is one of the first attempts to unite a critical analysis of fatherhood and masculinities with close attention to the linguistic practice deployed by fathers in online spaces.

Chapter 5 examines the intersections of masculinity, ethnicity, and nationalism in /r/The_Donald, a community on the social networking site Reddit. In particular, the chapter traces how different types of men are represented in this community and what this might tell us about broader discourses of masculinity in the ‘alt-right’, a political movement which pits itself against left-wing liberalism, feminism, and multiculturalism. This chapter contributes to the growing body of work on how ethnic and national identities become bound up with masculinity politics, as well as adding to our understanding of how ‘banal nationalism’ is expressed in gendered terms. In the context of growing extremist right-wing political ideology and the spread of white nationalist discourse, such a project is ever more socially relevant.

Chapter 7 focuses on ‘positive masculinities’ and explores how men are encouraged to pursue healthier conceptualizations of masculinity. Since the media plays a key part in setting out cultural scripts and expectations of masculinity, this chapter then presents an analysis of the television comedy show Brooklyn Nine-Nine to examine how men use language to connect with others, build relationships, and demonstrate affiliation with friends and loved ones, subsequently subverting and destabilizing hegemonic forms of masculinity. Given that the intersection of language, masculinity, and television is a somewhat unexplored area, this chapter is important in improving our understanding of the role the media plays in promoting alternative constructions of masculinity.

This article summarizes air passenger rights in the UK post-Brexit, the status of European Union (EU) law that has been retained by the UK and how it is to be interpreted. It concludes that in practical terms there is little material change to date. Further, divergence is unlikely due to a combination of the statutory scheme adopted by the UK in respect of the implementation of Brexit and the terms of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) made with the EU – unless and until the EU departs significantly from what its law provided as at Brexit in relation to air passenger rights. Air Passenger Rights, Brexit, UK, Status, Interpretation

Radiation heat loss introduces one of the main uncertainties associated with the determination of laminar flame speeds from experiments using the spherically expanding flame constant volume method. In this study, a radiation model was developed to solve for the volumetric radiative power in spherical geometry using discrete transfer method accounting for spectrally dependent emission and absorption. The model was validated against the results obtained from the discrete ordinate method. Subsequently, the newly developed radiation model was integrated into a hybrid thermodynamic-radiation model used to derive laminar flame speeds from experimental pressure-time history data. Laminar flame speeds were measured for flames of C5 C10 n-alkanes and isooctane for pressure and unburned mixture temperature ranges of 13–25 atm and 540 – 670 K respectively, and the data are reported with properly derived uncertainties. Additionally, the data are free from measurable instability-induced effects and to assure that a systematic analysis of cell formation was undertaken. Comparison of the experimental data with predicted laminar flame speeds showed consistency and reasonable agreement with two kinetic models. The development of new modeling tools over the last few years, allows for the derivation of accurate laminar flame speeds using the spherically expanding flame constant volume method for engine-relevant fuels and thermodynamic conditions, which other methods cannot accommodate.

The HyChem ( hy brid chem istry) approach is utilized for modeling the combustion behaviors of gasoline fuels. The approach combines an experimentally constrained, lumped-step model for fuel pyrolysis under the high-temperature combustion condition and a detailed foundation fuel chemistry model to describe the subsequent oxidation of the pyrolysis products. We present results obtained for two Shell gasoline fuels as examples. The results show that with the parameters in the lumped reactions determined by matching the experiment time history data of key products of gasoline pyrolysis, the HyChem reaction models capture the ignition delay times and laminar flame speeds over a wide range of thermodynamic conditions. The HyChem approach is also extended to model the negative-temperature coefficient (NTC) behaviors for the gasoline fuels. The results show that the NTC-enabled models are capable of capturing the ignition delays under both high-temperature conditions and the conditions under which the NTC behaviors are important. The relationship between fuel composition and combustion properties is analyzed. Finally, the HyChem models are reduced to about 40 species to enable turbulent combustion modeling of gasoline fuels in practical engine simulations.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a true pandemic. Consideration is given to potential exposure of air carriers to passenger liability in respect of alleged infection with the virus in the course of carriage by air having regard to the terms of the Montreal and Warsaw Conventions and case law relating to the same. It is concluded that such claims face various legal and practical hurdles and that liability is unlikely to engage in vast numbers. COVID-19, Passenger Liability, Article 17, Bodily Injury, Accident, Causation

The Montreal Convention is now twenty-one. This article summarizes its purpose, passage, and what it added to its predecessor, the Warsaw Convention, and its progeny. It considers the case law that it has produced and issues that arise in its application. It is concluded that the Montreal Convention has not passed its sell-by date and remains a praiseworthy international instrument for the regulation of air carrier liability, but suggestions are made as to possible further revisions and enhancements. Carrier liability, Montreal Convention, Review, Revision, Expansion

The spherically expanding flame under constant volume method was introduced in 1934 by Lewis and von Elbe as a means to study laminar flame propagation at engine-relevant conditions. Despite its potential, this method has not been utilized extensively due to concerns regarding the underlying assumptions and data uncertainty. In the present study, the intricacies of the experimental approach as well as the models and assumptions involved during data interpretation were reassessed with the aid of direct numerical simulations. Results confirmed that stretch effects are negligible during the compression stage of the experiment for a wide range of Lewis numbers. Additionally, it was shown that the laminar flame speed is sensitive to the flame radius stressing thus the requirement that the modeling of flame radius needs to be done with the highest possible accuracy by accounting properly for product dissociation and thermal radiation from the burned gases. It was also shown, that the equilibrium assumption is valid for modeling the flame radius as a function of pressure and, as expected, the kinetic and transport effects are negligible. Subsequently, laminar flame speeds were measured for methane, ethane, ethylene, propane, propylene, n-butane, 1-butene, and isobutene flames for 8–30 atm pressures and 400–520 K unburned mixture temperatures. A hybrid thermodynamic/radiation model was utilized to interpret the experimental observables and derive the laminar flame speed by accounting for spectrally dependent emission from and absorption by the burned gases as well as product dissociation during compression. The data were found to be consistent with measurements obtained in spherically expanding flame experiments under constant pressure conditions and predictions using a number of current kinetic models.

In the past two decades, the field of language and masculinities studies has become an established part of language, gender, and sexuality research, growing in response to concerns about the limited criticality directed toward men and masculinities in sociolinguistics. In doing so, the field has added to the conceptual and theoretical tool kit of sociolinguistics, furthering both our understanding of the linguistic strategies used by men in a variety of contexts and the myriad links connecting language and the social performance of gender. This review surveys the historical trajectory of scholarship broadly concerned with men, masculinities, and language and charts its development from more critical work on men and masculinities within sociology to its emergence as an independent field of inquiry. I outline some of the key contributions this body of work has made to sociolinguistic theory, methodology, and knowledge and suggest some future research directions through which the field may engage with contemporary social issues.

Dataset by Country of the Economic Freedom of the World Annual Report that measures the degree to which the policies and institutions of countries are supportive of economic freedom. The cornerstones of economic freedom are personal choice, voluntary exchange, freedom to enter markets and compete, and security of the person and privately owned property. Forty-two data points are used to construct a summary index, along with a Gender Legal Rights Adjustment to measure the extent to which women have the same level of economic freedom as men. The degree of economic freedom is measured in five broad areas: Size of Government, Legal System and Property Rights, Sound Money, Freedom to Trade Internationally, and Regulation.

Dataset for Researchers of the Economic Freedom of the World Annual Report that measures the degree to which the policies and institutions of countries are supportive of economic freedom. The cornerstones of economic freedom are personal choice, voluntary exchange, freedom to enter markets and compete, and security of the person and privately owned property. Forty-two data points are used to construct a summary index, along with a Gender Legal Rights Adjustment to measure the extent to which women have the same level of economic freedom as men. The degree of economic freedom is measured in five broad areas: Size of Government, Legal System and Property Rights, Sound Money, Freedom to Trade Internationally, and Regulation.

This essay considers the role played by images of Russia and Russian culture in conjuring the earliest appearances of jazz in the everyday British imaginary.

Abstract. Across three studies, we assessed the impact of perceived social norms on attitudes and positive behavioral intentions towards atheists and religious believers. Reported attitudes, reported acceptability of expressing positive and negative attitudes, and reported positive behavioral intentions disproportionately favored religious believers over atheists. However, participants reported a higher likelihood of engaging in positive behaviors towards atheists when the threat of public scrutiny was limited, indicating that the social norm in the US may be suppressing privately held, positive behavioral intentions that would otherwise support atheists, creating a state of pluralistic ignorance. Individuals also reported having more positive attitudes and a higher level of positive behavioral intentions towards religious believers relative to others. Finally, estimates of the prevalence of religious believers in the population also tied directly to one’s perception of the acceptability of expressing positive and negative attitudes towards these groups.

Despite the great strides made over the past 30 years by female comedy performers, their status in a male-dominated industry has typically been marginal. This is coupled with the widespread view that even women who do appear on mainstream comedy face the challenge of getting their voices heard in an arena where it is often the loudest voice that wins. In order to investigate claims that female comedians contribute less than male comedians on comedy panel shows, this article presents the findings of a sociolinguistic analysis of the British show Mock the Week, drawing on an XML-annotated corpus of the transcripts of series five. Rather than viewing features such as talkativeness and interruption solely as a substantiation of conversational dominance (cf. Brand, 2009), we suggest that these can also be understood as strategies in the production of humour in the context of comedy panel shows. In addition to genre-specific considerations, our results show that the use of these features on Mock the Week is influenced by an interplay of social factors, rather than gender alone. Overall, this study could act as a catalyst for writers and production companies to use more linguistically-informed approaches to comedy show scripting, particularly in relation to issues of linguistic and representational inequality.

The American and British Debate over Equality, 1776–1920