Ecofeminism: Feminist Intersections with Other Animals and the Earth edited by Carol J. Adams and Lori Gruen

Astrida Neimanis reviews Ecofeminism: Feminist Intersections with Other Animals and the Earth, edited by Carol J. Adams and Lori Gruen

A Field Guide for Weathering: Embodied Tactics for Collectives of Two or More Humans

In our inherited meteorological practices and frameworks, weather conditions are managed for us in a range of ways (for example, through architecture, technology, commodity culture, infrastructure, economic rationale). This field guide brings the weather back to the body. A traditional field guide provides tools for the individual sovereign human subject to observe and document nature “over there”. In contrast, through a range of different activities, our field guide not only invites investigation and cataloguing of the field that we also comprise, but also challenges what counts as a noteworthy observation regarding the weather and also climate

Animate Intimacies

A review of Kath Weston. 'Animate Planet', Duke University Press, Durham, 2017. ISBN 9780822362326 RRP US$24.95 (pb)

Promocijas darbs

Elektroniskā versija nesatur pielikumusJāľa Rudzīša disertācijā „Vardarbība pret bērniem ģimenē Vecajā Derībā” autors analizē vardarbības daţādas izpausmes, vecāku vardarbīgās rīcības iemeslus un pārbauda, vai Vecās Derības tekstos ir novērojamas teoloģiskas tendences pārvarēt vai ierobeţot vardarbību. Līdz šim maz pētīto tēmu Vecās Derības teoloģijā autors pēta 4 nodaļās, vispirms raksturojot, ko nozīmē vardarbība un bērnība Vecajā Derībā. Konkrētu Vecās Derības vardarbības tekstu ekseģēze, pielietojot vēsturiski kritiskās ekseģēzes metodes, veido pētījuma galveno daļu (III. un IV. nodaļas), aplūkojot sekojošas apakštēmas: vardarbīga bērnu audzināšana ģimenē, bērnu pamešana un bērnu pārdošana verdzībā. Neskatoties uz daţādām vardarbību atainojošajām situācijām Vecajā Derībā, visu vardarbības pret bērniem veidu gadījumā Vecās Derības teksti piedāvā vardarbību ierobeţojošus vai novērsošus risinājumus. Atslēgvārdi: bērni, Vecā Derība, vardarbība, ģimeneAbstract In his doctoral thesis „Violence against children in the family in the Old Testament” Jānis Rudzītis explores violence in various forms, parents‟ reasons for violent conduct and exegetically examines the Old Testament writings in order to identify theological attitudes to overcome, stop or prevent domestic violence against children. The research is devoted to the little-studied domain of the Old Testament theology, and it consists of four parts. Introductory matters, such as methods and sources, themes „violence childhood in the Old Testament” and „childhood in the Old Testament” are covered in the first two chapters (I. and II.) before the thesis moves on to a detailed exegesis of selected passages which is the heart of the research (the chapters III. and IV.). In these chapters the author explicates different aspects of violence against children (violent education; children's abandonment; selling of children into slavery). To conclude, the author states that violence against children in the family is condemned either in the same text or is criticized intertextually in other Old Testament texts. Keywords: children, the Old Testament, violence, famil

Promocijas darbs

Elektroniskā versija nesatur pielikumusJāľa Rudzīša disertācijā „Vardarbība pret bērniem ģimenē Vecajā Derībā” autors analizē vardarbības daţādas izpausmes, vecāku vardarbīgās rīcības iemeslus un pārbauda, vai Vecās Derības tekstos ir novērojamas teoloģiskas tendences pārvarēt vai ierobeţot vardarbību. Līdz šim maz pētīto tēmu Vecās Derības teoloģijā autors pēta 4 nodaļās, vispirms raksturojot, ko nozīmē vardarbība un bērnība Vecajā Derībā. Konkrētu Vecās Derības vardarbības tekstu ekseģēze, pielietojot vēsturiski kritiskās ekseģēzes metodes, veido pētījuma galveno daļu (III. un IV. nodaļas), aplūkojot sekojošas apakštēmas: vardarbīga bērnu audzināšana ģimenē, bērnu pamešana un bērnu pārdošana verdzībā. Neskatoties uz daţādām vardarbību atainojošajām situācijām Vecajā Derībā, visu vardarbības pret bērniem veidu gadījumā Vecās Derības teksti piedāvā vardarbību ierobeţojošus vai novērsošus risinājumus. Atslēgvārdi: bērni, Vecā Derība, vardarbība, ģimeneAbstract In his doctoral thesis „Violence against children in the family in the Old Testament” Jānis Rudzītis explores violence in various forms, parents‟ reasons for violent conduct and exegetically examines the Old Testament writings in order to identify theological attitudes to overcome, stop or prevent domestic violence against children. The research is devoted to the little-studied domain of the Old Testament theology, and it consists of four parts. Introductory matters, such as methods and sources, themes „violence childhood in the Old Testament” and „childhood in the Old Testament” are covered in the first two chapters (I. and II.) before the thesis moves on to a detailed exegesis of selected passages which is the heart of the research (the chapters III. and IV.). In these chapters the author explicates different aspects of violence against children (violent education; children's abandonment; selling of children into slavery). To conclude, the author states that violence against children in the family is condemned either in the same text or is criticized intertextually in other Old Testament texts. Keywords: children, the Old Testament, violence, famil

InterAKTions with FKBPs - mutational and pharmacological exploration

The FK506-binding protein 51 (FKBP51) is an Hsp90-associated co-chaperone which regulates steroid receptors and kinases. In pancreatic cancer cell lines, FKBP51 was shown to recruit the phosphatase PHLPP to facilitate dephosphorylation of the kinase Akt, which was associated with reduced chemoresistance. Here we show that in addition to FKBP51 several other members of the FKBP family bind directly to Akt. FKBP51 can also form complexes with other AGC kinases and mapping studies revealed that FKBP51 interacts with Akt via multiple domains independent of their activation or phosphorylation status. The FKBP51-Akt1 interaction was not affected by FK506 analogs or Akt active site inhibitors, but was abolished by the allosteric Akt inhibitor VIII. None of the FKBP51 inhibitors affected AktS473 phosphorylation or downstream targets of Akt. In summary, we show that FKBP51 binds to Akt directly as well as via Hsp90. The FKBP51-Akt interaction is sensitive to the conformation of Akt1, but does not depend on the FK506-binding pocket of FKBP51. Therefore, FKBP inhibitors are unlikely to inhibit the Akt-FKBP-PHLPP network

Making Common Causes: Crises, Conflict, Creation, Conversations: Offerings from the Biennial ALECC Conference Queen’s University, Kingston 2016

At ALECC’s biennial gathering at Queen’s University in June 2016, participants came together to explore the possibilities of “making common causes” from a host of angles, yet all were anchored in an acknowledgement of the diverse more-than-human relationships that make up our common worlds. The following collection of short essays, authored by some of the gathering’s keynote speakers, explores specific aspects of making common causes. In this special section of The Goose, we deliberately invoke the plural of conversation. We understand the effort to make common causes as a process, rather than a “one and done” act. It is multifaceted and messy; it invites imagination and critique. Most importantly, it needs to cultivate the common ground whereupon these difficult conversations can be engaged

Mundane energies:The working body as a heat source in the Indian Himalayas

This article takes the case of heating the body to show how non-commodified energy forms make up part of the thermal landscape in Pahari villages, like Gau, in the Indian Himalayas. In Gau, the person is a resource as well as a beneficiary in the household, and through the activity of labour, the person produces energy which heats the body in the winter chill. This energy helps ensure the capacity to continue to do work, as it safeguards the body from the debilitating risks to health from the cold. Working life in Gau is irreconcilable with the room-heating model of domestic thermal regulation. The idea of heating the walled space around the body becomes superfluous as it is the active body which heats and is heated in the direct carrying out of tasks necessary to the sustenance of the household.</p

Bodies of Water

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. Water is the element that, more than any other, ties human beings in to the world around them – from the oceans that surround us to the water that makes up most of our bodies. Exploring the cultural and philosophical implications of this fact, Bodies of Water develops an innovative new mode of posthuman feminist phenomenology that understands our bodies as being fundamentally part of the natural world and not separate from or privileged to it. Building on the works by Luce Irigaray, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Gilles Deleuze, Astrida Neimanis’s book is a landmark study that brings a new feminist perspective to bear on ideas of embodiment and ecological ethics in the posthuman critical moment

Combining DNA metabarcoding with macroscopic analysis increases the number of detected prey taxa in the estimated diet for harbour porpoises

Knowledge of animal diets is fundamental in ecology as it can provide insight into the structure, function and resilience of entire ecosystems. In this study we investigate the diet composition of the harbour porpoise (Phocoena phocoena), a small marine top predator with great ecological importance, to provide updated dietary estimates for the species in Swedish waters. This is done by parallel use of macroscopic stomach content analysis and DNA based prey species determinations by DNA metabarcoding (sDNA analysis), which allows us to also compare and evaluate the methods' respective and combined performance. We show that harbour porpoises during 2017-2022 consumed a broad variety of both benthic and pelagic fish along the Swedish west coast. The combination of macroscopic and sDNA analysis for diet estimation yielded an almost two-fold increase in species and taxa detection compared to macroscopic analysis alone, with overall detection of 36 unique prey species from 21 prey families. Consistent with results from previous studies in the area, the main prey taxa were clupeids, gadoids and gobiids. In the macroscopic analysis these three taxa together represent more than 80% of the relative numerical contribution to the estimated diet. Using sDNA analysis the same three taxa dominate the relative read abundance, with clupeids detected in all sampled porpoise stomachs, gobiids in 86% of stomachs, and gadoids in 66%. The diet estimates from the two diet tracing methods are overall in high agreement, but sDNA analysis increased the number of detected prey taxa and also increased the sample size by allowing extraction of dietary data from apparently empty stomachs. The detection probability of some occurring prey taxa, however, appears to be method dependent. To facilitate combined use of sDNA and macroscopic analysis in diet studies, we established and propose a new occurrence metric that can be used to merge data for more straightforward diet comparisons. We conclude that for diet studies on harbour porpoises and other cetaceans, which often present empty stomachs in post-mortem examinations, the use of sDNA analysis has the potential to recover valuable data from animals where stomach samples would otherwise be disregarded as unavailable for diet analysis