The book brings studies of modern Thai history and culture into dialogue with debates in comparative intellectual history, Asian cultural studies, and postcolonial studies. It takes Thai Studies in ...new directions through case studies of the cultural hybridity and ambivalences that have emerged from the manifold interactions between Siam/Thailand and the West from 1850 to the present day. Central aims of The Ambiguous Allure of the West are to critique notions of Thai "uniqueness" or "exceptionalism" and locate Thai Studies in a broader, comparative perspective by arguing that modern Siam/Thailand needs to be understood as a semicolonial society. In contrast to conservative nationalist and royalist accounts of Thai history and culture, which resist comparing the country to its once-colonized Asian neighbours, this book's contributors highlight the value of postcolonial analysis in understanding the complexly ambiguous, interstitial, liminal and hybrid character of Thai/Western cultural interrelationships. At the same time, by pointing to the distinctive position of semicolonial societies in the Western-dominated world order, the chapters in this book make significant contributions to developing the critical theoretical perspectives of international cultural studies. The contributors demonstrate how the disciplines of history, anthropology, political science, film and cultural studies all enhance these contestations in intersecting ways, and across different historical moments. Each of the chapters raises manifold themes and questions regarding the nature of intercultural exchange, interrogated through theoretically critical lenses. This book directs its discussions at those studying not only in the fields of Thai and Southeast Asian studies but also in colonial and postcolonial studies, Asian cultural studies, film studies and comparative critical theory.
Innovation in chimpanzees Bandini, Elisa; Harrison, Rachel A.
Biological Reviews,
October 2020, 2020-10-00, 20201001, Letnik:
95, Številka:
5
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
ABSTRACT
The study of innovation in non‐human animals (henceforth: animals) has recently gained momentum across fields including primatology, animal behaviour and cultural evolution. Examining the ...rate of innovations, and the cognitive mechanisms driving these innovations across species, can provide insights into the evolution of human culture. Especially relevant to the study of human culture is one of our closest living relatives, the chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes). Both wild and captive chimpanzees demonstrate an impressive ability to innovate solutions to novel problems, but also a striking level of conservatism in some contexts, creating a unique and at times puzzling, picture of animal innovation. Whilst the animal innovation field is rife with potential for expanding our knowledge of human and non‐human cognition and problem‐solving, it is undermined by a lack of consistency across studies. The field is yet to settle on a definition of the term ‘innovation’, leading to studies being incomparable across and even within the same species. Here, we fill two gaps in the literature. First, we discuss some of the most prevalent definitions of ‘innovation’ from different fields, highlighting similarities and differences between them. Secondly, we provide an up‐to‐date review of accounts of innovations in both wild and captive chimpanzees. We hope this review will provide a resource for researchers interested in the study of innovation in chimpanzees and other animals, as well as emphasising the need for consistency in the way in which innovations are reported.
Touchscreen technology has provided researchers with opportunities to conduct well‐controlled cognitive tests with captive animals, allowing researchers to isolate individuals, select participants ...based on specific traits, and control aspects of the environment.
In this study, we aimed to investigate the potential utility of touchscreen technology for the study of cognition in wild vervet monkeys. We assessed the viability of touchscreen testing by comparing rates of participation between wild and sanctuary‐housed vervets. Additionally, we compared performance on a simple associative learning task in order to verify that wild participants are able to engage meaningfully with a touchscreen task presented in their natural environment.
We presented eight groups of vervet monkeys (four wild and four sanctuary groups, totalling 240 individuals) with a portable touchscreen device. The touchscreen displayed tasks in which food rewards could be gained by touching a stimulus displayed on the screen. We assessed individuals' likelihood of interacting with the touchscreen, their frequency of participation, and their performance on a simple associative learning task.
We found that sanctuary‐housed monkeys were more likely to interact with the touchscreen. Participation in wild vervet monkeys was influenced by sex and age. However, monkeys in the two contexts (sanctuary vs. wild) did not differ in their performance on a simple associative learning task.
This study demonstrates that touchscreen technology can be successfully deployed in a population of wild primates. This gives us a starting point to test animal cognition under natural conditions that include varying group composition, environmental challenges and ongoing activities such as foraging, which are challenging to recreate in captivity. While rates of participation were lower than those found in captivity, reasonable sample sizes can be achieved, and wild primates can successfully learn touchscreen tasks in a manner comparable to their captive counterparts.
The authors adapted a portable touchscreen, built to conduct research in zoos, for the field. The aim was to test the feasibility of using this technology in the wild with vervet monkeys, and to compare participation rates with captive groups.
Infants born to mothers with preeclampsia are at risk for many short and long-term complications. The objective of this study was to examine the association between preeclampsia and ICD diagnosis of ...neonatal sepsis in a large United States data set.
A retrospective cohort study from the Consortium on Safe Labor. A total of 180,277 women with a singleton gestation greater than 23 weeks were included. The primary outcome, neonatal sepsis, was compared between women stratified by diagnosis of preeclampsia using univariable and multivariable analyses.
Of the 180,277 women eligible for analysis, 8331 (4.6%) were diagnosed with preeclampsia. Neonatal sepsis rates were higher among women diagnosed with preeclampsia (6.4 vs. 2.0%, p < 0.001). In multivariable logistic regression, adjusted for confounders, the association between preeclampsia and neonatal sepsis remained significant (adjusted OR = 1.30, 95% CI: 1.06-1.60).
In this large cohort, the rate of neonatal sepsis ICD diagnosis was higher among women diagnosed with preeclampsia.
Theoretical and empirical scholars of cultural evolution have traditionally studied social learning strategies, such as conformity, as adaptive strategies to obtain accurate information about the ...environment, whereas within social psychology there has been a greater focus upon the social consequences of such strategies. Although these two approaches are often used in concert when studying human social learning, we believe the potential social benefits of conformity, and of social learning more broadly, have been overlooked in studies of non-humans. We review evidence from studies of homophily, imitation, and rapid facial mimicry that suggests that behaving like others affords social benefits to non-human animals and that behaviour matching may be deployed strategically to increase affiliation. Furthermore, we review studies of conformity in dispersers, and suggest that forgoing personal information or preferences in favour of those of the new group during immigration may be a strategy to facilitate social integration. We therefore propose that the informational and social functions of conformity apply to humans and animals alike. We use this perspective to generate several interesting research questions to inspire work in this field. For example, under what conditions do animals use informational or social conformity and what role does uncertainty play in social learning in immigrant individuals?
Studies of wild non-human primates have yielded groundbreaking insights into social learning and social cognition. These studies have the benefit of placing the animal within its natural social and ...broader environmental context, with factors such as group composition, dispersal, presence of predators, and environmental change offering unique study opportunities that are either challenging or impossible to replicate in captivity. Novel statistical techniques and technologies have recently facilitated studies into social learning in wild primates that would previously have been out of reach. Finally, the increasing use of controlled experiments with wild populations offers the possibility of generating findings directly comparable to those in captivity, that have the potential to highlight differences in the cognitive abilities of wild versus captive individuals.
The broken coloniser Pietersma, Edwin; Harrison, Rachel V
Indonesia and the Malay world,
11/2023, Letnik:
51, Številka:
151
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Dutch colonial understanding of the Dutch East Indies has rarely taken into consideration the experiences and influences of returnees and of colonialists originating outside the Netherlands’ ...political centre. In this article we make a case of how Frisian novels from the colonial period might provide a solution to this paucity of original data, as they have rarely been analysed in relation to colonialism. We take, as a case study, the work of the Frisian author Nyckle Haisma (1907–1943), who lived in the Dutch East Indies between 1930–1935 and 1936–1943 and wrote Peke Donia, de koloniaal based upon his unsuccessful, temporary return to Friesland in 1935. Haisma’s novel depicts the former colony as a catalyst that breaks the ability of the main protagonist to reintegrate into his home province. In addition, it constructs a paradox between the provinces of Holland and Friesland and deploys the author’s inability to integrate into Friesland as a result of his imaginary Dutch East Indies that he has created in opposition to his own homeland. Following the award of the highest literary prize of Frisian literature – the Gysbert Japicxpriis – in 1948, Haisma’s writings became embedded into the Frisian literary landscape, yet the colonial discourse apparent in the work was left unquestioned. We argue that the effects of colonialism, as portrayed in Peke Donia, must be considered when studying the Netherlands’ colonial legacies and their interplay with Dutch society in contemporary times.
Obesity and prescription opioid misuse are important public health concerns in the United States. A common intersection occurs when women with obesity undergo cesarean birth and receive narcotic ...medications for postpartum pain.
To examine the association between obesity and inpatient opioid use after cesarean birth.
A retrospective cohort study of patients that underwent cesarean birth in 2015-2018. Primary outcome was post-cesarean delivery opioid consumption starting 24 h after delivery measured as morphine milliequivalents per hour (MME/h). Secondary outcome was MME/h consumption in the highest quartile of all subjects. Opioid consumption was compared between three BMI groups: non-obese BMI 18.5-29.9 kg/m
; obese BMI 30.0-39.9 kg/m
; and morbidly obese BMI ≥ 40.0 kg/m
using univariable and multivariable analyses.
Of 1620 patients meeting inclusion criteria, 496 (30.6%) were in the non-obese group, 753 (46.5%) were in the obese group, and 371 (22.9%) were in the morbidly obese group. In the univariate analysis, patients with obesity and morbid obesity required higher MME/h than patients in the non-obese group 1.3 MME/h (IQR 0.1, 2.4) vs. 1.6 MME/h (IQR 0.5, 2.8) vs. 1.8 MME/h (IQR 0.8, 2.9), for non-obese, obese, and morbidly obese groups respectively, p < 0.001. In the multivariable analysis, this association did not persist. In contrast, subjects in the obese and morbidly obese groups were more likely to be in the highest quartile of MME/h opioid consumption compared with those in the non-obese group (23.5% vs. 48.1% vs. 28.4%, p < 0.001, respectively); with aOR 1.42 (95% CI 1.07-1.89, p = 0.016) and aOR 1.60 (95% CI 1.16-2.22, p = 0.005) for patients with obesity and morbid obesity, respectively.
Maternal obesity was not associated with higher hourly MME consumption during inpatient stay after cesarean birth. However, patients with obesity and morbid obesity were significantly more likely to be in the top quartile of MME hourly consumption.
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