Golden Thread Research Articles

Corporeal: Exploring the Material Dynamics of Embodiment

Corporeal: Exploring the Material Dynamics of Embodiment

Identification of a suitable working posture for female workers engaged in golden thread work

Background: The golden thread (jori) work is one of the major home based industries providing employment to thousands of artisans spread over several rural areas of the West Bengal. The study is essentially labor intensive and thus workers are prone to suffer from work related health problems. Objective: The present study was aimed to evaluate the musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) and postural stress of the female golden thread workers. Methods: The study was carried on 123 adult female golden thread workers in different districts of West Bengal. The prevalence of MSD, body part discomfort rating (BPD) and postural stress (by OWAS, RULA, REBA method) of the workers were evaluated by standard methods. The EMG of shoulder and back muscle was recorded with the help of the BIOPAC system. Result: The results showed that the prevalence of MSDs, BPD rating and postural stress were comparatively lower in case of sitting on the floor with folded legs than squatting and sitting on the floor with stretched legs. The EMG and RMS values of EMG voltage of shoulder and back muscle were comparatively lower in this posture than that of other two postures. Conclusion: It was therefore, concluded that sitting on the floor with folded legs was less hazardous and it imposed less postural stress in comparison to other sitting postures adopted by the golden thread workers.International Journal of Occupational Safety and Health, Vol 4 No 2 (2014) 24 – 33

Home in a New Place: Making Laos in Morganton, North Carolina

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] When you live your life, it is like going to a rice paddy. Your focus is on the rice, hut along the way you may pick up a cricket or see a snail. You take what you can along the way: life is not tunnel vision.--Lao proverb, as told by Noubath Siluangkhot is the sense of place going with us still that is the ball of golden thread to carry us there and back and, in every sense of the word, to bring us home.--Eudora Welty, Place in Fiction, 1957 Food is the sensory landscape of Laos. In the city streets of Vientiane, smoke rises from grilling fish, chicken, and pork. Lower to the ground, vendors turn soft and short bananas evenly over charcoal. A fruit vendor rings his bell as he bicycles down the street. There is no explanatory sign or text; the gleaming fruits declare themselves on their own terms. Red and spiny rambutan, green raw mango (paired with spiced salt), and pale, chewy yellow corn gleam from behind the glass. Mopeds dart in and out of traffic, which slows as drivers judge the pineapples for sale on the back of a parked truck. The talats (markets) overwhelm you with a kaleidoscope of produce. Maneuvering through the heavily laden tarps, tables, and bargaining shoppers is a feat. Herbs and bitter greens lie beside parts of plants you never thought to eat: the leaves of squash and galangal flowers. Vientiane embraces a bend in the Mekong River, and even here, in the country's largest city, men and women fish in its waters. You see them heading home at dusk with shining silver fish in plastic crates. Venture just beyond the urban center and the landscape opens into lush rice paddies. Green papayas hang on drooping branches just steps from the kitchen and the mortar and pestle that will pound flavor into their flesh. This is the world the Phapphayboun family left behind upon moving to the United States. Toon Phapphayboun, one of three daughters and a son, was the first to leave Vientiane. She did so by canoeing and swimming across the Mekong, fleeing a repressive regime heralded by the rise of the communist Pathet Lao party. She arrived in Los Angeles in 1981. Eleven years later, she successfully helped the rest of her family leave Laos for the United States. After living in California and Connecticut, the Phapphaybouns almost entirely reunited in Morganton, North Carolina, in 2003. It was in Morganton, in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, that I first met Toon and her family. At the time, I was seeking connections to the Hmong community in western North Carolina to investigate current textile traditions. Instead, the Phapphaybouns' enthusiastic welcome and love of their country pulled my work in an entirely different direction. Between November 2013 and May 2015, I visited Morganton ten times and I overlapped with some of the family in Vientiane for six weeks during July and August 2014. I completed over nineteen interviews, many with Toon acting as translator. I continue to be great friends with the Phapphaybouns, who are generous in both their stories and their hospitality. As so often happens during fieldwork, my initial questions were answered patiently, but it took months of spending time with the family before I began to understand the heart of their way of being in this world. Looking for textiles, I met the Phapphaybouns. Throughout the course of my fieldwork, I have found more similarities than differences between textiles and foodways. Each art form is an indelible part of our everyday lives. We wake in the morning, dress, eat, and our day begins. By examining a weaving we can learn about a culture's taste preferences, technological developments, the influence of trade, and social norms--and the same can be said of the foods on the dinner table. Both humble and sublime, each art speaks of histories complex and intertwined. By seeking to understand such everyday arts--through the generosity of those we interview--we seek to understand life itself. …

Developing sustainability into a golden thread throughout all levels of education

Developing sustainability into a golden thread throughout all levels of education

Leadership developments in Slovenian companies

In this paper we study the relationship between the company and the leaders. We are interested what is characteristic of leadership in the best Slovenian companies. We used standardised employee questionnaire and data gathered in the Golden thread project. We observe the situation in these companies in the period between 2007 and 2014 to find out if there are any significant changes in leadership developments. Special attention in leadership observation is devoted to 1. The fundamental relationship between the company and the leaders, 2. The role and quality of leaders work, 3. Organizational culture, climate and relationships, 4. Entrepreneurship and innovation, 5. The quality of the working environment, 6. The personal growth and development and 7. Emotional commitment. The analysis represents an insight into current leadership situation and shows that the recent developments were heavily marked by the economic crisis, especially in 2009.

Sustainability and energy self-sufficiency; overcoming the barriers

Sustainability and energy self-sufficiency; overcoming the barriers

"Walking Threads, Threading Walk": Embroidering Reflection

This both visual and textual contribution consists of a series of four separate embroideries on textile (Fig. 1, 2, 3, 4), which can be assembled into a unique piece (Fig. 5), and of a text, that engages with a reflection on the overall process of creation with and transformation of a particular daily object: a yarn of golden thread. The contribution has been inspired by the first ‘Walking Threads’ walk and event in Seaton Park, Old Aberdeen, March 2014, from which the ongoing ‘Walking Threads’ project has been initiated. The work is intended as a specific way of ‘thinking through making’ (Ingold 2013) and of further developing the research insights that appeared during and after that walk. In what ways materials, artefacts, skill apprenticeship, gesture, , lines, breathing and the ‘weather-world’ (Ingold 2007a, b, 2015) can relate to each other? It is also a personal attempt to respond to the Ingoldian call towards a ‘Graphic’ Anthropology’, within which ‘to follow the materials, to learn the movements and to draw the lines’ (Ingold 2013) are the main points at the very core of its agenda.

Between Norms and Facts: The Constitutional Court’s Commitment to Pluralism in South Africa’s Radically Heterogeneous Public Schools

The recognition of pluralism constitutes a golden thread that runs through the Constitutional Court’s entire oeuvre of work. This ‘right to be different’ finds its initial footing in Gauteng Education Bill, Prince, and Bhe. Pluralism then inserts itself into our jurisprudence as a grundnorm. The Court affirms this status repeatedly through very different rights in such cases as Fourie, Pillay, Shilubana, Ermelo and Juma Musjid. Pluralism must be understood as a necessary condition for maintaining order in a radically riven heterogeneous society. It’s hardly surprising, then, that pluralism plays a similar role in our schools and our still nascent development of an inclusive education policy. Pluralism frames, and circumscribes, the manner in which individual schools may order their admissions policies, curriculum, discipline proceedings and other internal affairs. At the same time, it gives adequate effect to learners’ rights and the communal interests within which the school is situated. Pluralism doesn’t require us to like one another. Suspicion of members of other groups remains an inextricable part of humanity’s DNA. However, we do have to learn to live with one another. The problem of pluralism is not – as Habermas and Judt show – a uniquely South African conundrum. That said, it’s universality does not mean we can ignore it’s challenges. Our schools remain wonderful places to reshape the manner in which we engage others who appear foreign to us. This article concludes that until our schools take this reshaping qua pluralism seriously, the South African experiment in democracy will remain fragile indeed.

From Oedipus to PACE, using the concepts of shame and guilt as golden thread.

To demonstrate that antiquity's concepts of shame and guilt developed in their meaning over the centuries and can still have practical applicability in psychological therapies these days. To review shame and guilt in philosophy, history, ethics and psychiatry contexts. Within limitations, a narrative is presented, starting with Oedipus in antiquity, visiting several important philosophical theories and ending in the present time with, for example, Dan Hughes' PACE model for therapy. The first part expands on selected ideas presented in Melvyn Bragg's 2007 BBC radio programme entitled 'Guilt'; the second part adds selected therapeutic models where concepts of shame and guilt play a role. Shame and guilt are archaic but quintessential concepts that already occupied thinkers in antiquity. Shame and guilt are concepts that preoccupied science and art over the millennia and continue as useful concepts to the present day. Moreover, shame and guilt, as concepts, continue to play a salient role in recent and contemporary psychiatry.

Can grade-6 students understand quarks? Probing acceptance of the subatomic structure of matter with 12-year-olds

This study introduces a teaching concept based on the Standard Model of particle physics. It comprises two consecutive chapters –¬ elementary particles and fundamental interactions. The rationale of this concept is that the fundamental principles of particle physics can run as the golden thread through the whole physics curriculum. The design process was conducted from a constructivist perspective based on students’ documented conceptions. Three pillars underpin the whole teaching concept: a permanent model character, linguistic accuracy, and innovative typographic illustrations. Using the framework of design-based research, microteaching sessions with 20 Grade-6 students were conducted to probe its acceptance. The study focusses on learning processes of 12-year-olds with respect to elementary particles. Our findings indicate broad acceptance of most key ideas, but also avoidance when considering the permanent model character of physics. The most promising outcomes of the study are pure typographic illustrations. Not only were these thoroughly accepted by all students, but they also seem to reduce known misconceptions. Overall, students’ understanding of elementary particles improved fundamentally.

Learning by Writing About and Discussing Big Questions

The context: I use this strategy in an introductory course on the Old Testament. The course is part of the general education program at a Christian university. The pedagogical purpose: The purpose of this tactic is to engage students directly with significant life questions that the Old Testament repeatedly addresses. With this pedagogy, students not only develop the intellectual habits/skills of close reading, analytic and synthetic writing, and text-based dialogue, they also see how the Old Testament adds its voice to the discussion of these big questions. Description of the strategy: On the first day of class students are introduced to the three big questions the course will address: Who is God and what is God like? What does it mean to be human? and How do God and humans relate? The students then think for a minute, write a one-sentence response to one of the questions, and share and explain their answers. Next, in the first week, students write a short thought paper on Genesis 1–3 explaining how these chapters address the big questions. This paper serves as the prompt for a seminar discussion. Finally, the students write a major paper that addresses one of the big questions. They develop this paper in stages: (1) they pick one of the big questions and, while reading the assigned Old Testament passages, note relevant and significant texts; (2) they write an annotated list of several texts from each part of the Old Testament canon and a few secondary, scholarly sources that can be used to answer the question; and (3) they create a formal outline or rough draft of the paper and meet with me individually to discuss the paper's thesis, texts, interpretations, argumentation, and use of secondary sources. Finally, the students hand in the final draft during the last week and have a culminating seminar discussion on these questions based on the Old Testament. Why it is effective: This strategy succeeds for three reasons. First, it hooks students into the course with perennial questions, existential issues that students – whatever their creed and major – want and need to wrestle with as young adults. Second, it gives students a golden thread that helps them analyze individual passages and synthesize the Old Testament canon. Third, by giving students time to read, write, and talk about a few questions throughout the course, they can reflect on and refine their understanding of and thoughts on these big questions.

Common but Differentiated Responsibilities: Need for an Alternative Approach

Climate Change is one of the gravest global concerns of the present era but the issue cannot be dealt in isolation as it leaves its mark on various other issues like ozone layer depletion, poverty etc. Arriving at a consensus on how to resolve the issue is fairly complex given the conflicting interests of the different stakeholders. The golden thread of common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR) which runs through Kyoto Protocol sought to cater to the varied interests and limitations but it has neither capacitated States in achieving the goals nor has it succeeded in holding the nation-States together. An alternative approach to the application of CBDR must be considered if we have any hope of consensually reducing carbon emissions. In this regard, the author analyses the different proposals put forth by minimalists and egalitarians and attempts to propose an interdisciplinary approach that would be practical, feasible, accommodative and balanced with due regard to mitigation, adaptation and accountability.

Alternative Dispute Resolution, Access to Justice and Development in Kenya

The Constitution of Kenya, 2010, envisions a prominent role for alternative dispute resolution, including traditional dispute resolution mechanisms. This is in addition to other legislative frameworks which provide for non-formal methods of dispute resolution. A thesis is made that formal forums such as litigation through courts of law have various disadvantages including complexity, high costs, and technical procedures, delays, amongst others, which make a strong case for the usually convenient and available ADR mechanisms. Put to good use, these mechanisms have potential to spur economic development through enhanced access to justice and the rule of law. The authors, indeed, argue that there is a golden thread that weaves across the themes of rule of law, human rights and access to justice and development.

The golden thread: educator connectivity as a central pillar in the development of creativity through childhood education. An Irish life history study

This paper presents the narratives of five creative Irish Adults who contributed to the study by sharing their childhood education experiences. The five participants are all of different ages and occupations. All identify themselves as highly creative people and all worked with me over the course of this study to identify how this creativity developed within their engagement with the Irish childhood education system. All excelled with higher education and they share a high degree of success within their careers. Between them, they express their creativity across five key genres. These are: Science, Engineering, The Arts, Entrepreneurship and Social Entrepreneurship. Well-developed themes were analysed to identify interrelationships which formed a theoretical framework of core concepts that demonstrate what holds great importance in the lives of these participants for the development of their creativity during childhood education in Ireland. A clear theme of this study was that of connectivity. Connections and relationships matter greatly. The creative journey is joyful and clear where children experience a positive connection with their educator. Conversely, the creative journey is stymied by a lack of connection or by a negative connection. These stand in the way of creative growth, like a big boulder on the child's developmental path. This paper showcases, through the stories of these five research participants, how creativity development is affected by the connection between the child and their educator.

“Undir ilmöndum laufum ok nýsprungnum blómstrum”: Sensual Pleasure in Old Norse Arthurian Romance

“Undir ilmöndum laufum ok nýsprungnum blómstrum”:Sensual Pleasure in Old Norse Arthurian Romance M. A. Jacobs Tristrams saga begins with a young man who wants to go to court. Having acquired as much wealth and fame as he could at home, Kanelangres, who will become Tristram’s father, sets his sights higher: the court of England, which is renowned for its wealth, its pleasures, and the prowess and courtliness of its members. After preparing himself appropriately, Kanelangres sets out with a company of men for Tintajol, where they are greeted warmly and with honor. During their stay, King Markis decides to have a feast to celebrate a holiday. He invites all the nobles in the land and undertakes lavish preparations. We are told that: safnaðiz saman allr sá fjöldi í Kornbretalandi í einum skógi hjá stöðuvatni nokkuru. Þar váru fagrir vellir ok víðir, sléttir, prýddir fögrum grösum ok blómasamligum. En fyrir sakir þess, at staðr þessi var hinn lystiligasti sakir margfaldrar skemtanar, þá lét Markis kóngr á þeim völlum þar setja ok skipa stórum landtjöldum, gulum ok grænum, blám ok rauðum, ok ríkuliga búnum, gylldum ok gullsaumuðum, undir ilmöndum laufum ok nýsprungnum blómstrum. (Jorgensen 1999, 32) the entire crowd gathered together in Cornwall in a forest and beside a lake. There were beautiful fields, spacious and flat, adorned with fine herbs in bloom. Because this place was the most delightful due to its many pleasures, King Markis had large tents set up and furnished in yellow and green, blue and red—and richly decorated, gilded and embroidered with golden thread—under fragrant foliage and bursting blossoms. (Jorgensen 1999, 33) [End Page 107] The scene is vividly descriptive, of both natural features and the manmade structures found among them. The language is the elaborate prose typical of translated romance, characterized by alliteration and strings of adjectives (Kalinke 1977). The descriptive elements pile up, the language itself adding to the image of lushness and luxury. Also noteworthy in this scene is the attention to elements designed to engage the senses. There are bright colors to catch the eye, a pleasing arrangement of forest and field and lake, and herbs and flowers to perfume the air. This is, of course, the setting for a feast, so we might also imagine further sensory engagement in the “dýrustar vistir” (Jorgensen 1999, 32) [“choicest foods” (Jorgensen 1999, 33)] that the saga tells us Markis provides for his guests. This episode is indicative of a broader tendency in the Old Norse translated romances: they emphasize sensory engagement—and in particular, sensual pleasure—in ways that Old Norse sagas of other genres rarely do. For anyone acquainted with Icelandic sagas, the scene from Tristrams saga is somewhat startling. The Íslendingasögur and konungasögur—the Icelandic family sagas and the kings’ sagas, respectively—typically feature a spare style, characterized by parataxis and minimal description. When the narrative does pause to describe something, it is generally to introduce an important character or to create narrative tension, rather than to set a scene, as in the example above.1 French and German romances, however, delight in vivid detail, with elaborate descriptions of people and settings that were so commonplace as to become tropes.2 The Old Norse translations of these romances fall somewhere between the extremes of their source texts and the Íslendingasögur. Medieval translations did not simply consist of word-for-word substitutions, but employed a variety of strategies whereby a text was made intelligible to a new audience through means of acculturation (Copeland 1991).3 Romances translated into Old Norse display strategies such as providing short explanations of unfamiliar concepts, restructuring texts according to native principles, and emphasizing or de-emphasizing certain aspects of the stories, such as battles and internal monologues, respectively, and changing verse to prose. Given the amount of acculturation these texts have undergone, it is noteworthy that so much sensory description [End Page 108] has been retained. This seeming incongruity allows us an opportunity to inquire into how the senses were understood in medieval Iceland and...

Aqueous dye-sensitized solar cells.

Nowadays, dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) are the most extensively investigated systems for the conversion of solar energy into electricity, particularly for implementation in devices where low cost and good performance are required. Nevertheless, a key aspect is still to be addressed, being considered strongly harmful for a long time, which is the presence of water in the cell, either in the electrolyte or at the electrode/electrolyte interface. Here comes the present review, in the course of which we try our best to address the highly topical role of water in DSSCs, trying to figure out if it is a poisoner or the keyword to success, by means of a thoroughly detailed analysis of all the established phenomena in an aqueous environment. Actually, in the last few years the scientific community has suddenly turned its efforts in the direction of using water as a solvent, as demonstrated by the amount of research articles being published in the literature. Indeed, by means of DSSCs fabricated with water-based electrolytes, reduced costs, non-flammability, reduced volatility and improved environmental compatibility could be easily achieved. As a result, an increasing number of novel electrodes, dyes and electrolyte components are continuously proposed, being highly challenging from the materials science viewpoint and with the golden thread of producing truly water-based DSSCs. If the initial purpose of DSSCs was the construction of an artificial photosynthetic system able to convert solar light into electricity, the use of water as the key component may represent a great step forward towards their widespread diffusion in the market.

The analysis of medication for dysentery prescribed byWu Jutong

Objective To discuss the rule of medication for treating Dysentery prescribed byWu Jutong. Methods To classify and summary the medicines for Dysentery inWenbing-Tiaobian andWu Jutong Yi’an. Results There are many therapies and medicines for treating dysentery byWu Jutong , such as ginseng, licorice root, golden thread, baical skullcap root, dried tangerine peel, white peony alba, and so on. Conclusions We should learn the valuable experiences from the medical record ofWu Jutong. Key words: Dysentery Wenbing-Tiaobian Wu Jutong Yi’an The rule of medication

Implementing for Sustainability: Promoting Use of a Measurement Feedback System for Innovation and Quality Improvement.

Measurement feedback systems (MFSs) are increasingly recognized as evidence-based treatments for improving mental health outcomes, in addition to being a useful administrative tool for service planning and reporting. Promising research findings have driven practice administrators and policymakers to emphasize the incorporation of outcomes monitoring into electronic health systems. To promote MFS integrity and protect against potentially negative outcomes, it is vital that adoption and implementation be guided by scientifically rigorous yet practical principles. In this point of view, the authors discuss and provide examples of three user-centered and theory-based principles: emphasizing integration with clinical values and workflow, promoting administrative leadership with the 'golden thread' of data-informed decision-making, and facilitating sustainability by encouraging innovation. In our experience, enacting these principles serves to promote sustainable implementation of MFSs in the community while also allowing innovation to occur, which can inform improvements to guide future MFS research.

Tibeto-Burman subgroups and historical grammar

Several distinct strains of thought on subgrouping, presented in memory of David Watters and Michael Noonan, are united by a golden thread. Tamangic consists of Tamangish and maybe something else, just as Shafer would have wanted it. Tamangic may represent a wave of peopling which washed over the Himalayas after Magaric and Kiranti but before Bodish. There is no such language family as Sino-Tibetan. The term ‘trans-Himalayan’ for the phylum merits consideration. A residue of Tibeto-Burman conjugational morphology shared between Kiranti and Tibetan does not go unnoticed, at least twice. Black Mountain Monpa is not an East Bodish language, and this too does not go unnoticed.

<i>Homo viator</i>

Homo viator. This article investigates the uniqueness of a metaphor. The golden thread throughout this article is the contemplation of a metaphor as a journey. The creative thinking of Paul Ricoeur, Johan Degenaar, Bertie du Plessis and Adelia Carstens on the metaphor is recognised and explored in this article. Julian M�ller�s use of the metaphor as journey is also discussed. The metaphor as a journey in Homeros, the Old Testament as well as the New Testament is investigated. The binding force of metaphors in language is also considered. The essence and expressiveness of a metaphor are explained by means of several different examples. The destination of this journey finds its conclusion in a poem.