Laguna Beach Research Articles

Robert K. Josephson (1934-2016).

![Graphic][1] Professor Robert K. Josephson died at his home in Laguna Beach, California, on 6 February 2016 following a 3 month fight with lymphoma. Over a career spanning more than half a century, and numerous venues world-wide, he became widely known and venerated as a mentor, teacher,

The Reef Cornetfish,Fistularia commersoniiRüppell, 1838, New to the California Marine Fish Fauna

I report here on several sightings in southern California of the reef cornetfish, Fistularia commersonii Ruppell, 1838. These records mark the first time this species has been reported from California marine waters. Mr. Bill Powers reported an unverified sighting on 7 November 2015 at Little Flower Reef, San Clemente Island (32u50.399'N, 118u22.136'W). Mr. Powers was diving over a sand-shell hash slope adjacent to a vertical rock wall in about 12 m of water. The approximately onemeter-long fish was more or less motionless and Mr. Powers was able to observe it for several minutes, eventually approaching and touching it. Mr. Powers reports that the fish was green in color with blue spots and stripes and had a long filament extending from its caudal fin. This fish was not photographed. A second sighting was made by Ms. Sandy Dildine on 12 November 2015 within Crescent Bay, Laguna Beach (33u32.7'N, 117u48.3'W) in 7 m of water with surface water temperature at this site of about 20uC. This approximately one-meter-long fish was slowly swimming just above the bottom. Photographs and videos of this fish taken on 12 and 13 November 2015 show a green fish with blue spots and stripes. Ms. Dildine noted that when the fish was more or less motionless it had a series of dark bars along its body as well as bright, light blue spots and stripes (Fig. 1). When actively swimming, the bars of this individual quickly disappeared and the stripes and spots became darker (Fig. 2). Ms. Dildine also observed what was likely the same individual within the same circumscribed area (of about 10 m) on 19, 20, and 22 November 2015. In these instances, the fish was associated with an aggregation of blacksmith, Chromis punctipinnis (Cooper, 1863). Three cornetfish species live in the Pacific Ocean: Fistularia commersonii Ruppell, 1838, reef cornetfish; Fistularia corneta Gilbert & Starks, 1904, deepwater cornetfish; and Fistularia petimba Lacepede, 1803, red cornetfish. All range widely in the Indo-Pacific (F. petimba is also found in the Atlantic Ocean). In the eastern Pacific, Fistularia corneta occurs as far north as Huntington Beach, southern California (Curtis and Herbinson 2001) and southwards to Callao, Peru (Chirichigno and Velez 1998), including the Gulf of California (Fischer et al. 1995) and Islas Galapagos (Grove and Lavenberg 1997). Fistularia petimba is absent from the eastern Pacific (Nakabo 2002). Of these taxa, F. commersonii is the only species that is green with blue spots and stripes (Thomson et al. 2000, Robertson and Allen 2015) as F. corneta is orange or brown with pink dorsal, anal, and caudal fins (Robertson and Allen 2015) and F. petimba is red to orange-brown (Kells and Carpenter 2011). Thus, based on color and pattern, it is highly likely that the San Clemente Island and Laguna Beach individuals are F. commersonii. These California sightings extend the eastern Pacific range to southern California. The previous northernmost range was Bahia Magdalena (Thomson et al. 2000) to Iquique, northern Chile (Sielfeld et al. 2010), including the Gulf of California (Fischer et al. 1995) and Islas Galapagos (Grove and Lavenberg 1997). They have been reported from surface waters to depths of 132 m (Mundy 2005). This species reaches a maximum length of 1.6 m (Fischer et al. 1995). Bull. Southern California Acad. Sci. 115(1), 2016, pp. 81–83 E Southern California Academy of Sciences, 2016

Listen, Slowly by T. Lai

Lai, Thanhha. Listen, Slowly. New York: HarperCollins Children’s Books, 2015. Print.Twelve year-old Mai wants nothing more for her summer vacation than to spend her days on the beach hanging out with her best friend, getting to know her first romantic crush. Instead, her parents expect Mai to chaperone her grandmother (Bà) on a return trip to Vietnam to uncover the secrets of her grandfather’s disappearance and death in “THE WAR” over 40 years ago. Despite being raised in a home that carried on some Vietnamese traditions, Mai’s parents could not have prepared her for the heat, mosquitoes or infrequent Internet access in her grandfather’s rural northern village. In a display of her preteen angst, Mai immediately starts counting down the days until she can return to the known comforts of life back home in California.With time, however, her language skills improve and she begins to form relationships in the community, particularly with Ut, a girl her age with a serious interest in frogs, and Minh, the local teenage translator with a Texan drawl he acquired through his international studies in the United States. In Mai’s ensuing journey she travels across Vietnam, from the rural rhythms of her ancestral village to the colonial splendour of Hanoi and the humid chaos of Ho Chi Minh City. The nation’s contrasts provide her with an unforgettable summer that far surpasses anything she could have imagined with her initial Laguna Beach plans.After receiving a 2011 National Book Award and 2012 Newbery Medal Honor for Inside Out and Back Again, Thanhha Lai’s second novel continues to explore Vietnamese-American experiences. In contrast to her first book’s focus on a refugee family’s journey, Listen, Slowly examines the frustrations of a second-generation American attempting to reconcile her Vietnamese cultural deficits. Mai’s path to settle within her bicultural identity is an experience familiar to thousands of children her age, who are raised in part with traditions from their parents’ country yet never fully feel immersed in that culture. In her protagonist, Lai has created a relatable character who eventually, and maybe reluctantly, shows capacity for adaptation and resilience in the face of adversity.Lai depicts a vibrant Vietnam with verdant landscapes and mouth-watering descriptions of the nation’s notoriously fresh cuisine. The novel’s humour generally hits the mark, including a hilarious passage of cultural colonialism in which Mai convinces young Vietnamese girls to transform their comfortable underwear to thongs. While the disruption of the story’s pace during philosophical Vietnamese translations might test the patience of young readers, this challenge will be welcomed by many. Overall, this story of adventure, family history and bicultural identity is one that should have a home in all school and public libraries.Recommended: 3 out of 4 StarsReviewer: Kyle MarshallKyle Marshall is the School-Aged Services Intern Librarian for Edmonton Public Library. He graduated with his MLIS from the University of Alberta in June 2015, and is passionate about diversity in children's and youth literature.

How Far Can the Palm Weevil, Rhynchophorus vulneratus (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), Fly?

The palm weevil, Rhynchophorus vulneratus, is native to Southeast Asia and was recovered from an infested Canary Islands date palm in Laguna Beach, California, USA, in 2010. The detection of this potentially destructive palm pest initiated a detection, containment, and eradication program that was reliant, in part, on the deployment of bucket traps loaded with aggregation pheromone and baited with fermenting fruit. A key question that pertained to the deployment of traps was “how far can R. vulneratus fly?” This question could not be answered and in response to this knowledge deficit, computerized flight mill studies were conducted with field-captured R. vulneratus in an outdoor screen house in Sumatra, Indonesia. Of the 63 weevils tethered to flight mills, ∼27% failed to fly >1 km in 24 h and were excluded from analyses. In total, 46 weevils (35 females and 11 males) flew >1 km on flight mills and of these adults, the average total distance flown in 24 h was significantly greater for females (∼32 km) when compared with males (∼15 km). A small proportion of females (∼16%) flew 50-80 km, and one female flew 100.1 km in 24 h. Flying weevils exhibited an average weight loss of ∼13–17% and non-flying control weevils (n=27) lost 10–13% body weight in 24 h. The distribution of flight distances for female and male weevils combined was leptokurtic, which suggests that faster than expected spread by R. vulneratus may be possible in invaded areas.

“Where Do I Belong, from Laguna Beach to Jersey Shore?”: Portrayal of Minority Youth in MTV Docusoaps

Based on the notion that reality television is used by the youth to learn about various social identity groups, the portrayal of minority in MTV “docusoap” was analyzed. Whereas Whites were overrepresented, Asians were completely absent. Although a few of them were shown, Latinos were virtually invisible as central characters as well as in social and romantic relationships. Blacks were also severely underrepresented and the problem was more pronounced for women than men. Among the minority groups, only mixed-raced women were shown as normalized as White women and men. Implications and suggestions for future studies were discussed.

Censoring and Selling Film Noir

Film noir is known for its duplicity. Industry censors considered 1940s noir cinema provocative, salacious and ‘sordid.’ Hollywood studios walked a fine line between appearing to comply with Hays office Production Code censorship while simultaneously pushing the envelope of its moral constraints, then hyping and sensationalizing censorable sex, violence and hard-hitting themes to sell noir films to the public. In fact, studios capitalized on the racy explicit nature of noir pictures in publicity contradicting assurances of censorial compliance. For instance, censor Joseph Breen was “shocked” when MGM purchased James Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice. It was banned for a decade. Yet, ten years later as filmmakers adapted hardboiled fiction, Breen assured religious groups it would “not be offensive.” Yet, it was promoted as “torrid,” “too hot to handle” with Lana Turner in a bathing suit finding “Love at Laguna Beach” with hunky John Garfield who clamored, “You must be a she-devil,” suggesting far more sex, skin and “savage boldness” than is shown in the film. Film noir responded to Production Code censorship and other regulatory factors, including Office of War Information Bureau of Motion Pictures restrictions on Hollywood screen depictions of the domestic American home front (or overseas combat front), and Office of Censorship strictures such as a wartime ban on screen gangsters as ‘un-American’ for propaganda purposes in World War II-era noir films centering on criminals. These multiple censorship entities often collided. This regulatory climate catalyzed the development of film noir, a dark cycle of shadowy 1940s-50s crime films that boomed by World War II and evolved over the postwar era. I will investigate extensive primary archival research—including scripts, memos from industry censors, writers, directors, producers, and publicity records—to compare how film noir was censored and sold.

Uptalk in Southern Californian English and Mexican Spanish

“Uptalk” is the tendency for declarative sentences to end with rising intonation instead of falling intonation. In Southern Californian English, uptalk is realized with a shallow pitch rise [L-H% in Tones and Break Indices (ToBI) labeling]. In contrast to this are polar questions, which are typically realized with steep rises (H-H%) [Ritchart and Arvaniti 2014]. Uptalk has also been impressionistically found in the variety of Spanish spoken in Mexico City. Mexican Spanish has three forms of phrase-final rises: low-to-high rises (LH%), low-to-mid rises (LM%), and high-to-high rises (HH%) [de-la-Mota et al. 2010], whereas English only has low and high rises [Beckman & Ayers Elam 1997]. Given the larger inventory of possible phrase-final melodies in Spanish vs. English, uptalk may be realized differently in the former than the latter. To determine whether uptalk in Spanish differs from uptalk in English, we analyzed the intonation from one representative female speaker of each language. Fifty phrases from each language were extracted from recordings of two television shows, Laguna Beach (for English) and Rebelde (for Spanish). Two coders then labeled each phrase using ToBI conventions for English and Spanish. The phonological and phonetic differences between English vs. Spanish uptalk will be discussed.

In Memoriam: Luiz Alberto Dias Menezes Filho (1950–2014)

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Additional informationNotes on contributorsDona LeichtDona Leicht and her husband, Wayne, have owned and operated Kristalle in Laguna Beach, California, since 1974.

A reinvestigation of seroconversion rates in hepatits B-vaccinated individuals.

The purpose of this study was to examine whether the hepatitis B seroconversion rates in a small sample of subjects reflected that of the published rates, regardless of HIV status, after a hepatitis B vaccination series was completed while following strict vaccine protocols. The study, which had a nonexperimental, correlational cross-sectional design, took place at a community clinic in Laguna Beach, CA. Participants comprised 100, predominantly White, men aged 18-65 years (mean 39.2 years) who were hepatitis B naive, regardless of immune status. After receiving a primary vaccine series for hepatitis B, participants were tested for seroconversion to immune status. Seroconversion to the immune state occurred in 78.6% of the non-immunocompromised, HIV-negative participants (n = 50), who had received the standard three-dose regimen of the vaccine, and in 77% of the immunocompromised, HIV-positive participants (n = 48), who had received the recommended modified three-double-dose regimen. The manufacturer-published rates of seroconversion are 90-100%, depending upon the population. These findings highlight a need for further study to validate or reveal deficits in current vaccine protocols for individuals who are vaccinated against hepatitis B, including health care workers, the immune-compromised and other high-risk populations.

Clinical patient education challenges and risks

Melanie Balestra is a partner at Cummins & White, LLP, Newport Beach, Calif., and a pediatric nurse practitioner at Laguna Beach Community Clinic, Laguna Beach, Calif. The author has disclosed that she has no financial relationships related to this article.

Latin American Perspectives

In the mid-1960s a new forum for progressive work in Latin American studies was born in Southern California. It was initiated by junior faculty and graduate students who questioned the mainstream emphasis on institutional stability in modern capitalism. Negative effects of the market economy in Latin America such as social inequality, political repression, and external dependence, they protested, were absent from the agenda of mainstream research. Too often, concerns central to Latin American intellectuals were sidelined by traditional U.S. journals. To counter this tendency, the Southern California progressive Latin Americanists, many of them educated at the prestigious but rather conservative Stanford University, launched initiatives such as Union of Radical Latin Americanists (URLA), the Los Angeles Group for Latin American Solidarity (LAGLAS), Non-Intervention in Chile (NICH), and the North American Congress on Latin America (NACLA). In 1974 they converged in a new academic journal, Latin American Perspectives (LAP). During its founding meeting in Laguna Beach, LAP was conceived to be on the cutting edge of studies on capitalism, socialism, and imperialism and in tune with popular struggles and debates within the Latin American left. The founders’ intention was to unite intellectuals North and South and be open to new thinking and debates. They adopted a participatory editorial culture accompanied by a critique of both mainstream positivism and the orthodox Marxist politicization of social research while seeking theoretical innovations and concrete analyses of capitalism. During four decades, debates appeared in the journal’s pages, initially with pioneering issues on dependency, Cuban socialism, gender, democratic class struggle, and imperialism. Later, when

Minimizing legal risks when prescribing

Melanie L. Balestra is an Attorney Partner with Cummins & White, LLP, in Newport Beach, Calif., and a pediatric NP at the Laguna Beach Community Clinic In Laguna Beach, Calif. The author has disclosed that she has no financial relationships related to this article.

Classed Femininity, Performativity, and Camp in British Structured Reality Programming

This article explores the representations and tonal qualities of British “structured reality” programming. Focusing on The Only Way Is Essex and Made in Chelsea, it investigates their glocalizing of the model established by MTV’s Laguna Beach and The Hills. It argues that while they blur boundaries between docusoap, drama, and soap opera, the British programs also recognize and foreground issues of construction for their reality TV-literate youth audience. It suggests the programs play a key role in their respective channel identities and the ideologies of British youth television, connecting to larger issues of class, gender, and taste. This is articulated through their regional and classed femininities, with the article exploring how the programs draw on classed ideologies surrounding “natural” and “excessive” femininities and of the role of this in their engagement with construction and camp play. This play contributes to the tonal shift offered by the British programs, mixing the melodrama of the MTV programs with a knowing, at times comic edge that can tip into mockery. In doing so, the programs offer their audience a combination of performative self-awareness and emotional realism that situates them clearly within British youth television.

Predicting the Potential Worldwide Distribution of the Red Palm WeevilRhynchophorus ferrugineus(Olivier) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) using Ecological Niche Modeling

The red palm weevil (RPW), Rhynchophorus ferrugineus (Olivier) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), ranks among the most important pests of various palm species. The pest originates from South and Southeast Asia, but has expanded its range dramatically since the 1980s. We used ecological niche modeling (ENM) approaches to explore its likely geographic potential. Two techniques, the Genetic Algorithm for Rule-set Prediction (GARP) and a maximum entropy approach (MaxEnt), were used. However, MaxEnt provided more significant results, with all 5 random replicate subsamples having P < 0.002 while GARP models failed to achieve statistical significance in 3 of 5 cases, in which predictions achieved probabilities of 0.07 < P < 0.10. The MaxEnt models predicted successfully the known distribution, including the single North American occurrence point of Laguna Beach, California, and various areas where the pest has been reported in North Africa, southern Europe, Middle East and South and Southeastern Asia. In addition, areas where the pest has not been yet reported were found to be suitable for invasion by RPW in sub-Saharan Africa, southern, central and northern America, Asia, Europe, and Oceania. Highly suitable areas in the United States of America were limited mostly to coastal California and southern Florida, while all Caribbean islands were found highly suitable for establishment and spread of the pest.

Chronic Disease: Are We Missing Something?

Chronic Disease: Are We Missing Something?

Supporting the right industries

Earlier this month at a housewarming party in Long Beach, California, I met Mike Rivas, the vice president of admissions at Laguna College of Art and Design (LCAD) in nearby Laguna Beach. As a location for an art school, Laguna Beach makes sense. The town has an unusually high number of shops that sell paintings, sculptures, and other art. But at the risk—which I willingly take—of being thought a snob, I have to say the art on sale in Laguna Beach is vulgar, unicorns-in-the-surf dross.

The reality of reality television: Does reality TV influence local crime rates?

Overnight celebrity status of reality-based television cast members and filming locations may result in negative outcomes such as increased crime. Using a popular reality show filmed in Laguna Beach, we employ a difference-in-differences approach to analyze changes in the city's crime rates.

Sunshine and Vitamin D. A Comprehensive Guide to the Benefits of the “Sunshine Vitamin”

Frank Murray. . Laguna Beach, CA: Basic Health Publications, 2008, pages, US $18.95 This encyclopedic review of vitamin D is an astonishing work. Every physician knows that an absence of this vitamin causes rickets. Most Americans get their vitamin D from skin synthesis, fortified foods (especially milk), and fatty fish, if they even think about it; and vitamin D is necessary …

Film Review ETIENNE!: A Film about the Little Things in Life

I have to admit that I had no intention of reviewing this film for publication. My journey to the hostel on the beach in Sausalito was meant purely to be a fun night out at a special event with a colleague when she made the comment, “You’re reviewing this movie tonight, aren’t you?” The thought had never occurred to me. Why would a bona fide clinical ethicist want to review a movie about the end-of-life vacation of a hamster with terminal cancer? I mean really, I have to be serious about my work! Then the film started rolling ... Etienne, a dwarf hamster with a diagnosis of terminal cancer, isn’t the star of the film as I assumed; rather, Richard, loving owner, is the star. Richard’s goofiness and nerdy appearance is captivating. He takes you on his (mostly) bicycle journey from Laguna Beach in Southern California to Sausalito in Northern California, with a hand-crafted basket carrying Etienne hanging from the handlebars. In the days prior, Richard, who is taking a “sabbatical” from his mixed media art classes, has been informed that his best friend has terminal cancer. The veterinarian’s advice is euthanasia as soon as possible; however, the office receptionist suggests that Etienne “live life out loud” till its natural end. Richard opts for plan B and the adventure begins. Etienne’s “vacation” is Richard’s attempt to show the hamster how much he/she is loved and valued; it is also meant to be Etienne’s last hurrah. Up until now, Etienne’s life had been lived out in a series of hand-crafted domiciles, built by Richard with the best of design intent, but not always with structural integrity. Now, the hamster is running the beach and hiking the trails. In life and in death, Richard sets out to ensure that Etienne will shine. Convinced he cannot cure the disease, he aims to give total comfort and serenity during Etienne’s last days of life. Toward the end of the movie, somewhat awkwardly, a new character enters: Elodie. Her plight as a jilted college student who is also on “sabbatical” makes the two stories eventually collide. In some ways, Elodie can be a bit distracting, but she is a thread that pulls the movie together at its conclusion. The parallel to what is often seen when human patients are transitioned to comfort care is vivid. On the other hand, the caring images in the film between owner and animal also bring to mind the painfully difficult images encountered in hospitals when families refuse to transition their loved ones to comfort care and instead insist on their continued torture with needles, knives, and tubes of all sorts at the end of life. It seems that, sometimes, pets can get better endof-life care than genetic relations. This film affirms the importance of the “little things in life”, but what are these “little things” that the movie refers to? Rather than give up the plot, you will have to see the movie for yourself, as I suspect Bioethical Inquiry (2009) 6:513–514 DOI 10.1007/s11673-009-9189-7

The Halliburton House and its Architect, William Alexander

The 1938 Laguna Beach house designed by William Alexander for adventure writer Richard Halliburton is a landmark of modern architecture. This article explores the relationships between the client's goals, the architect's vision and sources of inspiration, and the construction chal lenges. It also links the house to the current discourse on "queer space" and evaluates the house's influence on contemporary literature.