Oppositional Culture Research Articles

Mechanomemory of pulmonary fibroblasts demonstrates reversibility of transcriptomics and contraction phenotypes

Fibroblasts are cells responsible for producing extracellular matrix (ECM) components, which provides physical support for organs. Although these mesenchymal cells are responsive to mechanical cues in their environment, the permanence of these mechanophenotypes is not well defined. We investigated the mechanomemory of lung fibroblasts and determined how switching culture conditions modulate cell responses and function. Primary murine lung fibroblasts were isolated and cultured on 2D tissue culture plates or within 3D collagen hydrogels and were then passaged within the same or opposite culture condition to assess changes in gene expression, protein production, fibroblast subpopulation, contractile behavior, and traction forces. Compared to fibroblasts isolated on 2D tissue culture plates, fibroblasts within 3D hydrogels exhibited a decreased activation phenotype including reduced contraction profiles, diminished cell traction forces and decreased αSMA gene expression. Cells initially isolated via 2D culture and then cultured in 3D hydrogels exhibited a reversal in activation phenotype as measured by gene expression and contraction profiles. Bulk RNAseq identified groups of genes that exhibit reversible and non-reversable expression patterns. Overall, these findings indicate that lung fibroblasts have a mechanical memory that is altered by culture condition and can be reversible through precondition of cells within a softer 3D microenvironment.

Transforming policing in Ghana through technology: a focus on police operations in the Greater Accra region

Integrating technology into policing has the potential to greatly improve the effectiveness, transparency, and community participation of law enforcement agencies. This study examines the profound influence of technology on the Ghana Police Service, with a specific emphasis on the Greater Accra Region. The main aim of this research is to examine how technological advancements might enhance police results and tackle existing difficulties in the context of law enforcement in Ghana. The study adopts a qualitative research approach and collects data from police officers and community members through the use of semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions. The investigation involved the participation of a combined total of twenty-six police officials from the Tema and Accra Regional Headquarters, as well as twenty-two community members. The data gathering procedure sought to gather a wide range of viewpoints on the present condition of technology in law enforcement, its advantages, difficulties, and prospects for future advancement. The results demonstrate that the utilisation of technology, such as mobile data terminals and social media platforms, can greatly improve the effectiveness of police operations, promote community involvement, and increase transparency. Nevertheless, the presence of obstacles such as insufficient infrastructure, cultural opposition, and the necessity for extensive training were also acknowledged. The research enhances the current knowledge by presenting empirical evidence on the benefits and constraints of technology in law enforcement, particularly in the setting of Ghana. This study emphasises the significance of making strategic investments in technology infrastructure and training, as well as the necessity of establishing legal frameworks to tackle ethical and privacy concerns. Additionally, it proposes that future studies should prioritise examining the enduring viability of technological advancements in law enforcement and investigating their effects in various geographical areas. The study suggests that politicians and law enforcement organisations should promote the deployment of technology in a way that is successful and build public trust in the Ghana Police Service.

Representations of Dissent against Communism in Romania: Anti-Communist Heroes, “Prison Saints,” and (Extra)Ordinary Citizens

This article discusses the uses and functions of visual representations in the articulation of a comprehensive memory of dissent against the Communist regime in Romania. Through qualitative research using the interdisciplinary study of the art and politics of memory, the study answers the question of how artistic renditions of the past differ from official discourse on dissent and how these representations are used politically. This article argues that these artistic representations enrich the understanding of dissent against the Romanian Communist regime and thus play a political role in consolidating a missing or limited memorialization of diverse forms of opposition to the Communist regime, thus disrupting the narrative of perfect control. Artistic discourses about the Communist past include at least three types of portraits of dissenters: (1) anti-Communist heroes who participated in the armed resistance of the 1940s and 1950s; (2) Communist prisoners who are recalled either as victims or “prison saints”; and (3) (extra)ordinary citizens who had nonconforming ideas either through their political activity or through their cultural choices. The latter are recalled as participating in workers’ strikes, as exercising a form of personal opposition through their refusal to comply with the regime’s natalist policies (dissenting women), or as taking part in broader cultural opposition forms, such as watching Western films on videocassettes. These artistic discourses vary from heroization to politicization, serve to build legitimacy for the democratic regime, explain how dissent had a role in the change of regime, and accentuate individuals’ agency.

Japanese Gardens: Time of Letting – Time of Growth

Abstract From a transcultural stance the contribution explores an access to the problem of nature and time which relies on our embodied experience of our environment. By means of a phenomenological investigation into distinctive features of Japanese gardens, such as rocks and trees, the specific temporalities incorporated in these elements become elucidated. The intention is to invalidate the Eurocentric opposition of nature and culture, as the “natural” environment grows together with “cultural” activities, and cannot be separated from human engagement, in the case of Japanese gardening. There “nature” cannot become objectified or conceptually determined. It can only be disclosed by our bodily getting involved in an environment, encompassing a peculiar way of “becoming time”. This mode of temporalization exhibits significant similarities with Martin Heidegger’s Gelassenheit. Therefore, time and nature in a Japanese garden both request and set forth, a specific existential attitude towards our life environment.

Re-print of: Contextualizing oppositional cultures: A multilevel network analysis of status orders in schools

Different lines of research have argued that specific groups, such as boys or ethnic minorities, are more prone to develop an anti-school culture than others, leading to group differences in the social acceptance of high performers. Taking an ecological view, we ask to what extent the school context promotes or prevents the emergence of group-specific oppositional cultures. Theoretically, we argue that group-based oppositional cultures become more likely in schools with low socio-economic resources and in schools where socio-economic differences align with demographic attributes. We test our hypotheses based on data from a large-scale, four-wave network panel survey among more than 4000 students in Germany. Applying stochastic actor-oriented models for the coevolution of networks and behavior, we find that group-based oppositional cultures in which students like high performers less are very rare. However, in line with theoretical expectations, the less resourceful a school is, the more boys tend to evaluate high-performing peers less positively than girls do. Moreover, the more ethnic minority boys are socioeconomically disdvantaged in a school, the more they tend to evaluate high performers less positively than majority boys do.

Russian women, Ukraine war, and (Neglected) writing on the wall: From the (Im)possibility of world traveling to failing feminist alliances

ABSTRACT We argue that the Russian feminist and resistance groups, Pussy Riot, Feminist Antiwar Resistance, and Les Pleureuses, operate and should be acknowledged as agents of social change, and leaders of cultural opposition during the current Russia-Ukraine war. We establish Second World Feminism and Russian feminism as its cultural product in this essay. We argue how, in the years preceding the war, Pussy Riot repeatedly protested the totalitarian grip of the Russian state, its corruption, and the concretion of the Russian Orthodox Church and the state in creating conditions of female obedience and oppression. Further, we analyze the emergence and the ongoing activism of the anti-war resistance movement, FAR and its branch Les Pleureuses, in their fight against war, patriarchy, authoritarianism, and militarism. We illustrate how and why Russian feminists/resistance groups became agents of dissent, and can become torchbearers of peace. We examine the collectives’ potential contribution to and compatibility with transnational feminist alliances and make a case for including both Russian and Second World Feminisms as meaningful and impactful perspectives within the framework of transnational feminism.

Jakša Kušan’s Forgotten Struggle for Freedom and Democracy in Croatia

Croatian journalist and writer Jakša Kušan (1931–2019) was one of the most prominent Croatian émigré dissidents. By editing and publishing the non-partisan magazine Nova Hrvatska (New Croatia), he tried to inform the global public about the suppression of human rights and civil liberties in socialist Yugoslavia, even under constant threat of being attacked by the Yugoslav secret police. After the fall of communism, he returned to Croatia and continued his work in the media and the civil sector for a brief time. In this article, I offer an overview of the most relevant of Kušan’s oppositional activities during the period of communist rule in Croatia and Yugoslavia and consider the roles and impact of his activities. I also venture some explanation as to why his life and work have mostly been forgotten in today’s Croatia. One possible answer to this question could be his complex relationships with the Croatian dissidents who won the first multiparty elections in Croatia in 1990. My discussion is based on the findings of the COURAGE project (Cultural Opposition – Understanding the Cultural Heritage of Dissent in the Former Socialist Countries), oral history sources, and archival documents of the Yugoslav secret police.

Axiological basis of interaction between church law and culture: A theoretical approach

The article examines the axiological foundation of interaction between church law and culture, highlight problems concerning the criteria of correlation between church law and culture, a large number of approaches to definition of these terms, comparison methodology. Possible variants of the relationship between church law and culture are identified, such as: the opposition of church law and culture; church law as part of culture; church law includes culture as a social context of churchlegal issues; church law and culture are considered together. The problem of the correlation of ecclesiastical and canonical law is outlined, which will help to avoid terminological confusion and highlight the essential characteristics of ecclesiastical law. Operational definitions of “culture” and “church law” concepts are given. Using a legal approach, it is established that the relationship between church law and culture is realized through the category of legal regulation. A theoretical approach to the study of interaction between church law and culture through the prism of cultural heritage of the church is proposed, while the term “cultural heritage of the church” is interpreted and typologized by the author, in particular, it is proposed to distinguish material and spiritual cultural values of the church. The formation of the cultural values of the church has its own evolution, the subject of church law includes issues of preservation and use of the cultural values of the church (the cultural heritage of the Russian Orthodox Church). With the help of the norms of church law, the mechanism for solving issues of preserving and using the cultural values of the church is outlined.

Kultura opozycyjna. Między jurodiwymi a instytucjonalizacją

The aim of this text is to create a conceptual apparatus (a categorial grid) that would make it possible to explain all possible manifestations of oppositional culture in autocratic regimes. I distinguish two basic understandings of oppositional culture: social and domain-specific. The first is the totality of disapproval attitudes towards an autocratic political regime. The latter includes all manifestations of artistic creativity that are critical of the existing political regime. I distinguish three basic typologies of opposition cultures in the latter sense due to the following criteria: organizational shape, place of artistic expression and levels of negation of a given regime. The first typology concerning the organizational shape allows for the differentiation of opposition culture entities due to their numbers and the strength of social bonds created while performing this social role. The second typology makes it possible to define the space of freedom for the subjects of the opposition culture, and the third one – the level of refutation of a given political system.

Re‐Examining Collective Religious Violence at Rajneeshpuram: A Cultural Opposition Model Analysis

AbstractThe research literature on collective religious violence with regard to new or nontraditional religious movements (NRMs) has revealed an engaging set of arguments about the relative importance of internal versus external factors. While internal or group‐bounded factors are certainly significant, external factors and conditions are sometimes overlooked or at least not fully appreciated. This article synthesizes several models of collective religious violence highlighting external factors into a single “cultural opposition” model to reexamine the Rajneesh movement case in Oregon in the 1980s. I contend that key external incidents, particularly the bombing of the Rajneesh hotel by outsiders, serve as pivotal turning point for the dramatic advent of an armed encampment. The study then offers evidence to support the proposition that exogenous conditions of intense cultural opposition can transform the nonviolent beliefs and practices of a peaceful religious community into the endogenous conditions that Robbins identifies as “necessary” to heighten the likelihood of collective religious violence.

From Representation to Sabotage: The New Practices of Russian Antiwar Groups

AbstractSince February 24, 2022, new oppositional groups—Feminist Antiwar Resistance (FAR), Stop the Wagons, Combat Organization of Anarcho‐Communists (BOAK), the Russian Freedom Legion, and others—have emerged in Russia. Politically, they range from socialist and anarchist to nationalist or fascist, and in their visual media present a range of anonymous protest subjectivities, from the young feminist female artist to the Molotov cocktail‐throwing anarchist to the army defector. Differences notwithstanding, antiwar groups resemble one another in their use of anonymity and sabotage, departing from the culture of the prewar Russian opposition to Putin. The new antiwar groups seek to demonstrate the existence of a broad decentralized movement, but one that continues, rather than disrupts, historical narratives. This article pays special attention to narratives produced by “railway partisans” currently operating in Russia and Belarus, analyzing how they challenge, through tactic as well as rhetoric, their regimes’ uses of World War II history for state‐building myths. I find that antiwar activists claim that sabotage, vandalism, and other forms of material damage represent continuity—rather than break or rupture—with historic forms of grassroots resistance.

Cedric Robinson's Black Marxism and the uses of historical geography

Cedric Robinson's Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition is one of the key sources of the idea of ‘racial capitalism’ and offers an important account of the lineage of Black radical thought. It is argued here that central to Robinson's development of these ideas is the setting out of the different historical geographies of capitalism and Black people's resistance to oppression. This argument is pursued through a detailed reading of the historical geographical imagination central to Black Marxism that shows how Robinson deploys different historical geographies, and to what effect. The case is made that Robinson uses historical geographical analysis to effect shifts in ways of seeing race, capitalism and politics which work to decentre capitalism as the focus of analysis and, correspondingly, direct attention to the continuities and connections within Black political cultures of opposition to oppression. The conclusion draws out the implications of this for historical and geographical work on racial capitalism and resistance.

Dekonstruksi Ruang Domestik Dalam Film Ki & Ka

This research was conducted with the aim of deconstructing gender roles in the domestic space using a Bollywood film entitled Ki & Ka, with the binary opposition of patriarchal culture that is, deconstructing is carried out by reserving the binary opposition. This research is a type of qualitative descriptive research with the method used in analyzing the data is descriptive analysis with the theoretical perspective of Jaques Derrida's deconstruction. The results of the study show that the deconstruction in the film Ki & Ka has succeeded in making Kabir fulfill his role as the controller of domestic space in his household with Kia.
 Keywords: deconstruction, binary opotition, gender

"The babbitry of professors' humble abodes": Representation of Everyday Life of the "Positivist Father" in Memoirs of Russian Symbolism

The formation of symbolism as an artistic and worldview phenomenon took place in intellectual and cultural opposition to the tradition of Russian academic positivism. In the article positivism and symbolism are viewed as two discourses competing for influence in the Russian intellectual environment, the competition of which often took on the features of a conflict between "fathers and children". One of the ways of " battle for the authority" was the construction of the image of "father-positivist" in memoirs and diary notes by symbolists. The object of the study is the representation of the everyday culture of the conventional "father" in the memoirs of A. Beliy, G. I. Chulkov, V. Y. Brusov, N. Petrovskaya, B. M. Runt and Z. N. Gippius. The subject is those discursive mechanics, through which the representation of otherness and "othering" of such everyday life are achieved. The methodology of the work is built around the optics of the translation turn, which allows us to look at the scenes from the memoirs as "third space", where the battle of discourses unfolds at the expense of representational practices. The novelty of the research is manifested both in drawing attention to this problem and in the development of an actual methodological base. Based on the results of the analysis, the following mechanics of "othering" were identified: unification and generalization, binarity and asymmetry, giving the Other the status of timelessness and non-historicity, the use of pejorative categories, the narrative technique of double representation and concealment. The aim of the fathers "othering" was the construction of personal identity and selfhood, as well as the attempt to define oneself through the constitutive Other.

Balancing Dualities and Fusing Opposites: Reading Jhumpa Lahiri’s Interpreters of Maladies

With a focus on Jhumpa Lahiri’s Interpreter of Maladies, this research investigates the intricate existence of Indian women caught up in the conventional marginalization at the hands of patriarchy in their home country and repressions of otherness across new borders. By employing Gloria Anzaldua’s concept of “balancing dualities and fusing opposites”, I analyze Lahiri’s text in order to explore how, oscillating between displacement and resettlement, gendered identities are formed in the in-between space of acceptance across borders. Border crossing is mostly embedded in the experiences of displacement, alienation, and longing for belonging. Diasporic experiences are heterogeneous in articulating the loss and pains of dislocation, uprootedness, and struggles of immigrants to territorialize across new borders. This study explores the diverse experiences of diasporic women in the confrontation of the opposite borders of old and new and scrutinizes how they make their lives meaningful in their respective situations. In this paper, I argue that life across borders offers an in-between space for doubly marginalized women by resisting the hierarchical patterns at home and abroad and balancing these dualities in the liminal space between two cultures. Moreover, this cross- border life also strives towards fusing cultural opposites in the space of un/belonging through strategic resistance and resilience.

P-234 Increased live birth rates follow increased normal fertilization and usable blastocyst rates with use of low lactate culture medium

Abstract Study question Does an increase in usable blastocyst rates with low lactate culture medium lead to increased live birth rates? Summary answer Increased overall usable blastocyst rate correlates with an increased live birth rate following low lactate embryo culture. What is known already Lactate is essential to the oocyte and early embryo and while it is produced naturally through the normal glycolytic pathways of the same, it is nonetheless added to available embryo culture media. In embryo culture using a continuous culture medium containing only 1mM lactate, an increase in day 5 and overall usable blastocyst rates has been documented as compared to higher lactate (6-10mM) in a sequential media system. There are now also studies showing an increase in normal fertilization with a decrease in no fertilization and abnormal fertilization with oocytes placed in low lactate at oocyte retrieval. Study design, size, duration In a prospective interventional study of IVF cases between October 2020 and April 2021, patient oocytes were divided randomly amongst a control (Vitrolife G1/G2) and treatment (Continuous Single Culture Medium-NX Complete) group. Oocytes were split following oocyte retrieval and embryo culture proceeded in one of the two groups through day 6. Total oocytes in the control group, 258, and in the treatment group, 273. Patients of all ages and diagnosis’ were included. Participants/materials, setting, methods All cases were inseminated via intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection, blastocyst biopsy performed for next generation sequencing, and blastocysts vitrified with Vit Kit or Vit Kit–Freeze NX for frozen embryo transfer. All blastocysts were warmed with Vit Kit–Warm NX and transferred using SG/G2-Plus. Primary analysis included initial beta-HCG, clinical pregnancy rate (fetal cardiac activity) and live birth. Secondarily, fertilization rates were examined for comparison of normal (2PN), abnormal (1PN and 3PN), and no fertilization (0PN). Main results and the role of chance Chi-square analysis was applied on all considerations to assess statistical significance and p < 0.05 considered significant. In the analysis of fertilization parameters for the control versus treatment group, normal fertilization (69.0% vs 74.0%), abnormal fertilization (6.2% vs 8.0%) and no fertilization (19.8% vs 15.8%) rates were not significant. The initial beta HCG rates following frozen embryo transfer in the control and treatment groups were significant at 65.3% and 90.9%, respectively (p = 0.036). The rate of clinical pregnancy in the control was 38.5% and in the treatment group was 68.2% (p = 0.040). Live birth rate in the control versus treatment group was 30.8% and 59.1%, respectively (p = 0.049). There was no difference in the implantation rate between groups (control = 56.7%, treatment = 80.0%) (p = 0.065). In patients where the first embryo transfer did not result in clinical pregnancy, a subsequent transfer with an embryo from the opposite culture medium yielded a live birth rate of 11.1% (control) and 33.3% (treatment). Limitations, reasons for caution The pregnancy data in this particular study all result from frozen embryo transfers, with no fresh embryo transfers, and the possible effect or interference of the vitrification media, recovery medium and/or transfer medium cannot be accounted for, therefore, more study is needed. Wider implications of the findings The pregnancy and live birth rates in this analysis support previous findings that low lactate culture medium increases the instance of usable blastocysts and demonstrates that those increases can ultimately correlate with, and result in, a higher live birth rate for patients. Trial registration number Not Applicable

Trust antecedents in online reviews across national cultures

When reading an online review, consumers rely on implied trust-building factors within it. Trust antecedents have been extensively researched and categorized into argument quality and source credibility. However, there is still a need to investigate how their help for consumers differs across national cultures. Furthermore, while a profile photo has been found to enhance the helpfulness of a review by improving source credibility, little is known about how consumers perceive user appearance in a review picture and no research has compared these two types of visual information. To bridge these gaps, we examine how trust antecedents and visual information help consumers' decision making differently across national cultures, using reviews collected from Amazon in the US and Germany, respectively. Our results show that information quality is more helpful for consumers in an individualistic and low uncertainty avoidance culture, whereas source credibility is more valued in the opposite culture. Interestingly, the effects of the two types of visual information, user appearance in a profile photo versus in a review picture, also differ across cultures. This research contributes to the online review literature by introducing visual information and national culture with new perspectives of trust. Our findings suggest that multinational e-commerce businesses adopt culture-specific strategies in review systems to better help consumers make informed purchase decisions.

The Night and Life on the Streets: Disorder in an Irish Town in the 1820s and 1830s

It is argued in this essay that the streets of Tralee in south-west Munster in the late 1820s and early 1830s were characterised by a protean, anarchic and often oppositional culture which was both diurnal and very frequently nocturnal in its context of enactment. Indeed, more often than not, darkness framed and enabled expressions of dissidence, resistance and criminality. Technology would, in due course, challenge the imperium of darkness.

Персуазивный потенциал языковых средств пропаганды миграционной политики в программе партии «Альтернатива для Германии»

The aim of the study is to identify the means of creating a persuasive effect in the programme of the ‘Alternative for Germany’ (AfD) party. The scientific novelty of the study lies in the identification of persuasive tactics and linguistic means for representing the position of the AfD in relation to migration policy. As a result of the study, it has been found that in order to ensure a persuasive effect, the following tactics are used in the party’s programme: stating the problem, discrediting the opponent, pointing out ways to solve the problem, using a national stereotype, emphasising negative information, creating a ‘circle of strangers’, comparing German migration policy and that of the leading world powers, relying on pan-European democratic values, calling for change. The part of the text of the AfD programme devoted to the problems of migration is based on the antithesis that presupposes the opposition of the German key culture and various manifestations of foreign cultures. At the same time, one can clearly see an attempt to introduce such elements of meaning as ‘incompatibility’, ‘the need to counteract’ and ‘prohibition’ into the MIGRANT concept.

How Cultural Factors Influence Empathy Levels in Specific Contexts: A Comparision Between Individualism and Collectivism

As one of the opposite cultures, people who live under individualistic and collectivistic cultures always have diverse ideologies. Basic on this, this article aims to explore the empathy difference between these two cultures. The first part of the essay provides a literature review to clarify different terminology and points out the hypothesis. Secondly, an experiment was designed to interview culturally diverse respondents. This essay selected China and Australia to represent collectivism and individualism. To get a more prosperous answer, the interviewees in this experiment are mainly undergraduates or above. The interview is scheduled mainly in two parts, one is to quote GLOBE methods to test whether the experiments are representative of individualism/collectivism. In addition, the various emphases were measured based on the progressive test. The final comparison showed that people from collectivist backgrounds have a more significant role in empathy when they encounter things and show slightly more compassion for different things than people from individualistic backgrounds.