Melanie Wasmuth, Tero Alstola , Rotem Avneri Meir
et al.
Empires and kingship are long-standing topics of research in ancient Near Eastern studies; the study of queenship has gradually received more attention over recent decades. However, discussions of the social implications of kingship and queenship, comparisons of the gender roles, and their study across several empires remain rare. The paper at hand takes the unprecedented step of such a comparative analysis by tracing a specific detail of royal ideology, namely the presentation of the king and queen to the public as builders, across seven major Near Eastern empires following and/or interacting with each other throughout the first millennium BCE: the Neo-Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, Teispid-Achaemenid, Seleucid, Ptolemaic, Parthian, and Roman empires. Drawing on the available textual, material, and visual sources from the ancient contemporary contexts of each empire and from Classical reception history, we showcase the potential of a longue-durée comparison for the social institutions of kingship and of queenship, giving full attention and space also to the lesser known empires and the queens’ roles. To achieve this, we present first a synopsis of the key findings per empire and role, followed by a diachronic study of three aspects of gender comparison: concerning the empire-internal portfolios of king and queen, the joint presentation as a couple, and the question of how far the roles of king and queen mirror or complement each other. We conclude with some pertinent (albeit tentative) results on the features shared by some or all of the empires as well as their outstanding idiosyncracies.
Having dominated the world during antiquity by his power, Africa has known several difficult times in his history such as slavery, colonization and socio-political crises… It has become a hotbed of conflicts in this third millennium caused earlier by the Western bloc whose interventionism is motivated by the control and the plunder of African resources. The geopolitical and geostrategic weight of sociopolitical crises of Africa fueled by ethnicity is felt. This prompts a reflection on the endogenous and exogenous dynamics of socio-political crises in Africa. It is urgent to question crisis management in Africa as a way out for development. Thus, we have undertaken the present study entitled: ‘‘The endo-exogenous dynamics of African socio-political crises’’. Based on a variety of documentation consisting of books, academic works, etc. in a synthetic approach with historical, political science aspects we have formulated the following hypothesis: Scientific research development in Africa is possible only by the resolution of the crises in the continent. To analyze this work, we have mobilized the theory of social conflict and a theory of international relations namely realism. Thus, we propose an african federal state as the issue of crises exit on the one hand and on the other hand we call on the African States to the valorization of traditional rites as a way of achieving peace in Africa.
Kaushik Satapathy, Dimitrios Psaltis, Feryal Özel
et al.
The black hole images obtained with the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) are expected to be variable at the dynamical timescale near their horizons. For the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy, this timescale (5–61 days) is comparable to the 6 day extent of the 2017 EHT observations. Closure phases along baseline triangles are robust interferometric observables that are sensitive to the expected structural changes of the images but are free of station-based atmospheric and instrumental errors. We explored the day-to-day variability in closure-phase measurements on all six linearly independent nontrivial baseline triangles that can be formed from the 2017 observations. We showed that three triangles exhibit very low day-to-day variability, with a dispersion of ∼3°–5°. The only triangles that exhibit substantially higher variability (∼90°–180°) are the ones with baselines that cross the visibility amplitude minima on the u – v plane, as expected from theoretical modeling. We used two sets of general relativistic magnetohydrodynamic simulations to explore the dependence of the predicted variability on various black hole and accretion-flow parameters. We found that changing the magnetic field configuration, electron temperature model, or black hole spin has a marginal effect on the model consistency with the observed level of variability. On the other hand, the most discriminating image characteristic of models is the fractional width of the bright ring of emission. Models that best reproduce the observed small level of variability are characterized by thin ring-like images with structures dominated by gravitational lensing effects and thus least affected by turbulence in the accreting plasmas.
Muturi Michael N. K., Bargul Joel L., Lattorff H. Michael G.
Pollen nutrition is critical for the development and well-being of the honeybee. Previous studies have compared the effect of pollen and carbohydrate-only diet on honeybee physiology. The effect of a monofloral versus polyfloral diet on the African honeybee (Apis mellifera scutellata) is poorly understood. This knowledge is critical as diversity-rich habitats are being altered to less diverse environments through increased urbanization and intensified agricultural activities, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. Here, we report how lowly diverse (LD) and highly diverse (HD) pollen diets influence honeybee life-history traits and physiology. To achieve this, we fed caged bees with the two pollen diets and tested their effects on the parameters of survival, body weight, pollen consumption, and immune response. HD-fed bees had significantly higher survival and greater pollen consumption than LD-fed bees. However, LD-fed bees were heavier than HD-fed bees. The correlation between body weight gain and pollen consumption was expressed strongly in HD-fed bees than in LD-fed bees. Overall, our findings reveal the benefits that the highly diverse polyfloral diets provide to honeybee workers. This study shows how pollen diversity influences honeybee life-history traits, thus informing the need for conserving the biodiversity of environments for safeguarding the health of honeybees and other pollinators.
Abstract This chapter examines how FinTech is breaking barriers to financial inclusion. It first traces the history of FinTech and its evolution both globally and in Africa. Then it reviews the impact of selected FinTech products in African countries. Several observations are noteworthy. First, mobile money facilitated by mobile technology stands out as the most successful innovation in extending financial inclusion in Africa. Second, the most promising innovation that has the potential to alleviate SME funding constraints is crowdfunding. However, this potential can only be realized by increasing internet access in Africa, the region with the lowest penetration. Finally, the chapter discusses the challenges facing the proliferation of FinTech investments in Africa.
E. Torres-Delgado, D. Baumgardner, O. L. Mayol-Bracero
<p>African aerosol particles, traveling thousands of kilometers before reaching the Americas and the Caribbean, directly scatter and absorb solar
radiation and indirectly impact climate by serving as cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) or ice-nucleating particles (INPs) that form clouds. These
particles can also affect the water budget by altering precipitation patterns that subsequently affect ecosystems. As part of the NSF-funded
Luquillo Critical Zone Observatory, field campaigns were conducted during the summers of 2013 (23 <span class="inline-formula">d</span>), 2014 (11 <span class="inline-formula">d</span>), and 2015
(92 <span class="inline-formula">d</span>) at Pico del Este, a site in a tropical montane cloud forest on the Caribbean Island of Puerto Rico. Cloud microphysical properties,
which included liquid water content, droplet number concentration, and droplet size, were measured. Using products from models and satellites, as
well as in situ measurements of aerosol optical properties, periods of high- and low-dust influence were identified. The results from this study
suggest that meteorology and air mass history have a more important effect on cloud processes than aerosols transported from Africa. In contrast,
air masses that arrived after passing over the inhabited islands to the southeast led to clouds with much higher droplet concentrations, presumably
due to aerosols formed from anthropogenic emissions.</p>
A entrevista foi realizada no contexto da I Conferência do Caribe Afroandaluz, organizada por Javier García Fernández e Pedro Ordoñez Eslava, em colaboração com o Departamento de História e Ciências da Música e graças ao financiamento da Vice-Reitora do de Cultura e Pesquisa da Faculdade de Filosofia e Letras da Universidade de Granada. A entrevista tematiza a relação entre África e Andaluzia, a partir do ativismo cultural e musical de Cosano e também explora os livros que publicou sobre a presença africana no sul da Europa.
Palavras chave: Jesús Cosano. Andaluzia. África. Relações
Resumen:
Entrevista realizada en el contexto de las I Jornadas del Caribe Afroandaluz, organizadas por Javier García Fernández y Pedro Ordoñez Eslava, en colaboración con el Departamento de Historia y Ciéncias de la Música y gracias a financiación del Vicedecanato de Cultura e Investigación de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la Universidad de Granada. La entrevista se centra en la relación entre África y Andalucía, basada en el activismo cultural y musical de Cosano y también explora los libros que publicó sobre la presencia africana en el sur de Europa.
Palabras clave: Jesús Cosano. Andalucia. África. Relaciones
Abstract:
This interview took place in the context of the 1st Afroandaluz Caribbean Days, organized by Javier García Fernández and Pedro Ordoñez Eslava, in collaboration with the Department of History and Music Sciences and the funding of the Vicedecanato de Cultura e Investigación de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la Universidad de Granada. This interview focuses on the relationship between Africa and Andalucía, based on Cosano’s cultural and musical activism and also explores the books he published about the African presence in the south of Europe.
Keywords: Jesús Cosano. Andalucia. Africa. Relations
Latin America. Spanish America, Social sciences (General)
This article focuses on ethnographic work conducted at the Men-Tsee-Khang (Dharamsala, India) on Garuda 5 (khyung lnga), a commonly prescribed Tibetan medical formula. This medicine’s efficacy as a painkiller and activity against infection and inflammation is largely due to a particularly powerful plant, known as ‘virulent poison’ (btsan dug) as well as ‘the great medicine’ (sman chen), and identified as a subset of Aconitum species. Its effects, however, are potentially dangerous or even deadly. How can these poisonous plants be used in medicine and, conversely, when does a medicine become a poison? How can ostensibly the same substance be both harmful and helpful? The explanation requires a more nuanced picture than mere dose dependency. Attending to the broader ‘ecologies of potency’ in which these substances are locally enmeshed, in line with Sienna Craig’s Efficacy and the Social Ecologies of Tibetan Medicine (2012), provides fertile ground to better understand the effects of Garuda 5 and how potency is developed and directed in practice. I aim to unpack the spectrum between sman (medicine) and dug (poison) in Sowa Rigpa by elucidating some of the multiple dimensions which determine the activity of Garuda 5 as it is formulated and prescribed in India. I thus embrace the full spectrum of potency— the ‘good’ and the ‘bad,’ the ‘wanted’ and the ‘unwanted’—without presuming the universal validity of biomedical notions of toxicity and side effects.
The emergence of the Acheulean from the earlier Oldowan constitutes a major transition in human evolution, the theme of this special issue. This paper discusses the evidence for the origins of the Acheulean, a cornerstone in the history of human technology, from two perspectives; firstly, a review of the history of investigations on Acheulean research is presented. This approach introduces the evolution of theories throughout the development of the discipline, and reviews the way in which cumulative knowledge led to the prevalent explanatory framework for the emergence of the Acheulean. The second part presents the current state of the art in Acheulean origins research, and reviews the hard evidence for the appearance of this technology in Africa around 1.7 Ma, and its significance for the evolutionary history of Homo erectus. This article is part of the themed issue ‘Major transitions in human evolution’.
The South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) Library and Information Service (LIS) forms part of the SAAO - which is a business unit of the National Research Foundation (NRF) in South Africa. Until recently each business unit had a library service that operated independently. With the formation of the NRF Knowledge Center (KC) this is set to change. Previously it was possible for a library service to conduct its processes and procedures in isolation as long as the LIS aligned with the business unit. This paper covers the study that investigated the needs and possible guidelines for an e-Strategy for the SAAO LIS that is both aligned to the broader NRF strategy but which also incorporates recommendations to upgrade the library products and services offering. The pool of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) -based products and services is growing. ‘Upgrading’ therefore requires that it is acknowledged that ICT provides essential infrastructure for the relevant the library. Library focused trends show continuous development. Bringing the SAAO LIS up to standard will require that these developments are continuously monitored for relevance and incorporation. This paper provides information about the SAAO LIS and its history. Both ‘SWOT’ and ‘PESTEL’ analyses were used to direct the discussion on the internal and external influences on the SAAO LIS. The analyses also provided insight into the challenges the SAAO LIS faces, the strengths that could be capitalized and the opportunities that could be exploited. The paper recommends that the SAAO LIS, before engaging in a strategic change, addresses the challenges of sustainable funding and accessibility to core resources. It is also recommends that the SAAO LIS uses its e-Strategy to ‘fast track’ the process of bringing it up to the standard required of world-class astronomy libraries.
Integrated corporate reporting (ICR), which entails the process of compiling, documenting and reporting on company’s resources, its ongoing relationships with key stakeholders; business models; products (services); and the impact of such products (or services) on stakeholders, society, as well as the environment to optimize company value, has generated considerable interest among top 100 Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) listed companies in South Africa over the last decade. Despite the surging interest in ICR to leverage the social responsibility, transparency and public accountability of companies in the developing African countries, little is known about the combined influence of ICR and internal company resources and/ capabilities (e.g., age and experience of the Chief Executive Officer (CEO)) on the performance of South African listed companies. The main objective of this study, therefore, is to examine the impact of Integrated Reporting Ratings (IRR); the company CEO’s age; and his/her years as a CEO on the share price of the company within the South African context. The top-106 JSE listed companies for the period Year-end 2014 constitute the sample for this study. Multivariate non-parametric regression is used to model the relationship between the predictor (i.e., independent) variables and the response (i.e., dependent) variable using MATLAB. The model developed in this study is, then, used to evaluate the impact of IRR; the CEO’s age and years of experience as CEO on the share price of individual companies. The proposed methodology is illustrated step-by-step. The finding of the study reveal that the share price of a company tended to increase with an increase in IRR, age and years of experience of the CEO, demonstrating that a company’s established history in integrated reporting and corporate experience positively impact its performance (i.e., the share price).
Keywords: integrated corporate reporting, corporate responsibility, JSE listed companies, MATLAB. JEL Classification: G17
This paper examines the development and change of Arab media discourse since mid-1990s. The paper looks at how the production and consumption of media discourse have changed dramatically in the Arab world over the last decade or so, notably in relation to taboos such as religion, governance and gender. The paper argues that transnational Arab media, particularly al-Jazeera, have contributed to this change by adopting a liberal and critical approach when dealing with Arab taboos. This change is clearly reflected in the new discourse adopted by both the Arab public and Arab media. Such a discourse practice shapes and is shaped by a new Arab social, cultural and political practice.
Abstract:This article explores one source through which African women’s sport history can be drawn and interpreted: the sport sections of African newspapers. In the case of Kenya, the major dailies,Daily NationandThe East African Standard, are repositories of information pertaining to the challenges that confronted female athletes. Taking into account the history and development of these media, the article addresses the question of why did Kenyan women lag behind their male counterparts in entering the sport at an international level? Focusing on the early post-colonial period, it is argued that institutional barriers abroad as well as economic and cultural factors at home disproportionately disadvantaged female runners in their career progression. These conclusions would be difficult to substantiate without investigating the Kenyan press, a valuable source for anyone seeking to access information about the lives of the women who have contributed to Africa’s sport history.
In a country where there is a consistent loud outcry about school achievement of youth
in the final school examination in Grade 12, attention has recently shifted to children in
the primary school. The very founding of this journal was motivated by a deep concern
about research in childhood education and children’s lives. Questions were being asked
about what happens in the first years of schooling, about the suitability of the national
curriculum for such a diverse population, about specialised research in the field of
learning in the early years, and about teaching with care and with insight, knowing
who the children of this nation are.
The journal took an early stand when, at its launch in 2010, the editor noted that the
notion of a national foundation phase curriculum assumes the existence of a ‘national’
Grade 1 learner. In South Africa there are children who come to school, well prepared
for the demands of school – and there are others who come with only their survival
records in homes of extreme poverty, of absent parents and of families broken by the
effects of the history of the nation and the effects of disease. Much as we would like
to see a standard of performance expected from the ‘national’ young learner, we need
to see the layers of diversity too. Can such a stratified population, socially fractured
in many ways, truly enact a differentiated curriculum for children who have so much
and for children who have so little at the same time and at the same pace? Can our
foundation phase classes be truly inclusive?
It remains a vexing question. Much research is needed to even try to give a robust
response. In recent years, in the research of the Centre for Education Practice Research
at my home institution, we have encountered more than 3000 children between five
and seven years old in an extensive interview test of mathematical cognition. In the
process we found children who had never encountered a print drawing and children
who did not know that a page can be turned. However, the very same children had
a perfectly normal idea of approximate number and size. We regard this as evidence
that they have the core knowledge of number that has to be developed by systematic
instruction and caring apprenticeship in classrooms. But for that they would need
teachers who know them as well as they know the latest curriculum and its suggested
tools of teaching.
This is but one example of how important teacher education is and how important
it is that we should investigate both learners and teachers, but also teacher education
and teacher educators. Teachers and their educators at universities have their own
view of children, of learning and of childhood. Much as we may all agree that the
core activity of schools is for the young to learn the three Rs and the subject areas of
the curriculum, there are researchers who are opposed to a developmental view of
learning. The journal’s stance is that, in the Vygotskian tradition (Kozulin, 1990), the
young learn and are initiated – and thus develop – in the work of school (and society).
SAJCE– December 2014
ii
In the SAJCE we welcome different views on child learning and celebrate South
Africa’s researchers who argue that “pedagogical ‘know-how’ and views of child and
childhood constitute the subject knowledge that is foundational in the foundation
phase curriculum” – as Murris and Verbeek do in this issue. Add to that knowledge
of how children the world over have core knowledge systems, as argued by cognitive
developmental psychologists and neuroscientists, and we have a composite picture
of what the object of teacher education is – to know 1) the learner and 2) the subject
content, but also 3) the self as teacher.
This ‘didactical triangle’, was already proposed as view of teaching in the 17th century
in Comenius’s major work, Didactica Magna (Comenius, 1632/1967). In the 20th century,
for some reason, the English- speaking world used the term ‘didactic’ to denote
teacher-centred learning, while Comenius proposed what can arguably nowadays be
termed pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). Jari Lavonen, the chair of the teacher
education department at the University of Helsinki, recently noted that PCK is the
transformation of subject content knowledge by infusing it with knowledge of the
learner and of the self as teacher. In Finland they refer to PCK simply as Didactics, while
taking full cognisance of Shulman’s model (Shulman 1986).
But, views on teaching become more complicated when teachers are faced
with children who enter Grade 1, but who are not ready to embrace the way of life
at school. Bruwer and her co-authors report in this issue on teachers’ views on the
predicament they face when children need to cross the liminality boundary – when
they are still ‘betwixt and between’ life as an informal learner and life in school, where
they have to be inducted into life as a formal learner in a national curriculum. In the
same vein, Condy and Blease argue that a “one-size-fits-all curriculum cannot address
the issues that rural multigrade teachers and learners face”. Seldom do educational
researchers contemplate this very real issue. I was in the same class in Grade 1 as my
brother, who was then in Grade 8, in a little farm school. I recall vividly how we young
ones spent much time making clay oxen while they were doing indecipherable maths
on the writing board.
When more than one language is used, or required to be used, in a single classroom
communication set-up, a teacher is faced with yet another dimension. Ankiah-Gangadeen
and Samuel write about a narrative inquiry that was conducted in Mauritius, noting
that the “narrative inquiry methodology offered rich possibilities to foray into these
[teachers’] experiences, including the manifestations of negotiating their classroom
pedagogy in relation to their own personal historical biographies of language teaching
and learning”.
Added to the multilayered types of knowledge around which a teacher needs to
negotiate her way in a foundation phase classroom, are knowledge and understanding
of children’s transition from one grade to the next. Nieuwenhuizen and co-authors
found that the move from Grade 2 to Grade 3 is notably more difficult for children than
earlier grade transitions. I wish to add that it is also a grade transition that requires
much more of the learning child in volume and in pace of learning; the transition
Editorial
requires a ‘mature’ young learner who has worked through the curriculum of the
earlier grades effectively.
Kanjee and Moloi not only present information about ANA results, but show how
teachers utilise these in their teaching. To that, the editorial team adds: what is the
national testing ritual really doing for teachers? Are there many unforeseen and even
unintended effects? Many teachers may say that it alerts them to gaps in their own
knowledge and pedagogy and, especially, we would think, the way in which they
assess children’s learning effectively. While Kanjee and Moloi invoke local national
tests, Fritz and her co-authors from Germany, Switzerland and South Africa show
how a mathematics competence and diagnostic test for school beginners found
its way from Europe to South Africa. They point to the challenges of translating an
interview-based test and of validating it in a local context in four languages. With the
promise that the test will be normed in this country, the foundation phase education
as well as the educational psychology community may stand to benefit from such a
test, which is theoretically grounded in children’s conceptual development.
The matter of teaching with formative assessment as pedagogical tool comes to
mind whenever one discusses assessment. In an article by Long and Dunne, one reads
about their investigation into teaching of mathematics with a very specific angle – how
to “map and manage the omissions implicit in the current unfolding of the Curriculum
and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) for mathematics”. In a very dense and fast
paced curriculum it is not possible to fill all the gaps. Who knows what the effect may
be for future learning of children who move through a curriculum quite rapidly?
Staying in the early grade classroom, Sibanda explores the readability of two
textbooks for natural science learning for Grade 4 learners. She touches on one of
the sensitive nerves of South African school education, namely the English language.
In her analysis of two textbooks, using a range of methods of text analysis, she
comes to the conclusion that the books are simply too difficult to read. She argues
that the authors have not taken into account that both vocabulary and syntax have
to be taught systematically in order for Grade 4 children to be able to read texts in a
language they do not know well, for one, and in a discourse of science writing that is
new for them as well.
Ragpot narrates the story of how an instructional film, #Taximaths: how children
make their world mathematical, was conceptualised, scripted and produced with
senior undergraduate students at UJ. This artefact serves not only as higher education
material in teacher education, but is also used as material for teacher development.1
This issue of the journal is rounded off by an important contribution about the
ethics of research on children. Pillay explains how experts in ethics have advised him
in the work they do in the National Research Foundation South African Research
Chair he holds in ‘Education and Care in Childhood’ at the University of Johannesburg.
The reader is reminded that care of vulnerable children and the protection of their
rights should be high on the list of educational practice and its research.
iii
SAJCE– December 2014
The next issue of SAJCE is a special one. It is edited by Nadine Petersen and Sarah
Gravett and it celebrates a programme of research and development of the South
African Department of Higher Education and Training, with funding support from the
EU. The Strengthening Foundation Phase Teacher Education Programme started in
2011 and included most of the universities in the country. The issue promises to be a
milestone publication on teacher education for the primary school.
Editorial greetings
Elizabeth Henning
Special aspects of education, Theory and practice of education