‘Too Severe on the Female Sex’?

Author(s):  
Jennifer Batt

This chapter explores how Stephen Duck negotiated the competing hierarchies of gender and class as he sought to establish himself as a poet who moved in courtly circles. In both his narrative and occasional verse, Duck’s writing about, and addressed to, women was informed by his own unique and unprecedented position as a former thresher who had been brought to live at the periphery of the royal court. As several contemporary commentators noted, women and labouring-class men were often considered to be similarly—though not equally—circumscribed when it came to accessing literary and intellectual culture. Duck repeatedly made use of this supposed equivalence in order to bolster his own position against that of women who were, by birth, above him in the Georgian social strata. Now a labourer no more, Duck used the hierarchy of gender to trump the hierarchy of class. As this chapter shows, Duck’s misogyny was a product of the culture in which he was writing, but it was also a tool that he could strategically deploy in a variety of circumstances in the service of establishing his own credentials as a would-be gentleman.

2020 ◽  
pp. 79-101
Author(s):  
Clim Wijnands

A tabula scalata consists of triangular slats painted on two sides and attached to a panel, creating a “double image”. Sometimes, a mirror was placed at straight angles of the upper frame, allowing the beholder to see both painted sides at the same time – but only when standing in the right position. This contribution analyses how these scarcely studied devices relied on the beholder’s active participation to convey intertwined layers of artistic, scientific, political, and poetic meanings. To do so, it discusses two sixteenth-century case studies. The first is a lost painting created in French royal court circles around 1550 and subsequently making its way to Rome as a diplomatic gift. The device combined a portrait of Henry II of France, a moon symbol, and a puzzle-ridden poem to convey interrelated political and poetic meanings. The second painting is Ludovico Buti’s Portrait of Charles III of Lorraine and Christina de’ Medici. It was commissioned by the Medici, and originally hung in a room filled with maps and geographical devices. This article considers three aspects central to the paintings’ reception: motion, sensory perception, and ideology. Operating in an intellectual culture fuelled by curiosity and designed to evoke wonder, these devices aimed to prolong the beholders’ attention by establishing thresholds within the artistic experience. As such, they straddled the vague boundaries between painting, scientific instrument, and poem to stimulate the beholders’ senses and involve them in an interactive game of meaning-making.


Author(s):  
S. Karkare ◽  
J. Gilloteaux ◽  
T. R. Kelly

Approximately 1 million people in the United States alone develop gallstones each year. The incidence is higher in women than in men and the ratio being 4 ≥ 1. A correlation has also been suggested between oral contraceptives and cholelithiasis. In addition, postmenopausal or cancer estrogen therapy has been reported to be a factor responsible for gallstone formation. Female sex hormone receptors have been detected not only in the gallbladder musculature, but also in its epithelium. As a follow up to experiments effectuated in the male and the ovariectomized Syrian hamster, this report shows that, a combination of a low cholesterol diet with female sex steroid treatment contributes to the formation of gallstone-like deposits, while modifying the surface epithelium morphology. Syrian hamsters (F1B strain, BioBreeders, Watertown MA) were housed under 12h light: 12 h dark cycle, at 20 °C, fed Purina chow and water ad libitum. Several duration/treatment groups were studied, but this report will focus on data obtained with the group injected weekly with estradiol valerate (E weekly, s.c. 8-10 μg/100 g.b.w., in corn oil) and with i.m. medroxyprogesterone acetate (DepoProvera Upjohn Co., Kalamazoo, MI; 8-10 mg/100 g.b.w.) for a 3-month period. Other parameters (blood and bile) were also studied but not reported here.


2020 ◽  
Vol 90 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 346-352
Author(s):  
Vincenzo Pilone ◽  
Salvatore Tramontano ◽  
Carmen Cutolo ◽  
Federica Marchese ◽  
Antonio Maria Pagano ◽  
...  

Abstract. We aim to assess the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency (VDD) in patients scheduled for bariatric surgery (BS), and to identify factors that might be associated with VDD. We conducted a cross-sectional observational study involving all consecutive patients scheduled for BS from 2017 to 2019. The exclusion criteria were missing data for vitamin D levels, intake of vitamin D supplements in the 3 months prior to serum vitamin D determination, and renal insufficiency. A total of 206 patients (mean age and body mass index [BMI] of 34.9 ± 10.7 years, and 44.3 ± 6.99 kg/m2, respectively) met the inclusion criteria and were enrolled for data analysis. VDD (<19.9 ng/mL), severe VDD (<10 ng/mL), and vitamin D insufficiency (20–29.9 ng/mL) were present in 68.8 %, 12.5 %, and 31.2 % of patients, respectively. A significant inverse correlation was found between vitamin D levels and initial BMI, parathyroid hormone, and homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance (r = −0.280, p < 0.05; r = −0.407, p = 0.038; r = −0.445, p = 0.005), respectively. VDD was significantly more prevalent in patients with higher BMI [−0.413 ± 0.12, CI95 % (−0.659; −0.167), p = 0.006], whereas no significant association between hypertension [−1.005 ± 1.65, CI95 % (−4.338; 2.326), p = 0.001], and diabetes type 2 (T2D) [−0.44 ± 2.20, CI95 % (−4.876; 3.986), p = 0.841] was found. We observed significant association between female sex and levels of vitamin D [6.69 ± 2.31, CI95 % (2.06; 11.33), p = 0.006]. The present study shows that in patients scheduled for BS, VDD deficiency is common and was associated with higher BMI, and female sex.


2010 ◽  
Vol 222 (S 01) ◽  
Author(s):  
M Laube ◽  
E Küppers ◽  
U Thome

2014 ◽  
Vol 62 (S 01) ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Färber ◽  
M. Zacher ◽  
T. Doenst ◽  
T. Sandhaus ◽  
M. Diab ◽  
...  

2014 ◽  
Vol 11 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 370-377
Author(s):  
Brian McFarlane

On stage, Lindsay Anderson directed ten plays by David Storey, who also wrote the novel on which This Sporting Life is based. Anderson directed Storey's In Celebration both in the theatre, at the Royal Court in 1969, and on television, for the American Film Theatre in 1975. Although it focuses primarily on the television version of In Celebration, a work which is all too often neglected in critical discussions of Anderson's output, this article examines Anderson as a director for both stage and screen, and also explores the numerous significant links between Storey's and Anderson's oeuvres.


2012 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 22-27
Author(s):  
Sissel Undheim

The description of Christ as a virgin, 'Christus virgo', does occur at rare occasions in Early Christian and late antique texts. Considering that 'virgo' was a term that most commonly described the sexual and moral status of a member of the female sex, such representations of Christ as a virgin may exemplify some of the complex negotiations over gender, salvation, sanctity and Christology that we find in the writings of the Church fathers. The article provides some suggestions as to how we can understand the notion of the virgin Christ within the context of early Christian and late antique theological debates on the one hand, and in light of the growing interest in sacred virginity on the other.


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