scholarly journals The language of suffering

Author(s):  
Swarndeep Singh ◽  
Koushik Sinha Deb

The recently published book 'Affliction' by Veena Das explores the meaning of normalcy, illness, suffering, and loss in the lives of the marginalized urban poor living in and around India’s capital city of Delhi. The language that evolves in such communities to describe the afflictions of the body forms from an amalgamation of terms derived from medical, spiritual, and faith-based systems, resulting in a unique vocabulary that needs to be understood by the clinical service provider. This think piece is a psychiatrist’s interpretation of an anthropological exploration of the understanding of various illness experiences. The commentary focuses primarily on the introductory chapter of the book, entitled ‘How the Body Speaks’, and discusses the various themes and theorizations offered by Das regarding communication about illness. The book and the chapter complement and broaden the biomedical understanding of what constitutes sickness and cure for the vulnerable and the disadvantaged.

2021 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-13
Author(s):  
S. O. K. Fajemilehin

The study was conducted using 800 adult local chickens comprising 355 males and 445 females, which were obtained from 2 major markets in Ado Ekiti, the capital city of Ekiti state, Nigeria. Convenience sampling technique was employed in selecting animals for observation. The birds were individually observed for phenotypic expression of shank colour, feather morphology, feather structure, polydactyly, ptylopody and comb types. The number in each group was expressed as a percentage of the total number of birds. The body size parameters measured include body weight, body girth, body length, shank length, wing length, toe length, keel length and shank diameter. The result revealed that the phenotypic frequencies of birds with dominant genes for feather morphology (FF, Ff), feather structure (NaNa + Nana), poly dactyl (PoPo + Popo) and ptylopods (FshFsh + Fshfsh) were 0.033, 0.037, 0.042 and 0.046 respectively, while that of the recessive gene carriers were 0.967, 0.963, 0.958 and 0.954 respectively. The calculated gene frequencies for frizzled (F), Naked neck (Na), Polydactyly (Po) and ptylopods (Fsh) were 0.035, 0.024, 0.034 and 0.035 respectively. The local chicken showed different plumage coloration with black, brown and pink predominating. The male birds were superior to their female counterparts with significant differences (P<0.05) in all the parameters measured except weight.


2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 519-536 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne Shand

To make co-production work as a strategy for urban development, and to establish a basis for collaborative action, states and organized communities must find a way to manage their unequal power relationship. Effective partnerships, constructed through projects of co-production, require participants to move beyond institutionally defined roles of service provider and service consumer to forge new terms for collaboration and spaces for joint decision-making. The processes of making space for co-production can be centrally important to establishing the legitimacy of development activity that includes the urban poor as stakeholders. Drawing from research undertaken in Harare, Zimbabwe, this paper examines how a memorandum of understanding was used to frame dialogue between community and state actors and facilitate co-production of housing and infrastructure in a low-income settlement.


Author(s):  
Mohd. Yousuf Bhat

Delhi, the capital city of India, which is the concern of this chapter, has its own significance as it is the seat of governance, learning, and the healthcare service provider. Capital cities though inhabit people from every region and tend to be overcrowded, but in Delhi, the situation is not only the nature of a capital city, but also the industrial and commercial centre of high order in the northern zone of India, which is creating a number of environmental problems, such as air and water pollution, slum development, congested housing, etc. The chapter discusses all causes of Delhi's environmental problems like atrophy of political will, mismanaged urbanisation, court interventions, etc., and finally, the chapter tries to find out possible solutions in a detailed manner keeping in view the measures taken by other countries like China to deal with such problems.


Author(s):  
Hannah Schwadron

This introductory chapter frames the book’s emphasis on the twenty-first-century Sexy Jewess, whose image proliferates in neoburlesque, comedy, mainstream film, and progressive pornography. A review of significant literature in Jewish studies, gender and sexuality studies, and dance and performance studies (1) introduces how performers complicate self-critical jokes of the excessive Jewish female body by playing up their differences, (2) historicizes the techniques that performers employ to mimic and master different ideas of sexiness, and (3) theorizes how performances of Jewish female identity use the body to participate in and parody notions of appropriate femininity as they relate to white womanhood.


Author(s):  
Manish Madan ◽  
Mahesh K. Nalla

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine citizens’ perception of police in India, particularly the authors examine the factors influencing citizen satisfaction with the police in India. Design/methodology/approach – Using survey data collected from the residents in a neighborhood of the capital city and from the passengers on a 41-hour-1,281 miles journey traveling from the northern part to the southern part of the country and return via Indian Railways, this study empirically analyzed citizens’ perceptions of police and factors that accounted for the variation in Indian citizens’ assessment of police. Consistent with the literature, this study integrates a broader range of explanatory variables to explain citizens’ perceptions toward police, including demographic characteristics, views about professionalism in police, police performance, fairness, police corruption, and citizens’ perceptions about their safety in their neighborhood. Findings – Older citizens reported higher satisfaction with the police. Among the contextual characteristics, the authors find a positive relationship between perceived police performance, fairness, professionalism, and citizen satisfaction with police. As expected, perceived police deviance is associated with lower citizen satisfaction with police. Practical implications – Findings of the study provide Indian police administrators with important references and directions to improve police performance and move to increase citizen satisfaction about police. It also adds to the limited literature on citizens’ perceptions of the police in India. Originality/value – This study is an attempt to systematically assess the citizens’ perception of police in India. The researchers believe that this as an original contribution in the body of criminal justice research, particularly to the scholarship on policing in India. Moreover, the examination of citizens’ satisfaction of police highlights their detailed views about professionalism of police, police performance, corruption, fairness and their perceptions about the safety in their neighborhood.


2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-63
Author(s):  
Haque Mahfuz ◽  
Md Mizanur Rahman ◽  
Mohammad Nuruzzaman Bhuyain ◽  
Debashish Shaha

Introduction: Examination of peripheral blood film (PBF) and biopsy of the bone marrow are an indispensible adjunct to the study of diseases of the blood and may be the only way in which a correct diagnosis can be made. Marrow can be obtained by needle aspiration, percutaneous trephine biopsy or surgical biopsy. Morphological examination of the bone marrow by an experienced haematologist can provide very useful information important for many haematological and non-haematological disorders. Objective: The aim of the study was to diagnose both haematological and non-haematological disorders by only morphological bone marrow examination in a district town distant from the capital city where sophisticated diagnostic facilities are not available. Methods: This cross sectional type of descriptive study was carried out in Combined Military Hospital (CMH), Jessore and different private and public hospitals. Five hundred cases taken as a non-probability purposive sampling method were included in this study irrespective of age and sex from January 2009 to June 2011. Bone marrow was aspirated from posterior superior iliac spine and first piece of the body of the sternum taking aseptic precautions and after infiltrating local anaesthesia. Only two cases required percutaneous trephine biopsy. After aspiration bone marrow smears were stained and examined under microscope. 59 JAFMC Bangladesh. Vol 9, No 2 (December) 2013 Results: There were 294 (58.8%) male and 206 (41.2 %) female out of 500 cases. The age of the patients ranged from one year to 82 years. Haematological malignancy were 321 cases (64.2%), non-malignant haematological and non-haematological diseases were 112 (22.4%) and 56 (11.2%) cases respectively and normal active marrow were from 11 (2.2%) cases. Among 321 haematological malignancies, Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) and Acute Myeloblastic Leukaemia (AML) were 126 (39.3%) and 99 (30.8%) respectively and Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia (CML) were 37 (11.5%). Out of 112 non-malignant haematological cases, erythroid hyperplasia was found in 42 (37.5%) cases in which micronormoblastic erythroid hyperplasia was 33 (29.5%) and megaloblastic erythroid hyperplasia was 9 (8.0%) cases. Aplastic anaemia/progressive marrow failure was diagnosed in 40 (35.7%) cases. Two (1.8%) cases were diagnosed as myelofibrosis. Non-haematological diseases were 56 of which 49 (87.5%) cases were secondary reactive marrow & only seven (12.5%) cases were secondary metastatic deposits in the bone marrow. Conclusion: Morphological examination of bone marrow aspirate is a key to the diagnosis of many diseases especially the haematological disorders. Microscopic examination of bone marrow aspirate by an experienced haematologist may solve many diagnostic difficulties faced in day to day clinical practice. Therefore, for the betterment of both patients and physicians more emphasis should be given to become well conversant in reporting a bone marrow aspirate by the haematologists. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/jafmc.v9i2.21828 Journal of Armed Forces Medical College Bangladesh Vol.9(2) 2013


2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 163-180
Author(s):  
Theresa Harrison ◽  
Dottie Weigel ◽  
Melinda Smith

Higher education institutions face many competing priorities and are still expected to serve the public good. Faith-based institutions, in particular, aim to meet a faith-inspired calling and serve the communities in which they are situated while guiding students in their faith formation by integrating service and academic priorities. In this paper, the authors explore, through a case study methodology, the unique positionality of Messiah University, a faith-based university located near the capital city of Harrisburg, PA. Specifically, this study explores the impact of a community engaged course with an urban nonprofit agency.


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