scholarly journals Comparing Japanese and US Language Spaces: A Case Study

2021 ◽  
pp. 341-364
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Lavolette ◽  
Matthew Claflin

Language spaces worldwide have much in common. However, we believe that there is a meaningful difference between spaces that are considered “language centers” in the US (USLCs) and “self-access language centers” (SALCs) in Japan. These differences provide an opportunity for practitioners and scholars involved in language spaces to learn from each other. In the current article, we investigated the Global Commons at Kyoto Sangyo University for the characteristics of both USLCs and SALCs by collecting information about it from publicly available sources and from interviews with staff. We show that it can be considered an administrative SALC (Mynard, 2019) and show how it fulfills some of the USLC mandates (Lavolette, 2018) but not others. We discuss the implications of these characterizations, including how the Global Commons could be more useful to its stakeholders. Based on this case study, scholars of both SALCs and LCs can gain new ideas for services and roles that will benefit their stakeholders and facilitate change.

2011 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 455-478 ◽  
Author(s):  
DAVID A. MESSENGER

AbstractThis work links the western Allies’ policy of denazification in occupied Germany to efforts to repatriate German intelligence agents and Nazi Party officials – so-called ‘obnoxious’ Germans – from the neutral states of Europe after the Second World War. Once on German soil, these individuals would be subject to internment and investigation as outlined in occupation policy. Using the situation in Franco's Spain as a case study, the article argues that new ideas of neutrality following the war and a strong commitment to the concept of denazification led to the creation of the repatriation policy, especially within the United States. Repatriation was also a way to measure the extent to which Franco's Spain accepted the Allied victory and the defeat of Nazism and fascism. The US perception was that the continued presence of individual Nazis meant the continued influence of Nazism itself. Spain responded half-heartedly, at best. Despite the fact that in terms of numbers repatriated the policy was a failure, the Spanish example demonstrates that the attempted repatriation of ‘obnoxious’ Germans from neutral Europe, although overlooked, was significant not only as part of the immediate post-war settlement but also in its bearing on US ideas about Nazism, security and perceived collaboration of neutral states like Spain.


Author(s):  
Elizabeth A. Bennett

Cannabis (marijuana) is the most commonly consumed, universally produced, and frequently trafficked psychoactive substance prohibited under international drug control laws. Yet, several countries have recently moved toward legalization. In these places, the legal status of cannabis is complex, especially because illegal markets persist. This chapter explores the ways in which a sector’s legal status interacts with political consumerism. The analysis draws on a case study of political consumerism in the US and Canadian cannabis markets over the past two decades as both countries moved toward legalization. It finds that the goals, tactics, and leadership of political consumerism activities changed as the sector’s legal status shifted. Thus prohibition, semilegalization, and new legality may present special challenges to political consumerism, such as silencing producers, confusing consumers, deterring social movements, and discouraging discourse about ethical issues. The chapter concludes that political consumerism and legal status may have deep import for one another.


Author(s):  
Kasey Barr ◽  
Alex Mintz

This chapter examines the effect of group dynamics on the 2016 decision within the administration of President Barack Obama to lead the international coalition in a mission to liberate Raqqa, Syria, from the Islamic State. The authors show that whereas the groupthink syndrome characterized the decision-making process of the US-led coalition’s decision to attack Raqqa, it was polythink that characterized the decision-making dynamics both in the US-led coalition and within the inner circle of Obama’s own foreign policy advisors. Through case-study analysis, the authors illustrate that groupthink is more likely in strategic decisions, whereas polythink is more likely in tactical decisions.


2021 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 117863292110192
Author(s):  
Minh Van Hoang ◽  
Anh Tuan Tran ◽  
Trang Thu Vu ◽  
Tuan Kim Duong

This study examined the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) preparedness and response of the health system (HS) in Hanoi, Vietnam, and identified enabling factors and barriers. This cross-sectional, mixed-methods study was conducted in 4 urban and peri-urban districts that included some wards with COVID-19-positive cases and some without. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) analytical frameworks were used. Overall, 10% of health facilities (HFs) failed to fully implement COVID-19 risk determination; 8.8% failed to fully implement stronger community partnerships with local stakeholders to support public health (PH) preparedness; 35% and 2.5% incompletely implemented and did not implement evaluation of PH emergency operations, respectively; 10% did not identify communication channels to issue public information, alerts, warnings, and notifications; 25% incompletely implemented identification, development of guidance, and standards for information; 72.5% had good preventive and treatment collaboration; and 10% did not fully implement procedures for laboratory testing and reporting results. Enablers included sufficient infrastructure and equipment, strong leadership, and good cross-public-sector collaboration with police and military forces. Barriers included workforce constraints, overburdened and inconsistent reporting systems, inappropriate financial mechanisms, ambiguous health governance, and lack of private-sector engagement. Nonetheless, the HS preparedness and response were satisfactory, although further coordinated efforts in evaluation, coordination, communication, and volunteering remain necessary.


Pharmaceutics ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 48
Author(s):  
Ioana Gherghescu ◽  
M. Begoña Delgado-Charro

Biosimilar medicines expand the biotherapeutic market and improve patient access. This work looked into the landscape of the European and US biosimilar products, their regulatory authorization, market availability, and clinical evaluation undergone prior to the regulatory approval. European Medicines Agency (EMEA, currently EMA) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) repositories were searched to identify all biosimilar medicines approved before December 2019. Adalimumab biosimilars, and particularly their clinical evaluations, were used as a case study. In the past 13 years, the EMA has received 65 marketing authorization applications for biosimilar medicines with 55 approved biosimilars available in the EU market. Since the first biosimilar approval in 2015, the FDA has granted 26 approvals for biosimilars with only 11 being currently on the US market. Five adalimumab biosimilars have been approved in the EU and commercialized as eight different medicines through duplicate marketing authorizations. Whilst three of these are FDA-approved, the first adalimumab biosimilar will not be marketed in the US until 2023 due to Humira’s exclusivity period. The EU biosimilar market has developed faster than its US counterpart, as the latter is probably challenged by a series of patents and exclusivity periods protecting the bio-originator medicines, an issue addressed by the US’s latest ‘Biosimilar Action Plan’.


2021 ◽  
pp. 016344372199453
Author(s):  
Antonios Vlassis

The article proposes to consider the COVID-19 global pandemic as new major development for cultural industries and policies and to highlight timely and crucial trends due to the lockdown measures. Thus, it attempts to stimulate the scholarship debate regarding the consequences of the pandemic to the action of global online platforms, as well as to policy and economic aspects of cultural sectors. Taking as case study the audio-visual sector, the article explores whether the US global streaming platforms are the winning players of the lockdown measures and emphasizes the multifaceted strategies developed by US-based platforms in order to strengthen their soft power. Focusing on China and the European Union, the article also argues that the overwhelming action of US-based online platforms triggers the potential emergence of media platform regionalization in the context of COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, it highlights the regulatory challenges and how the new empirical trends are expected to shape the current audio-visual policy framework. The analysis focuses on the period between the beginning of global pandemic in Asia-Pacific in January 2020 and the progressive easing of lockdown measures in North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific in July 2020.


Author(s):  
R. A. Earnshaw

AbstractWhere do new ideas come from and how are they generated? Which of these ideas will be potentially useful immediately, and which will be more ‘blue sky’? For the latter, their significance may not be known for a number of years, perhaps even generations. The progress of computing and digital media is a relevant and useful case study in this respect. Which visions of the future in the early days of computing have stood the test of time, and which have vanished without trace? Can this be used as guide for current and future areas of research and development? If one Internet year is equivalent to seven calendar years, are virtual worlds being utilized as an effective accelerator for these new ideas and their implementation and evaluation? The nature of digital media and its constituent parts such as electronic devices, sensors, images, audio, games, web pages, social media, e-books, and Internet of Things, provides a diverse environment which can be viewed as a testbed for current and future ideas. Individual disciplines utilise virtual worlds in different ways. As collaboration is often involved in such research environments, does the technology make these collaborations effective? Have the limits of disciplinary approaches been reached? The importance of interdisciplinary collaborations for the future is proposed and evaluated. The current enablers for progressing interdisciplinary collaborations are presented. The possibility for a new Renaissance between technology and the arts is discussed.


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