A Psychoanalytical Deconstruction of Surpanakha in Kavita Kane’s Lanka’s Princess

This paper endeavours to examine the character Surpanakha in Kavita Kane’s novel Lanka’s Princess. It attempts to critically follow her struggle in the androcentric space with the trapping of being a female. Breaking down her identity as a daughter, sister, wife and more specifically, as an individual, it tracks down the formulation of her own self-perception in order to reinterpret her femininity. Through the psychoanalytical lenses, this work also critically analyses her ‘repression, rage and revenge’ by connecting the dots in her journey that shape her personality. The giving of voice to the ‘unvoiced’ through revisionist myth making in the novel and the evolution of ‘Surpanakha’ from ‘Meenakshi’ due to her experiences in the oppressive and suffocating environment is the focal point of the paper.

Connecting the Dots: Engaging Wider Forms of Openness for the Mutual Benefit of Musicians and Musicologists

While it is encouraging to see renewed attention to 'openness' in academia, that debate (and its interpretation of the F.A.I.R. principles) is often rather narrowly defined. This paper addresses openness in a broad sense, asking not so much whether a project is open, but how open and to whom. I illustrate these ideas through examples of my own ongoing projects which to seek to make the most of a potential symbiosis between academic and wider musical communities. Specifically, I discuss how these communities can both benefit from – and even work together on building – highly accessible and interoperable corpora of scores and analyses when ambitious openness is factored into decision making from the outset.

Connecting the Dots Between Mental and Menstrual Health: An Exploratory Review

Context: Mental and menstrual health, two emerging aspects of health critical to the female population, are bidirectionally linked. But there is limited empirical evidence that establishes the association between these entities. This essay aims to draw the attention of researchers to this healthcare niche. Evidence Acquisition: An exploratory review was carried out on literatures sourced from medical databases (e.g. PubMed, Google Scholar, Scopus, Science Direct, and Web of Science), and gray sources-popular and reputable institutional and journalistic websites that publishes mental or menstrual health research. The key words used for the search are “menstruation, menstrual hygiene, menstrual disorders, premenstrual syndrome, period poverty, menarche, menopause, mental health, mental disorder, mental illness, depression, anxiety, phobia, mania, mood, and affect”. The initial search generated 368 results. But after the duplicates were removed, the exclusion criteria (publication before 2000, and in languages other than English) was applied, and manual review of abstract (for relevance) was done, 21 publications from the databases and 5 from gray sources were included in this review. Results: Associations were found between menstrual cycle irregularities and disorders; and mental disorders such as premenstrual syndrome, premenstrual dysphoric disorder, major depressive disorder, major anxiety disorder, psychotic disorder, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, sleep disorder, substance use/abuse, and suicidal ideation and attempts. Few positive associations between mental and menstrual health were recorded, and several research and treatment gaps were identified. Conclusions: Research into the links between mental and menstrual health should not remain a fringe area of scientific curiosity, as it shows tremendous promise in improving healthcare offered to women/girls globally.

Connecting the Dots from Professional Development to Student Learning

Teacher participation in professional development (PD) improved student learning compared with control teachers. Delivering neuroscience as a unit produced more student learning than when the content was sprinkled throughout the course. Despite commitment to enacting PD strategies, teacher decisions and implementation strategies influenced student outcomes.