Envisioning the next human genome reference

Summary: We provide an Editorial perspective on approaches to improve ethnic representation in the human genome reference sequence, enabling its widespread use in genomic studies and precision medicine to benefit all peoples.

Recruitment of Community-Based Samples: Experiences and Recommendations for Optimizing Success

Background Recruitment in health and social science research is a critically important but often overlooked step in conducting successful research. The challenges associated with recruitment pertain to multiple factors such as enrolling groups with vulnerabilities, obtaining geographic, cultural, and ethnic representation within study samples, supporting the participation of less accessible populations such as older adults, and developing networks to support recruitment. Purpose This paper presents the experiences of two early career researchers in recruiting community-based samples of older adults, their caregivers, and associated health providers. Methods Challenges and facilitators in recruiting two community-based qualitative research samples are identified and discussed in relation to the literature. Results Challenges included: identifying potential participants, engaging referral partners, implementing multi-methods, and achieving study sample diversity. Facilitators included: making connections in the community, building relationships, and drawing on existing networks. Conclusions Findings suggest the need for greater recognition of the importance of having clear frameworks and strategies to address recruitment prior to study commencement as well as the need to have clear outreach strategies to optimize inclusion of marginalized groups. Recommendations and a guide are provided to inform the development of recruitment approaches of early career researchers in health and social science research.

Staging the Folk: Choreographic Issues of National Representation

This article looks at the multiple ways that folk dance has been staged in both the nineteenth century when character or national (the two terms were used interchangeably) dance was widely used in classical ballet, and the twentieth in which Igor Moiseyev created a new genre of dance related to it. The ballet masters that created character dance for ballet often created ballroom dances based on folk origin, but that would be suitable for the urban population. This popularity of national dance was the result of the burgeoning of romantic nationalism that swept Europe after the French Revolution. Beginning in the 1930s with Igor Moiseyev founding the first professional ‘folk dance’ company for the Soviet Union, nation states across the world established large, state-supported folk dance companies for purposes of national and ethnic representation that dominated the stages of the world for the second half of the twentieth century. These staged versions of folk dance, were, I argue an extension of nineteenth century national/character dance because their founding directors, like Igor Moiseyev, came from the era when ballet dancers were trained in that genre.