Remote Practice Methods of Survey Education for HBIM in the Post-Pandemic Era: Case Study of Kuiwen Pavilion in the Temple of Confucius (Qufu, China)

The Field Trip for Measured Survey of Built Heritage carried out by Tianjin University every summer aims to educate students in each practice session, i.e., on-site data acquisition, condition investigation, classification of the component library, taking observation notes, and accomplishing HBIM deliverables. Under the risks posed by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the students could not leave the campus as a provisional arrangement. Only a team of five people was allowed to visit the Kuiwen Pavilion in the Temple of Confucius (Qufu, China). Therefore, the field trip for students had to be replaced with remote solutions, which consists of the following methods: on-site data acquisition; post-processing; online education, observation, modeling, delivery. Kuiwen Pavilion in the Temple of Confucius is a library with the official architectural style of the Ming and Qing Dynasties (14th to 20th century), for which building regulations are commonly recognized, and are suitable for survey education. In this context, this article focuses on the remote practice methods applied and tested throughout the case study. During the practice of the course, students who managed to finish the course, through the virtual tours and other online methods, finally achieved delivery of the HBIM models.

The 4.2 ka Event and the End of the Maltese “Temple Period”

The small size and relatively challenging environmental conditions of the semi-isolated Maltese archipelago mean that the area offers an important case study of societal change and human-environment interactions. Following an initial phase of Neolithic settlement, the “Temple Period” in Malta began ∼5.8 thousand years ago (ka), and came to a seemingly abrupt end ∼4.3 ka, and was followed by Bronze Age societies with radically different material culture. Various ideas concerning the reasons for the end of the Temple Period have been expressed. These range from climate change, to invasion, to social conflict resulting from the development of a powerful “priesthood.” Here, we explore the idea that the end of the Temple Period relates to the 4.2 ka event. The 4.2 ka event has been linked with several examples of significant societal change around the Mediterranean, such as the end of the Old Kingdom in Egypt, yet its character and relevance have been debated. The Maltese example offers a fascinating case study for understanding issues such as chronological uncertainty, disentangling cause and effect when several different processes are involved, and the role of abrupt environmental change in impacting human societies. Ultimately, it is suggested that the 4.2 ka event may have played a role in the end of the Temple Period, but that other factors seemingly played a large, and possibly predominant, role. As well as our chronological modelling indicating the decline of Temple Period society in the centuries before the 4.2 ka event, we highlight the possible significance of other factors such as a plague epidemic.

Fissures in EU Citizenship

This book argues that core concepts in EU citizenship law are riddled with latent fissures traceable back to the earliest case law on free movement of persons, and that later developments simply compounded such defects. By looking at these defects, not only could Brexit have been predicted, but it could also have been foreseen that unchecked problems with EU citizenship would potentially lead to its eventual dismantling during an era of widespread populism and considerable challenges to further integration. Using a critical constructivist approach, the author painstakingly outlines the 'temple' of citizenship from its foundations upwards, and offers a deconstruction of concepts such as 'worker', the role of non-economic actors, the principle of equal treatment, and utterances of citizenship. In identifying inherent fissures in the concept of solidarity and post national identification, this book poses critical questions and argues that we need to reconstruct EU citizenship from the bottom up.

Regressive Religious Practices; A Threat to the Fundamental Rights of Women

The paper aims to provide an insight into the famous and revolutionary Sabarimala Judgement - Indian Young Lawyers Association and Ors. v. The State of Kerala and Ors.2 The paper throws light on the background of the case and closely analyses the judgement so pronounced and its consequences. Since the practices of the temple were seen as exclusionary in nature, the implications of a judgement so grave have serious consequences on the immediate category of people directly affected and the society at large. The primary issues addressed in the case; whether or not the said practice is discriminatory and so a violation of Article 17, and whether or not the practice violates the right to equality by lacking an intelligible differential and a reasonable nexus (pertaining to Article 14) have been further deconstructed to paint a better understanding of the interpretation of the Constitution of India.Furthermore, an attempt has been made to establish the judiciary’s primary objective, whether it is to strike a balance between the conflict of liberty, equality, public interest and affected groups of people has been fulfilled in this judgement or not. The main task of the judgement was to figure out whether the exclusionary practice is essential for the religion so as to deem it to be violative of the fundamental right to religion, as granted to the citizens of the country by the Constitution. One of the striking features of this judgement is the dissenting opinion of Justice Indu Malhotra, who, reasoning through constitutional morality: the harmonisation of fundamental rights of every individual citizen, religious denomination to practise their faith in accordance with the tenets of their religion irrespective of it being rational or logical has concluded that the practice is neither exclusionary, nor discriminatory in nature. The paper delves into this dissenting opinion, and proposes a possible approach to balancing public interests and rights of the affected categories.

Understanding the use of Challakere grasslands by the local communities and their livestocks

Challakere grasslands have been in news since the allotment of Amruth Mahal Kavals to the prestigious institutions like the BARC, DRDO, ISRO and IISC in 2008. There was lot of anger and demonstration being held from Challakere to the national capital New Delhi. The supreme court formed a Central Inquiry Committee and heard the queries of both the contestant parties. Finally there is access to only few things in the allocated kavals like the temple, drinking water and few important roads. The lifestyle of the people who are staying around these kavals have changed since last ten years. The people who always grew some crops during the rainy season and then grazed their livestock in the vast kavals have lost hopes on both, thanks to the diminished rains and shrinking of kaval. The livestock number is fast decreasing due to the scarcity of fodder which is shown both in secondary data and also from the socio-economic survey we conducted. Wildlife has dwindled with number and the imbalance in predator- prey population may pose a threat to the future remaining agricultural lands.