Rice Bunnies vs. the River Crab: China’s Feminists, #MeToo, and Networked Authoritarianism

As censorship algorithms for digital communications evolve in China, so do netizens’ evasion techniques. In the last two decades, strategic users have employed the language of satire to slip sensitive content past censors in the form of euphemisms or analogies, with messages ranging from lighthearted frustration to wide scale resistance against repressive government policies. In recent years activists have used spoofs to discuss controversial subjects, including the president, violent arrests by the Domestic Security Department, and even the #MeToo movement. In addition to providing an outlet for criticism and free speech, spoofs can also be a powerful organizational tool for activists in authoritarian societies through their ability to facilitate decentralized, personalized, and flexible connective action. This paper investigates how feminists used spoofs for social mobilization throughout China’s #MeToo movement while evaluating potential frameworks for measuring activists’ success against the media censorship and political repression of a networked authoritarian regime.

Insurgent words: challenging the coloniality of language

This article explores language ideologies and sociolinguistic scales from the perspective of decolonization. Coloniality is a multi-scalar world system that affects micro-level interactions in multiple locales, both in the metropole and in the former colonies. Not only does coloniality exist on a world scale, resistance to it is scaled up too and engulfs the world. The linguistic tradition that I seek to trace in this article is imaginative, creative and oriented towards alternative decolonial futures. It speaks to the experience of the coloniality of language, of language as alienating and oppressive, and to the corresponding desire, and need, for a different language. It articulates a decolonial philosophy and brings art and politics together to change the world. I show that the global south was, and is, an intellectual-artistic-political vanguard, articulating and shaping discourses about language and revolutionary action. In philosophical, artistic and political practice – stretching from Martinique to Paris, from Cape Town to Kingston – language and revolutionary practice merge into one: language no longer just reflects reality, it can change it.

Flow Mechanism Characterization of Porous Oil-Containing Material Base on Micro-Scale Pore Modeling

The self-lubricating effect of the porous oil-containing cage is realized by storing and releasing lubricants through its internal micro-scale pore structure. The internal flow and heat transfer process in the micron-submicron pore structure is crucial to the self-lubricating mechanism of the porous oil-containing cage. To this end, a new modeling method of porous cage was proposed based on random seeds theory, and the local two-dimensional models of porous cage with different micro-scale pore structure were established. The multiphysics coupling simulation analysis of lubricating oil inside the porous cage with the effect of centrifugal force and thermal expansion was carried out based on the COMSOL Multiphysics platform. In order to characterize the micro-scale pore structure, new structural parameter indicators, such as relative surface perimeter, effective porosity, tortuosity and fluid properties related to the internal flow process, were all extracted from the above models. Combing with the Hagen–Poiseuille equation, a flow resistance model of oil flow inside the porous oil-containing cage was obtained. Finally, comparison of simulation results and analytical solutions of the micro-scale resistance model was carried out to verify the correctness of the micro-scale resistance model. The work provides a new direction for the study of the lubrication mechanism of the porous oil-containing cage.

Making space for resistance: the spatiality of popular protest in the late medieval Southern Low Countries

Using several cities in the late medieval Southern Low Countries as a case-study, this article deals with the relation between urban space and different forms of political protest. Urban commoners were aware of the powerful symbolism of certain places in the late medieval city and used that to their advantage during large-scale revolts. Yet the use of space was not limited to the dramatic occupations during these revolts. This article uncovers a wide range of strategies and tactics that common people used to act within given spaces to make their resistance possible. A spatial analysis of several instances of large- and smaller-scale resistance shows that space was intrinsically connected with how and when any form of resistance developed in late medieval cities. As such, the article aims to contribute to the literature on the importance of space in late medieval urban politics, in which attention to smaller-scale practices has been very limited.

Overburdened Gauls: the case of Florus and Sacrovir’s revolt of 21 CE

In 21 CE, a series of localized movements broke out in Gallia Comata due to heavy debts among provincials according to Tacitus. Modern scholars have long argued that the indebtedness occurred because of rising interest rates, resulting from dwindling currency in circulation after decades of free-spending following Augustus’ victory at Actium, and that Gallic communities were subjected to an additional tribute to support the wars of Germanicus (14–16 CE), which continued unabated after the wars and pushed Gauls beyond their means. These claims are misguided, however, in that there is no certain evidence of a special tax to support Germanicus’ wars and that the argument for a dwindling circulation of currency in Gaul falters under closer inspection. Rather, the pressing statal and military needs imposed on communities in Gallia Comata after 9 CE on top of routine exactions could significantly increase burden levels levied on provincial populations, thus contributing to rising debts. Through examining how Roman logistics and conscription operated in this period, it is possible to trace how populations were impacted by such demands and which communities were most heavily affected by them, too. Individually, the impact of each factor is unlikely to have been burdensome enough to have caused large-scale resistance, it is only the cumulative effect that these explanations had on top of routine Roman extraction schemes that could create the conditions for this revolt. This paper argues that in extraordinary circumstances, such as the period after the Varian Disaster for Gallia Comata, the costs of supporting military campaigns places real short-term strains on local economies, which creates the conditions for revolt. The benefit of this approach is that it may explain other episodes of anti-fiscal resistance that broke out during or within a decade of wars in neighboring regions.

Small-scale resistance seam welding of 304 stainless steel with capacitor discharge welding machine

In this paper, small scale resistance seam welding (SSRSEW) of 304 stainless steel sheet with a thickness of 0.1 mm with a capacitor discharge (CD) welding machine is investigated. The effect of the main parameters such as discharged energy, electrode force, and electrode speed on the quality of the weld seam was investigated. In order to control the speed of the electrode, the electrode wheel was mounted on a CNC machine. Mechanical tests such as tensile-shear and peel tests were used to evaluate the quality of the weld seam. Also, the failure modes were investigated in different welding conditions. The results show that the discharged energy has more effect on the weld seam strength and the maximum strength in the peel test is usually lower than the strength of the tensile-shear test. Also, discharge energy level of 14 ws and electrode force of 20 N and electrode speeds of 200 and 300 mm/min are the optimum welding condition for welding the 304 stainless steel sheets with a thickness of 0.1 mm.