Revisiting Auburn Avenue: The Construction of an Afrofuturist Counterpublic Space

The black counterpublic, as a space where black people could exercise their discursive contestation and participatory deliberation, has too often served to produce a counter-discourse aiming at defying white hegemonic mode of rule and racialized categorization of members of society. In the same vein, Afrofuturism, as a burgeoning cultural movement in the United States, employs the Afrodiasporic experience as a backdrop against which to contest the white-narrated version of black history and to project a better future for people of African descent. Merging the underlying philosophies of the black counterpublic and Afrofuturism, this paper seeks to advance the notion of the Afrofuturist counterpublic as a more embedded concept that tends to address the past and future of the black experience in a more explicit and overt form. Drawing mainly on Inwood’s representation of the redevelopment project along Auburn Avenue in Atlanta, GA, as a contemporary form of the counterpublic, this article adds to his insights by suggesting that Auburn Avenue as a rehabilitated space is deeply informed by the undergirding tenets of the counterpublic and Afrofuturist theories so as to exalt it to a symbol of an Afrofuturist counterpublic.

Failing to Perform Citizenship: Daily Narratives About Stockholm’s ‘vulnerable EU citizens’

The question of mobile Roma beggars in Europe has been analysed in terms of securitization, racialization, and deportability. These people have been hailed as ‘abject’ or ‘failed’ citizens, the problem of race being made largely invisible. In the Swedish context, the category of race does not emerge in overt form, and Swedes generally imagine themselves to be an egalitarian and just society. However, in Stockholm, in 2015, the unprecedented visibility of rough sleeping EU-migrants turned daily chance meetings tasks into ‘ethical encounters’. Using the concept of enacting citizenship and the Narrative Policy Framework, this article analyses day-to-day narratives about ‘vulnerable EU citizens’ constructed by the media and experts in the winter of 2015 in Stockholm. Most press narratives would silence the voices of migrants, framing them as passive victims, their problem being defined in terms of extreme temperature, thus making cold weather the principle villain. With regard to acts of citizenship, the paper analyses expert opinions on the migrants’ performance. Their stories and discourse reveal the image of a ‘vulnerable EU citizen’: one of a passive, begging, distressingly visible individual who is failing to perform citizenship. This shortcoming is regarded here as contributing to the justification of a wider policy framework in which the migrants’ claims are seen as unfounded and undeserved, while their attitude is viewed as unappreciative, although they would allegedly not be racialized as a group.

Conscientious Objectors

This chapter explores the interconnections between psychiatric medicalization and the dissent of German soldiers during World War I, and it explains how these men took an explicit and decisive stand against the war by refusing to serve. It discusses the psychiatric observation that determines what illness lay at the heart of the soldiers' allegedly incomprehensible refusal to defend Germany. It also identifies the conscientious objectors during World War I who faced examination by doctors who sometimes dismissed them as mentally ill or incompetent. The chapter describes psychiatrists that expressed cognizance of the limits of their own diagnostic abilities in comparison to the wartime medical community. It reviews the medicalization of conscientious objection, which is considered as the most overt form of dissent that appealed to many of the objectors because of the greater room for maneuver against criminalization.

What’s Wrong with (Some) Human Rights Lawyers?

This chapter turns from judges to human rights lawyers, whose role as advocates gives rise either to different problems or to the same ones in more overt form. It focuses on writings intended for the general public by Shami Chakrabarti, Conor Gearty, and Anthony Lester. All three are publicly prominent British lawyers, whose views echo and amplify those reported in previous chapters from judges in Strasbourg and Ottawa, and from Human Rights Watch in New York. The chapter argues that their advocacy for the rights of individuals is vitiated by habitual cynicism toward government, and a constantly deaf ear to its genuine concerns. Since it cannot persuade sceptics, this is poor advocacy. Moreover, since it is widely acknowledged in principle that few rights are absolute and unconditional, it follows that there are circumstances when it would be proportionate for rights to be limited or suspended, or not to be extended. Therefore, human rights lawyers should be more willing than are these three to think about what those circumstances would be, and to recognise them when they obtain, instead of treating every concession to circumstance as if it were a grubby betrayal of principle. A defence of rights that fully accepted that imperfect compromise can really be inevitable, and that acknowledged that sometimes the claims of the social good really do justify exposing individuals to greater risk, would be a more honest defence, and much the stronger for it.

Early identification of hepatic encephalopathy improves outcomes

Early identification and prompt treatment of hepatic encephalopathy can help reduce its progression into its overt form. As the initial signs and symptoms of this complication can be extremely subtle, diagnosis can be difficult, particularly for non-specialists. This article describes how the use of simple and widely available tests can help facilitate this

Reactions to Witnessing Ethnic Microaggressions: An Experimental Study

Introduction: Minimal research has examined how witnesses identify and respond to ethnic microaggressions including the role of colorblind racial attitudes. Method: University student participants (N = 401) were randomly assigned to one of three experimental conditions in which they witnessed a research decoy experiencing an ethnic microaggression, an overt discriminatory interaction, or a neutral interaction (control). Results: The study findings showed that 46% of participants who witnessed an ethnic microaggression identified it as unfair or differential treatment compared to 84% of those who observed an overt form of discrimination. Multilevel model analyses revealed a 3-way interaction (time × experimental condition × colorblind racial attitudes) such that participants with low colorblind racial attitudes had significant increases in negative affect and systolic blood pressure after witnessing overt discrimination. Discussion: Key differences exist in the identification and responses associated with witnessing an ethnic microaggression compared to overt discrimination. Findings suggest that shifting colorblind racial attitudes may be a promising area of intervention to improve detection of ethnic microaggressions.

The War in Afghanistan (1979–1986)

This chapter analyzes the end of the Cold War and external involvement in Afghanistan. On the Soviet side, the December 1979 invasion was preceded by six months of covert involvement in counterinsurgency military operations. The chapter reviews evidence on the motives for covertness and the detection of it by American leaders. It then assesses covertness in the American weapons supply program after the overt Soviet invasion. Escalation fears—in particular, fear of provoking Soviet retaliation against Pakistan and a larger regional war—led to consistent efforts to keep the expanding U.S. aid program covert from 1979 to 1985. By the mid-1980s, however, American leaders embraced a more aggressive strategy and identified key changes that largely eliminated the risk of escalation, leading them to approve an overt form of weaponry (the Stinger missile system). The chapter also reviews covert Soviet cross-border operations into Pakistan and U.S. inferences from its detection of these activities.

Effect of Subclinical and Overt Form of Rat Maternal Hypothyroidism on Offspring Endochondral Bone Formation

Maternal hypothyroidism in its overt form affects skeletal development of the offspring, but these data are not available for the subclinical form which is becoming very frequent among pregnant women. We hypothesized that the subclinical form of hypothyroidism in rat dams, infl uences the process of offspring endochondral ossifi cation affecting proliferation and differentiation of chondrocytes, osteoclasts and osteoblasts in pups. Seven-day-old male pups (n=18) derived from control dams and dams treated with a low dose (1.5 mg/L) or high dose (150 mg/L) of propylthiouracil in drinking water during pregnancy and lactation were used. Histomorphometric analysis of pups’ tibia proximal growth plate, expression of mRNA, immunohistochemical and histochemical visualization of extracellular matrix components was performed. The length of the tibia was reduced in hypothyroid pups. Secretion of type 2 and 10 collagens in the subclinical and overt form were lower while the amount of glycosaminoglycans was higher when compared with controls. Down-regulated tartrate resistant acid phosphatase mRNA indicated altered osteoclasts function while lower expression of dentin matrix acid protein-1 mRNA and reduced synthesis of type 1 collagen accentuated a compromised bone formation in the overt form of hypothyroidism. The subclinical form of maternal hypothyroidism had a negative effect on the differentiation of hypertrophic chondrocytes and calcifi ed cartilage removal in 7-day-old pups. In addition, overt hypothyroidism had a negative effect on the proliferation of chondrocytes and deposition of osteoid. Both forms of hypothyroidism resulted in a decrease of tibia length due to changes in growth plate formation.

Third person pronoun forms in Estonian in the light of centering theory

This paper explains the distinctions between the Estonian 3rd person overt pronoun and the zero person marker in spoken narratives. As both forms express the most salient entities in discourse, the saliency criterion cannot distinguish them. The Centering Theory is used to explore if the overt pronoun and zero have different effects on discourse coherence, i.e. whether there is a difference between transition types relating to zero and those signaling the overt pronoun. Additionally, factors such as grammatical role, case and clause type affecting the choice of pronominal forms are studied to supplement results from the Centering analysis. It is hypothesized that the use of the zero form connects to the CONTINUE transition, while the overt pronoun combines with other Centering- based transition types as well. Furthermore, results show that the zero form is more restricted in its usage contexts and signals mainly nominative subjects in main clauses, while the overt form can appear more widely in different linguistic environments.