Use of a Y chromosome probe as an aid in the forensic proof of sexual assault

Currently, the most common procedures for the forensic identification of semen that may be present due to a sexual assault include the microscopic identification of spermatozoa, acid phosphatase activity, or the detection of PSA. However, not all cases of sexual assault result in the deposit of semen. Fluorescent In Situ Hybridization (FISH) has been found to be a very sensitive and specific method for detection of the Y chromosome from male cells. This study was undertaken to demonstrate the presence of epithelial cells of male origin in the postcoital vaginal tract using a commercially available probe. Results identified Y chromosome in intact epithelial cells on postcoital Days 1 through 4, and on Day 7. Additionally, Y chromosome positive epithelial cells were identified in vaginal swabs obtained following intercourse with no ejaculation. The method developed in this study demonstrates that FISH is a sensitive method for the identification of the presence of male epithelial cells in the postcoital vagina.     

Regulating Volunteering: Lessons from the Bingo Halls

This article uses charitable bingo to explore the sociolegal regulation of volunteers. Using case studies of two provincial bingo revitalization initiatives in Canada, I explore how charities and government officials manage the tension between regulating and incentivizing volunteers. I show that bingo revitalization plans in Alberta and Ontario increased surveillance of nonregularized workers and failed to protect charity service users from unpaid labor requirements. Moreover, revitalization initiatives reframe the volunteer role to focus on customer service and explaining how charities benefit the community. The potential for bingo volunteering to promote spaces of mutual aid with players will thus likely decline. I suggest that the allied power of charity and state over unpaid workers is increasing, giving charities better‐protected interests in volunteer labor and changing the tasks that volunteers do. The need for more research exploring the interests of volunteers as regulatory stakeholders in their own right is thus pressing.     

Experiential and empathetic engagements with global poverty: ‘Live below the line so that others can rise above it’

In recent years events that physically challenge Northern publics have emerged as a new form of engagement with global poverty. In this article we examine the ‘Live Below the Line’ (LBTL) campaign, which asks participants to live on a small amount of money equivalent to the international poverty line for five days, as an example of experiential exercises that complement physical challenges with the simulation of some aspect of poor people’s lives. Drawing on interviews with participants in the 2013 New Zealand campaign, we argue that LBTL creates a limited understanding of poverty focused on poor food consumption caused by low income. While participants were able to have a more embodied and empathetic engagement with poverty, they projected their own physical and emotional sensations onto imagined poor others. As a result, stereotypes about those living in poverty were reinforced rather than challenged.     

A Conversation About Q. D. Leavis

Mary Ellen Mark's photographic collection Twins (2003) raises provocative questions about performance, contingency and the relativity of difference, self and other. Her images complicate notions of individuality and foundational difference and challenge both self-recognition and recognition by others. They require viewers to observe closely, to spend time studying her subjects and to address the relativity—sometimes the radical relativity—of difference but also of sameness. Difficult questions about where ‘you’ end and ‘I’ begin are raised. Though Twins contains images of fraternal twins and triplets, Mark's subjects are, overwhelmingly, identical twins. She usually photographs them standing together, dressed in precisely the same way, in carefully constructed poses. This recreates the carnivalesque, performative aspect of Twins Day, held each year in Twinsburg, Ohio, in which the fact of being a twin (or in some cases triplet) is affirmed. Some identical twins choose to represent themselves as twins rather than solely as individuals, or as siblings who are also twins, in order to test out the limits of individuality. Here, I consider the ways in which such a chosen celebratory representation challenges different ways in which identical twins have been conceived of, which emphasise instead alterity and uncanniness.     

Interrogating the Political Economy of Age

This article considers the argument by Tim Vlandas, in this issue, that an ageing electorate may undermine democracies’ ability to make the right economic choices. Vlandas suggests that the emergence of gerontocratic politics may give rise to ‘gerontonomia’: an economy run for the old, at the expense of younger generations and of future prosperity. However, evidence from the UK suggests a more mixed picture. Age-based voting patterns have been consequential around single issues, not least the 2016 Brexit referendum. However, voters’ interests in broad economic policy models are not easily reducible to age dynamics, and intergenerational politics are filtered through a set of normative and affective considerations beyond straightforward self-interest. Moreover, since the rational interests of different age groups do not speak for themselves, cueing by political elites is potentially significant and may be contributing to older voters’ relative tolerance of a poor economic record.