Media and the politics of belonging: Sudanese Australians,letters to the editor and the new integrationism

Nolan, Burgin, Farquharson and Marjoribanks focus on media as a significant site through which a politics of belonging is played out, focusing particularly on coverage of Sudanese Australians. To this end, they analyse letters to the editor that concern Sudanese Australians in three Victorian newspapers in 2007, a highly significant year in which this group became the focus of significant levels of (predominantly negative) media coverage. Through textual and thematic analysis, the authors demonstrate how such letters worked to reiterate and extend a politics of ‘integrationism’ that, without entirely departing from Australia's commitment to multiculturalism, has rearticulated the latter along neo-assimilationist lines. In doing so, they show how, in many letters, Sudanese Australians are problematized for their failure or refusal to ‘integrate’ in ways that involve an explicit or implicit process of racialization. In the process, the article also critically considers the important role performed by media in the politics of belonging, particularly through their reiteration and contestation of the politics of race and multiculturalism in Australia. Rather than simply a matter of reproducing a hegemonic politics, it shows how such processes, despite the marked limitations of their framing within a ‘race debate’, also serve to demonstrate significant fault lines in the politics of belonging.     

Persistence of cellular material after exposure to water

Disposing of items of forensic relevance in bodies of water is one countermeasure offenders can use to avoid detection. The impact of immersion in water has been explored for blood, saliva, and semen; however, few studies have assessed touch DNA. Here we report on the effect of exposure to water on the persistence of touch DNA over prolonged periods of time. To evaluate the persistence of cells from touch DNA, after water exposure, three substrates and two water types were tested: plastic, metal, and ceramic, submerged into seawater or tap water. Diamond™ Nucleic Acid Dye was used to stain cells deposited by touch. Cell counts before and after water exposure were compared to investigate cell loss over time, ranging from 6 hours to 5 days. A logarithmic increase in the percent of cells lost was observed over time when the data for substrate and water type conditions were combined. Substrate type influenced the persistence of cells, with the metal substrate retaining cells longer than plastic or ceramic. The influence of water type appeared dependent on the substrate, with varied cell persistence on metal whereas plastic and ceramic recorded similar cell loss over time between water types. The ability to visualize cells after exposure to water could assist in triaging evidence within operational forensic laboratories and allow for targeted sampling. This proof-of-concept study demonstrated that greater than 50% of cells can persist on various items submerged in aqueous environments for at least 5 days, highlighting the possibility for downstream DNA testing.     

A Primary Cause of Partisanship? Nomination Systems and Legislator Ideology

Many theoretical and empirical accounts of representation argue that primary elections are a polarizing influence. Likewise, many reformers advocate opening party nominations to nonmembers as a way of increasing the number of moderate elected officials. Data and measurement constraints, however, have limited the range of empirical tests of this argument. We marry a unique new data set of state legislator ideal points to a detailed accounting of primary systems in the United States to gauge the effect of primary systems on polarization. We find that the openness of a primary election has little, if any, effect on the extremism of the politicians it produces.     

Spatial Patterns of Robbery at Tourism Sites: A Case Study of the Vieux Carré in New Orleans

This paper looks at the connection between spatial patterns of robbery within the framework of routine activities theory. This theoretical perspective sees robbery (and other crimes) as occurring when three factors converge: suitable targets, motivated offenders and guardianship. The Eighth and part of the First Police Districts of New Orleans become target rich environments during periods of time when large numbers of tourists and conventioneers are in the city. The city certainly has the neighborhoods of highly concentrated poverty and disorganization that tend to be criminogenic and produce motivated offenders. The spatial distribution of robbery is hypothesized to be a function of the presence or absence of guardianship. In order to test this hypothesis two types of data are examined: robberies (simple, armed, both successful and attempted) that occurred during the convention and tourism season and patterns of deployment and patrol in these areas. Preliminary results indicate that simple tourist/conventioneer robbery victimizations tend to be concentrated within tourist attraction areas while aggravated tourist/conventioneer robbery is concentrated in places that are primarily residential and where there are no attractions and no concentrated police presence. This is also an area of ingress and egress for people from perimeter neighborhoods of highly concentrated poverty and disorganization.     

Too Many People and Too Few Livestock in West Africa? An Evaluation of Sandford's Thesis

We examine whether Stephen Sandford's (2006 Sandford, S. 2006b. “Too many people, too few livestock: the crisis affecting pastoralists in the Greater Horn of Africa”. Accessed at: http://www.future-agricultures.org/pdf%20files/Sandford_thesis.pdf [Google Scholar]b) ‘too many people, too few livestock’ thesis for the Greater Horn of Africa applies to West Africa. In a comparative study of seven pastoral systems across West Africa we found that pastoralists have generally successfully adapted to pressures on grazing resources. We describe three adaptive strategies: 1) integration and intensification in the Sudanian zone; 2) movement to the Sub-Humid zone; and 3) extensification in the Sahelian zone. We end by proposing four interrelated factors that account for the differences in pastoral systems between West Africa and the Greater Horn of Africa.     

The Chinese peasant economy: Paradigm and myth

The Chinese Peasant Economy: Agricultural Development in Hopei and Shantung. 1890–1914. By Ramon H. Myers. Harvard: Harvard University Press and London: Oxford University Press, 1971. Pp. xix, 394. Index. £6.75.     

Forces Required for a Knife to Penetrate a Variety of Clothing Types

In stabbing incidents, it is usual for the victim to be clothed and therefore a knife penetrates both clothes and skin. Clothes (other than leather) have been thought to make little difference to the penetration force. However, there is little quantitative data in the literature. In this study, a range of clothes have been tested, either singly or in layers of, for example, T‐shirt and shirt, to quantify the additional force required when clothes are present. A materials testing system has been used to test the penetration force required to stab through clothes into a foam–silicone rubber skin simulant. The results show that the force required can be significantly different, particularly when layers of clothing are penetrated. A cotton t‐shirt adds c. 8 N to the penetration force, while a T‐shirt and jacket can add an additional 21 N. The results allow a more quantitative assessment of forces required in stabbing.     

Negligence and Human Rights Law: The Case for Separate Development

A number of judges and academics have argued in favour of the convergence of negligence law with human rights law. By contrast, the thesis of this article is that the two legal orders should develop independently, so that for the most part the law of negligence ought not to be affected by human rights considerations. It is argued that the case for convergence is based on two false assumptions, namely that human rights law and negligence law perform similar functions within our legal order and that the norms of human rights law are more fundamental than the norms encapsulated in negligence law. It is also argued that convergence would undermine the coherence of negligence law. Ultimately, the case for separate development rests on the desirability of recognising public law and private law as autonomous normative systems with their own distinctive rationales, concepts and core principles.     

The recovery of illicit drugs from oral fluid sampling devices

Testing for drugs in oral fluid is a convenient procedure for determining recent drug use. A number of issues are still to be resolved and this paper investigates the effects of storage systems on drug stability and recovery using three different collection devices supplied by Cozart, Immunalysis and Microgenics (third party). Drugs were analysed using a range of immunoassay systems followed by MS confirmation and quantitation. The reproducibility of the weight of specimen collected was excellent (CV<10%) for the three collection devices tested. Of the three systems studied, only the Cozart product gave acceptable recovery of THC from drug-spiked oral fluid. A combination of Cozart, Immunalysis and Diagnostix immunoassays with the Cozart collection system gave the most sensitive and discriminating screening assays for the drugs studied, namely THC, benzodiazepines, methamphetamine and morphine. Storage at either 5 degrees C or room temperature had no significant effect on drug recoveries.