Denigrating the local,glorifying the foreign: Malawian language policies in the era of African Renaissance

ABSTRACT

Malawi's Vision 2020 document, a national document that serves as a vehicle to project a future for a more developed, secure and democratically mature nation, laments the tendency of Malawians to denigrade local products and glorify all things foreign. Yet, paradoxically, the document does not address the important issue of promoting Malawi's indigenous languages. This silence can be interpreted as reflective of the population's inclination to ascribe greater value to foreign culture. In Malawi, as in many other African countries, indigenous languages are not considered worthy as media of education, subjects of advanced study or critical vehicles for national development. They are still victim to a discrimination rooted in Africa's 500 plus years of European enslavement and colonisation. Against the backdrop of the pursuit of an African Renaissance, this article looks at Malawi's language policies since independence in 1964, and at how, ten years short of an idyllic national vision, Malawi measures up on the important issue of language.     

The language that unites and the language that divides us: Why was Arabic kept and Serbo-Croatian abolished?

This article explores why the Arabs chose to keep a common language, while the Serbs, Croats, Bosniaks and Montenegrins chose not to. The study argues that the main reason for this can be found in the ideological constrains resulting out of the salience and interaction between different religious and ethnic group building projects in former Yugoslavia and the Arab states. Political elites in both regions favored the ethnic and religious category to different extents. Language planning reflected and implemented the respective ideological imperatives resulting out of these processes. This led to different approaches in defining the common language and its subsequent standardization.     

Testing for linguistic injustice: territoriality and pluralism

This article develops a linguistic injustice test. Language policy measures passing the test conflict with the normative ideal of equal language recognition. The first part of the test checks for external restrictions – language policies that grant more recognition to one language group than to another. The second part of the test checks for internal restrictions – language policies that grant more recognition to some members of a language group than to other members of the same group. The article then applies the linguistic injustice test to two models of linguistic justice: linguistic territoriality and linguistic pluralism. It is argued that real-life cases of linguistic territoriality tend to pass the test. It is argued that instantiations of linguistic pluralism tend to fail the test.     

Open-source intelligence and privacy by design

As demonstrated by other papers on this issue, open-source intelligence (OSINT) by state authorities poses challenges for privacy protection and intellectual-property enforcement. A possible strategy to address these challenges is to adapt the design of OSINT tools to embed normative requirements, in particular legal requirements. The experience of the VIRTUOSO platform will be used to illustrate this strategy. Ideally, the technical development process of OSINT tools is combined with legal and ethical safeguards in such a way that the resulting products have a legally compliant design, are acceptable within society (social embedding), and at the same time meet in a sufficiently flexible way the varying requirements of different end-user groups. This paper uses the analytic framework of privacy design strategies (minimise, separate, aggregate, hide, inform, control, enforce, and demonstrate), arguing that two approaches for embedding legal compliance seem promising to explore in particular. One approach is the concept of revocable privacy with spread responsibility. The other approach uses a policy mark-up language to define Enterprise Privacy Policies, which determine appropriate data handling.     

Capturing ethnicity: the case of Ukraine

Abstract

Building on past survey-based studies of ethnic identity, we employ the case of Ukraine to demonstrate the importance of taking seriously the multidimensionality of ethnicity, even in a country that is regarded as deeply divided. Drawing on relational theory, we identify four dimensions of ethnicity that are each important in distinctive ways in Ukraine: individual language preference, language embeddedness, ethnolinguistic identity, and nationality. Using original survey data collected in May 2014, we show that the choice of one over the other can be highly consequential for the conclusions one draws about ethnicity’s role in shaping attitudes (e.g. to NATO membership), actions (e.g. participation in the Euromaidan protests), and the anticipation of outgroups’ behavior (e.g. expectations of a Russian invasion). Moreover, we call attention to the importance of including the right control variables for precisely interpreting any posited effects of ethnicity, making specific recommendations for future survey research on ethnic identity in Ukraine.     

性别角色刻板印象与女性发展的民族学研究

性别角色是民族心理研究中的重要内容,它总是带有明显的社会、文化、民族等的印记。本文就性别角色作了民族学与心理学的分析,本文就性别角色作了民族学与心理学的分析,尤其是对性别角色获得的文化与民族因素、对性别角色刻板印象作以剖析,以期对民族性别角色获得及克服性别刻板印象进行分析研究。     

贵州苗族芦笙文化初探

芦笙文化是苗族世代沿袭下来的一种具有典型意义的古老文化.在贵州苗族地区的社会生活中,芦笙是一种多功能的文化复合体.在祭祀活动中,它是祭器也是法师;在社会教育中,它是件具有语义性的教化工具,在文化生活中,是一件不可或缺的乐器,它以历史赋予的特殊身份和多种功能,作用于苗族社会生活中的各个领域,并为当今贵州苗族地区的文化、旅游服务.     

Walk and Die: An Unusual Presentation of Head Injury

Abstract:  We report three deaths in young adult males following closed blunt trauma to the head and face where the affected individuals were able to walk away from the incident, before subsequently collapsing and dying a short distance from the site of the assault. In each case, due to the rapidity of the posttrauma collapse, the pathologist was faced with a diagnostic difficulty at autopsy; the external examination revealed multiple injuries to the head and face, but internal examinations showed limited findings with no structural explanation for the death. We discuss possible mechanisms that could account for this scenario, the implications of alcohol consumption with a concussive head injury, and parallels that can be drawn with the so-called "talk and die,""talk and deteriorate," and "second impact syndrome." Finally, the possible role of so-called "postexercise peril" is discussed in relation to these deaths.     

占有改定与善意取得 兼论民法规范漏洞的填补

占有改定和善意取得的关系,考验着法律人的抽象思维能力和具体情形中符合事理的判断力,需要运用成文法解释模式进行法律论证。在物权法的意义脉络中,立法文本所表述的交付概念从未涵括占有改定。作为法律拟制产物的占有改定,其物权变动效果不等同于现实交付,与善意取得之间具有不相容性。占有改定的物权合意只能在传来取得的情形中产生效力,在善意取得的情形中则不生效力。为填补规范漏洞,物权法第106条所言交付应作目的论限缩解释,以免法律激励出坏的交易风险,有悖于此条款追求交易安全的价值取向。     

遗失物的善意取得——试析《物权法》第107条的规定

《物权法》第107条是关于遗失物的善意取得的规定。仔细研读这一条款,就会发现它有几个问题需要分析:遗失物是否适用善意取得?第107条规定的原权利人的返还请求权的性质,以及如何理解原权利人的有偿回复义务?第107条属于善意取得制度的特别规定,原权利人的返还请求权兼具有形成权和请求权效力。在有偿回复的情形,原权利人现实提出对价支付是原权利人返还请求权发生效力的条件。