“Trying to be positive in the face of the storm”: The experiences of independent college students during the COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic created multiple stressors for college students, particularly for young adults experiencing multiple forms of disadvantage. Little is known about the pandemic experiences of independent college students, many of whom are emancipated minors, former wards of the state, and other students who lack familial financial and practical support as they pursue higher education. Twenty-three independent students, ages 18–23, from one northeastern university were interviewed to understand how independent students were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and their needs for support from the university during this time. Most participants were identified as Black or Latinx, and two thirds were first-generation college students. Participants reported an overall lack of support from their families prior to the pandemic. During the pandemic, they experienced compounding academic, economic, and mental health-related stressors. Students responded to these stressors in resilient and resourceful ways, by adapting to their new realities, expressing gratitude, and finding opportunities for self-growth. Participants recommend that institutions of higher education support independent students during periods of emergency through providing financial assistance, offering opportunities for connection with both adults and peers, and demonstrating administrative flexibility and understanding of their unique needs.     

Child well-being in the context of family harmony: Parental marital relationship as mediator and parent–child attachment style as moderator

Extant research in Western countries have indicated that children's well-being may be influenced by children's own resilience, parent–child attachment, and parental marital relationship. Yet, there is very little research in Malaysia on how these factors may influence well-being among children in middle childhood. The aim of this study, therefore, was to explore the relationships among children's self-efficacy—a resilience factor—and well-being, parental marital relationship, and parent–child attachment style. The study used a quantitative, cross-sectional survey method. Participants were 955 Malay-Malaysian children aged 11 years from intact families. They responded to a questionnaire on demographic background, self-efficacy, well-being, parental harmony and conflict, and parent–child attachment style. Moderated mediation analysis indicated that (i) parental harmony was a significant mediator for the relationship between children's self-efficacy and well-being; (ii) parental conflict was not a significant mediator for the relationship between children's self-efficacy and well-being; and (iii) parent–child attachment style was a significant moderator for the relationship between children's self-efficacy and well-being. These findings are discussed within the frameworks of optimal child development and family relationship. These findings may also inform policies such as Malaysia's Sustainable Development Goal 3 (SDG 3) and National Family Policy.     

Professors and Students in China during World WarⅡ:The Political Involvement of Intellectuals during and after the War

There were in the past two main approaches to discussion of the political orientation of the intellectual community and its relations with student unrest in the Republican period, especially on the upsurge of the student movement during the civil war between the Guomindang and the Communist Party of China (CPC) (1945-1949). One was to attribute this to the leadership of the CPC, seeing it as the "second front" opened up by the CPC when the two parties were at war. The other approach was straightforward discussion of how intellectual circles promoted democracy, struggled against autocracy and gradually became estranged from the     

The impact of a respite volunteer ‘buddy’ programme on behavioural and psychological well-being in young carers

Young carers often face a great amount of emotional burden and have high practical and social responsibilities. The role of being a young carer is associated with behavioural, developmental, physical and psychosocial problems that may not only affect the individual in childhood but also in adulthood. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of a Danish respite volunteer programme called The Buddies for Children and Youngsters Programme on young carers' (n = 49; aged 6–16) social–emotional functioning. A pre–post-design was applied, and data were collected through the parent version of the strengths and difficulties questionnaire (SDQ), here with an impact supplement at baseline and at the end of the programme (after 4 months). The programme showed a positive impact on emotional symptoms, hyperactivity symptoms, conduct problems, peer problems, prosocial aspects and impact aspects, with mean differences values of −2.50 (p = .000), −0.62 (p = .271), −1.18 (p = .000), −0.74 (p = .008), 0.62 (p = .004) and −0.88 (p = .007), respectively. Furthermore, a large effect was found for the total difficulties score: −5.03 (p = .000). In conclusion, the programme seems promising considering its effect on young carers' social–emotional functioning. However, future research should include comparative studies with a longer duration.     

Collective Ownership Lost in the Public Ownership System and Its Reassertion:The Case of the Ownership of Rocks on the Riverbed

The inhabitants of mountainous regions make use of mountain and water resources to develop tourism and attract tourists from the cities. Some greedy people steal large quantities of strange-shaped rocks from the riverbeds and mountains, leaving devastation     

The role of Spain and the Spanish in the creation of Europe's transnational democratic political culture, 1840–70

During the mid-nineteenth century European radicals developed contacts, relationships and networks. They organized activities and plans and propagated discourses and projects that transcended national borders. This article explores this transnational dimension of European democracy by analysing the case of Spain from around 1840, when the first Spanish self-proclaimed democrats began to organize, to the 1870s, when a certain national withdrawal took place among European democratic activists. It examines the journeys and contacts made by Spanish democrats as well as the extensive coverage of leading European activists that was published in Spanish newspapers, and considers how these connections were perceived by Spanish democratic activists. It is argued that contacts and networks contributed to configure a European democratic transnational political culture characterized by interrelations, exchanges and processes of cross-fertilization, through which the feeling of belonging to a national democratic community co-existed with a strong link to a wider European democratic family. The speeches, manifestos and projects of activists of various origins affected and greatly influenced each other, as well as shaping their socio-political views and strategic options.     

“Wearing a Mask Won't Protect Us from Our History”: The Impact of COVID-19 on Black Children and Families

The data on COVID-19 show an irrefutable and disturbing pattern: Black Americans are contracting and dying from COVID-19 at rates that far exceed other racial and ethnic groups. Due to historical and current iterations of racism, Black Americans have been forced into conditions that elevate their risk for COVID-19 and consequently place Black children at the epicenter of loss across multiple domains of life. The current paper highlights the impact of the pandemic on Black children at the individual, family, and school levels. Based on an understanding of the influence of structural racism on COVID-19 disparities, policy recommendations are provided that focus on equitable access to quality education, home ownership, and employment to fully address the needs of Black children and families during and after the pandemic. Research, practice, and policy recommendations are made to journal editors, funding agencies, grant review panels, and researchers regarding how research on COVID-19 should be framed to inform intervention efforts aimed at improving the situation of Black children and families.     

The social composition of plaintiffs and defendants in the Peacemaker court,Leiden, 1750–54

This article assesses the social positions of the plaintiffs and defendants who appeared before a small claims court, namely the Peacemaker court (Vredemakers) of the city of Leiden in the Dutch Republic in the eighteenth century, a low threshold law court that boasted a quick and inexpensive procedure. Analysis of the social positions of the court's plaintiffs and defendants helps reveal the extent to which lower social groups actively made use of it. The article is based on linkage between a sample of users of the Peacemaker court during the years 1750–54 and a census of 1749 comprising socio-economic data for the entire Leiden population. The court clientele of the Peacemaker court was distinctively elitist. The court was thus first and foremost a forum for an inner group of more well-to-do households who were firmly established in the local community. The Peacemaker court was notably inexpensive and simple in its procedures, yet lower social groups remained markedly reticent to file complaints there, revealing a significant socio-cultural gap between these groups and the burgomasters and aldermen who staffed and maintained the courts.     

The Numerological Tradition and Mathematical Beauty in Ancient Chinese Literature-Concurrently on the Mathematical Critique of Ancient Chi-nese Literature

中国上古重数,以数为宇宙化生的关键和万象联络的枢纽。先民由卜筮之数创为八卦——《易经》,开创我国文献-文学倚数编撰的传统。包括《易经》产生的商周之际,文献-文学中数的传统经六次变迁而贯穿始终,表现由文献而文学,由诗文而小说、戏曲,由外及内,由明转暗,由粗转精等逐步深入的过程。这一过程因久被忽略而显得隐晦。其隐晦之故有社会、哲学及文学批评诸方面的原因。从作品的不同层面看,这一传统表现为编撰“倚数”称名和布局谋篇,“倚数”行文的模式与技巧等,综合而成中国古代文学的数理机制,表现出数理美的特点。中国古代文学作品的数理与形象互相含蕴而相得益彰。中国古代文学的数理批评不单纯是文学形式的探讨,而将为文本的阐释提供新的可能,有时本身就是这种阐释。本文主张建立写人与叙述并重、形象与数理结合的新的古代文学批评和研究模式。     

The role of individual agents in promoting peace processes: business people and policy entrepreneurship in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict

Are individual businesspeople who operate as policy entrepreneurs willing and able to influence peace processes in conflict areas? The literature on businesspeople as policy agents shifts when talking about peace processes, focusing on group level activities and ignoring the effect of individual agents. We argue that rather than regarding businesspeople as a traditional interest group, we should consider the approaches to promoting change that strongly motivated individuals adopt as policy entrepreneurs. Based on interviews with senior Israeli businesspeople and decision-makers, we demonstrate how strongly motivated Israeli businesspeople promote peace as policy entrepreneurs. We identify their motivations, goals, challenges, and the strategies they use. The findings indicate that although motivated by economic profits, businesspeople undertake activities that may prove very beneficial to both themselves and society as a whole.     

Status,gender and life cycle in the consumption practices of the English elite. The case of Mary Leigh, 1736–1806

The consumption practices of the elite have received a great deal of attention from historians over the years. The role of women (and gender) is mostly considered in the context of married couples, and therefore at a particular stage in the life cycle, with emphasis placed on the complementary role of husband and wife in the household economy. We know less about the consumption behaviour of single women, especially the ways in which this developed over their life course, singleness being seen as a passing stage rather than a long-term condition for many elite women. This article takes a case-study approach to explore in detail how consumption and shopping behaviour were shaped by gender, status and family, and how the relative importance of these changed over the life course of the individual. It focuses in particular on what was bought from whom and the factors shaping the choice of supplier, and argues that single status gave women freedom to act, but that this was framed by the obligations of status and the constraints of family. Landownership, of course, brought responsibilities as well as opportunities that shaped spending; but family as lineage was especially important in shaping patterns and geographies of spending.     

The destruction of liberty in French Guiana: law,identity and the meaning of legal space, 1794–1830

Abstract

This article examines the colonial legal culture of French Guiana from 1794 to 1830 during a period marked by dramatic historical rupture; slaves in the colony who were liberated by decree of the French legislature in 1794 were returned to slavery under Napoleon. People who managed to remain free in the nineteenth century endured humiliating legal handicaps as well as challenges to their free status. In Guiana during this period, a person's access to the ‘rights of man and citizen’ depended on intricate and ultimately fragile legal structures. The perils besetting Guiana's freed people during and after the French Revolution often arose from the highly adjustable character of legal space – the legal status of imperial territory in relation to domestic soil. This article draws on archival materials including notarial documents and trial records to reconstruct the role of law and legal discourse in mediating everyday life, familial relationships and social encounters on the French colonial frontier.     

Violence and Order on the Chengdu Plain: the story of a secret brotherhood in rural China, 1939–1949

T. G. Cook (ed.), The History of Education in Europe (1974), x+99 (Methuen, £2.20).

Guy Chaussinand‐Nogaret (ed.), Une Histoire des Elites, 1700–1848; recueil de textes présentés et commentés (1975), 376 (Mouton, Paris and The Hague, 38.50 guilders, 64 francs). (A History of Elites, 1700–1848; a collection of texts with introduction and commentary.)

Hans H. Gerth, Bürgerliche Intelligenz um 1800. Zur Soziologie des deutschen Früh‐liberalismus. Kritische Studien zur Geschichtswissenschaft 19 (edited by Ulrich Herrmann) (1976), 155 (Vandenhoeck &; Ruprecht, Göttingen, n.p.). (The Professional Middle Class in Germany about the year 1800. A contribution to the sociology of early German liberalism.)

Peter N. Stearns, The Revolutions of 1848 (1974), 278 (Weidenfeld &; Nicolson, £3.95).

Hugh McLeod, Class and Religion in the Late Victorian City (1974), xii+360 (Croom Helm, £6.95).     

The “Catholic Grotesque” at the Sacro Monte of Varallo: the Protestant aversion to a graphic space during the late 19th and early 20th centuries

The hyper-sensual Early Modern Italian Sacro Monte of Varallo was dismissed by nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Protestant scholars and tourists as nothing more than the “Catholic Grotesque.” This derision has had serious repercussions. By examining the acoustically shaped spaces, use of architectural chiaroscuro, hapticity, architectural effects of weather, and the importance of touch and smell, one realizes the extent to which the Sacro Monte is a multi-valent atmosphere. As such it challenges the ontological fixation and ocularcentrism of architectural theory and the way in which the discipline of architectural history is practiced. An analysis of the site compels us to recalibrate our “sensory ratio” and recognize that, in order to understand a set of practices that has left little written record, we, as architectural historians, need to draw from disciplines other than our own. In the process, we also need to be aware of the extent to which current topics and attitudes have been shaped by a Protestant past.     

Rise and Fall: Deciphering Urban Sites and their Environment in Overlapping Agrarian/Pastoral Regions — Based on Examination of the Border Fortified Camps along the Yansui Section of the Great Wall during the Ming Dynasty

陕北长城沿线属黄土高原与鄂尔多斯沙地交接地带,也是北方农牧交错地带,历 史上经常是游牧民族与农耕民族争夺的地域。明延绥长城及沿线39营堡就是在蒙汉争 战过程中构筑起来的。由于营堡与交通走廊互为一体,带动了经济发展,历明清两代 三百多年,发挥了重要的政治、经济与交通中心作用。它的废毁是在晚清民国时期, 今天大多已沦为废城。究其原因,城址选择上过多考虑军事防守需要是主因,而边疆 内地化及沿边经济结构变动加速了其衰亡。因此,北方农牧交错地带城堡的兴衰与王 朝的政治、军事行动相关联,与民族、部落流转迁徙及文明演进过程相一致,其中的 历史成因极其复杂,地址废弃往往是多方面因素造成的。

关键词: 明清?鄂尔多斯南缘?农牧交错带?城址?环境

The area along the Grear Wall in northern Shaanxi between the Loess Plateau and the Ordos Desert is one of the major agrarian‐pastoral regions of northwest China. Historically, the land was fought over by the nomadic and the agrarian peoples of the region. The Yansui section of the Ming Great Wall and thirty‐nine fortified encampments along it were built during fighting between the Mongols and the Han people. As all of them were located along communication lines vital to economic development, they played an important role in politics, the economy and transport over three hundred years of Ming and Qing rule. However, they fell into disuse in the late Qing and the Republican period and are now in ruins. The main reason underlying their decline was that the sites had been chosen for their defensive value, so the subsequent northern expansion of China's borders and structural changes in the border economy hastened their decline. Thus the rise and fall of these fortified towns at the intersection of the agrarian and the pastoral regions was closely related to imperial political and military activity and was in line with ethnic and tribal movements and migrations and the evolution of civilizations. In sum, the reasons behind the demise of these fortified towns and camps were highly complex and usually involved multiple factors.