Reflections on conducting research on the ‘war on terror’: religious identity,subjectivity and emotions

In recent years there has been an increase in literature which has explored the insider/outsider position through ethnic identities. However, there remains a neglect of religious identities, even though it could be argued that religious identities have become increasingly important through being prominent in international issues such as the ‘war on terror’ and the Middle East conflict. Through drawing on the concept of subjectivity, I reflect on research I conducted on the impact of the ‘war on terror’ on British Muslims. I explore the space between the insider/outsider position demonstrating how my various subjectivities – the ‘non-Islamic appearance I’, the ‘Muslim I’, the ‘personal I’, the ‘exploring I’, the ‘Kashmiri I’ or the ‘Pakistani I’, the ‘status I’ and the ‘outsider I’ – assisted in establishing trust, openness and commonality. I conclude by demonstrating how the ‘emotional I’ allowed me to manage my own emotions and participants emotions.     

纪念苏丹商人穆罕默德·哈吉在华首设商务处

中国与阿拉伯非洲的历史交往源远流长,特别是与苏丹的联系,可以追溯到西汉时期,而且从那时起双方之间的往来一直延续不断。本文在历史回顾的基础上,通过实地调查和口传资料,着重考察了19世纪末苏丹商人穆罕默德·哈吉在广州首设商务办事处并开展苏(丹)中(国)贸易、加强双方社会联系的历史活动,揭示了苏中悠久关系史上鲜为人知的一页。     

Terrorism and the integration of Muslim immigrants

We study the effect that a series of Islamist terrorist attacks across Europe in 2004–2005 had on the integration of Muslim immigrants. Using unique panel data that oversamples immigrants in the Netherlands, we show that, shortly after the attacks, Muslim immigrants’ attitudes toward integration worsened significantly compared to those of non-Muslim immigrants, with no evidence of a negative trend in the attitudes of Muslims prior to the attacks. While, in particular, low-educated Muslims became more geographically segregated and unemployed after the attacks, high-educated Muslims were affected most negatively in terms of their perceived integration. This decline in perceived integration is associated with a higher intention to permanently re-migrate to the country of origin.     

A Study of An Alternative School for Pregnant and/or Parenting Teens: Quantitative and Qualitative Evidence

In response to multiple problems faced by pregnant and parenting teens, many alternative school-based comprehensive programs have been established throughout the United States. By collecting data from a sample of enrollees of such a school-based comprehensive program and comparing them with data collected from a sample of non-enrollees, the present study systematically evaluates the program. The results of the study seem to suggest that the program participants were more likely to have higher educational aspiration, better reproductive health outcomes, higher contraceptive use, and more breast-feeding practice and intention than those of their non-participating counterparts. The implications of the study findings for comprehensive school-based program for pregnant and/or parenting teens are discussed.Ruhul Amin is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Health Disparities Solutions and Senior Research Scientist in the Institute for Urban Research, Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD 21239. Dorothy C. Browne is the Director of the Institute for Urban Research, Jamir Ahmed is a research assistant at the Center for Health Disparities Solutions and Takanori Sato is research assistants at the Institute for Urban Research, Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD 21239.     

Two notions of positive ageing based on stochastic dominance

The negative effects of age on the life length of a device or positive ageing are commonly used criteria for classifying life distributions. In this paper two notions of positive ageing are considered. These are the new better (worse) than used in average conditional survival probability and harmonic new better (worse) than used in upper tail. Closure of these notions under mixture and convolution are studied. The survivals of a device subject to discrete shocks of these notions of ageing which occur according to homogeneous Poisson processes are studied. A cumulative damage model is considered. Two test statistics are proposed for the two notions of ageing.     

Preservation properties for the Laplace transform ordering of residual lives

Several preservation results for the Laplace transform ordering of residual lives (Lt−rl) are given. In particular, we show that theTt−rl-order is preserved under convolutions, mixtures and weak convergence. Some examples of interest in reliability theory are also presented.     

On the NBAFR (NWAFR) class of life distributions

Recently Loh (1984) presented a new generalization of the NBU class of life distributions called New Better than Average Failure Rate (NBAFR). In this paper several properties of this class are presented. For instance the closure property of its dual (NWAFR) under the operation of mixture is obtained and characterization of the NBAFR (NWAFR) property by using the Laplace transform and its relation to the cumulative damage model is studied. Some shock models which give rise to the NBAFR (NWAFR) class are discussed. Finally, a test statistic for testing exponentiality against the NBAFR alternatives is presented.     

Forgiveness, Reconciliation, and Shame: Three Key Variables in Reducing School Bullying

This study examined the relationships between forgiveness, reconciliation, shame and school bullying. The sample consisted of 1,875 Bangladeshi adolescents (60% girls) in grades 7 to 10 ( M = 8.28). In a structural equation model, both forgiveness and reconciliation directly predicted less bullying. In addition to the direct effect, an indirect pathway showed reconciliation reduced bullying via adaptive shame management. Shame acknowledgment predicted less bullying whereas shame displacement predicted more in accord with the shame management theory. An alternative model was also tested, which demonstrated that parental forgiveness eroded when children displaced their shame. The nature of the intersection between these two theoretically viable psychological models has implications for both restorative justice theory and practice.     

Stock Market and Aggregate Investment Behavior in Malaysia: An Empirical Analysis

The present paper analyzes the role of stock market, more specifically real stock prices and stock market uncertainty/volatility, on aggregate investment behavior for an emerging market, Malaysia. Employing the autoregressive distributed lags approach to cointegration test, the paper establishes a long run equilibrium that ties the aggregate investment to its determinants—real income, real stock prices, real lending rate and stock market volatility. In the long run, we document a positive relation between aggregate investment and real stock prices and a negative relation between aggregate investment and stock market volatility. These results are further supported by our analyses of their dynamic interactions based on Granger causality and impulse-response functions. Based on the results, the real stock market prices, which has yet reached the level recorded prior to the crisis, may have explained the low investment in Malaysia after the Asian crisis. Moreover, the stock market volatility can also post a threat to the investment performance.