Whitewashing the nation: racist jokes and the construction of the African ‘other’ in Greek popular cinema

This article explores representations of race in three Greek popular films of the 1970s and 1980s. The portrayal of African characters in these films is antagonistically positioned in relation to the dominant, ‘whitewashed’ Greek national narrative which relies on the nineteenth century idea that Greece is the progenitor of European civilization. Often masquerading itself as ‘just a joke’, the discourse of these films narrates the African Other as lacking in terms of culture, intelligence and beauty – the three central categories upon which the idea of the ‘white supremacy’, according to Cornell West, is historically constructed in modernity. Tightly woven with this idea (largely introduced in Greece by the leading European powers), these films enunciate explicitly colonial viewpoints in a country that was neither a colonial power nor at the geopolitical center of the European project. The article argues that the racialized representations of these films are an effect of appropriating the Eurocentric idea of historicism, where the ‘progress’ and ‘backwardness’ of groups and nations are measured according to how effectively they perform the values of modernity.     

The Peasant World in the Discourse of Generational Sorrow

This article spells out the methodological considerations and various procedural and methodological subtleties developed over the author's quarter century of sociological field studies of Russia's peasant worlds. Particular attention is paid to “voices from below”—peasant discursive formats that capture, in natural and undiluted form, the evolution of peasant practices constituting the core of everyday life. In particular, the phenomenon of generational sorrow and a special chronological nostalgia that functions as a “social gyroscope” is identified and discursively captured. This phenomenon is noteworthy and useful for its ability to retain a record of the productively longed for past in a rural community's collective memory and thereby influence new peasant worlds taking shape today.     

不忘初心：基于央视宣传片百年政党多模态形象建构研究

央视形象宣传片《我是谁》是中国共产党建党95周年以来的首部公益广告,具有重要的时代意义和研究价值.结合视觉设计语法、评价理论和“宣传片”的图像、文本和声音语料建立“宣传片”多模态形象诠释框架,探索“宣传片”建构党的形象的过程与范式.研究发现:一是“宣传片”图像的再现意义体现接地气的创意理念,互动意义展现与受众间的平等权势关系,构图意义揭示青年群体是目标受众的精准定位;二是“宣传片”文本重点建构人际意义的协商语义,从客观视角而不是主观情感刻画党员群体爱岗敬业的务实作风和百年政党一心为民的赤子之心;三是“宣传片”音乐、旁白等声音能够有效增强受众全方位了解党的形象塑造,从而尽快接受党为人民服务的不变“初心”.     

Monitoring the coefficient of variation using a variable sample size and sampling interval control chart

This article proposes a CV chart by using the variable sample size and sampling interval (VSSI) feature to improve the performance of the basic CV chart, for detecting small and moderate shifts in the CV. The proposed VSSI CV chart is designed by allowing the sample size and the sampling interval to vary. The VSSI CV chart's statistical performance is measured by using the average time to signal (ATS) and expected average time to signal (EATS) criteria and is compared with that of existing CV charts. The Markov chain approach is employed in the design of the chart.     

A direct procedure for monitoring the coefficient of variation using a variable sample size scheme

A variable sample size (VSS) scheme directly monitoring the coefficient of variation (CV), instead of monitoring the transformed statistics, is proposed. Optimal chart parameters are computed based on two criteria: (i) minimizing the out-of-control ARL (ARL₁) and (ii) minimizing the out-of-control ASS (ASS₁). Then the performances are compared between these two criteria. The advantages of the proposed chart over the VSS chart based on the transformed statistics in the existing literature are: the former (i) provides an easier alternative as no transformation is involved and (ii) requires less number of observations to detect a shift when ASS₁ is minimized.     

Trend estimation of multivariate time series with controlled smoothness

This paper extends the univariate time series smoothing approach provided by penalized least squares to a multivariate setting, thus allowing for joint estimation of several time series trends. The theoretical results are valid for the general multivariate case, but particular emphasis is placed on the bivariate situation from an applied point of view. The proposal is based on a vector signal-plus-noise representation of the observed data that requires the first two sample moments and specifying only one smoothing constant. A measure of the amount of smoothness of an estimated trend is introduced so that an analyst can set in advance a desired percentage of smoothness to be achieved by the trend estimate. The required smoothing constant is determined by the chosen percentage of smoothness. Closed form expressions for the smoothed estimated vector and its variance-covariance matrix are derived from a straightforward application of generalized least squares, thus providing best linear unbiased estimates for the trends. A detailed algorithm applicable for estimating bivariate time series trends is also presented and justified. The theoretical results are supported by a simulation study and two real applications. One corresponds to Mexican and US macroeconomic data within the context of business cycle analysis, and the other one to environmental data pertaining to a monitored site in Scotland.     

视觉权力反抗下的艾米丽

《献给艾米丽的一朵玫瑰花》引起了很多研究者的兴趣,但是,是谁以及为什么献给艾米丽一朵玫瑰花却没有定论。从视觉权力的角度分析这一问题,指出艾米丽作为个体的“被看者”在面对“看”所代表的集体权力时,表面采取了顺从,实际运用了最强烈的反抗,扭转了“看”与“被看者”的不平等关系,从而赢得福克纳的一朵代表敬意的玫瑰花。     

快速傅立叶变换在数字信号处理器上的实现研究

结合数字信号处理器的性能特点,对基2、基4、分裂基和Bruun FFT等快速傅立叶变换算法及其在TMS320C30上的实现进行了研究,开发出高效的FFT算法和程序。     

视觉文化:广告女性形象的看与被看

广告女性形象的看与被看是一种复杂的视觉行为和视觉文化。从观看的行为来说,女性形象看与被看的模式呈现为女性形象被男性观看,被女性观看,甚至是女性的自赏。无论广告中女性形象是在场还是缺席,是真实地存在还是由男性的虚拟而存在,女性形象出现的目的就是被看。由于男女两性在生物特征和社会特性方面的不同,观看的行为方式和观看的文化意味有着显著的区别。男性通过窥视行为,放大女性的性征,并过滤掉女性美的其他成分,将女性视为满足自己潜在欲望的性符号,女性被男性性化。女性通过审视行为,激发起因缺失而引起的焦虑,将广告女性幻化成生活的指导者和楷模,将女性美化。