Journal articles on the topic 'Names, Ethnological – Sri Lanka'

Sri Lanka was a colony of the Portuguese, Dutch, and British. The simplification of Sri Lankan food culture can be seen most clearly today, including how the diet has been changed in the last 400 years since the colonial occupation began. Therefore, greater efforts must be made to uncover the colonial forces that have undermined food security and health in Sri Lanka. Also traditional eating habits, which are associated with countless health benefits, have been gradually replaced by the globalized food system of multinational corporations and hidden hunger, a system inherent in the emergence of non-communicable diseases, such as cancer, diabetes, cholesterol, and kidney disease epidemics, in Sri Lanka. This article discusses factors that have underpinned the dietary change in Sri Lanka from its early colonization to the post-colonization period. The research followed the integrated concept in ethnological and sociological study approaches. The study examined literature and conducted several interviews with field experts and senior people in marginal areas in Sri Lanka. This study examines the Sri Lankan traditional food system and how it changed after the colonial period, including the main changes and their impact on current micronutrient deficiencies and non-communicable diseases.

Towards a comprehensive revision of Gesneriaceae in Sri Lanka, 12 names are here typified, of which 11 are lectotypifications, including one second-step lectotypification, and the other is a neotypification.

There are many ways to find out the location and diversity of medicinal herbs for documentation. The detail study of herbal place names is one of them. This study was carried out to identify and documentation of herb based place names of Mullaitivu District in the Northern Province of Sri Lanka. The data was collected from field study, interviews, Government publications, books and authentic journals. Among the 632 villages of this district, 183 villages (30%) were related to herbs names. The types of herbs relevant to the place names were 64% trees, 16% shrubs, 10% grasses, 8% creepers and 2% aquatic plants. Details are described in this article.

Our country got many setbacks after it changed the name from Ceylon to Sri Lanka. In the Ceylon days we were one of the best countries of Asia. Even Singapore wants to be similar to our country. However, after the name was changed to Sri Lanka Tamil Elam war and Economic problems started in the country and it became one of the worst countries in Asia. In this paper authors tried to search that whether there was any impact on the name change to the existing prosperity of the country based on accepted numerological principles. Also, it was tried to study the possibility of a new name be applied to solve the country’s ongoing economic crisis and other related issues. A new name was proposed based on the numerology and a program was operated in an infinite loop of computer. Results were obtained by analyzing the media news on economic progress of the country. Numerology is a subjective system that can show us another level of interpretation in the matters of life. New names were made according to Chaldean Numerology and the results were analyzed the after.

The taxonomic status of the colubrid snake Dendrelaphis tristis (Daudin, 1803) was investigated on the basis of morphological data taken from 64 museum specimens. Univariate and multivariate analyses of these data reveal that Dendrelaphis tristis is composed of two species. One of these species agrees with the description of Dipsas schokari Kuhl, 1820 which is revalidated in the combination Dendrelaphis schokari (Kuhl, 1820). The syntypes of D. schokari have been lost and a type for D. tristis has never been deposited in a collection. Neotypes are designated and described for both species in order to stabilize the names. D. schokari differs from D. tristis in having a lower number of ventrals and subcaudals, a larger eye, a shorter vertebral stripe and the absence of a bright interparietal spot. D. tristisand D. schokari exhibit a partially overlapping distribution. D. tristis ranges from Sri Lanka northward through most of India to Myanmar whereas the distribution of D. schokari is restricted to Sri Lanka and South-west India (Western Ghats). Although the two species coexist on Sri Lanka and in South-west India, these species presumably do not occur syntopically as suggested by their distribution patterns and morphology.

A series of nomenclatural and taxonomic misunderstandings have surrounded the montane Indo-Iranian species in Plantago subgenus Plantago. This work has the objective of clarifying the nomenclature and taxonomy for the species and subspecies names available for these plants, in order to determine the correct species names for these entities. More specifically, P. tatarica is here lectotypified and re-established, P. griffithii is re-established, and P. aitchisonii is synonymised with P. griffithii. I provide here images of the types of the names studied, and also an identification key to Plantago subgenus Plantago in the Indo-Iranian region (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Iran, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka).

The genus Henckelia Sprengel (1817: 402) was re-established by Weber & Burtt (1997), with approximately 180 species, to include most of the Malesian, Sri Lankan and south Indian species of Didymocarpus Wallich (1819: 378). Weber et al. (2011) and Middleton et al. (2013) based on molecular data redefined the genus and included only 56 species. Subsequently three more species were added to the genus, H. pradeepiana Nampy, Manudev & Weber in Manudev et al. (2012: 119), H. sivagiriensis (Rajakumar et al. 2009: 481) Kumar (2014: 149) and H. bracteata Janeesha & Nampy (2015: 53) while Middleton et al. (2015) transferred H. smitinandii ( Burtt 2001: 89) Middleton & Möller in Weber et al. (2011: 776) to the genus Chayamaritia Middleton & Möller (2015: 1961). At present the genus includes 58 species distributed in Sri Lanka, southern and northeastern India, Nepal, Bhutan, southern China, northern Vietnam, northern Laos and northern Thailand.

Abstract This article explores the multiethnic and multireligious sacred place of Kataragama (Tamil: Kathirkamam) located at the southeast corner of Sri Lanka. For the devotees, Kataragama’s main attraction is the god Skanda, also known by many other names, for example Murukan, Kataragama Deviyo, or Mahasena. Kataragama attracts people from all ethnic and religious communities, as well as from all social strata in Sri Lankan society. Using Marianne Qvortrup Fibiger’s notion of “religious hotspots” as a starting point, this article analyzes how the “thaumaturgical power” of Kataragama forms the basis for the coexistence of multiple religious systems within the defined space of the sacred city. This coexistence, however, is under constant pressure from exclusionary nationalist and political forces. This transformation is analyzed with reference to the recent decades of Sinhala Buddhist politics of public space to “restore” Sri Lanka to dhammadipa, that is, sacred Buddhist territory. This raises questions about the possible loss of “thaumaturgical power,” as Kataragama is moving from having “ontic” multireligious qualities to “epistemic” qualities along majoritarian lines.

Prevalence of bullying among school going adolescents was estimated to be high (approximately 37%) in Sri Lanka according to the Global School based student Health Survey. However, limited number of studies were carried out in Sri Lanka on bullying among adolescents, specifically about early adolescents in rural settings. In this study, we aimed to fill the research gap in local literature. The objectives of this study were a) to describe prevalence of bullying acts and different types of bullying in schools, and b) to describe common responses to bullying among early adolescents in Galenbindunuwewa educational zone in Sri Lanka. A cross sectional study was carried out in three schools in Galenbindunuwewa educational zone. A multi-stage sampling method incorporated simple random sampling and a systematic sampling method was used. Three hundred seventy-two students in grade 7, 8, 9 (12-15 years of age) participated in the study. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect data. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21 was used for data analysis. Descriptive statistics were employed. Bullying acts were reported as prevalent among early adolescents in schools in Galenbindunuwewa educational zone. Calling mean names, pushing, and hitting, disturbing learning processes were the most prevent bullying acts. The most common response of the victims for bullying were tolerating it and walking away.

In modern Sri Lankan society, caste has become less significant as a marker of social identity and exclusion than was the case in the past. While acknowledging this trend across South Asian societies, the literature does not adequately explain why this is happening. Increasing urbanization, the growing number of inter-caste marriages, the expanding middle class, and the bulging youth population have all been suggested as contributory factors. In rural Sri Lanka, family names are used as identifiers of family and kinship groups within each caste. The people belonging to the “low castes” identified with derogatory village and family names are socially marginalized and stigmatized. Social segregation, marked with family names and traditional caste occupations, makes it difficult for the low-caste people to move up in the class ladder, and socialize in the public sphere. Political and economic development programs helped to improve the living conditions and facilities in low-caste villages, but the lowness of such castes continued to linger in the social fabric. Socially oppressed low-caste youth in rural villages moved to cities and the urban outskirts, found non-caste employment, and changed their names to acaste names. By analyzing newspaper notifications and selected ethnographic material, this article shows how name changes among the Sinhalese have facilitated individualization and socialization by people who change their names to acaste names and seek freedom to choose their own employment, residence, marriage partners, and involvement in activities of wider society—a form of assimilation, in the context of growing urbanization and modernization.

The Implicit in Translation: A Case Study of Récifs by Romesh Gunesekera. Translating Sri Lankan Culture to French. This article aims to shed light on how the translator of Reef, a novel written by the Sri Lankan author Romesh Gunesekera, has dealt with culture-specific lexis originating from the Sri Lankan context. We chose this novel because it contains many references to Sri Lankan culture. The terms referring to Sri Lankan realities appear in names of Sinhala or sometimes Tamil origin. First, we will assess whether the French translation utilised a source-oriented or target-oriented translation approach. Secondly, we will work on the strategy of literal translation, focusing on translating the implicit. Thirdly, we will see the use of the Sri Lankan English language as it appears in the original novel. The author of the novel voluntarily chose the ‘Sri Lankan English’ register to remain in the local context. Are there traces of these linguistic nuances in the French translation or did the translator decide to choose the register of contemporary standard French? Our findings suggest that the translation of Reef follows a source oriented approach and succeeds in referring to local realities of Sri Lanka, maintaining specific Sri Lankan terms, which in most cases become comprehensible in the context.

The comic series, the Adventures of Asterix created by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo became exceptionally popular in Sri Lanka in the early 2000s when the local TV channel Sirasa broadcasted the animated films dubbed in Sinhala. The present paper focuses on one aspect that captivated the audience, the translation of the proper names from English into Sinhala. The translation of the anthroponyms in Asterix poses numerous complexities. Following Michel Ballard’s theoretical views on the translation of the proper names, we examine the decision of the translators to translate, the challenges and the strategies referring to five Asterix animated films that were dubbed into Sinhala. The names of the main characters, and the secondary/recurring characters that include Gauls, Romans and other nationalities in the target language are analysed, discussed and compared with the English equivalents. The analysis reveals that the names are translated based on the simple, and familiar characteristics easily comprehensive to the audience while the addition of the term pappa which replaces the suffix -ix in Sinhala in the names of the Gaulish characters, essentially provides the comical component. The paper argues that the sophisticated wordplay, and the literally and the artistic allusions that Astérix is known for, are lacking in the Sinhala version. Further, by eliminating the presence of foreign names, the translators have favoured a domestication approach. Though the translators have not attempted to recreate the overall effect that the creators intended, their attempts to form names, comprehensible and appreciable to the local audience, and that equally complements the original screen play, have succeeded in popularizing the comic series.

IntroductionUncontrolled hypertension is the leading risk factor for mortality globally, including low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). However, pathways for seeking hypertension care and patients’ experience with the utilisation of health services for hypertension in LMICs are not well understood.ObjectivesThis study aimed to explore patients’ perspectives on different dimensions of accessibility and availability of healthcare for the management of uncontrolled hypertension in Sri Lanka.SettingPrimary care in rural areas in Sri Lanka.Participants20 patients with hypertension were purposively sampled from an ongoing study of Control of Blood Pressure and Risk Attenuation in rural Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka.MethodWe conducted in-depth interviews with patients. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed into local language (Sinhala) and translated to English. Thematic analysis was used and patient pathways on their experiences accessing care from government and private clinics are mapped out.ResultsOverall, most patients alluded to the fact that their hypertension was diagnosed accidentally in an unrelated visit to a healthcare provider and revealed lack of adherence and consuming alternatives as barriers to control hypertension. Referring to the theme ‘Accessibility and availability of hypertension care’, patients complained of distance to the hospitals, long waiting time and shortage of medicine supplies at government clinics as the main barriers to accessing health services. They often resorted to private physicians and paid out of pocket when they experienced acute symptoms attributable to hypertension. Considering the theme ‘Approachability and ability to perceive’, the majority of patients mentioned increasing public awareness, training healthcare professionals for effective communication as areas of improvement. Under the theme ‘Appropriateness and ability to engage’, few patients were aware of the names or purpose of their medications and reportedly missed doses frequently. Reminders from family members were considered a major facilitator to adherence to antihypertensive medications. Patients welcomed the idea of outreach services for hypertension and health education closer to home in the theme ‘Things the patients reported to improve the system’.ConclusionPatients identified several barriers to accessing hypertension care in Sri Lanka. Measures recommended improving hypertension management in Sri Lanka including public education on hypertension, better communication between healthcare professionals and patients, and efforts to improve access and understanding of antihypertensive medications.Trial registration numberNCT02657746.

Two collections of Pleurotus giganteus and one collection of Pl. tuber-regium from Mengsong in Yunnan Province, China, and commercially grown strains of Pl. giganteus and Pl. tuber-regium from Jiangxi Province, China were identified using macro and micro morphological characters. The identification was also confirmed by phylogenetic analysis using Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) universal primers. Phylogenetic analyses of ITS-1-5.8S-ITS2 rDNA sequence data of collections of Pl. giganteus from Sri Lanka (epitype), Thailand, Malaysia and Pl. tuber-regium from Australia, Cameroon, China, Ghana, Malaysia, Nigeria, and Papua New Guinea using maximum likelihood, maximum parsimony and Bayesian inference showed that Pl. giganteus forms a strongly supported clade with Thai and Chinese Pl. giganteus, while the Chinese Pl. tuber-regium clade with Cameroon, Ghana and Nigeria samples with strong support. In this paper, we clarify the identifications of the two edible cultivated mushrooms, Pl. giganteus and Pl. tuber-regium in China.

Kumud the herb mentioned with different names in Nighantu is one of the herbs useful in Rakta and Pitta Doshas. It is well known herb in ayurveda with many medicinal properties. Blue lotus, red and blue aquatic plant, star lotus, or manel flower are number of the common names for it. It is also called as Indian Blue lotus. It belongs to the southern and eastern parts of Asia, and also known as the national flower of Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. Its Sanskrit name is utpala. It is a well-known herb found in Indian classical text and also used in Siddha medicinal system. Due to its bitter taste, it is widely used in pitta disorders and helps in reducing fever as well as acts as a cooling agent for the body. Many studies showed it hepatoprotective, antioxidant, antidiabetic, DNA protecting activities, antimicrobial activities, analgesic, and anti-inflammatory activities along with its traditional uses.The present review focus on modern pharmacological actions of traditional herb.

Two new species of Zodariidae of the genus Suffasia Jocqué, 1991, obtained from the easternmost part of Nepal are described under the names, Suffasia martensi sp. nov., and S. kanchenjunga sp. nov. Both new species can be distinguished from each other and from all the known species of the genus, Suffasia tigrina (Simon, 1893) from India, S. tumegaster Jocqué, 1992 from Nepal, S. attiduya Benjamin & Jocqué, 2000 and S. mahasumana Benjamin & Jocqué, 2000 from Sri Lanka by the peculiar shape of male palpal tibia. In both species, the tibia is very thick, and it has a dorsal spine in S. kanchenjunga. The females of both species have an epigynum with a long scape, which is slightly widened in front in S. kanchenjunga.

The typification of Rivca ornata (Roxb.) Choisy (Convolvulaceae), based on Lettsomia ornata Roxb., is discussed. R. ornata is shown to have been frequently (though not consistently) misapplied to a taxon from S India and Sri Lanka which has also been called Convolvulus candicans Roth ex Roem. & Schult., nom. illegit.; it is here newly described as R. wightiana R.R. Mill. Lettsomia ornata was based on a specimen of a plant introduced to Calcutta Botanic Garden from Uttar Pradesh. This is synonymous with Rivea ornata var. griffithii C.B. Clarke, not Clarke's ‘typical variety’ which Prain formally named var. typica. Lectotypifications are proposed for two species names in Argyreia Lour. Calystegia hederacea Wall., Convolvulus arvensis L. and Dichondra repens J.R. & G. Forst. are recorded from Bhutan for the first time.

Pseudosida szalayi Daday, 1898 is redescribed on the basis on type material from Sri Lanka (Ceylon) and other materials from India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, East and South China, and Far East of Russia (Lower Amur River basin). The investigation of intraand interpopulational morphological variability has allowed coming to the conclusion about the conspecificity of specimens from different regions and occurrence of the only species, P. szalayi, in East and South Asia. The male of the species is described in detail for the first time. The first discovered northernmost localities of the species in the Lower Amur River basin are far separated from others and may have a relict status. While probably, only one species of the genus occurs in East and South Asia, the taxonomic status of African pseudosidas known under the names “P. szalayi” and “P. bidentata” remains uncertain.

The taxonomy of the genus Bolboceras Kirby, 1819 (= Indobolbus Nikolajev, 1979) is discussed. The Oriental members of the genus as currently conceived have not been revised for the past 160 years. Operational groups of species are proposed, including the Bolboceras nigricans group. In this group B. nigricans Westwood, 1848 and five new Oriental group members are here keyed, diagnosed, and illustrated. The new species proposed are: Bolboceras schulzei (Bangladesh, India), B. malabaricum (India), B. extraneum (Bangladesh, India, Pakistan), B. insulare (Sri Lanka), and B. mimicans (Myanmar). In an Appendix a single new species is described in the Bolboceras perpunctatum group, to consolidate the key to the Bolboceras species groups – B. perpunctatum (India). A list of names of all Bolboceras species is given, indicating a formal retransfer of some from Indobolbus to Bolboceras, following a 2006 ruling of the ICZN on the use of the name Bolboceras.

In 1940, E.E. Green’s collection of scale insects, consisting of 6505 microscope slides and 2172 boxes of dry material, was donated to the The Natural History Museum, London, U.K. (then the British Museum (Natural History)). Green was a tea and coffee planter in Sri Lanka, and later became Government Agricultural Entomologist there before retiring to England in 1913. He continued to work on scale insects and became one of the foremost scale insect specialists at the time. His collection includes most of the species he described as new, but is also important because it contains authentic material sent to Green by other contemporary workers on scale insects. The collection is listed as it was when originally donated, firstly giving the names of species that Green recognised at the time, followed by the number of microscope slides, followed by numbers of developmental stages in the material; lastly is provided the current name of each species. The list is divided into the 31 extant families represented in Green’s collection.

Heliothrips (Parthenothrips) octarcticulatus was originally described by Schmutz (1913) from Sri Lanka. Subsequently, Hood (1954) described from Taiwan a new genus and species Copidothrips formosus, and then Stannard and Mitri (1962) described a further new genus and species, Mesostenothrips kraussi, from Kiribati and Gibert Islands. Bhatti (1967, 1990), recognized that only a single genus and species was involved amongst these names, established the resultant synonymies, and recorded the species octarcticulatus from various localities between the Seychelles and five different Pacific Island groups. It has also been recorded from Northern Australia, and Thailand (ThripsWiki 2021) as well as Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean (Mound 2019). Despite these records, there is little reliable information about host plants and biology apart from Piper myristicum on Pohnpei island (Micronesia), and also damage caused to the leaves of Aglaonema and Spathoglottis at Darwin in Australia (Mound & Tree 2020). In this note, we add a further interesting host record and describe the previously unknown male as well as the larvae of this species.

This is a medicinal plant belonging to the family Lamiaceae, and the botanical name is Ocimum Sanctum. Tulsi is widely used for its various healing properties and is called a ‘queen of the herb’. All the parts of the plant are helpful, including leaves and seeds. The Incomparable One and the mother of natural medicine are the other names of Tulsi. Tulsi is available in India, Burma, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Southwest Asia, China, Thailand, and Malaysia. The plant is an erect, much-branched subshrub, 30-60cm tall, with hairy stems and simple, green leaves that are strongly scented. It is native globally tropics and widely cultivated for its medicinal value. In the traditional system of medicine, different parts of Tulsi have been recommended for the treatment of bronchitis, malaria, diarrhoea, dysentery, skin diseases, eye diseases, arthritis, insect bites, and so on. Pharmacological actions like anti-cancer, antidiabetic, antioxidant, antimalarial, antimicrobial, and anti-fertility are present in the Aromatic plant. These activities may be attributed mainly to phytochemicals like eugenol, ursolic acid, rosmarinic acid, methyl chavicol, linalool, etc.

A checklist comprising information on taxonomy, distribution and host plants is provided for 161 species of jumping plant-lice from the Indian subcontinent (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka) based on published records and museum material. In addition there are 15 species recorded in the literature which are identified to genus only. Museum material provides eight new country and two new state (within India) records. The taxonomy is updated and following nomenclatorial acts are proposed: new genus (1), new generic synonymies (2), designation of type species (1), new species synonymies (5), replacement names for primary homonyms at species level (3), new status of subspecies (3), new combinations (23). Toonapsylla Burckhardt, gen. nov. is described for Psylla cedrelae (Kieffer, 1905). The new genus belongs to Mastigimatinae (Calophyidae) and is probably closest related to Bharatiana and Mastigimas, both associated with Cedrela and Toona (Meliaceae). The new genus is diagnosed and a key is provided for the world genera of Mastigimatinae. The Neoptropical genus Allophorina Hodkinson is transferred here from Mastigimatinae (Calophyidae) to Psyllinae (Psyllidae).

The paper devoted to summarizing of new data on the Asian members of the subgenus Triacanus Erichson, 1843 sensu stricto considered together with subgenus Monafricus Kirejtshuk, 1995, stat. nov. in composition of one genus. All Asian species of Triacanus were re-examined, except for T. (Triacanus) japonicus Hisamatsu, 1985 from Japan. Triacanus (Triacanus) conformis sp. nov. from Sichuan (China), T. (T.) pullus sp. nov. from Fujian (China) and T. (T.) unicolor sp. nov. from Cameron Highland (Malaysia) were described. Triacanus (Triacanus) nigripennis Reitter, 1873 with a very wide range in the Indo-Malayan Region is regarded as including three forms, forma typica, forma “parva” from Vietnam and forma “punctatissima” from Myanmar (Burma); Vietnam; India, Kerala; Sri Lanka; Malaysia, Cameron Highlands, Sabah (names of these forms taken from synonyms of T. (T.) nigripennis: punctatissimus Grouvelle, 1892 and parvus Kirejtshuk, 1990, syn. nov.). The new data on distribution of all studied species of Triacanus were given and a key to species of this subgenus was elaborated. The probable mode of life of the species of the considered subgenus is discussed.

The world species ofOoderaWestwood, 1874 (Chalcidoidea: Pteromalidae: Cleonyminae: Ooderini) are revised. We examined 115 specimens of this rarely collected genus and based on morphological characters assign 110 specimens to 20 recognised species, of which the following ten are described as new:Ooderacircularicollissp. n.(Morocco),O.felixsp. n.(Central African Republic),O.fidelissp. n.(Vietnam),O.floreasp. n.(Thailand),O.heikewerneraesp. n.(Botswana and South Africa),O.leibnizisp. n.(Papua New Guinea, Malaysia and Phillippines),O.mkomaziensissp. n.(Tanzania),O.namibiensissp. n.(Namibia),O.niehuisorumsp. n.(Egypt and Israel), andO.srilankiensissp. n.(Sri Lanka).OoderamonstrumNikol’skaya, 1952, syn. n., is synonymised underO.formosa(Giraud, 1863). Five specimens could not be assigned to species and are treated asOoderasp. Redescriptions are provided for all previously described valid species.OoderaalbopilosaCrosby, 1909 is excluded fromOoderaand transferred toEupelmusDalman, 1820 (Eupelmidae) asE.albopilosa(Crosby, 1909) n. comb.OoderarufimanaWestwood, 1874 andO.obscuraWestwood, 1874 are treated asnomina dubiabecause we were unable to locate type specimens and the original descriptions are not sufficiently informative to clarify the taxonomic status of these names. Several specimens from North America are identified as introduced specimens of the European speciesO.formosa. We provide images and diagnostic characters for all 20 included species and an identification key to species.

The genus Penares Gray 1867 (Tetractinellida Marshall; Astrophorina Sollas; Geodiidae Gray) is reviewed from new and existing New Zealand collections, with 75 specimens examined and registered. The only species known from New Zealand prior to this study, P. tylotaster Dendy 1924, is re-examined and re-described from the holotype, using new scanning electron microscope images. Nine new species are described from New Zealand’s Exclusive Economic Zone: P. mollis sp. nov., P. aureus sp. nov., P. vermiculatus sp. nov., P. kermadecensis sp. nov., P. turmericolor, sp. nov., P. deformis sp. nov., P. okokewae sp. nov., P. orbis sp. nov., and P. astronavis sp. nov. A specimen of P. schulzei (Dendy 1905), first described from Sri Lanka and subsequently recorded from New Caledonia, was also found in New Zealand, extending the range of this species. This study brings the total New Zealand Penares fauna to 11 species, making a significant contribution to the now, global total of 39 species. All previously described Penares species are reviewed based on their published descriptions, and species names have been corrected to their masculine form. Based on the published description of P. obtusus Lendenfeld 1907, it is recommended that this species be reassigned to the genus Stelletta Schmidt 1862.

Giovanni Casaretto published Eugenia rotundifolia Casaretto (1842: 40) using material that he collected in Restinga vegetation between Copacabana and Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Berg (1857: 287) treated E. rotundifolia Casaretto as a distinct species, and recognized two varieties. However, the binomial E. rotundifolia (Walker-Arnott 1836: 335) Wight (1841: 17) was previously published for a taxon occurring in Sri Lanka. Therefore, Casaretto’s name is a later superfluous homonym and illegitimate. In a recent article on the typification of plant names published by Casaretto, Delprete et al. (2019) proposed E. casarettoana Delprete (2019: 25) as a substitute name for E. rotundifolia Casaretto. However, Delprete and his collaborators overlooked that the name E. casarettoana O. Berg (1857: 520) was previously published using material collected by Martius near the town of Coari, state of Amazonas, Brazil, and belongs to a distinct species occurring in the Brazilian Amazon. Also, Berg (1857) spelled the specific epithet “casaretteana” without explaining to whom he dedicated the epithet. It is obvious that it was dedicated to Casaretto, as no other botanist or plant collector has a similar last name. Therefore, according to Recommendation 60C of the ICN (Turland et al. 2018), the spelling of this epithet should be corrected to casarettoana, as it has been done for this and other specific epithets dedicated to Casaretto (Delprete 2016).

Momordica charantia (M. charantia), commonly known as bitter gourd, bitter melon, kugua, balsam pear, or karela, is a tropical and sub-tropical vine belonging to the Cucurbitaceae family. It has been used to treat a variety of diseases in the traditional medicine of China, India, and Sri Lanka. Here, we review the anti-obesity effects of various bioactive components of M. charantia established at the cellular and organismal level. We aim to provide links between various bioactive components of M. charantia and their anti-obesity mechanism. An advanced search was conducted on the worldwide accepted scientific databases via electronic search (Google Scholar, Web of Science, ScienceDirect, ACS Publications, PubMed, Wiley Online Library, SciFinder, CNKI) database with the query TS = “Momordica charantia” and “obesity”. Information was also obtained from International Plant Names Index, Chinese Pharmacopoeia, Chinese herbal classic books, online databases, PhD and MSc dissertations, etc. First, studies showing the anti-obesity effects of M. charantia on the cells and on animals were classified. The major bioactive components that showed anti-obesity activities included proteins, triterpenoids, saponins, phenolics, and conjugated linolenic acids. Their mechanisms included inhibition of fat synthesis, promotion of glucose utilization, and stimulation of auxiliary lipid-lowering activity. Finally, we summarized the risks of excessive consumption of M. charantia and the application. Although further research is necessary to explore various issues, this review establishes the therapeutic potential of M. charantia and it is highly promising candidate for the development of anti-obesity health products and medicines.

Brahui is one of the oldest languages of the Sub-continent and Brahui speaking people are found in Balochistan, Sindh, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and Iran. Some researchers claim that Brahui is an Aryan language others assert that it is a Turko-Iranian language. Another group of intellectuals also emphasize that the traces of Brahui language have been found in the remainants of Mohenjo Daro and it has Dravidian origin and same language is being spoken in some parts of India and Sri Lanka. According to some historians Brahui’s and Baloch’s belong to same race. Balochi speaking people entered Mekran while Brahui speaking people entered from Chagai as they defeated the Dravidian rulers of Kalat and entered into matrimonial relationship with the Dravidian and Balochi languages were mixed up and a new language of “Brahui” was born due to same relationship. According to reports about four million peoples of the above countries and regions speaks Brahui language. Languages are vehicles of our cultures, collective memory and values. They are an essential component of our identities, and a building block of our diversity and living heritage. Globalized economics and media are altering the face of culture around the globe, reducing the number of languages that human’s converse. As the world economy becomes more integrated, a common tongue has become more important than ever to promote commerce, and that puts speakers of regional dialects and minority languages at a distinct disadvantage. In addition, information technology has pressured languages to become more standardized, further squeezing local variations of language. These pressures are inducing a rapid die-off of languages around the world. UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger declaring that Brahui is vulnerable language. A small scale print and electronic media are playing important role in the promotion of Brahui language but have no ample capacity to stop the invasion of globalization. Surveys and research finding are also shows that many Brahui words, names of boys, girls, days, relationships, terminologies, names of food items were replaced by the words of the other dominant languages of electronic media.

Trichophyton simii is an important zoophilic dermatophyte. It has two different names, one for the asexual form (the anamorph state) that occurs in the vertebrate host, and the other for the sexual form (teleomorph also called “perfect state”) produced by mating between anamorphs. The sexual state of T. simii belongs to the genus Arthroderma in the family Arthrodermataceae of the phylum Ascomycota of the Kingdom fungi. Zoophilic Trichophyton species include Trichophyton equinum, T. bullosum, members of the T. mentagrophytes complex, T. simii, and T. verrucosum. The clinical lesions caused by T. simii in humans and animals are usually inflammatory and erythematous. It can be distinguished from other Trichophyton species by its faster growth on agar media, forming finely granular colonies with white-to-pale yellow color on reverse and distinctive to fusiform 3–7 septate macroconidia converting into chlamydospores in older cultures, and pyriform microconidia, and inability to perforate hair in-vitro, and produce the enzyme urease . Trichophyton simii is known to infect monkeys, chickens, dogs, and humans worldwide, though infections are sporadic and epidemic potential and zoonotic risk for humans is low; this dermatophyte is also known to occur as a geophilic species in several countries. The literature search generated a lot of data on T. simii infections from several countries, namely India, Sri Lanka, Japan, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Belgium, France, the USA, and Brazil; many of the reports lacked details of clinical lesions and did not mention about treatment/outcome of infections. The results are analyzed and presented concisely in the tables. There is need for investigating the epidemiology of T. simii infections in countries from where, human T. simii infections have been reported, and occurrence of this dermatophyte in soil by employing conventional mycological methods and a newly developed PCR technique based on ITS genomic sequences of this dermatophyte.

We all are animals and animals (are) us. There is only a thin line between both of us and beasts. We often tend to fall towards the beastly line. This paper, however, will show how the Native American tribes maintain their ties and wisdom with the animals. For them, animal spirits stand for life and livelihood. They regard animals as “the messenger for wisdom about life, nature, and power. These also prophecy future (events), as we take dogs’ moaning to herald earthquake and cats’ growling to trumpet troubles. The tribes represent those spirits through symbols on clothes, art and ceremonial items as “Traditional Ecological Knowledge,” or TEK, in short (Grayson). For example, northern Plains peoples used buffalo images in holy rites and placed its skulls on homes to honor its spirit while others name clans after animals, and use animal amulets, talismans, and fetishes. In Nepal also, some Tharus have Gajaraj (King of Elephants) clan; and Hatti (elephant) is the clan name of a Vaishya caste in Terai. Here Gaindakot, across the Trishuli River, is named so as “a habitat of rhinos” and Chitrawan (Chitwan) after Chitrakut, India and it celebrates the entire flora and fauna along with the humans. Other noteworthy animal place names, among many, are Gaighat (Udaypur), Bayalbas (Sarlahi), Ghodasahan (Bihar, India), Gaushala (Mahottari and Kathmandu), Gauchar(an) (Kathmandu), Singapore (Singapore), and so on. Many deities have animals as their carriers or costumes like snake and tiger skin (Shiva), mouse (Ganesha), and peacock (Saraswati), and many nations have animals as their prominent national symbols like eagle (USA), tiger (India), lion (Sri Lanka). Even some currencies carry animals denoting denominations—for examples, gainda (rhino) means 100.00 NPR, bagh (tiger) stands for 500.00 NPR, and hatti (elephant) is worth 1,000.00 NPR.

Kopyor coconut is a naturally-occurring mutant having fluffy solid endosperm in stead of the normal one. Similar type of coconut has been found in several other Asian countries, with their distinct local names, such as Macapuno (Philippines), Makhrao Kathi (Thailand), Dikiri Pol (Sri Lanka), Thairu Thengai (India). It is a delicacy coconut to Indonesian and sells as much as ten times higher than normal coconut. In nature, three types of kopyor coconut exist in Indonesia: kopyor tall, kopyor dwarf, and kopyor hybrid. There are three kopyor dwarf varieties (‘Pati Kopyor Green Dwarf’, ‘Kopyor Yellow Dwarf’ and ‘Kopyor Brown Dwarf’) officially released, and one registered tall variety (‘Puan Kalianda Kopyor Tall’). In general, kopyor fruit yield under natural conditions is only < 25% of the total harvested fruits for both the tall and the dwarf types. Traditionally, Indonesian farmers harvest kopyor fruits at ten months after pollination while normal fruits at 11 months. They use the harvested normal fruits for propagation; but cannot guarantee whether or not they would produce korpyor fruit. Adoption of kopyor seedling production through embryo culture has been done. However, the seedling production is slow, while the price is very expensive, thus unaffordable to common farmers. Indonesian Palm Research Institute and Bogor Agricultural University have collaborated to develop alternative approaches to increase kopyor fruit production through the production of seedling that would ensure to produce korpyor fruit through control pollination. Initiated since 2010, the activities successfully overcome uncertainty in kopyor seedling production. Moreover, hybridization among local superior coconut varieties and known kopyor one have been done to broaden genetic background of kopyor trait and to develop breeding population for new kopyor varieties in the future. Overview and update of research progress on korpyor in Indonesia are presented in this paper.

The synonymy of Perichaeta darnleiensis Fletcher, 1886, first described from Australian Darnley Island in the Torres Straits, was confused since Beddard (1900) and Michaelsen (1900) wrongly applied the names Perichaeta cingulata Schmarda, 1861 (= Megascolex cingulatus) and Megascolex indicus Horst, 1883 [= Amynthas corticis (Kinberg, 1828)], respectively. Taxonomic revision of this species now merges several parthenogenetic morphs, including Pheretima decipiens Beddard, 1912 syn. nov. from Luzon, Philippines. Final resolution depends on location of missing types or, alternatively, on neotypification, nevertheless new material from Mt. Kinabalu, north Sabah (Borneo) allows augmentation of the description of Pheretima darnleiensis from that given by Sims & Easton (1972) who, for its lobate/serrate intestinal caeca, remarked that these “cannot be regarded as taxonomic characters as they are more fully formed in the larger specimens”. Body size range is now 45–700 mm, although this suggests either high plasticity or too wide synonymy. Its distribution in the tropical Indo-Australasian Archipelago and islands of Malaysia, Indonesia and Fiji is attributed to human-mediated introductions in recent and pre-historic times that mask its true provenance; reports from Hawaii, Sri Lanka, South Africa and South America are disputed. Sympatric Amynthas omeimontis kinabalu Sims & Easton, 1972 was elevated to species level by Blakemore (2005). Descriptions of Pheretima (Parapheretima) saba Sims & Easton, 1972 and Polypheretima everetti (Beddard & Fedarb, 1895: 69) – somewhat similar to Polypheretima kinabaluensis (Beddard & Fedarb, 1895: 71) – are augmented and specimens are figured on newly collected material. A new Mt Kinabalu earthworm, Metaphire paka Blakemore sp. nov. is proposed that compares with Metaphire cai (Michaelsen, 1916) from Java [originally “Pheretima inflata (Horst) var. cai”], bringing the total known earthworms from Mt Kinabalu to six species. Ecological associations are briefly discussed.

The genus Grumilea was established by Gaertner (1788: 138, t. 28, f. 2) on the basis of a single species, G. nigra Gaertner from Sri Lanka. The genus was subsequently recognized and treated by a number of authors such as Candolle (1830: 495), Wight & Arnott (1834: 432), Miquel (1857: 295) and Thwaites (1859: 147). However, Bentham & Hooker (1873: 123) combined Grumilea with Psychotria Linnaeus (1759: 929, 1364), nom. cons., a delimitation that was accepted by later workers (e.g., Mabberley 2008: 377). Hooker (1880: 161) treated Grumilea as a Section of Psychotria. Wight (1845: 16, t. 1036) described a species, Grumilea elongata from Tamil Nadu, India which was transferred to Psychotria by Hooker as Psychotria elongata (Wight) Hooker (1880: 163). This name was used in most of the subsequent floristic treatments (e.g., Trimen 1894; Brandis 1906; Gamble 1921; Fyson 1932; Sebastine & Vivekananthan 1967; Matthew & Rani 1983; Swaminathan 1987; Mohanan & Henry 1994). Sohmer (1977: 381), realizing that the name P. elongata is a later homonym of two names published by Bentham (1853: 32) and Beddome (1872: t. 17), applied a new name, P. fosbergii Sohmer which was accepted and used by Deb & Gangopadhyay (1989: 70, f. 29) in their revision of the genus Psychotria. Unfortunately, they overlooked the fact that this name is also a later homonym of P. fosbergii Steyermark (1972: 630). Later, Kiehn published the replacement name P. sohmeri Kiehn (1986: 215) and this was used as the correct name by Sohmer (1987: 339). Two years later, Suresh proposed another replacement name, P. glandulosa Suresh (1988: 229). As this is a later replacement name, it is superfluous and illegitimate. Unfortunately, all these authors overlooked the fact that Kuntze (1891: 957) published the name Uragoga nilgherensis replacing Grumilea elongata which, if transferred to Psychotria, becomes the earliest valid replacement name for the Wight’s species. Hence the necessary new combination is proposed below.

Background of South African IslamIn 1994, South Africans will celebrate three centuries of Islam inSouth Africa. Credit for establishing Islam in South Africa is usuallygiven to Sheikh Yusuf, a Macasser prince who was exiled to South Africafor leading the resistance against the Dutch colonization of Malaysia. Thefitst Muslims in South Africa, however, were actually slaves who hadbeen imported, beginning in 1677, mainly from India, the Indonesianarchipelago, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka, by the Dutch colonists living in theCape. The Cape Muslim community, popularly but inaccurately knownas "Malays" and known under apattheid as "Coloreds," is the oldest Muslimcommunity in South Africa. The other major Muslim community wasestablished over a century later by indentured laborers and tradespeoplefrom northern India, a minority of whom weae Muslims. The majority ofSouth African Indian Muslims, classified as "Asians" or "Asiatics," nowlive in Natal and Tramvaal. The third ethnically identifiable group, classifiedas "Aftican" or "Black," consists mainly of converts or theirdescendants. Of the entire South African Muslim population, roughly 49percent are "Coloreds," nearly 47 pement are "Asians," and, although statisticsregarding "Africans" ate generally unreliable, it is estimated thatthey are less than 4 percent. Less than 1 percent is "White."Contributions to South African SocietyAlthough Muslims make up less that 2 petcent of the total population,their presence is highly visible. There ate over twenty-five mosques inCape Town and over one hundred in Johannesburg, making minarets asfamiliar as church towers Many are histotic and/or architectuml monuments.More importantly, Muslims ate uniquely involved in the nation'scultwe and economy. The oldest extant Afrikaans-language manuscriptsare in the Arabic script, for they ate the work of Muslim slaves writingin the Dutch patois. South African historian Achrnat Davids has tracedmany linguistic elements of Afrikaans, both in vocabulary and grammar,to the influence of the Cape Muslims. Economically, the Indian Muslimsaxe the most affluent, owing primarily to the cirmmstances under whichthey came to South Africa. Muslim names on businesses and buildingsare a familiar sight in all major cities and on those UniveAty campusesthat non-Whites were allowed to attend during apartheid ...

The predominantly tropical ophionine genus Enicospilus Stephens, 1835 is one of the largest genera of Darwin wasps (Hymenoptera, Ichneumonidae), with more than 700 extant species worldwide that are usually crepuscular or nocturnal and are parasitoids of Lepidoptera larvae. In the present study, the Japanese species of Enicospilus are revised using an integrative approach (combined morphology and DNA barcoding). On the basis of 3,110 specimens, 47 Enicospilus species are recognised in Japan, eight of which are new species (E. acutus Shimizu, sp. nov., E. kunigamiensis Shimizu, sp. nov., E. limnophilus Shimizu, sp. nov., E. matsumurai Shimizu, sp. nov., E. pseudopuncticulatus Shimizu, sp. nov., E. sharkeyi Shimizu, sp. nov., E. takakuwai Shimizu, sp. nov., and E. unctus Shimizu, sp. nov.), seven are new records from Japan (E. jilinensis Tang, 1990, E. laqueatus (Enderlein, 1921), E. multidens Chiu, 1954, stat. rev., E. puncticulatus Tang, 1990, E. stenophleps Cushman, 1937, E. vestigator (Smith, 1858), and E. zeugos Chiu, 1954, stat. rev.), 32 had already been recorded in Japan; three (E. biharensis Townes, Townes &amp; Gupta, 1961, E. flavicaput (Morley, 1912), and E. merdarius (Gravenhorst, 1829)) have been erroneously recorded from Japan based on misidentifications, and four names that were previously on the Japanese list are deleted through synonymy. The following taxonomic changes are proposed: E. vacuus Gauld &amp; Mitchell, 1981, syn. nov. (= E. formosensis (Uchida, 1928)); E. multidensstat. rev.; E. striatus Cameron, 1899, syn. nov. = E. lineolatus (Roman, 1913), syn. nov. = E. uniformis Chiu, 1954, syn. nov. = E. flatus Chiu, 1954, syn. nov. = E. gussakovskii Viktorov, 1957, syn. nov. = E. striolatus Townes, Townes &amp; Gupta, 1961, syn. nov. = E. unicornis Rao &amp; Nikam, 1969, syn. nov. = E. unicornis Rao &amp; Nikam, 1970, syn. nov. (= E. pungens (Smith, 1874)); E. iracundus Chiu, 1954, syn. nov. (= E. sakaguchii (Matsumura &amp; Uchida, 1926)); E. sigmatoides Chiu, 1954, syn. nov. (= E. shikokuensis (Uchida, 1928)); E. yamanakai (Uchida, 1930), syn. nov. (= E. shinkanus (Uchida, 1928)); E. ranunculus Chiu, 1954, syn. nov. (= E. yezoensis (Uchida, 1928)); and E. zeugosstat. rev. = E. henrytownesi Chao &amp; Tang, 1991, syn. nov. In addition, the following new regional and country records are also provided: E. flavocephalus (Kirby, 1900), E. puncticulatus, and E. vestigator from the Eastern Palaearctic region, E. laqueatus from the Eastern Palaearctic and Oceanic regions, and E. maruyamanus (Uchida, 1928) from the Oriental region; E. abdominalis (Szépligeti, 1906) from Nepal, E. flavocephalus from Laos, E. formosensis from Laos and Malaysia, E. insinuator (Smith, 1860) from Taiwan, E. maruyamanus from India and Philippines, E. nigronotatus Cameron, 1903, E. riukiuensis (Matsumura &amp; Uchida, 1926), and E. sakaguchii from Indonesia, E. pungens from 14 countries (Australia, Bhutan, Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Nepal, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, and Taiwan), and E. yezoensis from South Korea. An identification key to all Japanese species of Enicospilus is proposed. Although 47 species are recognised in the present study, approximately 55 species could potentially be found in Japan based on ACE and Chao 1 estimators. The latitudinal diversity gradient of Enicospilus species richness is also tested in the Japanese archipelago based on the constructed robust taxonomic framework and extensive samples. Enicospilus species richness significantly increases towards the south, contrary to the ‘anomalous’ pattern of some other ichneumonid subfamilies.

Sri Lanka, famously called the ‘pearl of the Indian ocean’, is an island nation located in the tropics, lying off the southern tip of the Indian subcontinent. Given her favourable geostrategic position at the crossroads of major maritime routes, Sri Lanka, which is richly endowed with natural resources, has since time immemorial, been a major player in International trade. Known formerly as Serendib, Saheelan and Seylan among the Türks, Arabs and Persians, Sri Lanka, on which prophet Adam is believed to have descended when expelled from Paradise, has been immortalized in the works of numerous scholars including Mawlana Rūmī, and Katip Çelebi. Despite the fact that Süleyman the Magnificent's reign heralded the beginning of contacts between Sri Lanka and Ottoman Türkiye, official diplomatic relations were not established until Sulţan Abdül Aziz's reign in 1864. The Muslims of Si Lanka revered the Ottoman Sulţāns to the point of mentioning their names in the ‘khutba’, or sermon, during Friday prayers, and this age-old tradition continued until the reign of Sulţān Abdül Hamid II, after whom the first Muslim Boys’ School and a road in Sri Lanka are named. Unfortunately, limited research has been done on Sri Lanka-Türkiye historical relations, a subject that, despite its relevance, has received little attention. Therefore, this article, which examines Sri Lanka-Türkiye relations from ancient times to the twentieth Century, intends to enlighten the readers about the largely untold and unknown facets of our shared history and heritage. Given that Sri Lanka is one of Türkiye's important allies, raising awareness of this topic is timely, and pertinent.

The scarab beetles of the subfamily Orphninae (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae) from Sri Lanka are reviewed. Four species of the genus Orphnus Macleay, 1819, are recorded from the island: O. bicolor (Fabricius, 1801), O. parvus (Wiedemann, 1823), O. mysoriensis Westwood, 1845, and O. medvedevi sp. nov. Lectotypes are designated for the three former names. Synonymy of O. detegens Walker, 1859, and O. scitissimus Walker, 1859, is discussed. Keys, illustrations of habitus and male genitalia, and distributional record maps are given for all species.

The following new species from Mindanao, Philippines are described and illustrated: Thyreocephalus lumawigi sp. n., Achmonia davaoensis sp. n., and Manilla shavrini sp. n. In a note preoccupied names of two species from New Caledonia that I have described in the 289th contribution and one species from Sri Lanka, published in my 274th contribution is changed, relating to species of the genera Pachycorynus and Zeteotomus. New records for some species of the oriental Region are listed. Thyreocephalus depressus Bordoni, 2013, described from Yunnan, is new for Laos.

Olyra Linnaeus (1759: 238) is the best known genus of the herbaceous bamboos, belonging to the tribe Olyreae Kunth ex Spenner (1825: 172), which is composed of the subtribes Buergersiochloinae L.G.Clark & Judz. in Judziewicz & Clark (2007: 311), Parianinae Hackel (1887: 88) and Olyrinae Krombach (1875: 496) (Oliveira et al. 2014, Clark & Oliveira 2018, Ferreira et al. 2019, Oliveira et al. 2020a, Oliveira et al. 2020b). Olyra is the largest genus within the subtribe Olyrinae, including 25 species in its current delimitation, but this estimate will soon be revised since phylogenetic studies evidenced its non-monophyletic nature (Oliveira et al. 2014, Clark & Oliveira 2018, Oliveira et al. 2020a, Oliveira et al. 2020b). All species occur throughout the Neotropics, except O. latifolia Linnaeus (1759: 1261), which is also found in Africa/Madagascar and Sri Lanka (Judziewicz & Clark 2007, Ruiz-Sanchez et al. 2019).

This paper presents an improved diagnosis and definition of the genus Stenaelurillus Simon, 1886, with new taxonomic and faunistic data for 23 species. The genera Microheros Wesołowska & Cumming, 1999 and Mashonarus Wesołowska & Cumming, 2002 are synonymized with Stenaelurillus. Six new species are described: Stenaelurillus bandama sp. nov. (♂♀, from Côte d’Ivoire), S. belihuloya sp. nov. (♂, from Sri Lanka), S. jocquei sp. nov. (♂♀, from Cameroon), S. pseudoguttatus sp. nov. (♂, from Namibia), S. senegalensis sp. nov. (♂♀, from Senegal), and Stenaelurillus siyamae sp. nov. (♀, from Sudan). Lectotypes are designated for two species: S. albopunctatus Caporiacco, 1949 (♂) from Kenya and S. werneri Simon, 1906 (♀) from South Sudan. Six new combinations are proposed: Aelurillus ambiguus (Denis, 1966), comb. nov. (ex Stenaelurillus); Evarcha werneri (Simon, 1906), comb. nov. (ex Stenaelurillus); Phlegra davidi (Caleb, Mungkung & Mathai, 2015), comb. nov. (ex Mashonarus); Stenaelurillus brandbergensis (Wesołowska, 2006), comb. nov. (ex Mashonarus); Stenaelurillus guttatus (Wesołowska & Cumming, 2002), comb. nov. (ex Mashonarus); and S. termitophagus (Wesołowska & Cumming, 1999), comb. nov. (ex Microheros). Two species names are synonymized: Evarcha elegans Wesołowska & Russell-Smith, 2000 with E. werneri comb. nov.; and Aelurillus sahariensis Berland & Millot, 1941 with Stenaelurillus nigricaudus Simon, 1886. The female of S. fuscatus Wesołowska & Russell-Smith, 2000 is described for the first time.

Introduction: Since ancient times, plants contributed in the treatment of multiple disease conditions due to their immense therapeutic claims and currently serve as the principal origin of various medicinal preparations. The aim of present study is to agglomerate all available ethnomedicinal information and research updates pertaining to Erythroxylum moonii Hochr. that is used by traditional health practitioners. Materials and Methods: Reported ethnomedicinal uses of E. moonii were reviewed with the use of books and research articles with especial relevance to ethnobotany and ethnomedicine from December 2019 to September 2020. Information was categorized as per vernacular names, locality, used parts, therapeutic claims, type and mode of administration along with the ingredients and dosage forms of the preparations. Results: Erythroxylum moonii is reported in 3 countries and 2 states of India for its presence and it is observed that the plant has been utilized for therapeutic purpose as food preparations and medicinal preparations only in Sri Lanka. Its leaves (majorly) and stem bark are used in 5 different disease conditions either internally or externally. Maximum number of claims are indicated in the management of worm infestation. Among them, the leaves have the maximum application on 4 disease conditions followed by stem bark which has only one. Resent research activities have revealed the presence of anti-fungal and anti-nematodal activities of E. moonii. Conclusion: Conducting provable scientific studies (pharmacological and clinical) is needed for E. moonii to establish its multiple ethnomedicinal claims.

Introduction: Clinical diagnosis is mostly dependent on laboratory test results. Studies have shown that 70% of clinical laboratory samples are rejected due to pre-analytical errors. This study was conducted to assess; rejection rates of blood samples, major reasons for rejection of blood samples, and knowledge, attitudes and practice of nurses on blood sample collection. Methods: Details of rejected blood samples were collected using data sheets of rejected blood specimens at the Teaching Hospital Karapitiya, Sri Lanka. Knowledge, attitudes and practices of nursing officers on blood sample collection were assessed using a self-administered questionnaire. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 22. Results: Overall blood sample rejection rate was 3.3%. The major cause of rejection of blood samples was the clotting of specimens. Insufficient volume, hemolysis, unavailability of request form for investigation, discrepancies in bed head tickets, discrepancies of the names, and use of IV line for blood collection were among the other reasons for sample rejection. The highest rejection rate was reported from the samples obtained for Prothrombin time/International Normalized Ratio (PT/INR) test. According to the scores obtained for knowledge of the nurses on blood sample collection, 43% of them scored ‘average’ while 38% scored ‘good’. The nurses’ attitudes on blood sample collection were satisfactory. Conclusions: Overall rejection rate was higher in the Haematology Laboratory of Teaching Hospital Karapitiya compared to the values reported elsewhere. Although the overall knowledge of nurses was satisfactory regarding blood sample collection, aspects such as knowledge on the correct volume of blood needed for specific investigations, choosing a suitable site for blood drawing, and practices such as the provision of duly filled investigation forms need to be improved.Keywords: Rejection rate, Pre-analytical error, Haematology, Blood, Sample collection

Objective: To investigate the effects of heating on phytonutrients of cooked Vigna unigulculata. Methods: The consequences of heating on V. unigulculata were investigated by phytochemical analysis (qualitatively and quantitatively), alongside analysis of proximate contents. Five phytochemicals were quantified and nutrient contents determined. Results: Results revealed that phytochemicals in raw sample were significantly (p<0.05) higher than cooked sample. Alkaloids, saponins and flavonoids in raw black-eyed bean (RBEB) were significantly (p<0.05) higher than cooked black-eyed bean (CBEB). Meanwhile, apart from crude fat content, others (carbohydrate content, ash content, protein and fiber content) of CBEB V. unigulculata were significantly (p < 0.05) higher than RBEB V. unigulculata. Conclusions: Cooking by heating influenced a reduction of phytochemicals but an increase in proximate content in V. unigulculata. Peer Review History: Received 11 May 2021; Revised 18 June; Accepted 29 June, Available online 15 July 2021 Academic Editor: Dr. Asia Selman Abdullah, Al-Razi university, Department of Pharmacy, Yemen, asia_abdullah65@yahoo.com UJPR follows the most transparent and toughest ‘Advanced OPEN peer review’ system. The identity of the authors and, reviewers will be known to each other. This transparent process will help to eradicate any possible malicious/purposeful interference by any person (publishing staff, reviewer, editor, author, etc) during peer review. As a result of this unique system, all reviewers will get their due recognition and respect, once their names are published in the papers. We expect that, by publishing peer review reports with published papers, will be helpful to many authors for drafting their article according to the specifications. Auhors will remove any error of their article and they will improve their article(s) according to the previous reports displayed with published article(s). The main purpose of it is ‘to improve the quality of a candidate manuscript’. Our reviewers check the ‘strength and weakness of a manuscript honestly’. There will increase in the perfection, and transparency. Received file: Reviewer's Comments: Average Peer review marks at initial stage: 5.0/10 Average Peer review marks at publication stage: 7.5/10 Reviewer(s) detail: Dr. Dennis Amaechi, MrsFoluBabade Mini Estate , Flat 5 by Old Soldiers Quarter, Sabongari/Bwari, Abuja- Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria. amaechitoexcel@yahoo.com Dr. Nagalingam Varnakulenthiren, Siddha Medicine, Unit of Siddha Medicine, Trincomalee Campus, EUSL, Sri Lanka, drvarnan@gmail.com Julie Ann S. Ng, Blk 18 Lot 6 Grandville 3 Subdivision Mansilingan, Bacolod City, Philippines. julieann_ng@yahoo.com Similar Articles: A REVIEW: EFFECT OF TEMPERATURE TO ANTIOXIDANT ACTIVITY AND HCN LEVEL IN CASSAVA (MANIHOT ESCULENTA CRANTZ) LEAVES HEATING EFFECT ON PHYTOCHEMICAL AND PROXIMATE CONTENTS OF COOKED AQUEOUS EXTRACT OF PHASEOLUS VULGARIS (KIDNEY BEANS)

Deepa Mehta first attempted to shoot her film Water in the year 2000, in Varanasi, a holy city hanging on the edge of the Ganges in East-Central India. A film about the anguish of widows in 1930’s India, where widowhood was in many parts of the country taken to be a curse, an affliction that the widow paid penance for by living in renunciation of laughter and pleasure, Water points not only to the suffering of widows in colonial India but to the widow-house that still exists in Varanasi and houses poor widows in seclusion and disgrace, away from the community. The film opens the lens to the prostitution and privation experienced by many widows, as well as Gandhi’s efforts to change the laws that affected “widow remarriage.” The international filming crew was forced to shut down production after one day of shooting, following a violent uproar in the Varanasi community. These riots were fueled by the same political party coalition that was responsible for the destruction of the Babri Masjid in 1992, a Muslim religious site dating from the sixteenth-century, that was smashed to rubble when Hindu Nationalists alleged that it was the original site of a Rama temple and hence a Hindu, rather than a Muslim, site of worship. While the Water crew had permission (after a few censorship negotiations) from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to shoot the film in Varanasi, following the riots lead by these fundamentalist political parties—the BJP, the KSRSS and the VHU—the Indian government (lead by the BJP) strode in to shut down, or at the very least delay (which given the tight budget of the film amounted to the same thing), the shooting of this film. It apparently caused too much local upheaval. A few years later, Mehta managed to surreptitiously shoot this last film of the controversial trilogy in Sri Lanka, fielding and ignoring letters from the Indian government that implied that the content of the film was not very flattering to India and showed India in a poor light to the international community. The film was released worldwide in 2005. I would like to place this astringent argument that was put forward by government officials and political rioters in a historical light by locating it within anti-colonial nationalist discourse of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. This desire to mask the face of Indian oppressive patriarchy and assert moral uprightness and the ‘reform’ of women is neither new nor original, and dates back to colonial India. The British colonial government had a tendency to zero-in on instances of female oppression by Indian men to justify the fact of colonial power and domination. British rulers denounced the moral degradation and lack of initiative of Indian men as two of the reasons to continue their control of the land in face of the mounting opposition, both in India and in other parts of the world, which was rising up against colonialism and later fascism. Chatterjee analyses this facet of the nationalist movement and suggests that female emancipation was a question of importance at the turn of the century in colonial India, as Indian men defended their right to ‘protect’ their women from oppressive orthodox practices. They repeatedly asserted their ability to rule their own country, and adopt modernity, both through ‘reform’ movements and rebellious uprising. Spivak too addresses this question as it centres on the Sati debate. The immolation of widows on the funereal pyres of husbands is often cited as an example of abusive Indian patriarchy. However, even at its height in the nineteenth century, as both Spivak and Narayan point out, this custom was practiced only in one location in India, and not nationwide as is popularly believed in the West. Debates around widow immolation were an easy answer both for the British to assert moral superiority and for Indian men to claim that they would ‘reform’ the lot of their women, and carve a new, more enlightened nation. The question of ‘widow remarriage’, along with dowry and Sati, became popular issues at various times in the last hundred years when the nation wished to champion the uprightness of Indian masculine morality, and its ability to protect its women. This fretfulness by the government and other political parties over the picture of Indian women that is revealed in Water is an anxiety over the portrayal of India as backward and unenlightened, a plodding place seeped in orthodox traditions and bubbling with religious fundamentalism. It a picture that puts the West at ease in the face of the growth of economic and telecommunications power in the region, and a Western-media-driven picture that often collects self-fulfilling data, while ignoring contradictory evidence. It also points an easy finger that quells and controls the frightening Other. It is really interesting, however, that the very political parties in India who are most active in generating this criticism of the film are in fact the most strongly fundamentalist of all, and are, in a seeming contradiction, also the coalition responsible for speeding open-door economic policies along their way in the second half of the nineties in India. While the nationalist Hindutva coalition quivers at this, one could say “Orientalist” description of Indian women in Water as always-oppressed, always-victims of Indian male chauvinism, it is also this coalition that assisted economic liberalisation policies by indigenising and Orientalising Western products so that they could find an easier market within the Indian population. It seems in fact that the versions of the Indian past that can be made public with lavish additions of Orientalist signs are the ones that are marketable, like yoga, cheap booze, and tantric sex. Add to these the very exportable Indian textiles and jewelry, Indian software engineers and Indian masala films, and you have a sizzling avenue for foreign trade and investment. The versions of the Indian past that are not marketable, however, even if depicted with courage and sensitivity, like the issue of middle-class patriarchal abuse of women and lesbian relationships in Mehta’s Fire (1996), or widow-houses in Water, do not advertise a mecca for tourists or investors, and hence are beaten into oblivion by Hindu fundamentalists. While these fundamentalists wish to change the names of cities from British colonial names to ‘authentic’ Indian ones, or protest against the hosting of the Miss World pageant in India in 1995, they do, however, wish to bring in increasing amounts of foreign investment in the media, in consumer products, and in the service sector to bring new lifestyles and ideologies to the rapidly growing middle-class. While films about widows are inappropriate and apparently show India in a poor light, films about prostitutes (like Devdas released in 2002), as long as they romanticize the courtesan and act as a lure to tourists and diasporic Indians nostalgic for an ‘authentic’ Indian spiritual experience, are entirely acceptable. For fundamentalist political parties that wish to maintain or regain power it seems like an easy step to incite local populations to rise against religious minorities, homosexuals, and filmmakers who wish to document instances of abuse, so that Western imperialism can quietly slide in through the back door. Water points to the inequality between men and women, remarking on the traditional practice of an arranged match between a man in his forties or fifties with a young pre-pubescent girl. It looks closely at the custom of sending widows to live in isolation, lifelong chastity, and renunciation of ‘worldly desires’, while as little nine year old widowed Chuiya in the film points out, there is no such house for widowers. It also, however, talks about the change in laws in the late 1930’s that allowed widows to marry again after the death of their husband, and banned child marriage. It sets the film in the historic struggle of a nation trying to find its feet between Hindu nationalist traditions and British colonial ideologies, Indian aspirations for education and emancipation, and fear of cultural annihilation. Maybe if Mehta romanticized the widows’ struggle, and added a few more song and dance sequences, made the film more marketable and set it in exotic Goa, and allowed the widows to frolic in the streets decked in Indian block prints and marketable kundan jewels, fundamentalist Hindus would not find it quite as disturbing. References Bhabha, Homi. The Location of Culture. London: Routledge, 1994. Chatterjee, Partha. The Partha Chatterjee Omnibus. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999. Corbridge, Stuart, and John Harriss. Reinventing India. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2000. Levy, Emanuel. “Mehta Water”. May 2006 http://www.emanuellevy.com/article.php?articleID=2300>. Mazzarella, William. Shoveling Smoke: Advertising and Globalization in Contemporary India. Durham: Duke University Press, 2003. Meduri, Avanti. Woman, Nation, Representation. Dissertation. 1996 Narayan, Uma. “Contesting Cultures.” In The Second Wave: A Reader in Feminist Theory. Ed. Linda Nicholson. New York: Routledge, 1997. Said, Edward. Orientalism. Revised ed. New York: Vintage Books, 1994. Spivak, Gayatri. “Can the Subaltern Speak?”. In Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture. Eds. Carl Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1988. Yuen-Carrucan, Jasmine. “The Politics of Deepa Mehta’s Water” April 2000. May 2006 http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/28/water.html>. Films Devdas. Directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali. Nayyar, Mishra and Shah. 2002. Fire. Directed and Produced by Deepa Mehta. 1996. Water. Directed by Deepa Mehta. David Hamilton. 2005. Citation reference for this article MLA Style Nijhawan, Amita. "Damning the Flow: Deepa Mehta’s Water." M/C Journal 9.4 (2006). echo date('d M. Y'); ?> <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0609/3-nijhawan.php>. APA Style Nijhawan, A. (Sep. 2006) "Damning the Flow: Deepa Mehta’s Water," M/C Journal, 9(4). Retrieved echo date('d M. Y'); ?> from <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0609/3-nijhawan.php>.

IntroductionFor many, north is an abstract point on a compass, an arrow that tells you which way to hold up a map. Though scientifically defined according to the magnetic north pole, and/or the earth’s axis of rotation, these facts are not necessarily discernible to the average person. Perhaps for this reason, the Oxford English Dictionary begins with reference to the far more mundane and accessible sun and features of the human body, in defining north as; “in the direction of the part of the horizon on the left-hand side of a person facing the rising sun” (OED Online). Indeed, many of the words for ‘north’ around the world are etymologically linked to the left hand side (for example Cornish clēth ‘north, left’). We shall see later that even in English, many speakers conceptualise ‘north’ in an egocentric way. Other languages define ‘north’ in opposition to an orthogonal east-west axis defined by the sun’s rising and setting points (see, e.g., the extensive survey of Brown).Etymology aside, however, studies such as Brown’s presume a set of four cardinal directions which are available as primordial ontological categories which may (or may not) be labelled by the languages of the world. If we accept this premise, the fact that a word is translated as ‘north’ is sufficient to understand the direction it describes. There is good reason to reject this premise, however. We present data from three languages among which there is considerable variance in how the words translated as ‘north’ are typically used and understood. These languages are Kuuk Thaayorre (an Australian Aboriginal language spoken on Cape York Peninsula), Marshallese (an Oceanic language spoken in the Republic of the Marshall Islands), and Dhivehi (an Indo-Aryan language spoken in the Maldives). Lastly, we consider the results of an experiment that show Australian English speakers tend to interpret the word north according to the orientation of their own bodies and the objects they manipulate, rather than as a cardinal direction as such.‘North’ in Kuuk ThaayorreKuuk Thaayorre is a Pama-Nyungan language spoken on the west coast of Australia’s Cape York Peninsula in the community of Pormpuraaw. The Kuuk Thaayorre words equivalent to north, south, east and west (hereafter, ‘directionals’) are both complex and frequently used. They are complex in the sense that they combine with prefixes and suffixes to form dozens of words which indicate not only the direction involved, but also the degree of distance, whether there is motion from, towards, to a fixed point, or within a bounded area in that location, proximity to the local river, and more. The ubiquity of these words is illustrated by the fact that the most common greeting formula involves one person asking nhunt wanthan pal yan? ‘where are you going’ and the other responding, for example, ngay yuurriparrop yan ‘I’m going a long way southwards towards the river’, or ngay iilungkarruw yan ‘I’m coming from the northwest’. Directional terms are strewn liberally throughout Kuuk Thaayorre speech. They are employed in the description of both large-scale and small-scale spaces, whether giving directions to a far-off town, asking another person to ‘move a little to the north’, or identifying the person ‘to the east’ of another in a photograph. Likewise, directional gestures are highly frequent, sometimes augmenting the information given in the speech stream, sometimes used in the absence of spoken directions, and other times redundantly duplicating the information given by a directional word.The forms and meanings of directional words are described in detail in Gaby (Gaby 344–52). At the core of this system are six directional roots referring to the north and south banks of the nearby Edward River as well as two intersecting axes. One of these axes is equivalent to the east—west axis familiar to English speakers, and is defined by the apparent diurnal trajectory of the sun. (At a latitude of 14 degrees 54 minutes south, the Kuuk Thaayorre homeland sees little variation in the location of sunrise and sunset through the year.) While the poles of the second axis are translated by the English terms north and south, from a Western perspective this axis is skewed such that Kuuk Thaayorre -ungkarr ‘~north’ lies approximately 35 degrees west of magnetic north. Rather than being defined by magnetic or polar north, this axis aligns with the local coastline. This is true even when the terms are used at inland locations where there is no visual access to the water or parallel sand ridges. How Kuuk Thaayorre speakers apply this system to environments further removed from this particular stretch of coast—especially in the presence of a differently-oriented coast—remains a topic for future research.‘North’ in MarshalleseMarshallese is the language of the people of the Marshall Islands, an expansive archipelago consisting of 22 inhabited atolls and three inhabited non-atoll islands located in the Northern Pacific. The Marshallese have a long history as master navigators, a skill necessary to keep strong links between far-flung and disparate islands (Lewis; Genz).Figure 1: The location of the Marshall IslandsAs with other Pacific languages (e.g. Palmer; Ross; François), Marshallese deploys a complex system of geocentric references. Cardinal directions are historically derived from the Pacific trade winds, reflecting the importance of these winds for navigation and wayfinding. The etymologies of the Marshallese directions are shown in Table 1 below. The terms given in this table are in the Ralik dialect, spoken in the western Marshall Islands. The terms used in the Ratak (eastern) dialect are related, but slightly different in form. See Schlossberg for more detailed discussion. Etymologies originally sourced from Bender et al. and Ross.Table 1: Marshallese cardinal direction words with etymological source semantics EastWestNorthSouthNoun formrearrilik iōn̄ rōkEtymology‘calm shore (of islet)’‘rough shore (of islet)’‘windy season’; ‘season of northerly winds’‘dry season’; ‘season of southerly winds’Verb modifier formtatonin̄a rōn̄aEtymology‘up(wind)’‘down(wind)’‘windy season’; ‘season of northerly winds’‘dry season’; ‘season of southerly winds’As with many other Oceanic languages, Marshallese has three domains of spatial language use: the local domain, the inshore-maritime domain and the navigational domain. Cardinal directions are the sole strategy employed in the navigational domain, which occurs when sailing on the open ocean. In the inshore-maritime domain, which applies when sailing on the ocean or lagoon in sight of land, a land-sea axis is used (The question of whether, in fact, these directions form axes as such is considered further below). Similarly, when walking around an island, a calm side-rough side (of island) axis is employed. In both situations, either the cardinal north-south axis or east-west axis is used to form a secondary cross-axis to the topography-based axis. The cardinal axis parallel to the calm-rough or land-sea axis is rarely used. When the island is not oriented perfectly perpendicular to one of the cardinal axes, the cardinal axes rotate such that they are perpendicular to the primary axis. This can result in the orientation of iōn̄ ‘north’ being quite skewed away from ‘true’ north. An example of how the cardinal and topographic axes prototypically work is exemplified in Figure 2, which shows Jabor, an islet in Jaluit Atoll in the south-west Marshalls.Figure 2: The geocentric directional system of Jabor, Jaluit AtollWhile cartographic cardinal directions comprise two perpendicular axes, this is not the case for many Marshallese. The clearest evidence for this is the directional system of Kili Island, a small non-atoll island approximately 50km west of Jaluit Atoll. The directional system of Kili is similar to that of Jabor, with one notable exception; the iōn̄-rōk ‘north-south’ and rear-rilik ‘east-west’ axes are not perpendicular but rather parallel (Figure 3) The rear-rilik axis takes precedence and the iōn̄-rōk axis is rarely used, showing the primacy of the east-west axis on Kili. This is a clear indication that the Western abstraction of crossed cardinal axes is not in play in the Marshall Islands; the iōn̄-rōk and rear-rilik axes can function completely independently of one another.Figure 3: Geocentric system of spatial reference on KiliSpringdale is a small city in north-west of the landlocked state of Arkansas. It hosts the largest number of expatriate Marshallese in the United States. Of 26 participants in an object placement task, four respondents were able to correctly identify the four cardinal points (Schlossberg). Aside from some who said they simply did not know others gave a variety of answers, including that iōn̄, rōk, rilik and rear only exist in the Marshall Islands. Others imagined a canonical orientation derived from their home atoll and transposed this onto their current environment; one person who was facing the front door in their house in Springdale reported that they imagined they were in their house in the Marshall Islands, where when oriented towards the door, they were facing iōn̄ ‘north’, thus deriving an orientation with respect to a Marshallese cardinal direction. Aside from the four participants who identified the directions correctly, a further six participants responded in a consistent—if incorrect—way, i.e. although the directions were not correctly identified, the responses were consistent with the conceptualisation of crossed cardinal axes, merely that the locations identified were rotated from their true referents. This leaves 16 of the 26 participants (62%) who did not display evidence of having a conceptual system of two crossed cardinal axes.If one were to point in a direction and say ‘this is north’, most Westerners would easily be able to identify ‘south’ by pointing in the opposite direction. This is not the case with Marshallese speakers, many of whom are unable to do the same if given a Marshallese cardinal direction and asked to name its opposite (cf. Schlossberg). This demonstrates that for many Marshallese, each of these cardinal terms do not form axes at all, but rather are four unique locally-anchored points.‘North’ in DhivehiDhivehi is spoken in the Maldives, an archipelago to the southwest of India and Sri Lanka in the Indian Ocean (see Figure 4). Maldivians have a long history of sailing on the open waters, in order to fish and to trade. Traditionally, much of the adult male population would spend long periods of time on such voyages, riding the trade winds and navigating by the stars. For Maldivians, uturu ‘north’ is a direction of safety—the long axis of the Maldivian archipelago runs north to south, and so by sailing north, one has the best possible chance of reaching another island or (eventually) the mainlands of India or Sri Lanka.Figure 4: Location of the MaldivesIt is perhaps unsurprising, then, that many Maldivians are well attuned to the direction denoted by uturu ‘north’, as well as to the other cardinal directions. In an object placement task performed by 41 participants in Laamu Atoll, 32 participants (78%) correctly placed a plastic block ‘to the north’ (uturaṣ̊) of another block when instructed to do so (Lum). The prompts dekonaṣ̊ ‘to the south’ and huḷangaṣ̊ ‘to the west’ yielded similarly high rates of correct responses, though as many as 37 participants (90%) responded correctly to the prompt iraṣ̊ ‘to the east’—this is perhaps because the term for ‘east’ also means ‘sun’ and is strongly associated with the sunrise, whereas the terms for the other cardinal directions are comparatively opaque. However, the path of the sun is not the only environmental cue that shapes the use of Dhivehi cardinal directions. As in Kuuk Thaayorre and Marshallese, cardinal directions in Dhivehi are often ‘calibrated’ according to the orientation of local coastlines. In Fonadhoo, for example, which is oriented northeast to southwest, the system of cardinal directions is rotated about 45 degrees clockwise: uturu ‘north’ points to what is actually northeast and dekona/dekunu ‘south’ to what is actually southwest (i.e., along the length of the island), while iru/iramati ‘east’ and huḷangu ‘west’ are perpendicular to shore (see Figure 5). However, despite this rotated system being in use, residents of Fonadhoo often comment that these are not the ‘real’ cardinal directions, which are determined by the path of the sun.Figure 5: Directions in Fonadhoo, Laamu Atoll, MaldivesIn addition to the four cardinal directions, Dhivehi possesses four intercardinal directions, which are compound terms: iru-uturu ‘northeast’, iru-dekunu ‘southeast’, huḷangu-uturu ‘northwest’, and huḷangu-dekunu ‘southwest’. Yet even a system of eight compass points is not sufficient for describing directions over long distances, especially on the open sea where there are no landmarks to refer to. A system of 32 ‘sidereal’ compass directions (see Figure 6), based on the rising and setting points of stars in the night sky, is available for such purposes—for example, simāgu īran̊ ‘Arcturus rising’ points ENE or 67.5°, while simāgu astamān̊ ‘Arcturus setting’ points WNW or 292.5°. (These Dhivehi names for the sidereal directions are borrowings from Arabic, and were probably introduced by Arab seafarers in the medieval period, see Lum 174-79). Eight sidereal directions coincide with the basic (inter)cardinal directions of the solar compass described earlier. For example, gahā ‘Polaris’ in the sidereal compass corresponds exactly with uturu ‘north’ in the solar compass. Thus Dhivehi has both a sidereal ‘north’ and a solar ‘north’, though the latter is sometimes rotated according to local topography. However, the system of sidereal compass directions has largely fallen out of use, and is known only to older and some middle-aged men. This appears to be due to the diversification of the Maldivian economy in recent decades along with the modernisation of Maldivian fishing vessels, including the introduction of GPS technology. Nonetheless, fishermen and fishing communities use solar compass directions much more frequently than other groups in the Maldives (Lum; Palmer et al.), and some of the oldest men still use sidereal compass directions occasionally.Figure 6: Dhivehi sidereal compass with directions in Thaana script (used with kind permission of Abdulla Rasheed and Abdulla Zuhury)‘North’ in EnglishThe traditional definition of north in terms of Magnetic North or Geographic North is well known to native English speakers and may appear relatively straightforward. In practice, however, the use and interpretation of north is more variable. English speakers generally draw on cardinal directions only in restricted circumstances, i.e. in large-scale geographical or navigational contexts rather than, for example, small-scale configurations of manipulable objects (Majid et al. 108). Consequently, most English speakers do not need to maintain a mental compass to keep track of North at all times. So, if English speakers are generally unaware of where North is, how do they perform when required to use it?A group of 36 Australian English speakers participated in an experimental task where they were presented with a stimulus object (in this case, a 10cm wide cube) while facing S72ºE (Poulton). They were then handed another cube and asked to place it next to the stimulus cube in a particular direction (e.g. ‘put this cube to the north of that cube’). Participants completed a total of 48 trials, including each of the four cardinal directions as target, as well as expressions such as behind, in front of and to the left of. As shown in Figure 7, participants’ responses were categorised in one of three ways: correct, near-correct, or incorrect.Figure 7: Possible responses to prompt of north: A = correct, B = near-correct (aligned with the side of stimulus object closest to north), C = incorrect.Every participant placed their cube in alignment with the axes of the stimulus object (i.e. responses B and C in Figure 7). Orientation to Magnetic/Geographic North was thus insufficient to override the local cues of the task at hand. The 9% of participants showed some awareness of the location of Magnetic/Geographic North, however, by making the near-correct response type B. No participants who behaved in such a way expressed certainty in their responses, however. Most commonly, they calculated the rough direction concerned by triangulating with local landmarks such as nearby roads, or the location of Melbourne’s CBD (as verbally expressed both during the task and during an informal interview afterwards).The remaining 91% of participants’ responses were entirely incorrect. Of these, 13.2% involved similar thought processes as the near-correct responses, but did not result in the identification of the closest side of the stimulus to the instructed direction. However, 77.8% of the total participants interpreted north as the far side of the stimulus. While such responses were classified incorrect on the basis of Magnetic or Geographic North, they were consistent with one another and correct with respect to an alternative definition of English north in terms of the participant’s own body. One of the participants alludes to this alternative definition, asking “Do you mean my North or physical North?”. We refer to this alternative definition as Relative North. Relative North is not bound to any given point on the Earth or a derivation of the sun’s position; instead, it is entirely bound to the perceiver’s own orientation. This equates the north direction with forward and the other cardinals’ points are derived from this reference point (see Figure 8). Map-reading practices likely support the development of the secondary, Relative sense of North.Figure 8: Relative North and the Relative directions derived from itConclusionWe have compared the words closest in meaning to the English word north in four entirely unrelated languages. In the Australian Aboriginal language Kuuk Thaayorre, the ‘north’ direction aligns with the local coast, pointing in a direction 35 degrees west of Magnetic North. In Marshallese, the compass direction corresponding to ‘north’ is different for each island, being defined in opposition to an axis running between the ocean and lagoon sides of that island. The Dhivehi ‘north’ direction may be defined either in opposition to the (sun-based) east-west axis, calibrated to the configuration of the local island, as in Marshallese, or defined in terms of Polaris, the Pole star. In all these cases, though, the system of directions is anchored by properties of the external environment. English speakers, by contrast, are shown to—at least some of the time—define north with reference to their own embodied perspective, as the direction extending outwards from the front of their bodies. These findings demonstrate that, far from being universal, ‘north’ is a culture-specific category. As such, great care must be taken when translating or drawing equivalencies between these concepts across languages.ReferencesBender, Byron W., et al. “Proto-Micronesian Reconstructions: I.” Oceanic Linguistics 42.1 (2003): 1–110.Brown, Cecil H. “Where Do Cardinal Direction Terms Come From?” Anthropological Linguistics 25.2 (1983): 121–161. François, Alexandre. “Reconstructing the Geocentric System of Proto-Oceanic.” Oceanic Linguistics 43.1 (2004): 1–31. Gaby, Alice R. A Grammar of Kuuk Thaayorre. Vol. 74. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton, 2017.Genz, Joseph. “Complementarity of Cognitive and Experiential Ways of Knowing the Ocean in Marshallese Navigation.” Ethos 42.3 (2014): 332–351.Lewis, David Henry. We, the Navigators: The Ancient Art of Landfinding in the Pacific. 2nd ed. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1994. Lum, Jonathon. "Frames of Spatial Reference in Dhivehi Language and Cognition." PhD Thesis. Melbourne: Monash University, 2018. Majid, Asifa, et al. “Can Language Restructure Cognition? The Case for Space.” Trends in Cognitive Sciences 8.3 (2004): 108–114.OED Online. “North, Adv., Adj., and N.” Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press. <http://www.oed.com.ezproxy.lib.monash.edu.au/view/Entry/128325>.Palmer, Bill. “Absolute Spatial Reference and the Grammaticalisation of Perceptually Salient Phenomena.” Representing Space in Oceania: Culture in Language and Mind. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics, 2002. 107–133. ———, et al. "“Sociotopography: The Interplay of Language, Culture, and Environment.” Linguistic Typology 21.3 (2017). DOI:10.1515/lingty-2017-0011.Poulton, Thomas. “Exploring Space: Frame-of-Reference Selection in English.” Honours Thesis. Melbourne: Monash University, 2016.Ross, Malcolm D. “Talking about Space: Terms of Location and Direction.” The Lexicon of Proto-Oceanic: The Culture and Environment of Ancestral Oceanic Society: The Physical Environment. Eds. Malcolm D. Ross, Andrew Pawley, and Meredith Osmond. Vol. 2. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics, 2003. 229–294. Schlossberg, Jonathan. Atolls, Islands and Endless Suburbia: Spatial Reference in Marshallese. PhD thesis. Newcastle: University of Newcastle, in preparation.

“There is nothing more public than privacy.” (Berlant and Warner, Sex) How did it come to this? How did it happen that a one-off, two-hour event at a public swimming pool in a suburb of outer Melbourne ignited international hate mail and generated media-fanned political anguish and debate about the proper use of public spaces? In 2010, women who attend a women’s only swim session on Sunday evenings at the Dandenong Oasis public swimming pool asked the pool management and the local council for permission to celebrate the end of Ramadan at the pool during the time of their regular swim session. The request was supported by the pool managers and the council and promoted by both as an opportunity for family and friends to get together in a spirit of multicultural learning and understanding. Responding to criticisms of the event as an unreasonable claim on public facilities by one group, the Mayor of the City of Greater Dandenong, Jim Memeti, rejected claims that this event discriminates against non-Muslim residents of the suburb. But here’s the rub. The event, to be held after hours at the pool, requires all participants older than ten years of age to follow a dress code of knee-length shorts and T-shirts. This is a suburban moment that is borne of but exceeds the local. It reflects and responds to a contemporary global conundrum of great political and theoretical significance—how to negotiate and govern the relations between multiculturalism, religion, gender, sexual freedom, and democracy. Specifically this event speaks to how multicultural democracy in the public sphere negotiates the public presence and expression of different cultural and religious frameworks related to gender and sexuality. This is demanding political stuff. Situated in the messy political and theoretical terrains of the relation between public space and the public sphere, this local moment called for political judgement about how cultural differences should be allowed to manifest in and through public space, giving consideration to the potential effects of these decisions on an inclusive multicultural democracy. The local authorities in Dandenong engaged in an admirable process of democratic labour as they puzzled over how to make decisions that were responsible and equitable, in the absence of a rulebook or precedents for success. Ultimately however this mode of experimental decision-making, which will become increasingly necessary to manage such predicaments in the future, was foreclosed by unwarranted and unhelpful media outrage. "Foreclosed" here stresses the preemptive nature of the loss; a lost opportunity for trialing approaches to governing cultural diversity that may fail, but might then be modified. It was condemned in advance of either success or failure. The role of the media rather than the discomfort of the local publics has been decisive in this event.This Multicultural SuburbDandenong is approximately 30 kilometres southeast of central Melbourne. Originally home to the Bunorong People of the Kulin nation, it was settled by pastoralists by the 1800s, heavily industrialised during the twentieth century, and now combines cultural diversity with significant social disadvantage. The City of Greater Dandenong is proud of its reputation as the most culturally and linguistically diverse municipality in Australia. Its population of approximately 138,000 comprises residents from 156 different language groups. More than half (56%) of its population was born overseas, with 51% from nations where English is not the main spoken language. These include Vietnam, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, India, China, Italy, Greece, Bosnia and Afghanistan. It is also a place of significant religious diversity with residents identifying as Buddhist (15 per cent) Muslim (8 per cent), Hindu (2 per cent) and Christian (52 per cent) [CGD]. Its city logo, “Great Place, Great People” evokes its twin pride in the placemaking power of its diverse population. It is also a brazen act of civic branding to counter its reputation as a derelict and dangerous suburb. In his recent book The Bogan Delusion, David Nichols cites a "bogan" website that names Dandenong as one of Victoria’s two most bogan areas. The other was Moe. (p72). The Sunday Age newspaper had already depicted Dandenong as one of two excessively dangerous suburbs “where locals fear to tread” (Elder and Pierik). The other suburb of peril was identified as Footscray.Central Dandenong is currently the site of Australia’s largest ever state sponsored Urban Revitalisation program with a budget of more than $290 million to upgrade infrastructure, that aims to attract $1billion in private investment to provide housing and future employment.The Cover UpIn September 2010, the Victorian and Civil and Administrative Appeals Tribunal (VCAT) granted the YMCA an exemption from the Equal Opportunity Act to allow a dress code for the Ramadan event at the Oasis swimming pool that it manages. The "Y" sees the event as “an opportunity for the broader community to learn more about Ramadan and the Muslim faith, and encourages all members of Dandenong’s diverse community to participate” (YMCA Ramadan). While pool management and the municipal council refer to the event as an "opening up" of the closed swimming session, the media offer a different reading of the VCAT decision. The trope of the "the cover up" has framed most reports and commentaries (Murphy; Szego). The major focus of the commentaries has not been the event per se, but the call to dress "appropriately." Dress codes however are a cultural familiar. They exist for workplaces, schools, nightclubs, weddings, racing and sporting clubs and restaurants, to name but a few. While some of these codes or restrictions are normatively imposed rather than legally required, they are not alien to cultural life in Australia. Moreover, there are laws that prohibit people from being meagerly dressed or naked in public, including at beaches, swimming pools and so on. The dress code for this particular swimming pool event was, however, perceived to be unusual and, in a short space of time, "unusual" converted to "social threat."Responses to media polls about the dress code reveal concerns related to the symbolic dimensions of the code. The vast majority of those who opposed the Equal Opportunity exemption saw it as the thin edge of the multicultural wedge, a privatisation of public facilities, or a denial of the public’s right to choose how to dress. Tabloid newspapers reported on growing fears of Islamisation, while the more temperate opposition situated the decision as a crisis of human rights associated with tolerating illiberal cultural practices. Julie Szego reflects this view in an opinion piece in The Age newspaper:the Dandenong pool episode is neither trivial nor insignificant. It is but one example of human rights laws producing outcomes that restrict rights. It raises tough questions about how far public authorities ought to go in accommodating cultural practices that sit uneasily with mainstream Western values. (Szego)Without enquiring into the women’s request and in the absence of the women’s views about what meaning the event held for them, most media commentators and their electronically wired audiences treated the announcement as yet another alarming piece of evidence of multicultural failure and the potential Islamisation of Australia. The event raised specific concerns about the double intrusion of cultural difference and religion. While the Murdoch tabloid Herald Sun focused on the event as “a plan to force families to cover up to avoid offending Muslims at a public event” (Murphy) the liberal Age newspaper took a more circumspect approach, reporting on its small vox pop at the Dandenong pool. Some people here referred to the need to respect religions and seemed unfazed by the exemption and the event. Those who disagreed thought it was important not to enforce these (dress) practices on other people (Carey).It is, I believe, significant that several employees of the local council informed me that most of the opposition has come from the media, people outside of Dandenong and international groups who oppose the incursion of Islam into non-Islamic settings. Opposition to the event did not appear to derive from local concern or opposition.The overwhelming majority of Herald Sun comments expressed emphatic opposition to the dress code, citing it variously as unAustralian, segregationist, arrogant, intolerant and sexist. The Herald Sun polled readers (in a self-selecting and of course highly unrepresentative on-line poll) asking them to vote on whether or not they agreed with the VCAT exemption. While 5.52 per cent (512 voters) agreed with the ruling, 94.48 per cent (8,760) recorded disagreement. In addition, the local council has, for the first time in memory, received a stream of hate-mail from international anti-Islam groups. Muslim women’s groups, feminists, the Equal Opportunity Commissioner and academics have also weighed in. According to local reports, Professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Melbourne, Shahram Akbarzadeh, considered the exemption was “nonsense” and would “backfire and the people who will pay for it will be the Muslim community themselves” (Haberfield). He repudiated it as an example of inclusion and tolerance, labeling it “an effort of imposing a value system (sic)” (Haberfield). He went so far as to suggest that, “If Tony Abbott wanted to participate in his swimwear he wouldn’t be allowed in. That’s wrong.” Tasneem Chopra, chairwoman of the Islamic Women’s Welfare Council and Sherene Hassan from the Islamic Council of Victoria, both expressed sensitivity to the group’s attempt to establish an inclusive event but would have preferred the dress code to be a matter of choice rather coercion (Haberfield, "Mayor Defends Dandenong Pool Cover Up Order"). Helen Szoke, the Commissioner of the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission, defended the pool’s exemption from the Law that she oversees. “Matters such as this are not easy to resolve and require a balance to be achieved between competing rights and obligations. Dress codes are not uncommon: e.g., singlets, jeans, thongs etc in pubs/hotels” (in Murphy). The civil liberties organisation, Liberty Victoria, supported the ban because the event was to be held after hours (Murphy). With astonishing speed this single event not only transformed the suburban swimming pool to a theatre of extra-local disputes about who and what is entitled to make claims on public space and publically funded facilities, but also fed into charged debates about the future of multiculturalism and the vulnerability of the nation to the corrosive effects of cultural and religious difference. In this sense suburbs like Dandenong are presented as sites that not only generate fear about physical safety but whose suburban sensitivities to its culturally diverse population represent a threat to the safety of the nation. Thus the event both reflects and produces an antipathy to cultural difference and to the place where difference resides. This aversion is triggered by and mediated in this case through the figure, rather than the (corpo)reality, of the Muslim woman. In this imagining, the figure of the Muslim woman is assigned the curious symbolic role of "cultural creep." The debates around the pool event is not about the wellbeing or interests of the Muslim women themselves, nor are broader debates about the perceived, culturally-derived restrictions imposed on Muslim women living in Australia or other western countries. The figure of the Muslim woman is, I would argue, simply the ground on which the debates are held. The first debate relates to social and public space, access to which is considered fundamental to freedom and participatory democracy, and in current times is addressed in terms of promoting inclusion, preventing exclusion and finding opportunities for cross cultural encounters. The second relates not to public space per se, but to the public sphere or the “sphere of private people coming together as a public” for political deliberation (Habermas 21). The literature and discussions dealing with these two terrains have remained relatively disconnected (Low and Smith) with public space referring largely to activities and opportunities in the socio-cultural domain and the public sphere addressing issues of politics, rights and democracy. This moment in Dandenong offers some modest leeway for situating "the suburb" as an ideal site for coalescing these disparate discussions. In this regard I consider Iveson’s provocative and productive question about whether some forms of exclusions from suburban public space may actually deepen the democratic ideals of the public sphere. Exclusions may in such cases be “consistent with visions of a democratically inclusive city” (216). He makes his case in relation to a dispute about the exclusion of men exclusion from a women’s only swimming pool in the Sydney suburb of Coogee. The Dandenong case is similarly exclusive with an added sense of exclusion generated by an "inclusion with restrictions."Diversity, Difference, Public Space and the Public SphereAs a prelude to this discussion of exclusion as democracy, I return to the question that opened this article: how did it come to this? How is it that Australia has moved from its renowned celebration and pride in its multiculturalism so much in evidence at the suburban level through what Ghassan Hage calls an “unproblematic” multiculturalism (233) and what others have termed “everyday multiculturalism” (Wise and Velayutham). Local cosmopolitanisms are often evinced through the daily rituals of people enjoying the ethnic cuisines of their co-residents’ pasts, and via moments of intercultural encounter. People uneventfully rub up against and greet each other or engage in everyday acts of kindness that typify life in multicultural suburbs, generating "reservoirs of hope" for democratic and cosmopolitan cities (Thrift 147). In today’s suburbs, however, the “Imperilled Muslim women” who need protection from “dangerous Muslim men” (Razack 129) have a higher discursive profile than ethnic cuisine as the exemplar of multiculturalism. Have we moved from pleasure to hostility or was the suburban pleasure in racial difference always about a kind of “eating the other” (bell hooks 378). That is to ask whether our capacity to experience diversity positively has been based on consumption, consuming the other for our own enrichment, whereas living with difference entails a commitment not to consumption but to democracy. This democratic multicultural commitment is a form of labour rather than pleasure, and its outcome is not enrichment but transformation (although this labour can be pleasurable and transformation might be enriching). Dandenong’s prized cultural precincts, "Little India" and the "Afghan bazaar" are showcases of food, artefacts and the diversity of the suburb. They are centres of pleasurable and exotic consumption. The pool session, however, requires one to confront difference. In simple terms we can think about ethnic food, festivals and handicrafts as cultural diversity, and the Muslim woman as cultural difference.This distinction between diversity and difference is useful for thinking through the relation between multiculturalism in public space and multicultural democracy of the public sphere. According to the anthropologist Thomas Hylland Eriksen, while a neoliberal sensibility supports cultural diversity in the public space, cultural difference is seen as a major cause of social problems associated with immigrants, and has a diminishing effect on the public sphere (14). According to Eriksen, diversity is understood as aesthetic, or politically and morally neutral expressions of culture that are enriching (Hage 118) or digestible. Difference, however, refers to morally objectionable cultural practices. In short, diversity is enriching. Difference is corrosive. Eriksen argues that differences that emerge from distinct cultural ideas and practices are deemed to create conflicts with majority cultures, weaken social solidarity and lead to unacceptable violations of human rights in minority groups. The suburban swimming pool exists here at the boundary of diversity and difference, where the "presence" of diverse bodies may enrich, but their different practices deplete and damage existing culture. The imperilled Muslim woman of the suburbs carries a heavy symbolic load. She stands for major global contests at the border of difference and diversity in three significant domains, multiculturalism, religion and feminism. These three areas are positioned simultaneously in public space and of the public sphere and she embodies a specific version of each in this suburban setting. First, there a global retreat from multiculturalism evidenced in contemporary narratives that describe multiculturalism (both as official policy and unofficial sensibility) as failed and increasingly ineffective at accommodating or otherwise dealing with religious, cultural and ethnic differences (Cantle; Goodhart; Joppke; Poynting and Mason). In the UK, Europe, the US and Australia, popular media sources and political discourses speak of "parallel lives,"immigrant enclaves, ghettoes, a lack of integration, the clash of values, and illiberal cultural practices. The covered body of the Muslim woman, and more particularly the Muslim veil, are now read as visual signs of this clash of values and of the refusal to integrate. Second, religion has re-emerged in the public domain, with religious groups and individuals making particular claims on public space both on the basis of their religious identity and in accord with secular society’s respect for religious freedom. This is most evident in controversies in France, Belgium and Netherlands associated with banning niqab in public and other religious symbols in schools, and in Australia in court. In this sense the covered Muslim woman raises concerns and indignation about the rightful place of religion in the public sphere and in social space. Third, feminism is increasingly invoked as the ground from which claims about the imperilled Muslim woman are made, particularly those about protecting women from their dangerous men. The infiltration of the Muslim presence into public space is seen as a threat to the hard won gains of women’s freedom enjoyed by the majority population. This newfound feminism of the public sphere, posited by those who might otherwise disavow feminism, requires some serious consideration. This public discourse rarely addresses the discrimination, violation and lack of freedom experienced systematically on an everyday basis by women of majority cultural backgrounds in western societies (such as Australia). However, the sexism of racially and religiously different men is readily identified and decried. This represents a significant shift to a dubious feminist register of the public sphere such that: “[w]omen of foreign origin, ...more specifically Muslim women…have replaced the traditional housewife as the symbol of female subservience” (Tissot 41–42).The three issues—multiculturalism, religion and feminism—are, in the Dandenong pool context, contests about human rights, democracy and the proper use of public space. Szego’s opinion piece sees the Dandenong pool "cover up" as an example of the conundrum of how human rights for some may curtail the human rights of others and lead us into a problematic entanglement of universal "rights," with claims of difference. In her view the combination of human rights and multiculturalism in the case of the Dandenong Pool accommodates illiberal practices that put the rights of "the general public" at risk, or as she puts it, on a “slippery slope” that results in a “watering down of our human rights.” Ideas that entail women making a claim for private time in public space are ultimately not good for "us."Such ideas run counter to the West's more than 500-year struggle for individual freedom—including both freedom of religion and freedom from religion—and for gender equality. Our public authorities ought to be pushing back hardest when these values are under threat. Yet this is precisely where they've been buckling under pressure (Szego)But a different reading of the relation between public and private space, human rights, democracy and gender freedom is readily identifiable in the Dandenong event—if one looks for it. Living with difference, I have already suggested, is a problem of democracy and the public sphere and does not so easily correspond to consuming diversity, as it demands engagement with cultural difference. In what remains, I explore how multicultural democracy in the public sphere and women’s rights in public and private realms relate, firstly, to the burgeoning promise of democracy and civility that might emerge in public space through encounter and exchange. I also point out how this moment in Dandenong might be read as a singular contribution to dealing with this global problematic of living with difference; of democracy in the public sphere. Public urban space has become a focus for speculation among geographers and sociologists in particular, about the prospects for an enhanced civic appreciation of living with difference through encountering strangers. Random and repetitious encounters with people from all cultures typify contemporary urban life. It remains an open question however as to whether these encounters open up or close down possibilities for conviviality and understanding, and whether they undo or harden peoples’ fears and prejudices. There is, however, at least in some academic and urban planning circles, some hope that the "throwntogetherness" (Massey) and the "doing" of togetherness (Laurier and Philo) found in the multicultural city may generate some lessons and opportunities for developing a civic culture and political commitment to living with difference. Alongside the optimism of those who celebrate the city, the suburb, and public spaces as forging new ways of living with difference, there are those such as Gill Valentine who wonder how this might be achieved in practice (324). Ash Amin similarly notes that city or suburban public spaces are not necessarily “the natural servants of multicultural engagement” (Ethnicity 967). Amin and Valentine point to the limited or fleeting opportunities for real engagement in these spaces. Moreover Valentine‘s research in the UK revealed that the spatial proximity found in multicultural spaces did not so much give rise to greater mutual respect and engagement, but to a frustrated “white self-segregation in the suburbs.” She suggests therefore that civility and polite exchange should not be mistaken for respect (324). Amin contends that it is the “micro-publics” of social encounters found in workplaces, schools, gardens, sports clubs [and perhaps swimming pools] rather than the fleeting encounters of the street or park, that offer better opportunities for meaningful intercultural exchange. The Ramadan celebration at the pool, with its dress code and all, might be seen more fruitfully as a purposeful event engaging a micro-public in which people are able to “break out of fixed relations and fixed notions” and “learn to become different” (Amin, Ethnicity 970) without that generating discord and resentment.Micropublics, Subaltern Publics and a Democracy of (Temporary) ExclusionsIs this as an opportunity to bring the global and local together in an experiment of forging new democratic spaces for gender, sexuality, culture and for living with difference? More provocatively, can we see exclusion and an invitation to share in this exclusion as a precursor to and measure of, actually existing democracy? Painter and Philo have argued that democratic citizenship is questionable if “people cannot be present in public spaces (streets, squares, parks, cinemas, churches, town halls) without feeling uncomfortable, victimized and basically ‘out of place’…" (Iveson 216). Feminists have long argued that distinctions between public and private space are neither straightforward nor gender neutral. For Nancy Fraser the terms are “cultural classifications and rhetorical labels” that are powerful because they are “frequently deployed to delegitimate some interests, views and topics and to valorize others” (73). In relation to women and other subordinated minorities, the "rhetoric of privacy" has been historically used to restrict the domain of legitimate public contestation. In fact the notion of what is public and particularly notions of the "public interest" and the "public good" solidify forms of subordination. Fraser suggests the concept of "subaltern counterpublics" as an alternative to notions of "the public." These are discursive spaces where groups articulate their needs, and demands are circulated formulating their own public sphere. This challenges the very meaning and foundational premises of ‘the public’ rather than simply positing strategies of inclusion or exclusion. The twinning of Amin’s notion of "micro-publics" and Fraser’s "counterpublics" is, I suggest, a fruitful approach to interpreting the Dandenong pool issue. It invites a reading of this singular suburban moment as an experiment, a trial of sorts, in newly imaginable ways of living democratically with difference. It enables us to imagine moments when a limited democratic right to exclude might create the sorts of cultural exchanges that give rise to a more authentic and workable recognition of cultural difference. I am drawn to think that this is precisely the kind of democratic experimentation that the YMCA and Dandenong Council embarked upon when they applied for the Equal Opportunity exemption. I suggest that by trialing, rather than fixing forever a "critically exclusive" access to the suburban swimming pool for two hours per year, they were in fact working on the practical problem of how to contribute in small but meaningful ways to a more profoundly free democracy and a reworked public sphere. In relation to the similar but distinct example of the McIver pool for women and children in Coogee, New South Wales, Kurt Iveson makes the point that such spaces of exclusion or withdrawal, “do not necessarily serve simply as spaces where people ‘can be themselves’, or as sites through which reified identities are recognised—in existing conditions of inequality, they can also serve as protected spaces where people can take the risk of exploring who they might become with relative safety from attack and abuse” (226). These are necessary risks to take if we are to avoid entrenching fear of difference in a world where difference is itself deeply, and permanently, entrenched.ReferencesAmin, Ash. “Ethnicity and the Multicultural City: Living with Diversity.” Environment and Planning A 34 (2002): 959–80.———. “The Good City.” Urban Studies 43 (2006): 1009–23.Berlant, Lauren, and Michael Warner. “Sex in Public.” Critical Inquiry 24 (1998): 547–66.Cantle, Ted. Community Cohesion: A Report of the Independent Review Team. 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