Journal articles on the topic 'Subsequent search miss'

When searching a visual image that contains multiple target objects of interest, human subjects often show a satisfaction of search (SOS) effect, whereby if the subjects find one target, they are less likely to find additional targets in the image. Reducing SOS or, equivalently, subsequent search miss (SSM), is of great significance in many real-world situations where it is of paramount importance to find all targets in a given image, not just one. However, studies have shown that even highly trained and experienced subjects, such as expert radiologists, are subject to SOS. Here, using the detection of camouflaged objects (or camouflage-breaking) as an illustrative case, we demonstrate that when naïve subjects are trained to detect camouflaged objects more effectively, it has the side effect of reducing subjects’ SOS. We tested subjects in the SOS task before and after they were trained in camouflage-breaking. During SOS testing, subjects viewed naturalistic scenes that contained zero, one, or two targets, depending on the image. As expected, before camouflage-training, subjects showed a strong SOS effect, whereby if they had found a target with relatively high visual saliency in a given image, they were less likely to have also found a lower-saliency target when one existed in the image. Subjects were then trained in the camouflage-breaking task to criterion using non-SOS images, i.e., camouflage images that contained zero or one target. Surprisingly, the trained subjects no longer showed significant levels of SOS. This reduction was specific to the particular background texture in which the subjects received camouflage training; subjects continued to show significant SOS when tested using a different background texture in which they did not receive camouflage training. A separate experiment showed that the reduction in SOS was not attributable to non-specific exposure or practice effects. Together, our results demonstrate that perceptual expertise can, in principle, reduce SOS, even when the perceptual training does not specifically target SOS reduction.

Introduction. The algorithm for choosing a method of treatment for permanent teeth with incompletely formed root, described in the study of Shabahang S. (2013), involves the procedure of apexification in cases of irreversible pulpitis and pulp necrosis, and convalescent therapy in cases of diagnosis of recurrent pathological phenomena in the pulp structure. The aim of the study was to conduct a retrospective analysis of the effectiveness of applying mineral trioxide aggregate and calcium-containing agents in order to carry out the apexification procedure according to the data of previous studies. Materials and methods. Relevant publications were searched by Google Scholar search (https://scholar.google.com/), Pubmed databases (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ pubmed /) and ScienceDirect (https://www.sciencedirect.com/). Results. The data available to date are of varying evidence and do not confirm the fact that the mineral trioxide aggregate is more clinically effective than calcium hydroxide for the purpose of apexification in cases of endodontic treatment of incomplete root formation. However, a significant advantage of mineral trioxide aggregate is the possibility of one-stage root canal formation with subsequent permanent obturation of the root canal after complete curing of mineral trioxide aggregate. Conclusion. The reports analyzed are characterized by variability of designs and the use of different approaches to assess the formation of the apical part of the tooth; moreover, most publications do not evaluate the initial level of root formation, which can potentially affect the success of the manipulation. The lower success rate of calcium-containing aids for apexification reported in a number of studies is justified by the prolongation of treatment, during which there is a tendency for patients to miss the check-ups and to drop out of the generated study sample during the relevant monitoring period. In order to formulate appropriate clinical recommendations, it is necessary to ensure that the baseline and treatment outcomes are referenced to a unified system of criteria for interpretation of all quality indicators of apexification achieved.

There has been substantial research on sub-linear time approximate algorithms for Maximum Inner Product Search (MIPS). To achieve fast query time, state-of-the-art techniques require significant preprocessing, which can be a burden when the number of subsequent queries is not sufficiently large to amortize the cost. Furthermore, existing methods do not have the ability to directly control the suboptimality of their approximate results with theoretical guarantees. In this paper, we propose the first approximate algorithm for MIPS that does not require any preprocessing, and allows users to control and bound the suboptimality of the results. We cast MIPS as a Best Arm Identification problem, and introduce a new bandit setting that can fully exploit the special structure of MIPS. Our approach outperforms state-of-the-art methods on both synthetic and real-world datasets.

Biomedical databases are an important source of information for health technology assessment. However, there is considerable variation in the costs of accessing commercial databases. We sought to measure the quality, amount of overlap, and costs of information retrieved from two of the main database sources — MEDLINE and EMBASE. Librarians at two health technology assessment agencies ran a total of eight literature searches on various medical technologies, using both databases. All search results were independently reviewed by two researchers. The researchers were asked to identify relevant references and to rank each of these according to a level of evidence scale. The results were tabulated to show the number of references identified by each database, the number of relevant references ranked by level of evidence, and the number of these references that were unique to one or the other database. The cost of retrieving references from each source was also calculated. Each database contained relevant references not available in the other. Because of the longer time lag for indexing in MEDLINE, many of the references that originally appeared to be unique to EMBASE were subsequently available in MEDLINE as well. Since our study was conducted, MEDLINE has been made available worldwide, free of charge, via the Internet. Hence, the cost difference between the databases is now even greater. However, notwithstanding the costs, it appears that literature searches that rely on only one or the other database will inevitably miss pertinent information.

Breast cancer is a common deadly diseases in women. Initial recognition of breast cancer using mammogram images is a challenging task. Hence, this paper proposed a unique automatic diagnosis model for breast cancer. Initially, the mammogram images are preprocessed with a median filter and contrast limited adaptive histogram equalization (CLAHE). The pre-processed image is automatically segmented using the multilevel threshold method. Subsequently, statistical, texture, shape, and geometric features are extracted from the segmented image. So, the length of the feature vector is high, and it is important to identify optimum features. In this paper, the dimension of the feature vector is reduced by 2-stage feature selection methods. Initially, the feature vector is applied to the best first search method information gain (IG) with rank feature method, and then secondly, apply the Pearson correlation method (PCM). Artificial neural networks (ANNs) are used to increase the classification accuracy of a breast cancer diagnosis. In this model, the selection of appropriate neurons in a single hidden layer is used to avoid overfitting problems in an ANN model. Based on optimum feature selection, the appropriate number of neurons chosen in the hidden layer is 20, which was applied for the proposed IG+PCM+Boosted-ANN model. The proposed model is applied on 2 regular datasets mini-Mammographic Image Analysis Society (mini-MIAS) and Digital Database for Screening Mammography (DDSM). The proposed model was superior to other exiting models and the model in this study achieves the accuracy of 99 and 98.80 % for mini-MIAS and DDSM datasets, respectively.

Ginsenoside Rg3 exerts antiproliferation activity on cancer cells by regulating diverse noncoding RNAs. However, little is known about the role of long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) or their relationship with competitive endogenous RNA (ceRNA) in Rg3-treated cancer cells. Here, a lncRNA (ATXN8OS) was found to be downregulated via Rg3-mediated promoter hypermethylation in MCF-7 breast cancer cells. SiRNA-induced downregulation of ATXN8OS decreased cell proliferation but increased apoptosis, suggesting that the noncoding RNA possessed proproliferation activity. An in silico search for potential ATXN8OS-targeting microRNAs (miRs) identified a promising candidate (miR-424-5p) based on its high binding score. As expected, miR-424-5p suppressed proliferation and stimulated apoptosis of the MCF-7 cells. The in silico miR-target-gene prediction identified 200 potential target genes of miR-424-5p, which were subsequently narrowed down to seven that underwent hypermethylation at their promoter by Rg3. Among them, three genes (EYA1, DACH1, and CHRM3) were previously known oncogenes and were proven to be oppositely regulated by ATXN8OS and miR-424-5p. When taken together, Rg3 downregulated ATXN8OS that inhibited the tumor-suppressive miR-424-5p, leading to the downregulation of the oncogenic target genes.

AimsTo present a case of a near-miss, where an unexpected Pulmonary Embolism (PE) was identified in a patient with psychotic depression and catatonia, who almost had Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT). Our aim is to highlight the importance of Venous-Thrombo Embolism (VTE) risk assessment in all psychiatric inpatients, particularly those with catatonia, and those about to undergo ECT.MethodA 53-year-old female admitted with her first presentation of psychotic depression, catatonia, poor oral intake, and significant weight loss in the community for months prior to admission. She was recommended for emergency ECT as the severity of her self-neglect was becoming life threatening. Her first ECT session was cancelled due to low potassium levels prior to ECT, which proved to be a fortunate event. She developed sudden onset chest pain the next day, and following further medical investigations; was diagnosed to have a bilateral PE, and subsequently treated with Apixaban. Due to the potential risk of ECT dislodging the clots, treatment was done by optimising medication alone; Venlafaxine 300 mg, Mirtazapine 45 mg, Haloperidol 6 mg. She made a slow but successful recovery, and was discharged home, with ongoing support from Early Intervention in Psychosis services.ResultWe conducted a literature search, and it is well known that there is an increased risk of VTE in catatonic patients, as well as other psychiatric inpatients; due to anti-psychotic medication. Furthermore, cases have been reported where ECT was associated with increased risk of death in patients with known VTE/PE.On retrospective review of the patient's risks of developing VTE in the community, it was clear, that she was at very high risk of developing VTE. It was also noted that she should have had a VTE risk assessment on admission, in accordance with NICE guidelines; where all acute psychiatric inpatients should have this assessed as soon as possible.ConclusionThrough a process of assessment and treatment, VTE is often preventable. Identification of high-risk patients on admission to hospital is therefore crucial. It is thus, imperative that a comprehensive VTE risk assessment is completed on admission and regularly reviewed.This case highlights the risk of missing VTE assessments in WAA Inpatients, particularly those with catatonia, about to undergo ECT, which could have been fatal. As such, VTE/PE risk assessment in such patients, about to undergo ECT, is particularly crucial.Clinicians need to have a high index of suspicion of VTE/PE, particularly in patients with catatonia.

Background Enterobacter cloacae (EC) is a Gram-negative bacterium that has been utilized extensively in biotechnological and environmental science applications, possibly because of its high capability for adapting itself and surviving in hazardous conditions. A search for the EC from agricultural and industrial areas that possesses high capability to tolerate and/or accumulate cadmium ions has been conducted in this study. Plausible mechanisms of cellular adaptations in the presence of toxic cadmium have also been proposed. Methods Nine strains of EC were isolated and subsequently identified by biochemical characterization and MALDI-Biotyper. Minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) against cadmium, zinc and copper ions were determined by agar dilution method. Growth tolerance against cadmium ions was spectrophotometrically monitored at 600 nm. Cadmium accumulation at both cellular and protein levels was investigated using atomic absorption spectrophotometer. Proteomics analysis by 2D-DIGE in conjunction with protein identification by QTOF-LC-MS/MS was used to study differentially expressed proteins between the tolerant and intolerant strains as consequences of cadmium exposure. Expression of such proteins was confirmed by quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR). Bioinformatics tools were applied to propose the functional roles of cadmium-binding protein and its association in cadmium tolerance mechanisms. Results The cadmium-tolerant strain (EC01) and intolerant strain (EC07) with the MICs of 1.6 and 0.4 mM, respectively, were isolated. The whole cell lysate of EC01 exhibited approximately two-fold higher in cadmium binding capability than those of the EC07 and ATCC 13047, possibly by the expression of Cd-binding proteins. Our proteomics analysis revealed the higher expression of DUF326-like domain (a high cysteine-rich protein) of up to 220 fold in the EC01 than that of the EC07. Confirmation of the transcription level of this gene by qRT-PCR revealed a 14-fold induction in the EC01. Regulation of the DUF326-like domain in EC01 was more pronounced to mediate rapid cadmium accumulation (in 6 h) and tolerance than the other resistance mechanisms found in the ATCC 13047 and the EC07 strains. The only one major responsive protein against toxic cadmium found in these three strains belonged to an antioxidative enzyme, namely catalase. The unique proteins found in the ATCC 13047 and EC07 were identified as two groups: (i) ATP synthase subunit alpha, putative hydrolase and superoxide dismutase and (ii) OmpX, protein YciF, OmpC porin, DNA protection during starvation protein, and TrpR binding protein WrbA, respectively. Conclusion All these findings gain insights not only into the molecular mechanisms of cadmium tolerance in EC but also open up a high feasibility to apply the newly discovered DUF326-like domain as cadmium biosorbents for environmental remediation in the future.

The present study aimed to characterize the susceptibility profile of Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter spp. clinical isolates to polymyxin B in a public hospital in Recife-PE, Brazil, between the years of 2018 and 2019, as well as to search for the presence of the mcr-1 gene and evaluate the interaction between polymyxin B and usnic acid against these isolates. The strains were identified using the BD Phoenix™ automated system and the agar-spot test was used to determine the susceptibility profile to polymyxin B. The minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of usnic acid and polymyxin B were determined through the broth microdilution method according to the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI). Subsequently, Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) was performed to detect the mcr-1 gene in the isolates. The interaction between usnic acid and polymyxin B was evaluated by the Checkerboard assay. Among 34 isolates of P. aeruginosa, 26.5% (9/34) were positive for the polymyxin B agar-spot test, and 11.8% (4/34) presented an intermediate susceptibility (MIC = 4 μg/mL), while 14.7% (5/34) presented antimicrobial resistance with MIC values ranging from 8 to 32 μg/mL. Among 38 isolates of Acinetobacter spp., 13.2% (5/38) were positive for the polymyxin B agar-spot test and all of them were resistant to polymyxin B with a MIC value > 32 μg/mL. The mcr-1 gene was not detected in the clinical isolates. Regarding usnic acid, it presented a moderate antibacterial activity against two P. aeruginosa isolates (MIC = 250 μg/mL) and no activity was detected against the others. A synergistic effect between usnic acid and polymyxin B was observed against three clinical isolates of P. aeruginosa which were resistant to polymyxin B (FICI ≤ 0.5). Therefore, it was possible to observe that usnic acid is a promising candidate to be used in combination with polymyxin B against infections caused by resistant P. aeruginosa.

Abstract Introduction: Multiple myeloma (MM) is a B-cell malignancy, characterized by accumulation of plasma cell clones in the bone marrow. While novel therapeutic agents like immunomodulatory drugs and proteasome inhibitors have improved overall survival of MM patients, the disease remains incurable in most patients. Several studies showed that immune-checkpoint molecules are expressed by myeloma cells and induce tumor-related immune suppression. Despite the promising results achieved by blocking CTLA4 and the PD-1/PD-L1 axis in the treatment of various solid tumors and Hodgkin's lymphoma, targeting these checkpoints did not induce objective responses in Phase I/II trials in MM patients. Therefore, identification of novel immune-checkpoints and defining the subsequent molecular mechanisms of inhibition are essential for further improvement. Methods: Our main goal is to identify novel MM-related immune-checkpoint molecules by taking advantage of a high-throughput (HT) RNAi screen and sequentially validate the role of candidate molecules, whose blockade could potentially induce anti-tumor immunity in MM patients. Methods: High-throughput RNAi screens offer a possibility to systemically search for immune-checkpoint molecules. Therefore, we established a high-throughput screening system to discern candidate molecules and evaluate their use as potential targets for multiple myeloma immunotherapy. We established a luciferase based read-out system by generating a stable luciferase expressing MM cell line (KMM-1-luc). To test the effect of immune-checkpoint molecules, KMM-1-luc cells were transfected with a siRNAs library targeting 2514 genes encoding for cell surface proteins, kinases and GPCRs. Transfected tumor cells were subsequently co-cultured with patient-derived HLA-matched Myeloma Infiltrating T Lymphocytes (MILs) and the effect of gene knock-down on T-cell mediated tumor lysis was measured. Results: Based on our primary HT-screening, we have identified 132 candidate molecules (hits) whose knockdown increased T-cell mediated killing more efficiently than the established checkpoint genes CCR9. To confirm the hits and the robustness of the screening, we re-tested the identified candidates in a secondary screening. Among these potential immune-checkpoints we selected 10 hits for further validation. So far, we were able to confirm expression of the hits at mRNA level and to validate siRNAs on-target effect by qPCR and luciferase-based cytotoxicity assay. Detailed results will be presented at the meeting. Conclusion: Altogether we optimized a high-throughput RNAi screen to discover novel immune-checkpoints that are potential immunotherapeutic targets for the treatment of multiple myeloma. We are currently investigating the mode of action of the candidate hits in vitro. Further in vivo validation of these immune-checkpoint molecules is still required for clinical studies. Disclosures Goldschmidt: Celgene: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding; Bristol-Myers Squibb: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding; Chugai: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding, Speakers Bureau; Janssen: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding; Novartis: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding; Millennium: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding; Onyx: Honoraria, Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees; Takeda: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees; Amgen: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees. Witzens-Harig:Pfizer: Honoraria, Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding; Roche: Honoraria, Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding.

It gives me a great pleasure to be a small contributor to the first inaugural issue of “International Journal of Medicine & Biomedical Sciences” being published from Nepal with efforts put in by Nepalese Researches. As the name suggests, this journal is mainly devoted to Biomedical Sciences & Medical sciences and related topics. On this special auspicious occasion I would like to take opportunity to share some of my thoughts. The medical microbiology revolves around three main areas and topics such as type's infectious diseases, diagnosis methods andtreatment options. Over the past decades, major advances in the field of molecular biology, coupled with advances in multiplex real time PCR technologies have facilitated the development of high performing,innovative, low cost and syndrome based tests for the diagnosis of various bacteria, viruses and parasites with the aid of fast track diagnostics. These technologies are particularly specialised in symptoms based disease approach as different pathogens can cause similar clinical pictures while diagnosed for respiratory infections, gastroenteritis, sexually transmitted infections, fever, rash, childhood infections, hepatitis, meningitis, infections of the immune suppressed, tropical fever and many other infections. Fungal infections are increasing worldwide specially with increase in immune compromised patients. Correct and accurate laboratory diagnosis of fungal infections has become an essential part of the laboratory services. After achieving success in diagnosis,it's now a turn of a clinician to give most appropriate antimicrobial treatment from the available armament of antimicrobial agents. At this point the gloomy scenario surfaces. Due to ever increasing number of resistant organisms treatment options for clinicians are very limited. Emergence of MRSA, VRSA, ESBL and MBL including NDM1 and so on have made one time considered most powerful antibiotics blunt in action. The number of strains resistant to different antibiotics and their ever increasing number revealed in several publications worldwide are really scary. The situation is really bad in Asian countries. Lot of discussion goes and finally blame points at uncontrolled misuse of antibiotics. Though it is true, there are certain associated socio-economic issues that need to be considered. The clinician is often forced to go for empirical antibiotic treatment due to high cost of susceptibility tests needed to be performed before starting the appropriate antibiotic treatment and moreover even if he wants, it not easily available particularly in rural areas. Additionally, leading international Pharma companies have either stopped their search for new antibiotics or slowed down and instead prefer to invest in lifestyle diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes and asthma due to their higher shelf life, unlike that of antibiotics. The safety issues and very high cost of clinical trials coupled with uncertainty of final success have made development of NCEs less rewarding. The art of antibiotic discovery from natural sources such as soil is slowly dying out even though it still has a very high potential to reward. Now days it is possible to give outstanding resultstogether with the help of sophisticated and advanced analytical identification tools and database of known antibiotics, not available during the early days of antibiotic research. Today the countries of the world are fast connected with each other. Any asymptomatic carrier can carry deadly resistant pathogens fromone end of the world to another within less than 24 hours without even his or her knowledge and without any suspect of the regulatory authority. It is very difficult now to stop this spread even in so called isolated advanced countries. Another reason for immergence of antimicrobial resistance is also need to be equally understood. The suboptimal doses when given during the therapy can create antibiotic levels lower than the Mutant Prevention Concentration (MPC) and thereby give chance to slowly growing resistant subpopulation to grow which then increase in number during the same treatment. It is essential that clinician has knowledge of PK-PD effect of antibiotics and by what parameter the antibiotic acts. These are governed by either Cmax /MIC or AUC/MIC or time above MIC. For example Fluoroquinoles act by Cmax/MIC and therefore a single dose once a day is often recommended whereas beta lactams class of antibiotics need longer time above MIC level to act and hence frequent dosing is practised. Any compromise with these parameters could lead to development of resistant strains. The five hours short duration incubation in automated susceptibility test is based on development and measurement of optical density. However, resistant mutants which are few in number compared to a large sensitive population fail to impart turbidity and hence the culture is labelled as sensitive. This is a major error in susceptibility testing. To overcome this problem, E-test MIC method is better option since on 24 hr incubation, the resistant mutants that grow in the form of isolated colonies in the zone of inhibition can clearly show their presence. This observation would help clinician to take informed decision at right time to choose a more efficacious and appropriate antibiotic treatment protocol. This is one of the reasons which results in not only creating reservoir of resistant organisms in patient’s body and its subsequent spread but could also result in mortality. The national level antibiotic resistance surveillance program if undertaken on regular intervals of time would help draw correct picture of gravity of alarming situation and also to judge the effectiveness of program implemented to control AMR. It is a joint responsibility of Pharma companies to refrain themselves from introducing irrational antibiotic combinations without understanding the PK –PD of an individual partner. In antimicrobial therapy, the concentration of an individual component at the site of infection when present together during the therapy is critical as observed in in-vitro evaluation experiments. Similarly, MIC results in in-vitro combination study must show MICs of resistant strains falling in the sensitive range as recommended by CLSI guideline. Researchers have to keep in mind that the outcome of quality research should lead to new findings, better understanding or insight into earlier findings or ideally suggesting a better treatment option. The publication of reconfirmation of known data is sometimes essential. However, these type of publication when very frequently appear in journals do not lead to advancement of science. Finally I congratulate IJMBioS team a good success in this noble endeavour.

AbstractFor over 50 years, the satisfaction of search effect has been studied within the field of radiology. Defined as a decrease in detection rates for a subsequent target when an initial target is found within the image, these multiple target errors are known to underlie errors of omission (e.g., a radiologist is more likely to miss an abnormality if another abnormality is identified). More recently, they have also been found to underlie lab-based search errors in cognitive science experiments (e.g., an observer is more likely to miss a target ‘T’ if a different target ‘T’ was detected). This phenomenon was renamed the subsequent search miss (SSM) effect in cognitive science. Here we review the SSM literature in both radiology and cognitive science and discuss: (1) the current SSM theories (i.e., satisfaction, perceptual set, and resource depletion theories), (2) the eye movement errors that underlie the SSM effect, (3) the existing efforts tested to alleviate SSM errors, and (4) the evolution of methodologies and analyses used when calculating the SSM effect. Finally, we present the attentional template theory, a novel mechanistic explanation for SSM errors, which ties together our current understanding of SSM errors and the attentional template literature.

Dementia is a devastating age-related disorder. Its therapy would largely benefit from the identification of susceptible subjects at early, prodromal stages of the disease. To search for such prognostic markers of cognitive impairment, we studied spatial navigation in male BALBc vs. B6N mice in combination with in vivo magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H-MRS). BALBc mice consistently showed higher escape latencies than B6N mice, both in the Water Cross Maze (WCM) and the Morris water maze (MWM). These performance deficits coincided with higher levels of myo-inositol (mIns) in the dorsal hippocampus before and after training. Subsequent biochemical analyses of hippocampal specimens by capillary immunodetection and liquid chromatography mass spectrometry-based (LC/MS) metabolomics revealed a higher abundance of glial markers (IBA-1, S100B, and GFAP) as well as distinct alterations in metabolites including a decrease in vitamins (pantothenic acid and nicotinamide), neurotransmitters (acetylcholine), their metabolites (glutamine), and acetyl-L-carnitine. Supplementation of low abundant acetyl-L-carnitine via the drinking water, however, failed to revert the behavioral deficits shown by BALBc mice. Based on our data we suggest (i) BALBc mice as an animal model and (ii) hippocampal mIns levels as a prognostic marker of mild cognitive impairment (MCI), due to (iii) local changes in microglia and astrocyte activity, which may (iv) result in decreased concentrations of promnesic molecules.

Social health insurance (SHI) is a form of health finance mechanism that had been implemented in many countries to achieve universal health care (UHC). To emulate the successes of SHI in many developed countries, many developing and middle-income countries (MICs) have attempted to follow suit. However, the SHI implementation has problems and obstacles. Many more obstacles were observed despite some successes. This scoping review aimed to study the various developments of SHI globally in its uses, implementation, successes, and obstacles within the last 5 years from 2017 to 2021. Using three databases (i.e., PubMed, EBSCO, and Google Scholar), we reviewed all forms of articles on SHI, including gray literature. The PRISMA-ScR protocol was adapted as the guideline. We used the following search terms: social health insurance, national health insurance, and community health insurance. A total of 57,686 articles were screened, and subsequently, 46 articles were included in the final review. Results showed that the majority of SHI studies were in China and African countries, both of which were actively pursuing SHI programs to achieve UHC. China was still regarded as a developing country. There were also recent experiences from other Asian countries, but only a few from South America. Implementing SHI to achieve UHC was desirable but will need to consider several factors and issues. This was especially the case in developing and MICs. Eventually, full UHC would only be possible with a combination of general taxation and SHI.

ABSTRACTBackground: Despite the recent increase in opioid overdoses across Canada, few pharmacy-led initiatives have been implemented to address issues related to opioid prescribing in the hospital setting.Objectives: The primary objective of this study was to develop a clinical tool, intended for use by hospital pharmacists and informed by best practices from the literature, that would provide a structured approach to enhancingthe safety of opioid prescribing. The secondary objective was to collect pharmacists’ opinions about the feasibility and utility of this tool.Methods: A comprehensive literature search and pharmacist focus group analysis provided content for development of a candidate clinical tool. This tool was then piloted by clinical pharmacists working on generalmedical and surgical units in a single hospital. Pharmacists participating in the pilot were invited to complete an online survey concerning their perceptions of the tool. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the survey results.Results:The literature search and focus group analysis led to development of a candidate clinical tool that focused on Medication review, Optimization, Reassessment, and Education (MORE). It included key risk factors relating to opioid safety, along with suggested mitigating strategies. The MORE tool was piloted for 3 weeks by 14 clinical pharmacists, 9 of whom responded to the subsequent survey. Five respondents indicated that the clinical tool increased their ability to identify risk factors. Five respondents also noted an increase in their ability to identify possible interventions. Most respondents felt that the tool was useful and that it would be feasible to integrate it into their practice; however, they noted that a more streamlined version could improve ease of use.Conclusions: The MORE tool was well received by clinical pharmacists. Implementation of the tool into routine practice requires additional changes to improve ease of use. Suggestions for modifying and streamlining the tool will be incorporated into future versions.RÉSUMÉContexte : Malgré l’augmentation récente des surdoses d’opioïdes au Canada, peu d’initiatives menées sous la houlette de pharmacies ont été mises en place sur les enjeux potentiels liés à la prescription d’opiacés en milieu hospitalier.Objectifs : L’objectif principal de cette étude visait à élaborer un outil destiné aux pharmaciens d’hôpitaux, s’inspirant des meilleures pratiques rapportées dans la documentation, qui fournirait une approche structuréepour améliorer la sécurité de la prescription d’opioïdes. L’objectif secondaire consistait à recueillir les opinions des pharmaciens sur la faisabilité et l’utilité d’un tel outil.Méthode : Des recherches bibliographiques étendues ainsi qu’une analyse de groupes de discussion de pharmaciens ont fourni le contenu necessaire à l’élaboration d’un outil clinique expérimental. Ensuite, cet outil a été testé par des pharmaciens cliniciens travaillant dans des unités médicales générales et chirurgicales au sein d’un seul hôpital. Les pharmaciens participant au projet pilote ont été invités à répondre à une enquête en ligne sur leur perception de l’outil. Des statistiques descriptives ont permis d’analyser les résultats de l’enquête.Résultats : Les recherches bibliographiques et l’analyse des groupes de discussion ont débouché sur le développement d’un outil clinique nommé MORE [pour Medication review, Optimization, Reassessment, and Education, ou Examen, optimisation, réévaluation et éducation aux médicaments]. Il comprenait des facteurs de risque liés à la sécurité des opioïdes ainsi que des suggestions de stratégies d’atténuation. Quatorzepharmaciens cliniciens, dont neuf ont répondu à l’enquête qui a suivi, ont testé le MORE pendant trois semaines. Cinq répondants ont indiqué que l’outil clinique augmentait leur capacité à déterminer les facteurs de risque. Cinq ont également noté une meilleure capacité à déterminer les interventions possibles. La plupart des répondants ont estimé que l’outil était utile et qu’il serait possible de l’intégrer dans leur pratique; cependant, ils ont aussi noté qu’une version simplifiée pourrait faciliter son utilisation.Conclusions : Les pharmaciens cliniciens ont bien accueilli l’outil MORE. Sa mise en oeuvre dans la pratique courante exige cependant des changements supplémentaires pour faciliter son utilisation. Les versions à venir tiendront compte des propositions visant à le modifier et à le simplifier.

Loquat (Eriobotrya japonica (Thunb.) Lindl.) is a fruit tree of high economic impotance in China. In May 2021, fruit rot on cv. “Baozhu” was observed in Yuhang district (119°40’E, 30°09’N), Zhejiang province, at an incidence of more than 30% within five orchards (the total affected area were about 121, 000 m2). Early symptoms of naturally affected fruits were dark brown, necrotic lesion (Fig. 1 A). Lesions subsequently expanded, and orange conidia were observed (Fig. 1 B). Conidia were transferred using a sterilized needle into sterile water, diluted to several conidia (approximately 10 conidia/µL) in the field of light microscope, and spread onto potato dextrose agar (PDA). After 24 h, single colonies were transferred, and six single-spore strain isolated from different fruits or locations were obtained. Six-day old colonies grown on PDA at 27°C had gray-green centers with white edges, and on the reverse side, the centers were brown (Fig. 1 C). Isolate PPGS2 was selected for further characterization. Conidia were unicellular, smooth-walled, hyaline, cylindrical with one rounded and one acute end, or with both ends rounded and they (n = 30) measured 11.1 to 16.0 µm (mean = 13.3 µm) × 3.0 to 4.6 µm (mean = 4.1) (Fig. 1 D). Appressoria were single or in smalln groups, light brown to dark brown, ovoid or elliptical with a smooth or undulate outline, and measured (n = 30) 4.6 to 8.7 µm (mean = 6.5 µm) × 4.0 to 5.6 µm (mean = 4.9 µm) (Fig. 1 H). These features of PPGS2 were consistent with species of the Colletotrichum acutatum species complex (Damm et al. 2012). For species identification, the internal transcribed spacer (ITS), beta-tubulin (TUB), chitin synthase (CHS-1), calmodulin (CAL), and actin (ACT) genes were sequenced (O’Donnell et al. 2000; Weir et al. 2012). The five sequences were deposited in GenBank (OK054581, OK077960, OK077987, OK077988 and OK077989, respectively). A BLAST search of these sequences showed 99% identity with sequences of the ex-holotype C. scovillei CBS126529 (Damm et al. 2012). The evolutionary tree shown that PPGS2 and C. scovillei CBS126529 were clustered in a branch (SH-aLRT/approximate Bayes test/bootstrap support = 88.6/0.999/96). Combining morphological characteristics with phylogenetic analysis, PPGS2 was identified as C. scovillei. To fulfill Koch’s postulates, E. japonica fruit were disinfected with 75% alcohol and air-dried for 5 mins to allow the alcohol to volatilize. A conidial suspension (10 mL of 1 × 106 conidia/ml) of PPGS2 was sprayed onto six fruits, and six fruit sprayed with sterilized water served as controls. The experiment was repeated three times. Fruits were kept on a mist bench at 27°C and 80% relative humidity for 5 days. Inoculated fruit developed dark brown necrotic lesions that later fused and expanded (Fig. 1, E-G), whereas control fruit remained symptomless. C. scovillei was re-isolated from lesions of inoculated fruit. C. scovillei has been reported from fruit of Capsicum sp., Musa sp., Mangifera indica, and Clausena lansium in China (Farr and Rossman 2021). To our knowledge, this is the first report of C. scovillei causing anthracnose fruit rot of E. japonica in China. This disease results in severe economic losses both in the field and after harvest, and it is necessary to develop more effective prevention and control strategies.

IntroductionIn July 1997, the Mackay campus of Central Queensland University hosted a conference with the theme Regional Australia: Visions of Mackay. It was the first academic conference to be held at the young campus, and its aim was to provide an opportunity for academics, business people, government officials, and other interested parties to discuss their visions for the development of Mackay, a regional community of 75,000 people situated on the Central Queensland coast (Danaher). I delivered a presentation at that conference and authored a chapter in the book that emerged from its proceedings. The chapter entitled “Mackay Online” explored the potential impact that the Internet could have on the Mackay region, particularly in the areas of regional business, education, health, and entertainment (Pace). Two decades later, how does the reality compare with that vision?Broadband BluesAt the time of the Visions of Mackay conference, public commercial use of the Internet was in its infancy. Many Internet services and technologies that users take for granted today were uncommon or non-existent then. Examples include online video, video-conferencing, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), blogs, social media, peer-to-peer file sharing, payment gateways, content management systems, wireless data communications, smartphones, mobile applications, and tablet computers. In 1997, most users connected to the Internet using slow dial-up modems with speeds ranging from 28.8 Kbps to 33.6 Kbps. 56 Kbps modems had just become available. Lamenting these slow data transmission speeds, I looked forward to a time when widespread availability of high-bandwidth networks would allow the Internet’s services to “expand to include electronic commerce, home entertainment and desktop video-conferencing” (Pace 103). Although that future eventually arrived, I incorrectly anticipated how it would arrive.In 1997, Optus and Telstra were engaged in the rollout of hybrid fibre coaxial (HFC) networks in Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane for the Optus Vision and Foxtel pay TV services (Meredith). These HFC networks had a large amount of unused bandwidth, which both Telstra and Optus planned to use to provide broadband Internet services. Telstra's Big Pond Cable broadband service was already available to approximately one million households in Sydney and Melbourne (Taylor), and Optus was considering extending its cable network into regional Australia through partnerships with smaller regional telecommunications companies (Lewis). These promising developments seemed to point the way forward to a future high-bandwidth network, but that was not the case. A short time after the Visions of Mackay conference, Telstra and Optus ceased the rollout of their HFC networks in response to the invention of Asynchronous Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL), a technology that increases the bandwidth of copper wire and enables Internet connections of up to 6 Mbps over the existing phone network. ADSL was significantly faster than a dial-up service, it was broadly available to homes and businesses across the country, and it did not require enormous investment in infrastructure. However, ADSL could not offer speeds anywhere near the 27 Mbps of the HFC networks. When it came to broadband provision, Australia seemed destined to continue playing catch-up with the rest of the world. According to data from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), in 2009 Australia ranked 18th in the world for broadband penetration, with 24.1 percent of Australians having a fixed-line broadband subscription. Statistics like these eventually prompted the federal government to commit to the deployment of a National Broadband Network (NBN). In 2009, the Kevin Rudd Government announced that the NBN would combine fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP), fixed wireless, and satellite technologies to deliver Internet speeds of up to 100 Mbps to 90 percent of Australian homes, schools, and workplaces (Rudd).The rollout of the NBN in Mackay commenced in 2013 and continued, suburb by suburb, until its completion in 2017 (Frost, “Mackay”; Garvey). The rollout was anything but smooth. After a change of government in 2013, the NBN was redesigned to reduce costs. A mixed copper/optical technology known as fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) replaced FTTP as the preferred approach for providing most NBN connections. The resulting connection speeds were significantly slower than the 100 Mbps that was originally proposed. Many Mackay premises could only achieve a maximum speed of 40 Mbps, which led to some overcharging by Internet service providers, and subsequent compensation for failing to deliver services they had promised (“Optus”). Some Mackay residents even complained that their new NBN connections were slower than their former ADSL connections. NBN Co representatives claimed that the problems were due to “service providers not buying enough space in the network to provide the service they had promised to customers” (“Telcos”). Unsurprisingly, the number of complaints about the NBN that were lodged with the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman skyrocketed during the last six months of 2017. Queensland complaints increased by approximately 40 percent when compared with the same period during the previous year (“Qld”).Despite the challenges presented by infrastructure limitations, the rollout of the NBN was a boost for the Mackay region. For some rural residents, it meant having reliable Internet access for the first time. Frost, for example, reports on the experiences of a Mackay couple who could not get an ADSL service at their rural home because it was too far away from the nearest telephone exchange. Unreliable 3G mobile broadband was the only option for operating their air-conditioning business. All of that changed with the arrival of the NBN. “It’s so fast we can run a number of things at the same time”, the couple reported (“NBN”).Networking the NationOne factor that contributed to the uptake of Internet services in the Mackay region after the Visions of Mackay conference was the Australian Government’s Networking the Nation (NTN) program. When the national telecommunications carrier Telstra was partially privatised in 1997, and further sold in 1999, proceeds from the sale were used to fund an ambitious communications infrastructure program named Networking the Nation (Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts). The program funded projects that improved the availability, accessibility, affordability, and use of communications facilities and services throughout regional Australia. Eligibility for funding was limited to not-for-profit organisations, including local councils, regional development organisations, community groups, local government associations, and state and territory governments.In 1998, the Mackay region received $930,000 in Networking the Nation funding for Mackay Regionlink, a project that aimed to provide equitable community access to online services, skills development for local residents, an affordable online presence for local business and community organisations, and increased external awareness of the Mackay region (Jewell et al.). One element of the project was a training program that provided basic Internet skills to 2,168 people across the region over a period of two years. A second element of the project involved the establishment of 20 public Internet access centres in locations throughout the region, such as libraries, community centres, and tourist information centres. The centres provided free Internet access to users and encouraged local participation and skill development. More than 9,200 users were recorded in these centres during the first year of the project, and the facilities remained active until 2006. A third element of the project was a regional web portal that provided a free easily-updated online presence for community organisations. The project aimed to have every business and community group in the Mackay region represented on the website, with hosting fees for the business web pages funding its ongoing operation and development. More than 6,000 organisations were listed on the site, and the project remained financially viable until 2005.The availability, affordability and use of communications facilities and services in Mackay increased significantly during the period of the Regionlink project. Changes in technology, services, markets, competition, and many other factors contributed to this increase, so it is difficult to ascertain the extent to which Mackay Regionlink fostered those outcomes. However, the large number of people who participated in the Regionlink training program and made use of the public Internet access centres, suggests that the project had a positive influence on digital literacy in the Mackay region.The Impact on BusinessThe Internet has transformed regional business for both consumers and business owners alike since the Visions of Mackay conference. When Mackay residents made a purchase in 1997, their choice of suppliers was limited to a few local businesses. Today they can shop online in a global market. Security concerns were initially a major obstacle to the growth of electronic commerce. Consumers were slow to adopt the Internet as a place for doing business, fearing that their credit card details would be vulnerable to hackers once they were placed online. After observing the efforts that finance and software companies were making to eliminate those obstacles, I anticipated that it would only be a matter of time before online transactions became commonplace:Consumers seeking a particular product will be able to quickly find the names of suitable suppliers around the world, compare their prices, and place an order with the one that can deliver the product at the cheapest price. (Pace 106)This expectation was soon fulfilled by the arrival of online payment systems such as PayPal in 1998, and online shopping services such as eBay in 1997. eBay is a global online auction and shopping website where individuals and businesses buy and sell goods and services worldwide. The eBay service is free to use for buyers, but sellers are charged modest fees when they make a sale. It exemplifies the notion of “friction-free capitalism” articulated by Gates (157).In 1997, regional Australian business owners were largely sceptical about the potential benefits the Internet could bring to their businesses. Only 11 percent of Australian businesses had some form of web presence, and less than 35 percent of those early adopters felt that their website was significant to their business (Department of Industry, Science and Tourism). Anticipating the significant opportunities that the Internet offered Mackay businesses to compete in new markets, I recommended that they work “towards the goal of providing products and services that meet the needs of international consumers as well as local ones” (107). In the two decades that have passed since that time, many Mackay businesses have been doing just that. One prime example is Big on Shoes (bigonshoes.com.au), a retailer of ladies’ shoes from sizes five to fifteen (Plane). Big on Shoes has physical shopfronts in Mackay and Moranbah, an online store that has been operating since 2009, and more than 12,000 followers on Facebook. This speciality store caters for women who have traditionally been unable to find shoes in their size. As the store’s customer base has grown within Australia and internationally, an unexpected transgender market has also emerged. In 2018 Big on Shoes was one of 30 regional businesses featured in the first Facebook and Instagram Annual Gift Guide, and it continues to build on its strengths (Cureton).The Impact on HealthThe growth of the Internet has improved the availability of specialist health services for people in the Mackay region. Traditionally, access to surgical services in Mackay has been much more limited than in metropolitan areas because of the shortage of specialists willing to practise in regional areas (Green). In 2003, a senior informant from the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons bluntly described the Central Queensland region from Mackay to Gladstone as “a black hole in terms of surgery” (Birrell et al. 15). In 1997 I anticipated that, although the Internet would never completely replace a visit to a local doctor or hospital, it would provide tools that improve the availability of specialist medical services for people living in regional areas. Using these tools, doctors would be able to “analyse medical images captured from patients living in remote locations” and “diagnose patients at a distance” (Pace 108).These expectations have been realised in the form of Queensland Health’s Telehealth initiative, which permits medical specialists in Brisbane and Townsville to conduct consultations with patients at the Mackay Base Hospital using video-conference technology. Telehealth reduces the need for patients to travel for specialist advice, and it provides health professionals with access to peer support. Averill (7), for example, reports on the experience of a breast cancer patient at the Mackay Base Hospital who was able to participate in a drug trial with a Townsville oncologist through the Telehealth network. Mackay health professionals organised the patient’s scans, administered blood tests, and checked her lymph nodes, blood pressure and weight. Townsville health professionals then used this information to advise the Mackay team about her ongoing treatment. The patient expressed appreciation that the service allowed her to avoid the lengthy round-trip to Townsville. Prior to being offered the Telehealth option, she had refused to participate in the trial because “the trip was just too much of a stumbling block” (Averill 7).The Impact on Media and EntertainmentThe field of media and entertainment is another aspect of regional life that has been reshaped by the Internet since the Visions of Mackay conference. Most of these changes have been equally apparent in both regional and metropolitan areas. Over the past decade, the way individuals consume media has been transformed by new online services offering user-generated video, video-on-demand, and catch-up TV. These developments were among the changes I anticipated in 1997:The convergence of television and the Internet will stimulate the creation of new services such as video-on-demand. Today television is a synchronous media—programs are usually viewed while they are being broadcast. When high-quality video can be transmitted over the information superhighway, users will be able to watch what they want, when and where they like. […] Newly released movies will continue to be rented, but probably not from stores. Instead, consumers will shop on the information superhighway for movies that can be delivered on demand.In the mid-2000s, free online video-sharing services such as YouTube and Vimeo began to emerge. These websites allow users to freely upload, view, share, comment on, and curate online videos. Subscription-based streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime have also become increasingly popular since that time. These services offer online streaming of a library of films and television programs for a fee of less than 20 dollars per month. Computers, smart TVs, Blu-ray players, game consoles, mobile phones, tablets, and other devices provide a multitude of ways of accessing streaming services. Some of these devices cost less than 100 dollars, while higher-end electronic devices include the capability as a bundled feature. Netflix became available in Mackay at the time of its Australian launch in 2015. The growth of streaming services greatly reduced the demand for video rental shops in the region, and all closed down as a result. The last remaining video rental store in Mackay closed its doors in 2018 after trading for 26 years (“Last”).Some of the most dramatic transformations that have occurred the field of media and entertainment were not anticipated in 1997. The rise of mobile technology, including wireless data communications, smartphones, mobile applications, and tablet computers, was largely unforeseen at that time. Some Internet luminaries such as Vinton Cerf expected that mobile access to the Internet via laptop computers would become commonplace (Lange), but this view did not encompass the evolution of smartphones, and it was not widely held. Similarly, the rise of social media services and the impact they have had on the way people share content and communicate was generally unexpected. In some respects, these phenomena resemble the Black Swan events described by Nassim Nicholas Taleb (xvii)—surprising events with a major effect that are often inappropriately rationalised after the fact. They remind us of how difficult it is to predict the future media landscape by extrapolating from things we know, while failing to take into consideration what we do not know.The Challenge for MackayIn 1997, when exploring the potential impact that the Internet could have on the Mackay region, I identified a special challenge that the community faced if it wanted to be competitive in this new environment:The region has traditionally prospered from industries that control physical resources such as coal, sugar and tourism, but over the last two decades there has been a global ‘shift away from physical assets and towards information as the principal driver of wealth creation’ (Petre and Harrington 1996). The risk for Mackay is that its residents may be inclined to believe that wealth can only be created by means of industries that control physical assets. The community must realise that its value-added information is at least as precious as its abundant natural resources. (110)The Mackay region has not responded well to this challenge, as evidenced by measures such as the Knowledge City Index (KCI), a collection of six indicators that assess how well a city is positioned to grow and advance in today’s technology-driven, knowledge-based economy. A 2017 study used the KCI to conduct a comparative analysis of 25 Australian cities (Pratchett, Hu, Walsh, and Tuli). Mackay rated reasonably well in the areas of Income and Digital Access. But the city’s ratings were “very limited across all the other measures of the KCI”: Knowledge Capacity, Knowledge Mobility, Knowledge Industries and Smart Work (44).The need to be competitive in a technology-driven, knowledge-based economy is likely to become even more pressing in the years ahead. The 2017 World Energy Outlook Report estimated that China’s coal use is likely to have peaked in 2013 amid a rapid shift toward renewable energy, which means that demand for Mackay’s coal will continue to decline (International Energy Agency). The sugar industry is in crisis, finding itself unable to diversify its revenue base or increase production enough to offset falling global sugar prices (Rynne). The region’s biggest tourism drawcard, the Great Barrier Reef, continues to be degraded by mass coral bleaching events and ongoing threats posed by climate change and poor water quality (Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority). All of these developments have disturbing implications for Mackay’s regional economy and its reliance on coal, sugar, and tourism. Diversifying the local economy through the introduction of new knowledge industries would be one way of preparing the Mackay region for the impact of new technologies and the economic challenges that lie ahead.ReferencesAverill, Zizi. “Webcam Consultations.” Daily Mercury 22 Nov. 2018: 7.Birrell, Bob, Lesleyanne Hawthorne, and Virginia Rapson. The Outlook for Surgical Services in Australasia. Melbourne: Monash University Centre for Population and Urban Research, 2003.Cureton, Aidan. “Big Shoes, Big Ideas.” Daily Mercury 8 Dec. 2018: 12.Danaher, Geoff. Ed. Visions of Mackay: Conference Papers. Rockhampton: Central Queensland UP, 1998.Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts. Networking the Nation: Evaluation of Outcomes and Impacts. Canberra: Australian Government, 2005.Department of Industry, Science and Tourism. Electronic Commerce in Australia. Canberra: Australian Government, 1998.Frost, Pamela. “Mackay Is Up with Switch to Speed to NBN.” Daily Mercury 15 Aug. 2013: 8.———. “NBN Boost to Business.” Daily Mercury 29 Oct. 2013: 3.Gates, Bill. The Road Ahead. New York: Viking Penguin, 1995.Garvey, Cas. “NBN Rollout Hit, Miss in Mackay.” Daily Mercury 11 Jul. 2017: 6.Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority. Reef Blueprint: Great Barrier Reef Blueprint for Resilience. Townsville: Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, 2017.Green, Anthony. “Surgical Services and Referrals in Rural and Remote Australia.” Medical Journal of Australia 177.2 (2002): 110–11.International Energy Agency. World Energy Outlook 2017. France: IEA Publications, 2017.Jewell, Roderick, Mary O’Flynn, Fiorella De Cindio, and Margaret Cameron. “RCM and MRL—A Reflection on Two Approaches to Constructing Communication Memory.” Constructing and Sharing Memory: Community Informatics, Identity and Empowerment. Eds. Larry Stillman and Graeme Johanson. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007. 73–86.Lange, Larry. “The Internet: Where’s It All Going?” Information Week 17 Jul. 1995: 30.“Last Man Standing Shuts Doors after 26 Years of Trade.” Daily Mercury 28 Aug. 2018: 7.Lewis, Steve. “Optus Plans to Share Cost Burden.” Australian Financial Review 22 May 1997: 26.Meredith, Helen. “Time Short for Cable Modem.” Australian Financial Review 10 Apr. 1997: 42Nassim Nicholas Taleb. The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. New York: Random House, 2007.“Optus Offers Comp for Slow NBN.” Daily Mercury 10 Nov. 2017: 15.Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. “Fixed Broadband Subscriptions.” OECD Data, n.d. <https://data.oecd.org/broadband/fixed-broadband-subscriptions.htm>.Pace, Steven. “Mackay Online.” Visions of Mackay: Conference Papers. Ed. Geoff Danaher. Rockhampton: Central Queensland University Press, 1998. 111–19.Petre, Daniel and David Harrington. The Clever Country? Australia’s Digital Future. Sydney: Lansdown Publishing, 1996.Plane, Melanie. “A Shoe-In for Big Success.” Daily Mercury 9 Sep. 2017: 6.Pratchett, Lawrence, Richard Hu, Michael Walsh, and Sajeda Tuli. The Knowledge City Index: A Tale of 25 Cities in Australia. Canberra: University of Canberra neXus Research Centre, 2017.“Qld Customers NB-uN Happy Complaints about NBN Service Double in 12 Months.” Daily Mercury 17 Apr. 2018: 1.Rudd, Kevin. “Media Release: New National Broadband Network.” Parliament of Australia Press Release, 7 Apr. 2009 <https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;query=Id:"media/pressrel/PS8T6">.Rynne, David. “Revitalising the Sugar Industry.” Sugar Policy Insights Feb. 2019: 2–3.Taylor, Emma. “A Dip in the Pond.” Sydney Morning Herald 16 Aug. 1997: 12.“Telcos and NBN Co in a Crisis.” Daily Mercury 27 Jul. 2017: 6.

Introduction Ireland did not have a tradition of printed cookbooks prior to the 20th century. As a consequence, Irish culinary manuscripts from before this period are an important primary source for historians. This paper makes the case that the manuscripts are a unique way of accessing voices that have quotidian concerns seldom heard above the dominant narratives of conquest, colonisation and famine (Higgins; Dawson). Three manuscripts are examined to see how they contribute to an understanding of Irish social and culinary history. The Irish banking crisis of 2008 is a reminder that comments such as the one in the title of this paper may be more then a casual remark, indicating rather an underlying anxiety. Equally important is the evidence in the manuscripts that Ireland had a domestic culinary tradition sited within the culinary traditions of the British Isles. The terms “vernacular”, representing localised needs and traditions, and “polite”, representing stylistic features incorporated for aesthetic reasons, are more usually applied in the architectural world. As terms, they reflect in a politically neutral way the culinary divide witnessed in the manuscripts under discussion here. Two of the three manuscripts are anonymous, but all are written from the perspective of a well-provisioned house. The class background is elite and as such these manuscripts are not representative of the vernacular, which in culinary terms is likely to be a tradition recorded orally (Gold). The first manuscript (NLI, Tervoe) and second manuscript (NLI, Limerick) show the levels of impact of French culinary influence through their recipes for “cullis”. The Limerick manuscript also opens the discussion to wider social concerns. The third manuscript (NLI, Baker) is unusual in that the author, Mrs. Baker, goes to great lengths to record the provenance of the recipes and as such the collection affords a glimpse into the private “polite” world of the landed gentry in Ireland with its multiplicity of familial and societal connections. Cookbooks and Cuisine in Ireland in the 19th Century During the course of the 18th century, there were 136 new cookery book titles and 287 reprints published in Britain (Lehmann, Housewife 383). From the start of the 18th to the end of the 19th century only three cookbooks of Irish, or Anglo-Irish, authorship have been identified. The Lady’s Companion: or Accomplish’d Director In the whole Art of Cookery was published in 1767 by John Mitchell in Skinner-Row, under the pseudonym “Ceres,” while the Countess of Caledon’s Cheap Receipts and Hints on Cookery: Collected for Distribution Amongst the Irish Peasantry was printed in Armagh by J. M. Watters for private circulation in 1847. The modern sounding Dinners at Home, published in London in 1878 under the pseudonym “Short”, appears to be of Irish authorship, a review in The Irish Times describing it as being written by a “Dublin lady”, the inference being that she was known to the reviewer (Farmer). English Copyright Law was extended to Ireland in July 1801 after the Act of Union between Great Britain and Ireland in 1800 (Ferguson). Prior to this, many titles were pirated in Ireland, a cause of confusion alluded to by Lehmann when she comments regarding the Ceres book that it “does not appear to be simply a Dublin-printed edition of an English book” (Housewife 403). This attribution is based on the dedication in the preface: “To The Ladies of Dublin.” From her statement that she had a “great deal of experience in business of this kind”, one may conclude that Ceres had worked as a housekeeper or cook. Cheap Receipts and Hints on Cookery was the second of two books by Catherine Alexander, Countess of Caledon. While many commentators were offering advice to Irish people on how to alleviate their poverty, in Friendly Advice to Irish Mothers on Training their Children, Alexander was unusual in addressing her book specifically to its intended audience (Bourke). In this cookbook, the tone is of a practical didactic nature, the philosophy that of enablement. Given the paucity of printed material, manuscripts provide the main primary source regarding the existence of an indigenous culinary tradition. Attitudes regarding this tradition lie along the spectrum exemplified by the comments of an Irish journalist, Kevin Myers, and an eminent Irish historian, Louis Cullen. Myers describes Irish cuisine as a “travesty” and claims that the cuisine of “Old Ireland, in texture and in flavour, generally resembles the cinders after the suttee of a very large, but not very tasty widow”, Cullen makes the case that Irish cuisine is “one of the most interesting culinary traditions in Europe” (141). It is not proposed to investigate the ideological standpoints behind the various comments on Irish food. Indeed, the use of the term “Irish” in this context is fraught with difficulty and it should be noted that in the three manuscripts proposed here, the cuisine is that of the gentry class and representative of a particular stratum of society more accurately described as belonging to the Anglo-Irish tradition. It is also questionable how the authors of the three manuscripts discussed would have described themselves in terms of nationality. The anxiety surrounding this issue of identity is abating as scholarship has moved from viewing the cultural artifacts and buildings inherited from this class, not as symbols of an alien heritage, but rather as part of the narrative of a complex country (Rees). The antagonistic attitude towards this heritage could be seen as reaching its apogee in the late 1950s when the then Government minister, Kevin Boland, greeted the decision to demolish a row of Georgian houses in Dublin with jubilation, saying that they stood for everything that he despised, and describing the Georgian Society, who had campaigned for their preservation, as “the preserve of the idle rich and belted earls” (Foster 160). Mac Con Iomaire notes that there has been no comprehensive study of the history of Irish food, and the implications this has for opinions held, drawing attention to the lack of recognition that a “parallel Anglo-Irish cuisine existed among the Protestant elite” (43). To this must be added the observation that Myrtle Allen, the doyenne of the Irish culinary world, made when she observed that while we have an Irish identity in food, “we belong to a geographical and culinary group with Wales, England, and Scotland as all counties share their traditions with their next door neighbour” (1983). Three Irish Culinary Manuscripts The three manuscripts discussed here are held in the National Library of Ireland (NLI). The manuscript known as Tervoe has 402 folio pages with a 22-page index. The National Library purchased the manuscript at auction in December 2011. Although unattributed, it is believed to come from Tervoe House in County Limerick (O’Daly). Built in 1776 by Colonel W.T. Monsell (b.1754), the Monsell family lived there until 1951 (see, Fig. 1). The house was demolished in 1953 (Bence-Jones). William Monsell, 1st Lord Emly (1812–94) could be described as the most distinguished of the family. Raised in an atmosphere of devotion to the Union (with Great Britain), loyalty to the Church of Ireland, and adherence to the Tory Party, he converted in 1850 to the Roman Catholic religion, under the influence of Cardinal Newman and the Oxford Movement, changing his political allegiance from Tory to Whig. It is believed that this change took place as a result of the events surrounding the Great Irish Famine of 1845–50 (Potter). The Tervoe manuscript is catalogued as 18th century, and as the house was built in the last quarter of the century, it would be reasonable to surmise that its conception coincided with that period. It is a handsome volume with original green vellum binding, which has been conserved. Fig. 1. Tervoe House, home of the Monsell family. In terms of culinary prowess, the scope of the Tervoe manuscript is extensive. For the purpose of this discussion, one recipe is of particular interest. The recipe, To make a Cullis for Flesh Soups, instructs the reader to take the fat off four pounds of the best beef, roast the beef, pound it to a paste with crusts of bread and the carcasses of partridges or other fowl “that you have by you” (NLI, Tervoe). This mixture should then be moistened with best gravy, and strong broth, and seasoned with pepper, thyme, cloves, and lemon, then sieved for use with the soup. In 1747 Hannah Glasse published The Art of Cookery, Made Plain and Easy. The 1983 facsimile edition explains the term “cullis” as an Anglicisation of the French word coulis, “a preparation for thickening soups and stews” (182). The coulis was one of the essential components of the nouvelle cuisine of the 18th century. This movement sought to separate itself from “the conspicuous consumption of profusion” to one where the impression created was one of refinement and elegance (Lehmann, Housewife 210). Reactions in England to this French culinary innovation were strong, if not strident. Glasse derides French “tricks”, along with French cooks, and the coulis was singled out for particular opprobrium. In reality, Glasse bestrides both sides of the divide by giving the much-hated recipe and commenting on it. She provides another example of this in her recipe for The French Way of Dressing Partridges to which she adds the comment: “this dish I do not recommend; for I think it an odd jumble of thrash, by that time the Cullis, the Essence of Ham, and all other Ingredients are reckoned, the Partridges will come to a fine penny; but such Receipts as this, is what you have in most Books of Cookery yet printed” (53). When Daniel Defoe in The Complete English Tradesman of 1726 criticised French tradesmen for spending so much on the facades of their shops that they were unable to offer their customers a varied stock within, we can see the antipathy spilling over into other creative fields (Craske). As a critical strategy, it is not dissimilar to Glasse when she comments “now compute the expense, and see if this dish cannot be dressed full as well without this expense” at the end of a recipe for the supposedly despised Cullis for all Sorts of Ragoo (53). Food had become part of the defining image of Britain as an aggressively Protestant culture in opposition to Catholic France (Lehmann Politics 75). The author of the Tervoe manuscript makes no comment about the dish other than “A Cullis is a mixture of things, strained off.” This is in marked contrast to the second manuscript (NLI, Limerick). The author of this anonymous manuscript, from which the title of this paper is taken, is considerably perplexed by the term cullis, despite the manuscript dating 1811 (Fig. 2). Of Limerick provenance also, but considerably more modest in binding and scope, the manuscript was added to for twenty years, entries terminating around 1831. The recipe for Beef Stake (sic) Pie is an exact transcription of a recipe in John Simpson’s A Complete System of Cookery, published in 1806, and reads Cut some beef steaks thin, butter a pan (or as Lord Buckingham’s cook, from whom these rects are taken, calls it a soutis pan, ? [sic] (what does he mean, is it a saucepan) [sic] sprinkle the pan with pepper and salt, shallots thyme and parsley, put the beef steaks in and the pan on the fire for a few minutes then put them to cool, when quite cold put them in the fire, scrape all the herbs in over the fire and ornament as you please, it will take an hour and half, when done take the top off and put in some coulis (what is that?) [sic]. Fig. 2. Beef Stake Pie (NLI, Limerick). Courtesy of the National Library of Ireland. Simpson was cook to Lord Buckingham for at least a year in 1796, and may indeed have travelled to Ireland with the Duke who had several connections there. A feature of this manuscript are the number of Cholera remedies that it contains, including the “Rect for the cholera sent by Dr Shanfer from Warsaw to the Brussels Government”. Cholera had reached Germany by 1830, and England by 1831. By March 1832, it had struck Belfast and Dublin, the following month being noted in Cork, in the south of the country. Lasting a year, the epidemic claimed 50,000 lives in Ireland (Fenning). On 29 April 1832, the diarist Amhlaoibh Ó Súilleabháin notes, “we had a meeting today to keep the cholera from Callan. May God help us” (De Bhaldraithe 132). By 18 June, the cholera is “wrecking destruction in Ennis, Limerick and Tullamore” (135) and on 26 November, “Seed being sown. The end of the month wet and windy. The cholera came to Callan at the beginning of the month. Twenty people went down with it and it left the town then” (139). This situation was obviously of great concern and this is registered in the manuscript. Another concern is that highlighted by the recommendation that “this receipt is as good as the bank. It has been obligingly given to Mrs Hawkesworth by the chief book keeper at the Bank of Ireland” (NLI, Limerick). The Bank of Ireland commenced business at St. Mary’s Abbey in Dublin in June 1783, having been established under the protection of the Irish Parliament as a chartered rather then a central bank. As such, it supplied a currency of solidity. The charter establishing the bank, however, contained a prohibitory clause preventing (until 1824 when it was repealed) more then six persons forming themselves into a company to carry on the business of banking. This led to the formation, especially outside Dublin, of many “small private banks whose failure was the cause of immense wretchedness to all classes of the population” (Gilbert 19). The collapse that caused the most distress was that of the Ffrench bank in 1814, founded eleven years previously by the family of Lord Ffrench, one of the leading Catholic peers, based in Connacht in the west of Ireland. The bank issued notes in exchange for Bank of Ireland notes. Loans from Irish banks were in the form of paper money which were essentially printed promises to pay the amount stated and these notes were used in ordinary transactions. So great was the confidence in the Ffrench bank that their notes were held by the public in preference to Bank of Ireland notes, most particularly in Connacht. On 27 June 1814, there was a run on the bank leading to collapse. The devastation spread through society, from business through tenant farmers to the great estates, and notably so in Galway. Lord Ffrench shot himself in despair (Tennison). Williams and Finn, founded in Kilkenny in 1805, entered bankruptcy proceedings in 1816, and the last private bank outside Dublin, Delacours in Mallow, failed in 1835 (Barrow). The issue of bank failure is commented on by writers of the period, notably so in Dickens, Thackery, and Gaskill, and Edgeworth in Ireland. Following on the Ffrench collapse, notes from the Bank of Ireland were accorded increased respect, reflected in the comment in this recipe. The receipt in question is one for making White Currant Wine, with the unusual addition of a slice of bacon suspended from the bunghole when the wine is turned, for the purpose of enriching it. The recipe was provided to “Mrs Hawkesworth by the chief book keeper of the bank” (NLI, Limerick). In 1812, a John Hawkesworth, agent to Lord CastleCoote, was living at Forest Lodge, Mountrath, County Laois (Ennis Chronicle). The Coote family, although settling in County Laois in the seventeenth century, had strong connections with Limerick through a descendent of the younger brother of the first Earl of Mountrath (Landed Estates). The last manuscript for discussion is the manuscript book of Mrs Abraham Whyte Baker of Ballytobin House, County Kilkenny, 1810 (NLI, Baker). Ballytobin, or more correctly Ballaghtobin, is a townland in the barony of Kells, four miles from the previously mentioned Callan. The land was confiscated from the Tobin family during the Cromwellian campaign in Ireland of 1649–52, and was reputedly purchased by a Captain Baker, to establish what became the estate of Ballaghtobin (Fig. 3) To this day, it is a functioning estate, remaining in the family, twice passing down through the female line. In its heyday, there were two acres of walled gardens from which the house would have drawn for its own provisions (Ballaghtobin). Fig. 3. Ballaghtobin 2013. At the time of writing the manuscript, Mrs. Sophia Baker was widowed and living at Ballaghtobin with her son and daughter-in-law, Charity who was “no beauty, but tall, slight” (Herbert 414). On the succession of her husband to the estate, Charity became mistress of Ballaghtobin, leaving Sophia with time on what were her obviously very capable hands (Nevin). Sophia Baker was the daughter of Sir John Blunden of Castle Blunden and Lucinda Cuffe, daughter of the first Baron Desart. Sophia was also first cousin of the diarist Dorothea Herbert, whose mother was Lucinda’s sister, Martha. Sophia Baker and Dorothea Herbert have left for posterity a record of life in the landed gentry class in rural Georgian Ireland, Dorothea describing Mrs. Baker as “full of life and spirits” (Herbert 70). Their close relationship allows the two manuscripts to converse with each other in a unique way. Mrs. Baker’s detailing of the provenance of her recipes goes beyond the norm, so that what she has left us is not just a remarkable work of culinary history but also a palimpsest of her family and social circle. Among the people she references are: “my grandmother”; Dorothea Beresford, half sister to the Earl of Tyrone, who lived in the nearby Curraghmore House; Lady Tyrone; and Aunt Howth, the sister of Dorothea Beresford, married to William St Lawrence, Lord Howth, and described by Johnathan Swift as “his blue eyed nymph” (195). Other attributions include Lady Anne Fitzgerald, wife of Maurice Fitzgerald, 16th knight of Kerry, Sir William Parsons, Major Labilen, and a Mrs. Beaufort (Fig. 4). Fig. 4. Mrs. Beauforts Rect. (NLI, Baker). Courtesy of the National Library of Ireland. That this Mrs. Beaufort was the wife of Daniel Augustus Beaufort, mother of the hydrographer Sir Francis Beaufort, may be deduced from the succeeding recipe supplied by a Mrs. Waller. Mrs. Beaufort’s maiden name was Waller. Fanny Beaufort, the elder sister of Sir Francis, was Richard Edgeworth’s fourth wife and close friend and confidante of his daughter Maria, the novelist. There are also entries for “Miss Herbert” and “Aunt Herbert.” While the Baker manuscript is of interest for the fact that it intersects the worlds of the novelist Maria Edgeworth and the diarist Dorothea Herbert, and for the societal references that it documents, it is also a fine collection of recipes that date back to the mid-18th century. An example of this is a recipe for Sligo pickled salmon that Mrs. Baker, nee Blunden, refers to in an index that she gives to a second volume. Unfortunately this second volume is not known to be extant. This recipe features in a Blunden family manuscript of 1760 as referred to in Anelecta Hibernica (McLysaght). The recipe has also appeared in Cookery and Cures of Old Kilkenny (St. Canices’s 24). Unlike the Tervoe and Limerick manuscripts, Mrs. Baker is unconcerned with recipes for “cullis”. Conclusion The three manuscripts that have been examined here are from the period before the famine of 1845–50, known as An Gorta Mór, translated as “the big hunger”. The famine preceding this, Bliain an Áir (the year of carnage) in 1740–1 was caused by extremely cold and rainy weather that wiped out the harvest (Ó Gráda 15). This earlier famine, almost forgotten today, was more severe than the subsequent one, causing the death of an eight of the population of the island over one and a half years (McBride). These manuscripts are written in living memory of both events. Within the world that they inhabit, it may appear there is little said about hunger or social conditions beyond the walls of their estates. Subjected to closer analysis, however, it is evident that they are loquacious in their own unique way, and make an important contribution to the narrative of cookbooks. Through the three manuscripts discussed here, we find evidence of the culinary hegemony of France and how practitioners in Ireland commented on this in comparatively neutral fashion. An awareness of cholera and bank collapses have been communicated in a singular fashion, while a conversation between diarist and culinary networker has allowed a glimpse into the world of the landed gentry in Ireland during the Georgian period. References Allen, M. “Statement by Myrtle Allen at the opening of Ballymaloe Cookery School.” 14 Nov. 1983. Ballaghtobin. “The Grounds”. nd. 13 Mar. 2013. ‹http://www.ballaghtobin.com/gardens.html›. Barrow, G.L. “Some Dublin Private Banks.” Dublin Historical Record 25.2 (1972): 38–53. Bence-Jones, M. A Guide to Irish Country Houses. London: Constable, 1988. Bourke, A. Ed. Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing Vol V. Cork: Cork UP, 2002. Craske, M. “Design and the Competitive Spirit in Early and Mid 18th Century England”, Journal of Design History 12.3 (1999): 187–216. Cullen, L. The Emergence of Modern Ireland. London: Batsford, 1981. Dawson, Graham. “Trauma, Memory, Politics. The Irish Troubles.” Trauma: Life Stories of Survivors. Ed. Kim Lacy Rogers, Selma Leydesdorff and Graham Dawson. New Jersey: Transaction P, 2004. De Bhaldraithe,T. Ed. Cín Lae Amhlaoibh. Cork: Mercier P, 1979. Ennis Chronicle. 12–23 Feb 1812. 10 Feb. 2013 ‹http://astheywere.blogspot.ie/2012/12/ennis-chronicle-1812-feb-23-feb-12.html› Farmar, A. E-mail correspondence between Farmar and Dr M. Mac Con Iomaire, 26 Jan. 2011. Fenning, H. “The Cholera Epidemic in Ireland 1832–3: Priests, Ministers, Doctors”. Archivium Hibernicum 57 (2003): 77–125. Ferguson, F. “The Industrialisation of Irish Book Production 1790-1900.” The Oxford History of the Irish Book, Vol. IV The Irish Book in English 1800-1891. Ed. J. Murphy. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2011. Foster, R.F. Luck and the Irish: A Brief History of Change from 1970. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008. Gilbert, James William. The History of Banking in Ireland. London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman, 1836. Glasse, Hannah. The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy by a Lady: Facsimile Edition. Devon: Prospect, 1983. Gold, C. Danish Cookbooks. Seattle: U of Washington P, 2007. Herbert, D. Retrospections of an Outcast or the Life of Dorothea Herbert. London: Gerald Howe, 1929. Higgins, Michael D. “Remarks by President Michael D. Higgins reflecting on the Gorta Mór: the Great famine of Ireland.” Famine Commemoration, Boston, 12 May 2012. 18 Feb. 2013 ‹http://www.president.ie/speeches/ › Landed Estates Database, National University of Galway, Moore Institute for Research, 10 Feb. 2013 ‹http://landedestates.nuigalway.ie/LandedEstates/jsp/family-show.jsp?id=633.› Lehmann, G. The British Housewife: Cookery books, cooking and society in eighteenth-century Britain. Totnes: Prospect, 1993. ---. “Politics in the Kitchen.” 18th Century Life 23.2 (1999): 71–83. Mac Con Iomaire, M. “The Emergence, Development and Influence of French Haute Cuisine on Public Dining in Dublin Restaurants 1900-2000: An Oral History”. Vol. 2. PhD thesis. Dublin Institute of Technology. 2009. 8 Mar. 2013 ‹http://arrow.dit.ie/tourdoc/12›. McBride, Ian. Eighteenth Century Ireland: The Isle of Slaves. Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 2009. McLysaght, E.A. Anelecta Hibernica 15. Dublin: Irish Manuscripts Commission, 1944. Myers, K. “Dinner is served ... But in Our Culinary Dessert it may be Korean.” The Irish Independent 30 Jun. 2006. Nevin, M. “A County Kilkenny Georgian Household Notebook.” Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 109 (1979): 5–18. (NLI) National Library of Ireland. Baker. 19th century manuscript. MS 34,952. ---. Limerick. 19th century manuscript. MS 42,105. ---. Tervoe. 18th century manuscript. MS 42,134. Ó Gráda, C. Famine: A Short History. New Jersey: Princeton UP, 2009. O’Daly, C. E-mail correspondence between Colette O’Daly, Assistant Keeper, Dept. of Manuscripts, National Library of Ireland and Dorothy Cashman. 8 Dec. 2011. Potter, M. William Monsell of Tervoe 1812-1894. Dublin: Irish Academic P, 2009. Rees, Catherine. “Irish Anxiety, Identity and Narrative in the Plays of McDonagh and Jones.” Redefinitions of Irish Identity: A Postnationalist Approach. Eds. Irene Gilsenan Nordin and Carmen Zamorano Llena. Bern: Peter Lang, 2010. St. Canice’s. Cookery and Cures of Old Kilkenny. Kilkenny: Boethius P, 1983. Swift, J. The Works of the Rev Dr J Swift Vol. XIX Dublin: Faulkner, 1772. 8 Feb. 2013. ‹http://www.google.ie/search?tbm=bks&hl=en&q=works+of+jonathan+swift+Vol+XIX+&btnG=› Tennison, C.M. “The Old Dublin Bankers.” Journal of the Cork Historical and Archeological Society 1.2 (1895): 36–9.

Cohesion as a term connotes attraction, unity, and commonness amongst discrete entities. Considering cohesion as a concept is timely with the recent rise of network culture, which comes with both subtle and radical changes in how people connect with, position themselves in relation to, and understand other constituents of society (cf. Varnelis; Castells; Jenkins et al.). Such dis- and inter-connections signify an imminent and immanent epistemological challenge we must confront: how can we understand inherently multi-faceted subjects, components of which are in constant transformation? For researchers, disciplinary complexity is one of the main implications of this situation. While disciplinary integration may be an effective or vital component in pursuit of knowledge (cf. Nicolescu) it may also impart significant conceptual and pragmatic conflicts. What are possible ways to coalesce multiple dimensions of reality that can lead to conceptually cohesive and useful knowledge production? This issue of M/C Journal attempts to answer this question by looking at different perspectives on the notion of cohesion across topical and disciplinary boundaries. Our premise for exploring ‘cohesion’ in this issue is two-fold: first, there is a need to understand the conceptual and experiential significance of social cohesion in the increasingly urbanised and networked contemporary world. In the 1997 OECD report, Societal Cohesion and the Globalising Economy, Michalski, Miller, and Stevens attribute ‘strains of the fabric of OECD societies’ to global economic and political changes, as well as the rapid technological progress. The World Bank places social cohesion as a metonym for social capital; they argue that social cohesion is ‘critical for societies to prosper economically and develop sustainably,’ and that it is ‘the glue’ that holds constituents of the society together. While it is true that the need to build bonds between human beings, and to bring together otherwise disparate experiences and aspirations is evermore crucial to a sustainable future for the world, we doubt that the current pervasive view of cohesion as a measurable parameter for ideal harmony and unity. Rather, in this uncertainty we see opportunities for re-examining the existing definitions of cohesion and further shaping different versions of social/community strengthening. If social cohesion is inherent in the relationships between and amongst entities, ideologies or experiences disagreement and difference or transition are as important or integral as shared ideas. Anheier, Gerhards and Romo have re-imagined Bourdieu’s view of positions individuals inhabit within social spaces as a ‘network, or a configuration, of objective relations among positions.’ From this view the merging of individuals or groups into a cohesive whole becomes less important than the coming together, sometimes only briefly, of ideas into a dynamic and complicated matrix – in other words, the shaping of togetherness through temporary adhesive connections amongst individuals managing various such adhesive networks. We are not necessarily questioning the obvious advantages of a unified society. Rather, we are suggesting a need to enquire into new ways of approaching cohesion, and subsequent implications in viewing, governing, and living in society today, and tomorrow. The second reason for considering cohesion is the development of network technologies, which are embedded in everyday life. Network technologies engender and accentuate multiplicities: multifaceted self-identity, multitasking, and multisensorial experience via interactive media, for example. As we transition from the current network era towards that of ubiquitous computing (ubicomp), our social and technological systems and practices become modular-like (Choi, Foth and Hearn), resonating with what Stone calls ‘continuous partial attention.’ Practice of multi-media communication – for example, concurrently watching television while chatting on Skype on the computer and texting on the mobile phone; another example is Habuchi’s notion of ‘telecocoon’ in which a multitude of constant and partial connections with small, insular social relations are maintained through always-on network technologies. The spatio-temporal zone that is made available, created, and extended by network technologies for expression of the self and communication with others is an inherently in-between space bridging what can be generally considered dichotomous. In this environment, it is cohesion that validates a networked entity by giving it a unified form and/or voice amongst its distributed constituents. The scale of such cohesive process varies from small (individual) to large (collective); examples include individual and community, respectively. As Castells (7) notes, while technology is not entirely responsible for social change, it embodies the capacity for change. Cohesion then, is perhaps best understood as inherently transformative. Thus examining cohesion as a phenomenon should not be focused on the ‘connections’ amongst individual entities but should concern what triggers, sustains, and suspends adhesive interactions, and how such processes relates to overall cohesion within the concerned subject. This notion resonates with the connection – access relation in understanding network culture. As Choi asserts, ‘in a network environment where the connection is a primal element, connection itself cannot be the rationale for interaction; rather, it is access – the act of accessing and being accessed – that becomes the prime motive for participation in network interactions’ (104). This issue of M/C Journal brings together diverse articles that explore the dynamic and challenging concept of cohesion in the current era, where technological, cultural, and structural conditions rapidly co-evolve through communicative networks, thereby reshaping the ontological and epistemological dimensions of various societies. The feature article by Holmes Cohesion, Adhesion and Incoherence explores the creation of a cohesive visual identity for a collective via digital and print-media. Her paper illustrates the ways in which Flickr participants communicate with each other, and how it is possible for networks to come together in an organically cohesive way, if only temporarily. Holmes also provides and insight into the process of and obstacles to establishing and maintaining a cohesive group identity. This feature article provides a framework for the issue as whole that shows how cohesive identity is created through ‘negotiation’ confirms our view that it’s in constant transformation. It also serves as a launching pad for the other articles to continue deconstructing cohesion as a cohesive concept. Glover turns the focus to policy making in the cultural sector. In his paper Failed Fantasies of Cohesion he examines the fantasy of cohesion as fundamental to whole-of-government cultural policy-making undertaken within Arts Queensland in the 1990s and 2000s. The emphasis in this paper is the complexity of cohesion as a critical factor in cultural policy making, and also the paradox that cohesion presents. In the quest for cohesion the potential for important and rich dissent can be discouraged. As Glover eloquently argues, when cohesion is lost all is not lost. This embracing of both the flaws in and potential of cohesion is carried in Publish or Perish. Martin puts forward possible strategies for university presses to work as a cohesive force between emerging writers and the writing industry. He examines the inter-relationship between university presses and the broader publishing industry, and asks whether broader access and sustained co-operation between creative writing departments and university publishing houses or presses could result in a new version of cohesion in the Australian literary landscape. He presents a holistic contour of the contemporary literary industry, using the University of Western Australia and the University of Western Sydney as examples of how entities with competing agendas can come together in a mutually beneficial and innovative way. Leder and colleagues bring the focus to the individual techno-social experience, as exemplified in their ToTeM (Tales of Things and Electronic Memory) project. This project addresses social cohesion through combining personal narratives with Web2.0 and tagging technologies to create a network of shared object-related memories. This paper accentuates the pluralistic nature of cohesion and thus calls for a multiplicity of approaches to cohesion. This issue closes with an artistic piece by Kari Gislason. His personal essay Independent People provides an exploration of Iceland’s financial collapse and its disconnection with the European Union, and calls into question whether a cohesive relationship with its neighbours is possible for or even desired by the Icelandic people. This discussion is played out against the backdrop of competing national identities in his own life and the search for unity. It is in this problematising and challenging of cohesion as a static or permanent state of agreement that this issue found its own cohesive thread. References Anheier, Helmut, Jurgen Gerhards, and P. Romo. “Forms of capital and social structure in cultural fields: Examining Bourdieu’s Social Topography.” The American Journal of Sociology 100.4 (1995) 859-903. Bordieu, Pierre. “Social Space and Symbolic Power.” Sociological Review 7.1 (1989) 14-25. Castells, Manuel. The Rise of the Network Society. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1996. Choi, Jaz Hee-jeong. "The City, Self, and Connections: Transyouth and Urban Social Networking in Seoul." Youth, Society and Mobile Media in Asia. Eds. Stephanie Hemelryk Donald, Theresa Anderson and Damien Spry. London, New York: Routledge, 2010. 88-107. Choi, Jaz Hee-jeong, Marcus Foth, and Greg Hearn. "Site Specific Mobility and Connection in Korea: Bangs (Rooms) between Public and Private Spaces." Technology in Society 31.2 (2009). Habuchi, Ichiyo. "Accelerated Reflexivity." Personal, Portable, Pedestrian : Mobile Phones in Japanese Life. Eds. Mizuko Ito, Daisuke Okabe and Misa Matsuda. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2005. 165-82. Jenkins, Henry, et al. "Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century". 2006. 6 Nov. 2006. ‹http://www.digitallearning.macfound.org/site/c.enJLKQNlFiG/b.2108773/apps/nl/content2.asp?content_id=%7BCD911571-0240-4714-A93B-1D0C07C7B6C1%7D&notoc=1 >. Michalski, Wolfgang, Riel Miller, and Barrie Stevens. "Economic Flexibility and Societal Cohesion in the Twenty-First Century." Societal Cohesion and the Globalising Economy. Ed. OECD. Paris: OECD, 1997. 7-26. Nicolescu, Basarab. Manifesto of Transdisciplinarity. Trans. Karen-Claire Voss. New York: State University of New York Press, 2002. Stone, Linda. "Attention: The *Real* Aphrodisiac." O'Reilly Media Emerging Technology Conference. Varnelis, Kazys. Networked Publics. Ed. Annenberg Center for Communication, University of Southern California. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2008. World Bank. "Social Capital: The Glue Holding Society Together". 2001. March 18 2010. ‹http://www.worldbank.org/html/prddr/trans/augsepoct00/boxpage31.htm >.

Pornography can appear as a staid genre with a rigid series of rules and representations, each video consisting of a specified number of liaisons and pre-designated sexual acts, but it is also a genre that has developed and focused its numerous activities. What was considered to be an arousing taboo in the 1970s would not, for example, be considered as such today. Anal sex, while once comparatively rare in pornographic films, is now commonplace, and, while once utterly unspoken in mainstream heterosexual culture it is now acknowledged and celebrated, even by female targeted films such as Brigit Jones’ Diary (Sharon Maguire, 2001). Pornography, however, has raised the stakes again. Hardcore is dependent on so called ‘nasty girls’ and most interviews with starlets focus on their ability to enjoy being ‘nasty’, to enjoy what are considered or labelled as ‘perverse’ manifestations of sexuality by the normalising discourses of dominant culture and society. While once a porn star merely had to enjoy – or pretend to enjoy – sucking cock, now it is expected her repertoire will include a wider range of activities. With anal sex, an event that transpires in most modern pornography, the site of penises – either singularly or in pairs – pushed into swollen sore assholes is a visual commonplace. In the 1980s and 1990s (when the representation of heterosexual anal sex became truly dominant in pornography) there was a recognizable process of sexual acts, between penetration of mouth, vagina, and asshole. Each penetration would be edited and between each take the male star would wipe down his penis. Until somebody in hardcore pornography developed the A-to-M, a.k.a ass-to-mouth aka A2M. In this move the male pulls his cock from the asshole of the female and then sticks it straight into her open mouth and down her throat without wiping it clean first. All of this is presented unmediated to the viewer, in one singular shot that follows the penis as it moves from one willing hole to the other (and the body must be understood as fragmented, it is a collection of zones and areas, in this instance orifices each with their own signifying practices, not a singular organic whole). Even assuming that the nubile starlet has had an enema to blast clean her rectum prior to filming there will still be microscopic traces of her shit and rectal mucus on his penis. Indeed the pleasure for the viewers is in the knowledge of the authenticity of the movement between ass and mouth, in the knowledge that there will be small flakes of shit stuck to her lips and teeth (a variant of the ass-to-mouth sees the penis being pulled from one starlet’s anus and inserted into another starlet’s gaping mouth, again in one unedited shot). Shit escapes simple ontology it is opposed to all manner of being, all manner of knowledge and of existence yet it is also intimately linked to self-presence and continuity. From earliest infancy we are encouraged not to engage with it, rather it is that which is to be flushed away immediately, it is everything about being human that is repulsive, rejected and denied. Shit escapes simple symbolism; it exists in its own discursive zone. While death may be similarly horrific to us, it is so because it is utterly unknown shit, however, horrifies precisely because it is known to us. Like death, shit makes us all equal, but shit is familiar, we know its fragrance, we know its texture, we know its colour, and – yes – deep down, repressed in our animal brain we know its taste. Its familiarity results because it is a part of us, yet it is no longer of us. In death the cadaver can be theorized as the body without a soul, without spirit, or without personality, but with shit humanity does not have this luxury, shit is the part of us that both defies and defines humanity. Shit is that which was us but is no longer, yet it never fully stops being part of us, it contains traces of our genetic material, pieces of our diet, even as it is flushed more is already being pushed down our intestine. Shit is substance and process. If the act of fucking is that which affirms vital existence against death, then introducing shit into the equation becomes utterly transgressive. Defecation and copulation are antithetical St Augustine’s recognition that we are born between piss and shit – inter faeces et urinam – understands the animistic nature of existence and sex as contaminated by sin, but he does not conflate the act of shitting and fucking as the same, his description is powerful precisely because they are not understood as the same. Introducing shit into sexual activity is culturally forbidden, genuine scatologists, coprophiles and shit fetishists are rare, and most keep their desires secret even from their closest companions. Even the few that confess to enjoying ‘brown showers’ do not admit to eating raw shit, either their own or that of somebody else. The practice is considered to be too dangerous, too unhealthy, and too disgusting. Even amongst the radical sexual communities many find that it stinks of excess, as if desires and fantasies had limits. In Pier Paolo Pasolini’s cinematic masterpiece Salo (1975) the quartet of libertines and their fellow explorers in unleashed lust – both the willing and the coerced – indulge in a vast coprophilic feast, but in this film the shit that is slathered over the bodies of the young charges and greedily scoffed down is not real. However there are a handful of directly scatological pornographic videos, often they depict people crouching down and shitting, the shit being rubbed on to nude bodies and eventually consumed. In some videos hungry mouths open directly under the puckering asshole, allowing the brown turd to plop directly onto the enthusiastic tongue and into the mouth. Cameras zoom in to show the shit-smeared lips and teeth. Like the image of ejaculation manifested in the cum-shot of mainstream hardcore pornography this sight is a vindication of the authenticity of the action. Such videos are watched by both fetishists and the curious – commonly teenage males trying to out shock each other. Unlike ‘traditional’ heterosexual hardcore pornography, which depicts explicit penetrative sex, scatology films rarely appear on the shelves of video stores and enthusiasts are compelled to search the dark bowels of pornography to find them. Yet the popularity of the ass-to-mouth sequence in hardcore suggests that there is an interest with such faecal taboo acts that may be more common that previously imagined. This is not to suggest that the audience who witness an ass-to-mouth scene want to go and eat shit, or want their partners to, but it does suggest that there is an interest in the transgressive potential of shit or the idea of shit on an erect penis. Watching these scenes the audience’s attention is drawn to the movement from the locus of defecation to that of consumption. Perhaps the visual pleasure lies in the degradation of the ‘nasty’ girl, in the knowledge that she can taste her own mucus and faecal matter. But if the pleasures are purely sadistic then these films fail, they do not (just) depict the starlets ‘suffering’ as they engage in these activities, in contrast, they are ‘normalised’ into the sexual conventions of the form. Hardcore pornography is about the depiction of literal excess; about multiple penis plunging into one asshole or one vagina (or even both) about orgies about the world’s biggest gang bangs and facials in which a dozen or more men shoot their genetic material onto the grinning faces of starlets as cum slathers their forehead, cheeks, chin, lips, and teeth. The sheer unremitting quantity becomes an object in itself. Nothing can ever be enough. This excess is also philosophical; all non-reproductive sexual activity belongs to the category of excess expenditure, where the unrestrained pursuit of pleasure becomes in itself both object choice and subject. Some would see such pornographic activities as anti-humanist, as cold, and as nihilistic, but such an interpretation fails. In watching these films, in seeing the penis move from asshole to mouth the audience are compelled by the authenticity of the gesture to read the starlet as human the ‘pleasure’ is in knowing that she can taste her own shit on some anonymous cock. Finally, she is smiling through its musky taste so we do not have to. Appendix / Sources / Notes / Parallel Text Throughout this paper I am referring only to pornographic material marketed to an audience who are identified or identify as heterosexual. These films may contain scenes with multiple males and females having sex at one time, however while there may be what the industry refers to as girl-on-girl action there will be no direct male-on-male contact (although often all that seperates two male penises is the paper thin wall of fleshy tissue between the vagina and anus). The socio-cultural history of heterosexual anal sex is a complex one, made more so because of its illicit and, in some jurisdictions, illegal status. It is safe to assume that many people have engaged in it even if they have not subsequently undertaken an active interest in it (statistics published in Exploring the Dimensions of Human Sexuality 2nd Edition suggest that 28% of male and 24% of female American college graduates and 21% of male and 13% of female high school graduates have experienced anal sex [377]). In hardcore pornography it is the male who penetrates the female, who presents her asshole for the viewer’s delectation. In personal sexual behaviour heterosexual males may also enjoy anal penetration from a female partner both in order to stimulate the sensitive tissue around the anus and to stilulate the prostate, but the representation of such activities is very rare in the mainstream of American hardcore porn. As inventer of gonzo porn John Stagliano commented when interviewed about his sexual proclivities in The Other Hollywood , “…you know, admitting that I really wanted to get fucked in the ass, and might really like it, is not necessarily a socially acceptable thing for a straight man” (587). Anal sex was most coherently radicalised by the Marquis de Sade, the master of sodomaniacal literature, who understood penetrating male / penetrated female anal sex as a way in which erotic pleasure/s could be divorced from any reproductive metanarrative. The scene in Brigit Jones’ Diary is made all the more strange because there is no mention of safe sex. There are, however, repeated references and representations of the size and shape of the heroine’s buttocks and her willingness to acquiesce to the evidentially dominant will of her ‘bad’ boyfriend the aptly named Daniel Cleaver. For more on heterosexual anal sex in cinema see my ‘Hot, Hard Cocks and Tight, Tight Unlubricated Assholes.Transgression, Sexual Ambiguity and ‘Perverse’ Pleasures in Serge Gainsbourg’s Je T’Aime Moi Non Plus’, in Senses of Cinema 30 (Jan.-March 2004). Hardcore pornography commonly means that which features a depiction of penetrative intercourse and the visual presentation of male ejaculation as a climax to a sequence. For more on the contemporary porn scene and the ‘nasty girl’ see Anthony Petkovich, The X Factory: Inside The American Hardcore Film Industry, which contains numerous interviews with porn starlets and industry insiders. While pornography is remembered for a number of key texts such as Deep Throat (Gerard Damiano, 1972) or Behind the Green Door (Jim & Artie Mitchell, 1972), these were shot and marketed as erotic narrative film and released theatrically (albeit to grindhouse and specialist cinemas). However since 1982 and the widespread availability of video – and more recently DVD – pornography has been produced almost exclusively for home consumption. The increasing demands of the consumer, combined with the accessablity of technology and cheap production costs of video when compared to film have led to a glut of available material. Now videos/DVDs are often released in series with absurdly self descriptive titles such as Anal Pounding, Lesbian Bukkake, and Pussy Party, most of which provide examples of the mise-en-scene of contemporary hardcore, specific ass to mouth series include Ass to Mouth (vol 1 – 15), Ass to Mouth CumShots (vol 1 – 5), Her First Ass to Mouth, From Her Ass to Her Mouth, From My Ass to My Mouth, A2M (vol 1 – 9), and no doubt many others. For more on hardcore pornography and its common themes and visual styles see Linda Williams, Hardcore. Wikipedia suggests that the director Max Hardcore was responsible for introducing the form in the early 1990s in his series Cherry Poppers. The act is now a staple of the form. (Note that while Wikipedia can not normally be considered an academic source the vagaries of the subject matter necessitate that research takes place where necessary). All pornographic positions and gestures have a nickname, industry shorthand, thus there are terms such as the DP (double penetration) or the reverse cowgirl. These names are no more or less shocking than the translations for sexual positions offered in ‘classic’ erotic guidebooks such as the Kama Sutra. This fragmented body is a result of the cinematic gaze of pornography. Lenses are able to zoom in and focus on the body, and especially the genitals, in minute detail and present the flesh enlarged to proportions that are impossible to see in actual sexual encounters. The body viewed under such scrutiny but devoid of singular organic plenitude echoes the body without organs of Deleuze and Guattari (in contrast some radical feminist writers such as Andrea Dworkin would merely interpret such images as reflecting the misogyny of male dominated discourse). For more on the psychological development of the infant and the construction of the clean and unclean see Julia Kristeva Powers of Horror. It should be noted that commonly those who enjoy enema play – klismaphiliacs – are not related to scatologists, and often draw a distinction between their play, which is seen as a process of cleansing, and scatologists’ play, which is understood to be a celebration of the physical shit itself. Salo has undergone numerous sanctions, been banned, scorned, and even been interpreted by some as a metaphor / allegory for the director’s subsequent murder. Such understandings and pseudo-explanations do not do justice to either the director or to his film and its radical engagement with de Sade’s literature. These videos always come from ‘elsewhere’ of course, never close to home, thus in Different Loving the authors note “the Germans seem to specialize in scat” (518). Correspondence concerning the infamous bestiality film Animal Farm (197?) in the journal Headpress (issues 15 and 16, 1998) suggested that the audience was made up from teenage males watching it as a rite of passage, rather than by true zoophiles. Those I have seen were on shock and ‘gross out’ Internet sites rather than pornographic sites. Disclaimer – I have no interest per se in scatology, but an ongoing interest with the vagaries of human thought, and desire in particular, necessarily involves exploring areas others turn their noses up at. References Brame, Gloria G., William D. Brame, and Jon Jacobs. Different Loving: The World of Dominance and Submission. London: Arrow, 1998. Greenberg, Jerrold S., Clint E. Bruess, and Debra W. Haffner. Exploring the Dimensions of Human Sexuality. 2nd Edition. London: James & Bartlett, 2004. Russ Kick, ed. Everything You Know about Sex Is Wrong. New York: Disinformation, 2006. Julia Kristeva. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. New York: Columbia UP, 1982. McNeil, Legs, and Jennifer Osborne, with Peter Pavia. The Other Hollywood: The Uncensored Oral History of the Porn Film Industry. New York: Regan Books, HarperCollins, 2006. Petkovich, Anthony. The X Factory: Inside the American Hardcore Film Industry. Stockport: Critical Vision, 2001. Marquis de Sade. Justine, Philosophy in the Bedroom, and Other Writings. London: Arrow, 1991. Sargeant, Jack. “Hot, Hard Cocks and Tight, Tight Unlubricated Assholes: Transgression, Sexual Ambiguity and ‘Perverse’ Pleasures in Serge Gainsbourg’s Je T’Aime Moi Non Plus.“ Senses of Cinema 30 (Jan.-March 2004). Wikipedia. “Ass to Mouth.” 15 Sep. 2006 http://en.wikipedia.org.wk/Ass_to_mouth>. Williams, Linda. Hardcore. London: Pandora Press, 1990. Citation reference for this article MLA Style Sargeant, Jack. "Filth and Sexual Excess: Some Brief Reflections on Popular Scatology." M/C Journal 9.5 (2006). echo date('d M. Y'); ?> <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0610/03-sargeant.php>. APA Style Sargeant, J. (Nov. 2006) "Filth and Sexual Excess: Some Brief Reflections on Popular Scatology," M/C Journal, 9(5). Retrieved echo date('d M. Y'); ?> from <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0610/03-sargeant.php>.

If I find out that you have bought a $90 red light sabre, Tara, well there's going to be trouble. -- Kevin Brabazon A few Saturdays ago, my 71-year old father tried to convince me of imminent responsibilities. As I am considering the purchase of a house, there are mortgages, bank fees and years of misery to endure. Unfortunately, I am not an effective Big Picture Person. The lure of the light sabre is almost too great. For 30 year old Generation Xers like myself, it is more than a cultural object. It is a textual anchor, and a necessary component to any future history of the present. Revelling in the aura of the Australian release for Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, this paper investigates popular memory, an undertheorised affiliation between popular culture and cultural studies.1 The excitement encircling the Star Wars prequel has been justified in terms of 'hype' or marketing. Such judgements frame the men and women cuing for tickets, talking Yodas and light sabres as fools or duped souls who need to get out more. My analysis explores why Star Wars has generated this enthusiasm, and how cultural studies can mobilise this passionate commitment to consider notions of popularity, preservation and ephemerality. We'll always have Tattooine. Star Wars has been a primary popular cultural social formation for a generation. The stories of Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Darth Vader, Yoda, C-3PO and R2D2 offer an alternative narrative for the late 1970s and 1980s. It was a comfort to have the Royal Shakespearian tones of Alec Guinness confirming that the Force would be with us, through economic rationalism, unemployment, Pauline Hanson and Madonna discovering yoga. The Star Wars Trilogy, encompassing A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, was released between 1977 and 1983. These films have rarely slipped from public attention, being periodically 'brought back' through new cinematic and video releases. The currency of Star Wars is matched with the other great popular cultural formations of the post-war period: the James Bond series and Star Trek. One reason for the continued success of these programmes is that other writers, film makers and producers cannot leave these texts alone. Bond survives not only through Pierce Brosnan's good looks, but the 'Hey Baby' antics of Austin Powers. Star Trek, through four distinct series, has become an industry that will last longer than Voyager's passage back from the Delta Quadrant. Star Wars, perhaps even more effectively than the other popular cultural heavyweights, has enmeshed itself into other filmic and televisual programming. Films like Spaceballs and television quizzes on Good News Week keep the knowledge system and language current and pertinent.2 Like Umberto Eco realised of Casablanca, Star Wars is "a living example of living textuality" (199). Both films are popular because of imperfections and intertextual archetypes, forming a filmic quilt of sensations and affectivities. Viewers are aware that "the cliches are talking among themselves" (Eco 209). As these cinematic texts move through time, the depth and commitment of these (con)textual dialogues are repeated and reinscribed. To hold on to a memory is to isolate a moment or an image and encircle it with meaning. Each day we experience millions of texts: some are remembered, but most are lost. Some popular cultural texts move from ephemera to popular memory to history. In moving beyond individual reminiscences -- the personal experiences of our lifetime -- we enter the sphere of popular culture. Collective or popular memory is a group or community experience of a textualised reality. For example, during the Second World War, there were many private experiences, but certain moments arch beyond the individual. Songs by Vera Lynn are fully textualised experiences that become the fodder for collective memory. Similarly, Star Wars provides a sense-making mechanism for the 1980s. Like all popular culture, these texts allow myriad readership strategies, but there is collective recognition of relevance and importance. Popular memory is such an important site because it provides us, as cultural critics, with a map of emotionally resonant sites of the past, moments that are linked with specific subjectivities and a commonality of expression. While Star Wars, like all popular cultural formations, has a wide audience, there are specific readings that are pertinent for particular groups. To unify a generation around cultural texts is an act of collective memory. As Harris has suggested, "sometimes, youth does interesting things with its legacy and creatively adapts its problematic into seemingly autonomous cultural forms" (79). Generation X refers to an age cohort born between the mid-1960s and the mid-1970s. Finally cultural studies theorists have found a Grail subculture. Being depthless, ambivalent, sexually repressed and social failures, Xers are a cultural studies dream come true. They were the children of the media revolution. Star Wars is integral to this textualised database. A fan on the night of the first screening corrected a journalist: "we aren't Generation X, we are the Star Wars generation" (Brendon, in Miller 9). An infatuation and reflexivity with the media is the single framework of knowledge in which Xers operate. This shared understanding is the basis for comedy, and particularly revealed (in Australia) in programmes like The Panel and Good News Week. Television themes, lines of film dialogue and contemporary news broadcasts are the basis of the game show. The aesthetics of life transforms television into a real. Or, put another way, "individual lives may be fragmented and confused but McDonald's is universal" (Hopkins 17). A group of textual readers share a literacy, a new way of reading the word and world of texts. Nostalgia is a weapon. The 1990s has been a decade of revivals: from Abba to skateboards, an era of retro reinscription has challenged linear theories of history and popular culture. As Timothy Carter reveals, "we all loved the Star Wars movies when we were younger, and so we naturally look forward to a continuation of those films" (9). The 1980s has often been portrayed as a bad time, of Thatcher and Reagan, cold war brinkmanship, youth unemployment and HIV. For those who were children and (amorphously phrased) 'young adults' of this era, the popular memory is of fluorescent fingerless gloves, Ray Bans, 'Choose Life' t-shirts and bubble skirts. It was an era of styling mousse, big hair, the Wham tan, Kylie and Jason and Rick Astley's dancing. Star Wars action figures gave the films a tangibility, holding the future of the rebellion in our hands (literally). These memories clumsily slop into the cup of the present. The problem with 'youth' is that it is semiotically too rich: the expression is understood, but not explained, by discourses as varied as the educational system, family structures, leisure industries and legal, medical and psychological institutions. It is a term of saturation, where normality is taught, and deviance is monitored. All cultural studies theorists carry the baggage of the Birmingham Centre into any history of youth culture. The taken-for-granted 'youth as resistance' mantra, embodied in Resistance through Rituals and Subculture: The Meaning of Style, transformed young people into the ventriloquist's puppet of cultural studies. The strings of the dancing, smoking, swearing and drinking puppet took many years to cut. The feminist blade of Angela McRobbie did some damage to the fraying filaments, as did Dick Hebdige's reflexive corrections in Hiding in the Light. However, the publications, promotion and pedagogy of Gen X ended the theoretical charade. Gen X, the media sophisticates, played with popular culture, rather than 'proper politics.' In Coupland's Generation X, Claire, one of the main characters believed that "Either our lives become stories, or there's just no way to get through them." ... We know that this is why the three of us left our lives behind us and came to the desert -- to tell stories and to make our own lives worthwhile tales in the process. (8) Television and film are part of this story telling process. This intense connection generated an ironic and reflexive literacy in the media. Television became the basis for personal pleasures and local resistances, resulting in a disciplined mobilisation of popular cultural surfaces. Even better than the real thing. As the youngest of Generation Xers are now in their late twenties, they have moved from McJobs to careers. Robert Kizlik, a teacher trainer at an American community college expressed horror as the lack of 'commonsensical knowledge' from his new students. He conducted a survey for teachers training in the social sciences, assessing their grasp of history. There was one hundred percent recognition of such names as Madonna, Mike Tyson, and Sharon Stone, but they hardly qualify as important social studies content ... . I wondered silently just what it is that these students are going to teach when they become employed ... . The deeper question is not that we have so many high school graduates and third and fourth year college students who are devoid of basic information about American history and culture, but rather, how, in the first place, these students came to have the expectations that they could become teachers. (n. pag.) Kizlik's fear is that the students, regardless of their enthusiasm, had poor recognition of knowledge he deemed significant and worthy. His teaching task, to convince students of the need for non-popular cultural knowledges, has resulted in his course being termed 'boring' or 'hard'. He has been unable to reconcile the convoluted connections between personal stories and televisual narratives. I am reminded (perhaps unhelpfully) of one of the most famous filmic teachers, Mr Holland. Upon being attacked by his superiors for using rock and roll in his classes, he replied that he would use anything to instil in his students a love of music. Working with, rather than against, popular culture is an obvious pedagogical imperative. George Lucas has, for example, confirmed the Oprahfied spirituality of the current age. Obviously Star Wars utilises fables, myths3 and fairy tales to summon the beautiful Princess, the gallant hero and the evil Empire, but has become something more. Star Wars slots cleanly into an era of Body Shop Feminism, John Gray's gender politics and Rikki Lake's relationship management. Brian Johnson and Susan Oh argued that the film is actually a new religion. A long time ago in a galaxy far far away -- late 1970s California -- the known universe of George Lucas came into being. In the beginning, George created Star Wars. And the screen was without form, and void. And George said, 'Let there be light', and there was Industrial Light and Magic. And George divided the light from the darkness, with light sabres, and called the darkness the Evil Empire.... And George saw that it was good. (14) The writers underestimate the profound emotional investment placed in the trilogy by millions of people. Genesis narratives describe the Star Wars phenomenon, but do not analyse it. The reason why the films are important is not only because they are a replacement for religion. Instead, they are an integrated component of popular memory. Johnson and Oh have underestimated the influence of pop culture as "the new religion" (14). It is not a form of cheap grace. The history of ideas is neither linear nor traceable. There is no clear path from Plato to Prozac or Moses to Mogadon. Obi-Wan Kenobi is not a personal trainer for the ailing spirituality of our age. It was Ewan McGregor who fulfilled the Xer dream to be the young Obi Wan. As he has stated, "there is nothing cooler than being a Jedi knight" (qtd. in Grant 15). Having survived feet sawing in Shallow Grave and a painfully large enema in Trainspotting, there are few actors who are better prepared to carry the iconographic burden of a Star Wars prequel. Born in 1971, he is the Molly Ringwall of the 1990s. There is something delicious about the new Obi Wan, that hails what Hicks described as "a sense of awareness and self- awareness, of detached observation, of not taking things seriously, and a use of subtle dry humour" (79). The metaphoric light sabre was passed to McGregor. The pull of the dark side. When fans attend The Phantom Menace, they tend to the past, as to a loved garden. Whether this memory is a monument or a ruin depends on the preservation of the analogue world in the digital realm. The most significant theoretical and discursive task in the present is to disrupt the dual ideologies punctuating the contemporary era: inevitable technological change and progress.4 Only then may theorists ponder the future of a digitised past. Disempowered groups, who were denied a voice and role in the analogue history of the twentieth century, will have inequalities reified and reinforced through the digital archiving of contemporary life. The Web has been pivotal to the new Star Wars film. Lucasfilm has an Internet division and an official Website. Between mid November and May, this site has been accessed twenty million times (Gallott 15). Other sites, such as TheForce.net and Countdown to Star Wars, are a record of the enthusiasm and passion of fans. As Daniel Fallon and Matthew Buchanan have realised, "these sites represent the ultimate in film fandom -- virtual communities where like-minded enthusiasts can bathe in the aura generated by their favourite masterpiece" (27). Screensavers, games, desktop wallpaper, interviews and photo galleries have been downloaded and customised. Some ephemeral responses to The Phantom Menace have been digitally recorded. Yet this moment of audience affectivity will be lost without a consideration of digital memory. The potentials and problems of the digital and analogue environments need to be oriented into critical theories of information, knowledge, entertainment and pleasure. The binary language of computer-mediated communication allows a smooth transference of data. Knowledge and meaning systems are not exchanged as easily. Classifying, organising and preserving information make it useful. Archival procedures have been both late and irregular in their application.5 Bocher and Ihlenfeldt assert that 2500 new web sites are coming on-line every day ("A Higher Signal-to-Noise Ratio"). The difficulties and problems confronting librarians and archivists who wish to preserve digital information is revealed in the Australian government's PADI (Preserving Access to Digital Information) Site. Compared with an object in a museum which may lie undisturbed for years in a storeroom, or a book on a shelf, or even Egyptian hieroglyd on the wall of a tomb, digital information requires much more active maintenance. If we want access to digital information in the future, we must plan and act now. (PADI, "Why Preserve Access to Digital Information?") phics carve The speed of digitisation means that responsibility for preserving cultural texts, and the skills necessary to enact this process, is increasing the pressure facing information professionals. An even greater difficulty when preserving digital information is what to keep, and what to release to the ephemeral winds of cyberspace. 'Qualitative criteria' construct an historical record that restates the ideologies of the powerful. Concerns with quality undermine the voices of the disempowered, displaced and decentred. The media's instability through technological obsolescence adds a time imperative that is absent from other archival discussions.6 While these problems have always taken place in the analogue world, there was a myriad of alternative sites where ephemeral material was stored, such as the family home. Popular cultural information will suffer most from the 'blind spots' of digital archivists. While libraries rarely preserve the ephemera of a time, many homes (including mine) preserve the 'trash' of a culture. A red light sabre, toy dalek, Duran Duran posters and a talking Undertaker are all traces of past obsessions and fandoms. Passion evaporates, and interests morph into new trends. These objects remain in attics, under beds, in boxes and sheds throughout the world. Digital documents necessitate a larger project of preservation, with great financial (and spatial) commitments of technology, software and maintenance. Libraries rarely preserve the ephemera -- the texture and light -- of the analogue world. The digital era reduces the number of fan-based archivists. Subsequently forfeited is the spectrum of interests and ideologies that construct the popular memory of a culture. Once bits replace atoms, the recorded world becomes structured by digital codes. Only particular texts will be significant enough to store digitally. Samuel Florman stated that "in the digital age nothing need be lost; do we face the prospect of drowning in trivia as the generations succeed each other?" (n. pag.) The trivia of academics may be the fodder (and pleasures) of everyday life. Digitised preservation, like analogue preservation, can never 'represent' plural paths through the past. There is always a limit and boundary to what is acceptable obsolescence. The Star Wars films suggests that "the whole palette of digital technology is much more subtle and supple; if you can dream it, you can see it" (Corliss 65). This film will also record how many of the dreams survive and are archived. Films, throughout the century, have changed the way in which we construct and remember the past. They convey an expressive memory, rather than an accurate history. Certainly, Star Wars is only a movie. Yet, as Rushkoff has suggested, "we have developed a new language of references and self-references that identify media as a real thing and media history as an actual social history" (32). The build up in Australia to The Phantom Menace has been wilfully joyful. This is a history of the present, a time which I know will, in retrospect, be remembered with great fondness. It is a collective event for a generation, but it speaks to us all in different ways. At ten, it is easy to be amazed and enthralled at popular culture. By thirty, it is more difficult. When we see Star Wars, we go back to visit our memories. With red light sabre in hand, we splice through time, as much as space. Footnotes The United States release of the film occurred on 19 May 1999. In Australia, the film's first screenings were on 3 June. Many cinemas showed The Phantom Menace at 12:01 am, (very) early Thursday morning. The three main players of the GNW team, Paul McDermott, Mikey Robbins and Julie McCrossin, were featured on the cover of Australia's Juice magazine in costumes from The Phantom Menace, being Obi-Wan, Yoda and Queen Amidala respectively. Actually, the National Air and Space Museum had a Star Wars exhibition in 1997, titled "Star Wars: The Magic of Myth". For example, Janet Collins, Michael Hammond and Jerry Wellington, in Teaching and Learning with the Media, stated that "the message is simple: we now have the technology to inform, entertain and educate. Miss it and you, your family and your school will be left behind" (3). Herb Brody described the Net as "an overstuffed, underorganised attic full of pictures and documents that vary wildly in value", in "Wired Science". The interesting question is, whose values will predominate when the attic is being cleared and sorted? This problem is extended because the statutory provision of legal deposit, which obliges publishers to place copies of publications in the national library of the country in which the item is published, does not include CD-ROMs or software. References Bocher, Bob, and Kay Ihlenfeldt. "A Higher Signal-to-Noise Ratio: Effective Use of WebSearch Engines." State of Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction Website. 13 Mar. 1998. 15 June 1999 <http://www.dpi.state.wi.us/dpi/dlcl/lbstat/search2.php>. Brody, Herb. "Wired Science." Technology Review Oct. 1996. 15 June 1999 <http://www.techreview.com/articles/oct96/brody.php>. Carter, Timothy. "Wars Weary." Cinescape 39 (Mar./Apr. 1999): 9. Collins, Janet, Michael Hammond, and Jerry Wellington. Teaching and Learning with Multimedia. London: Routledge, 1997. Corliss, Richard. "Ready, Set, Glow!" Time 18 (3 May 1999): 65. Count Down to Star Wars. 1999. 15 June 1999 <http://starwars.countingdown.com/>. Coupland, Douglas. Generation X. London: Abacus, 1991. Eco, Umberto. Travels in Hyper-Reality. London: Picador, 1987. Fallon, Daniel, and Matthew Buchanan. "Now Screening." Australian Net Guide 4.5 (June 1999): 27. Florman, Samuel. "From Here to Eternity." MIT's Technology Review 100.3 (Apr. 1997). Gallott, Kirsten. "May the Web Be with you." Who Weekly 24 May 1999: 15. Grant, Fiona. "Ewan's Star Soars!" TV Week 29 May - 4 June 1999: 15. Hall, Stuart, and Tony Jefferson, eds. Resistance through Rituals. London: Hutchinson, 1976. Harris, David. From Class Struggle to the Politics of Pleasure: the Effects of Gramscianism on Cultural Studies. London: Routledge, 1992. Hebdige, Dick. Hiding in the Light. London: Routledge, 1988. Hopkins, Susan. "Generation Pulp." Youth Studies Australia Spring 1995. Johnson, Brian, and Susan Oh. 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M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2.4 (1999). [your date of access] <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9906/sabre.php>. Chicago style: Tara Brabazon, "A Red Light Sabre to Go, and Other Histories of the Present," M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2, no. 4 (1999), <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9906/sabre.php> ([your date of access]). APA style: Tara Brabazon. (1999) A red light sabre to go, and other histories of the present. M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2(4). <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9906/sabre.php> ([your date of access]).