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Is a literary text an act of communication, and if so, how does it work? Relating works of literature to everyday utterances, this book focuses on the relationship between meaning and language in literary works. It uses an influential theory from linguistic pragmatics, relevance theory, to reveal a connection between literature and ordinary talk, while maintaining that the effect of literariness is achieved through exploiting the communicative options open to us more deeply and in more complex ways in poetry and prose fiction. It provides an accessible introduction to relevance theory and connects the theory to ideas in evolutionary cognitive psychology, whilst also comparing it to other approaches in stylistics, literary studies and pragmatics. This book also includes detailed analyses of literary texts, supported with linguistic descriptions of form, examining texts and textual features such as satire, first and third person narratives, sound-patterned poetry, comic rhymes, literary parodies and metaphor.
This comprehensive guide presents a data science approach to healthcare quality measurement and provider profiling for policymakers, regulators, hospital quality leaders, clinicians, and researchers. Two volumes encompass basic and advanced statistical techniques and diverse practical applications. Volume 1 begins with a historical review followed by core concepts including measure types and attributes (bias, validity, reliability, power, sample size); data sources; target conditions and procedures; patient and provider observation periods; attribution level; risk modeling; social risk factors; outlier classification; data presentation; public reporting; and graphical approaches. Volume 2 introduces causal inference for provider profiling, focusing on hierarchical regression models. These models appropriately partition systematic and random variation in observations, accounting for within-provider clustering. Item Response Theory models are introduced for linking multiple categorical quality metrics to underlying quality constructs. Computational strategies are discussed, followed by various approaches to inference. Finally, methods to assess and compare model fit are presented.
This comprehensive guide presents a data science approach to healthcare quality measurement and provider profiling for policymakers, regulators, hospital quality leaders, clinicians, and researchers. Two volumes encompass basic and advanced statistical techniques and diverse practical applications. Volume 1 begins with a historical review followed by core concepts including measure types and attributes (bias, validity, reliability, power, sample size); data sources; target conditions and procedures; patient and provider observation periods; attribution level; risk modeling; social risk factors; outlier classification; data presentation; public reporting; and graphical approaches. Volume 2 introduces causal inference for provider profiling, focusing on hierarchical regression models. These models appropriately partition systematic and random variation in observations, accounting for within-provider clustering. Item Response Theory models are introduced for linking multiple categorical quality metrics to underlying quality constructs. Computational strategies are discussed, followed by various approaches to inference. Finally, methods to assess and compare model fit are presented.
Bringing together new and accessible translations of texts from Plutarch's Lives and the Moralia, this volume demonstrates Plutarch's enduring importance in the history of political thought. The texts selected include the essays 'Beasts are Rational' and 'How to Profit from Enemies', which were taken up by key theorists including Hobbes and Rousseau, alongside full translations of lesser-known works including 'Life of Phocion', 'On Women's Courage' and 'Advice on the Conduct of Politics' which inspired numerous political actors and writers throughout Europe. With an introductory essay, explanatory notes on the translation and bibliography, the volume offers fresh insights for readers seeking an understanding of Plutarch's work and its continued influence and relevance for politics.
Why do some electoral commissions earn public trust while others collapse under pressure? Why Elections Need Parties offers a sharp and timely exploration of how democracies succeed or stumble at the ballot box. Drawing on more than a decade of fieldwork, elite interviews, and archival research across Latin America and Africa, Alejandro Trelles uncovers the institutional and political forces that determine whether electoral management bodies (EMBs) gain real autonomy or become vulnerable to manipulation. Trelles develops a new theory of partisan inclusion to show how party engagement, transparency, and accountability can strengthen, rather than weaken, electoral governance. Through vivid country cases and rich comparative analysis, this book demonstrates how institutional design, consultation mechanisms, and administrative practice shape election quality and democratic resilience.
The New Dual State examines how authoritarian regimes can institutionalize judicial autonomy without relinquishing ultimate political control. Extending the dual state theory beyond its classical and contemporary formulations, Yueduan Wang argues that the consolidation of autocratic authority can clarify and stabilize the boundary between legal order and arbitrary power, thereby permitting limited judicial independence. Using China as the central case, the book shows how political centralization enabled the regime to insulate judges from local officials, suppress unsanctioned extrajudicial interventions, and channel politically sensitive disputes away from the courts through the repression of legal activism and the expansion of state-led mediation. These measures have produced a system in which courts demonstrate increasing professionalism and autonomy in routine cases, while the regime retains decisive authority over politically salient matters. Grounded in extensive fieldwork and framed by comparative legal theory, the book advances a compelling framework for understanding authoritarian legality.
Economic growth transformed the world. It freed us from a world where nearly everyone was mired in poverty and half of all children died before reaching adulthood. However, these benefits have not been felt everywhere, nor by everyone. In this groundbreaking new account of the divergence between east and west, Philip T. Hoffman uncovers the ultimate causes of economic growth and the reasons why it originated in seventeenth-century western Europe. He examines the relative impacts of a wide range of economic, political, and social factors, from high wages, cheap capital, and financial institutions to political fragmentation, porous borders, and interstate warfare. Through accessible economic principles and fascinating case studies, he demonstrates why growth began in Britain, why it spread so unevenly elsewhere, and why inequality inhibits growth.
Linguistic imitation is not mere repetition, but is instead a foundational mechanism of language use. It underpins the engagement and categorisation of meaning as a conceptual pact among speakers. This book redefines imitation as the creative engine of human communication, showing how language evolves through our engagement with what others say. It discusses dialogic resonance – the reuse and reshaping of communicative constructions – as a unifying framework that bridges pragmatics and construction grammar. Combining evidence from first and second language acquisition, intercultural communication and neurodiverse interaction, the book highlights the crucial role of imitation in shaping social conformity, engagement, categorisation and innovation. It combines detailed qualitative case studies with innovative corpus-based and statistical analyses to provide new theoretical insights and methodological tools. It is essential reading for scholars and students of linguistics, psychology, education and sociology, and for anyone interested in how language emerges from the creative interplay of human voices.
Older than the pyramids, Sumerian was used in ancient Mesopotamia (Southern Iraq). It is probably the world's first written language, and survives on clay tablets in the cuneiform script, dating from c.3000 BCE to the beginning of the Common Era. It abounds in simple inscriptions, ideal for beginners, but also boasts a wealth of more advanced writings, such as fascinating mythological poetry. This comprehensive textbook equips students to read the full range of texts – including the special variety of the language known as Emesal. Drawing on the authors' experience in the classroom, it uses intuitive terminology and also makes extensive use of diagrams, which unravel the language's structures in an easy-to-learn way. The examples and readings are all taken from original sources. The learning journey is further supported by exercises (with key), a full sign list and glossary, and online recordings with 'approximate pronunciations'.
Sicilian curse practices have often been misread through Athenocentric paradigms. This book repositions Sicily at the centre of inquiry, offering the first holistic analysis of legal curse tablets (defixiones iudiciariae) from the sixth to the fourth centuries BCE, with particular focus on Selinous, Akragas and Kamarina. Moving beyond isolated textual readings, it situates these inscriptions within the legal, social and political environments that shaped their production. The study provides new editions and drawings of key tablets – revisited after decades of neglect – while addressing palaeographic, chronological and editorial issues. For the first time, it also assembles a complete set of images of all major examples, making them fully accessible. By embedding curses within civic life and predominantly elite rivalries, it reveals them as 'paralegal' instruments in the renegotiation of status, authority and power. Sicilian legal curses thus emerge as independent from, rather than appendices to, their better-known Attic and Athenian counterparts.
Drawing connections between the medieval and early modern papacy, this study give vivid examples of its reactive rather than proactive character. D. L. d'Avray identifies unobvious continuities and challenges temporal divides, tracing themes that cut through the conventional periodisation. Using fresh translations and transcriptions of sources from Roman archives, alongside key passages from medieval canon law commentaries, the book defends the central thesis that papal government was predominantly 'responsive' and papal authority was not imposed from the top but emerged through a series of appeals and responses. D'Avray focuses on religious governance, rather than on the secular aspects of papal power, so the book challenges an exaggerated emphasis on the papal states. Offering a sequel to Debating Papal History, c. 250–c. 1300, this volume presents a different way of thinking about papal history over a long period.
This graduate-level volume is a coherent and self-contained introduction to Quantum Field Theory, uniquely focused on geometric and non-perturbative aspects. The first part covers quantum fields and Euclidean path integral, Yang-Mills field theories, and Wilsonian renormalization. Wilson's notion of the effective field theory and its heavy implication for the QFT framework itself are given particular attention. Next, geometrical and topological aspects are thoroughly treated, accompanied by a healthy dose of underlying mathematics. Anomalies, or quantum failures of classical symmetries, follow as crucial litmus tests for self-consistency, which are delineated in unprecedented detail, spanning decades of development. In the final part, the book asks how relativistic gravity, known to resist standard quantization schemes, may reconcile with the quantum world. This question is approached by invoking d=2 Weyl anomaly, Hawking effects, black hole partition functions, and the renormalization of fundamental strings, with a view toward quantum gravity and superstring theory.
Brazil has captivated global audiences through its vibrant multiculturalism, manifesting in music, football, and gastronomy. However, beyond figures such as Pelé, and cultural staples such as bossa nova and caipirinha, Brazilian culture boasts a distinguished literary tradition, exemplified by writers such as Machado de Assis, Clarice Lispector, and Guimarães Rosa. This volume provides readers with a comprehensive engagement with Brazilian literature, tracing its development in tandem with the nation's social history. The chapters emphasize literary analysis while critically incorporating the sociohistorical contexts that have shaped Brazil's rich cultural landscape. Covering the trajectory from the emergence of the Brazilian novel to contemporary works within the genre, this book guides readers through a broad spectrum of themes, including Blackness, Jorge Amado, Indigeneity, Macunaíma, political violence, feminism, and Graciliano Ramos. Each chapter balances scholarly depth with accessibility, catering both to newcomers to Brazilian studies and to seasoned academics.
Research in the Cloud reimagines how students learn behavioral research methods by focusing on active, project-based learning. This innovative textbook is built around 'CLABs' (Classroom-Laboratory hybrids) that integrate theoretical concepts with hands-on projects, allowing students to learn by doing. It provides dozens of research activities using real data collected from over 2,500 online participants, with all materials, datasets, and analysis instructions available on the Open Science Framework. The book guides students through a four-step progression, from understanding concepts to analyzing real data, engaging in guided research, and creating their own original studies. It incorporates the latest technology, including AI tools for tasks like creating measurement scales, and modern challenges like data quality in online research. This approach helps students to develop a comprehensive portfolio of skills, from statistical analysis to conducting randomized experiments and writing up their research findings. This book is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
Phase transitions take place when a substance changes from one physical state to another, and they are of fundamental importance in science and engineering with applications ranging from superconductivity to climate science. This Student's Guide coherently examines the underlying dynamics of phase transitions, beginning with a detailed description of phase diagrams and their graphical interpretation, before introducing the Van der Waals equations of state. It progresses to more advanced topics such as mean-field theory in magnetic systems, phase transitions in binary mixtures, and other more exotic types of phase transitions in liquid crystals, superconductors, and superfluids. A separate chapter covers the unique and subtle phase transition dynamics of water. The book includes numerous worked examples and problems, with full solutions available online. It will be a valuable resource for students and life-long learners in physical science and engineering.
Against the background of the interest in ancient Mediterranean connectivity and globalization, the present volume examines local places and local communities. Exploring the interplay between the local and the global, the focus shifts from long-distance connections and 'global' trends to the local dimensions of Mediterranean interactions, highlighting how local contexts engaged with their long-distance counterparts. Given the transformative nature of this period and region, our focus is firmly on the western Mediterranean during the first half of the first millennium BCE. Discussions of the local places and local communities of the Iron Age West Mediterranean are wrapped around the twin notions of agency and locality. We argue that everyday local agency produces locality in an ongoing dialectic, ranging from collaboration to struggle, with globalizing influences and colonial forces. The eighteen West Mediterranean case studies are organized around the themes of 'Indigeneity and locality', 'agency and empowerment' and 'practice and production'.
Students are challenged to stay ahead in today's ever-changing political environment. This third edition comprehensive and accessible casebook, designed specifically for undergraduates, integrates both the political science and legal perspectives of American constitutional law. Covering developments from the constitution's drafting through to the presidency of Donald Trump, the book balances doctrinal analysis with historical and political context. Key updates include expanded discussions of judicial review, judicial power, nationwide injunctions, and the elimination of Chevron deference in administrative law. New material addresses Native American sovereignty, congressional investigatory powers, presidential authority and criminal liability, and the evolving balance of power in foreign affairs and war powers. Additional coverage explores presidential and congressional budget authority, impeachment, and state power within the federal system. The text examines pressing contemporary issues such as public health, property rights, substantive due process, and eminent domain, providing students with the essential tools to critically analyze constitutional law.
Misuses of Comparative Law in International Development examines how comparative law has been deployed by international organizations, governments, and NGOs to legitimize legal reforms that entrench inequality and reinforce power hierarchies. These reforms often align development agendas with neoliberal and authoritarian logics. The book exposes the flawed assumptions—such as convergence, efficiency, and legalism-that underpin transnational reform projects like the World Bank's indicators and the harmonization initiatives of the EU and OECD. It shows how these frameworks misrepresent local contexts and silence alternative legal traditions. Introducing a new typology of misuse-from cannibalization to epistemic impoverishment—it reveals how comparative law frequently operates as a tool of domination rather than emancipation. Bridging critique and utopia, the book re-characterizes these misuses as social constructions and reimagines comparative law as a vehicle for equitable, context-sensitive, and redistributive legal reform.
Combining historical insight with contemporary theory, this book demonstrates that Kant's aesthetics can ground a robust theory of art criticism. It challenges the widespread view that Kant's rejection of aesthetic testimony – the idea that we cannot simply adopt someone else's judgment without first-hand experience - and his dismissal of general rules such as 'symmetry guarantees beauty' or 'a tragic ending ensures depth' leaves critics powerless. If testimony and rules are excluded, evaluations such as 'Blade Runner is a masterpiece' lose authority, while descriptions like 'most of the story takes place in perpetual rain and darkness' seems irrelevant to the critic's evaluation. This book locates the solution in Kant's overlooked judgments of perfection such as 'the film innovates within the neo-noir genre.' It reimagines what critical communication can be by positioning these judgments as mediators. They guide aesthetic evaluations and draw support from descriptions of a work's non-aesthetic features.