Preparation time influences ankle and knee joint control during dynamic change of direction movements

The influence of preparation time on ankle joint biomechanics during highly dynamic movements is largely unknown. The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of limited preparation time on ankle joint loading during highly dynamic run-and-cut movements. Thirteen male basketball players performed 45°-sidestep-cutting and 180°-turning manoeuvres in reaction to light signals which appeared during the approach run. Both movements were executed under (1) an easy condition, in which the light signal appeared very early, (2) a medium condition and (3) a hard condition with very little time to prepare the movements. Maximum ankle inversion angles, moments and velocities during ground contact, as well as EMG signals of three lower extremity muscles, were analysed. In 180°-turning movements, reduced preparation time led to significantly increased maximum ankle inversion velocities. Muscular activation levels, however, did not change. Increased inversion velocities, without accompanying changes in muscular activation, may have the potential to destabilise the ankle joint when less preparation time is available. This may result in a higher injury risk during turning movements and should therefore be considered in ankle injury research and the aetiology of ankle sprains.     

Increasing hip and knee flexion during a drop-jump task reduces tibiofemoral shear and compressive forces: implications for ACL injury prevention training

Although most ACL injury prevention programmes encourage greater hip and knee flexion during landing, it remains unknown how this technique influences tibiofemoral joint forces. We examined whether a landing strategy utilising greater hip and knee flexion decreases tibiofemoral anterior shear and compression. Twelve healthy women (25.9 ± 3.5 years) performed a drop-jump task before and after a training session (10–15 min) that emphasised greater hip and knee flexion. Peak tibiofemoral anterior shear and compressive forces were calculated using an electromyography (EMG)-driven knee model that incorporated joint kinematics, EMG and participant-specific muscle volumes and patella tendon orientation measured using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Participants demonstrated a decrease in peak anterior tibial shear forces (11.1 ± 3.3 vs. 9.6 ± 2.7 N · kg^?1; P = 0.008) and peak tibiofemoral compressive forces (68.4 ± 7.6 vs. 62.0 ± 5.5 N · kg^?1; P = 0.015) post-training. The decreased peak anterior tibial shear was accompanied by a decrease in the quadriceps anterior shear force, while the decreased peak compressive force was accompanied by decreased ground reaction force and hamstring forces. Our data provide justification for injury prevention programmes that encourage greater hip and knee flexion during landing to reduce tibiofemoral joint loading.     

The international political economy of the hack: A closer look at markets for cybersecurity software

This article examines the development of hacking and cybersecurity software packages as commodities, based on an international political economy of vendors and clients operating in the interstices of international law. Offensive hacking and defensive cybersecurity tools offer new means for surveillance of critics, journalists, and human rights workers, especially in corrupt or authoritarian political systems. The article provides a case study of the Hacking Team, an international “cybersecurity” firm offering spyware and surveillance systems to government security agencies, which was itself hacked and “doxed” in 2015. The leak of documents contributes new knowledge of an international political economy for software products, which exploits the digital rights of targets and which could further undermine general Internet security.     

'England Expects Every Man to do his Duty': The gendering of the citizenship textbook 1940-1966

This article is based on a pilot study investigating the representation of women in a sample of texts for citizenship education in the immediate post-Second World War era in England. The authors argue that existing research into the field of education for citizenship does not engage adequately with how the subject is taught in schools, and how citizenship education constructs the polity in line with normative and traditionalist assumptions about the role of women and men in society. By studying the texts of citizenship for the period 1940-66, the authors argue that researchers can, if they deploy a more critically engaged approach to the way in which notions of 'citizenship' and 'polity' are gendered, generate new questions and new understandings of how education for citizenship functions in schools.     

Two tales of a city: John Walson,Sr., Mahanoy city,and the “founding”; of cable TV

For the last 20 years, scholarly and popular accounts of the development of cable television have recounted the story of John Walson, Sr., who claimed to have started the first CATV system in June of 1948 in Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania. When Walson died in March of 1993, newspapers around the country credited him with starting the nation's first cable system and even “founding”; the industry. The claim, however, has always been clouded by questions and a lack of documentation. This paper reports the results of an investigation of the Walson story. It concludes that, as bright and promising as the Walson tale may be, it probably is not true. At the very least, the preponderance of evidence suggests that Walson got his start in the community antenna television business in late 1950, about the same time as many others around the country and, importantly, probably after another group of businessmen already had begun a system in Mahanoy City itself.     

NOTES ON ONGOING RESEARCH IN SPECIAL EDUCATION

ABSTRACT

With the support of Unicef and Unesco, the Romanian Ministry of Education has since 1993 been operating a programme to promote the educational and social integration of children and young people with special needs. In a comparatively short time the programme has grown from a pair of pilot projects to comprise a number of interactive elements which include a Joint European Project within the EU's TEMPUS programme, as well as provision for networking, and for describing, monitoring and generalizing experience of good practice. In this process a ‘philosophy’ of integration has developed which is appropriate to Romanian realities and which offers the possibility of an integration project to everyone concerned with special needs. The paper stresses the importance of the voluntary organizations and their new cooperative relationship with the institutions, and of the role of the universities in professional training. The paper ends with a discussion of the barriers and supports to integration, together with some conclusions about the significance and future of the programme.     

The new ‘market‐state’ and education

This paper argues that changes at all levels of education and training (i.e., learning) policy exemplify a new capitalist state formation. This has been aptly named by US political scientist Philip Bobbitt (2002) ‘the new market‐state’, particularly with reference to its administration or ‘governance’. It can be seen especially in the governance of education and training where a new centralized system of contracting or devolving provision to ‘non‐governmental agencies’ has all but replaced the previous ‘national system locally administered’ (Ainley, ). The latter typified the administration of the classic post‐war welfare state, which Bobbitt calls the ‘nation‐state’. Like the former welfare state, the new ‘market‐state’ is also a capitalist state and, therefore, also the means to rule for a persisting capitalist ruling class (Roberts, , pp. 169–192). The new state formation is, however, as different as the former welfare state was in turn from pre‐war capitalist state forms in England. This is particularly clear when the new ‘settlement’ of education and training, imposed by the 1988 Education and 1992 Further and Higher Education Acts, is contrasted with the former welfare state ‘settlement’ established by the 1944 Education Act. In conclusion, implications for opposition to the ‘new market‐state’ are discussed.     

Distance education for the gifted and talented: An interactive design model

In 1994, the New South Wales Board of Studies, Australia, introduced three high level Distinction Courses for gifted and talented students: comparative literature, cosmology, and philosophy. All are offered by distance education but the cosmology course employs an interactive design model and an extensive communication system that differentiates it from the other two. This article explains the model and the way it is used in practice to organize, sequence and deliver the course. Discussion addresses ways in which the model might be used to design a wider range of courses for gifted and talented students.