During the 9th lunar month of each year around 1 billion Muslims adhere to the religious 4- week festival of Ramadan, which is considered as a time for empathy for those less fortunate, a time for restraint, and goodwill. The main focus of the religious intervention of Ramadan is the intermittent fast whereby, each day between dawn and sunset nutritional abstinence is practiced. Empirical evidence from experienced soccer coaches in Qatar has indicated that the 4-week intermittent fast during Ramadan impedes the quality and quantity of training, as well as match play. However, there has been lack of attention directed to the consequences associated with Ramadan and football (soccer) players. Greater understanding of the consequences of Islamic soccer players adhering to lifestyle changes and intermittent fasting would facilitate soccer coaches in a systematic approach to addressing potential negative performance effects associated with Ramadan in future soccer-seasons. In order to address the research problem, a soccer-specific battery of tests was required; as there is no established gold standard battery of soccer-specific field tests preliminary technical and methodological studies were required. In Study-1 a soccer-specific anaerobic capacity field test (Liverpool Anaerobic Speed Test or LAST) was piloted for validity, reliability, and practicality since, the choice for suitable soccer-specific anaerobic capacity tests were inadequate. It was found that two familiarisation sessions are necessary to reduce systematic bias markedly and habituate players with procedures of the LAST. The total measurement error (ratio of Limits of Agreement) of the LAST was 2.5% (± 18 m), and peak blood lactate values produced were 17.6 mmol.l⁻¹, which were greater than the 14.7 mmol.l⁻¹ criteria set for maximal anaerobic effort before the pilot study. The test set-up and administration proved to be practical, facilitating large numbers of subjects to be evaluated relatively quickly ( < 20 min). Therefore, the LAST was included in the soccer-specific battery of field tests, which then provided a comprehensive analysis of the separate components soccer performance. The available facility to conduct this investigation was the soccer-field at Al-Ahli Sports Club Doha, Qatar and therefore, further methodological investigations were necessary; temperatures within Qatar can vary during different times of the season, and at times are quite severe with respect to heat and humidity. The purpose of Study-2 was to examine how robust the discrete soccer-specific field tests were which, would be used during the intervention of Ramadan, using a repeated measures counter-balanced design of indoor and outdoor conditions. It was found that during the Yo-Yo Intermittent Recovery Test (YYIRT) (Krustrup et al., 2003) outdoor assessment maximal performance was reduced by 19% in contrast to the YYIRT conducted indoors, despite the subjects attaining similar maximal heart rates. Consequently, the YYIRT to volitional exhaustion was excluded from the battery of tests to be used during the intervention of Ramadan; all other soccer-specific field tests were found to be robust for use in the heat. The aim of Study-3 was a qualitative investigation to observe current soccer-practice and related factors surrounding training; this brief included bedtime, wake-up time, sleep duration, environmental conditions, pre-training dehydration, body fluids lost during training, body-core temperature, and relative training intensity. During Ramadan it was found that bedtime and wake-up time were significantly delayed and sleep duration lengthened compared to normal. Post-Ramadan was found to be akin to eastward time travel with advancement in bedtime, wake-up and return to normal sleep duration. Dehydration was significantly greater pre-training during Ramadan in comparison to non- Ramadan training weeks, and body fluid loss during training in both Ramadan and non- Ramadan periods was considerable. Relative training workload was also quantified during this time and highlighted important practical problems.

This intergenerational study within Liverpool communities employed embodied memory as an analytical tool to explore the changing nature of food practices and the consequent implications for diet and health. The methodology had a qualitative focus using a phenomenological approach that employed the ethnographic methods of participant/nonparticipant observation, natural conversations, document analysis and in-depth interviews with eight families that comprised three and four generations of mixed gender and socioeconomic backgrounds spanning almost one hundred years. Memory is a multi-faceted phenomenon through which I have explored a range of concepts in relation to food and familial practices; history, inter-generational transmission, identity, tradition, community and health. The notion of embodied memory involving the senses and emotions, revealed the cultural and social meanings my participants afforded to traditional, ritual and everyday foods and food practices and the extent to which these organised and embodied their relationship with the past bound up in life experiences that included transitions, turning points and significant events and relationships. Within particular temporal, social, economic and historical contexts such memories moulded food and eating practices that in turn, intersected with the major influences on food choice including available resources, corporate marketing, personal attributes and knowledge, family values and health concerns. The study produced evidence that health and illness are not independent variables that can be tested and measured, but rather are subjective experiences embodied in everyday life attention to which can help us develop a better understanding of why the relationship between food and health has become problematic. Food stories across time revealed that people draw on, and respond to, different knowledges that may, or may not, lead them to improvise or make adjustments to their food practices. A common sense stock of knowledge bound up in the notion of tradition once embedded in the community and family has, to a large extent, been superseded by 'expert' knowledge derived from surveys that provide evidence base for government advice on healthy eating from which, despite inconsistencies, the individual is expected to make rational, informed choices. My study challenges this ethos of individualism wrapped up in the aphorism 'you are what you eat', arguing that we need to focus our attention on the social and cultural ways in which food 'gets done', food as it is valued and practiced, that in turn may lead to more effective health promotion strategies.

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Family centres have become a common institution to promote health and wellbeing among young children (0-6 years of age) and their parents in Sweden. The core of the work is usually based on both maternal and child health care, a preschool and social services, all located under the same roof in the local community. The family centre in this study, known as the "Family House", was the first of its type to be built in the city of Kristianstad, Sweden. The overall aim of the thesis was to understand family centre practice through professionals' and parents' perceptions of the Family House and its relationship to modernity. The study employed a qualitative design using phenomenography as method to capture people's perceptions of the practice. The research also drew on the approach of action research, where participants and researchers co-generate knowledge through collaborative communicative processes. Data was generated from semi-structured interviews conducted with nineteen professionals and sixteen individual parents. Dialogue sessions with the professionals of the study have been held in order that they and the researcher could enter into a dialogue based on the findings of the interviews. Data was consequently also generated from these meetings. The way the professionals perceived the practice of the Family House fell into three categories, namely, as a professional service, the provision of an informal meeting place for professionals and families with young children or as a broad community based centre. Parents' perceptions fell into four categories; as a professional reception to obtain expert guidance and support, a study circle and living room to informally share experiences and socialising, and a playground for children where children could interact and learn social skills. One core finding of this thesis is that family centre practice for those involved contained a balancing act between simple modem expertise to control the world and late modem opportunities for self-realisation and reflexivity. The House enhanced both parents' and professionals' mastery of the world, supporting a stable and trusting world view under uncertain late modem conditions. Parents and professionals shared the responsibility for children's well-being and the distinction between private and public was blurred since parents used the House as a social arena for developing personal relations. It was also an arena for integration between Swedes and immigrants based on engagement for both cultural diversity and similarity.

This thesis examines the experiences of the sailors who worked in the Royal Navy from the 1830s to the early days of continuous service contracts. With the coming of peace, the Royal Navy had dropped rapidly in size, from nearly 950 ships in 1815 to 128 by 1821, and relied entirely on volunteers to man these ships. It nonetheless remained in operation all over the world as an instrument of British foreign policy, with ships on the West African coast in anti-slave patrols, on the China station, in Australasia and North America, and in home waters and the Mediterranean. This period also saw the start of the change from sail to steam. By 1850 there were 71 steam ships and vessels in the Royal Navy compared to 106 sailing ships. This study considers the reasons sailors volunteered to serve with the Royal Navy, their training, promotion and career prospects, as well as their daily lives on board different types of ship at home and overseas, and how these changed during the period. Continuous service contracts provided for centralised administration, which made manning ships quicker and meant that for the first time most adult sailors joined the Navy rather than a specific ship. However, many of those who served in the Royal Navy before 1853 already regarded it as their main employer and had long and successful careers within it, with some signing up for longer periods of service. Recruitment was not a problem for the Navy in this period, and rating systems, pay, training and conditions were already being improved to provide incentives for long service and the development of skills. The new contracts recognised changes that had already taken place in the way sailors saw themselves and the Royal Navy.

The state of Qatar provides an interesting illustration of a nation that has recently witnessed spectacular urban development worthy of investigation. Indeed, during the past three decades huge oil revenues have enabled the country to embark on unprecedented national development. The main thrust of this research study is urbanisation and urban development in Qatar and the impact this phenomenon has had on the urban growth of its capital city, Doha. This study sets out to examine a set of issues caused by the urbanisation process within the framework of urban growth and land use development. The present study examines urbanisation and its impact on the city development in the Arab Gulf states (GCC) in general and in Qatar in particular. The main objective of the study has been to trace the influence these changes have had on the general growth of the city and the land uses particularly the residential and commercial land development with particular emphasis on the political and socio-economic factors which form the main thrust of this research. In addition, the examination of the emerging urbanisation phenomenon has aimed to establish the necessary background before dealing with the topic at the scale of the capital city. Following these objectives, the study has adopted a combined approach, which can be described as historical and empirical. The historical setting provides the changing nature of urbanisation in the Gulf States (GCC) and Qatar by establishing the evolution of this phenomenon until the present time. This is clearly done through defining the evolutionary periods reflecting the urban development stages, which included two distinctive phases: the traditional (pre-oil period) and modern/contemporary periods. The empirical/analytical part focuses especially on the city of Doha with respect to its recent urban development, socio-economic characteristics and the changing land use patterns of which the residential and commercial development represents one of the most rapidly growing and changing land use types that took place in a relatively short period (1970-1997). Clearly, the empirical research begins by investigating the socio-economic and physical features of the city. The analysis points out the enormous scale of development that occurred in the city benefiting largely from massive urban development plans engendered by the remarkable growth of the country's oil economy. Subsequently, the research separately examines additional dimensions pertinent to the residential and commercial land development. The findings show to what extent the growth of the city has influenced the emerging patterns of land use that were drastically changed. Also, the findings always reveal the existence of a strong correlation between the overall economic performance of the country and the changing residential and commercial uses. Indeed, the economic and social transformations of Qatar have resulted in new emerging patterns that were utterly unknown before the advent of oil. The thesis presents this research topic in three main parts. The first consists of two chapters, which introduce the methodology and approaches adopted by the study and the theoretical aspects relevant to urbanisation, urban development and urban internal structure along with definitions and concepts as well as previous studies done for Qatar. The second part includes three chapters, which deal with urbanisation in the GCC and Qatar. Chapter three provides an historical perspective of urbanisation and urban development pertaining to the Arab Gulf States. Chapter four presents an in-depth analysis of urbanisation and urban development in Qatar. This is followed by another chapter, which exclusively deals with the overall characteristics of population in Qatar. Part three of the thesis is entirely concerned with the city of Doha. It is divided into five chapters. Chapter six is concerned with the evolution and development of Doha; its changing demographic aspects and the factors affecting the population structure of the city are examined in chapter seven. The remaining three chapters of this part (8,9 & 10) deal with the city's land use development in general and with the residential and the commercial land development in particular. For this purpose, chapter eight investigates the overall characteristics relevant to land use in the city. The central aim is to establish an objective understanding of the evolution of land uses, the major factors influencing their development and the present distribution patterns over the 1980-1997 period. The latter analytical stage involves examining the emerging patterns of the residential land development in an attempt to explore the changing patterns and the housing characteristics. In the third analytical phase, the analysis proceeds to consider the changing patterns of the commercial development within the city. A final summary of the findings, conclusion of the study and suggestions for future research are provided in chapter eleven.

This thesis entails an analysis of the relationship between space and politics in the construction and legitimisation of modern China. The thesis argues that the production of space has since the onset of modernity in China, in itself very much a spatial process, played a substantial yet, largely unexplored and academically unacknowledged role in both the construction of the nation state and the legitimisation of political ideologies. I wish to show that the production of modern space has since the mid-17th century played an increasingly vital role in the abstract concretisation and the everyday diffusion of the geographic imagination of the Chinese nation state. The state, in other words, legitimises its existence through the reification of space. This thesis contributes to a historical and spatial understanding of the role of geographies of power in creating an alternative understanding of what China is and how it is (re-)produced spatially. Such an understanding problematises the realised abstraction of the Chinese nation state and politicises the production and representation of space in China. The thesis thus questions notions of Chinese essentialism, Chinese history, Chinese architecture and other expressions of state spaces. The position that this thesis takes is that the production of space gives form and meaning to the political. The thesis looks at a variety of spatial techniques of power by analysing the politics of cartography, urban planning, architecture and other forms of production of space. By emphasising the politics of space, this thesis is a work of political geography on the subject of modern Chinese state space. This thesis comprises six chapters, an introduction and a conclusion.

Background: Community participation has become an integral part of many areas of public policy over the last two decades. For a variety of reasons, ranging from concerns about social cohesion and unrest to perceived failings in public services, governments in the UK and elsewhere have turned to communities as both a site of intervention and a potential solution. In contemporary policy, the shift to community is exemplified by the UK Government’s Big Society/Localism agenda and the Scottish Government’s emphasis on Community Empowerment. Through such policies, communities have been increasingly encouraged to help themselves in various ways, to work with public agencies in reshaping services, and to become more engaged in the democratic process. These developments have led some theorists to argue that responsibilities are being shifted from the state onto communities, representing a new form of 'government through community' (Rose, 1996; Imrie and Raco, 2003). Despite this policy development, there is surprisingly little evidence which demonstrates the outcomes of the different forms of community participation. This study attempts to address this gap in two ways. Firstly, it explores the ways in which community participation policy in Scotland and England are playing out in practice. And secondly, it assesses the outcomes of different forms of community participation taking place within these broad policy contexts. Methodology: The study employs an innovative combination of the two main theory-based evaluation methodologies, Theories of Change (ToC) and Realist Evaluation (RE), building on ideas generated by earlier applications of each approach (Blamey and Mackenzie, 2007). ToC methodology is used to analyse the national policy frameworks and the general approach of community organisations in six case studies, three in Scotland and three in England. The local evidence from the community organisations’ theories of change is then used to analyse and critique the assumptions which underlie the Localism and Community Empowerment policies. Alongside this, across the six case studies, a RE approach is utilised to examine the specific mechanisms which operate to deliver outcomes from community participation processes, and to explore the contextual factors which influence their operation. Given the innovative methodological approach, the study also engages in some focused reflection on the practicality and usefulness of combining ToC and RE approaches. Findings: The case studies provide significant evidence of the outcomes that community organisations can deliver through directly providing services or facilities, and through influencing public services. Important contextual factors in both countries include particular strengths within communities and positive relationships with at least part of the local state, although this often exists in parallel with elements of conflict. Notably this evidence suggests that the idea of responsibilisation needs to be examined in a more nuanced fashion, incorporating issues of risk and power, as well the active agency of communities and the local state. Thus communities may sometimes willingly take on responsibility in return for power, although this may also engender significant risk, with the balance between these three elements being significantly mediated by local government. The evidence also highlights the impacts of austerity on community participation, with cuts to local government budgets in particular increasing the degree of risk and responsibility for communities and reducing opportunities for power. Furthermore, the case studies demonstrate the importance of inequalities within and between communities, operating through a socio-economic gradient in community capacity. This has the potential to make community participation policy regressive as more affluent communities are more able to take advantage of additional powers and local authorities have less resource to support the capacity of more disadvantaged communities. For Localism in particular, the findings suggest that some of the ‘new community rights’ may provide opportunities for communities to gain power and generate positive social outcomes. However, the English case studies also highlight the substantial risks involved and the extent to which such opportunities are being undermined by austerity. The case studies suggest that cuts to local government budgets have the potential to undermine some aspects of Localism almost entirely, and that the very limited interest in inequalities means that Localism may be both ‘empowering the powerful’ (Hastings and Matthews, 2014) and further disempowering the powerless. For Community Empowerment, the study demonstrates the ways in which community organisations can gain power and deliver positive social outcomes within the broad policy framework. However, whilst Community Empowerment is ostensibly less regressive, there are still significant challenges to be addressed. In particular, the case studies highlight significant constraints on the notion that communities can ‘choose their own level of empowerment’, and the assumption of partnership working between communities and the local state needs to take into account the evidence of very mixed relationships in practice. Most importantly, whilst austerity has had more limited impacts on local government in Scotland so far, the projected cuts in this area may leave Community Empowerment vulnerable to the dangers of regressive impact highlighted for Localism. Methodologically, the study shows that ToC and RE can be practically applied together and that there may be significant benefits of the combination. ToC offers a productive framework for policy analysis and combining this with data derived from local ToCs provides a powerful lens through which to examine and critique the aims and assumptions of national policy. ToC models also provide a useful framework within which to identify specific causal mechanisms, using RE methodology and, again, the data from local ToC work can enable significant learning about ‘what works for whom in what circumstances’ (Pawson and Tilley, 1997).

This research explores the functions of music by analyzing the relationship between musical and social classification. More particularly it focuses on the manifestation of this relationship during the active participation of audiences in music events where the individual and the collective, the musical and the social are argued to be experientially interwoven. The main argument proposed is that music categories as well as the ritualistic structures and expressions that shape their corresponding live performances are linked with perceptions and fantasies of the social self. Considering elements such as representations, performativity and the constitution of identity within social interaction, this study questions the class-­‐focused approaches conventionally employed to explore the subject. Contrarily it proposes that the ‘reality’ or fantasy of the social self is not ‘a given’ but it is personally configured, and relates the construction of social identities to notions of the spectacle. The interplay between the mediatized representations that shape music categories and individuals’ agency to choose and construct their identity is argued to produce different discursive and performative expressions of ‘the ideal’. In this context, music rituals are sketched as opportunities for the celebration and legitimization of their embodied values, and idealized social identities and relationships. The empirical part of this investigation focuses on Greek music audiences. Employing semi-­‐structured interviews it examines the way individuals with different music identifications construct their understandings of music categories and their rituals, as well as their perceived interconnections with social identities. Its findings suggest that music categories are perceived as naturally linked with different aspects of individuals’ social selves and realities that are expressed and actualized in music performances, verifying the performative and discursive intertwinement of the two modes of classification. However, the analysis of the data collected also indicates that the values expressed or experienced during such immersive processes, which combine social relationships, cultural categories, and multisensory experiences, necessitate widening the theorization of the ‘ideal’.