No description available.

I examine the role of context as a rhetorical trope. As a rhetorical trope, context tends to fix complex practices in single places, which allows for the celebration of the authentic or original. Further, it privileges production while masking complex practices of circulation and consumption while simultaneously constraining seemingly infinite possibilities into finite frames that then become static and naturalized. These practices need to be examined in order to understand how power is being enacted via the trope of context for the purposes of control and limitation. I argue throughout that these power dynamics need to be addressed--that the ethics of context need to consider who or what is empowered, who or what is disempowered, and decide whether such a situational power dynamic is acceptable or should be changed.I move through the dissertation by first presenting the metaphors of context--maps, frames, and landscapes--discussing the ways in which each of these metaphors control and limit context and therefore control and limit the text. I then analyze the textual and rhetorical context traditions to illuminate the ways in which these two prevalent traditions assume a static and constant original context to which a text belongs. The constant appeal to an origin, I argue, invests a text or artifact with historical aura, which is often used to obscure and limit other critical engagements with a text thus controlling a text's or artifact's possible meanings and transformative power. Following this exploration, I turn my attention to contexts as consumable commodities. I argue that contexts as rhetorical tropes are divorced from the dialectical process of meaning making from a text and can therefore exist as its own entity. As such, contexts can be marketed to and consumed by people. An ethics of context, I conclude, would challenge the god term that context has become in order to expose the power and ideological control that is exerted via a deployment of rhetorical contexts. Such an ethics would address, again, the dialectical formation of texts and contexts--texts define contexts; contexts define texts; they are inseparable.

A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Science, University of the Witwatersrand, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. Johannesburg, 2013 / A thorough description and cladistic analysis of the Antetonitrus ingenipes type material sheds further light on the stepwise acquisition of sauropodan traits just prior to the Triassic/Jurassic boundary. Although the forelimb of Antetonitrus and other closely related sauropododomorph taxa retains the plesiomorphic morphology typical of a mobile grasping structure, the changes in the weight-bearing dynamics of both the musculature and the architecture of the hindlimb document the progressive shift towards a sauropodan form of graviportal locomotion. Nonetheless, the presence of hypertrophied muscle attachment sites in Antetonitrus suggests the retention of an intermediary form of facultative bipedality. The term Sauropodiformes is adopted here and given a novel definition intended to capture those transitional sauropodomorph taxa occupying a contiguous position on the pectinate line towards Sauropoda. The early record of sauropod diversification and evolution is re-examined in light of the paraphyletic consensus that has emerged regarding the ‘Prosauropoda’ in recent years.

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of country of origin (COO) on the UK fashion industry, with specific reference to retail and wholesale brands. In this study, the fashion industry encompasses both manufacturing and branding perspectives. This qualitative study comprised 23 in-depth interviews with key informants from large-scale retailers, manufacturers and textile consultancy companies, thereby analysing the issues from an industry, rather than consumer, perspective. The key informants were chosen using a judgmental sampling approach, and the data obtained were analysed using a thematic approach. The notion of country of origin is deemed important because the existing literature suggests that COO, has been considered as an effective branding device with which consumers associate when evaluating the quality of the product and when making purchasing decisions. However, no research has examined country of origin from an industry perspective, and the findings in the UK context are limited in the existing literature. Consequently, this study contributes to the body of knowledge about the importance of COO, and its implication on retail and wholesale brands in the UK fashion industry. The findings of this research also have practical implications for manufacturers and retailers, informing the debate on the value of the 'Made in [...]' epithet, and how country of origin can be used as a branding strategy. This study demonstrates that country of origin is considered important in the UK fashion industry in terms of its strategic importance to organisations. Moreover, COO is manifested in different ways, depending on brand positioning, long-term strategic plan, expertise, brand history and values. Another finding that emerged as a key theme is the blurring of retail and wholesale brands. Thus, the study has found that retailers are becoming wholesale-oriented businesses by selling own label products through third party retailers, including online via pure-play retailers (e.g. ASOS), and concessions within department stores. This is being done to expose brands internationally, to develop a global recognition, as well as improve the brand image. Furthermore, wholesale brands are becoming retail-oriented in order to enjoy superior profit margins, to have control over the product merchandise and to increase customer loyalty. Finally, the study developed a typology of strategic action and implications of country of origin to include the blurring of differences whereby, for instance, brand name is used to promote country of brand origin by both retail and wholesale brands, however, how this manifests itself differs in the sense that retailers promote via sub-brand name, and wholesales have associations with company's name.

A origem da controladoria no Brasil está relacionada a instalação das primeiras empresas multinacionais norte-americanas no país. Na época a função do profissional da controladoria estava ligada à área financeira ou da contabilidade, devido à habilidade de trabalhar com informações econômico-financeiras, bem como, pelo conhecimento sistêmico da organização. Do surgimento da controladoria no Brasil até os dias atuais, o país passou por grandes transformações, especialmente nos aspectos econômicos e sociais, pois o mundo se globalizou, reduzindo as fronteiras entre os países. Para que o país pudesse se inserir neste contexto globalizado foi necessário que o brasileiro se adaptasse a uma nova forma de fazer negócios a nível mundial. Além do que, para se manterem competitivas, as organizações brasileiras passaram a demandar, cada vez mais melhorias em seus processos e controles. Diante disso, este trabalho tem como objetivo evidenciar como ocorreu a evolução da controladoria no Brasil, através do estudo da sua origem, evolução do perfil, atribuições do controller e identificação das principais atribuições da controladoria no país. Quanto ao método classifica-se esta pesquisa como descritiva, sendo conduzida através de pesquisa bibliográfica. Os resultados demonstram que a evolução da controladoria no Brasil, acompanhou a evolução da controladoria a nível mundial, uma vez que ocorreu a partir das necessidades de informações e controles que acompanharam a evolução natural da economia brasileira. Neste contexto, a controladoria passou a ser um importante player da gestão empresarial, pois auxilia os gestores durante todo o processo decisório a fim, de garantir a eficácia do negócio. Entretanto no campo semântico conclui-se que a controladoria ainda precisa evoluir, pois não existe consenso entre os pesquisadores sobre o que é a controladoria, sobre as suas funções e atribuições. / The origin of controllership in Brazil is connected to the settlement of the first US multinational companies in the country. Back then, the function of a controller was linked to finance or accounting, because of the ability to work with economic and financial pieces of information as well as the systemic knowledge of the company. From the beginning of controllership in Brazil to nowadays the country has gone through major changes, especially economic and social aspects as the world has globalized, reducing the boundaries between countries. For the country to enter this globalized context it was necessary for the Brazilian one to adapt to a new way of doing business globally. Moreover, to remain competitive Brazilian companies began demanding more and more improvements in their processes and controls. Thus, this work aims to show how the evolution of controllership was in Brazil, through the controllership origin study, profile evolution checking and the controller assignments and identifying the main tasks of controllership in the country. As for the method this research is descriptive, driven by bibliographic search. The results show that the evolution of controllership in Brazil followed the global controllership evolution once it occurred from the information requirements and controls that followed natural Brazilian economy evolution. In this context, controllership has become a major player in business management, as it assists managers throughout the decision-making process in order to ensure business effectiveness. However, in the semantic field controllership still needs to evolve as there is no consensus among researchers about what controllership is, on its functions and tasks.

No description available.

The question about the origins of life often appears as a difficult question to answer. A more reliable candidate molecule for the chemical origins of life would be a molecule that is capable of making copies of itself from simple precursors. With the finding of the catalytic activities of RNA molecules by Thomas Cech and Sid Altman in late 1980s, the term ribozyme was introduced to define an RNA molecule with catalytic activity. The RNA World is a conceptual period in the early stages in the development of life because RNA simultaneously possesses evolvability and catalytic function. An RNA molecule that could evolve in such a fashion is likely to have been one of the Earth's first life forms. The most important problem facing the RNA World is the difficulty of prebiotic synthesis of RNA. Different prebiotic environments could provide the right reaction conditions for synthesis of catalytically active RNA molecules. Most importantly, these environments can support new ways to assemble monomers into polymers. In order to understand and demonstrate how small inactive RNA oligomers can self-assemble into an autocatalytic ribozyme molecule, here I have used the Azoarcus Group I intron. First, the fragmentation and the self-assembly reactions were done using the natural IGS-tag combination of the Azoarcus group I intron, which is GUG/CAU. The main purpose was to experimentally demonstrate that the ribozyme can be broken down into five or more shorter RNA fragments and these fragments can self-assemble into a catalytically active covalent full-length molecule. Then, with the successful demonstration that five inactive RNA fragments can self-assemble, the next step to test the other possible breaking locations with mutated IGS/tag combinations. A new IGS/tag pair GCG-CGU also successfully demonstrated the five-piece self-assembly reaction. Finally, we tested these reactions in different Mg2+ concentrations to optimize the self-assembly reactions. By focusing not only one single reaction but on a collection of different sequence requirement combinations and with the development of evaporation and subsequent rehydration by spinning down methods this study successfully illustrates that covalent self-assembly from inactive RNA oligomers is possible. Therefore, this thesis work focuses on a more broader aspect of intermolecular interactions in the study of the RNA World, as illustrated in following chapters.

<p>Med globaliseringen ökar antalet multinationella företag vilket medför att många varumärken byter nationalitet när fusioner och förvärv genomförs. Många varumärken marknadsförs i sin tur med sitt ursprung vilket skapar ett potentiellt problem kring tvetydighet. Studier visar att ett varumärkes ursprung kan påverka konsumenter i deras köpbeslutsprocess då bland annat stereotyper om länder spelar in. Uppsatsens problemformulering är: Vilken betydelse har brand origin för globala varumärken som ägs av multinationella företag? Huvudsyftet är att undersöka varumärkens brand origin avseende hur konsumenterna uppfattar dem samt hur företagen marknadsför dem. Metoderna som använts är enkätundersökning, fokusgrupper, intervju och innehållsanalys. Slutsatsen är att konsumenter är medvetna om varumärkens ursprung och detycker att ursprunget bidrar med något positivt. De lägger inte så stor vikt vid, eller så är de inte så medvetna om att det är multinationella företag som är ägare av varumärkena. Brandorigin kan i vissa fall påverka konsumenternas köpbeslut och det är i de fall då de väljer mellan olika varumärken som förutom brand origin har liknande egenskaper och pris. Då är det troligt att konsumenterna väljer det varumärke som har ett brand origin som har positiva associationer för produkttypen eller som motsvarar konsumentens egen nationalitet. Inga direkta slutsatser kan dras från företagsperspektivet om vilken betydelse brand origin har för globala varumärken som ägs av multinationella företag.</p> / <p>Globalization means that the number of multinational companies increases and that a lot of brands changes nationality after mergers and acquisitions. As many brands are marketed using their origin this creates a potential problem of confusion. Studies also shows that a brands origin can affect consumers in their decision making process because consumers can be influenced by stereotypes towards a country. The problem formulation is: Which impact has brand origin to global brands that are owned by multinational companies? The main purpose is to examine how the consumers perceive brand origin and how the companies use brand origin in their marketing. The methods that have been used are a survey, focus groups, an interview and a content analysis. The conclusion is that consumers are aware of a brands origin and they think that the origin contributes to something positive. They do not really take in to consideration (or maybe they are not aware of it) that there are multinational companies who are the owners of the brands. Brand origin can sometimes affect consumers' purchasing decisions and that is when they choose between different brands that has similar features and cost. In these cases it is likely that consumers choose the brand that has a brand origin which gives positive associations for the product type or is equal to the consumers' own nationality. No direct conclusions can be drawn from the business perspective on the importance of brand origin for the global brands owned by multinational companies.</p>

Med globaliseringen ökar antalet multinationella företag vilket medför att många varumärken byter nationalitet när fusioner och förvärv genomförs. Många varumärken marknadsförs i sin tur med sitt ursprung vilket skapar ett potentiellt problem kring tvetydighet. Studier visar att ett varumärkes ursprung kan påverka konsumenter i deras köpbeslutsprocess då bland annat stereotyper om länder spelar in. Uppsatsens problemformulering är: Vilken betydelse har brand origin för globala varumärken som ägs av multinationella företag? Huvudsyftet är att undersöka varumärkens brand origin avseende hur konsumenterna uppfattar dem samt hur företagen marknadsför dem. Metoderna som använts är enkätundersökning, fokusgrupper, intervju och innehållsanalys. Slutsatsen är att konsumenter är medvetna om varumärkens ursprung och detycker att ursprunget bidrar med något positivt. De lägger inte så stor vikt vid, eller så är de inte så medvetna om att det är multinationella företag som är ägare av varumärkena. Brandorigin kan i vissa fall påverka konsumenternas köpbeslut och det är i de fall då de väljer mellan olika varumärken som förutom brand origin har liknande egenskaper och pris. Då är det troligt att konsumenterna väljer det varumärke som har ett brand origin som har positiva associationer för produkttypen eller som motsvarar konsumentens egen nationalitet. Inga direkta slutsatser kan dras från företagsperspektivet om vilken betydelse brand origin har för globala varumärken som ägs av multinationella företag. / Globalization means that the number of multinational companies increases and that a lot of brands changes nationality after mergers and acquisitions. As many brands are marketed using their origin this creates a potential problem of confusion. Studies also shows that a brands origin can affect consumers in their decision making process because consumers can be influenced by stereotypes towards a country. The problem formulation is: Which impact has brand origin to global brands that are owned by multinational companies? The main purpose is to examine how the consumers perceive brand origin and how the companies use brand origin in their marketing. The methods that have been used are a survey, focus groups, an interview and a content analysis. The conclusion is that consumers are aware of a brands origin and they think that the origin contributes to something positive. They do not really take in to consideration (or maybe they are not aware of it) that there are multinational companies who are the owners of the brands. Brand origin can sometimes affect consumers' purchasing decisions and that is when they choose between different brands that has similar features and cost. In these cases it is likely that consumers choose the brand that has a brand origin which gives positive associations for the product type or is equal to the consumers' own nationality. No direct conclusions can be drawn from the business perspective on the importance of brand origin for the global brands owned by multinational companies.

Title: According to Swedish Citizens – Sweden has the Safest and Best food in the world – Really? Level: Thesis for Master’s Degree in Business Administration Authors: Benny Berggren and Mai Nasser Fouda Supervisor: Jonas Kågström, Ph.D. Date: May 20, 2013 Aim: The aim of this thesis is to fill the research gap on whether there are differences in how Swedish consumers remember publicized scandals in regards to the Country of Origin (COO), focusing on age, gender and time. Furthermore, this paper will also aim to look at how different scandals have affected the consumers trust based on whether foreign food scandals have a higher impact. Methodology: Since this thesis tested different relationships a deductive approach was taken with a conclusive research design. Quantitative data was collected via a VAS-scale questionnaire to 187 individuals via random sampling at train stations which had a response rate of 75,9%. By using SPSS, the primary data was analyzed via a Correlation and Factor analysis in accordance with scientific articles from within the fields of Purchasing Decision theory, the COO and Consumer Memory. A semi-open telephone interview with an expert from within the food industry was conducted as additional explanations to the findings were needed. Result &amp; Conclusions: It was found that Swedish consumers remembered scandals differently depending on origin, and were according to themselves more affected by the foreign scandals. Gender did not have a preference depending on the COO of the product and consumer memory while age did. It was also found that trusting food was the essential theme throughout the empirical findings where the Swedish consumers valued cues such as food quality and food safety. This played a significant role on impacting the consumer’s long-term memory. Three different types of trust was found and divided by their characteristics; High-level-involvement products, the COO of the product or the company which the scandal was involved with, and finally, the size, positioning and equity of the brand involved. Business implications: Media can be seen as a key source of spreading negative publicity regarding scandals. It is therefore extra important for companies to act immediately, especially if they have any of the three characteristics of trust since it influences the consumer’s long-term memory in a negative way. These three characteristics combined could have strong more negative impact on the companies, where there is a risk of losing potential &amp; current business partners, decreased brand equity &amp; image and risk of facing legal aspects. This can be very costly both financially and time-wise which ultimately could lead to a negative turnover. Research Implications: future research is suggested to study why the results in this thesis differ from the other scientific findings when it comes to gender. Also suggested is that studies should be conducted similar to this, but based on specific types of food products since this thesis only studied food in general. Furthermore, studies comparing the effect of the consumer memory in regards to food scandals based on different companies are also suggested. Key words: Country of Origin, Scandals, Memory, Trust, Purchasing behavior.