An exponentially growing global population, power demands, pollution levels and, on the other hand, rapid advances in means of communication have made the public aware of the complex energy situation. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has vast open land, an abundance of fossil fuel, a small population but has always been among the front-runners where the development and utilisation of clean sources of energy are concerned. Several studies on wind, solar and geothermal sources of energy have been conducted in Saudi Arabia. Solar photovoltaic (pv) has been used for a long time in many applications such as cathodic protection, communication towers and remotely located oil field installations. Recently, a 2MW grid-connected pv power plant has been put online and much larger solar desalination plants are in planning stage. Wind resource assessment, hub height optimisation, grid-connected wind farm and hybrid power system design were conducted in this study using existing methods. Historical daily mean wind speed data measured at 8 to 12metres above ground level at national and international airports in the kingdom over a period of 37 years was used to obtain long-term annual and monthly mean wind speeds, annual mean wind speed trends, frequency distribution, Weibull parameters, wind speed maps, hub height optimisation and energy yield using an efficient modern wind turbine of 2.75MW rated power. A further detailed analysis (such as estimation of wind shear exponent, Weibull parameters at different heights, frequency distribution at different heights, energy yield and plant capacity factor and wind speed variation with height) was conducted using wind speed measurements made at 20, 30 and 40metres above ground level. As a first attempt, an empirical correlation was developed for the estimation of near-optimal hub height (HH = 142.035 * (α) + 40.33) as a function of local wind shear exponent (α) with a correlation coefficient of 97%. This correlation was developed using the energy yield from a wind turbine of 1 000kW rated power and wind speed and local exponent for seven locations in Saudi Arabia. A wind-pv-diesel hybrid power system was designed and specifications were made for a remotely located village, which is being fed 100% by diesel power generating units. The proposed system, if developed, will offset around 35% of the diesel load and therefore will result in decreased air pollution by almost the same amount. The developed wind speed maps, the frequency distributions and estimated local wind shear exponents for seven locations and energy yield will be of great help in defining the further line of action and policy-building towards wind power development and utilisation in the kingdom. The study also recommends conducting a wind measurement campaign using tall towers with wind measurements at more than one height and estimating the local wind shear exponents and developing a wind atlas for the kingdom. The study further states that a grid-connected wind farm of moderate capacity of 40MW should be developed using turbines of varying rated powers. The wind speed data was also analysed using wavelet transform and Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) to understand the fluctuation in wind speed time series for some of the stations. It is also recommended that policy-makers should take firm decision on the development of hybrid power systems for remotely located populations which are not yet connected with the grid. There are two challenges which need research: one is the effect of dust on the moving and structural elements of the wind turbines and the second is the effect of high prevailing temperatures on the performance and efficiency of the same. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering / PhD / Unrestricted

This research investigates the Neo-Baroque aesthetic of excess in contemporary South African art, and explores reasons for the emergence of this style. It investigates artists who use their bodies as a site of resistance, to contest or reconstruct the dominant social values which establish differences between bodies to place them within the marginal position of ‘Other’. This investigation relates to post-colonial concerns. The artists’ exploitation of the Neo-Baroque aesthetic of excess as a comment on social concerns reveals a sense of crisis within South African society, similar to the conditions from which the seventeenth century Baroque style evolved. Neo-Baroque aesthetics of excess manifest in a variety of ways, and are particularly evident when artists transgress social boundaries placed on the body through abject and erotic associations. Excess ultimately arises from complexity, as hybrid art forms are created from the combination of media and content found within the art work. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Visual Arts / unrestricted

The purpose of this research is to examine John La Montaine's only two song cycles for soprano and orchestra, Songs of the Rose of Sharon, opus 6 (1947) and Fragments from the Song of Songs, opus 29 (1959). In this investigation-the first ever specific to these works-I examine the works and cultural context in which they were created. I then evaluate the reasonable possibility that La Montaine used his public platform as a composer and performer to subtly celebrate taboo themes of feminism, sexuality, and blackness while shining a light on human injustice. Through close examination of social and historical context, I argue two points. Firstly, Rose of Sharon and Fragments are landmark American works. They are anomalies in classical music history in that a white male heralds texts about a black woman in an unlikely time in American history, thus arguably becoming an unlikely part of the evolution of African-American women in artistic endeavors. Secondly, in the performance guide, I advocate that these works would readily adapt to a staged performance. I discuss how La Montaine's musical settings illustrate the inherent drama of the text, provide a context for interpreting the protagonist in Rose of Sharon and Fragments, and present an interpretation of how these works could be staged. The ultimate goal of this research is to bring these intricately crafted masterpieces to the attention of singers and voice teachers so that they may assume their rightful place in the repertoire.

une délicate maison de bêtises est un recueil de poésie qui explore la tension entre rester et partir. La sujet lyrique évoquée dans les poèmes est tiraillée entre son envie de connexion, de relation, et son besoin de liberté. Écrit en vers libres, séparé en trois parties selon les affects de la sujet, le recueil explore les espaces, physiques et émotionnels, que l’on fuit puis réinvestit incessamment. L’essai s’intéresse au recueil Là où fuit le monde en lumière de Rose Eliceiry et analyse comment les lieux mis en place dans les poèmes interagissent avec la sujet lyrique. Il réfléchit à l’inscription de la douleur sur les corps, que ceux-ci soient humains ou urbains. S’appuyant notamment sur le concept de Thirdspace développé par le géographe Edward W. Soja, il invite à repenser les lieux au-delà de leur inscription physique et mentale, dans ce qu’ils peuvent produire comme espaces tiers. La compréhension de ces emplacements autres se construit également à partir des travaux de Michel Foucault, autour de ce qu’il nomme des hétérotopies et des hétérochronies. Entrant et sortant de ces espaces autres, la sujet lyrique d’Eliceiry est soumise aux délimitations des lieux qui l’accueillent ou la rejettent. Malgré l’importance de l’altérité au cœur de la poésie, cet essai étudie également la présence et la signification de multiples lieux communs insérés dans la parole poétique. Ces topoï littéraires ancrent l’œuvre et l’expérience de la sujet lyrique dans notre contemporanéité en évoquant à la fois certains enjeux de l’époque et différentes réalités sociales. / une délicate maison de bêtises is a book of poetry that explores the tension between staying and going. The lyrical subject evoked in the poems is torn between its desire for connection, for relationship, and its need for freedom. Written in free verses, separated into three parts according to the affects of the subject, the book explores places, physical and emotional, that we avoid and then constantly reinvest. This dissertation focuses on the book of poetry Là où fuit le monde en lumière of the Quebecoise poet Rose Eliceiry. It analyses how the places of the city interact with the lyrical subject. It explores the inscription of pain on bodies, whether they are human or urban. Based on the concept of Thirdspace developed by the geographer Edward W. Soja, it invites us to rethink places beyond their physical and mental inscription, in what they can produce as othering spaces. The understanding of these spaces is also built around the work of Michel Foucault, from what he calls heterotopias and heterochronies. Entering and leaving these other areas, the lyrical subject of Eliceiry is vulnerable to the boundaries of the places that welcome or reject her. Despite the importance of otherness at the heart of the poems, this essay also studies the presence and significance of multiple commonplaces inserted in the poetic speech. These literary topoi anchor the work and experience of the lyrical subject in our contemporaneity by evoking both certain issues of the time and different social realities.

This project is dealing with creating of system for e-learning support. It describes problematics of e-learning, explains meaning of this term and describes its advantages and disadvantages. The objectives were to create an application suitable for electronic learning, which could illustrate specifications of restrictions of the system objects. This means to create an application, where is explained the problem of OCL in that kind of format, which reacts the structure and the form of application used for e-learning. I meet the program languages of OCL and UML 2.0. I read over the CASE Rational Rose environment and meet the e-learning problem, too. These are the knowledges, which I used while I was creating my e-learning application.

The geographical focus area of this essay is Holmöarna archipelago, which is a very large group of islands that are located a short distance to the east of the city Umeå, in northern Sweden, Västerbotten county. This essay is an attempt to uncover and provide knowledge regarding Holmöarna archipelago’s forgotten Iron Age period through the means of GIS-analysis, literary studies, a field visit, as well as morphological comparisons of ancient artefacts and monuments from the area. / Det geografiska fokusområdet i denna uppsats är Holmöarna skärgård, vilket är en mycket stor ögrupp som är lokaliserad ett kort avstånd öster om staden Umeå, i norra Sverige, Västerbottens län. Denna uppsats är ett försök att avslöja och förse information som har med Holmöarna skärgårds bortglömda järnålder att göra. Detta sker med hjälp av GIS-analyser, litterära studier, ett fältbesök, samt morfologiska jämförelser av artefakter och fornlämningar från området

This dissertation claims contributions on two fronts. First, it aims to contribute to the theory of reception with a practical model of reading postclassical texts that substantially engage ancient ones. In the second place, it contributes three individual readings of three important works of literature on which nothing has been written by anglophone classicists working on classical reception: José Watanabe’s Antígona, Christine Brooke-Rose’s Amalgamemnon, and Anne Carson’s Economy of the Unlost. This dissertation’s contribution to the theory of reception is the proposition of a practical schema of reading, which is a figure upon which the imagination can operate. Simply put, it posits a schema as the place where meaning is construed. The schema calls attention to the constructedness of meaning and to the act of construction and organizes different moments of “reception”: that of the postclassical text receiving the ancient one (which the schema imagines as a vertical line) and that of the scholar receiving that particular instance of reception, the “I” of interpretation, which is theorized as one of two axes of transcendence of the schema (the other one being the world of/to which the schema speaks and means). Furthermore, the schema puts the “where” of meaning in the relation of (at least) two texts, but the “of” of meaning belongs to the postclassical texts. The postclassical text receiving ancient text(s) is proposed as a complex work, simultaneously in relationship with texts from the past as well as other texts from other periods. The relations of the postclassical text with each of these texts are different and need to be differently traced or theorized. The relation with the ancient texts is properly textual and thus the primary way of tracing it in the schema is a vertical line that first and foremost pays attention to form, with the tools of structural analysis and philology. Then, the theorization of the vertical line is made thicker with the operation of concepts upon it. As each of these texts (the classical and the postclassical) mean in relation to webs of texts that are relevant to the vertical relation, the schema imagines an additional dimension to the vertical one: the horizontal. Each of the horizontal lines traced for both the classical and the postclassical texts are in one way or another “historicist” readings, they trace contexts for the texts, but the way that context is understood in the theorization of the horizontal dimension of the schema is plural and never saturated. While this horizontal aspect of meaning is understood as textual, the schema also imagines for it an axis of transcendence, the world on which writers write and in which the reader is situated. The first chapter’s primary goal is to provide a reading of José Watanabe’s Antígona using the schema to illuminate the ways in which this text makes meaning in relation to Sophocles’ Antigone and part of the body of texts that have come to form part of that name. This reading counters the predominant approach to this work (and to many a work in classical reception), which reads it allegorically, as a commentary on a particular moment in the history of Peru. That predominant way of reading not only ignores the vertical orientation of the text in relation to its avowed ancient source, it also limits itself to one way of tracing the horizontality of the postclassical text, construing “context” in the most immediate and literal sense. The chapter contributes a reading that opens up Antígona to much more than allegory, highlighting its powerful affective and aesthetic dimension, as well as its intersection with recent feminist readings of the Greek tragedy that turn towards the figure of Ismene and the politics of sisterhood. The second chapter sets itself to the analysis of the complex role that ancient texts play in Christine Brooke-Rose’s radically experimental novel Amalgamemnon. This novel has not been the focus of attention of any work by a classical scholar, and those scholars who have written about it in other fields have failed to analyze the importance that Herodotus’ Histories and Aeschylus’ Agamemnon play at both the structural and the thematic levels. Tracing the vertical line, the chapter shows how these two texts are essential to the novel’s writing and themes. In the horizontal dimension, the schema situates the novel’s engagement with those ancient sources in the context of contemporary feminist discourse, especially as it concerns the question of the possibility of a feminine discourse and an outside of the phallocentric system of signs. That intersection illuminates both how Brooke-Rose is reading the ancient sources as well as what are arguably some of the limitations of her writing in contrast to the ethical commitments of feminisms. Finally, the third chapter is a reading of Anne Carson’s Economy of the Unlost, a text that is perhaps better known than the texts treated in the previous two chapters, at least in the Anglophone world, but which has nonetheless been fairly disregarded in the scholarship. The chapter provides a rigorous analysis of the “work” of this text, of what it does and how it does it, as the scholarship on Carson’s work has failed to posit or satisfactorily respond to the important questions regarding what constitutes the undeniable originality of her writing. In this particular book, which combines academic and poetic discourses into a new form that partakes of both, Carson proposes a comparative mode of making meaning that cannot be captured with a structural analysis of inter- or -trans- textuality, as the previous two chapters construed the vertical dimension of the schema. Instead, the theory of metaphor developed by Paul Ricoeur provides the appropriate tool to imagine the vertical dimension of the schema and analyze Carson’s exercise in bringing an ancient and a modern author together. This particular construction of the schema brings into the terrain of classical reception the possibility of interpretating comparative works that do not fit nicely within the theoretical margins of this subfield of classical studies. Finally, the chapter provides the occasion to trace another aspect of the schema, its other axis of transcendence, which is the “I” of interpretation.

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Le présent mémoire s’emploie à analyser la manière dont l’ironie supporte dans les trois romans de Rafaële Germain (Soutien-gorge rose et veston noir, Gin tonic et concombre et Volte-face et malaises) une parole métaféministe, soit un féminisme actualisé, en continuité avec les luttes passées et qui s’intègre à l’écriture plutôt que d’en être le motif. Il est vrai, ces romans, comme toute bonne série de chick lit, ont d’abord pour objectif de divertir leurs lecteur·rice·s. Fidèles au genre, l’alcool, les conquêtes et les relations amoureuses tordues s’y côtoient. Il n’en demeure pas moins qu’omettre d’interroger ces textes en raison de leur côté rose bonbon consisterait en une erreur : les sourires qu’ils provoquent sont souvent annonciateurs de l’ironie qui s’y terre. Ce qui n’est pas anodin puisque l’ironie, comme le constate Lucie Joubert, recèle souvent un potentiel dénonciateur. Ainsi, malgré ce que les préjugés entourant ce genre associé à la littérature de grande consommation laissent supposer, il ne se cache pas seulement une douce étourderie sous ces premières de couverture colorées. En prenant principalement en compte les relations interpersonnelles que les différentes héroïnes entretiennent avec leur entourage, c’est-à-dire avec leur mère, leur père, leurs ami·e·s, et leurs amoureux, ce mémoire exposera que l’ironie joue en quelque sorte un rôle de gardien qui les prémunit contre certaines constructions sociales particulièrement coriaces (par exemple qu’une femme doit absolument partager sa vie avec un homme, peu importe lequel, pour espérer être heureuse). Sans sombrer dans un optimiste débonnaire, puisque la chick lit reconduit, il faut en convenir, plusieurs stéréotypes de genre associés au féminin et au masculin, en même temps qu’un discours hétéronormatif restreignant, cette analyse démontrera que l’ironie permet aux romans de s’inscrire dans une trajectoire métaféministe, tout en prenant çà et là du recul vis-à-vis des discours plus conservateurs. / This thesis aims to analyze the ways in which irony supports a metafeministic voice, a contemporary feminism, in continuity with past struggles, which is integrated into the writing rather than being the motive in Rafaële Germain's novels (Soutien-gorge rose et veston noir, Gin tonic et concombre et Volte-face et malaises). Certainly, these novels, like any good series of chick lit, are primarily intended to entertain their readers. True to the genre, alcohol, conquests and twisted relationships rub shoulders. Nevertheless, omitting to analyze these texts due to their rosy-candy nature would be a mistake: the smiles they induce often herald the irony within these words. As observed by Lucie Joubert, this is not trivial since irony often conceals a potential whistleblower. Thus, despite the prejudices surrounding this genre associated with mass-consumption literature, look beyond the giddiness of their colorful covers. By mainly considering the interpersonal relationships that the various heroines have with their entourage, that is their mother, father, friends, lovers, this thesis sheds light on how irony plays, in a way, the role of a guard that protects them against certain particularly stubborn social conceptions. (For example, that a woman must absolutely share her life with a man, any man, if she wishes to be happy.) Always without indulging into a debonair optimism since the chick lit perpetuates many gender stereotypes associated to both, women and men – simultaneously a restrictive heteronormative speech – this analysis will demonstrate that irony allows novels to be part of a metafeminist trajectory, and take a step back, here and there, towards more conservative speeches.

Il est bien connu que la synchronisation de l’activité oscillatoire dans les réseaux de neurones joue un rôle important dans le fonctionnement du cerveau et pour le traitement des informations données pas les neurones. Cette thèse porte sur l’analyse de l’activité de synchronisation en utilisant des outils et des méthodes issues de la théorie du contrôle et de la théorie de la stabilité. En particulier, deux modèles ont été étudiés pour décrire l’activité oscillatoire des réseaux de neurones : le modèle de Kuramoto et le modèle de Hindmarsh-Rose. Une partie de ce manuscript est consacrée à l’étude du modèle de Kuramoto, qui est un des systèmes les plus simples utilisé pour modéliser un réseau de neurones, avec une connexion complète (all-to-all). Il s’agit d’un modèle classique qui est utilisé comme une version simplifiée d’un réseau de neurones. Nous construisons un système linéaire qui conserve les informations sur les fréquences naturelles et sur les gains d’interconnexion du modèle original de Kuramoto. Les propriétés de stabilité de ce modèle sont ensuite analysées et nous montrons que les solutions de ce nouveau système linéaire convergent vers un cycle limite périodique et stable. Finalement, nous montrons que contraint au cycle limite, les dynamiques du système linéaire coïncident avec le modèle de Kuramoto. Dans une seconde partie, nous avons considéré un modèle de réseau de neurones plus proche de la réalité d’un point de vue biologique, mais qui est plus complexe que le modèle de Kuramoto. Plus précisément, nous avons utilisé le modèle de Hindmarsh-Rose pour décrire la dynamique de chaque neurone que nous avons interconnecté par un couplage diffusif (c’est à dire linéaire). A partir des propriétés de semi-passivité du modèle de Hindmarsh- Rose, nous avons analysé les propriétés de stabilité d’un réseau hétérogène de Rindmarsh-Rose. Nous avons également montré que ce réseau est pratiquement synchronisé pour une valeur suffisamment grande du gain d’interconnexion. D’autre part, nous avons caractérisé le comportement limite des neurones synchronisés et avons établi une approximation de ce comportement par une moyenne des dynamiques de tous les neurones. / It is widely recognized that rhythmic oscillatory activity in networks of neurons plays an important role in the brain functionning and a key role in processing neural information. This thesis is devoted to the analysis of this synchronized activity by using tools and methods issued from automatic control and stability theory. Two models are used to describe oscillatory activity of neural networks : Kuramoto model and network of Hindmarsh-Rose neurons. First, we consider Kuramoto model with complete (all-to-all) coupling, which is one of the simplest systems used to model neural network. For this model we construct an auxiliary linear system that preserves information on the natural frequencies and interconnection gains of the original Kuramoto model. Next, stability properties of this model are analyzed and we show that the solutions of the new linear system converge to a stable periodic limit cycle. Finally, we show that constrained to the limit cycle, dynamics of the linear system coincide with the original Kuramoto model. Second, a model for the network (population) with a better behavior, with respect to the Kuramoto model, from a biological point of view but more complex is considered. Particularly, we consider a network of diffusively coupled neurons where we use a Hindmarsh-Rose model to describe the dynamics of each individual neuron. Based on semi-passivity of individual Hindmarsh-Rose neurons, we analyse stability properties of a heterogeneous network of such neurons and show that network is practically synchronized for sufficient large values of interconnection gains. Moreover, we characterize the limiting synchronized behavior by using an averaging of all neuron dynamics.