Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 1999. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 1999. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available in print.

This document is the final report to the thesis executed by Henrik Granlund at the University of Linköping. The thesis is a practical assignment which includes an extension of the currently existing modelling tool GOAT. The extension regards to a integration of the internet based security database, the SHIELDS SVRS. The report goes through an overview of how GOAT is designed and later also the parts that has been extended. There after follows a summary and discussion about the work.

The purpose of this research was first to study the Wildland-Urban Interface and Wildland-Urban Intermix (WUI) fire problem, and then to design, develop and implement improved fire assessment and fire protection features for structures in the these interface fire-prone areas. The findings included that several areas of the world are prone to devastating fires that claim lives and destroy property, and their fire problems continue to exacerbate. None of these compare to the property loss experienced in Southern California due to its vast development in fire prone areas. It is because of the continuing huge property loss and frequency of major WUI fires that Southern California was selected as the concentration for research and the case studies used in this paper. However, the results of the research are applicable to other interface fire-prone areas in the world. The author is motivated by a need to dramatically improve our ability to effectively deal with what is no longer a fire “threat,” but the reality that people have chosen to live in an area of the world in which wildland fires are part of natural forest dynamics. To reduce the economic and social impacts of these inevitable fires, we need to understand the causes of fire damage, and establish methods to minimize damage when fires occur. This thesis proposes several fire protection strategies for increased fire resiliency and safety of individuals. Following a search of fire history and analysis, three related fire assessment matrixes were synthesized (see Chapter Five). The Fire Profile Index is the principal fire assessment matrix. It was developed empirically and applied to historical fire spreads for a sense of accuracy. The intended users of the Fire Profile Index are design professionals, public agencies charged with oversight for development in the WUI, insurance agencies, building and landscape contractors, homeowners, potential homeowners, residents and fire service professionals. From the Fire Profile Index two derivative special-use matrixes were established for use by diverse groups. The first of these matrixes, the Developers Guide, is intended for design professionals, public agencies, insurance agencies, and building and landscape contractors. The second matrix is the WUI Fire Assessment Guide, whose intended users are those concerned with development in high fire hazard areas, who should have a fundamental knowledge of fire behavior. This group includes fire agencies, developers, homeowners, potential homeowners and insurance companies. This thesis contributes to increased residential structure fire resistiveness and occupant fire safety in the WUI, by proposing site-specific fire assessment and corresponding design features in both structures and landscapes. Chapter Seven covers the development of noncombustible fire shields to divert airflow and diminish flames and embers blown towards structures. Wind tunnel modeling research was conducted at the Aerospace Program’s wind tunnel at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.

Le présent mémoire propose une analyse de l'ironie dans deux oeuvres d'auteures canadiennes-anglaises contemporaines, soit The Penelopiad de Margaret Atwood et Unless de Carol Shields. Envisagée dans son rapport au « gender », l'ironie y apparaît comme une stratégie féministe qui, par l'intermédiaire de la parodie et la métafiction, interroge et subvertit les discours qui légitiment un ordre social et symbolique fondé sur le sacrifice de la femme. S'appuyant avant tout sur les théories féministes, notre analyse fait converger les théories de l'ironie et de l'ironie au féminin, de l'« agency », du postmodernisme, de la parodie et de la métafiction. Le dialogue entre notre corpus et ces différentes approches critiques nous permet non seulement de mesurer l'impact de l'ironie sur les oeuvres en question, mais aussi de rendre compte de la portée sociale, politique et morale de la stratégie textuelle privilégiée par nos deux auteures. L'objectif d'une telle recherche est de poursuivre la réflexion sur les différents moyens textuels utilisés par les femmes pour contester le pouvoir masculin. De plus, comme l'a fait Lucie Joubert dans son ouvrage pionnier sur l'ironie au féminin, nous souhaitons mettre en évidence le lien entre ce procédé littéraire et les différents enjeux de l'écriture des femmes. Nous désirons également montrer la pertinence de porter un tel éclairage sur deux oeuvres qui, par leur utilisation particulière de l'ironie, nous permettent de repenser la notion d'engagement féministe dans la littérature et contribuent au décloisonnement et à l'évolution des formes littéraires et des discours qui s'y chevauchent. Le tour d'horizon théorique que constitue notre premier chapitre sera suivi d'un deuxième chapitre sur The Penelopiad et d'un dernier chapitre sur Unless. Au terme de notre analyse, nous serons en mesure de mieux comprendre en quoi l'ironie au féminin, comme acte de résistance à certaines conventions sociales et littéraires, participe d'un vaste projet de féminisation du paysage idéologique et des codes de la fiction. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Margaret Atwood, The Penelopiad, Carol Shields, Unless, Ironie, Parodie, Métafiction, Féminisme, Agentivité, Postmodernisme, Littérature canadienne.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Illinois State University, 2005. / Title from title page screen, viewed on April 16, 2007. Dissertation Committee: Robert McLaughlin (chair), Lynn Worsham, Sally Parry. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 312-331) and abstract. Also available in print.

This paper describes and develops a trade off model of optimal capital structure by Bradley et al. (1984). The model is then tested to examine how changes in corporate tax rates affect the optimal capital structure of firms. Based on theoretical implications of the model, four hypotheses are derived stating that firms’ optimal debt-to-value ratio is (1) negatively related to financial distress costs, (2) negatively related to non-debt tax shields, (3) negatively related to firm volatility and (4) positively related to the corporate tax rate. Based on the results of two regression models applied on 753 Scandinavian and German firms, we find empirical support for hypothesis 1 and 3 while we find no empirical support for hypothesis 2 and 4. These results can be explained by problematic empirical proxies and in the light of the pecking-order theory.

Erosion of a river bed has important implications with respect to scour around river structures such as bridges, transport of contaminants attached to the sediment, and disruption or destruction of aquatic habitats. Erosion occurs when the resistive strength of the sediment is overcome by the hydrodynamic forces produced by the flow of water. This resistance to erosion in a sediment originates from gravity or interparticle forces for coarse sediment (sand and gravel) and fine sediment (silt and clay), respectively. Since the erosion of fine sediment depends on the combination of many interparticle forces, and this combination fluctuates widely amongst different fine sediments, past studies have had difficulty finding a consistent method to estimate fine sediment erosion. This study analyzes sediments that fall in the transition size range between fine and coarse sediments and compares the findings with those from fine sediments (Wang 2013) and sandy coarse sediments (Navarro 2004, Hobson 2008), in order to correlate the erosion rates of both sediment types to their physical characteristics. In this study, kaolin-sand mixtures were prepared by mixing various percentages of Georgia kaolin by weight ranging from 30% to 100% with industrial fine sand and tap water. Geotechnical and other tests of sediment properties were performed to measure water content, bulk density, grain size distribution, temperature, pH, and conductivity of these mixtures. Hydraulic flume experiments measured the erosion rates of each sediment and these rates were used to estimate the critical shear stress correlating to that mixture. Relationships between the physical properties of the sediment and critical shear stress were developed by multiple regression analysis. An alternative option of estimating the critical shear stress by a weighted equation, which uses the combination of fine sediment erosion and coarse sediment erosion equations separately, was explored and found to be a viable and accurate option to estimating both coarse and fine sediment erosion from the same parameters and equation. The results from this study can be used to estimate sediment erodibility and thus river bed stability based on simple tests of physical properties of the river bed sediment and will help predict scour around bridges and other flow obstructions.

A creative dissertation consisting of two parts: a novel and a critical preface. The critical preface, titled “Novel without Falsehood” deals directly with David Shields’s Reality Hunger, touching on issues of reality as it pertains to truth, writing, fiction, and contemporary culture. The novel is entitled Down and Out and follows the fortunes of a small town in Arkansas before, during, and after its sole source of employment ceases to exist.

This paper explores the relationship between postmodernist discourses and feminist discourses, asking, firstly, whether or not feminist political action is possible within a postmodernist theoretical climate that scrutinizes the construction of universalizing group identities, and, secondly, how political action might be undertaken in such a theoretical climate. I contend that Carol Shields, reflecting the postmodernist ideology of Jean-François Lyotard and Patricia Waugh, creates Daisy Goodwill Fletts absence in The Stone Diaries. This absence, in turn, acts to acknowledge the gaps in knowledge that exist within self-legitimating grand narratives. It demonstrates that Daisys performance of these grand narratives, particularly heteronormativity, necessarily obstructs her voice and, thereby, marginalizes her ability to act politically within that narrative. The Stone Diaries, then, calls for a plural public space by exposing what remains unknownwomens lives and narrativeswithin the current public space.