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Arguing that our understandings of space are always constructed in relation to, and on the basis of, the spatial framings of social practices, hence also on the way bodies are positioned in space, this chapter describes the semiotic resources of English and visual communication for representing space. Focusing both on spatial positions and spatial transitions, the chapter introduces discursive resources for describing as well as interpreting spatial arrangements. By demonstrating the important role of moral evaluation in the representation of space, the chapter opens up spatial representation as an important issue for critical discourse analysis

Philo was concerned to locate his group very carefully on a certain hill between the Mediterranean Sea and Lake Mareotis. He indicates the surrounding villages and buildings, and the little houses in which senior members of the Mareotic group live. He also shows us two meeting places: a semneion where the seventh-day assemblies take place, and a sumposion where the forty-ninth-day dinner is held. In fact, a further dimension of Philo's rhetoric of gender in De Vita Contemplativa concerns space. In creating a vision of what is good, Philo sought at times to create an ideal spatial arrangement which would vouchsafe the virtue of the group members. Along with this, Philo gives details about the personal space of the group members as signified by clothing. Clothing is a primary indicator of gender, and can be the first step towards the gendering of space in general. This chapter examines the spaces Philo constructs — communal, personal, and sacred — within the context of what we know about spatial arrangements in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt.

The relative numerosities and spatial arrangement of long-wave (L) and middle-wave (M) cones in the human and primate retina have long been debated. This topographical organization of cones is fundamental to the understanding of visual sensitivity and colour vision. This chapter examines the numerosity of L and M cones in the human fovea. It also examines cones at the ora serrata and analyzes the foveal array of a single female marmoset. The data suggests that the ratio of L:M cones in the foveal region in humans varies between individuals from close to unity to at least as high a 5L:M. However, the average for the population is 2:1. In the case of the female marmoset, the two types of long-wave cone were in the ratio 0.7:1. The functional significance of individual variation in the ratio of L and M cones in humans is discussed.

This chapter introduces a model which connects representations of the space surrounding a virtual humanoid’s body with the space it shares with several interaction partners. This work intends to support virtual humans (or humanoid robots) in near space interaction and is inspired by studies from cognitive neurosciences on the one hand and social interaction studies on the other hand. We present our work on learning the body structure of an articulated virtual human by using data from virtual touch and proprioception sensors. The results are utilized for a representation of its reaching space, the so-called peripersonal space, a concept known from cognitive neuroscience. In interpersonal interaction involving several partners, their peripersonal spaces may overlap and establish a shared reaching space. We define it as their interaction space, where cooperation takes place and where actions to claim or release spatial areas have to be adapted, to avoid obstructions of the other’s movements. Our model of interaction space is developed as an extension of Kendon’s F-formation system, a foundational theory of how humans orient themselves in space when communicating. Thus, interaction space allows for measuring not only the spatial arrangement (i.e. body posture and orientation) between multiple interaction partners, but also the extent of space they share. Peripersonal and interaction space are modelled as potential fields to control the virtual human’s behaviour strategy. As an example we show how the virtual human can relocate object positions toward or away from locations reachable for all partners, thus facilitating cooperation in an interaction task.

In turning to one of the most curious stories in all of African American literature—William J. Wilson's “Afric-American Picture Gallery” (1859)—this last chapter examines the relationship between visuality and curatorial practices as they relate to the representations of an alternative vision of U.S. nation formation and democracy. It contends that “Afric-American Picture Gallery” remains important not only as a contemporaneous account of various artwork but for its depiction of “Ethiop” as the curator who arranges the space of the museum. More theoretically, the chapter offers a reading about how to reconsider the making of the antebellum black public sphere, one where the discourse of politics is translated into objets d'art in the recesses of the mind as an act of interiorization, one where each reader ostensibly becomes an artist at the moment of visualizing these very images.

Gelatine is a well-known structural protein widely used in the daily life, as well as in the scientific and technological areas for the preparation of a great variety of composite materials. But in spite of its abundance and common use, gelatine presents itself as a complex biopolymer with a mixed character between a protein, since it is derived from collagen, and a synthetic linear polymer with random spatial arrangement above certain temperature. For numerous applications, mainly in biomedicine, the biocompatible and biodegradable properties of gelatine are crucial, and usually the reinforcement of biopolymer matrix by assembling to inorganic or hybrid nanoparticles is also required to improve its mechanical stability. Alternative treatments such as chemical crosslinking may also contribute to reduce water swelling and enhance the mechanical properties as well as thermal stability. The incorporation of inorganic solids into the proteinous matrix allows tailoring both the mechanical and functional properties of the resulting gelatine-based composites. Many strategies may be followed to tune the functional properties: selection of inorganic solids offering the desired functionalities, grafting of suitable functional groups to the gelatine hybrids, or combination of additional polymers or fillers in ternary composites. In this way, advanced functional materials of increasing complexity are developed from the basis of a very common biopolymer, opening the way for a wide range of applications of the gelatine-based nanocomposites.

In the last chapter, we looked at how examining pages before actually reading them provides useful advance preparation for young readers at home. Let's look now at the act of reading itself. How do we get the most out of what we read? Researchers now say that we can best understand what happens when someone reads if we think of reading as a process—a process in which a reader and writer transact information. For the time being, we're going to think of reading exclusively as print-bound. (We'll reconsider this premise later on.) The writer provides words, sentences, and paragraphs. The reader brings to the writer's pages personal experiences and impressions, knowledge of language, individual attitudes, thoughts, and ideas. In reading, both reader and writer engage in a kind of conversation to work out the message together. Not only the writer, but the reader as well, has considerable responsibility in determining meaning. Most enlightened educators no longer regard the old notion of a single, correct, absolute meaning for a piece of writing; readers and writers together shape the ideas captured by the words. The transactional activities involve sophisticated skills, such as what we infer from a reading, what generalizations and conclusions we draw, what judgments we make of the writer's effort—others, too, as you can imagine. We learn the advanced skills as we mature as readers, and I'm going to explore those skills throughout many of the remaining chapters of this book. Yet our ability to reach those more advanced regions of thought rests very much on what we perceive as the writer's essential idea, the nuggets of vital information contained in what we read. In short, we try to see that everything comes together in an answer to this question: "What is the writer trying to say?" Educators usually refer to a reader's basic ability to grasp information—facts, if you will—as literal comprehension. Literal comprehension means understanding the main idea that the writer is trying to convey and knowing the essential details that contribute to and support that main idea.

This chapter considers claims that spatial arrangements affect political behaviour. This matters for the overall project because it helps us to understand exactly what is at stake politically when it comes to battles over public space. The chapter begins by examining the micro-level claim, that physical form affects political action. The chapter argues that it does, but in nuanced ways that have to do with the distinction between ‘space’, the form itself, and ‘place’, that form filled with cultural, political, and historical associations, the form as used by people in a particular context. This then leads to the idea that form itself is structured by its processes of production, the political economy of space. It is argued that while different political economic structures are likely to deliver different kinds of public space, this matters less than believers might fear, and more than sceptics might think. The chapter concludes with a summary of the interpretive framework that will be applied in Part II to understanding particular cases, and in Part III to construct criteria for evaluating public space in democratic cities.

Chapter 4 treats the trial as an intersubjective, multimodal encounter, in which the positioning and movements of bodies are centrally relevant to the trial’s outcome. As evidenced in their interviews, jurors are consistently tuned in to bodies, especially those of defendants, when making their decisions. This chapter analyzes ways in which jurors physically interact with defendants during trials and how these interactions mediate their levels of empathy for defendants. This includes often unexamined components of trials such as eye contact and the spatial arrangement of the courtroom, which, my analysis demonstrates, affect jurors’ ability and willingness to empathize with defendants. These contextual components are institutionally mediated by particular legal paralinguistic ideologies in order to manipulate ways in which jurors encounter defendants, contributing to the moral and emotional distance jurors rely on to sentence defendants to death.