El artículo nos presenta una de las formas de acercamiento y puerta de visualización de la cultura japonesa conociendo sus métodos y costumbres. Uno de nuestros objetivos es dar a conocer cómo el Shinto interviene de manera fehaciente y práctica dentro del costumbrismo y cultura en la sociedad japonesa, y cómo este ha trascendido desde sus más remotos orígenes hasta la actualidad más contemporánea en dicha sociedad y cómo se ha extrapolado a otras culturas para alcanzar el conocimiento más profundo (...) sobre las mismas. Nuestro artículo muestra de cómo una religión puede seguirse o adaptarse para quedarse fuera de los límites que son marcados por una sociedad con grandes arraigos en la mitología que los conforman. (shrink)

Este artículo se postula como un aporte valioso para acercar el cine centroamericano a todas las personas que habitan la región y a los foráneos que sienten un interés particular por el cine que se realiza en Guatemala, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Costa Rica y Panamá. ¿Es el cine centroamericano realizado en el siglo xxi un espacio de reflexión sociopolítica?, ¿el tratamiento de sus temáticas conduce a los directores a reivindicar causas?, ¿cómo abordan los directores de cine centroamericano la ética (...) y la estética en sus producciones artísticas? En la respuesta a dichas preguntas se basa la investigación del cine centroamericano. Una importante carga de denuncia acompaña a películas que contemplan las migraciones en sus dos vertientes, forzosa y voluntaria, en búsqueda de una mejor calidad de vida. Las maras son la columna vertebral de la violencia junto a la recreación de las guerras civiles y los desaparecidos. La memoria colectiva, las persecuciones a los pueblos indígenas, la diversidad sexual, el poder de la religión en su versión evangélica y la maternidad como únicarespuesta a los embarazos no deseados, constituyen algunas de estas nuevas miradas. (shrink)

El siglo XXI ha visto aflorar ultranacionalismos propios del pasado. El neonazismo tiene su razón de ser en el ataque inequívoco contra las minorías, a partir de una ideología racista, xenófoba y excluyente, que tiene como máxima expresión la negación de muchos de los genocidios históricos. Cada vez más partidos de todo el mundo defienden algunas de estas ideas y modelos de pensamiento en sus programas, suavizándolas a la par que van ganando peso en las instituciones e instaurando su discurso (...) e idearios en la ciudadanía. El objetivo de este estudio es analizar la efectividad de una propuesta docente sobre el Holocausto en estudiantes de la etapa de Bachillerato. Para ello, se ha creado un plan de acción que fomenta la indagación y pretende desarrollar una conciencia que promueva el pensamiento ético y critico de estos hechos. Los resultados son muy positivos y confirman que el Holocausto puede y debe trabajarse con documentos históricos, fuentes de internet y otros recursos que potencian el trabajo en grupo y la motivación hacia el conocimiento y la crítica de estos hechos, preservando la memoria histórica. (shrink)

The global environmental and social-economic crises of industrialized agriculture have led to the emergence of agroecology as an alternative approach aiming to increase the ecological, social and economic sustainability of agri–food systems. The ‘multi-level perspective’ is now a widely used framework to understand and promote the upscaling of local innovation niches, such as agroecology, to broader scales, thus reconfiguring the dominant socio-technical regimes. Additionally, emergent ‘hybrid forums’ can provide a space between niche and regime where niche innovators can become important (...) actors in scaling up and out emergent innovations. In this paper, we examine a university training program, to better understand its role as a ‘hybrid forum’. Our analysis focuses especially on how the program, as an example of a hybrid forum, worked to reconfigure practices, concepts, and tools of local development practitioners. We also assess to what extent the program contributed to transitioning local development institutions toward agroecology. An online survey and in-depth interviews were carried out to determine how the training program has impacted the student’s opinions and their respective institutions. The results show that most of the students consider that they have acquired new theoretical frameworks and useful methods to re-framing their local development projects, that new alliances with multi-actor networks have been perceived, and that some internal changes of the local development practices have taken place. We conclude that the training program, as a hybrid forum, is capable of outscaling niche innovations through linkages with different kind of actors both from the niche and the regime. Political changes in the socio-technical landscape level offer an opportunity to amplify the impact of the innovations which are being generated by those multi-actor networks, but with a limited multi-level impact as far as institutional regime-actors not aligned with agroecological transition keep the most of the competencies on agri–food systems. (shrink)

The origin of the eukaryotic cell nucleus and the selective forces that drove its evolution remain unknown and are a matter of controversy. Autogenous models state that both the nucleus and endoplasmic reticulum (ER) derived from the invagination of the plasma membrane, but most of them do not advance clear selective forces for this process. Alternative models proposing an endosymbiotic origin of the nucleus fail to provide a pathway fully compatible with our knowledge of cell biology. We propose here an (...) evolutionary scenario that reconciles both an ancestral endosymbiotic origin of the eukaryotic nucleus (endosymbiosis of a methanogenic archaeon within a fermentative myxobacterium) with an autogenous generation of the contemporary nuclear membrane and ER from the bacterial membrane. We specifically state two selective forces that operated sequentially during its evolution: (1) metabolic compartmentation to avoid deleterious co‐existence of anabolic (autotrophic synthesis by the methanogen) and catabolic (fermentation by the myxobacterium) pathways in the cell, and (2) avoidance of aberrant protein synthesis due to intron spreading in the ancient archaeal genome following mitochondrial acquisition and loss of methanogenesis. BioEssays 28: 525–533, 2006. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Although in theory social justice is considered as a core dimension of agroecological transitions, alternative food initiatives related to agroecology have been criticised for their exclusionary practices based on important social and economic biases. In this article, we adopt the lens of political intersectionality to study two cases of Agroecology-oriented Food Redistribution Coalitions in Spain that emerged to address the rising levels of food insecurity during the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that the coalitions represent a convergence of diverse social struggles, (...) placing intersectionally marginalized groups at the centre of their activism. However, we also uncover that coalition members participate in different ways depending on their socioeconomic profiles, which could perpetuate inequalities in organizational practices. One major point of tension is the need to balance the goal of providing access to healthy and sustainable food with the affordability of such produce. This leads to the adoption of hybrid food networks that include conventionally produced food. We also highlight that while the predominance of women in these coalitions reflects the unequal distribution of food-related care work in society, the collectivization of such work through AFRCs practices points to a transformation of gender relations. Territorialized alliances between actors from urban and rural settings and between urban centers and peripheries are established through the coalitions. However, such networks fall short on involving large numbers of agroecology-oriented initiatives and providing direct encounters between consumers and producers. Overall, the article underscores the importance of addressing intersecting inequalities within alternative food initiatives and argues that intersectional coalitions offer an intriguing example of how to promote such understanding and pave the way towards (more) just agroecological transitions. (shrink)

El conocimiento histórico –entendido como un proceso metacognitivo de asimilación constructiva sobre el pasado para explicar fenómenos– comporta un análisis del impacto y la transcendencia de determinados acontecimientos y procesos históricos, en cuya comprensión y valoración influye el concepto de relevancia histórica. Desde esta perspectiva es necesario implementar propuestas de evaluación sólidas, vinculadas al desarrollo competencial. El objetivo de este estudio es diseñar una guía de caracterización de los instrumentos evaluativos –actividades y ejercicios– más utilizados por el profesorado de Historia, (...) con el fin de optimizar los procesos de evaluación de esta competencia mediante una serie de descriptores estructurales, competenciales y transferenciales. Estos indicadores de pertinencia pueden marcar el camino de aquellos docentes que deseen perfeccionar su manera de evaluar lo históricamente determinante. En conclusión, este innovador planteamiento supone un proceso de formación continua del profesorado que contribuye a la mejora de la calidad educativa. (shrink)

El Patronato de Misiones Pedagógicas desarrolló una importante labor de recuperación y difusión de la cultura musical, especialmente del folklore musical español, en los primeros años de la II República española, al poner en marcha un servicio de música y un coro que se encargaron de acercar diferentes estilos y géneros musicales a los habitantes de las zonas rurales más deprimidas. En este artículo se presenta un estudio documental sobre el trabajo llevado a cabo por los integrantes del coro y (...) por las personas que se encargaron de custodiar los recursos musicales cedidos por el Patronato y de programar las diferentes actividades musicales en los municipios que gozaron de dichos recursos. A su vez, se recogen diversos testimonios que dan fe del cometido realizado por esta institución y del impacto cultural y musical que supuso en los habitantes de las localidades donde se desarrollaron las diferentes actividades misionales. (shrink)

: Este texto trata de la socialización de mujeres indígenas guatemaltecas enfocada a dos aspectos: cómo deben comportarse en relación a la vida pública y cómo deben orientar sus sentimientos. Se destaca que la formalidad en la educación moral de las mujeres contrasta con su vida social. Finalmente se sugiere la conveniencia de considerar en planos de igualdad tanto las narrativas formales como práctica social. This text is about the socialization of indigenous Guatemalan women, focusing on two aspects: how they (...) should behave in relation to public life and how they should direct their feelings. We highlight the idea that the formality of women’s moral education contrasts with their social life. Finally, the text suggests the desirability of considering both formal narratives and social practice on an equal basis. (shrink)

Current discussions about education suggest that a transformative pedagogy that goes beyond the acquisition of knowledge and skills is needed. However, there is no agreement as to the inputs needed for a correct development of the educational model. In this sense, we can identify the presence of two different approaches to human and social capital which embody distinct educational worldviews. On the one hand, the ‘Marketable Human Capital’ or ‘Personal Culture’ approach, and on the other hand, the ‘Non-Marketable Human Capital’ (...) or ‘Civic Culture’ approach. The first, which is linked to mainstream economic theory, sees education as any stock of knowledge that contributes to an improvement in the productivity of the worker and individual well-being. The second, which is rooted in the Mediterranean tradition of political thought, highlights the role of civic virtues, reciprocity, and public action within the educational process and its influence on public happiness. In this article, we analyse these... (shrink)

Algae are significant members of Earth's biodiversity. Having been studied for a long time, the discovery of new algal phyla is extremely unusual. Recently, the enigmatic “Picobiliphyta,” a group of uncultured eukaryotes unveiled using molecular tools, were claimed to represent an unrecognized early branching algal lineage with a nucleomorph (remnant nucleus of a secondary algal endosymbiont) in their plastids. However, subsequent studies rejected the presence of a nucleomorph, and single‐cell genomic studies failed to detect any plastid‐related genes, ruling out the (...) possibility of plastid occurrence. The isolation of the first “picobiliphyte,” Picomonas judraskeda, a tiny organism that feeds on very small (<150 nm) organic particles, came as final proof of their non‐photosynthetic lifestyle. Consequently, the group has been renamed Picozoa. The passage from “picobiliphytes” to “picozoa” illustrates the crucial role that classical protistology should play to provide sound biological context for the wealth of data produced by modern molecular techniques. (shrink)

The first European settlements in the new world faced technical issues with the help of the XVI century scientific advances. Besides briefly exposing the scientific and technological situation, this paper explores, with the help of reverse engineering, two singular mechanical wits representative of the technological advances introduced in America to overcome different problems. Firstly, a pump, based on an alternative movement system through crankshafts and pistons used against the continuous flooding suffered in the Ciudad de México valley. Although flooding remained (...) a problem (it was solved in the XX century), hydraulic pumps were essential for continuous soil drainage. Secondly, a port crane for handling cannons, military devices, and construction materials during the Lima fortification in the XVII century. For both cases, reverse engineering, through engineering methods, Computer-Aided Design CAD programs, and additive manufacturing, provides virtual and/or tangible mockups that help to analyze and improve our knowledge about the dimensions, materials, and functions of used (and currently lost) mechanical systems during the American colonization. (shrink)

The global environmental and social-economic crises of industrialized agriculture have led to the emergence of agroecology as an alternative approach aiming to increase the ecological, social and economic sustainability of agri–food systems. The ‘multi-level perspective’ is now a widely used framework to understand and promote the upscaling of local innovation niches, such as agroecology, to broader scales (e.g., regional, national, international), thus reconfiguring the dominant socio-technical regimes. Additionally, emergent ‘hybrid forums’ can provide a space between niche and regime where niche (...) innovators can become important actors in scaling up and out emergent innovations. In this paper, we examine a university training program (Postgraduate Diploma in Local Agroecological Dynamization at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona), to better understand its role as a ‘hybrid forum’. Our analysis focuses especially on how the program, as an example of a hybrid forum, worked to reconfigure practices, concepts, and tools of local development practitioners. We also assess to what extent the program contributed to transitioning local development institutions toward agroecology. An online survey (n = 46) and in-depth interviews (n = 16) were carried out to determine how the training program has impacted the student’s opinions and their respective institutions. The results show that most of the students consider that they have acquired new theoretical frameworks and useful methods to re-framing their local development projects, that new alliances with multi-actor networks have been perceived, and that some internal changes of the local development practices have taken place. We conclude that the training program, as a hybrid forum, is capable of outscaling niche innovations through linkages with different kind of actors both from the niche and the regime. Political changes in the socio-technical landscape level offer an opportunity to amplify the impact of the innovations which are being generated by those multi-actor networks, but with a limited multi-level impact as far as institutional regime-actors not aligned with agroecological transition keep the most of the competencies on agri–food systems. (shrink)

Roger Boscovich, belonging to XVIII century, halfway from Newton to Faraday, is traditionally considered as a newtonian philosopher. Nevertheless, following Berkson’s suggestion, he could be a Field Theory forerunner. In this work, we will try to go on with the idea of this suggestion in order to show this possible Boscovich’s contribution.

Positive Youth Development (PYD) is an approach that promotes resilience and focuses on youth strengths rather than their weaknesses as done by the traditional deficit-based perspective. Research in Europe and North America show that developmental assets are associated with school success, psychological well-being, and lower health risks among youth and young adults. However, not much research has been done on these associations in Latin American contexts. The purpose of this research study is to assess the association between substance use behaviors, (...) such as drunkenness and the use of illicit drugs, and mental health, together with the mediating role of developmental assets representing youth strengths (e.g., social competence) and contextual resources (e.g., social support at home or school). Cross-national data was collected from Colombian (n= 210; 70.4% females) and Peruvian(n= 349; 66.5% females) 1st year university students. Results shed light on the protective role of developmental assets regarding substance use behaviors and mental well-being. Specifically, the results showed direct negative associations between developmental assets and substance use behaviors and positive associations of developmental assets with mental health indicators. Internal assets appear to be a stronger predictor of social, emotional, and psychological well-being compared to external assets. We did not find any statistical significance in the association of substance use behavior and mental health. We discuss implications regarding research, policy, and practice. (shrink)

El siguiente informe pericial se basa en la experiencia de investigación de los firmantes en relación a las exhumaciones de fosas comunes de la Guerra Civil y la postguerra, y al conocido como “movimiento para la recuperación de la memoria histórica” que están teniendo lugar en España desde el año 2000, que ha enfatizado sus demandas sobre la suerte de los desaparecidos y ha puesto en marcha un ciclo de exhumaciones de fosas comunes derivadas de la Guerra Civil y la (...) dictadura. En este peritaje se usan las exhumaciones del siglo XXI como indicadores de la persistencia en el tiempo de las políticas y culturas del miedo instaladas en la sociedad española durante la Guerra Civil y la dictadura, más allá de las profundas transformaciones políticas e institucionales acaecidas en el país tras la muerte de Francisco Franco. Fue presentado como parte de la documentación de la demanda de Fausto Canales contra España el 15 de septiembre de 2012 en el Tribunal Europeo de Derechos Humanos. (shrink)

Abstract“The Book of Secrets in the Results of Ideas”, usually called “The Book of Secrets” is a codex containing drawings and descriptions of thirty-one artifacts attributed to the engineer Alī Ibn Khalaf al-Murādī, who lived in Andalusia in southern Spain at the beginning of the 11th century. This manuscript is one of the first written testimonies that describe medieval mechanisms with complex precision. The aim of this work is to reconstruct and study from a historical and technological point of view (...) two of the ancient artifacts contained in the “Book of Secrets”, the “Fortress Demolisher” and the “Magic Well”. The “Fortress Demolisher” is a war machine designed to demolish the upper part of the walls or towers and consists of a battering ram mounted on a platform that can be raised several meters above the ground using a scissor mechanism. The “Magic Well” is a mechanism with several pulleys whose purpose is to raise water several meters from the bottom of a well by collecting a small portion of rope. To reconstruct the two artifacts, a digital model and a detailed study of the geometry and operation of the mechanisms, were first carried out. 3D printing, using the Fused Deposition Modelling technology, made the physical reproduction. The digitization and physical reproduction by 3D printing of the mechanisms represent an update of the traditional ways of transmitting knowledge. The use of these new technologies makes the knowledge more accessible, understandable and attractive. (shrink)

This document describes the implementation of a conical tank control system using an adaptive neurofuzzy system. For implementation, an indirect approach is used where the controller is optimized using the model obtained during the plant identification carried out using data obtained during the system operation. Furthermore, implementation includes training of neuro fuzzy-systems and application to control a conical tank. Regarding plant identification, preliminary training takes place using data obtained for different input values. The controller configuration is established considering the analogy (...) with a discrete-time linear system. The simulation shows that the control system manages to approach the desired response given by the considered reference model. (shrink)

Grounded theory, a research method born out of the social sciences field, offers a flexible technique that allows simultaneous data collection and processing. Researchers using this method immerse themselves in an area of study, focusing their observations on the data and taking into consideration not only their own interpretations, but also those of the other subjects involved, in order to strengthen their understanding of the social phenomena under examination. This text briefly describes the concept of grounded theory and uses concrete (...) examples to illustrate how data are analysed from the standpoint of the stereotype as an object of study. La teoría fundamentada, nacida al interior de las ciencias sociales, es un método de investigación que posee una técnica flexible y que realiza simultáneamente la recolección y el procesamiento de los datos. En este método, el investigador se encuentra inmerso en el campo de estudio y sus observaciones se abocan al dato, considerando tanto su interpretación como la de los otros sujetos implicados, con la finalidad de fortalecer la comprensión del fenómeno social investigado. En este texto se describe brevemente la teoría fundamentada y cómo se analizan los datos mediante ejemplos concretos, que se presentan a partir del estereotipo como objeto de estudio. (shrink)

Disagreement in science exists in a variety of strengths, from doubt-raising articles and issues of non-reproducibility up to raging disputes and major controversies. An often-latent form of disagreement consists of misconceptions whereby false ideas are held that run contrary to what is commonly accepted as knowledge. Misconceptions have been the focus of much research in education science and psychology. Here we draw attention to misconceptions that may arise in the very practice of science. We highlight formal features that can be (...) used to characterize misconceptions and distinguish them from controversies, in addition to how they relate to knowledge creation. (shrink)

El propósito es explicar cómo la crisis de la institución familiar lleva implícita una crisis en el sujeto humano, que desde la auto­nomía y la libertad se proponía como proyecto de vida conformar una familia. El modelo de análisis está centrado en esa configu­ración de las nuevas formas de familia, mediadas por el influjo de las tecnologías, especialmente, las fotografías digitales o las selfies como formas de expresión cotidiana donde ya no está presente la narración ni la historia, aunque sí (...) está la imagen. La metodología de investigación utilizada en este análisis es la hermenéutica feno­menológica a partir de manifestaciones relacionales mediadas por un generador de significado como es la selfie que se pone presente en este espacio conjunto de realidad y virtualidad. La tarea desde la educación es ser propositivos construyendo con los jóvenes nuevos sentidos de esperanza para que esas nuevas formas de familia sean espacios de amor. (shrink)

El objetivo de este estudio es conocer la percepción que tiene el alumnado de periferias escolares sobre las ciencias sociales. Para ello se ha diseñado y validado un instrumento, con la pretensión de que 120 estudiantes de centros escolares públicos de educación secundaria de la Comunidad Valenciana puedan aportar información sobre su aprendizaje de las ciencias sociales, las estrategias de enseñanza desempeñadas por el profesorado y su valoración de la formación ciudadana de esos proyectos didácticos que trabajan los problemas socialmente (...) relevantes. La percepción de las ciencias sociales es óptima y con diferencias más significativas entre los dos cursos analizados. (shrink)

[EN]In recent decades, problems related to the accessibility and sustainability of science have increased, both in terms of the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge and its generation. Policymakers, academics, and, increasingly, citizens themselves have developed various approaches to this issue. Among them, citizen science is distinguished by making possible the generation of scientific knowledge by anyone with an interest in doing so. However, participation alone does not guarantee knowledge generation, which represents an epistemological challenge for citizen science. Simultaneously, economic and (...) socio-institutional difficulties in science governance and maintenance have grown. To solve those problems, several market elements have been introduced, a solution rejected by those who consider science as a public good that states must guarantee. Alternatively, research and work on the commons are growing worldwide, the concept being extended from natural resources to knowledge resources. In this chapter, we propose science as a commons, underlining the essential role of citizen science. Difficulties also apply to citizen science itself, but the increasing development of a multitude of projects based on cooperation favours the conditions required for its sustainability and quality. Our philosophical proposal is based on empirical knowledge about citizen science coupled with socio-economic concepts, according to a sociopolitical epistemology. (shrink)

Gregory Bateson is well known for defining information by stating “In fact what we mean by information – the elementary unit of information – is a difference which makes a difference…” This conceptual perspective has the merit of simplicity and generality. Simplicity, in addressing the complexity of information. Generality, in seeking applicability to any and every field of human experience. The purpose of this paper is to focus the applicability of this conceptual approach by Bateson and use it to perform (...) a calculation of taking the difference between two grey-level digital images that are shifted one relative to the other. The digital images take the place of the field of view that a human being would have access through her sense of vision at two different spatial/temporal instances. The results show that it is possible to highlight the edges of the objects under scrutiny, as well as to highlight other differences within the object. Bateson’s “difference that makes a difference” would seem to provide a first step in the elusive meaning making process of humans. (shrink)