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The purpose of this paper is to provide a sampling of the flavor and content of the 2009 Bobcatsss Symposium held in Porto, Portugal.

An outline of the conference's stated purposes with subjective illustrations from the proceedings.

The conference's main theme was “Challenges for the new information professional”, and its focus was on the intersection of technology and librarianship in the future.

A brief report of value to professionals of many disciplines (particularly LIS) with an interest in the state and outlook of the information profession in 2009.

Understanding ways to foster wellbeing in postgraduate-research students (PGRs) requires focus especially with respect to positive relationship formation with supervisory teams. Hence, the purpose of this study was to explore six different ways of nurturing wellbeing; perceptions of positive relationships with supervisory teams; and interactions between these factors.

In total, 155 PGRs completed questionnaires at baseline and six months. The predictor variables were six ways of nurturing wellbeing; the outcome variable was psychological wellbeing appraisals overall; and the moderator variables were positive perceptions of relationships with key staff.

The most effective ways of nurturing wellbeing were Noticing and Being Aware; Discovering and Learning; Connecting with Others; and Being Healthy and Safe. Over time, Noticing and Being Aware predicted psychological wellbeing appraisals overall. Positive relationships with supervisors, co-supervisors and work peers were associated with wellbeing appraisals. Furthermore, positive relationships with co-supervisors most convincingly strengthened the relationships between wellbeing appraisals and Noticing and Being Healthy cross-sectionally, and Giving longitudinally.

It is concerning that PGRs are often overlooked when developing policies and strategies to combat mental health problems. Rather than simply focusing on diminishing mental health problems, the current work evidences ways of optimizing positive aspects of PGR experiences by actively nurturing wellbeing in tandem with enhancing relationships with supervisory team members. However, such initiatives have to be an investment at institutional, as well as individual levels.

Examining the interactions between nurturing positive wellbeing in PGRs and positive relationships with supervisory team members is under-researched.

This chapter uses critical race theories to interpret Obama-related content and changing discourse patterns on discussion boards maintained by a pro-gun, overwhelmingly white, male, and conservative virtual community. Beginning during the 2008 presidential primary season and continuing through Barack Obama's election as president, our analysis focused on the proliferation of negative “nicknames” (“Obamathets”) that were posted in race-oriented discussion threads over 16 months. We identified three types of frequently voiced Obamathets: those indicating general dislike, political disdain, or racial derision, and we analyzed usage patterns – which types of Obamathets appeared and at which times. Our results revealed a changing state of mind – annoyance to extreme anger – among posters whose sense of racial threat seemed increasingly palpable as Obama approached, and eventually won, the presidency. Over time, posts increasingly included racially derisive terms whose incidence intensified after the election and remained high; racially derisive terms overtook terms of general dislike (that had been more popular) as well as terms of political disdain several months into our analysis. Because posters tended to be more openly libertarian in orientation, we doubt our findings would generalize to the majority of conservative whites; however, our findings probably shed considerable light on activist elements among conservatives, including the “Tea Party” movement. Moreover, capturing sentiments expressed in a semiprivate venue – virtual community discussion boards – probably allowed us to uncover less censored racial sentiment (or racetalk) than is typical when social scientists solicit racial opinions from whites in face-to-face interviews, when many may omit racially hostile thoughts to appear more racially sensitive to researchers.

The image of Mel Gibson and Hugh Jackman (as Wolverine) in the Mad Max and X-Men franchises represents traditional heroic action masculinity. This chapter explores the roles of female action heroes in defying patriarchy and subverting action film genre stereotypes in male-dominated franchises. In contrast to past characterisations of Max, Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) provides both a departure to the role of Max as the male saviour seeking vengeance, by focusing on Imperator Furiosa and offering space for a portrayal of femininity characterised by inclusivity and tolerance. In Logan (2017), the decay of Wolverine is central to the narrative. Rather than the portrayal of an immortal hypermasculine hero in the previous X-Men films (with emphasis on men in X-Men), a new female mutant Laura assumes his mantle. In this context, I consider the gender roles and depiction of women in these films, and how they may be read as offering a futuristic vision of utopia in dystopian narrative worlds.

In the distant future, the social and economic systems build by the patriarchy are crumbling, causing an environmental crisis and divisive society, where people who are different (mutants) are hunted down. Mad Max: Fury Road and Logan both offer an alternative depiction of women and girls, providing new perspectives to navigate an uncertain dystopian world through fierce female warriors Furiosa, and mutant girl Laura. Ultimately this chapter demonstrates that survival in the post-apocalyptic and dystopian worlds represented in Mad Max: Fury Road and Logan may be achieved via a subversive feminist solution/utopia to the crisis of masculinity.

In the good old days, before civilisation and artificial eating habits caught up with mankind, the majority of people in the world got all the Vitamin B and protein their bodies needed through micro‐organic foods. Before the discovery of tea and coffee as beverages, European man drank beer and ale, and the people of Africa, Asia and Australasia drank palm wines. These drinks were prepared by the use of micro‐organisms or fermentation, and supplied large quantities of high‐grade protein and Vitamin B, so essential for health and growth. With the discovery of food yeast and the proposed manufacture of this remarkable food in the British Colonies, the modern diet is going to be revolutionised. The manufacture of bakers' yeast is a simple process and has been known to man for hundreds of years. Into a certain weight of yeast is. introduced a solution of sugars, nitrogen and phosphates and this is allowed to multiply and grow until it has increased its weight fourfold. During this time air is pumped into the solution so the micro‐organisms can breathe, and at the end of nine hours the yeast in the vat is separated from the bulk of the used food solution, washed and pressed ready for use. Yeast has become in recent years increasingly popular as a food, and research workers, knowing the value of yeast in the diet to correct deficiencies, have not been idle in this field. For many years Dr. A. G. Thaysen, Ph.D., M.Sc., has been conducting experiments with yeast, and now, under the auspices of the Colonial Products Research Council, the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research is setting up a Micro‐biological Research Laboratory to carry out further experiments. As a result of visits to the West Indies by Sir R. Robinson and Professor Simonsen, it has been decided that this laboratory should be built in St. Clair, Port of Spain, where Dr. Thaysen will conduct experiments for an initial period of three years. Dr. Thaysen is of Danish origin, a naturalised British subject. He went to England early in 1914 to work at the Lister Institute on micro‐organisms, and when World War I. broke out the Admiralty secured his services for special war work. After the war he continued his research work with the Admiralty, and in 1936 his laboratory was transferred to the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. Recently the Colonial Products Research Council, by arrangement with the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, secured Dr. Thaysen's services for the study of food yeast in the West Indies. Whereas bakers' yeast will only increase fourfold in nine hours, it has been possible to increase the weight of food yeast 64‐fold in the same time, and this yeast shows the same behaviour in its life cycle as is characteristic of all free living bacteria. The aim of these experiments is the manufacture of food yeast on an industrial scale, and some years ago a small pilot plant was started at Teddington, England, where some 100 to 150 lb. of food yeast could be produced weekly. With the experience gained at this plant, the Colonial Office has set up a commercial scale plant in Jamaica with funds provided under the Colonial Development and Welfare Act. Jamaica was chosen for the site of this first pilot plant in the West Indies because the West Indies Sugar Company had the available accommodation, surplus power and technical staff to manufacture food yeast economically, and also had adequate supplies of molasses, sugar and cane juice close at hand. A similar plant is under construction in India. In planning for a wide scale manufacture of food yeast it is necessary to select localities where there is an abundant and cheap supply of the necessary sugars or other carbohydrates. The West Indies and India, for instance, can supply molasses; Africa, maize and other grains; the Middle East, citrus fruit and carob beans; and Canada, Newfoundland and the United States, waste sulphite liquor from the manufacture of paper. Food yeast, as produced in the pilot plant, is a light, straw‐coloured flaky powder with a pleasant nutty or meaty flavour. It has a protein content of between 40 and 45 per cent., contains some 2 per cent. of phosphorus, a balanced proportion of Vitamin B, riboflavin and nicotinic acid, and is superior to liver and the various yeast extracts at present on the market. One ton of food yeast can be produced from 1·7 tons of sugar products or other carbohydrates. Food yeast has been fed successfully to livestock with remarkable results, and for human consumption it can be incorporated into flour for bread and biscuits and used for flavouring soups and stews. To quote Dr. Thaysen : “ It is essential to produce food yeast at the lowest possible price if it is to serve its primary purpose of supplying those sections of humanity who are least blessed with worldly riches with a wholesome and abundant protein and Vitamin B food.” In other words, it can well be seen that the discovery of food yeast is going to be one of the greatest contributions science has made in our own time, the atomic bomb notwithstanding, and with so many people in the world at the moment suffering from years of malnutrition in varying degrees, food yeast is going to be one of the Allied Nations' greatest contributions to the rehabilitation of the world and the immediate need to feed Europe, after years of war, can be faced confidently now that Jamaica is producing it in sufficient quantity.

Purpose – This chapter ruminates on a range of different ways that the author experiences being what the author calls a “lurker” in mainstream criminologies as a queer criminologist.

Methodology/approach – Drawing on the work of Jack Halberstam, Michel Foucault, Heather Love, Sarah Ahmed, and other queer theorists, the author explores their positionality as a lurker in mainstream criminologies, and policing particular, to better understand how “[d]isciplines qualify and disqualify, legitimate and delegitimate, reward and punish” (Halberstam, 2011, p. 10), and how leaders of these disciplines make calculated decisions about who qualifies as legitimate scholars of policing knowing.

Findings – The discussion steps through some significant moments of discomfort that have emerged in lurking around with/in these disciplines, and in doing the work of queer research with queer people about queer policing.

Originality/value – The author finishes by sharing strategies and learnings that have emerged out of these research and disciplinary contexts. The author suggests that it is most valuable to continue to lurk so their position of discomfort and potential failure persists as a more productive positionality than conforming with the mainstream.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the potential of cultural centres to be spaces that foster interaction between tourists and locals, and thereby meet the demands of new cultural tourists. This is done through conducting a case study of Katuaq Cultural Centre in Nuuk, Greenland. Combining theories of cultural contact and placemaking, the paper analyses how locals and tourists make use of and experience the centre. The paper then goes on to conduct a broader discussion about how future placemaking in tourism can respond to the emerging demands of cultural Arctic tourists, and to suggest ways to encourage positive interaction on both a local community level and a resident-visitor level.

A series of anthropological research methods were used, including participant observation in the cultural centre itself, and informal and semi-structured interviews with relevant stakeholders.

Concluding that, from multiple perspectives, Katuaq fails to perform as a “centre of culture”, the study offers innovative insights into how cultural centres can be operated more inclusively in the future, as spaces in which members of different cultural groups can achieve positive interaction. It is argued that the future of successful and fulfilling cultural tourism offerings in the Arctic lies at the intersection of tourism and leisure studies.

The originality of this paper lies first in its deepening of the academic discussion of cultural centres. Second, and on a broader level, the paper identifies an emerging trend of “community–tourism spaces” as cultural tourism offerings, and provides some insights into the conflicts experienced in these kinds of spaces, as well as some suggestions as to how further research on these spaces should continue.

Previous research indicates that racial and ethnic prejudice continues to be prevalent in U.S. society; however, the social-psychological processes of prejudice are not fully understood. Furthermore, much research on prejudice focuses on white against black prejudice, at the exclusion of other minority groups. The purpose of this chapter is to explore white prejudice against Latinos using in-depth interview data with college students. Findings indicate that many participants describe instances in which they felt prejudice, yet they use creative mechanisms to justify their prejudice or construct it as something other than prejudice. Mostly, participants described their own prejudice as a “special type” of prejudice – including trait prejudice, situational prejudice, reciprocal prejudice, and recovered prejudice – that is distinct from ordinary prejudice. By describing their own prejudice as a “special type,” participants are able to construct themselves as nonprejudiced individuals while simultaneously acknowledging their prejudice.

This study utilizes cultural values from the World Values Survey (WVS) to investigate the cultural hypothesis regarding economic growth. Following Granato et al.'s (1996) theory, this paper describes a systematic method for developing analytical models that clarify the effect of cultural values on economic growth by using seemingly unrelated regression (SUR).

The results are sustained through regression analysis using ordinary least squares (OLS) and SUR. The sample size covers all WVS countries from the third wave in 1994 to the seventh wave in 2021, due to the limited sample size in the first and second surveys, which is insufficient for estimation.

Results highlight culture as a crucial factor for economic growth. Although the study found a positive effect of autonomy, life satisfaction, and post-materialism on economic growth, trust has been found to have a negative impact.

Although the literature has theoretically proven the impact of cultural values on economic growth, there is a significant disparity in the empirical studies, owing to a lack of applied studies. This study deepens the cultural analysis compared to earlier empirical investigations. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first attempt to assess the combined effect of the selected four cultural values on economic growth during 1994 and 2021. Furthermore, SUR analysis allows for the estimation of the variables' effects throughout the five waves.

This paper aims to present recently published resources on information literacy and library instruction through an extensive annotated bibliography of publications covering all library types.

This paper annotates English-language periodical articles, monographs, dissertations and other materials on library instruction and information literacy published in 2017 in over 200 journals, magazines, books and other sources.

The paper provides a brief description for all 590 sources.

The information may be used by librarians and interested parties as a quick reference to literature on library instruction and information literacy.